Emily's Cat
Rarely prone to hissy-fits
Avoiding a derail, originally from here:
Many progressive notions are also based on this oppressed vs oppressor assumption, and they often exhibit the same style of oversimplification that Marx assumed. Race relations in the US, for example, are framed as if it's inescapably black vs white, and as if black people can only be viewed as oppressed and white people can only be viewed as oppressor. That's the underlying premise of anti-racism, and it's embedded throughout critical race theory. It's also the foundational framework for queer theory, gender studies, and modern liberal feminism, among many other topics. While it's rarely stated outright, there's a common thematic approach in these progressive concepts that frames whoever has been labeled 'oppressor' as being malicious and selfish, motivated purely by greed and a desire for power over others; similarly it frames the 'oppressed' as being powerless, noble, and it excuses them from any responsibility for their own outcomes.
Me... I'm a bit more pragmatic. People are not black and white. Nobody is wholly evil, and nobody is wholly good, nobody has complete control over the course of their lives, but neither are they impotent to alter that course.
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Opinions vary, but this might be one of the views I hold that actually *is* fairly conservative: Each nation should have a duty to prioritize the needs and opportunities of its own citizens above the profits of shareholders - especially if those shares can be purchased by foreign investors. I think it's irresponsible to have a system in which US businesses end up prioritizing the returns for foreign investors above the quality of life of their fellow citizens.
Marx' approach was strictly based on class, even though such classes were poorly defined. That said, the foundation of Marx's approach was premised on an insurmountable conflict between the 'oppressed' and the 'oppressor'. Woven throughout their philosophy is an unspoken assumption that each can only be one thing, and that there's no overlap between them. That of course is an absurd notion... but philosophy in general quite frequently oversimplifies complex relationships.
Many progressive notions are also based on this oppressed vs oppressor assumption, and they often exhibit the same style of oversimplification that Marx assumed. Race relations in the US, for example, are framed as if it's inescapably black vs white, and as if black people can only be viewed as oppressed and white people can only be viewed as oppressor. That's the underlying premise of anti-racism, and it's embedded throughout critical race theory. It's also the foundational framework for queer theory, gender studies, and modern liberal feminism, among many other topics. While it's rarely stated outright, there's a common thematic approach in these progressive concepts that frames whoever has been labeled 'oppressor' as being malicious and selfish, motivated purely by greed and a desire for power over others; similarly it frames the 'oppressed' as being powerless, noble, and it excuses them from any responsibility for their own outcomes.
Me... I'm a bit more pragmatic. People are not black and white. Nobody is wholly evil, and nobody is wholly good, nobody has complete control over the course of their lives, but neither are they impotent to alter that course.
Honestly, I don't think I'm "right" at all. I have very few views that are even conservative, and those are based in the concept of fiduciary responsibility rather than political ideology. Most of my views are historically liberal, some are libertarian. My general approach is to maximize personal freedom within reason, minimize the opportunity to infringe upon the freedom of others, provide collective benefit for those few things that are inefficient in a competitive market (utilities, for example), provide a minimum viable safety net that focuses on 'teaching a person to fish' and enables progress toward self-sufficiency, and a market that includes well-thought out regulation for consumer protection against exploitation and profiteering, and a very strict respect for personal privacy provided nobody is being harmed. To me, there's rarely a singular solution to any problem, it's a matter of finding a balance that works best for most people most of the time.
Probably to a lesser degree. I think we currently have too much wealth inequality... but I also think that some inequality is necessary for innovation. In order to take risks on new ideas, new technologies, new ventures, we need to have at least some people who have enough wealth that the marginal value of a few million is relatively low for them to be willing to invest in something that could be a complete loss. On the other hand, I have some serious philosophical qualms about that capital being in the hands of companies and corporations, especially if those companies are publicly traded. Over the years, I've started to think that stock markets might be a bad idea...
