So yesterday for work I flew for the 8th time this month. This time we flew southwest for scheduling issues. Since I’ve flown so many times this month for once I didn’t spend the whole run up to the flight worrying that someone would harass me for being a fat fat fatty. After cramming myself into a tiny American Eagle seat for an hour and a half I really wasn’t concerned.
Mom’s law states that whatever you’ve forgotten to worry about will therefore come to pass. Good job being right again Mom. (Icanhaz anxiety issues, yes.)
My work party of 4 walked up to the gate and had our little cards scanned. I got mine scanned and then walked down the jetway. And then there was a pause. My boss did not follow for a while. At the time I thought it may just have been them waiting for the jetway to clear.
However, once I had boarded and chosen my seat in a row with an empty middle seat it became apparent that that may have not been the case. The gate agent, who reminded me of a brand new bschool grad with his first very important job in consulting, was on the plane. He walked past me and asked if I could lower my armrest, which I did. Granted, there is a bit of a squish for me, but the armrest lowers and I fit and am not encroaching on the seat nearby. Of course I think this is no big deal, since I fit, and the plane has plenty of extra seats.
Well then later the gate agent is back and he speaks to me in what I’m sure he thinks is a “Very nice and helpful tone” but certainly comes off as more of a “I’m so excited to tell you what a fatass you are tone.” He tells me that this time they have very kindly decide not to charge me for an additional seat on a half empty plane, but that his supervisor says I need to be able to lower the arm rest “comfortably.” He says that next time I should really plan on buying two seats.
I tell him there wont be a next time, thanks.
It now becomes apparent to me that they my boss may have been asked to pay for an additional seat for me. He hasn’t said anything, but I kindof wish he would so we can get that over with. So now I’m angry, embarassed, and concerned about my job.
Thanks Southwest Gate Agent Fatty Police.
What really gets me is that this guy clearly wasn’t very familiar with their policies, or he would know that if I DID buy two seats, the extra seat would have been refunded anyway since I didn’t need it. Also, the word “comfortably” does not appear on their persons of size policies. They only state that the armrest must lower and that you must not encroach on nearby seats. The fact that he acted like he was doing me some kind of favor by not charging me and publicly humiliating me was pretty infuriating.
So I anticipate that that will be my last ever Southwest flight. My boss did observe that the service on that flight was not very “Southwesty.” But perhaps they have changed their policies, and they are now more interested in humiliating fat people than providing good service.
(I know I promised to post more. I will try harder. )
So here’s a round up of stuff I found interesting/enlightening or whatever over the weekend and this morning.
Blogging GO
Occupy WallStreet
I”m planning to write a big post later to talk about Occupy Wall Street. I have been following it pretty closely, watching their live streams. One could say I am interested.
- This weekend they released their “demands.” They are not all inclusive, heh.
- And here is a pretty great interview with an occupier, who talks to a fox news producer. Unsurprisingly this interview has not yet been aired on fox news. I sort of had a crush after watching this, if it weren’t for the hipsterish hat.
On a more Fat related note:
Paul Campos really nails some liberal pundits for their criticism of Gov. Christie. Paul Campos is awesome. (Via Marilyn Wann)
Here is an interesting article about sexism in the workplace, as it relates to recent accusations of sexism in the White House.
That’s all I’ve got for now. Time for a third cup of coffee. *Twitch*
A great video of Elizabeth Warren discussing debt and taxation has been making the rounds of late. Of course, the liberals love a video of a smart professorial type talking about why we all have to contribute to society, and conservatives pretty much hate it. Today there is an article in Reason about it. I think the most deeply out of touch part of the article is this:
But in August remarks about class warfare that have gone viral, the Democratic candidate for a Senate seat from Massachusetts is visibly seething.
That’s okay; everyone gets worked up now and then, and most of us are lucky enough not to be caught on camera at the moment. Funny thing is, Warren’s comments—her rage and resentment and sarcasm—have made her an overnight heroine.
