I object to being labelled as selfish when I voted for freedom and personal responsibility. It bothers me that people do not see the bondage socialism brings/represents - I struggle when thinking people like yourself are so clearly pro-left. I wonder if I'm missing something.
The quote (slightly paraphrased for clarity of meaning outside the original longer paragraph) is from an email from a friend this morning. I know she reads here and hope she won't mind that I've copied her words as the prompt for responding to her thoughts here. They feed into some other related topics which I want to thrash out myself.
I come from a working class and small farmer background. I also come from a solidly national voting background on both sides. I remember as a small child in pyjamas waiting in total silence as we watched the news at six o'clock to find out if Dad, a freezing worker, would go back to work the next day. The strikes sometimes lasted many weeks and they were not empowering for my father. He has often said that there is nothing wrong with capitalism, just that he is on the wrong end of it. My maternal grandfather was a big fan of Robert Muldoon. He owns all of his books. I do believe that he is also quite proud of how the farming industry responded to the dramatic changes when the sector was deregulated in the 1980s.
I grew up Roman Catholic, one of a tiny handful of Catholic children in my class each year. There was no Catholic school in the area at the time and so we were all at the local state school.
Ideas about the deserving and undeserving poor were clearly stated as I grew up. The underserving also seemed to include those late to Mass. I cannot tell you how completely undeserving I am these days.
What is freedom? Freedom to have sex with multiple partners? Freedom to abort in the second trimester? Freedom as a GP to charge as much as one wishes? Freedom to educate ones child wherever one wants? Freedom of speech? The freedom of a decent wage? Freedom to use high or low energy efficiency cars and other appliances?
What exactly is insurance? Is it only a private concept, paid for by ourselves as individuals to protect us against everything which might go wrong and cost money? Is it something which is partly or fully paid for in taxes so that a family or individual might not be ruined by the misfortune of an accident which stops the person from working for a time.
Health care. Who should bear responsibility for our health? Is the collective use of taxes to support our population into the best health possible, irrespective of the person's ability to pay, a moral and financial priority?
Whose children are they? Should our education system be geared to provide the best possible opportunities for all children, regardless of their home resource? Can this be done in a way which also respects and supports those who wish to opt out of institutional education provision and teach their children themselves?
These are just some of the questions which I find relevant to my decisions when I participate in my democracy, our democracy. I am sure there are more which I haven't yet remembered tonight. Where I come from cannot but inform my position, but it is not a position of received assumptions.
I am going to leave my responses to these questions for a separate post later this week when I have had more time to reflect. Going back to the original quote, where the idea of bondage to socialism is raised, I would for the moment suggest that we are in bondage to something. Whether we are in bondage to fate, to God (I realise the believers will consider us all to be so regardless of choice whereas others will see this as the same as bondage to fate - I mean that if we are governed by the teaching of a God, then that is a form of bondage), to an earthly master or to the thrall of marketing images in a consumer society, all of these things are indeed a form of bondage. It is not a matter of not being in bondage as human beings, but how and to whom we are in bondage.
We all must bear personal responsibility for our lives and for our decisions and for our responses to the decisions of others. It is true that ideas about personal responsibility differ and can be shaped by political ideology. I am very wary of the idea that any political landscape prevents personal responsibility.
More another time. Please feel very welcome to post comments on this post. Anything which sharpens our ideas on what we want to give and receive in our democracy has to be good.
It's better made at home
2 weeks ago
9 comments:
uhh yeah what you said.. lol..
i guess my simplistic answer is that i *like* having someone who's sole job is to make sure we're all looked after as well as they can possibly manage, i don't personally have the time, energy or nous to look after those less fortunate who require help, and i like that fact that those too selfish to help are forced to do so too ;)
i *much* prefer the idea of a community that looks after each other, rather than a 'fend for yourself' attitude...
but of course one of my dreams would be to sit in on a meeting of Gandhi, Mandela, and the dalai lama ;)
When I hear of 'bondage to the socialist system' and taunts of a 'nanny state' I do think of the continuum in psychology where the highest state of moral thought is when one makes decisions for the greater good, rather than for one's own personal gain.
It does appear - statistically - that the areas in New Zealand with the highest university degrees per capita are pretty red and green. I'm not saying that going to University necessarily makes one smarter, but it is a measure of educational attainment.
I guess what I am trying to say - though I'm sure to offend many - is that I view voting left as a thinking person's (often an educated person's) conscious choice for the greater good. And yes, the converse of this is that I think you're a bit stupid if you voted for John Key.
Yeah. What they said. :-)
Has anyone reading this blog watched or read the film or the book The Hollow Men? I've seen the film and while Favourite Handyman at the time said surely everyone knows what is in the film, I don't think that everyone does know. I wouldn't rule out a thinking person making an informed choice to vote to the right, but whether they are voting in persons of thoughtful and precise intellect who can serve the country well is much less clear.
I need to come back to charity and tory benevolence at a later stage.
The term 'nanny state' drives me mad. I don't mind people specifically challenging state involvement in a certain area of our lives and asking what other ways good results can be achieved, but the write off catch all phrase of nanny state does not engage, imo, with real efforts to create a healthier society. The other catch all derogatory phrase which drives me nuts is "political correctness". I'm not scared of equity. It is a goal worth pursuing.
I guess I'd better say something ;-) Interesting idea about bondage - don't think I disagree, but neither do I think being in bondage to a loving God who has the best interests of everyone at heart is the same as being in bondage to someone who can tell you how to live your life (without actually knowing the best way - whereas, in my belief, as God made us, He knows what will be best for us)....people tend to think socialism looks after the poor - I see it preventing them from living as they would like - eg a friend who wnated to homeschool, but because she was on a benefit, had to go back to work when child turned five - educating him was not considered to be real work. She had to choose between taking state money and raising her child as she saw fit. That's where I think "the church" (people, not institution) should be stepping in and helping her make the choice she wanted to - I've seen such community happen in another case.
But for the record, I might be as late to mass as you Sandra!!!! Done lots of temple-ing recently though.
Oh, and I have not done your post justice, but I;m about to lose the internet connection any minute so wanted to at least post something!
But Rachael how does the state prevent the church community from supporting your friend? And I do suspect that she could have won her case to home educate if she wanted to enough. It's not only solo parents who can experience officials being unhelpful about home educating, but parents who want to enough can almost always make it happen (in NZ) in terms of the legal stuff.
Why is voting for "freedom and personal responsibility" seen as the antithesis of "making decisions for the greater good"?
Why do we assume that if only people were educated (just like "us") then they would think just like us? Two rational, compassionate people may reach two very different conclusions when presented with the same material.
Why are we comforted if we believe that we are being looked after by a higher (human) power? Humans are fallible and prone to multiple vices (love of power et al. )
Why do we presume that red is always aligned with green?
I suspect that the correlation between educational attainment and voting red or green relates not to how educated the group is but to the higher proportion of people working in the tertiary sector. Health, education and other state sector jobs tend to lean towards the left. But there are many very bright and often well-educated people in business and self-employment who see a clear rationale for voting to the right.
I am personally really disappointed by a visitor to our home recently who explained how everyone must vote for what is best for themselves and their children and that my nuclear family should be pleased about the recession as it would bring prices down for us.
I am beginning to know of a few people who see their politics as blue and green. I've yet to get my head around that. Perhaps it is a sign of how widespread the awareness of environmental issues and their urgency has become.
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