Ziggy Stardust
Absolutely Sane
News at 11.
Finally sick of this: Minimal-state Jesus
- Thread starter Angst
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kochman
Deity
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Everything isn't based on morals, first... and a good moral defense would be to help the less fortunate, for one...
This is just logical, though, to have such a system.
Are you turning into a commie on us?
GW has thieved from us up to this point in his life. Now that he is getting old enough to realistically have to pay taxes, he is trying to make a getaway.
GhostWriter16
Deity
So it can be immoral but we should still do it?
At least your honest
Sounds good. It sounds less good when you agree that its OK to steal to help the less fortunate.
I mean, to take this to its logical extreme we should just tax all income above the poverty level at 100% and give it to third world countries.
I'm playing Devil's Advocate here. I do think there's room for a certain amount of what you are suggesting that is the lesser evil and that past a certain point it is no longer so. I just don't get how you can say that its actually good or right?
This is just logical, though, to have such a system.
I believe in property, so no
If anything, my theoretical starting point for that argument would have been anarcho-capitalism, but that's not actually a view I believe in although I have my sympathies towards it.
If you believe in property, how do you propose property rights be protected?
JohannaK
Heroically Clueless
Or the more guns.
kochman
Deity
- Joined
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Ammoral, rather than immoral...
It isn't about morals, necessarily... more of a math equation, a huge one, if you really want to consider it. A better supported society enables better support, etc.
It isn't stealing... when you get robbed, the theif doesn't generally say, oh, here's a hot dog I bought with that money I took from you.
I've never been into extremes...
Baby steps keeps us footed in reality.
Well, in true communism, it is rather anarchic... no government forcing distribution, just people doing it of their own accord... no property... Socialism is a step toward that end, per Marx...I believe in property, so no
I have a hard time grasping your ideal system... care to elaborate?
JohannaK
Heroically Clueless
I don't see how.... "words of comfort" have anything to do with the current debate, aside that they're from the Bible. It is possible that a mod will tell you to provide a translation too.
Oruc
Reactionary
What if you have a rich intellect? (not that would be a problem for me), people always get hung up on the wealth aspect
Mr. Dictator
A Chain-Smoking Fox
On the Sodom issue, why did god have to destroy two whole towns just because they wanted to rape some angels and Abraham's daughters?
Surely god gave them a way to shut that whole process down, right?
Surely god gave them a way to shut that whole process down, right?
GhostWriter16
Deity
Let's simplify the situation for a minute. I'm aware that this is overly simplistic, but it makes it understandable.
Take a small village, 100 people, is not a part of any nation, and has no government other than one created by itself. Its impossible to truly count defense out, but due to how small scale this is, let's pretend this problem does not exist.
Now, let's simplify this society into five "Classes". Note that we are assuming the legitimacy of property rights here, since I know you and I agree on it (You are well to the left of me but you aren't in favor of abolition of property to my knowledge.)
The richest class has only one person in it, yet due to their hard work and enginuity, owns 20% of the resources in the town. He's saved, been wise, lived a healthy lifestyle so he hasn't had to spend a lot of money on medical bills, and has worked hard to accumulate enough money to invest. Afrer earning this money, he made wise investments and earned even more money, until this point.
The second richest class consists of ten people, which is a larger group than the first class, but still below average. This second group, of ten people, owns 20% of the resources of the town. They have still worked hard, but not as hard as the first guy, and they didn't take as many chances to invest and help the economy.
The third class consists of regular, middle class folks. They likely work for people in the first or second class, but have skills. There are nineteen people in this class (We're at 30 now if you don't feel any desire to do the math.) They make what we'd consider "Upper Middle" incomes, say, somewhere around 70K or so a year (I'm making up numbers to demonstrate a point, I know if this little village was NYC this would be absurd.)
The fourth class runs the gamut from working poor to lower middle class. 60 villagers are in this group. They make an income, they work hard, but they only took the time to get a high school education, if even that. Their lot in life was in part decided by laziness early in life, or a general lack of ability. But they are hardworking enough that they have been able to work their way into a moderately decent life.
The fifth class are homeless, drug addicts (I'm just assuming drugs are legal since my society wouldn't have any laws against them, I'm aware that currently they are currently artifically thrown in prison, which is clearly unfair both to the user and the taxpayer) dropped out of high school AND have no wrok ethic, or otherwise cannot get any kind of a job. This group consists of ten people (10% of the village population.)
