From: 4224_5201@uwovax.uwo.ca (John LaRocque)
Subject: Re: NDP "communism?" (was Re: A vote for Reform...)
Organization: University of Western Ont, London
Date: Tue, 12 Jan 1993 01:15:40 GMT

In article <C0pBA3.Cxz@ecf.toronto.edu>, pelton@ecf.toronto.edu (PELTON MATTHEW ALAN) writes:

>   And it often is possible to work your way out of poverty.  But a lot of the
> time, it isn't.  Are you saying that Watts, L.A. has a 90% unemployment rate
> because the people there are lazier than the people in Rosedale.  (Don't say
> that they live there because they're poor, because practically all people in
>south-central L.A. were born there.)  

The Great Society failed. Social help cannot work. Only decent American
enterprise can. And as long as black people are told to expect that kind 
paternalistic help from the white-majority government they will continue
to be looked on as charity cases and not human beings. Malcolm X was right
- you can't rely on the white man, only on yourself.

>And you and your ancestors probably were
> damn hard workers and your success was a result of your hard struggle.

They expected nothing from life and worked for what they got, not like all
of those people who whine about their goddamn rights in Canada today.
What they got they earned with the sweat of their own brow.

>  But
> it was also a product of luck.  For everybody that makes it out, there are 
> five others who don't, even though they tried as hard.  One man I know
>was born penniless, worked three or four jobs all his life, starting as a kid,
> and always made enough money to get by.  But he finds it hard to feel pride
> in barely surviving for 80 years, with little or no help from others.  If you
>ask him to describe his life, he'd tell you it was pure hell.  He wasn't lazy,
> and he never wanted to live off others.  But he always would have appreciated
> a little help.

Help is always a little nice. But I have a counter example. A friend of my
parents has a very large family but the father does not earn a lot of money.
They just get buy but would begrudge it very much of someone came up to them
and made a charity case out of them. No, that sort of thing goes against 
pride - to be told that your government considers you unemployable and thus
is obligated to give you welfare.
 
> the people today. Poverty is a RELATIVE thing. Poor people today are
>>living a luxury compared to poverty 50 years ago. Work is the only 
 
>   And a lot of that change is due to the government.  Any historian worth
>his salt could tell you that the Great Depression would have ended much later,
> if at all, if it weren't for the interventions of the American government.

FDR was a president who used war to rebuild the economy. Too bad Americans
only remember those fireside chats. The US has been in a war ecomony for the
last 60 or so years. So much for intervention. And that stuff about him
saving America from a longer depression - that is just propaganda from FDR
apologists. 

> Live under the Industrial revolution was hell, and only improved because 
> governments instituted social programs, labour laws, union protection, child-
>labour laws, and other "socialist" measures.  If the government always just
>butted out, we'd all still be living in unheated hovels in grime-ridden 
>cities.

Techonology improves lifestyle, not government programs. But go on... I like
this.

>   Alone.  It's still damn hard to support a family.  And you can't support
> a kid on that two-digit child support allowance.

OK so screw the ex husband who just might also be having a hard time. (I
don't presume to know the case in question, but the subject is highly
debatable and for the sake of bandwidth should be ignored... for now)

>   So the government's made mistakes.  Of course it's not perfect.  But
> that doesn't mean the entire idea of a social-welfare government is wrong.
> Don't throw out the baby with the batchwater (to use a really stupid
> platitude). 

Social welfare goes against human pride. It means that society thinks of
you as a useless human being, and by Christian duty or some other nonsense
is required to help you out.

>   My brother has a learning disability.  (I don't make up these stories.)
> He's managed to get a CEGEP (Quebec community college) education, and can
> support himself.  But he never would have made it anywhere if he hadn't gone
>through special programs and recieved the necessary tailored education, all of
> which was paid for by the government.  We couldn't have afforded to get him
> what he needed.  And we're glad he got it. 

Well at least someone cared....in my Dad's day even poor people got some
minimum of care. Very shitty care, but better than none. And yes, you should
be glad for your brother. They knew that your brother was not just a "retard"
(not my words - no flames) - but a productive human being, and helped him
achieve something despite his challenges. I have no doubt that he earned
his DEC. I wish him the best of success.

I despise the current system which was originally designed to treat poor
people as people who would never be productive members of society and
thus did not design programs that would help them become productive.
We live with that system today. Victorian attitudes in the late 20th
century. "You will never be of useful help, here take some money, because
this is our Christian duty". An evil system that denies what these people
really are - human beings who can be productive once you unleash what is
within them. So many people out there are willing to work and do something
with their lives.

Charity isn't enough. And Welfare falls short of what these people need,
want and desire.
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