Marxism

You changed the meaning of doing or not doing work for the community to having an effect on the community by their poverty or success. Totally different conversation. Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Is it? Is not the purpose of the police to protect the community from the negative and dangerous effects of the killers , thieves , rapists etc.... ?

The police are doing work for the community.The needy are not.Please don't destroy logic, it makes me crazy.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

indeed by protecting the the community from the negative effects of murderers , rapists , thieves etc.... Not until they get the help to get back on their feet. When they do they will be. I thought I was being logical. I'm in a way thinking you aren't. I am confused by your logic

So here you are, deeply engaged in a right wing grass roots political movement, which has the aim of changing the meaning of "steal" so that taxation would be considered stealing.Yet, in the same breath, you are asserting that words have fixed meanings that cannot be changed by such a grass roots movement.

From where I'm standing welfare . Unemployment , and food stamps not only seem moral but also practical and beinfical to the community as a whole as it prevents people from not or never being productive member of society again.I wrote these in message 266 and then If not for the Police Suzy might be dead.If not for the government programs both Suzy and her two children most likely would never be productive members of society and might be deadDo you understand at all where I'm having trouble? Edited by DC85, : No reason given.

Yes it is. If everyone thinks that the word "dog" means dog, then you don't get to say that it really means cat.Words do in fact mean exactly what people think that they mean. That's how language works.In the same way, stealing means taking someone's property by methods which are illegal. That's what it means. It isn't more or less stealing if you use the money to help the poor. What you do with the money doesn't make it more or less theft. You continue to be funny.

Hi DC85, let me see if I can help. That's because it is not logical, it is shortsighted in ignoring future value.If we think in terms of investment in the future value rather than payment for work done, it make logical sense to invest in a better future for society.Because we - as human beings - are (generally) intelligent enough to plan for the future, and make judgments about future value, and thus we can build a society that also plans for the future.It makes sense to invest in police and fire departments so that they will be able to act when necessary. The firemen doesn't get paid only when they fight fires, and the police don't get paid only when they fight crime.Likewise it makes sense to invest in the education of people, because educated people are more capable of earning a better than average living, usually at higher pay than the uneducated, and thus overall will pay back the investment with the higher taxes they pay.Likewise it makes sense to invest in unemployed people, providing an insurance to tide them over through normal employment difficulties, insurance that is collected from everyone as a tax to ensure a safety net when stochastic events cause some to be unemployed.Likewise it makes sense to invest in health care to ensure that people are treated when possible to minimize the time they are not able to work.Now we come to welfare. Here we are investing in the future of people for several reasons:

• it keeps them from turning to a life of crime, so it reduces the cost of crime prevention,
• it allows those able to move up into the work force to become productive members of society and pay back the investment in taxes, and finally
• it benefits the economy to have a higher rate of flow of money, allowing more people to buy more than just the essentials, which benefits business, and most of this direct investment comes back to the govt in taxes as well.

Overall there is a net positive value benefit to society that makes such an investment a worthwhile expenditure.When a banker makes a loan, he is not paying people to perform work, he is making an investment in the future value of the person. Certainly nobody can reasonably claim that the person receiving the loan is stealing the money from the banker. Nor that the banker is stealing money from the bank\investors to give it to someone else. Such a claim would be a silly misuse of the word.Enjoy.Edited by RAZD, : ..

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I have no idea what connection there could be between taking money legally or illegally and what you do with the money you've taken.Stealing has nothing to do with what you do with the money and I've never said it does. It has to do with what you did to GET the money, specifically, you didn't EARN it and it wasn't GIVEN to you by its rightful possessor either.The government is not its rightful possessor. The government stole it from the citizens. The government may have bestowed upon itself a LEGAL rationalization for its theft AND managed to bamboozle the citizenry into thinking they (the gov't) have a legitimate right to it, but they don't, it's still theft.I don't think people on welfare are consciously stealing, by the way -- replying more to latest DC's post than to yours -- and in that sense they are innocent, but the government IS stealing.

And that's OK with you even if some of that involves stealing from others? I make absolutely NO judgments about the rightness or wrongness or stupidity or intelligence of a person's life situation, none whatever, because none of that has anything to do with whether or not the government has a right to steal money.Say you have a friend who is suffering in that way, is it OK for you personally to steal money from a stranger to help her? If it isn't, why is it OK for the government to do it? I don't really think of Suzy herself as stealing. Most people on welfare don't think about that aspect of the situation, they just need the money and the government offers it so they accept it as a gift. Morally they are usually innocent in the situation.It's the GOVERNMENT that is stealing. They wrote themselves a law to justify it. They have simply legitimized the morally illegitimate so they can steal from their citizens.It does seem that liberals think with their emotions, reject logic, and end up rationalizing all kinds of immoral things because of this. You can't even seem to address the idea of stealing at all. Can you see it if the example is you stealing the money in a wallet you found lying on the sidewalk, or you climbing through a window to steal money from a safe you noticed standing open? If you can see that that's not right, why can't you see that it's not right for the government to do that either? See, you WILL not think about the morality of the question of stealing. You think with your emotions: But but but Suzy NEEDS it. Right. Suzy needs help. I'm not denying that. My question is whether that makes it OK for you to steal money to help her? If not, how does it make it OK for government to do the same? Yes, you think with your emotions rather than logic, and you think narrowly only in terms of Suzy's need and not the rights of others from whom the government is stealing. Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

- Lewis Carrol

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Ridicule is the only weapon which can be used against unintelligible propositions. Ideas must be distinct before reason can act upon them; and no man ever had a distinct idea of the trinity. It is the mere Abracadabra of the mountebanks calling themselves the priests of Jesus. -- Thomas JeffersonFor we know that our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness. We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and non-believers. -- Barack ObamaWe see monsters where science shows us windmills. -- Phat

Yes I quoted that way back there in Message 267 I believe against the defenders of stealing who have to make stealing mean what they want it to mean rather than what it objectively means.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Faith my dear, you are free to argue against any form of governmental welfare. There are any number of compelling arguments. And if you think it's immoral, if you think it's akin to stealing, you can take that position. But you cannot simply ignore what the word means and give it one of your own. At least you can't if you want to debate in good faith with other people. And if you really think that your daffynition would have been accepted by any significant number of people at any point in time in the past, I'd be delighted to see actual evidence in support of that proposition, as opposed to your assertion that such is the case.If all you want to do is make up your own language and expect everyone else to go along with it, you really belong back on your own site.

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Ridicule is the only weapon which can be used against unintelligible propositions. Ideas must be distinct before reason can act upon them; and no man ever had a distinct idea of the trinity. It is the mere Abracadabra of the mountebanks calling themselves the priests of Jesus. -- Thomas JeffersonFor we know that our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness. We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and non-believers. -- Barack ObamaWe see monsters where science shows us windmills. -- Phat

Truly truly truly this IS Wonderland and all reason and logic are lost here.

Praytell, I beg you, how is it illogical and Wonderland-like for us to insist that you use a word the way that the rest of the English speaking world does?

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Ridicule is the only weapon which can be used against unintelligible propositions. Ideas must be distinct before reason can act upon them; and no man ever had a distinct idea of the trinity. It is the mere Abracadabra of the mountebanks calling themselves the priests of Jesus. -- Thomas JeffersonFor we know that our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness. We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and non-believers. -- Barack ObamaWe see monsters where science shows us windmills. -- Phat