Now, this town decides to start "Democracy" and the groups vote on a leader (Let's assume he's an autocrat but has to stand for election, again, I'm aware its more complex than this.) The options are Person A, a man who is in favor of either no tax or just a small rate in order to pay for essentials like defense and justice (To get the best of both worlds, let's say he's willing to pay for these things himself with the help of volunteers.) Person B, on the other hand, advocates a heavily progressive system, where the fifth class pays no taxes, and even gets free money for the government, the fourth class pays a fairly small 3% rate, the third class pays a slightly higher, 10% rate, the second class pays a 25% rate, and the highest class, consisting of one person, is forced to fork over 75% of his income to the service of the state. The people, in self-interest, in spite of the opposition of all the wealthy (First and second class) people, about half of the third class, and a few random voters in the fourth class that value ethics and hard work over self-interest. Person B still wins a landslide because he charges the successful minority more and everyone else (Read, most of his voters) less.
Now, I'm deliberately ignoring essentials like defense, courts, and police... I'll even give you roads since they do benefit practically everyone in the population (Rich and poor.) While I have some logical issues with forced taxation even for these, practically everyone agrees they are necessary (Again, roads less so, although still a huge majority, I'll give it to you), and not providing them wouldn't even help the more successful, at all,. Its also not a redistribution from one class to another, it benefits every person equally. I'm mainly focusing my post on the other parts of governmnet spending,).
How can you justify this huge, disproportionate penalty on the wealthy simply because they are successful and the mob says its OK?
Its mob rule if you ask me...
Now, I'll be fair here, in real life its not really the super rich that are being mistreated by the government. Disproportionate amounts of money are able to be used to turn back the tide of majority opinion, hence why there are certainly issues (Immgration being one, both parties have their reasons for NOT wanting to enforce the laws but independents predominately disagree with both parties [Note: I don't necessarily agree, just saying]) where the majority disagrees with both parties. Capital gains taxes are only 15% (I'd rather all taxes be lower than 15%... combined... but its not that terrible,) The rich cheat by taking bailouts and the like. Certain businesses aren't even open to the "Little guy" but only big businesses.
This, of course, punishes the middle class and the small business owner.
Regardless however, in our little village it IS the wealthy who are getting screwed. Why is that OK just because the majority says so?
Or even, let's say everyone paid the same %, but the majority agreed that ten of the 100 villagers would be enslaved (Drafted) and forced to carry guns and defend the village from foreign attack for low wages against their will? To make it worse, let's say only three were actually needed to defend against any real threat? Worse, let's say they were sent, by will of the majority or the people they were elected, to resolve some dispute between the north and south side of a foreign village, and were forced to support the south even while they were as bad or worse, which led to four of the ten losing their lives? Is this OK just because of "Majority rule"? (I know you're fairly noninterventionist anyway, but would this situation, be wrong solely because you don't agree with it? Or is it an outrage that should never be tolerated regardless of what the 51% say? How is this different from Vietnam, aside from scale?)
Or say the majority voted to punish that poriton of the lowest class who used drugs, locked them up to keep them out of the way? Would thatbe OK if the majority condoned it or there was some utilitarian purpose? On top of that, what if money was extorted from the people to pay for it?
I think morality is very important here. There may be a flaw in my own moral system, but I think all three of those scenarios are moral outrages. And yet, the latter two happen in America. The first one was exaggerated beyond what is true in America right now, but some parts of Europe do in fact look like that.
What if he did? Its still theft, isn't it?
Maybe in a few years I'll agree with you. I'm young, and so I am able to think idealistically with a lot less bias than I would were I a working class citizen in the real world. I'm not saying I won't ever think differently about this.
That said, I'd be intrigued as to your response. Because this is the kind of stuff I think about when deciding my opinions. Of course, I was raised in traditional, right wing conservatism, which has about a million and one inconsistencies, but I still have some remnants of that as well.
Well, in true communism, it is rather anarchic... no government forcing distribution, just people doing it of their own accord... no property... Socialism is a step toward that end, per Marx...
Ideally everyone would help each other, voluntarily, people wouldn't think it was OK to forcibly steal property (Whether this is called "Theft", "Plunder", "Taxes", "Democracy", "Social justice" or anything else.) People would, at the same time, be willing to help other people, would act in a moral way, pay fair wages (I realize "Fair" is subjective) exc.
