In Praise of Child Labor and Condemning Forbidding Federal Laws

Posted on April 11, 2013 by Jim

One of the common repeated condemnations of the Industrial Revolution, and therefore capitalism, is child labor.  A correct and frequent reply to such a spurious charge is that before the Industrial Revolution children worked ALWAYS, because the alternative was starving to death; further, the Industrial Revolution created the wealth that actually reduced child labor, unlike those erroneously praised laws.

I want to take a slightly different perspective on the issue.  My point is that individuals who support anti-child labor laws, including the minimum wage law, HATE children.  Seriously, what is wrong with you that you hate children?!?  If you doubt me, tell a child that they should not be able to work and get paid for it; you will feel them return your hate.

I have been listening to the Irving Stone’s biographical novel of Michelangelo, The Agony and the Ecstasy. The book begins with Michelangelo’s apprenticeship at age 13, and I am currently at his entry into the household of Lorenzo de’Medici a couple years later.  His even younger experience with heavy labor as a stone cutter plays an important part in Michelangelo’s later development.  The book has let me experience the passion and joy of a youth working.  Yes, I know it is a fictional account based upon real events; however, the fiction…the art…rang true with my own experiences and those of my family members.  Kids want to work and get paid.

I worked and got paid when I was a kid.  My kids wanted to do so, but were largely legally blocked from doing so.  Currently, my young nieces want jobs and payment for work performed.

I note that Sean Saulsbury on the Independent Entrepreneur podcast would always ask the successful entrepreneur that he was interviewing to tell the audience about their first job, which was always when these entrepreneurs were young.

Working is a great alternative to the self-esteem killing and soul crushing experience of public schools.  The standards on a job are based upon reality and excellence is rewarded.  In contrast, public schools value political indoctrination and orthodoxy, while punishing productivity, true originality, and achievement.

Consider the pathologies exhibited by today’s youth under the control of public education; some real paid work would be an inoculation in defense of our children.

Follow on Twitter Like on Facebook RSS Feed Email Subscription

Join the Selfish Party BannerBeSelfish_sharebanner

Posted in Political Discussions | Tagged , , | 3 Comments

Question #7: Should we modify the Bill of Rights by repealing the 2nd Amendment?

Posted on April 7, 2013 by Jim

In a YouTube video and blog post, Naomi Chambers answers affirmatively her rhetorical question, “Should we repeal the 2nd amendment?”

This post will do two things: (1) chew her analysis, and (2) provide the negative argument to her question.  However, I will attempt to refrain (and likely fail) from saying things like the consequences of her argument is that most blacks would be forbidden to own guns (see Carl Rowan); while evident in the actual application of gun control laws, I doubt that she supports the racist consequences of her advocacy.

The Chew

First, her appeal to authority by citing Thomas Jefferson totally mischaracterizes his thoughts on the Constitution by linking them to a modern fluid understanding of the Constitution advocated publicly by Justice Stephen Breyer.  The out-of-context misuse of the quotation is either ignorant or dishonest; such flimsy argument by quote mining is most commonly a tactic of libertarians and conservatives.  For some specific events to consider related to disproving this misuse, see: (1) Jefferson on amending the Constitution during the Louisiana Purchase, (2) Jefferson’s conflicts with the judiciary and Federalist based upon his strict constructionist views, (3) Madison’s role in creating the Virginia Declaration of Rights and the Bill of Rights, (4) Madison and Monroe’s constitutional arguments related to federal internal improvements, and (5) Monroe’s actions as Virginia Governor during a slave rebellion.

Second, she identifies that the 18th Amendment was repealed by the 21st Amendment; therefore, repealing the 2nd Amendment is legally possible…Duh.  By that same logic the Establishment Clause or the 16th Amendment could be repealed.  That something could be done does not make it a good idea.  Nevertheless, this does raise an important distinction between the man made and the metaphysically given; the former is subject to change by human choice and the later is not.  Other man made facts that could be changed by repeal: (1) Social Security, (2) government healthcare (FDA, Medicare, Medicaid, ObamaCare), and (3) progressive taxation.

