We want to do good for our fellow men, but what if good is bad and bad is good? by Rimfrel
(libertarian)
Monday, April 12, 2010
It is often said that people will do more of whatever behavior is rewarded. Sure, there are the iconclasts and rebels who are doing their own thing, regardless. But social bonding encourages getting with the program, and one way to make sure you know what the program is would be to see what behaviors are rewarded. Parents use this do train children, dog trainers use it, and the government uses it. Tax breaks, subsidies, and regulations are all tools used by the government to train us to certain modes of behavior.
Since our compliance is somewhat instinctive and survival-oriented, we should not fault anyone who succumbs, and "goes along to get along", or does what is required to stay out of jail and off the government's radar. Especially if people have dependents, also known as "hostages to fortune", obedience may be the prudent, if not the brave nor freedom-loving course. Every individual has the right to make his own decisions.
Progressives and other big government fans purport that the purpose of government is to take care of people. Unfortunately, no one really defines what this means. Should government be "warehousing" people and ensuring they have their survival needs met? Should it look for ways to make everyone successful, in lockstep so no one is more successful? Is either of these a "good" way to take care of people?
Progressives sometimes reach to Christian tenets to try to garner support from the religious among us. It is true that the Bible encourages Christians to love one another and to take care of each other, and it says to "render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's". I have read through the Bible several times. At no point does it say that taking care of others is Caesar's responsibility, for which he is entitled to confiscate as much of your worldly goods as he wants.
And yet, despite all the professions that there are millions of less fortunate people who have to be taken care of because "it's the right thing to do", we see no one beggaring themselves to take care of all these unfortunates. Mother Theresa did, because she genuinely believed that the people needed care. Other people (e.g. Michael Moore) are still suspiciously wealthy, though they seem quite willing to beggar the rest of us to support what they claim is "a moral imperative".
Healthcare to welfare, the government keeps demanding more money. They don't even spend it on things we have agreed should be supported. And they continue to be just as wealthy, if not more so. When do we get to spend their money on what we want? Only when we get elected to office.
The government's behavior is consistent with a belief that people should be given fish, not taught how to fish. People may originally want to get their own fish, but the government convinces them they have a right not to have to fish, and to be given some of the fish that others have caught. The government thereby relegates them permanently to being wards of the state, dependent for their lives on the handouts they have grown accustomed to receive. It is no wonder they vote for the politicians that promise to give them more fish, and fear the election of those who might demand they learn to fish for themselves.
In the long run, though, such dependence is very close to slavery. You are taken care of in exchange for obedience, basically, and you perform tasks to keep the government happy so they keep giving you fish. The government's behavior keeps you from achieving your human potential, and any deficiencies in the fish supply are blamed on the people who are actually doing the fishing.
People innately want to be free, and the government manages to convince the people receiving fish that they are free. Meanwhile, the fisherman are tasked to catch more and more fish until they feel like slaves, of the more abused variety. The care the government lavishes on the "less fortunate" actually makes them worse off. They are deprived of their personal freedom to make their own decisions, they are made dependent on the government, and also they are dependent on the fisherman continuing to fish. Meanwhile, the population continues to increase, with no provision or scaling of beneficiaries to providers.
Social security is in trouble for various reasons, but one thing mentioned is that the ratio of recipients to those still paying into the system is down to 2-to-1. This is a bubble that is going to burst eventually, and not long from now. The care and attention the government has been lavishing on those already retired is not going to be supportable when that happens. Meanwhile, we have spiraling national debt and increasing social programs on which to spend more of the money we already do not have enough of. It's another bubble.
When the government finally cannot support its expansive and expensive social programs, the current beneficiaries will not be prepared to take care of themselves. The greater good may be seen as the good of those who have been supported until now, as they outnumber the ones taxed for the support. The mathematics will still not support the few supporting the many.
"Good" will then result in various forms of bad: diminished social cohesion (e.g. riots), people who cannot afford food or rent (but the medical care will still be affordable, right?), balkanization of the populace into political factions more intolerant than ever.
What if we had done "bad" instead, demanding that people support themselves and not get used to taking from the public fisc? If people had been treated as adults, been allowed to fail and suffer thereby, learned to do better and eventually found success? They might have suffered more along the way, but the rest of us would not have been so bad off, and the additional money we had could have been spent to provide for our own old age and times of unemployment. And the government would not be scrambling to fund growing numbers of people who have been taught they have a right to government largesse, nor in danger of damaging so many people's lives when and if they get into financial trouble.
It is good for people to work, and not to depend on others. Independence is protection against the troubles that befall the society. Some interdependence is useful, but anything you depend on constitutes a risk for you if it goes away. Food, water, air, parents, anything can be a vulnerability. If you have chosen the dependence, you should be willing to accept the consequences when it falls through. If the government has instead manipulated the society to saddle you with dependents, you should not have to be reviled when the weight of the poor is too much for you to carry.
We may have done good, but we might have better, if we had done bad.
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Very nice explanation, Rimfrel. I just read Machiavelli "The Prince," and he advocated doing just what YOU say Big Government is doing in order to get the citizenry dependent upon a centralized political base. (He didn't call if 'government,' but it's the same thing.)
You are right. Good is sometimes bad, and bad is good.
