So, I don't want to talk about politics at all, but I just wanted to share with you some quotes from my Facebook, from the comments section on news sites, and from Reddit concerning a recent Supreme Court ruling (Hobby Lobby) as a way of setting the stage:
"They just took away their worker's freedom." (Message: Not buying someone something is taking away their freedom to ever own that thing.)
"This is an attempt to control women." (Message: Not buying women something is controlling them. Because not paying for something and legally forcing them not to have it are literally indistinguishable. I won't buy you a Countach, ergo I have prevented you from ever getting one.)
"That coverage is the worker's right." (Message: Getting some form of compensation is actually a right now.)
"IUD's are necessary because people forget to take birth control." (Message: Now forgetting to take birth control isn't even the responsibility of people taking it.)
"Health care is not a gift. Employers owe it to their employees to make it possible for their employees to pay for a house, cars, health care, and their kid's college as part of the bargain for working their (SIC) their whole lives." (I wish this was made up.)
"We're not free to get other jobs whenever we want. Not everyone has five job options lined up with health care. Not everyone can start their own company if they don't like their boss." (Message: My life is defined by avoiding difficulty and responsibility. I see hard things and run away, but want the rewards of accomplishing the same things I ran away from.)
There you have it. This is the crescendo of the $100K student loan, $20K in consumer credit card debt generation. Your employer is literally controlling you when they won't pay you something, they owe you compensation to do whatever you want, it's their responsibility to provide it, it's their fault if you forget to take other kinds of birth control or can't make a budget, and it's their responsibility to make sure that they give you not just options, but the options YOU WANT. No talk of providing more value to make it work, no discussion of helping the employer get what they want, just a person showing up with a resume and their hand out to take part in the fastlane machine you risked employment and savings and home and livelihood and ridicule and alienation to build. "I'll do some stuff or whatever," the person with the resume says, "just as long as you give me whatever I want."
I was reading and listening to this everywhere all day. Then it hit me: That's it. Just like CENTS is the seed of the fastlane, denial of agency is the seed of the sidewalk. It's the fundamental axiom that makes the side-walking life possible, that makes it make sense to the people stuck in it. Your debt is not your responsibility. Your weight is not your responsibility. Your health is not your responsibility. Your income and savings are not your responsibility. You can't be expected to control yourself and avoid overspending or impulse buying or binge eating or drinking or smoking when you're broke or not having 5 kids or even to take the medicine they do provide for you. It's the employer's responsibility to take care of you, nary a peep about your responsibility to provide value to them and make the hiring proposition worth their while or bring skills to the table that would make you a vital asset to the company. No. If others won't do things for you, you're being controlled and manipulated. When something bad happens, it's everyone else's fault. Every obstacle is someone else's problem, everyone else's choices are damning and have massive consequences, but yours have no potency at all. It's not your fault you dropped out, it's society's fault for not forcing you to stay in school. It's not your fault you did drugs, it's the police's fault you got busted. It's not your fault that you can't pay your medical expenses, that should be everyone else's responsibility.
Bust out the weed killer and drown this sucker the minute you see it hit the soil of your mind. Take responsibility-Own up to your actions, mindset, and choices, and you might just find very quickly that the other things that you "own" are growing by leaps and bounds.
(If this is too political, mods should feel free to delete it, with my sincere apologies to the community.)
"They just took away their worker's freedom." (Message: Not buying someone something is taking away their freedom to ever own that thing.)
"This is an attempt to control women." (Message: Not buying women something is controlling them. Because not paying for something and legally forcing them not to have it are literally indistinguishable. I won't buy you a Countach, ergo I have prevented you from ever getting one.)
"That coverage is the worker's right." (Message: Getting some form of compensation is actually a right now.)
"IUD's are necessary because people forget to take birth control." (Message: Now forgetting to take birth control isn't even the responsibility of people taking it.)
"Health care is not a gift. Employers owe it to their employees to make it possible for their employees to pay for a house, cars, health care, and their kid's college as part of the bargain for working their (SIC) their whole lives." (I wish this was made up.)
"We're not free to get other jobs whenever we want. Not everyone has five job options lined up with health care. Not everyone can start their own company if they don't like their boss." (Message: My life is defined by avoiding difficulty and responsibility. I see hard things and run away, but want the rewards of accomplishing the same things I ran away from.)
There you have it. This is the crescendo of the $100K student loan, $20K in consumer credit card debt generation. Your employer is literally controlling you when they won't pay you something, they owe you compensation to do whatever you want, it's their responsibility to provide it, it's their fault if you forget to take other kinds of birth control or can't make a budget, and it's their responsibility to make sure that they give you not just options, but the options YOU WANT. No talk of providing more value to make it work, no discussion of helping the employer get what they want, just a person showing up with a resume and their hand out to take part in the fastlane machine you risked employment and savings and home and livelihood and ridicule and alienation to build. "I'll do some stuff or whatever," the person with the resume says, "just as long as you give me whatever I want."
I was reading and listening to this everywhere all day. Then it hit me: That's it. Just like CENTS is the seed of the fastlane, denial of agency is the seed of the sidewalk. It's the fundamental axiom that makes the side-walking life possible, that makes it make sense to the people stuck in it. Your debt is not your responsibility. Your weight is not your responsibility. Your health is not your responsibility. Your income and savings are not your responsibility. You can't be expected to control yourself and avoid overspending or impulse buying or binge eating or drinking or smoking when you're broke or not having 5 kids or even to take the medicine they do provide for you. It's the employer's responsibility to take care of you, nary a peep about your responsibility to provide value to them and make the hiring proposition worth their while or bring skills to the table that would make you a vital asset to the company. No. If others won't do things for you, you're being controlled and manipulated. When something bad happens, it's everyone else's fault. Every obstacle is someone else's problem, everyone else's choices are damning and have massive consequences, but yours have no potency at all. It's not your fault you dropped out, it's society's fault for not forcing you to stay in school. It's not your fault you did drugs, it's the police's fault you got busted. It's not your fault that you can't pay your medical expenses, that should be everyone else's responsibility.
Bust out the weed killer and drown this sucker the minute you see it hit the soil of your mind. Take responsibility-Own up to your actions, mindset, and choices, and you might just find very quickly that the other things that you "own" are growing by leaps and bounds.
(If this is too political, mods should feel free to delete it, with my sincere apologies to the community.)
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