Which net?

Post #12,483 by Fearless Freep 10/9/01 4:09:55 PM Reply	Which net? that our society has an awfuly leaky safety net, My 'society' and my 'safety net' is my friends, my relatives, my church. I am there for them, they are there for me; that net has never leaked. The real infrastructure problem is the fact that we have replaced friends and relatives and our community as the 'net' with handouts from the government. When you talk about 'leaks' in the saftey net and you are referring to government programs, you've already lost I don't ask the government to share in my burdens, I don't ask them to take from my successes Jay O'Connor "Going places unmapped to do things unplanned to people unsuspecting"
Post #12,637 by inthane-chan 10/10/01 12:25:05 PM Reply	Doesn't work for everybody. I'm not a member of a church. I haven't found one yet that doesn't spoon-feed you religion like Gerber baby food. (Not implying that there aren't any out there, that has just been my experience with the ones I have visited. And I've been looking for a bit.) My family is in pretty dire financial straits. So is my wife's. We probably make more than anybody else in either of our families, except for my grandparents, and we're barely getting by. If something does go wrong, we have to use government fallback. Which leaves friends. Pretty much the only people I could hope to count on financially if things Went Bad would be you guys - and I'd hate to impose on you unless absolute survival was on the line. Now, the other side of this is that the old way did work great in small communities - because you knew your neighbors, and everybody did rely on everybody else for their survival. With the advent of large cities, along with large population mobility, it becomes increasingly difficult to know your neighbors or build a rapport with them. And that's one of the reasons that big city people tend to support government programs, while small towns tend to be more for "small government" - as long as "small government" doesn't mean "cut my farm subsidy checks..." ^_^ (Okay, that was a joke, not serious or related to the argument at hand. Couldn't resist, though.) "He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." - Friedrich Nietzsche
Post #12,660 by Fearless Freep 10/10/01 1:08:05 PM Reply	Re: Doesn't work for everybody. Now, the other side of this is that the old way did work great in small communities - because you knew your neighbors, and everybody did rely on everybody else for their survival. With the advent of large cities, along with large population mobility, it becomes increasingly difficult to know your neighbors or build a rapport with them. And that's where the breakdown that caused the leaks in the net occured, and the government is trying, pretty unsuccessfully, to patch holes in a net that is fundamentally no longer there for many people Jay O'Connor "Going places unmapped to do things unplanned to people unsuspecting"
Post #12,661 by inthane-chan 10/10/01 1:11:36 PM Reply	So how would you fix it? "He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." - Friedrich Nietzsche
Post #12,666 by Fearless Freep 10/10/01 1:29:05 PM Reply	I wouldn't We're reaping the consequences of going down paths we wanted to go down and worked hard to do so. There is no 'fix' and we're doomed if we try. You can't take ten thousand years of human social interactions and totally destroy them in a hundred years and then try to figure out how to 'fix' the results Might as well intentionally drive your car off a cliff and trhen as me to 'fix' the course that you are on toward the ground Jay O'Connor "Going places unmapped to do things unplanned to people unsuspecting"
Post #12,683 by addison 10/10/01 2:32:58 PM Reply	You're only looking at the bad. We're reaping the consequences of going down paths we wanted to go down and worked hard to do so. There is no 'fix' and we're doomed if we try. You can't take ten thousand years of human social interactions and totally destroy them in a hundred years and then try to figure out how to 'fix' the results From a religious aspect, I'm not surprised at that comment. But its a horribly one-sided issue. In the last hundred years, we've completely changed everything ABOUT the human social interactions. The "old ways" wouldn't have worked. We've also multiplied by incredible factors both the amount of damage that someone can do, the depths of debt someone can get into, and the reasons for it. (Car wreck, health care for any reason, etc). 