If Our Natures Differ, Do Our Duties, Responsibilities, Obligations Differ?
This rather odd question arose when a security guard, who works two jobs to make modest ends meet, expressed some anger at some 'bums' who spend every day hanging in this park near him, probably on welfare. It all starts with the obvious: people are all different. To the extent anyone differs from another it has to be genetic or environmental. There might be genetic reasons why a particular person cannot gain employment or hold on to a job. These days most of the mentally ill are not institutionalized, they are left to fend for themselves on the street. Many of them are the homeless, but not all of the homeless are mentally ill.
Without quibbling over numbers, some of those just 'hanging' around all day, existing outside the category of useful members of society, are products of their environment. What else can possibly be the reason why some members of society are productive and others are useless? Even if we use the term 'evil' and 'good', or 'saved' and 'not saved', or 'bum' and 'person of character' etc, we still end up with genetics or environment---unless one dumps the whole distinction on 'God'. If God is the One designating who will be a bum, then this whole discussion is beyond reason. Clearly what God wills, IS.
The only ALTERABLE factor involved here is the environment. If genetics is behind anyone's mental or emotional limitations, then the best we can do is medicate and provide them a safe environment within which to exist. Certainly the richest country on the earth could do this. But we don't. We are busy bombing other countries back into the stone age and then purportedly we will rebuild their country. Yeah, sure. We don't even rebuild New Orleans.
So we are left with the environment as the only controllable factor. There may be a case to be made for refusing some adults health coverage but there can be no logical reason why any child, living in the richest country in the world, should be denied proper health care. An unhealthy child--physically or mentally--cannot be expected to become a productive, responsible member of society in many cases. Every child, in the richest country in the world, should be entitled to have the same amount of money spent on his/her education as any other child in a public school system. We don't. Every society, in areas of overpopulation, has an obligation, for the welfare of all, to enforce responsible reproduction practices. Almost all countries don't. Every child has a right to have access to quality mentors. They don't. In an age of scientific and social enlightenment, raising kids remains a genetic crap shoot---born into the wrong family, you lose. Sometimes, born into the right family you still lose.
Now back to the 'bums' in the park. Maybe a few are genetically handicapped. That leaves the rest---who by the process of elimination are environmentally challenged victims. I suspect, if most of us were accepted to be members of their hang-out group, after a few hours we would become extremely bored with it all. What pleasure can ever be derived from being a 'nothingburger' in any society? Probably little, if any, pleasure. Thus, many of these hang-out 'bums' seek some sort of mental relief via drugs. If things cannot be good, drugs can at least make one feel good or give one relief from mental pain. The reason anyone takes a recreational drug, legal or illegal, is to feel high or get relief from stress. Drug abuse is a symptom, not a criminal act. When things aren't right in your life and you become a drug abuser to get relief, you need treatment, not jail. Drug abuse is a medical/social problem and always will be. Treating it as a criminal problem and throwing hundreds of thousands in jail for using or selling the drugs, at a cost of $30,000 per year to house them in a jail, is a pitiful and useless waste of money, not to mention human sacrifice. Drug abuse is about as prevalent in societies with strict drug laws as those with less strict drug laws. The forty years of our War on Drugs, of treating the whole business as a criminal activity instead of a medical problem, has not reduced the use of drugs in any appreciable way. If the vast amount of money spent to treat drug use as a criminal activity was used to treat people who abuse drugs, we would live in a much better society, with a hell of lot fewer 'bums' hanging in parks all day. It is the same situation with abortion. The number of abortions in countries with strict laws against abortion are about the same as in those countries where abortions are legal. The level of rationality on these issues is minimal at best. If we make marijuana illegal few people will use it. Nonsense. After 40 years nothing has changed. If we make abortion illegal people fewer people will have abortions. Nonsense, and the facts are there to support these conclusions.
The richest country in the world CAN afford to give almost every child the proper environment to prosper---medically, educationally, and socially. It is a matter of priorities and justice. In the absence of this, when I see 'bums' hanging out uselessly all day in a park, I feel blessed---sensing that 'there but for the grace of God goes I". But I also feel angry---angry that so many kids are left destined to the same fate. Of course I can feel my sadness in a distant abstract way, but to be amongst that crowd of adult 'misfits' would be a scary and repulsive experience. For the most part, the dye has been cast and they are what they are. The chance to have changed their destiny has mostly escaped. It doesn't do much good, in any practical way, to at this point say, "make them get a job". Sure. Like who the hell would hire them. Would you? I wouldn't. Let them hang in the park. I don't want them in my face.
Perhaps one who has received much may well have greater obligations, duties, and responsibilities than one who has received less. Can a child who has received few kindnesses be expected to feel much kindness toward others? He who receives little may be expected to give little. So much in life is really relative. Bill Gates may give a million dollar gift, which represents a minute fraction of his expendable assets. A poor person may give $10 which may represent 50% of their expendable assets at the moment. So who really has shown the greatest responsibility, duty, or obligation to others?
The 'bum' in the park, by doing nothing, is certainly not costing $30,000/year as are those who do things which land them in jail. We live in a world of compensations. To those kids for whom society invests little, society usually receives little in return. If we are lucky these kids, grown to adults, will just sit in the park all day. In the last analysis people build people. Maybe most of these 'bums' in the park are just unbuilt people.