Uhm, you guys, a Lady used SARCASM, and she may have RAISED HER VOICE. She should be ASHAMED.
The writer of this article clearly doesn’t understand the frustration that a lot of people on the left have been feeling of late. I say this not to be patronizing, because if he did he would not think it is so “funny” that Warren’s comments were so well received. People are frustrated, and she gave voice to some of those frustrations. I hope she never looks back on this video in shame.
I will also summarize some other points he made against this video for your enjoyment:
1. She is arguing against a straw person, no one says we don’t live in a community. I mean sure there are people who don’t want to pay as much to be part of that community, or people who want “the government” to be replaced by profit driven enterprises. There are also people who don’t want certain members of the community to have any particular power compared to other members of the community who have more money. But, of course, it is still a community!
2. It is offensive to hypothetical individual business owners to call them “you” instead of including them in “the rest of us.” Distinguishing an individual hypothetical business owner from the rest of the community is just like busting unions, except it is actually CLASS WARFARE, unlike the union thing.
3. When the richest fifth of Americans pay 64% of all federal taxes while poor people don’t pay any that hurts our feelings. But it doesn’t hurt our feelings quite as much as the fact that the richest fifth ONLY had 54% of total us income in 2010, that hurts our feelings too much to even mention. Also, sales taxes TOTALLY don’t count as taxes because everyone has to pay those.
4. Nobody minds paying taxes for roads and police and stuff, that’s crazy. We just mind paying taxes for things like preventing our fellow citizens from starving or being homeless. They should get a job, there are plenty of jobs they are not qualified for because they couldn’t afford the education, so really, hop to it.
5. Something possibly valid about schools and how we could try to improve efficiency there through validated methods that work. Though it is possible that improve efficiency actually means fire teachers and or pay them less. (I”m not even sure paying them less is possible at this point.)
6. Elizabeth Warren clearly hates employers. She wants them to pay taxes, But the poor employers are already providing jobs and pensions for their workers. Well that is they are providing pensions for their workers until profit margins get tight, and then the pensions are gonna go. Also the jobs might go too if the employer can find someone to do it cheaper somewhere else. Maybe the workers will just have to work twice as hard for less money, gotta make a profit y’know? Did someone say Union? You’re fired.
7.Steep taxes on rich people aren’t fair because those rich people are already giving back just by being rich around other people. They employ all those lawyers and accountants to avoid paying taxes. How can you expect them to give back in any other way besides employing all those people? Plus they totally donated a couple hundred bucks to an art institute the other day. Your property values have probably gone up just because of all the rich people around here. Oh you can’t afford to live here anymore? Sorry.
8. Maybe she’s just too sheltered to understand our enlightened point of view about how rich people should always be allowed to get richer, and richer. We can’t limit their richness, or they will stop being rich and then where will we be?
All snarkiness aside, I do think it is important to have discussions about how we can improve our systems. It is important that programs like education and welfare are better and more efficient. But the reason that is important is not to save money so the rich people can pay fewer taxes. It iso that those programs work better.
If they do save money, and then taxes can be lowered, that would be great. But republicans generally haven’t been proposing reforms and improvements in efficiency. They’ve been proposing blanket cuts, that would result in people losing services and losing their jobs.
I don’t even want to look at how long it has been since I updated this blog. I had declared it dead, and now it is going to rise from the dead in some kind of zombie form.
I find that recently I have thoughts. (BRAAAINS) I would like to share those thoughts, on the off chance that someone will actually care. The main caveat I’m gong to make here is that most of these thoughts are not really about Fat Acceptance. Politics, economics and feminism are important to me as well and I think part of the reason I stopped posting is that most of the things I had to say about FA were being said by someone else, better than I could.
