Forced to accept a lower standard of living compared to one’s parents

I will make no bones for, or apologies about, this: I quite enjoy reading the work of the late Steve Kangas, one of the first and best people to ask a question that the ruling elite seem to be very uncomfortable with. Specifically, why our world has turned into such a rotten, stinking mess over the past thirty years (or nineteen to twenty-four at the time he was murdered).

Social services should be about investment, not charity.

A common argument used by conservative shitheads who do not wish to pay the “enormous” costs of welfare to people other than themselves is that if welfare transfers to the poor were eliminated, small organisations that are formally known as charities would pick up the slack. Aside from the usual stupidities associated with this argument, it is well worth examining a few concepts associated with it. For one thing, the idea that privately run, disparate, and highly specialised charities can collectively replace a centrally organised and carefully planned system of allocations is laughable at best and complete bullshit at worst. Furthermore, because charities are only beholden to the people that finance them, impartiality is a big problem. A certain “charity” in America, for example, refuses to even talk to the people that it makes most of its money by claiming to represent, not even allowing them a spot at the table, so to speak. If a government organisation were to treat the people that it claimed to represent in this manner, the media would go after it with a vengeance.

Why inappropriate or insufficient help is not preferable to no help at all.

Everything we do in life, whether it be flipping off a police officer, firing a gun, or scratching one’s face, has an objective in mind. The dying art of social services is no different. In a society where competition is emphasised over cooperation to an excessive point, there are always going to be people who have difficulty fitting into a social group, or a society as one might call it. And over the past thirty or so years, the emphasis has shifted so far toward competition that it is getting more like a fight with axes or meat cleavers than a licensed boxing match. Which means that social services are strained to the point of breaking, and beyond.