02-20-2010, 09:09 PM
(02-20-2010, 08:07 PM)Cracker Wrote: I used to think that. In fact, I wasn't raised in a rich family so I shared the common "poor us, it could be anybody" attitude. Know what? Extreme poverty is a choice. Any American can change their lot in life through education and hard work. Is it tough to do? Yeah, that's why some take the easy way out and continue to live a life despair. There are too many success stories out there to even claim otherwise.
It doesn't do any good to feel sorry for people. They already feel sorry for themselves. It DOES help to look someone in the eye and tell them the truth.
Impoverished peoples (and I know most are white because a larger proportion of the US population is currently white) think, do, and spend differently than people with higher incomes. Look it up sometime.
It may piss you off, but the truth remains. The last thing impoverished people need is pity. What they do need is exposure to different ways of conducting life besides bitching and moaning and blaming someone else.
That's a great speech but none of those are mutually exclusive. You can feel sorry for someone while still being truthful with them and supporting a hand-up, not a hand-out.
Further, you suggest that these people "need exposure to different ways of conducting life". Are you proposing armies of people going in to poverty striken areas to enlighten them? Or maybe, fixing up all the shitty schools so they get exposure to something different that way? That's great...and there go our tax dollars. Everything costs money. Our current, shitty, abused welfare system probably costs less and that's why its allowed to continue. Everyone is busy guarding the money coming out of their paychecks (rightfully so) but that same mentality also prevents us from thinking long term and actually taking the steps to reduce the need for welfare in the first place.
Commando Cunt Queen