Rant on: Personal responsibility

[rurallib]

I believe it was yesterday that I was listening to a bit of Tom Ashebrook's 'On Point' on NPR. (our radio selections are limited out here)

The topic must have been unemployment and whether or not extensions of benefits should be extended. During the short section I heard there were about 4 callers who called to raise some variation of 'personal responsibility.' Like most republican talking points, this has been twisted into a weapon to beat those who are down right now.
One after another they declared that
1) there are jobs available if someone wants it
2) those out of work are too picky on what they will do
3) These people are taking advantage of a system that pays them not to work and
4) those not working need to cut their expenses. They don't need to eat out and go to movies etc

There are some points that people should be responsible for decisions they make that they have full control over, such as getting behind the wheel when drunk.
But what good does it do to beat up people for the consequences of decisions made by others. People lost their jobs due to myriad reasons that had little to do with any decisions made personally. If anyone should be beaten for these bad decisions it is GW Bush and his minions and his buddies on Wall Street.
Hillary Clinton was right about it taking a village. Extrapolated to the adult world, within the village we need a shoemaker and people to buy his shoes. Then the shoemaker can buy more material and mabe some food. And then the farmer can buy more seed..... etc. In other words we are interdependent.
And when they (y'all know who they is) beat on people whose chooses to invest in something that fails to live up to the sales pitch why do they not go after the sales person who overhyped a product or investment. Many elderly have watched their life saving melt down to nothing. And the hounds of personal responsibility blame the investor. Often these were class AAAA investments.

And this is why we as a society need rules. So people can make truly educated decisions. We need rules to guard people against the predators. And they must treat the predators harshly, just as we would treat a snake trying to eat our cat.

"Personal Responsibility" = stick it in your ass Newt and Newt-lites. Give me some of those good old-fashioned New Deal regulations!

Rant off.

[bobbolink]

1. A loud bunch of libertarians at DU.

[uncommon]

2. On the flip side...

there are a lot of irresponsible people out there who do cause their own financial problems. I work in a bankruptcy law firm and I have seen everything from a woman with 5 children who husband died suddenly who found herself in trouble (obviously not her fault) to a man who chose to put himself on the hook for a $500K mortgage, $250K boat loan, and various other ten and hundred thousand debts he couldn't repay, for the sake of living the good life.

A lot of people are hurting through no fault of their own - but a lot of people are hurting because they thought the gravy train would never run dry.

[rurallib]

3. Very true. I probably wasn't clear - the right is using another catch phrase

to explain all problems and to beat those who are down on their luck to a pulp.

[uncommon]

6. As they always do...

I just don't believe it helps society to give everyone who has financial problems the benefit of the doubt. We should be extending MORE help and forgiveness to those who have made the best decisions they could and still find themselves in trouble, but making it a little more difficult for those who are irresponsible and choose to screw their creditors to get away with it.

[county worker]

9. I have never gotten a good answer or one I can accept when I ask why did people sign up for home

loans that they could not pay back. It takes two to tango. The lenders were at fault for not following guidelines that they use to follow in the past. And the borrowers were at fault for signing up for payments they could not make. At least thats what goes on in my head.


I'm told that the buyers thought the value if the house would go up and they could refinance and come out ok before the rates adjusted.

If that is true, the question is this. Is it our responsibility to understand what is going on in the economy? I don't think so because we are not educated enough to understand it.

Then the question is this. Why were we living like there was no tomorrow? Borrowing to buy bigger and bigger houses and bigger and bigger pickups and suv's. My answer to that was competition between people who want to look successful to their friends and family.


So I come to the conclusion that yes people lack a certain amount of responsibility but they are too intellectually challenged to understand what that responsibility entails.

We would not be in this economic mess if people could have said no to the debt they couldn't afford to pay back. I doubt they could have done it.

[uncommon]

10. Yes -

people bought into the idea that there would be a big payday at the end of the line - the gravity of what they were signing onto did not occur to them or they didn't care. But this is a failure not only of banks and government but of individuals who lack the intellectual curiosity to fully inform themselves before making decisions with far-reaching consequences.

[gratuitous]

4. Well then, by all means, let us not help the needy

Because some of the greedy might show up. And while it's not always evident from just looking at people which category they fall into, we certainly have no shortage of the Discerners who will let us know without fail that someone may be getting something they don't deserve, so screw 'em all.

[uncommon]

7. Lol that was a bit of an overreaction...

I think that there are plenty of people out there who need and deserve help. I've been in a position to receive such help myself in the past. I just happen to be in a position now to see what people do and how they behave financially and it's appalling - particularly in the somewhat affluent area where our firm is located.

Perhaps there should just be a better vetting system to determine who should get help - truthfully not everyone deserves or even truly needs it. Often those who need it most are denied (as I was for almost all forms of assistance when I was working full time and could not eke out anything close to a living).

[handmade34]

5. So sad; most of us have lost sense of community

and any ability to empathize. We are alienated from each other and can only grasp what we are experiencing ourselves (the securely employed think the unemployed are lazy, until they lose their job).

I am a strong advocate of personal responsibility and also a strong advocate for community and the 'commons' and you are correct, we need rules and regulations within our communities. There certainly are a few who take advantage but they don't at all represent the whole.

I say don't extend the unemployment benefits - as soon you can guarantee a good job to all that need one.

[county worker]

8. Many times I've heard or read that conservatives lack the ability to feel compassion.

I think some of them do feel it but have told themselves that feeling compassion is negative or liberal or something.

For either case there is a need to say what they do about the unemployed so they can let themselves off the hook of feeling that they should be doing something about it. They live in denial and in fantasy land in their heads.

I often wonder how many conservatives are unemployed and are running out of unemployment insurance. Has the unemployment time changed their thinking in any way?

[KonaKane]

11. NPR has become a bullhorn for the right wing.

Which disgusts me to no end. This is just more of the same and why I only listen to our local affiliate because its the classical music station - and then shut it off the second I hear "This is NPR news".

[Odin2005]

12. "Personal Responsibility" is the mantra of Calvinistic morons who don't understand sociology.

The only place when it is appropriate to use the term is in reference to the Freepers that still live in their parents' basement.

Society is an interconnected whole, and people's behavior is wholly determined by one's own genetics and the environment within that society. Moral admonishment doesn't fix anything, to fix things to have to fix the causes. Unfortunately, doing that requires us to drop the delusion of "Free Will", which is unpalatable to most people.

[njalbertini]

13. Are you a sociologist? If so, please run for congress!

Please check out www.electexperts.webs.com and tell your friends.