The Long Slide into Loserhood

People who advocate self-reliance -- and stick to it even when it might be personally advantageous to change views -- got one thing right: "Don't allow yourself to become a victim."

Bad stuff happens to everybody, but victims allow themselves to be called victims. They jump up and call in when ambulance chasers advertise in hopes of draining some corporate wallet. If they become fat, the sue McDonalds's for making food taste good. If they lose support in the dice game that is the stock market, they occupy Wall Street. If they sign a mortgage that has a low but variable interest rate and it goes up, they complain loudly about the unscrupulous mortgage companies that tricked them. They sign their mortgage papers and then walk away blaming the banks. They lose their jobs, lose their houses and blame the banks, the politicians, the wind in the willows, for their problems. Their attention goes to blaming someone or something, not what they are responsible for causing and what they can do to dig their way out.

Victims are not made by criminals, banks, fast food restaurants or big business. They are made the instant a person decides they have been victimized and then assign blame to someone or something else. The instant they do that, they have declared themselves powerless against the evil this or that responsible for all their problems.

Non-victims expect to have to support themselves, take care of things, earn more than they spend, etc. They can be wealthy or poor, but whatever station they occupy in life, they figure it was themselves that got them there. The United States is the most affluent country in the history of the world per capita, and they figure if they are failing, it's their own damn fault. If they are succeeding, they also take a big share of the credit, while acknowledging the good things about the country that offers abundant opportunity, protections against unfairness etc.

Victims love to talk about their victimization, they focus on it, it becomes their life. It defines them, and their appeals for pity -- overt or cleverly disguised -- is an appeal for support, for others to pitch in and guarantee the survival the victim is unwilling to pursue directly.

It takes a village and lots of tax money to support a self-designated victim. "My wife ran away and I will never recover from it," soon degenerates into appeals for pity, an explanation as to why the house is a mess, the car has flat tires, the victim lost his job, etc. And if the loss was caused by a traffic accident the person goes after the city department of streets, the car manufacturer (remember the Pinto?) the air bag manufacturer, the other driver, the other driver's insurance company, etc. etc. And every win in court is a nail in the coffin of his own self-reliance.

If a non-victim loses his job, he may not like it, but he'll take a look at what he did or didn't do to contribute to the firing or layoff. If the work he did is greater than the income he got, he figures he did more than enough, and the company was either stupid or mismanaged and he's ready to find a job with a better-managed company. The victim will mope around for months or years, blame his former employer, live off unemployment, goof off, blame the economy, blame the dog, etc. and refuse to look for jobs at a lower salary.

We make our children into victims, by drilling into them that they have some learning disability, that they are ADHD and have to take medication because "their little brains are messed up." So the kid learns that to avoid work, escape unpleasant situations, etc. he just brings up his little brain, people feel sorry for him (or beat him up, which makes him even more of a victim) and his parents sue the bullies. The only way a kid can keep bullies at bay is to attack them. It doesn't really matter if he wins or loses. If he shows fear, runs away, shows the bullies his anxiety pills, he's doomed!

Kids do get picked on, abused, used and mistreated and that is not a small thing. But to smother the kid with sympathy, etc. is not useful. Tell him he's OK, he'll recover, rub dirt on it, get busy with other things. And in the meantime, raise hell behind the scenes with child abusers, send the bastards to prison if warranted. if a kid gets picked on, make him or her face it! That's what karate classes are for, work your way out of it, face your bullies and most often they disappear. Show fear and that's the beginning of a long slide into loserhood.

If some company cheats you, sue them and get your money back. But don't go around showing your wounds or suing for a million dollars for "pain and suffering," because the instant you do that, you've elected that company your oppressor. Them: "big strong oppressor." You: "poor weak creature."

There is no more vicious opponent than a victim who has made his victimization into a crusade against those who fail to accord him the respect, deference and pity he feels he deserves. If you fail to move aside, provide half your parking lot in the chance he might dine at your restaurant, have steps instead of a ramp, you'll get sued -- not by just anyone, but by a self-righteous avenger who has come full circle and is ready to attack those who fail to properly defer to the great burden he carries. Self-appointed victims are constantly proving how right they are to be in the situation they are in and how wrong you are to ignore them.

Our society, in its attempt to provide equal opportunity, has legislated certain benefits for the poor, and the disadvantaged, and that's to its credit. However, it has also penalized the "fat cats" as the media calls them.

Let's assume for a minute that the wealthy are rich because they are productive. OK, maybe some of the scions of hotel magnates are an exception, but the magnates have a right to bestow wealth on their children and heirs. So let's assume the rich are rich because they (or one of their predecessors) have been very productive and have provided a benefit to society. They made cars, built hotels, provided groceries, etc. etc. And let's assume that the poor are poor because they haven't been productive and haven't provided much of value to society.