Finally, the essence of her argument for repealing the 2nd Amendment is an incoherent emotionalist unprincipled mess that reeks of Pragmatism.  Dr. Tara Smith gave an excellent lecture at the National Press Club titled “The Menace of Pragmatism: How Aversion to Principle Is Destroying America”, which gives a more complete analysis of Pragmatism than I will attempt in this post.  By abandoning principles, Chambers looses the capacity to predict the future consequences of current choices.

Instead she gives us the following common formula: (1) I see something that makes me feel bad and if you are human then you feel bad about it too, (2) we have to act for the sake of action to do something about my feelings, and (3) such action will make me feel better because I feel that it is true.

In context, my satire of Obama’s gun control proposal (“Obama Plans More Rapes”) identifies the same type of error: the unidentified likely consequences of unprincipled actions.

The Answer

No, that is a really bad idea.

Is there an intrinsic right for an individual to have a gun? No.

Does the tradition of this principle being establish in 1776 as an essential requirement for the defense of individual rights override our own thoughts, experience, and context?  No.

Constitutional and statutory rights establish governmental rules to protect individual rights.  The essential purpose of government is to protect individual rights; thus, the question to be examined and answered related to the original question is “How does this proposal protect individual rights?”

However, Chambers proposal does not protect individual rights and instead increases the violations of individual rights.  The fundamental consequence of this proposal is to disarm law abiding citizens or to turn them into law breakers.  This has a secondary consequence of weakening protections against unreasonable searches and seizures by creating probable cause when an innocuous condition is made illegal.  Further, the implementation of this proposal will deny individual blacks equal protection of the laws as they have historically lived in jurisdictions that deny their access to self-protection (as part of the racist policies of the Democratic party).

The 2nd Amendment is tied to the right to self-defense from the right to life, as such Chamber’s proposal is an attack on the right to self-defense.  As seen in the Carl Rowan case, and similar cases of self-defense in one’s home around the world, gun control’s actual result is the criminal prosecution of individuals defending themselves from criminals.  Recent history in both the UK and Australia demonstrate that the disarming of law abiding citizens results in increasing violation of individual rights by criminals, and the inability of police workers and prisons to manage this consequence.

However, there is something real that is making Chamber’s feel bad; although I note that she ignores the role firearms played in individual Asians being able to protect their lives and businesses from attacks by racist mobs during urban riots.  Further, there are legitimate things that government can do, or stop doing, that could make her feel better without turning her into a thug that takes the self-defensive guns out of her neighbors’ hands, or her substituting her own judgment for theirs by denying them the choice of self-defense.

As mass shootings typically involve someone previously subject to psychological care, it is past time for that profession to clean itself up as it is full of too many witchdoctors (based upon philosophical errors) and practitioners who are more qualified to be patients.  Further, more mandates for in patient care should be made on those who are a danger to themselves or others; for example: there should be a mandatory evaluation admittance for someone being charged with domestic violence.

There is already enhanced sentencing for those who use a gun in the commission of a crime.  Perhaps, those can be stronger.  However, a more pressing issue is the state budget crises from unfunded pension liabilities that are likely to result in violent criminals being released from prison to cut expenses.  While selectivity will be needed in who will be let out, law abiding citizens will need to be able to choose to be armed to protect themselves from recidivists.

Two repeal proposals that would do more to reduce gun violence than the Chamber’s attack on our right to self-defense would be (1) ending the War on Drugs with full decriminalization and legalization, and (2) ending public schools.  With the former, the violence around drugs is principally the consequence of legal prohibition; see Chamber’s related points about alcohol Prohibition.  With the later, a far graver threat to children than guns, public schools are an expensive failure that cripples the minds of children with the Pragmatism of John Dewey.

Follow on Twitter Like on Facebook RSS Feed Email Subscription

Join the Selfish Party BannerBeSelfish_sharebanner

Posted in Political Discussions | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Top 10 Books for Selfish Citizens, 1st Quarter 2013

Posted on April 2, 2013 by Jim

The following are the top 10 books for January – March 2013 as identified by the readers of Selfish Citizenship.

