Entitlement
There's those people who think the world owes them something. ...that the earths resources, human labor pool, the rivers, all the land, all the forests, all the oceans, and even the contents of mountains belong to them and that they have the right to use all of this however they want to advance their selves. I'm of course talking about the extremely rich.
Yup.
Our dear Prime Minister, David Cameron, is a millionaire. He had a son who sadly died a few years back. The boy was ill, and disabled. So Mr Cameron claimed Disability Living Allowance, a non-means tested benefit for the disabled (hence millionaires can claim if they fit the criteria), to help with extra costs they may face in life. At most this would pay about £150 per week.
Mr Cameron gets into government, and does away with DLA.
And he says those who are angry about this and other government cuts - by and large, the poorest in society - have a 'sense of entitlement'.
I really don't like him.
That'd be the wealthy white folk.
Sometimes the poor are praised for being thrifty. But to recommend thrift to the poor is both grotesque and insulting. It is like advising a man who is starving to eat less. For a town or country labourer to practise thrift would be absolutely immoral. Man should not be ready to show that he can live like a badly-fed animal. He should decline to live like that, and should either steal or go on the rates, which is considered by many to be a form of stealing. As for begging, it is safer to beg than to take, but it is finer to take than to beg. No: a poor man who is ungrateful, unthrifty, discontented, and rebellious, is probably a real personality, and has much in him. He is at any rate a healthy protest. As for the virtuous poor, one can pity them, of course, but one cannot possibly admire them. They have made private terms with the enemy, and sold their birthright for very bad pottage. They must also be extraordinarily stupid. I can quite understand a man accepting laws that protect private property, and admit of its accumulation, as long as he himself is able under those conditions to realise some form of beautiful and intellectual life. But it is almost incredible to me how a man whose life is marred and made hideous by such laws can possibly acquiesce in their continuance.
Damn right.
Sweetleaf
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I find entitlement has nothing to do with class, nor does it have anything with what your skin color. It has more to do with personality and character. I know poor who feel entitled, I know poor people who don't. I know middle class folks who feel entitled and those who don't. I've met (don't hang around much rich folk, but I'm related to a few) rich people who feel entitled and I've met those who don't. I know black people who feel entitled and know some that don't. I know hispanic people who feel entitled and I know those who don't.
Those who feel entitled are loud and obnoxious. They want the world to know how much they "deserve" things. It creates an illusion of the group appearing larger than what it really is. It's the same with extremists.
Some people just want to watch the world burn. A lot of Republican (if you can even call that that. It's an insult to the Republicans of the past) politicians do the same things. They spout messages like how evil welfare is, but then the only way to keep their businesses afloat is to give them welfare!
The bounty of nature belongs to those who have the will and the means to partake thereof. The alternative would be this: in order to pick one apple from a wild apple tree, one would have to ask the permission of every human on earth. That is clearly not feasible, so the apple go to the one who can reach it.
ruveyn
Exactly. Well said.
nominalist
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Workers are owed the fruit of their labor. That "fruit" is stolen by capitalists.
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thomas81
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thomas81
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The bounty of nature belongs to those who have the will and the means to partake thereof. The alternative would be this: in order to pick one apple from a wild apple tree, one would have to ask the permission of every human on earth. That is clearly not feasible, so the apple go to the one who can reach it.
ruveyn
Collectively speaking, the dispossesed have the means to take it from the elite of your heirarchy of 'means to partake' so it is a circular argument. Moreover its a flawed analogy in the first instance because there is nothing natural about this heirarchy, it a flimsy system based on human created constructs that have little or no commonality with the rest of the animal kingdom or even many human societies.
The bounty of nature belongs to no given individual. The bounty of nature as you put it, just is.
thomas81
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Our dear Prime Minister, David Cameron, is a millionaire. He had a son who sadly died a few years back. The boy was ill, and disabled. So Mr Cameron claimed Disability Living Allowance, a non-means tested benefit for the disabled (hence millionaires can claim if they fit the criteria), to help with extra costs they may face in life. At most this would pay about £150 per week.
Mr Cameron gets into government, and does away with DLA.
And he says those who are angry about this and other government cuts - by and large, the poorest in society - have a 'sense of entitlement'.
I really don't like him.
Hear hear.
I never thought I'd say this. but I wish Labour was in charge again. Thats after they abolished free university education and lumbered me with a five figure debt.
Those who feel entitled are loud and obnoxious. They want the world to know how much they "deserve" things. It creates an illusion of the group appearing larger than what it really is. It's the same with extremists.
The bounty of nature belongs to those who have the will and the means to partake thereof. The alternative would be this: in order to pick one apple from a wild apple tree, one would have to ask the permission of every human on earth. That is clearly not feasible, so the apple go to the one who can reach it.
ruveyn
Translation: Might makes right.
In that case why do we need laws? And why is it when a stronger person takes from a weaker person it is the stronger one who is presumed to have a 'sense of entitlement'.....
The middle class, not so much.
It appears the American middle class is quite entitled. They think they are entitled to live inefficiently, living in McMansions and driving gas guzzling behemoth vehicles, until the end of time. Don't seem to realize that if everyone on earth lived the way they did there simply would not be enough energy. It's simply not going to last forever