The so-called "progressive income tax" penalizes the productive and rewards the unproductive. You penalize the productive by grabbing a larger percentage of their income than the rest of us. You reward the unproductive by not taking any of their income, and by giving them extra benefits paid for by the wealthy. At a personal level, that seems to make sense. After all, "the wealthy can afford it," and "the poor need help." However, from a larger perspective, all centralized and managed economies that penalize the productive and reward the unproductive eventually fail. The Soviet Union went broke, Cuba is on the ropes, Zimbabwe's productive citizens have fled and the economy is in ruins. China -- to lift its economy -- had to open the doors to capitalism. A Goldman-Sachs executive, interviewed on NPR this morning said that the Chinese Communist Party has become a sort of Chamber of Commerce.

While many good-hearted people voluntarily give to charity, endow non-profits and foundations, the progressive income tax is not voluntary, and any advantage accorded through it is attacked as a "loophole." If Warren Buffet doesn't think he pays enough taxes, that's great! Let him contribute more, but don't mandate it for everyone.

OK, lots of but.. but.. buts.. around these subjects. The poor can't help themselves, should we just let them die in the streets? No we shouldn't. But require something in return. A contribution or some kind of exchange for welfare not only helps the country, it gives those receiving public or private charity some basis for pride. Welfare reform decades ago horrified some -- they said requiring work for welfare would penalize the poor, cripple families, wreak havoc with social stability. It worked, however, and was a great success.

Many poor don't know English -- so do like Sweden does and require all students to learn English. Don't forbid Spanish, but require English, and don't do the "bilingual" classes for Spanish-speaking people that are taught only in Spanish, as Jaime Escalante pointed out in an interview years ago.

If the poor can't find jobs because they are uneducated and illiterate, fix the schools, and help them get a good education. Provide tutors, focus on education instead of on obesity, drugs, psychology and bullying. And stop providing breakfast and lunch for students. That's the parent's responsibility. Teach kids to make sandwiches, and teach them to work as janitors as Newt Gingrich suggested to the outrage of some. I went to a two-room school in a logging camp, and an eighth grade girl was the school janitor. We respected her because if we littered, she whacked us.

Require PE for all students. That handles obesity, increases self-confidence, etc. OK so the obese kids get laughed at, so help them work hard and lose it. Don't put them in special basket weaving classes because they are too fat to stand up. Stop blaming companies for making food that tastes good, provide lists of ingredients so people know what they're eating, but let the parents decide.

People are a lot tougher than we give them credit for. What makes them weak is sympathy, pity, "oh you poor poor child," and so on. The trick is not to be mean-spirited, but to shy away from pity and any hint that the child or the adult is a victim. As one assigns someone else as oppressor, they immediately assign self as victim. The oppressor is the hammer, the victim is the nail. And nails don't do well in any society, no matter how civilized or affluent.

As for the drug dealers? Drug dealers -- whether selling crank on the streets or paying doctors under the table to recommend their dangerous antidepressants -- decided to make people into slaves for their own profit. They create victims of their products, and become wealthy by destroying lives, not contributing to society. Throw them to the wolves.

Death is Good for Social Security

It's a good thing people die, or our Social Security system would be broke. Luckily they all do die, although unfortunately more and more of them are living longer. Used to be they'd retire at 62, sit around reading the paper for a year or two and then die, leaving lots of dollars in the system. Now, they think they have a right to live into their 80s, play golf, go fishing, start a small business or worse yet, go back to work and get a paycheck as well as their Social Security check.

Then there's those who are almost dead, but refuse to go. The numbers of people collecting Social Security Disability are growing almost as fast as those getting prescriptions for medical marijuana.

And then the government makes it worse, by requiring pictures of smokers on cigarette packs -- faces caved in, all wrinkley and saggy, holes in their necks, etc. So if they keep on discouraging smoking, people are just going to live longer, making the financial situation even worse. This anti-smoking deal really has backfired in my opinion. When I was a kid, all the adults and most of the kids smoked, and every year a few would start coughing up nasty stuff into a handkerchief and then they'd disappear with a little notice in the paper.

And then the government, in its infinite wisdom, starts going after fat people. We used to make fun of them in school, but that wasn't to make them lose weight, it was to make them feel bad, which is a whole different thing entirely. So now restaurants have to say how many calories each menu item has, so the eater can eat less, lose weight, feel better, start exercising -- you see where this is going -- and add years to their lives and suck millions more dollars out of the Social Security fund.

It seems to me that the government is fighting itself on this one. Keep people safe on one hand, and worry about Social Security going broke on the other. Clean air, clean water, no pesticides, no smoking, seat belts, air bags, helmets, drivers have to be sober and be old enough to see over the dashboard to drive, etc.

So my idea to solve this problem is upside down insurance. The longer you live, the more you have to pay the government. Pretty soon you got no money and you're eating Chinese dog food with melamine in it, kidneys give out, problem solved. Or you could allow electric wheelchairs onto the interstates.