  1. The Financial Crisis and the Free Market Cure: Why Pure Capitalism is the World Economy’s Only Hope by John A. Allison
  2. American Caesar: Douglas MacArthur 1880 – 1964 by William Manchester
  3. The Head of Athena (The Cyrus Skeen Series) by Edward Cline
  4. Andrew Jackson: The Course of American Empire, 1767-1821. Vol. 1 by Robert V. Remini
  5. Truman and MacArthur: Policy, Politics, and the Hunger for Honor and Renown by Michael D. Pearlman
  6. Jefferson the Virginian (Jefferson & His Time) by Dumas Malone
  7. Neoconservatism: An Obituary for an Idea by C. Bradley Thompson
  8. Black & White World III by Cox & Forkum
  9. The First American: The Life and Times of Benjamin Franklin by H. W. Brands
  10. The Aristotle Adventure: A Guide to the Greek, Arabic, & Latin Scholars Who Transmitted Aristotle’s Logic to the Renaissance by Burgess Laughlin

What are you reading? Tell us in a comment.

The top 10 posts on Selfish Citizenship for that period were:

  1. Obama Attacks Free Speech Again
  2. A Tale of Two Homeless Men
  3. Obama Using Accounting Cheat to Hide $761.5 Billion in Deficit Spending
  4. Obama Plans More Rapes (a satire)
  5. Obama is the Wiz, a Pretender President
  6. Question #6: Why is altruism bad?
  7. IRS’ 401k Early Withdrawal Penalties vs. Americans in Reality
  8. Chewing an Echo of What Passes for Thought on ObamaCare
  9. George Washington’s First State of the Union Address
  10. Dakota Meyer (Medal of Honor Recipient, Afghanistan) and the State of Our Military

Follow on Twitter Like on Facebook RSS Feed Email Subscription

Join the Selfish Party BannerBeSelfish_sharebanner

Posted in History, President | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Chewing an Echo of What Passes for Thought on ObamaCare

Posted on March 22, 2013 by Jim

The other day I posted a link to Reddit to iOpposeObamaCare with its announcement for an activism opportunity on Saturday, March 22, 2013…the third anniversary of the corrupt ObamaCare law.  In comments, the following was posted, and I thought its errors worthy of chewing:

“Meh, same old ‘grass roots’ FUD with a suspiciously slick website devoid of any objective facts.

“The only rationale they provide for “why” are four opinion essays on the “Intellectual Ammunition” page, which all boil down to philosophical arguments. Nothing that tangibly shows Obamacare is harmful or disproves reports that show it’s actually saved a $1.5 billion so far.”

First let us consider, the groundless smear around the phrases “…same old ‘grass roots’…” and “…a suspiciously slick website…”  To be clear, the comment implies without evidence that the site is inauthentic and a production of evil corporate interests.  As I know both charges to be false, the smear says much about the lack of honesty of that commentator, who speaks from the rhetoric of the sophist tradition.

Second, what is the FUD thingy?  It is an acronym for “fear, uncertainty, and doubt.”  To be clear, the comment is saying that we should accept ObamaCare on faith without question or serious consideration of its nature.  As such, this commentary is an attack upon virtue and in particular the virtues of independence and justice.  The appeal to FUD is essentially a charge of “Who are you to think?  Who are you to question?  Who are you to judge?”  I ask you my fellow selfish citizens, “Who is to think and judge about our lives other than ourselves?”

Third, consider the phrase “…[these intellectual ammunition essays] all boil down to philosophical arguments.”  This naked appeal to Pragmatism is an attack on human conceptual thinking and an invitation to the reader to lower themselves to the sub-human level of solely perception, unexamined emotions, and arbitrary muscle contractions as a guide to our actions.  Such an attack upon the human mind as a point within an argument is a symptom of dishonesty.  Essentially, it is a charge that your mind is impotent so you must defer to the minds of others, especially the person making the erroneous attack.

Fourth, consider the phrase “Nothing that tangibly shows…”  This is another instance of the anti-conceptual attack, but in this case it is an appeal to empiricism (a method of thought limited to data without context and concepts).  In reply to the commentator’s question, an individual might ask “By what standards of proof and evidence?  By what definition of harmful, beneficial, or even savings?”  However, such an inquiry would be fruitless because from the perspective of the commentator’s argument there are no standards or definitions, but only the perceptual observations of the moment, which are not related to knowledge induced from experience in reality, but only to be related to emotional whims of the moment.

