I really appreciated your conversation with Daniel Bessner and I am very surprised by the level of hostility shown towards him by Alex McKeon and many people on your YouTube channel. I see that unfortunately many take it for granted that Soviet Union was "evil" and that the United States are "good", which is a perfect example of simplistic, biased and Manichean thinking.
I see, too, that some of the commentators actually believe that mentally ill people, intellectually disabled people and addicted people deserve to live in the streets, that homelessness is an adequate punishment for "not being rational enough".
Black people make up about 40% of the homeless in the US. Even if all these homeless Black people were indeed mentally ill, intellectually disabled or addicted to various substances (which is certainly not the case), doesn't the racial disparity speak volumes about the nature of capitalism and the nature of the US society?
I always appreciate your comments on all kinds of issues and your openness to others' views. However, I find it very sad that your "Conservatism" (what a reductive label...) and your attitude towards the excesses of "wokeism" attract lots of people who seem to reject the very idea of social justice.
I am firmly convinced that one can be committed both to the idea of personal responsibility and to the idea of social justice. I believe that people, including very poor people, can make good or bad choices which deeply affect their lives. At the same time, however, we have to remember that the opportunities available to the poor are not the same as the opportunities available to middle- and upper-middle class people.
And every human being has basic human rights, which include "a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control" (The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 25, 1).
The majority of homeless people are there due to 1) substance abuse and 2) mental illness. To the former, there is no shortage of programs that will help someone kick an addiction, but none work without the individual willingly participating. The latter is part of the national disgrace that is mental health, extending beyond the homeless, but we're not going to round up the unstable and forcibly institutionalize them.
There is also a third group, which slightly overlaps the first - people who choose life on the streets. Yes, choose. I've seen them. Many police departments have homeless units that know people in this population by name and will do periodic welfare checks on them. But again, we're not going to round them up, either, and force them to live by societal norms of getting job and paying bills and all the rest.
This has nothing to do with what people deserve or capitalism; it has to do with the choices that people make and the consequences that stem from them. Places like LA., San Francisco, and Seattle don't have a homeless problem because of capitalism; they have a homeless program because govt action has this way of making things worse by doing nothing to change people lifestyles and a great deal to encourage more of the same. When police stop reacting to the property crimes that are rampant, you don't just get more property crime; you also wind up with an increase in violent crime as bad behavior escalates.
The UN is welcome to its lofty opinions but no one has a right to housing, clothing, and all the rest at the expense of third parties. Those are things that fall to the individual to obtain. Some of us see freedom from meddling and harassment by busybody groups who want to reach into our pockets as a basic human right, too. I'm all for helping people but they have to be invested in helping themselves.
I do support freedom from meddling and harassment. I absolutely don't think that mentally ill people should be rounded up and forcibly institutionalized.
At the same time, when you say "this has nothing to do with what people deserve or capitalism; it has to do with the choices that people make and the consequences that stem from them", you forget that 1. no one chooses to be mentally ill or addicted to substances (not to even speak of intellectual or physical disabilities); 2. people don't make choices in a vacuum and don't bear the consequences of these choices in a vacuum.
As an example, a person who has affluent parents and can rely on their support is not in the same situation as the child of a low-income single mother. Various bad choices have much more painful consequences for people who are poor. E.g. an affluent woman who uses hard drugs is extremely unlikely to become a street prostitute in order to finance her habit.
You say: "The UN is welcome to its lofty opinions but no one has a right to housing, clothing, and all the rest at the expense of third parties. Those are things that fall to the individual to obtain." This is your opinion, not an objective rule. And it is not true that individuals simply "obtain" all these things thanks to hard work - people can e.g. inherit houses or apartments. You also forget about the so-called "working poor" and about people who are unable to work.
As to things obtained "at the expense of third parties", you forget that many people are actually exploiting others - and not merely in order to satisfy their most basic needs, but in order to be rich or to become even richer.
You also missed the fact that cities like LA, San Francisco etc have a shortage of affordable housing because of state and city zoning and other regulations making it very expensive to build as well as a profound NIMBY-ist hypocrisy of the populace who regularly vote down proposals to build multi-family/multi-unit dwellings in those areas. They decry the lack of affordable housing but then block construction of said housing in their own neighborhoods.
