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LadyEllen -> RE: The purpose of the state and the social contract (3/27/2007 1:08:56 PM)
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Not a hijack at all; some good points
quote:
ORIGINAL: NeedToUseYou
For what it is worth. I think the problem is everybody wants to tell everybody else what to do, how to feel, what to say, what is important, etc...
True. That wont ever work anyway as I mentioned earlier in the thread. The only thing that will work in my view is to get agreement from within the people as to what kind of society they want - it cant be imposed.
Some one please tell me what exactly is wrong with a system were nobody gets a forced hand-out(poor or rich), where you can say what you want(on your property or public land), and the only thing enforcement is there for is punishing physical actions against a person or their property. Why should government / the state / geographic state/city, etc... be in the business of imposing moral behaviour on people. I trully believe this is the problem.
I see a problem here, in that even if there is an agreement from within the people as to what kind of society they want, we would still need an administrative apparatus of some sort to make sure that the agreed upon societal agreement is in place and is supported. In respect of your comment about free speech, we always have to remember two things - that freedom must not be at the expense of another's and that whatever we might like to think, words are as dangerous as any gun, and possibly more so, when used to stir up hate.
Why does one person say islamic people are wrong because they view their wife as property, as if they can't participate in society with that belief, why not? If she is fine with it, then it is arrogance, to feel the self important compulsion to fix that which they'd argue isn't broken. I think it is wrong personally, but also feel it wrong to force my views on someone else, who is not threatening me.
This is an interesting point. Given that the wife is consenting, then is it really society's business to intervene at all? Subject to the wife being able to withdraw consent and there being no attempt to impose such relationships on the rest of society or expect others to participate in them in their interactions with the wife, I suppose it is no one else's business. Not to compare bdsm relationships with Islam, but isnt this what we want too? I would expect though, that such arrangements would have to be on a strictly opt-in basis, with the default being the reverse.
Or why if someone is on drugs, does one person feel they have the right to steal(taxes from one to another) from another citizen to support them. It is your right to support them, but not your right to take from others to support them. It is their choice to do drugs, and obviously if they can do drugs and still support themselves via the states handouts(stolen money), they'll be more likely to do drugs. Or why is it anyones responsibility to provide anything to others that have made a life of bad choices.
This comes to an important point; that we are all individuals but that we are all also in this together, and anyone can fall on bad times for any reason, and enter the downward spiral that can end in substance abuse too, since you mentioned it. If the ideal is to build a coherent society, then there has to be some form of safety net as one of the advantages of contributing to it in better times. The alternative is to not contribute but then to expect no help when evil times visit. Some might suggest that charity should be the safety net, but given our record on charity giving now, I dont feel anything would work unless it is compulsory to give through taxes - though perhaps if people dont want to contribute then this could be permitted subject to them receiving nothing when unemployment et al comes along.
One can talk of civility, or freedom until they are blue in the face. But at the end of the day responsibility comes from suffering from ones bad decisions whether that be bad grades, piss poor job, poor health, etc.. The system is not set up for that. It breeds irresponsibility on the backs of the responsible.
This is something I very much agree with. We have in the UK a sizeable number of people who make no effort whatever and have a successful lifestyle based on social benefits. This is unacceptable. Understandable in that social benefits are often in excess of their likely earnings, but unacceptable. This again though is another issue of advantage in return for contribution and can be dealt with by way of strong encouragement to contribute to the society if the advantage is to be retained - not necessarily in terms of financial contribution either. Overall, we cannot throw out the safety net for all, because of the poor example of some who have come to rely on it.
This permeates the whole system. Government bailouts of failing Huge businesses support this same behaviour. Grants and preferred loans to businesses to entice them to set up shop, encourages this bad behaviour(It is not the right of the city, to take the taxpayers money and arbitrarily give it to a business). It seems to me all of these problems are all extended from the same source, and that is the central thought that "One has the right to take from one and give to another for no benefit to themselves". And a further extention of that belief is to dictate core beliefs to others. How can anyone ever talk of freedom, and hold that view simultaneously. It is beyond me.
Inducements to have business locate in a certain place are unfortunately necessary in the global economy where businesses can locate almost anywhere. Businesses mean jobs for local people, and that should be the sole reason for such inducement. You speak of taking from one person at no benefit to them, but is this true? Jobs enable the workers to spend more and pay tax, and businesses in an ideal world pay tax on their profits, so this does (or should) benefit everyone in the long term - indirectly as it might be, in terms of lower taxes because of greater revenues perhaps.
It is not like if everyone wasn't paying 40-60 percent taxes(once you add federal, state, local, vice taxes, phone taxes, fees, etc) supporting this give take system, that the economy wouldn't be flush with cash to provide more than enough jobs and opportunity for those who wanted them.
This is a political issue and not really the subject of this thread, but yes we have a similar tax burden here. If we were to work out by agreement within the people what sort of society we wanted - one where there are public services and a safety net, or one where we are to do everything ourselves for instance, then we would have the answer on that one.
It's is quite absurd... but yet we go on proposing this should be legislated or thiat should be legislated. LOL, we are already defeated, that much is obvious, because when people try to think of a solution it is always via more government, or more manipulating thought to encourage conformity to what the individual thinks is right.
We are not defeated until we admit it. We are in a mess, thats for sure in my opinion, but we've been in a mess before and solved it, so we can do it again albeit that this mess is different to any other before. You are right though, in that legislation is unsuitable to producing a solution, in that is imposed and we cannot impose any view on the people but rather it must be formed from amongst the people.
The problem is the manipulation, whether that be thought manipulation, or economic manipulation. It's all the same, at the end of the day and teaches the same lesson.
Anyway, sorry for the hijack.
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