Against liberalism

[The Dharma Bum]

[Philly]

[The Dharma Bum]

[The Dharma Bum]

then there is the popularity of antiliberal legislation in western society, like minimum wage requirements, restrictions on work hours per week, environmental regulation etc

[Philly]

[exploited]

Since you're not going to respond to my bait, I have no choice but to attempt to answer honestly. Frustrating.

The issue is that our governmental framework hasn't adapted to the needs of our world. Everything that needs to be done right away with utmost care is instead a silly half measure. Everything that shouldn't be done, or should only be done sparingly, is being abused.

The reason is that we have to cope with logic and precedent set two hundred years ago, as if it is relevant to today. So take the second amendment: it made a whole bunch of sense back in the day. Now that it makes more sense to have strong regulations on guns, the US is stuck with silly half-measures that don't work, and has a handgun murder rate to match.

Consider environmental regulations: now that we are developed enough to afford it, preserving and actually expanding the natural environment should be a top priority. Instead we have debated scientific fact for the past decade, and the urgent actions needed to be taken are quite likely illegal under the system of government we have.

Consider labor law: rather than expanding the scope of protections, we are repealing them, because for some reason we insist upon competing with nations that are in the industrial development stage. Who knows why. Even now we still have people that think the US should be into the business of manufacturing widgets, rather than moving fully to the knowledge economy.

Consider minimum wage: rather than repealing this and simply paying every person a minimum annual salary, we insist upon measure that are based on thinking from the 1920s, which is nearly a century ago. We could rid ourselves of so many social programs simply by having a modest, guaranteed redistribution scheme. But we don't, again because the laws and precedents of the past make it exceedingly difficult to accomplish.

Consider SWAT teams. Born out of necessity. Too many cops getting their asses kicked by better armed criminals. Now they are being used to break up poker matches, despite the fact that cops have never, ever been safer.

I could go on. It isn't so much liberalism as it is the necessity of carrying two hundred years of irrelevant shit on our backs.

[Ben Huh]

[Ben Huh]

[The Dharma Bum]

[Philly]