I'm not in favor of programs that prioritize anyone on the basis of external characteristics; I'm adamantly opposed to programs that deprioritize anyone on the basis of those characteristics. I believe that externalities should be irrelevant in the vast majority of cases. I grew up as the child of a black step-father, with a mixed sister, in a military household, during a time when the military had a high proportion of foreign service members. I LOVE learning about other cultures, other languages, other traditions, and being exposed to all the beauty that is humanity. But I also value diversity of viewpoint, and I think that's a more important goal than skin color. I also think that when there are standards that are necessary for the competent and safe performance of a role, those standards should be inflexible, regardless of what some people might consider extenuating circumstances. For example... as much of a feminist as I am, I think it's abhorrent to have different strength and fitness requirements for female firefighters than for male. If I'm in a burning building, I don't care that my local fire station has a 50/50 ratio of females, I only care that they can carry my unconscious spouse out of the house so they don't die.
I have two objections to UBI. The first is philosophical in that I don't think anyone else should be obligated to keep me alive and see to my needs. The mere fact that I got born some 50-odd years ago doesn't give me the right to continue being alive at someone else's expense. I am all for needs-based assistance paired with a 'graduation program' that moves people out of that state of need, and I support voluntary charity as much as possible (I think go fund me and similar things are an absolutely fantastic invention that allows large numbers of people to chip in small amounts to help others out). The second objection is funding and sustainability. The tests that have been done were all small scale and externally funded - the money to provide the UBI was provided by grant by third parties interested in seeing if it altered behavior. It hasn't been tested in a scenario where it needs to be self-sustaining, nor has it been tested over a long period of time. I think the intent is great, but I think the application is doomed. Consider it a differential equation across a time-series: all it takes is a relatively small number of freeloaders to start an increasing scale of contributions from a shrinking population of contributors. And once it extends to a second generation who has never known a world without it, I think the risk of freeloading will grow very quickly. I think it's an inherently unstable scheme.
Commuting is an entirely separate issue, and I'm of the opinion that highly centralized maga-corporations paired with gentrification is the biggest culprit here.
Healthy is not the same as comfort. As I've already said, I think our social safety nets should be minimum viable and intentionally paired with programs to remove dependence. It should be a "break glass in case of emergency" thing, not a base expectation.
Alternatively... the social funding could be based on critical care, with a private market that addresses non-critical needs. I'm a health insurance actuary, and that's where my view comes from. The way our system currently works incorporates a whole lot of routine care that isn't actually the province of insurance at all. It would be like expecting your auto insurance to cover all of our oil changes, routine maintenance, and give you a fresh set of tires every couple of years - it would quickly become unaffordable for a large number of people. It also ends up absolving consumers of responsibility for that maintenance. Even worse, it ends up providing an incentive for the providers of those services to charge ever higher prices, because the cost to value ratio is hidden via the spreading of risk. How much do you think tire manufacturers would charge for a new set of goodyears if they knew that everyone's auto insurance was *required* to pay for them every couple of years? What do you think that would do the auto premiums?
Encourage yes, require no. Like I said - I'm happy for all those preventive measures to exist, but I object to other people being expected to pay for them when those services don't protect the public as a whole. And I'll also admit to being a bit peevish about this one - there are a whole lot of actual preventive medicines that aren't covered as "preventive". I'm epileptic, and the cost of my anti-seizure medicine is absurd, especially since it's been generic for 17 years and is the most commonly prescribed and safest one available. It literally prevents me from having potentially lethal seizures. I'm not above pettiness, but I at least try to be aware of it when it happens
.Why not? People could just a couple generations ago. This is a flaw with poorly regulated capitalism in a publicly traded stock market that provides a perverse incentive to move low-skilled work to developing nations and exploit children and poor people with no oversight for working conditions. There are tons of potential low-skill manufacturing, assembly, and industrial jobs that 99.99% of people in the US could do. But large companies seeking profit on behalf of shareholders offshored everything, thus depriving US citizens of a whole lot of employment.
Opinions vary, but this might be one of the views I hold that actually *is* fairly conservative: Each nation should have a duty to prioritize the needs and opportunities of its own citizens above the profits of shareholders - especially if those shares can be purchased by foreign investors. I think it's irresponsible to have a system in which US businesses end up prioritizing the returns for foreign investors above the quality of life of their fellow citizens.
I'd definitely prefer an effective mitigation approach to a treatment after the fact approach. But effectiveness is paramount - I think it's negligent of a country to use the fruit of the labor of its citizens to play around and experiment in ways that a reasonably intelligent and prudent person would easily recognize as extremely likely to fail or be counterproductive.
