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| Why Socialism Doesn't Work In America (not that it can't) (778393) | |||
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Why Socialism Doesn't Work In America (not that it can't) |
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Posted by JayMan on Wed May 11 20:39:47 2011 Not that it can't work, but this is why it doesn't (to date). Properly executed a more European-esce social welfare system could be set up in the U.S, the type that Michael Moore advocates with 5+ weeks guaranteed paid vacations, free quality day care, government house maids, and healthcare for all. The reason it hasn't: minorities—that is, black and brown ones.I've wondered why the U.S. is so far to the right politically compared to the other First World nations, and my recent exploration of race differences has led me to see a good part of the reason why (at least, why it persists, not necessarily why things started this way): we have large underperforming minorities. Nearly 30% of the U.S. population consists of blacks and “Hispanics”, a proportion that is rapidly increasing, both to the poor fertility of whites and the high fecundity of the “Hispanic” groups (some of which no doubt actually are of primarily European ancestry, but the bulk of which consists of various Mestizos). By contrast all the other First World nations are generally ethnically homogenous, each of the European countries typically consisting of one dominant group of people (and the ones that aren’t/weren’t were sites of ethnic strife, like the UK’s Northern Ireland or the former Yugoslavia), as do Japan, South Korea, as well as Canada, Australia (both ~90% white) and New Zealand (~75% white). This is part of the reason for the difference in layout between European cities and American ones; with no minorities to flee from in the inner cities, there was no “white flight”, hence the general absence of sprawling suburbs in Europe. Part of the problem is heterogeneity itself. Despite the popular mantras, diversity is more of a source of strife and division than it is of strength. Not only do areas that are more ethnically homogenous have lower crime rates and less internal turmoil, people are also nicer and are more trusting of one another. In fact, in ethnically diverse areas, people are more mistrustful of everyone, even those of their own ethnic group. While this is plainly evident by contrasting any major city (outside the Northwest anyway) with the more lily white suburb/rural areas, it is also evident between cities (contrast the behavior of the people of Quebec City, which is all white and French, with Montreal, which is not much so), and even within the people of color themselves, as the black crime rate is considerably lower in the old Black belt of the Southeast where in many places blacks make up a majority of the population. In homogenous areas, people are more inclined to look out for one another as there is a greater sense of community between them (such as towns in rural Missouri I visited where all drivers wave to each other). People are more likely to see someone who is downtrodden as potentially being themself one day rather than the fate of a loser as they do in the cities. People in ethnically homogenous areas are much more apt to pay taxes and support schools as they see the funding as educating their own children and grandchildren, as we see with Bernie Sanders' initiative for true universal health care in Vermont. The lesson is that tribalism is simply a part of human nature, as there are obvious evolutionary reasons for favoring your own kind (the size of the natural tribe varies among the races, increasing as you go north). This is not to say that this is the way it should be, but it is what IS. (Note that there is a considerable downside to homogeneity: while people in these places are cordial to each other, they are not necessarily accepting of outsiders, some places more than others). As well, there the is issue of economic performance, in terms of ability, work ethic, and morality, where there are serious and visible group differences between whites and black and brown people, with whites comparing favorably in all three categories. As my last two posts on the topic demonstrate, despite what whites, even liberals say publicly, they are all aware of these differences between themselves and the other major racial groups in the country. It’s harder to sell the idea of everyone pooling together to create a more robust social safety net when we have groups of people that are seen—somewhat correctly—as those who will leech off this system and not contribute, sit at home and collect welfare, use drugs, pop out babies who will eat up food assistance and health care funds, and grow up to become violent thugs that terrorize good hard working people (it’s also important to note that most people have a hard time with the statistical nature of stereotypes, and I’m hoping some of you won’t go ahead and prove me right on that). This is quite different from supporting the unlucky family whose adults are temporarily out of work or the poor college student working his/her way up, because these individuals are more likely to one day contribute to the safety net themselves, and the occasional white mooch could be tolerated (although because of the increasing genetic stratification of society as social barriers to success are removed, a persistent underclass would exist even in an all-white society, as it does in Canada and Europe). This, I suspect, is in good part at the root of American conservative attitudes: self-reliance, hard-work, anti-entitlement, individualism; it’s born out of a visceral desire to not have hard-working (white) American’s wealth redistributed to lazy and undeserving black and brown people (and worthless white people). (The other of part American conservatism is due to the religious fanaticism that exists in here, partly due, ironically, to America’s freedom of religion that bred stiff competition for crazy among religions in their quest for followers). This is why Americans are reluctant to institute universal healthcare (something I can say I’ve heard explicitly said from some whites, as they feared that “Obamacare” was all about taking away healthcare from whites and giving it to blacks), why we are reluctant to pay more taxes for schools (since most of our education tax dollars are spent on the endless quest to bring colored people up to par), why (white) Americans even oppose measures that would stand to benefit them; they don’t want their families’ (potential) earnings taken by the government to support black and brown people on welfare. Even if not stated openly, this I suspect is the underlying motives driving conservative politics in this country. It is true that because of the large minority population, a European-style socialist system, if copied exactly, probably wouldn’t work here, as the tax-base to support it wouldn’t be as robust. In fact, as Europe gains its own brown people, in the form of Middle Easterners and North Africans, they have moved farther to the right and have railed against the newcomers who are creating a large underclasses in the Europeans' previously homogenous societies. (This is to say nothing of the outsourcing of manufacturing to China and other places that is eroding the economies and tax bases of all the First World nations except Germany). So what’s the solution? As someone who favors a European-style social safety net, how would we go about implementing it? Perhaps fortunately, if something like this would come to pass at all, it would have to be gradual, much as Obama’s health care reform, due to the acrid political climate. But since I’ve advocated measures to reverse the dysgenic trend in fertility, something that is essential if the United States wishes to remain competitive, perhaps as the IQ’s and productivity of the people rise, a more and more robust social welfare systems could be set up, to finally compassionately deal with the people on the bottom rungs of society and crafting a better and more considerate society for us all. Note that this is STILL not the promised groundbreaking post I promised, that will touch on a much more fundamental topic (and I mean really fundamental). |
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