This is my first guest-blogger post. I believe this is a good idea, because we all are contributors to the fabric of truth. Lynn has definite ideas, and her comments are well thought out. Anyone who takes time or effort to express themselves is appreciated by this blogger. If you are a frequent contributor, intelligent and passionate, even if I disagree with you, I might ask you to contribute a post one day. Your opinion counts in this world and we are all big enough to hear different perspectives from our own. To me, it’s a part of listening to God. After your post, however, we will comment, but you can handle that.
Rock, I really do not believe that inside of every compassionate conservative there lies a liberal just waiting to get out. I can sympathize and appreciate that your interests include 'doing right' for everyone, but in actuality, you are imposing your value system on others. Clearly, your value system includes having a home, having proper medical care, and medical coverage. These ideals are simply not the same ideals that everyone has in America. Not everyone wants a "home" or a responsibility. Some people actually want to fail, to disconnect. Of all people, I would think that you would realize this since you have a background in psychology.
Placing your values on others and assuming your value system is the same as all other value systems, is wrong. You are calling this 'compassion' but this is something that you are showing personal bias to. Your feelings/compassion are formed by your value system and it shows bias. I feel that this is inappropriate and is, in my opinion, one of the reasons why extreme liberals are unable to fathom why their ideology is not well received by everyone.
Some homeless people actually choose homelessness as a lifestyle. Some people on-the-system are on self-destructive courses, while others are willing themselves to succeed. Some people choose to disconnect, to fail, to have no responsibilities. Another segment of our population believes in taking care of themselves and their responsibilities.
America provides people with many choices and opportunities. America can also provide people with the means to barely-survive, to go rock bottom, if they so choose. People, being unique individuals, have a variety of influences that form the human foundation. This you know. There is no way that anyone, any group, or political party can "save everyone". There are too many variables.
Humans are a species that, like many other species, are a combination of genetic material that is individually exclusive for each organism within the same species. Our biological reproduction is not yet a cloned/identical process and until then, we are a population that is comprised of unique beings. Unless geneticists begin tampering with controlled DNA to create clones or selective breeding techniques, we will always have a subset of our species that represents the weaker population. This is nothing more than basic genetics.
If we were to "save everyone" we would need to implement a genetic "breeding program", because it is the most realistic and most scientific method to enable our population to become a more viable population. It is about biological control. Would you REALLY want this? (And let's please not even bring religion here -- that is a huge issue to itself.)
If genetic breeding were to be entertained/pursued, we would need to determine what factors would be bred OUT of our human species. Then we would clone asexually. To do that, what would constitute those 'weak' genetics? So here we are back at the idea that homeless people are weaker and need to be tended to and cared for and coddled. Or people who do not have the means to obtain medical care are weaker and need to be tended to and cared for and provided for. See where this is leading, Rock?
To define the weaker segment of the population, one must determine what constitutes that scientific value (not including personal value systems as you are doing, but objective, numeric quantifications). Then, through selective breeding, our species could HOPE for a 100% outcome of successful candidates to represent the human species.
Until then, we all begin as an organism, a neonate, and are nothing more than a genetic luck-of-the-draw, the combinatorics being the contributing factors to our very unique creation. After our birth, our environment will shape our perceptions and we will be formulated into the maturing human.
You know this, Rock. Why not get out your textbooks again and consider science? Let "survival of the fittest" actually take its natural course. Our government needs to stop tampering with human biology by continuing bailout programs everywhere. Any other species unable to provide for themselves, will perish. This is natural law and natural selection is everywhere around us. We accept this biological process with every other species on Earth, but when we look into the eyes of a fellow human who seemingly has "less" than we do, we sometimes get irrational. Some people call it 'compassionate'. Too many people forget that we humans are just another species on this planet.
4 comments:
Lynn, your point that we mistakenly assume our personal value systems for other people is well taken. I think we Americans do this fairly often. Recently, and most notably, we've done this in Iraq, assuming they will want an American-style democracy.
Also, I know what you mean by, and I do believe in, the survival of the fittest thing. This may be cruel, but that's life. On the other hand, if just left to nature, I'd be dead myself at this stage of my life, and my survival is important to me, on some days.
What I mean is, my life has been saved a few times by anti-biotics. If I had lived in the 18th century, I would have just died. So, science and medicine have intervened with my survivability. Was that good? Maybe not, from the perspective of pure survival of the fittest.
