in which sabrina might almost be mistaken for a libertarian

[sophiaserpentia]

Now the government is targeting unmarried adults up to age 29 as part of its abstinence-only programs, which include millions of dollars in federal money that will be available to the states under revised federal grant guidelines for 2007.

The government says the change is a clarification. But critics say it's a clear signal of a more directed policy targeting the sexual behavior of adults.

... Wade Horn, assistant secretary for children and families at the Department of Health and Human Services, said the revision is aimed at 19- to 29-year-olds because more unmarried women in that age group are having children.

... The revised guidelines specify that states seeking grants are "to identify groups ... most likely to bear children out-of-wedlock, targeting adolescents and/or adults within the 12- through 29-year-old age range." Previous guidelines didn't mention targeting of an age group.

"We wanted to remind states they could use these funds not only to target adolescents," Horn said. "It's a reminder."

from Abstinence message goes beyond teens

Let that sink in for a moment. The government is paying people to tell adults they shouldn't have sex out of wedlock. Anyone want to guess who is going to be particularly targeted here? Here's a hint: have you ever been to a government assistance office?

The government does not exist to tell you how to live your life. The government exists to facilitate the decisions you, as a free person, make.

The government does not exist to tell you what language you may or may not speak, the government does not exist to tell you what religion you may or may not practice, the government does not exist to tell you what chemicals to put in your body or not put in your body, the government does not exist to tell you to have children or not have children, and the government sure as hell does not exist to tell you who to have sex with or who not to have sex with.

Some of these choices might not be as economically efficient as others, but economic efficiency is not the end-all-be-all of human existence, not even close.

Comments

[gentlemaitresse.livejournal.com]

If the government is going to support a person's lifestyle, I can understand why they'd want to have some say in how that person lives. This is why I oppose welfare programs and support private charity. Private charity does not depend on force to exist, and there are many different flavors. In fact, if you can't find one you'd like to support, you're even free to start your own! That can hardly be said for government programs.

[sophiaserpentia.livejournal.com]

I have my own concerns about welfare programs not being entirely helpful, but IMO some form thereof is necessary in a society which is not completely heartless but where only some jobs earn wages and where only some people own property.

The concern i have about private charity is that it is very often selective. If i was homeless, i could not count on aid from the Salvation Army because i am queer.

[gentlemaitresse.livejournal.com]

I have those same concerns about private charities, but government welfare programs don't seem to be the answer. And government is force. I have a major problem with the use of force to help people. Where will it end? If you need a kidney and I am compatible, should the government force me to give you my kidney? If not, why should they force me to give you my hard-earned money? After all, I have another kidney, but the time taken from my life to earn that money is gone and I'll never get it back.

I just don't think we can force people to be nice, or charitable. We can't force the kind-hearted society we'd like to have.

And government has every right, IMO, like a parent, to say "If I support you then you'll live the way I think is right".

[sophiaserpentia.livejournal.com]

government welfare programs don't seem to be the answer.

Ultimately they are not. Ultimately the answer is for the human race to decide collectively that poverty is not acceptable. And when i say this, i am not speaking about "political solutions" (by which i mean the state or a meta-state like the UN implementing a policy) i mean a more fundamental transformation in human society and human nature.


And government has every right, IMO, like a parent, to say "If I support you then you'll live the way I think is right".

Hmm, you oppose government on the basis that it is force, but think that their use of coersion is right in this case?

The way i see it is, if we must have government at all, it is to facilitate our goals and make our lives easier. The government does not have the resources to do this without limit, and so a "bottomless entitlement" of any kind is not practical.

It does not help the situation for the government to impose conditions on assistance that they offer. These conditions are imposed ostensibly to "educate" welfare recipients, but the only thing recipients learn is how to be powerless and hopeless in the face of "the system." Very few come out of this system with the ability to successfully play our economic games.

[sophiaserpentia.livejournal.com]

Very few come out of this system with the ability to successfully play our economic games.

And beyond that, it is worth questioning the economic games we play. The primary function of our public school system is to prepare people for a life as wage serfs, to soften us up for a daily clockwork grind in a humiliating authoritarian machine that bases our "worth" on numerous criteria, many of which have little to do with the betterment of human life.

[neitherday.livejournal.com]

Why should we have laws at all?

When I was homeless, I stole quite a bit. I did it out of survival. I did not need to justify it in the polite limits of society, because I was outside of "society". As I was not part of the civilization around me, I did not view any of it's laws or codes as applying to me, as long as I managed not get caught. The only benefit that I was deriving from the civilization around me at that time was my ability to (often illicitly) extract from it what I needed.

I did have somewhat of a ethical code, I kept my stealing to mostly large businesses. I did not view these businesses as having any more right to their "property" than I had. And 12-13 years later, I still do not regret my actions and placed in the same situation again I would do same.

My point is, if the rules of civilization do not ensure that people are able to survive and prosper, people will reasonably live outside of the rules of civilization. Of course, not all crime is out of necessity; but drying up government assistance will create more crime that is.

My personal code kept me from doing real harm to individuals, but not everyone excluded from society will develop a similar personal ethical code. If I were not so adept a thief, I am not sure I would have been able to either. Morals and ethics are luxuries, but luxuries I think it best to ensure that people can afford.

[sophiaserpentia.livejournal.com]

Oops, i linked to the wrong entry, the one i meant to link to was this one:

http://sophiaserpentia.livejournal.com/579933.html

[neitherday.livejournal.com]

You don't sound like a libertarian:

You express concern about state harassment of people at government assistance offices. A libertarian would be more concerned with eliminating those offices all together.

[sophiaserpentia.livejournal.com]

If I choose to have a child that I can't afford, and seek government assistance, then I don't believe that it's unreasonable for the government to ask that the adult take reasonable precautions not to have children. I happen to believe that charities ought to offer incentives to encourage reproductive responsibility.

"Reproductive responsibility" should mean the same thing for people at all social strata. There are too many people on earth and it's good for us on the whole to encourage reproductive restraint. Also, each child carried to term places a physical burden on the woman who bears her.

But at the same time, here in the US, the political party which primarily advocates rollback of access to contraception and abortion simultaneously advocates the forced sterilization of women on public assistance. There are many various sinister undertones to this, but the thing is, we should not be making it harder for poor women to have children while at the same time making it harder for middle or upper class women to NOT have children. It should be one policy for all.

Why? Because our society sees children not as future contributors to society, but as an economic burden. Policymakers see children, especially poor children, as numbers, statistics to be reduced, or something that keeps an otherwise productive employee from sitting at their desk like a good little drone.

A society that does not love and value its children is insane! These children grow up to become adults with a seething anger.

[alobar.livejournal.com]

To me, there is a fucking big difference between giving out birth control and fvamily planning information, and telling people not to fuck.

Isaac Asimov used to give lengthy spiels on how the best birth control was to have lots of sex which did not include penises in vaginas. No need for pills, no expense, and no side effects. I'll bet if they played a video of one of his talks on birth control in the waiting room of social services, it would have a far greater impact than tens of thousands of dollars spent telling people not to have sex.