I really appreciated your conversation with Daniel Bessner and I am very surprised by the level of hostility shown towards him by Alex McKeon and many people on your YouTube channel. I see that unfortunately many take it for granted that Soviet Union was "evil" and that the United States are "good", which is a perfect example of simplistic, biased and Manichean thinking.
I see, too, that some of the commentators actually believe that mentally ill people, intellectually disabled people and addicted people deserve to live in the streets, that homelessness is an adequate punishment for "not being rational enough".
Black people make up about 40% of the homeless in the US. Even if all these homeless Black people were indeed mentally ill, intellectually disabled or addicted to various substances (which is certainly not the case), doesn't the racial disparity speak volumes about the nature of capitalism and the nature of the US society?
I always appreciate your comments on all kinds of issues and your openness to others' views. However, I find it very sad that your "Conservatism" (what a reductive label...) and your attitude towards the excesses of "wokeism" attract lots of people who seem to reject the very idea of social justice.
I am firmly convinced that one can be committed both to the idea of personal responsibility and to the idea of social justice. I believe that people, including very poor people, can make good or bad choices which deeply affect their lives. At the same time, however, we have to remember that the opportunities available to the poor are not the same as the opportunities available to middle- and upper-middle class people.
And every human being has basic human rights, which include "a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control" (The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 25, 1).
The majority of homeless people are there due to 1) substance abuse and 2) mental illness. To the former, there is no shortage of programs that will help someone kick an addiction, but none work without the individual willingly participating. The latter is part of the national disgrace that is mental health, extending beyond the homeless, but we're not going to round up the unstable and forcibly institutionalize them.
There is also a third group, which slightly overlaps the first - people who choose life on the streets. Yes, choose. I've seen them. Many police departments have homeless units that know people in this population by name and will do periodic welfare checks on them. But again, we're not going to round them up, either, and force them to live by societal norms of getting job and paying bills and all the rest.
This has nothing to do with what people deserve or capitalism; it has to do with the choices that people make and the consequences that stem from them. Places like LA., San Francisco, and Seattle don't have a homeless problem because of capitalism; they have a homeless program because govt action has this way of making things worse by doing nothing to change people lifestyles and a great deal to encourage more of the same. When police stop reacting to the property crimes that are rampant, you don't just get more property crime; you also wind up with an increase in violent crime as bad behavior escalates.
The UN is welcome to its lofty opinions but no one has a right to housing, clothing, and all the rest at the expense of third parties. Those are things that fall to the individual to obtain. Some of us see freedom from meddling and harassment by busybody groups who want to reach into our pockets as a basic human right, too. I'm all for helping people but they have to be invested in helping themselves.
I do support freedom from meddling and harassment. I absolutely don't think that mentally ill people should be rounded up and forcibly institutionalized.
At the same time, when you say "this has nothing to do with what people deserve or capitalism; it has to do with the choices that people make and the consequences that stem from them", you forget that 1. no one chooses to be mentally ill or addicted to substances (not to even speak of intellectual or physical disabilities); 2. people don't make choices in a vacuum and don't bear the consequences of these choices in a vacuum.
As an example, a person who has affluent parents and can rely on their support is not in the same situation as the child of a low-income single mother. Various bad choices have much more painful consequences for people who are poor. E.g. an affluent woman who uses hard drugs is extremely unlikely to become a street prostitute in order to finance her habit.
You say: "The UN is welcome to its lofty opinions but no one has a right to housing, clothing, and all the rest at the expense of third parties. Those are things that fall to the individual to obtain." This is your opinion, not an objective rule. And it is not true that individuals simply "obtain" all these things thanks to hard work - people can e.g. inherit houses or apartments. You also forget about the so-called "working poor" and about people who are unable to work.
As to things obtained "at the expense of third parties", you forget that many people are actually exploiting others - and not merely in order to satisfy their most basic needs, but in order to be rich or to become even richer.
You also missed the fact that cities like LA, San Francisco etc have a shortage of affordable housing because of state and city zoning and other regulations making it very expensive to build as well as a profound NIMBY-ist hypocrisy of the populace who regularly vote down proposals to build multi-family/multi-unit dwellings in those areas. They decry the lack of affordable housing but then block construction of said housing in their own neighborhoods.