100 years ago, there wasn't the need for the huge medical payments, for instance. Either you lived, or you died. Long term care needed a bed, and a bedpan changing. The Taliban have "fixed" things by shoving them back hundreds of years - and the result there hasn't been good. I put a lot of stock in the power that we've created by equating people in this country, whether by sex or race. And yes, there have been some drawbacks. But OTOH, a religious "solution" has plenty of failures. Even aside from the cons, and the scams run under the name of religion, and things like the Catholic church, and pedophilia and covering it up - aside from those things, other serious problems occur with "aid" from someone with a moral imperitive. (ObNit: the Government has the same issue, but on a smaller scale, and its far more politically changeable, which again, has good and bad aspects) Your religious solution.. would it help out 2 homosexual partners? A prostitute? Single mother who refused to marry? Someone of different religious belief? People from a much lower social caste? And even if yours would, would they all? That's a problem. So all the Jay's Church have a safety net, but Addison's Church (cause we're all poor) don't? A few years back, a church my mother was attending (and dragging us to, obviously it was a waste of time. :)) had a black family move into town and start attending services. It was a Lutheran Church, and they were Lutherans. The pastor was approached, and was requested that he request them to find another church. He refused, and was removed by the congregation. The black familiar apparently left, and the new pastor's son didn't even know of that until I told him (Went to college with him). (He was as shocked as I). Religious institutions might work for you - but they won't for the vast majority of people... thus the problem. Addison
Post #12,690 by Fearless Freep 10/10/01 2:57:12 PM Reply	Re: You're only looking at the bad. In the last hundred years, we've completely changed everything ABOUT the human social interactions. The "old ways" wouldn't have worked. No kidding. That was my point. Inthane was talking about the safety net having leaks and I was just point out that the leaks in the net are more fundamental than government programs missing a few people So all the Jay's Church have a safety net, but Addison's Church (cause we're all poor) don't? The poor churches I've attended tended to be far closer nit and better at helping each other out than the rich churches. A few years back, a church my mother was attending ... Which is totally irrelevant to the situation but...everyone has an antecdote Mine is that I spent the first 6 months of my Chirstian life attending a mostly rich white Megachurch on Sunday mornings and an almost all black,poor, pentecostal church on Saturday nights and between the two of them I learned what community was all about. You're looking at the church; I'm looking at the church as an example of a community that supports each other. Religion doesn't matter, but in our country that religion used to embody that community at some level and we've losed that community and whether you replace it with religion or some other purpose for people to come together, we are far weaker without something that does hold us together Jay O'Connor "Going places unmapped to do things unplanned to people unsuspecting"
Post #12,711 by addison 10/10/01 4:03:26 PM Reply	Re: You're only looking at the bad. That was my point. Inthane was talking about the safety net having leaks and I was just point out that the leaks in the net are more fundamental than government programs missing a few people I don't want to say "That's not your point" but I don't think I read you as saying that. Neither do I want to completely disagree. But your tone is one that religion and community were "kicked out" of modern life, and that I don't think is the case at all. I think its much more of a case that people have gotten lazy, and self-protective, and as a result have stopped having the community. Look at the huge subdivisions, where nobody has room for even throwing a baseball, much less the kids getting a game up. That's not forced on people, they're choosing it. And so I agree about the loss of community. I even agree some on that the community is also sometimes centered around religion. I just don't think that's a good focal point - when you have a problem with the focal point, the minister runs off with the till, or anything, its doubly worse... But that's a minor point. My take on religion was more in reply to your other post, that that would be your answer. The poor churches I've attended tended to be far closer nit and better at helping each other out