During the anniversary of this corrupt law, take a moment to listen, really listen, to the defenders of the modest proposal to destroy medical care in America.  For them what is reality, merely a social myth believed by the majority?  How do they know?  Are their arguments based upon emotionalism disconnected from reality, disconnected from cause and effect?  I expect that you will find that the advocates for ObamaCare are being dishonest with you, themselves, and the country.

As Ayn Rand wrote for Galt’s Speech in the novel Atlas Shrugged:

Honesty is the recognition of the fact that the unreal is unreal and can have no value, that neither love nor fame nor cash is a value if obtained by fraud—that an attempt to gain a value by deceiving the mind of others is an act of raising your victims to a position higher than reality, where you become a pawn of their blindness, a slave of their non-thinking and their evasions, while their intelligence, their rationality, their perceptiveness become the enemies you have to dread and flee—that you do not care to live as a dependent, least of all a dependent on the stupidity of others, or as a fool whose source of values is the fools he succeeds in fooling—that honesty is not a social duty, not a sacrifice for the sake of others, but the most profoundly selfish virtue man can practice: his refusal to sacrifice the reality of his own existence to the deluded consciousness of others.

Follow on Twitter Like on Facebook RSS Feed Email Subscription

Join the Selfish Party BannerBeSelfish_sharebanner

Posted in Political Discussions | Tagged , , , , , , | 5 Comments

Fire God, A Stimulus Plan for the Faithful

Posted on March 19, 2013 by Jim

I found a previously unpublished video script from four years ago.  It includes actionable ideas that remain valid today. In particular, this is a response to those who attempt to corrupt politics with religion.

As some of you might have heard we have been in the global Pelosi Recession for some time now and some fear that it might become the global Pelosi Depression as the US Congress advances the Welfare State equivalent of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff. The panicked response of President Bush, cheerleading of President Obama, and printing presses of Fed Chair Bernanke have not been sufficient to correct this reversal.

Therefore, I am putting forward an individual and personal stimulus package idea, which will particularly benefit Christians, Muslims, and Jews; Oh My!!

If you are a believer, a true believer, and you and your loved ones have been negatively impacted by this current decline in reason, justice, and freedom, then I recommend that you downsize, that you cut expenses.  Yes, I am suggesting that you fire someone from your personal staff.  I recommend that you fire God for his failure to perform his delegated tasks in reality.

[Image of God]  “Sorry God…in your latest performance review you are continuing to fail to meet expectations and assigned goals.  We have tried to work with you but there has been no improvement in your performance.  If times were better maybe…at this point we are just going to have to let you go.  Good luck with your future and hopefully you will find a new job better suited to your skill set.”  [Return to regular image]

Right off the bat, you will be saving your tithe; which is like a 10% increase in revenue, penny saved and all.  As this money was previously squandered unproductively, you can choose to redirect it towards debt reduction, savings, or investment, such as your own education.  Charity can be a good investment when not corrupted by duty and sacrifice, but is instead motivated by the merit of the recipient and their value to your life and vital values.

Of course, without tithing, there will be less spending on preacher bling-bling and other holy graft, plus less money will be spent supporting terrorism.

However, firing God is not about the Benjamins as He corrupts your entire life.  Taking God’s ideas seriously demonstrates that He is a parasitic cancer that retards your production of life sustaining values.  Putting aside God’s abusive assault on your self-esteem, in which you are unworthy trash who is only redeemed by His mercy (freaking sociopath), I want to focus on three fundamental bad ideas by which God cripples you.

In metaphysics, God pretends that there are multiple realities with their own separate rules governing cause and effect.  Further, that the one aspect of reality—which He created—that you are aware of is relatively unimportant and governed by rules which contradict the asserted important alternate realities of Heaven and Hell.  Really, that incompetent boob could not even create consistent work product so he had to compensate by providing an instruction manual that contradicts the system He created.  What a dumbass; no wonder you should consider firing God.

In contrast, the Pragmatists who created the Pelosi Recession assert that there is no independent reality governed by consistent rules of cause and effect; instead what we refer to using the arbitrary word “reality” is a shared socially agreed upon narrative.