This isn't reality though, so I do believe we need a government. I do, however, think that government interjection in the economy does more harm than good, and often helps the rich more than it helps the poor, but always hurts the middle class, small businesses, or anyone who succeeds without direct government help (I say, "Direct" because I am aware that they do in fact track your property rights and whatnot.) I don't think its unreasonable for some fee to be charged for the service of protecting your life, liberty, and property. The unfortunate fact is that nobody could really opt out. Defense is paid for collectively and there's no way out of it. Few people would want to anyway, so I can live with that. Same with the courts. Nobody should be denied justice since he can't pay. So I can see having that paid for by government as well. Police are justifiable by the same logic.
But there's no logic that defends forcible redistribution. There's no logic that justifies bailing out businesses that fail (Its unfair to everyone else) or taxing the successful absurdly because the majortiy who do not succeed say its OK.
Honestly, if I were extremely wealthy I'd give at least 90% of what I made to charity anyway. I have no desire to hoard billions and billions of dollars. But that doesn't give me a right to rob someone else who doesn't feel that way. Other rich people like Bill Gates and Warren Buffet should stop complaining that the amount taken from other people should be higher and instead they should give more to the poor on their own.
I don't really think that verse has any relation to politics, but its still funny and I'm still going to share it with my conservative dad
classical_hero
In whom I trust
Exactly. Far too much emphasis is putting Jesus into modern philosophical debates when he never had a mission to do any of that. He came to do the will of the Father, no more and no less and as a Christian my goal is to preach the gospel, not to preach about economics.
Borachio
Way past lunacy
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Well, I watched it, Ziggy. Green shirt or not. Skipping bits to save some data. The native voice wasn't heard until 1 hr 23 minutes, though. Rick Hall is OK. Funny in parts. Anyway, the clip I posted wasn't funny at all. But it's strange how we can post things that we think might make some of us pause for a minute, only for it to get ignored completely. Heigh-ho!
Anyway, what was your point? That the native American is the rich one? Spiritually, anyway.
classical_hero
In whom I trust
What does it say in the passage when God destroys the two cities? If you look at the Genesis passage it clearly explains why he sent judgement upon those cities. Just because he can use the for other things doesn't men it wipes the primary reason for the judgement. The Genesis passage explicitly explains it was for homosexuality that the cities were judged. Then in Ezekiel God is telling the Jews about their coming judgement since they are acting similar to those cities, first they were spiritually whoring themselves out and then God gives more reasons on why he judged the cities, due to their inhospitality. This does not overrule the original reason for judgement, just adds more reason as to why they were judged.
GhostWriter16
Deity
Yeah, I agree. Let's be clear, I don't think Jesus preached right-wing Republicanism and I think the Patriot's Bible is pretty clearly blasphemous. I equally think that its wrong to read "Blessed are those who help the poor" as "Blessed are those who charge high tax rates on other people to help the poor" and say that Jesus somehow justified social democracy.
Jesus wanted Christians to help the poor regardless of what kind of government he lived under. Equally absurd as the idea he actually justified taxation by saying Christians should pay is that Jesus justified monarchy by mentioning Caesar. Jesus' was more concerned with starting the Christian Church and how Christians are to live than he was about politics or about what laws Christians should impose on other people.
In case, anyone forgets this I don't think Jesus said social democracy is wrong. I do think there may be other parts of the Bible that can be used for political purposes, although even then they are few and their application is debatable (The most overt is using Genesis 9:6 to justify the Death Penalty, which I happen to agree with but I don't think that's a catch-all "Chrstians MUST support the death penalty" type verse.) But I don't think Jesus himself said one thing about politics. Jesus was concerned with far greater and more important things. And I don't think "Give to the poor" necessarily justifies a huge tax rate.
Unless the rest of you people are justifying theocracy
I thought you guys wanted to keep theology and politics separate? I mostly do, but most of you guys want to take that even further than I do when it comes to social issues. Yet when it comes to the economy its "Blah blah blah theology."I'm sorry, but I never saw Jesus say "When someone asks for your neighbor's coat, steal it and give it to him." And that's the way I view the social democrat state. If you disagree, find some other reason other than "Jesus said" because it has absolutely nothing to do with anything Jesus said. "Thou shall not steal" ends this debate for me
That's a very long post, and yet for obvious reasons does a very poor job of modelling society.
I'm just picking out one of many naive assertions on display here as I think it's an important misconception to address. Wealth does not equal hard work, nor does destitution equal laziness. There are hard workers in all echelons of society, just as there are slackers in all echelons of society. There are a great any rich people who are corrupt dullards who have achieved their positions through luck, class contacts or family wealth.
@GW - Do you consider exercising gleaning rights stealing?
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