On the other hand, I do believe humans have elevated themselves, at times, above the other animals. The mind and spirit of man (woman) has evolved along with the body. Philosophy has evolved. Religion has evolved. Thought has evolved. It might not be survival of the fittest in a physical sense to keep Stephen Hawking alive, but in the spiritual, intellectual sphere, this man has contributed to the positive evolution of humankind.
I hope I make my small contribution too.
I basically agree with you. Yes, we are just another animal species. But what a species! We talk, and think, and dream, and plot, and argue, and plan. We write poetry, and Hamlet. We go to the moon. We can destroy the whole world, or create one. Each of us is a world unto ourselves.
There is something to us apart from any other species. We are more spiritual, or can be. We are godlike. Yet, all too often, we are just animals.
So, to welfare or not to welfare, that is the question. I believe we welfare, but with limits, in deference to the survival of the fittest mandates, and in deference to the concept that you ought to be taking care of yourself.
Which leads us back to, you guessed it, compassionate conservatism.
Lynn S.
I guess I don't understand the survival of the fittest scenario you propose. Is it just "sink or swim, let the chips fall where they may" for the poor, disabled, uninsured and business as usual for the fortunate and advantaged. Is it ok that the Walton children have untold billions, and Wal-Mart workers have no/inadequate health insurance? Do you have health insurance? If so, does your employer provide it, or do you pay for private insurance as I do (I'm self-employed)?
I'm just choosing health care as one avenue of inquiry here, as I have a bit of a time crunch right now. Within the last couple of years two of my male acquaintances have had burst appendix events with resulting surgery, hospital stay and huge medical bill. Neither of them were covered by health insurance, for different reasons. Both of them filed bankruptcy afterward, so I/we as taxpayer/insurance premium payer are the ones who actually paid for their care. An interesting aside is that they are both racist Republicans with whom I have had heated clash of values, referred to in my previous post on racism. Should I just step over their writhing, sick bodies on my way into the doctor's office? I would be sorely tempted on one of my less charitable days.
Betty B.
betty b.,
I don't think we can be blamed for having negative thoughts about negative people. How we behave, though, determines our goodness. I think you are one of the good people on this earth, and I agree with you on this issue.
Rock said:
"So, science and medicine have intervened with my survivability. Was that good? Maybe not, from the perspective of pure survival of the fittest.
On the other hand, I do believe humans have elevated themselves, at times, above the other animals. The mind and spirit of man (woman) has evolved along with the body. Philosophy has evolved. Religion has evolved. Thought has evolved."
Ah, evolution. It is funny how cruel it can be, isn't it? But is it real? How is it that "humans have elevated themselves" if evolution is at work? Survival of the fittest is animal nature at work. Self-preservation is the opposite of what makes us different from the "other animals." We can think beyond that basal instinct, they cannot.
What is it within man that sets us apart? Some call it a "soul." It is, in the terms of Genesis 1, the "image of God." In that account the word for create is used three times, each time making a separation. God is said to have "created" the "heavens and the earth" (separate from Himself), the animals (separte from plants), and finally mankind (separate from the animals). We are different, for we care about others. It is the "image of God."
Betty B writes:
"Is it just "sink or swim, let the chips fall where they may" for the poor, disabled, uninsured and business as usual for the fortunate and advantaged. Is it ok that the Walton children have untold billions, and Wal-Mart workers have no/inadequate health insurance? Do you have health insurance? If so, does your employer provide it, or do you pay for private insurance as I do (I'm self-employed)?"
Though I sometimes think insurance is the biggest "scam" ever designed by men, I must admit it is a system based on the Christian ideal. With insurance we are taking care of the less fortunate by spreading the cost among the community at large. In the early church we find this sense of community in their communal life that truly illustrated what Paul called the "body of Christ." If a body "part" hurt the whole body suffered. The whole body, therefore, would work to stop the hurt. It was a collective survival instinct, if you will.
Sadly, if left to our basal "human nature" we would "step over" those less fortunate in our paths. But, thankfully, we "somehow" manage to rise above that. We call it civilization.
And Rock, one last thing:
You write: "How we behave, though, determines our goodness."
Actually, and most logically, it is our goodness that determines how we act. :-)
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