Letters to the Editor
Published Letters: 54 Editor's Choice: 3
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*grin*
[Read the article: I feed the poor but eat with the rich]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Hey, I said in my original post that I was an Internet libertarian nowadays, didn't I? :)
Seriously, I understand the intellectual argument that people must be assumed to be entitled to dispose of their property as they see fit; it's difficult to imagine any workable society in which this assumption wouldn't be a prerequisite, since the alternative requires a truly perfect and incorruptible governing authority.
The fact remains, however, that the concept of property is itself a completely artificial construct. The idea that you "own" your money, and that this money can be used to acquire other things that you can "own," is a consensual fiction -- and the poor are understandably unhappy with the strictures and structures that have left them on the losing side of that fiction.
Your moral argument for going on vacation is that it's your hard-earned money. What if you hadn't worked hard for it, if you'd won a lottery or married someone wealthy or been born rich or discovered uranium in your back yard? Is your claim on that wealth altered by the circumstances of its acquisition?
On the flip side: if someone is poor because he just can't get a break, is he less deserving of being poor than someone who's poor because he'd rather sit on the sidewalk and drink all day?
By associating income with expectations of merit, we risk forgetting that wealth is inherently amoral. Not immoral, but amoral. You don't necessarily deserve what you have; you simply have what you have, and we as a society allow you to feel entitled to it because the alternative is worse.
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I like Carol Lay...
[Read the article: WayLay]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]...but I always feel like she should just, you know, get over it already. She's clearly got talent, and I think she's got stories to tell if she can just get past tilling the same allegorical ground over and over.
As it stands, WayLay is like a somewhat dada version of Cathy for divorced women.
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This sort of self-congratulatory press...
[Read the article: How bots rigged D.C.'s "hot" reporter contest]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]...is always so amusing to me. Here in Madison, a local paper has a Page Two "celebrity" column that struggles to find enough names to boldface after name-dropping the mayor, the weatherman, and a B-lister who buzzed into town from L.A. for a charity event.
People like to believe in the integrity of their small circles, even if it leads to cannibalism.
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And yet...
[Read the article: I feed the poor but eat with the rich]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I refuse to apologize about being able to pay whatever figure I find appropriate for cutting my hair or doing my nails.
...that's almost exactly what you just did. :)
Consider your logic, BTW. You say you "need" to look "this presentable," and there are two implicit assumptions here: that looking as presentable as you currently do is a need, and that what you're currently paying for a haircut is what's necessary to look as presentable as you currently do.
Your use of "need" here is exactly the thing that I submit creates desperation in the poor. Don't the poor "need" to look presentable, too? If not, why not?
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Um, lawyerette...
[Read the article: I feed the poor but eat with the rich]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I think you just agreed with me. Was that intentional?
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Ownership, blackvegan...
[Read the article: I feed the poor but eat with the rich]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]...is an artificial construct. That's pretty much undeniable. The question is whether ownership is a useful construct -- and, again, I think it's a necessary construct for the functioning of society.
I see you've internalized your dad's "hard work reaps rewards" line, and that's fine; it's a powerful form of motivation (and I'm speaking here as a former poor kid, myself). But as we can see from your response to your lottery example, you're clearly slightly uncomfortable with rewards that you don't feel you've sufficiently earned. That's one of the side effects of that particular philosophy, and can be damaging precisely because the unspoken corollary is "rewards are given for hard work." This isn't true. "Rewards" in the form of "wealth" -- and by wealth I mean hard and soft assets -- come from a lot of places, and some of the hardest work is done by people who'll never accumulate much wealth at all.
And that's the trick: someone will always feel that they "deserve" your money more than you do, and someone else will always have more objective need for it than you do. It is necessary for society for us (as a society, if not as individuals) to ignore this reality -- but it's downright ridiculous to act as if possessing wealth is itself a moral virtue, or that spending wealth on comparatively frivolous things is something which someone "deserves" as a consequence of "earning" that wealth.
The distinction between "earned" wealth and "unearned" wealth is one that will always be completely lost on the truly desperate, and which looks fairly flimsy when poked by anybody.
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In all seriousness, blackvegan...
[Read the article: I feed the poor but eat with the rich]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]...I think you should read my posts again. You're increasingly arguing against what you incorrectly think I'm saying. We agree on more than I believe you realize.
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Man, Anonymous has a more exciting life than I do.
[Read the article: I'm so damned judgmental!]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I mean, I try to stay active, but I don't believe I've ever been hunted as prey. I bet Anonymous has a better figure, too.
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Oh, come on....
[Read the article: I'm so damned judgmental!]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]The LW has said, "I work hard not to make bad decisions. Sometimes people tell me about the bad decisions they've made, and I think less of them for it. But I feel bad about it. Please help me."
And people are criticizing her for it? Please.
If she's snotty, that's one thing. But we're dogpiling her inner thoughts here, ones she already feels guilty about. What other inner thoughts would you criticize? If a man sees a sixteen-year-old girl in a tank top and briefly entertains a moment of fantasy, would you call him a twisted pervert? If someone sees the last piece of cheesecake and considers eating it, would you call him a glutton?