MEAT-HEADED PRESUMPTIONS
Robert J. Samuelson in today's Washington Post calls us a nation of "closet welfare junkies," an appellation secured on his definition of Social Security and Medicare as "our biggest welfare programs." Well, straight off, I differ with his presumption that welfare programs are shameful or undesirable. To the contrary, they are among our most civil and humane activities, and much needed to maintain a society in which all citizens can live under bearable circumstanaces. And maintaining itself at minimal levels is ultimately what life is about. Much too often, however, ideology and theology, divisive instruments of power that divide people into warring camps, define human worth and need, invalidating persons unable to maintain minimal levels of living and shaming them for accepting the just rewards of civilization.
At issue, then, at least in my mind, is the question of the value and purpose of government and civilization. Civilization has arisen over the eons as a product of humans' efforts to live together in relative peace and with the ability to provide for at least creature comforts. Civilization also foster spiritual and emotional development, learning, art, and all the other worthy endeavors by which we live out our humanness. Government, on the other hand, structures civilization, adjusting it to the needs and desires of particular groups at particular times. In this adaptive function, government provides, among other things, for the common defense and the securing of livelihoods for all the people under its jurisdiction. Whenever necessary in providing this defense and livelihood, government conscripts its citizens to warfare or provides economic resources for them to survive. Thus, the need for civilization is to sustain life; the need for government is to direct common efforts towards that end. Sadly, the power function of government usually takes over and its sustaining function suffers. To de-legitimize government's sustaining function by defining the majority of citizens as "welfare junkies" is destructive of government itself and sheer nihilist arrogance.
To structure government so that it abrogates to just a few individuals at the top of the food chain a majority of the protections and privileges of civilization is to stand that noble achievement of mankind on its head. Civilization is for all people, and it is the function of government to assure that all peoples reap its benefits. To invalidate the claim of a portion, usually the vast majority, of a people who make claim on government's sustaining function not only defines claimants as undeserving of civilization's benefits, but even brings into question the purpose of civilization itself. This is too much meat-headed greed. Yet this is precisely what the current administration in Washington is determined to do.
At issue, then, at least in my mind, is the question of the value and purpose of government and civilization. Civilization has arisen over the eons as a product of humans' efforts to live together in relative peace and with the ability to provide for at least creature comforts. Civilization also foster spiritual and emotional development, learning, art, and all the other worthy endeavors by which we live out our humanness. Government, on the other hand, structures civilization, adjusting it to the needs and desires of particular groups at particular times. In this adaptive function, government provides, among other things, for the common defense and the securing of livelihoods for all the people under its jurisdiction. Whenever necessary in providing this defense and livelihood, government conscripts its citizens to warfare or provides economic resources for them to survive. Thus, the need for civilization is to sustain life; the need for government is to direct common efforts towards that end. Sadly, the power function of government usually takes over and its sustaining function suffers. To de-legitimize government's sustaining function by defining the majority of citizens as "welfare junkies" is destructive of government itself and sheer nihilist arrogance.
To structure government so that it abrogates to just a few individuals at the top of the food chain a majority of the protections and privileges of civilization is to stand that noble achievement of mankind on its head. Civilization is for all people, and it is the function of government to assure that all peoples reap its benefits. To invalidate the claim of a portion, usually the vast majority, of a people who make claim on government's sustaining function not only defines claimants as undeserving of civilization's benefits, but even brings into question the purpose of civilization itself. This is too much meat-headed greed. Yet this is precisely what the current administration in Washington is determined to do.
posted by Jerry at 8:14 AM
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