Reply #14: very disturbing [View All]

[Two Americas]

This is very destructive, and I would have hoped that we had achieved a level of sophistication about this that would prevent us from falling for it again and again. We are spreading very cruel and inhumane right wing ideas here - "getting them off the street" and "getting them on the right track." Yes, this feel good news story *could* be useful if it led to a deeper understanding and commitment, but when anyone tries to have such a discussion it is rejected because it is making us feel bad when we were just feeling so good. In other words, that is an admission that these dire social problems take second seat to our personal need to feel good about ourselves. I maintain that that is the most potent force for keeping these problems in place, and for perpetuating the suffering and deprivation.

Why do we fall hook, line, and sinker for that which makes *us* feel good - for spoon fed human interest stories palmed off to us for the exact purpose of putting a chipper face on horrible things and so leading us down the path of escapism and avoidance - and then resist looking at the real problems and real causes because those make us feel uncomfortable?

This not "part of the solution." It is not part of the problem, either, it is the entire problem. This is an invitation to wallow in the emotion-driven politics of personal choice and personal values, and to indulge ourselves in self-centered feelings and behavior while patting ourselves on the back about what good people we are.

We are trading away effective political action and discussion for the sake of personally feeling good, and real people are suffering as a direct result of that pervasive approach to politics that modern liberalism demands. We must reject that. We must overthrow that.