than the rich churches. Funny how that is, isn't it? You're right, of course, but I was talking more in generalities - the problem with "churches" is that they're of course inclusive, and of something that (obviously) is of great debate. I'm looking at the church as an example of a community that supports each other. That's true (for the purposes of this discussion), but what do you do for members who don't want to belong in your church, or you don't want in them? Religion doesn't matter, but in our country that religion used to embody that community at some level But I disagree here - religion does matter - does to you, see your prior post. The people who want a religious solution, or partial solution are presuming (from what I see) that everybody will agree with them... Its what do you do with the people who don't that's a big issue there. And the community is more a issue of size.. Small towns are still pretty closely knit.. We've spread out - notice your commute :) - and as a result, spread ourselves thinly - not allowing the time it takes for community. Addison
Post #12,743 by ben_tilly 10/10/01 6:38:20 PM Reply	And life was better a hundred years ago? A hundred years ago people depended on family. Which is how my grandfather, at 6, managed to find himself at work in a factory supporting a ton of siblings. A hundred years ago people depended on their children in their old age. Which is why people pre Roosevelt looked forward to old age with dread. For many it was a time of extreme poverty as everyone you had known and depended on went away. And furthermore since you depended on children, you made sure you had a lot of them. My grandparents all came from families of a dozen or more. That wasn't unusual. A hundred years ago people depended on their church. Which meant that people who disagreed with the churches were SoL. A hundred years ago people depended on local networks. So when those local networks frayed, people could and did slip between the cracks and starved. It doesn't happen any more. Now if you want to talk about 10,000 years of human action, well 200 years ago people believed that slavery was the inevitable way of the world. In fact selling yourself or your family into slavery was a time-honored way to handle personal debt. And of course any time prior to 300 years ago, in Europe at any given time, a substantial fraction of the population didn't have homes and had real reasons to fear death. You may idealize a world where people would add water to the soup and boil again and again and again until they could find something to put into it. I don't. Frankly, all told, this isn't such a bad world to be born into. Slavery isn't even a memory in this country. The bankruptcy laws are unbelievably generous (by the standards of past eras). Great fears of the past like "consumption" and "pressgang" are trivia questions, words which some adults don't know. Has there been a keelhauling in living memory? Not that I have heard of! (And darned few even know what it is. BTW the [link\|http://www.dictionary.com/cgi-bin/dict.pl?term=keelhaul\|dictionary version] doesn't mention that people generally didn't survive the experience...) Cheers, Ben
Post #13,000 by CRConrad 10/11/01 5:09:48 PM Reply	Wow, how impressively wrong you can be! Jay the Freep: We're reaping the consequences of going down paths we wanted to go down and worked hard to do so. There is no 'fix' and we're doomed if we try. Uhm... The "fix" would obviously be that we all, collectively, (all of us city dwellers at least) shoulder the burden for all of those among us, collectively, who can't right at the moment make it on their own. Which is exactly what we (you Merkins to a somewhat lesser extent than we YourPeons; but still, all of us in the "Western" world) are doing -- "Christian" charity at its blindest and finest -- in the form of... exactly those "government handouts" you are whining about! Sheesh. You can't take ten thousand years of human social interactions and totally destroy them in a hundred years and then try to figure out how to 'fix' the results Cities have been around for at least four thousand years (and it's debatable whether the six thousand years of "human social interactions" immediately before that were all that much to write home about -- notice, nobody did). What do you think the pyramids were, if not a Keynesian wealth-dispersal-through-government-projects program? Looks like it's you who are proposing to tear down thousands of years of human social interaction... What time frame did you have in mind; something a lot LESS than a hundred years, I guess? Double sheesh. Christian R. Conrad The Man Who Knows Fucking Everything
