Why the Christian right is against the safety net.

[Crepitus]

The same crowd that is against things like welfare and universal healthcare are the people who will loudly proclaim "See? god provides" when a stranger pays for someone else's groceries.

If you are in a system that produces mass suffering you have 2 options.

option one is demand and work for change.

Option two is to reframe the suffering as "meaningful". Suffering becomes the test. An act of kindness or generosity inside the suffering becomes a miracle.

Option two is cheaper and comes with a tiktok following.

The system that caused the suffering? That's forgotten background noise because everyone is busy staring at the "miracle moment" instead of the system that made it necessary.

The worse the suffering the more powerful the miracle has to be to balance it.

That means the people running the system have an incentive to keep it in place. Don't fix it, pray about it. Better publicity that way. A working safety net doesn't generate viral videos.

The suffering is what generates the "redemption arc", so the suffering can't stop. The feel good moment needs someone else's pain to make it work. The con only works if the pain continues.

 

[Spaniard22]

A quote by Milton Friedman

You cannot simultaneously have free immigration and a welfare state. ... I am in favor of the unilateral reduction of tariffs, but the movement of goods ...

www.goodreads.com

 

[DGS49]

As a card-carrying member of the "Christian Right" (formerly, the "great right-wing conspiracy"), I can shed a little light on this.

We kinda like the Federal government to behave in a way that is consistent with the U.S. Constitution. There is NOTHING in the U.S. Constitution that gives Congress the power to enact a "social safety net." Nothing. Not a word, not an inference…nothing.

We believe two things that are contrary to the government-sponsored Safety Net: Personal responsibility, and "Charity begins at home." In other words, we are personally charitable. We take care of our own, we belong to churches that have scores of 'community outreach' initiatives, we give to food banks, etc.

The Left has created this phony notion that confiscating money from other people, then distributing it to favored groups constitutes "charity" and "kindness" on our part. This is - how you say? - bullshit.

To the extent that there must be a "safety net," it starts with personal responsibility, then extends to family, then community (or church), then local government, then to State government. And that's where it ends.

Confiscating OPM then passing it out to your favored demographics is not altruism. It is theft.

 

[Crepitus]

As a card-carrying member of the "Christian Right" (formerly, the "great right-wing conspiracy"), I can shed a little light on this.

We kinda like the Federal government to behave in a way that is consistent with the U.S. Constitution. There is NOTHING in the U.S. Constitution that gives Congress the power to enact a "social safety net." Nothing. Not a word, not an inference…nothing.

We believe two things that are contrary to the government-sponsored Safety Net: Personal responsibility, and "Charity begins at home." In other words, we are personally charitable. We take care of our own, we belong to churches that have scores of 'community outreach' initiatives, we give to food banks, etc.

The Left has created this phony notion that confiscating money from other people, then distributing it to favored groups constitutes "charity" and "kindness" on our part. This is - how you say? - bullshit.

To the extent that there must be a "safety net," it starts with personal responsibility, then extends to family, then community (or church), then local government, then to State government. And that's where it ends.

Confiscating OPM then passing it out to your favored demographics is not altruism. It is theft.

the "general welfare".

 

[Crepitus]

A quote by Milton Friedman

You cannot simultaneously have free immigration and a welfare state. ... I am in favor of the unilateral reduction of tariffs, but the movement of goods ...

www.goodreads.com

Good thing we don't have that.

 

[Woodznutz]

The same crowd that is against things like welfare and universal healthcare are the people who will loudly proclaim "See? god provides" when a stranger pays for someone else's groceries.

If you are in a system that produces mass suffering you have 2 options.

option one is demand and work for change.

Option two is to reframe the suffering as "meaningful". Suffering becomes the test. An act of kindness or generosity inside the suffering becomes a miracle.

Option two is cheaper and comes with a tiktok following.

The system that caused the suffering? That's forgotten background noise because everyone is busy staring at the "miracle moment" instead of the system that made it necessary.

The worse the suffering the more powerful the miracle has to be to balance it.

That means the people running the system have an incentive to keep it in place. Don't fix it, pray about it. Better publicity that way. A working safety net doesn't generate viral videos.

The suffering is what generates the "redemption arc", so the suffering can't stop. The feel good moment needs someone else's pain to make it work. The con only works if the pain continues.

Not much one can do for people who bring suffering on themselves. While our social safety net is generous it also kicks out those who are slackers.