When people say “Eh, it’s a living” are they referring to simply being alive? I think people sometimes look too much into some idioms.
In the natural world, you don’t actually deserve to be alive and need to compete for it. In societies I would argue it’s what the society can put up with. You don’t deserve to be alive, you simply are or are not … or the many thousands of states in between. By default, you are going to need to adapt regardless to keep alive. I can see “living” referring to that adaptation, but then again, I can understand polysemy.
I mean … in a way? When one looks at it from nature’s point of view, no organism has some “given right to live”, all organisms try to survive. But do we, as a society, really want to live like animals, each for themself, without empathy, without solidarity?
I’d argue that our social capabilities are our nature, rather than an exception to nature.
Massive disagree, we exist within nature not separate from it.
Human sociality doesn’t supersede nature because it’s an embedded system within nature.
I think… That’s what I said?
Yeah I definitely responded to the wrong person, my bad
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I’ve always believed that everyone should be able to have, for free, a permanent private living space of at least 80sqft, a reasonably comfortable bed, access to a toilet and shower and associated toiletries, clothing suitable for the weather, water and food (even if only some flavorless nutritional paste), and access to medical care both as-needed and on a regular basis. if you have no ambition in life beyond sitting in that little room staring at the wall and eating soylent, then so be it, for a society to provide any less is immoral
And think of the world we would create if this were the norm.
The majority of people everywhere are ambitious, industrious and want to be useful. So you’d end up with a world full of people doing creative things … and entire groups of people doing creative, inventive and useful things together.
They’d figure out things like building space elevators, new industrial technologies, the cure for cancer (which would probably be redundant because everyone would automatically be able to afford to take care of their health), stabilize global warming, create alternate forms and sources of energy and begin the process of exploring space beyond our own system.
Instead, we have a world where a hundred people own all the wealth, a billion people who think they’re wealthy but aren’t and 7 billion people struggling to get by … and all of them fighting to become king or queen of the world.
The best argument for UBI isn’t that it’s an inherently decent thing to do, it’s that it would legitimately make the world better for rich people too.
UBI would never work with rich people in the world. The unfettered American form of a capitalist system is incompatible with life because the rich will never stop trying to take ALL the money, better world be damned. The system must be changed first.
Imagine my shock when I checked how much 80 square feet are.
honestly seems wild to me that people are pushing back so hard on the idea of having at minimum a small bedroom, as opposed to a cot in a crowded bunk room, or one of those Japanese pod hotels. y’all never seen a college dorm room?
Don’t get me wrong, I like the ideas you’re proposing. The 80 square feet is just a little behind the rest in my opinion. And the flavorless paste, but others mentioned it already. It’s not necessarily bad to have these as guaranteed minimum, but at the same time we can easily set the bar higher.
While I agree with the mindset, I share the same view, some of your details are kinda…barbaric
permanent private living space of at least 80sqft
That’s the size where prison cells float around. Iirc there was a study done that concluded that for an average person to remain mentally healthy they need at least 3-400 sq ft per person. Allowances must be made for families and partners
even if only some flavorless nutritional paste
Shit, that’s been widely considered to be cruel and unusual punishment for prisoners. There’s a balance between “not even good enough for prisoners” and “Lobsters every night”
if you have no ambition in life beyond sitting in that little room staring at the wall and eating soylent
Yeaaa there’s plenty of other ways to entice people to work or to aspire. You don’t need to make people eat flavorless paste, just luxury material goods alone would be enough. Like a decent smartphone, games, attractions (amusement parks, circuses etc), electronics etc. Plus most people want to work anyways just to have something to do
If we enacted your plan as-is, the suicide rate would skyrocket lol
In other words you want the homless to have a day pass from prison.
(Jokingly) Hey! Get (that meme template) out yo gotdamn mouth!
Lol same
Man, those pro life people will be so mad when they find out
I remember talking with a fellow Hungarian who happened to be a “moderate” conservative, and he told me there’s nothing wrong with Fidesz making our country for cheap labor, because some of those cheap laborers can be promoted to be middle managers in the factories.
There are a few folks who don’t deserve to be alive… Unfortunately they don’t need to “earn a living” as they happened to be born silver spoon in hand…
No one “makes money” they transfer it.
