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December 30, 2006

On Being a Liberal

I don't usually feel a need to define myself politically, or to explain or defend my political sympathies. However, spending the last week or so with a NeoCon and a staunch right-wing Republican have caused me to really think about WHY I think the way I do. My blood pressure tends to rise and make me completely incoherent when I have to listen to people blowing smoke up Bill O'Reilly's ass for four days straight. My father accused me of wanting no one to express an opinion that I don't like. That is absolutely untrue. I think everyone has a right to express their opinion, but not everyone with an opinion needs to have their own TV show so that they can shout it at me.

Here's what it comes down to: People like my father and Adam's father would rather help no one than accidentally see their hard-earned money go to even one person who does not, in their opinion, deserve it. I would rather see a little waste if people who truly need help are getting it. It seems that many conservatives who laud Capitalism and Free Markets think that rights are attached to dollar bills. I feel that responsibility is attached to dollar bills. If you've earned money, absolutely you have a right to spend it they way you want, and I don't think that social conscience can be legislated. But, I think that this world is a very sad place if we don't give a little back and think about the impact of our decisions on the rest of the world. This attitude of "I have a right to waste my own money and resources, but no one else better" is a bit confounding. If I can afford to drive a gas-guzzling SUV, even if I don't really "need" it, do I have a "right" to drive it when there may be a cumulative negative impact on others? Sure, I'm not causing anyone immediate bodily harm, but is it really right to wait for the "market" to make it more sensible for me to drive something else? It just seems really narrow to expect that my caring for others is only predicated by what saves (or makes) me money. What happens when we don't care about others as human beings? I am certainly not a shining example of humanitarianism. I tend to see a lot of other people as stupid idiots (and I think there's a lot out there to prove my point), but if I make decisions that negatively impact others over the long haul, I think I'm digging my own grave, so to speak. I just read an article on an anti-sweatshop activist who claims that her research shows that if just 2% of Americans purchased goods differently, the practice would be forced to change. But then I also read something last week claiming that sweatshops are good for people– in that they pay higher wages than the people in those areas are used to and precipitate greater wealth and social change in the communities they are in; people line up for sweatshop jobs. I think once again that that looks only at the economics of it, not at quality of life for those people. Women line up in some cities to become prostitutes too, because it affords more cash than agricultural life in the countryside, but can you argue that the short-term economic "good" is worth what it does to the people involved?

Not everyone can afford to live in such a way that they are completely insulated from the hoi polloi. Besides being lonely, it's just plain impractical and unaffordable for most of us. But I often get the impression that people like my father just don't realize how most people actually live. "Pull yourself up by the bootstraps and make something of yourself." Well, a lot of people haven't got the boots in the first place.

So that's my political rant for now. I suppose I'm a bit of an idealist in a lot of ways, but I really think there's two sides to every story. And I think that I'm better for sharing what little I have.

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