Social justice and politics.

I haven't written much about politics as such; I have fairly strong views, which could be described as a mixture of such extreme right and such radical left that they curl round and join up at the back. So here I write some of my views that could be regarded as political.

My most central view is that everyone should take responsibility at least for themselves; they may choose to take more, but not less. To take the small example that triggered me into writing this essay, I am annoyed by idiots who cross the road without looking on impulse to look at something in a shop window, thus not taking responsibility for their own actions, but forcing those going along the street to take avoiding action (or not, in the case of hefty along-going people like myself).

This, it appears, is a right-wing, politically-incorrect view; some parts of the left would require the more competent to take the responsibility and the effort for the less competent, forcing them into a reluctant servitude (perhaps similar to the reluctant servitude that has often throughout history been required of the less competent by the more competent). This seems more to apply to apparent competence levels rather than to real ones, and is particularly irritating to cold, uncool people such as myself when someone is competent to take a particular responsibility and to make the effort connected therewith, but can't be bothered, and so leave it for others to deal with. The first example that springs to mind is those who drive a car forward into a turning, and reverse out of it, forcing the traffic to `take pity' on them (or suffer a collision), rather than pulling into the side (which takes the responsibility to tackle the awkward stage of something earlier rather than later in order to reduce the overall awkwardness), waiting (which takes patience) for a chance to reverse in (which is more effort until you're used to it, as I remember from early days of my driving, although with practice it becomes as easy); another example (which will be more acceptable to those many annoyed by finding themselves matched by the description above) is litter-bugs, dropping things for other people to pick up. (The two examples are fundamentally similar; the difference is whether the litter is abstract or material.)

{Bible ref: let the stronger defer to the weaker; is that addressing this? And: bear one another's burden's. I think these are saying to offer to take what other people try to force you to do for them, but does not condone the forcing Look also at Proverbs about the sluggard, the fool and the conceited}

My second-most central view is that of co-operation, which requires responsibility and builds upon it. There are many parts to co-operation; an important one is observing what other people are doing, and fitting in with it. Making a plan (implicitly promising to do something, as part of a collection of agreements) and carrying out is important, but this is not the only form of co-operation; there is also spontaneous co-operation, not requiring anything more than very small-scale planning.

I am cynical about the the popular left, which was supposedly (I thought) meant to be helping the `poor and oppressed'... in particular, not only those who are of unfortunate social-economic heritage but also those who are naturally not capable of producing much to support themselves (through, for example, having less brain power than is needed by to succeed in a few useful tasks).

However, it recruits extensively among the students (after all, it promises bigger grants, and more of them, as though they were some kind of entitlement) but aren't the people it's meant to be helping the ones who go round beating up students for being more capable and more fortunate than themselves?

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For other essays, see the index to this collection; and for some other thoughts, my thoughts index.

Last modified: Sun Jun 10 22:28:51 GMT Daylight Time 2007