Why These Social Welfare Ideologies are So Dangerous

I recently came across this picture in my Facebook news feed, shared from "Right Wing News." I will continue to defend my position to the death about this, knowing the person who posted it was not being satirical in any sense of the word. Another fine example of people who cant think for themselves spreading socially dangerous propaganda about a subject they know nothing of. I was having a discussion about this with a friend today, who said it best when she said. "RIGHT, Like...yes now, we're just sitting on our asses watching pay per view on our huge tvs and eating top notch delivered food on our silk jammies." I laughed and replied, "don't forget about pimping out our trucks." I say "our" because we, like many others in an unequally divided wealth system, who have had to utilize the social welfare system out of necessity. And not laziness, may I add, which seems to be the ideology of so many people who are quick to think anyone on social assistance flat out refuses to work.

Let me start by saying that nobody flat out REFUSES to work. There are many social and personal problems that lead to a lack of employment. Think disability (and yes, mental illness is considered a disability), lack of jobs, unequal access to education, homelessness, involvement with the justice system, addiction, and the ultimate double edged sword I have found myself in - no money to print resumes or even take a bus to a job interview.

Why do people seem to think that living on social assistance is some sort of luxury? I have received disability for mental illness two years combined to date. There was a whole year where after I paid rent. my only left over income was fifty dollars a MONTH. Yes, a month. What is fifty dollars? No social life. No cigarettes. Definitely no drinking or drugs. Barely three loaves of bread and a carton of milk. As if I am wasting your tax dollars to have no social life, no upward social mobility and no hope for the future. It is difficult to come out of. Even now, on the upswing of receiving the appropriate mental health care and medication, I can only work part-time or the old demon of depression and anxiety creeps into every cell that I have, rendering me useless.  And the cycle starts all over, if I let myself go there. But I don't. I can't.

Another point here is that I have paid my share of tax dollars too. Why do you think you are special here? Do I have your permission now to utilize a necessary system within our social paradigm because I have worked? It shouldn't even matter, this point is actually irrelevant but I figured I should make it regardless, if only to educate the masses. Not to mention that more of your precious tax dollars are spent on say, Stephen Harper sending himself a bullet-proof limousine to India, which cost you 1.2 million dollars. And why exactly are a small portion of the population barely being able to eat or have any hope for the future so offensive to you?

These pictures and comments are categorically incorrect, which is why they bother me so much. If you don't want your tax dollars going to people who really need some social support why don't you just move to another country and be some sort of slave driving capitalist? I mean, that option is always there.

I don't see you at protests lobbying for free post-secondary education. I didn't see you bring food to the food bank or your old children's toys to the Single Parents Association. I didn't see you in rehab or the mental health unit at the hospital. I didn't see you talk to the street beggars like humans. I didn't see you volunteer at the women's shelter. All I saw was your ignorance, your brand new house, your trades diploma that mommy paid for, your fancy souped-up truck and your inability to think about the social issues that affect everyone around you. Except you, apparently, are immune. They don't involve you. You are better than us. I for one and am sick of this dangerous ideology. I am giving the voiceless a voice. As I just typed that, the cap on my tooth fell off. This is totally ironic because now I have no front tooth and no dental insurance. But I don't deserve a tooth because I am poor right??

Here's to thinking!!!