tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8078379512095504946.post1293519774309285213..comments2024-03-26T06:17:49.527-07:00Comments on Had Enough Therapy?: Enjoy Your PrivilegeStuart Schneidermanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12784043736879991769noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8078379512095504946.post-36338867534327266682015-03-23T05:52:42.376-07:002015-03-23T05:52:42.376-07:00If one is spending all their time being jealous of...If one is spending all their time being jealous of others then they are not spending valuable time improving themselves. I, personally have never understood the idea of being envious of others.<br />Each of us has skills, talents and abilities that will serve us well if we will only spend the time developing them. People who have more than I only serve as an inducement to be the best I can be and I am very privileged to live in a country that allows me to become successfully if I am willing to work hard. One even has the ability to define success which may be different than what others may consider success.<br />We are truly the masters of our own destiny in this country at present. All one really has to do is look at the quintile data on who is wealthy and note that large numbers of people move up and down those quintiles. If one thinks about it it is easy to see why. <br />There is an interesting graphic in the Forbes 2015 issue on Billionaires on how they grew up; 23 percent grew up poor, 17 percent grew up in the working class, 30 percent grew up in the middle class, 21 percent grew up in the upper middle class and only 9 percent grew up wealthy. Fully 70 percent of them came from the middle class, not counting upper middle class, or lower. It should surprise no one that many of these are women and minorities.<br />I suspect that many want to believe that there is a privileged class that makes all the money, but the statistics do not back up those assertions. It is an easy way to explain their own lack or desire to work hard and get ahead.<br />It is human nature to blame our failings on others because we don't want to accept our own contribution to our own success or lack thereof.Dennishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14962996070458991675noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8078379512095504946.post-18287916096750903872015-03-22T21:40:18.627-07:002015-03-22T21:40:18.627-07:00The "God of equality" is an interesting ...The "God of equality" is an interesting phrase but it got me wondering.<br /><br />Tonight I listened to an interview with René Girard, and he had an interesting suggestion of the 'purpose' of religion, in the sense of discounting the enlightenment's view that it was mere superstition.<br />https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g8Y8dVVV4To<br />@43:35-43:55 "The purpose of religion is to control violence. Religion organizes sacrifice and sacrifice innoculates society against the real threat of much worse violence."<br /><br />So at least that idea strikes center on the "God of equality" judgment, although whether its idolatrous worship, or just trying to regain something that we've lost in a diverse culture that fails to unify under a single religion.<br /><br />Girard's theories look into the nature of scapegoating as well, or that is scapegoating is itself the source of the "worse violence", so if society makes billionaires cry at the threat of 39.6% marginal tax rate rather than 35%, perhaps that small sacrifice is a bargain compared to the alternatives?<br /><br />But still we go back to "sacrifice", and nearly all modern ideals want "voluntary action", without compulsion, but we have to go deeper to ask what sacrifice means at all, or should mean.<br /><br />All that we really know is there is no such thing as fairness, and "equality" doubly imaginary, so all rules must be accepted or rejected not on personal self-interest, but some higher value that the majority can recognize.<br /><br />And if such agreement can't be made, where no one wants to sacrifice anything, Girard says we fall back into the ancient scapegoat mechanism where the majority finds a common enemy who can be punished and banished and temporarily restoring social cohesion on a common cause, his "Mimetic desire" theory.<br />https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rene_Girard<br /><br />Ares Olympushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09726811306826601686noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8078379512095504946.post-73207143477680908082015-03-22T17:20:47.333-07:002015-03-22T17:20:47.333-07:00"By indulging in an idolatrous worship of the..."By indulging in an idolatrous worship of the god of equality they can rail against the fact that members of one family have more skill at mathematics while members of another are more talented at spatial reasoning." This is not "privilege", this is genetics/having the right parents.<br /><br />Sam L.https://www.blogger.com/profile/00996809377798862214noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8078379512095504946.post-76513255264121097642015-03-22T10:14:11.257-07:002015-03-22T10:14:11.257-07:00This is the right video:
https://www.youtube.com/...This is the right video:<br /><br />https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sZHCVyllnck<br /><br />priss rulesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8078379512095504946.post-25396004022704659182015-03-22T10:13:13.414-07:002015-03-22T10:13:13.414-07:00It's the age-old dichotomy of spirituality/mor...It's the age-old dichotomy of spirituality/morality vs materiality/pleasure.<br /><br />Jews railed against Mammon but accumulated lots of money. <br /><br />Christians railed against power and wealth but grew rich and powerful. <br /><br />Confucians preached ethics and virtue but were mad about status and privilege. <br /><br />Muslims invoke Allah and virtue but look how the Saudi royal family lives. The Iranian mullahs are very rich too. <br /><br />We like money but we also love moral grandstanding about 'higher values'. <br /><br />Most people are not honest like this guy:<br /><br />https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUxOX7EGpcMpriss rulesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8078379512095504946.post-50278669479402842032015-03-22T09:13:06.440-07:002015-03-22T09:13:06.440-07:00I've had heated discussions with my pastor, an...I've had heated discussions with my pastor, and failed to make any dent in his "social justice" and beliefs like "white privilege." If you focus on inequality is would seem obvious and if you focus on reactions and solutions, it becomes intractible. There's just some nebulous ideal that if we all realized our privilege, we'd be more generous or something.<br /><br />By government intervention, the ideal can be "equal opportunity", and in part that means anti-discrimination, so if you own a business you're not allowed to decide who to hire or who to serve based on race, gender, age, religion, and sexual-orientation, etc.<br /><br />But even if you agree on all that on principle, you can generate a lot of resentment in individuals who want the freedom to have personal preference and express them, even if it comes out as discriminatory. I've seen Ron Paul and his supporter speak against the loss of freedom of association, and I don't have a simple answer except to see two valid sides that deserve a voice.<br /><br />Privilege is a funny word, implying special status, but the ultimate reductive status symbol is money itself, so if you have money, you can feel a privilege both towards personal entitlement to get whatever you want for yourself, but also to direct that money into politics to slant debate. You can fund think tanks that publish research extracted from predetermined conclusions of what they want to find.<br /><br />re: In a competitive world, some people do better than others. This might not seem right, but it is still true. And it is still advantageous. Without the possibility of success or failure, people would cease to try to improve themselves.<br /><br />I 100% agree with statements like this, but the missing idea for me is the problem also is that society has certain "needs" that will never be given high economic status or value. And worse some "high income" jobs are those that can externalize costs, like gambling casinos for instance.<br /><br />Or apparently being a military contractor is a good field for jobs and investment, and you have a vested interest in more conflict and strife in the world, and then you get crazy things like militarized police forces when there's a surplus of equipment because wars unexpectedly didn't happen.<br /><br />And the privilege of a 15% tax on capital gains and dividends, lower than ordinary income is funny too. Apparently we need a wealth class who will only invest their money if they can keep most of the capital gains, but for those of us with guaranteed wage income, we need to subsidize those risk takers on top. And of course now we'll bail out bad investors, so all you have to do is bow to the will of the federal reserve's direction, and you'll get nearly risk free returns and low taxes to boot.<br /><br />I have to believe something in that social agreement towards the "investment class" is going to crack, but I don't yet see how or when it'll happen.<br /><br />Its hard to imagine we'll ever get back to a 90% top marginal tax rate, but you never know what can happen in a crash. It seems impossible to believe we can survive another 2008 with the same tricks, but maybe the Petrodollar is the only currency that can keep transfering money to the top while the rest of the world burns?<br /><br />If war wasn't likely, I'd imagine things would work out. But with the option of war, the winner is merely the country who can make sure all the violence happens outside of its borders, and again America has an unfair advantage, and we don't have to care, like if Israel or Tehran burns into decade long wars of attrition.<br /><br />Ares Olympushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09726811306826601686noreply@blogger.com