Chances are this will still be true of anything I have to say about non FA stuff. However I’m going to post anyway, if only so that will keep me from trying to discuss it with my argumentative work colleagues. (Seriously they will argue about ANYTHING. We spent a half an hour seriously debating the appropriateness and rationality of shoes being placed on the lunch table. Real life trolls. I finally cut through all the “rationality” BS and pointed out that I don’t care if it is perfectly rational, don’t put your shoes where I’m about to eat, end of story.)
Here’s my plan, I’m going to post it here vaguely hoping that it will help me feel motivated to do it.
1. Share regular links that I find interesting. This will probably be from my reader news feed. I will try to post stuff that’s not already being posted a million places. (I’m also going to update my blogroll, so people who are interested in what I’m interested can read what I am reading and maybe recommend stuff that I have not yet read.)
2. Post about stuff. Any stuff.
3. Moderate Comments. For now comment moderation is on and to those 7 people whose comments NEVER posted, I’m sorry. I’m going to keep it pretty locked down for a while because there is an extremely minute chance that some new people will read this blog.
There is really nothing I hate more in this universe than seeing research being used to prove something it doesn’t actually prove. For all that I am an angry man hating feminist and I obviously spend a lot of time hating on men. (In fact just last night I went into a Feminist Bezerker Rage at a group of guys. If I wasn’t such an evil man hating bitch I would obviously be thrilled to listen to hours of conversations that amount to “Girls do this but not that and therefore ruin EVERYTHING.” but my rampant misandry prevents this. I would like to add that I did not look that word up.)
But really, the thing I hate more than all men evah is research being twisted to prove a point. Case in point is this recent article at Scientific American that has been making the rounds in a few spots.
The post itself is largely about the author throwing a hissy fit because someone said something he said was misogynist and he is upset. Blah blah blah, do not care about internet kerfluffle. I am not here to pass judgment on whether his previous statements regarding bodily fluids were sexist and whether the person who called him out was justified. NOT INTERESTED.
What I am interested in is how someone who is supposed to write for a science magazine can misuse research like this.
He cites a paper where researcher used Implicit Attitude Testing to evaluate hidden biases against feminist attitudes among college aged individuals. The paper just essentially confirms that stereotypes of women’s right’s activists that have existed in some form or another since women were fighting for the right to vote STILL in fact exist (I know, we are all shocked) even though they may not be overt.
However Bering seems to be making a different conclusion from this research than “Some populations still have a negative view of feminism.” Several times he implies that feminists themselves are the CAUSE of these negative views:
If you’ve ever wondered why some feminists have earned themselves such a bad name, and are at all curious about how some intriguing new experimental research demonstrates that this negative view of feminism is more than just my personal opinion and in fact runs very deep in the modern psyche, then read on.
…
Even worse, though, by all appearances the Nagoskis of this world—those radical, hot-headed, loudmouthed caricatures of blank slate feminism—are giving the feminist movement itself a bad name. A really bad name.
…
Jessica Jenen and her colleagues reported the results from the first Implicit Attitude Test (IAT) on feminist concepts, and what this study showed was that the most obnoxious, peevish and humorless feminists were sadly defining the movement in the minds of thoughtful onlookers.
The last quote above is perhaps the most egregious example of how Bering is mangling this research. As far as I can tell IAT study shows that these negative attitudes exist, not that these attitudes are in any way justified or based on any kind of experience with actual feminists.
This study does not prove what causes these negative attitudes, only that they still exist in the psyche of those who were studied. And yet this is an indictment of feminists everywhere.
Bering easily draws the conclusion that feminists ourselves are causing the negative attitudes against us without so much of a word as explanation. He provides no evidence for this besides an apparent twist of logic that if a negative attitude toward a non privileged group exists then it MUST be caused by the actions of that group.
I think the most misogynist thing about Bering’s article is his implication in this article that feminists should conduct themselves in a way that Mr. Bering and the rest of society finds appropriate in order to be taken seriously. We should never be radical or say anything that might cause offense to men, or we are perpetuating negative stereotypes and hurting their own cause. Feminism is apparently a great idea, as long as feminists are feminist in a way that everyone who is not a feminist finds appropriate.