A third option is available in contradiction to the options of multiple or no realities, that there is in fact ONE reality independent of the consciousness of God and men integrated with one set of consistent rules describing cause and effect relationships.  An issue that both God and the Pelosi Recession creators have in common is the failure to know what ‘is’ is.  Can you afford such an error to be at the foundation of your life?

In epistemology, God goes Platonic and denies the validity of your senses to know actual reality, because you can not perceive directly into the other more important realities that should inform your life.  The omni-impotent God can’t make functioning input devices that provide accurate and reliable data.  As a workaround, He outsources disintegrated and contradicting translation rules to Prophets through their defective auditory input devices to be recorded without effective validation by defective tactile and visual input devices, and consumed by end users through defection auditory and visual input devises.  Alternatively, some assert that God provided a spiritual perception input device through which you can perceive into the other realities; however, this is also defective and must be validate against the user manual through one’s other defective input devices.  Seriously, could God be a bigger screw up?

In contrast, the Pragmatists who created the Pelosi Recession hold that there is no knowledge of reality because reality does not exist to our knowledge.  Instead knowledge comes from consensus, feelings, and action.  “Reality” is what 50% + 1 says it is.  When the Wiz says that the color is green then says that the color is gold two minutes later, there is no inconsistency as reality is what we agree in that moment.  Without externally valid principles and data, our feelings guide our agreement so that we define “reality” by our emotions.  Our feelings direct our actions as thinking and analysis has been called impotent.  After we act then we can continue on that course of action or change as our emotions direct.

A third option exists about our knowledge of reality that opposes the arguments for revelation and feelings.  Its effectiveness has been demonstrated in ancient Greece, the Renaissance, the Ages of Reason and the Enlightenment, and the establishment of the United States and capitalism.  You as an individual can choose to be capable and effective as your perceptions are a valid source for data about reality and through reason you can conceive knowledge about reality that is valid, empowering, and life aggrandizing.  God and the creators of the Pelosi Recession agree that you as an individual can not independently gain knowledge of reality to fulfill the potential of your life.  Can you afford such an error to be at the foundation of your life?

In Ethics, God and the Pragmatists who created the Pelosi Recession are in total agreement:  the choices made by you in your life should be directed by the unassailable principle that you should voluntarily sacrifice yourself to the asserted needs of others.  Sacrifice being the destruction of a greater value in your life to attain a lesser value.  Further, that the ultimate virtue in their judgment is your voluntary self-immolation for the benefit of a stranger, or even better for your enemy who would consume your life.  This orgy of self-sacrifice and martyrdom manifests in the decline of life sustaining reason, justice, and freedom through its advocacy of irrationality, calling injustice justice, and the imposition of compulsion as the norm in human relations.  Can you afford such an error to be at the foundation of your life?

Another option is available, which contradicts the command to commit suicide.  The alternative is founded upon the principle that your individual life in reality is valuable to you, as it is for every other individual regarding themselves.  Your relationship to other individuals is not that of a cannibal, parasite, or victim; but, as a volitional trader of value for value based upon mutual consent and advantage.  You can choose to act in advancement of your life and vital values according to principles induced by your faculty of reason directly from the facts of reality.  Your own life is the standard of value to selfishly guide your ethical choices, and through free association you choose to augment relations with others who share your vital values and validly exclude individuals who do not.

In summary, for believers the question of God’s existence, or non-existence, is far less important than the question of whether God is good to and for you.  However, as a believer, you have an abusive relationship with God as He attacks your self-esteem and your capacity to independently live your life.  Further, He directs you to harm yourself and engage in high risk behaviors.  If He was your abusive boyfriend, then it would be long past time for your loved ones to stage an intervention.  Also, by His own admissions, He is a serial screw up who can not be trusted with important responsibility, like your life.

Finally, it is time to recognize that He is no good for you and move on.  In history, men of reason have demonstrated that you as an individual can choose to be capable and effective in your life in reality without being dragged down by that worthless bum, God.

Seriously, if your imaginary friend told you to walk off a cliff, would you?  When He tells you that you are worthless, unworthy, and incapable trash who is better off dead than alive, you should fire Him.

Follow on Twitter Like on Facebook RSS Feed Email Subscription

Join the Selfish Party BannerBeSelfish_sharebanner

Posted in Political Discussions | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment