A good person is never made better by associating with government but a bad person is usually made even worse. Maybe the occasional bad person will be made slightly better by association with government, but a lateral shift isn't really an improvement. For people who really have no "good" or "bad" compass, I would guess they will always be made worse by association with government.
I think the only refutations that could be seriously attempted would be based upon disagreements over the definitions of "good", "bad", and "better".
A good person who becomes associated with government and gets a government paycheck, for example, is now benefiting from theft. That is no improvement. A good person who becomes associated with government can't help but violate the rights of other people in some way. That is not an improvement.
A bad person might stop stealing or aggressing on his own, but through his association with government he will now be doing those things with official sanction. The only possibility of "better" is if he is now doing those evil acts less frequently than before.
All in all, it seems clear that the best course of action is to steer clear of associating yourself with The State in any way.
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Hi Kent,
ReplyDeleteMost oldsters would be shocked if you reminded them that the money they paid in has long-since been stolen and their monthly checks are now depersonalized theft. Same for unemployment.
Your commenting system sure has a lot of hoops to jump through.
Dave
Yeah, it is sad to think it's OK to take other people's money now because yours was taken in the past. In other areas two wrongs don't make a right, so why is this supposed to be different?
ReplyDeleteI didn't think I had many hoops for commenting other than the word verification. Or has Blogger changed something I'm not aware of?