After all we wouldn’t want to hurt anyone’s precious fee fees while we try to achieve actual equality. I think our new motto should be “Feminists, never challenging your worldview or making you feel uncomfortable in any way since 1792.”
New show about fat kids could be appeal to fat teens we are concerned that it may forget to remind them to hate themselves. Oh.. uh.. For their health.
They pretty much exactly say this actually:
But will “Huge” provide role models for overweight kids and inspire them to lose weight and get healthy? Or will the show skip obesity’s physical risks to focus on thepsychological and social drama?
Because obviously a show about fat kids has to be about how fat kids are losing weight, I mean like, why would we want a TV show with a bunch of people just being fat at us? That sounds terrible.
I don’t know if I will watch this new show, I’ll probably catch an episode. But to be honest it doesn’t really appeal to me.
I think that the portrayal of marginalized groups in any form of media is INCREDIBLY problematic. Not just fat people, but pretty much any people. It’s sortof a damned if you do damned if you don’t prospect. No matter what choice the show/film/book makes their is probably another better different choice that some member of said marginalized group will wish they had made.
I remember some conversations that happend when The Princess and the Frog came out about the race of the villain and the prince, and it struck me that even if they had moved the races around arguments could still be made against those choices. No matter what they do someone will be unhappy.
And what is happening with fat people on TV right now is one of those choices that makes me personally unhappy. We now have a whole “Fat TV” sub genre. Rather than creating shows that incorperate fat characters in a sympathetic and non stereotypical way, we have shows that make fat the central issue of the show.
I do think it is GREAT to have more fat people on TV, but I’d rather have fat people incorporated in such a way that it wasn’t about them being fat. I mean, being fat should come up, but it should not be their whole deal. Say what you want about GLEE, but I actually appreciate that there are a lot of plots involving Mercedes that have nothing to do with her being fat.
I watch a lot of procedural stuff, Leverage and Lie to me are this summer’s shows, House, Bones, I don’t remember my DVR list right now. Anyway, the thing about these shows is that they sometimes have fat people on them, and whenever there are fat people on them the show is then ABOUT THESE PEOPLE BEING FAT.
No one is just, y’know, a lawyer investigating a government coverup of tobacco industry crimes, who also happens to be fat. Or even just a CSI who is fat, Fatness always has to factor into the plot or be a big part of their identity. And I guess everyone who is not a thin able bodied white christian straight guy gets this too some extent.
It still drives me crazy. I don’t want to see shows specially made to talk about fat, or special fat issues of my favorite shows. I want fat people to show up on TV the same way they do in real life. (About 30% of the time.)
I really loved Silvana’s post at TigerBeatdown about the recent study indicating that obese teenage girls are more sexually active than their normal weight counter parts. Silvana made some really great points about the pile of steaming crap that was the MSNBC article, and I wanted to make Just One More. (A point that is so completely horrible I am sad that I even thought of it, but it is a reflection of my life experience, and so here it goes.)
A quote from the end of the MSNBC Article is what made me think of it.
“It’s not as though every overweight girl is having sex just because she’s overweight,” Chernick added. “And, of course, the flip side of that is that parents shouldn’t assume that they don’t have to worry if their daughters are normal weight.”
Perhaps another potential contributing factor to fat girls being more likely to have sex is because parents and other adults in their lives are less worried about them. If parents view their daughters as overweight and therefore less likely to be attractive to boys it may be that the parental behavior towards overweight daughters is different than normal weight daughters. They may be less protective of them, less likely to talk to them about sex (and using protection) because they see them as less likely to be sexually active. And this inaction can then gives the girls more opportunity to have sex and to potentially do so in risky ways.
I know this sounds terrible and I’m not saying that really this is all the parent’s fault. All of the things that Silvana mentioned, poor body image, early maturity, slut shaming regardless of their actions are probably all more likely reasons for the change in rates of sexual activity.
But for girls at the higher end of the fat spectrum I think their adolescent experience might be not always be about slut shaming and but more “who would want to have sex with you” messages.
A story from my childhood, once upon a time in a 5th grade class far far away I was pretty much hated by all. I think the comments on my “attitude problem” started around then. I had a small group of girlfriends and we generally left the rest of the class to their own devices. One day on our return to our classroom I remember my classmates started making comments to me like “Nice” “I didn’t think you had it in you” “Good going.” And after some breif detective work I learned that because some of the boys in my class were mad at another boy, they spread a rumor that he had slept with me.
The sex part was so ridiculous to me even at the time, I mean I was 10, and I was so catholic it hurt. What was upsetting was that it was not so much about me being a slut, but about him being disgusting for being willing to have sex with me. How’s that for fucked up ideas about your own sexuality?
But I am pretty sure if I had ever wanted to have sex before I had my first boyfriend I probably could have gotten away with it if I had wanted to. (Not after that of course.) My parents never talked to me about sex. They never told me that guys would try to take advantage of me or anything like that. Most of my friends were allowed to go pretty much anywhere as long as I was around because I was large and can fend off dangerous menfolk. (No one ever worried about the dangerous menfolk being interested in me.)
There was a friend from my jr high/highschool who would also have been classified as “Obese” at the time. The way her family treated her was terrible, I definetly recall hearing one family member of hers tell her to “Go eat something” when she was upset. I am pretty sure that even if she’d found like 15 guys to have sex with her in front of her parents, they wouldn’t have believed she was having sex.
No one was worried about her having sex, they were worried about her being fat. (I think MY Mom was more worried I was a Lesbian or that I was so fat I was going to DIE ALONE.)
So what I’m saying is I think that while young thin girls are seen as potential targets and victims of an overly sexual culture by the adults in their lives, I think some fat girls are seen as future spinsters. There is no worry that they are going to be a slut, because who would want to have sex with them anyway?
And this gives those girls an increased opportunity to act on whatever sexual desires or emotional needs or whatever they have that they think sex is the answer too. I know this fat girl for one did a lot of her sexytime over the intertrons. When I was 12 I was pretending I was 14 and 15 and having cybersex with guys on the internet. And maybe that sounds terrible to the ears of parents of 12 year old, but I had a lot of fun and it never scarred me in anyway. (Though i realize now how old some of those people I was talking to probably were, and that’s a little creepy. And I am glad I listened to my father about the whole no giving out phone numbers or addresses or real names thing.)
As much as I think the framing of this MSNBC article was awful, in a way I think it is good. I think it is an excellent reminder that fat girls are sexual beings too and that if we are going to police the behavior of girls to protect their precious virginities from whatever horrible thing happens to them when they have sex (locusts? we run out of ritual sacrifices? I don’t know) then we should be policing all of them, not just the ones we think are mad hotties.
It is hardly revolutionary for me to point out that doctors are dickheads to fat people. I just want to observe breifly that no matter how prepared you are to deal with medical BS upon visiting a doctor, it still REALLY REALLY Sucks. And part of why it sucks is that as a fat person it is I think even harder to just trust your doctors.
My boyfriend Mr. I who has congenital hypothyroid FINALLY went to the doctor last week. After two years with no insurance and a sixweek wait for an appointment we were finally there. He was finally going to get the medication he needs to feel fairly normal. My optimism levels were high.
So it was pretty crushing to find out that his doctor spent about 10 minutes trying to figure out WHY Mr. I didn’t have joint pain, since y’know, he’s a fat fat fatty, therefore he SHOULD have joint pain. This was heartbreaking because it meant his doctor was probably going to treat him like a fat guy instead of, y’know, a patient. And it is frustrating because even when you are aware that this happens and ready to deal with it you still wish that maybe this time the doctor wont be a total jerk and you’ll just be able to get the medical care you need. Maybe this time you will get medical care with out having to prove that you are indeed an individual capable of independent thought while simultaneously questioning everything your doctor does to determine whether it is motivated by an actual desire to treat you as a patient or whether they are treating your FAT.
But whatever, y’know, doctors are jerks sometimes as long as they write the perscription things will be fine, right?
So bloodtest results come in and they call tell him that his hypothyroid is sub clinical so they will not be treating it they tell him he will have “enough to worry about” with treating his apparent diabetes. Now this diagnosis of Diabetes is based on one blood test, ONE, before which he had not fasted all night but had in fact stayed up until about 3am eating ice cream and drinking soda, and then failed to sleep all night. The doctors then listed a ton of diabetic symptoms he should have, of which he has none, but his sugar levels are like OMG WHY ARENT YOU DEAD YET high, so we’re going with it.
The doctor and the dietician ordered him to eat no carbs and no sugar of any kind until he got in to see them. And even though this is probably a rational medical response to someone with insanely high sugar levels, as fat people it was kindof like “So, you’re putting me on the Atkins diet? Really” (I actually wrote a post over the weekend about this but since I hadn’t had carbs in like 2 days it made even less sense than normal. The general gist, WHY WOULD ANYONE DO THAT TO THEMSELVES ON PURPOSE? I had to start eating normally just so he and I would not kill each other, which is especially bad considering we argue about once a year.)
So here we are again, are these doctors (Totally different doctors by the way, from the first one he talked to) actually treating him the patient, or him the fat guy?
He’s going today to see the doctor and get medication for his Diabetes and a Glucose meter and then meeting with a Registered Dietician. ( If he gets through the RD appointment without making her cry, I will be happy. Reasons he will probably make her cry 1. he hasn’t eaten carbs in a week and is an angry panda 2. he went to culinary school and took a ton of nutrition and anatomy classes so really doesn’t enjoy being treated like he knows nothing 3. she proudly announced to him that milk has sugar in it as though it were not obvious to everyone, thus displaying mental weakness to the raging predator that is my boyfriend.)
I am hoping that these meetings will go better, and I am hoping that they will be able to discuss important issues like how his Hypothyroid might affect his ability to manage his sugar levels and how leaving it untreated may not be the greatest idea anyone has ever had.
I am hoping, but I am not hopeful. I don’t trust these doctors because I don’t feel like they trust their patient. It doesn’t seem like they believe or are even listening to the things he says. It seems like we are just supposed to go along with them because they have the word doctor in front of their name, they aren’t trying to earn his trust or treat him well. (The doc who told him he had Diabetes kept being all “I fell like I’ve just dropped a bombshell on you” well maybe you should be a little less worried about YOUR feelings here Doc, hmm?)
I think people who are not fat as well as many medical professionals are unaware of the serious trust gap between medical professionals and fat people who’ve been told that their rash/pain/infection/brain tumor will go away if they just stop being fat. Studies have shown that medical professionals do not trust fat patients. But I think it is also important to point out that some of their fat patients don’t trust them either, and for good reason.
Being a trained medical professional is not proof of infallibility or impartiality. That is not enough for everyone, some people want to actually understand why you are making this diagnosis, and to be treated like an adult. Some of us want you to prove that you are right about things so that we know you aren’t diagnosing our fat instead of our medical problems.
Some of us end up wishing we had never gone to the doctor in the first place.
I don’t really know what CNN’s thoughts were when they published this article. As though it is somehow a REVOLUTIONARY concept to dress your body so you look less fat. It is as if they have not watched any other TV channel in the last 10 years.
Oh I see, Charla Krupp has new book out called “Never Look Fat Again” Because ladies, we all know, fat is the worst possible thing you can look.
And if you, like me are thinking “But… what if I AM Fat” do not despair, this CNN article has a helpful bit of advice for us:
But there is hope. She says even women size 16 or 18 can look their best if they make the right choices. Those begin with what’s under the outfits.
That’s right ladies, as long as we just “make the right choices” for instance choosing supportive shape wear “To smooth out the dreaded back fat that can ruin your appearance” or Wear long billowing sleeves to “hide fatty arms”.
I don’t generally have a problem with fashion books. I’m not really into fashion, but some ladies could use some helpful tips. (Clinton, Stacey, please call my Mom… PLEASE.)
But this book isn’t selling itself as a book to help you look better, ito help you put your best foot forward, it is a book designed to help you avoid the dreaded F-A-T.
What I find particularly horrifying is the open acknowledgement that everbody has some fat. (from the book’s website)
The truth is, even if you do lose weight, and even if you commit yourself to serious exercise, you’re probably still going to have some flab. Even thin women may have hanging skin on their upper arms, tummy and tush.
SO MAKE SURE YOU HIDE IT LADIES! We wouldn’t want our bodies to look like they might actually be FLAWED.
How many ways are there to potentially look fat, well a lot, also from the website:
The book is organized by issue, such as big bust, “muffin top + back fat,” and “Buddha belly.” While some of the topics may seem wacky at first (“Are your brows making you look fat?” and “Hiding fat with your bag”),
That’s right, thought you just wanted to make sure your skirt fit properly and was flattering, NO NO, you MUST make sure your eyebrows are shaped just so so you don’t look like a fat fat fatty. Oh, And your bag better be big enough to hide that ass girl, or you’re going to look like you just don’t care.
Y’know maybe she has some great tips for dressing your body and looking fabulous. But I can’t help feel like all this book does is plays on what society has taught every woman to fear, fat. The worst possible thing you could possibly be. (Oh except for the premise of her other book “How not to look Old.” BLECH)
I was reading my twitter feed today and I was linked to a video advocating the Flat Tax. I’m not totally sure about whether or not the flat tax is actually a good idea for the economy of this country, but what I do know is that the people who are advocating it are advocating it for one reason.
It protects the wealth of the already wealthy.
The comments are the usual conservative rhetoric about taxes, i’m paraphrasing here, “If you support a progressive tax system you are a communist trying to steal from me and give it to the poor you robin hood bastard” (I often find it hilarious how some individuals with mid to low income will also advocate this point of view, based on the idea that they too will some day be wealthy. I try not to laugh.)
The illusion that if you just work hard enough you will be rich is a ridiculous falsehood propegated by the wealthy to keep the poor in this country from lynching them.
I know I would never be as well off as I am now if I had not had the vast opportunities given to me by my wealthy parents. To pretend that I deserved to go to a “New Ivy” school and therefore make several times what other people my age make would be lying to myself and everyone else. Additionally I have my wealthy parents to help me buy a house and get out of debt when I have health issues or make poor choices.
I learned, and I worked hard, but I will not pretend that my income is the result of some virtuous act on my part.
What exactly are people going to do with this wealth they are so concerned with protecting for them/ourselves? They are going to pass it on to another generation of wealthy people who will pass it on to the next, making sure that it never falls into the hads of the “undeserving.” (That is, people, who are not already wealthy.)
Frankly I find the whole whining about paying taxes thing dispicable. I know it sucks to see a big chunk of your check disappear, or pay more at the end of the year (this is the first year in 5 I’ve gotten a refund.) But we are so lucky to live in this amazing country, and we should be proud to pay for the privelege of living, working and doing business here.
I am proud to pay to provide safety and security for the poor and disabled. I am proud to pay more to protect the resources that I have gained as a result of my privelege. I am proud to pay to protect the safety of this country. And I am proud to pay more than others so people do not have to sacrifice meals. I am proud to pay my taxes.
Fatistician 