brad@looking.UUCP (Brad Templeton) (01/11/86)
Recently, there have been satirical criticisms of a mythical guy called
the RUGGED INDIVIDUAL. Who is the alternative to this RI? Perhaps
it is the ALTRUISTIC SOCIAL SAVIOR, or ASS for short.
These social saviors decry a recent decrease in their numbers and fear
a decline in the popularity of their philosophy. They're the members
of the "NOT ME" generation (Who'se going to pay for this? "NOT ME!"),
remnants of the hippie generation in the "Oh God, I hope I don't sell out"
phase.
It doesn't bother the ASS that his philosophy was born only through
the industrial revolution and high levels of material wealth. He'll gladly
take an axe to the tree he's standing on to get wood chips for the fire
that will burn it to the ground. He strongly resents the people who grew
the tree and are living on the better branches because of it.
The ASS prides himself on being an intellectual. Everybody knows that
socialism is the province of university types. What is odd is how this
is reconciled with the fact that socialism is supposed to be the philosophy
of the masses. The ASS isn't one of the masses and he certainly isn't
one of tree-growers, but he certainly feels he should be running the
show. The ASS finds it hard to understand how an RI can think of the
money he earns as his own, but that makes sense because the ASS has never
created wealth himself. At best he's shuffled it around to more deserving
folks, and it worst, he's lived off the wealth that other ASSes have
shuffled over to him.
The ASS believes strongly in God, although not by name, certainly.
What the ASS believes is that if somebody really, *really* smart were
to come along and tell everybody what to do, we would all work together
to lead happier, wonderful lives. Of course, God doesn't deem to come
down from this throne and run the country, so the ASS is willing to step
in His place and make the best try he can. The ASS believes that we need
a central authority, and that politics should be about who gets to be
that authority.
The ASS is sometimes unemployed if he couldn't arrange some sort of
socially appropriate job. He would be employed if his friends in
government weren't constantly taking job creating money away from the
proven most successful companies in the country and giving it to certified
losers in what are known as job "creation" programmes. After all, if
an industry is failing, it's well known that the way to increase employment
is to siphon off money from the rich, successful guys and give it to the
proven failures.
This is OK though, because ASSes favour the COMPLEX SOLUTION. Study
problems, form commissions, prepare reports and generally give lots of
other ASSes jobs. If only everybody would to things the way the ASS
says, oh how wonderful the world would be.
ASSes don't belong to unions, but they do organize them and work for
them directly. Unions are for steelworkers and truck drivers, and these
aren't the kind of jobs educated people do. That doesn't mean we don't
have to look out for their interests by telling them what to do. After
all, if we tell them we are looking out for their interests, they might
vote for us. If they don't, they're just rednecks, but we have to tell
them what to do anyway.
That makes sense because an ASSes favourite activity is to bribe people
with their own money. Whether it's taxes or union dues, it's much more
ethical to take somebody's money by force and bribe them with it than to
bribe them with your own money.
But what's even better is making people feel guilty for making use of
their own money after it was taken for them. An ASS likes to take
somebody's money, build a road with it and claim that all future
money made by the taxpayers isn't really theirs because they drove on
the public roads to make it. And of course, the ones who had the most
money taken from them should feel the most guilty.
The ASS is very jealous of the Yuppie's VCR, BMW and RRSP. In a perfect
world, there wouldn't be a BMW to present this contrast, or it would
be possible to provide a BMW simultaneously to everybody. The fact that
this is impossible is of no concern. The fact that there have to be
rich people to pay for new innovative products is unfortunate, but perhaps
enough government research might figure out how to make those 5 billion
BMWs
The ASS is very big on pooling of the wealth, but gets very annoyed if
you talk about the almost 5 billion people in the world. He realizes that
if you truly pooled all the wealth in the world that everybody would starve,
rich and poor alike. The ASS gets uncomfortable because it shows that
socialism only works if it has capitalism to live off of, and only in
a limited area.
FREE is an important word in the ASS's vocabulary, too, where it means
freedom from responsibility. The ASS loves to have all sorts of great
ideas, but would faint at the thought of having to *pay* to support them.
The ASS's job is to think of great social causes that *other* people can
be made to pay for.
That makes it very strange that ASSes are all for democracy. They love
democracy and put words like "Democratic" in the names of their political
parties. Of course, if you suggest that support of their fine social
programs be voluntary, ASSes will quickly say that the vast majority
of citizens wouldn't pay for them. That's why they must be forced to in
the true democratic fashion. ASSes really believe in democracy when the
majority happens to agree with them, and even Stalin believed in democracy
under those principles.
ASSes actually prefer the pressure-group style of government, where the
more visible a cause is, the more money it gets. It doesn't matter that
this money comes from somewhere less visible, as long as they get to
move it from place to place in the big game. ASSes aren't greedy for
money such much as they are greedy for power. They want to feel important,
and since they can't do it in a free society the have made up a big con
job to play in.
One of the ASS's greatest fears is selling out. He knows that just about
everybody does it, and is even aware at some level that it's going to
happen to him. It's too bad he doesn't think about why it's going to
happen.
ASSes like to think of themselves as "Liberals" or "Left-wing" when they
are actually today's arch-conservatives. Back in the old days, when
Kings were Kings and governments were autocratic, a liberal was somebody
who believed in improved individual freedom. Conservatives (a word whose
meaning has changed much less) just wanted to keep things as they were,
ie. autocratic. Once a little freedom was won, the conservatives wanted
to keep it and their opposites (sill called liberals, incorrectly) wanted
to move back to big government, albeit in a more modern form. Now that
Government is back, and bigger than ever, it is the ASSes who are the
conservatives who want to keep the big state. Those pushing for more personal
liberty are the modern reformists fighting the statist establishment.
ASSes suggest that people who don't like their philosophy move to another
country. Of course, they want to rule the whole world, so eventually they
are going to have to suggest a more drastic move. If they didn't have
the natural love of home that resides in humans, the Rugged Individuals
would gladly set up their own free country, but nobody wants to let them.
The reason for this is clear. Such a free state would succeed so well
that it would have to be destroyed before it destroyed the ASSes
credibility.
But they're here folks. They want to rule the world with your money, and
are sure that if everybody did just what ASSes think is best, we would
have a better place to live. They practice the worst sins that they
ascribe to their enemies. While their enemies are glad to let them
exist in their own little world, the ASS will only be vindicated if the
whole world follows his rules, for his system doesn't work unless everybody
takes part.
It's not a pretty sight.
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o=~=o
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O O | Would you pop that thing, please? |
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\Gondola/
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Brad Templeton, Looking Glass Software Ltd. - Waterloo, Ontario 519/884-7473morrison@ubc-cs.UUCP (Rick Morrison) (01/12/86)
Touche!