Post #13,062 by a6l6e6x 10/11/01 10:29:07 PM Reply	Jerico. [link\|http://emuseum.mnsu.edu/archaeology/sites/middle_east/jericho.html\|Jerico may be 10000 years old.] While trenching downward through the site she uncovered the first walled city along with a number of houses and courtyards that had been constructed over 10,000 years ago, during the Neolithic. I had heard somewhere (perhaps the The Ascent of Man program) it is the oldest city. Alex Whom the gods wish to destroy, they first make mad. -- Euripides
Post #13,181 by Ashton 10/12/01 6:34:42 PM Reply	Cackle.. glorp Brevity Award \ufffd with beladonna-leaf cluster! Yup, I've noticed that charity as defined by lots of folk to mean er 'Faith'-based-Monopoly: derives from and panders often to a mindset with a certain complex baggage: A) You're guilty from birth! you scum [it's in the book] - haven't figured out how to milk capital-gains and proxy bidding yet? = you're dumb too, then. B) Even though you don't 'deserve' it - we're so fucking magnanimous, we'll offer you this ___ IF.. you demonstrate your abject willingness to learn how to Believe Right. Too.. (er we'll find a way to gently introduce you to our Truth.) C) Government umm 'charity' OTOH - is bound to be abused by such as You are, and was invented by atheist scum intent upon keeping the word of [Our God] from being heeded. A computer on every desk running Our Soft-ware! is our goal. We demand a [Our]God-fearing Nation Now.. D) Add-in the other facets as are found to varying degrees. (Note that there are some exceptions to be found, natch - even to the point of actually eliding all the proselytizing, at least 'officially'. This last more honored by the breach than the observance.) Methinks that any efforts towards (say) "honest, simply less-skewed? apportionment of enough basic wealth as is needed to survive" -- will be constantly hampered ('least in Murica) by variations on the above themes. These are rarely uttered, of course, but my lifetime experience is such that I have seen this sub-rosa message in countless forms. We'd rather fund legions of insurance middle-men suits, over any idea of a national health plan, just as we have turned over prisons - and soon perhaps all the formerly 'public' schools to: the bizness mind. (Scandinavia made a trade of ~ "limiting the possibilities of any? much? truly obscene levels of personal wealth" (like Billy's) in exchange for a genuine safety net for all, as well as a decent level of health care. This naturally pisses off the Fundamentalist Capitalists no end: ya gotta earn as Rugged Induhvidualist, or die sucker.. And these folk don't even believe! in er, evolutionary 'survival of the fittest' -- officially!) I call that, an attempt towards civilization. I know what them Holy folk would call me. :-\ufffd Anyway .. You Said It (but briefer). Ashton
Post #13,232 by CRConrad 10/14/01 11:58:03 AM Reply	Belladonna? Uhm... Thanks - I think! :-)
Post #13,251 by boxley 10/14/01 7:57:15 PM Reply	belladona dilates the pupils (eye-opener)
Post #13,278 by Ashton 10/15/01 2:50:16 AM Reply	3 ears and a tail.. Alas I cannot claim credit for such subtlety (this time ;-) just thought the leaves purty.. But as with Oscar Wilde, Oscar: I wish I'd said that! Guest: Don't worry, Oscar - you will.. you will.. :-\ufffd
Post #13,779 by marlowe 10/17/01 1:30:42 PM Reply	There's such a thing as being too open-eyed. Dilate the pupil too much and parts of the lens that aren't meant to be used come on line. They don't focus properly. Useable resolution drops drastically. Plus, on a sunny day, it's extremely unpleasant. It's fun at night though. Kind of like that hokey special effect they used to use for dream sequences. Everything's blurry and sparkly at the same time. [link\|http://www.angelfire.com/ca3/marlowe/index.html\|http://www.angelfir...e/index.html] Sometimes "tolerance" is just a word for not dealing with things.
Post #13,936 by CRConrad 10/18/01 7:36:21 AM Reply	Actually, I was thinking (and "thank?"ing Ashton for)... ...the other part of the definition, "poisonous". (Not to poop on y'all's eyeball party, just saying I wasn't in on it.) Christian R. Conrad The Man Who Knows Fucking Everything About Venom In Writing
Post #12,668 by Fearless Freep 10/10/01 1:31:29 PM Reply	Clarification My solution would be a religious solution but very few would want that so my only recourse is to shrug and say "oh well" Jay O'Connor "Going places unmapped to do things unplanned to people unsuspecting"

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