Three Stories and a Rant: Part 2

False Charity

In part 1, I related 3 anecdotes from my life as a frugal, but comfortable, middle-class mom on a budget. Go here to catch up, if you missed it.

A reader might be excused for thinking that the rant was going to be all about how insulting it is to be offered all this “charity”, and how people really ought to mind their own business. But the reader would be wrong. As I’ve stated before, it takes a lot to insult me. I don’t think I’m so important that what other people think of me matters very much.

I will say that it is deeply painful to me that some are so quick to conclude that I and my husband are not providing quite what they think we ought to for our children. (Trust me, they’re well provided-for.) I tell myself, and mostly believe, that these people did not think that I was inadequate to the task of caring for my own children. They probably just thought that it would be nice to offer help of some sort to someone who was obviously (to them) struggling.

Well, I’m not struggling. My husband provides a good income for us, and I try to be a good steward of everything that he earns. There is little doubt in my mind that we have more in various bank accounts than any of the 5 people involved in my stories. I sleep quite well at night knowing that what looks like scarcity to others is actually self-sufficiency. So, no, this isn’t about how insulted I am. I’m actually not. They just don’t know any better. I can live with that, quite happily.

What bothers me–frightens me a little, in fact–is that each person’s reaction to my “hardship” is not to say, “I’ll pray for you to succeed.” or (in the case of the fast food workers) “Good for you, not buying the over-priced junk!”. Instead, each person, rather than being truly thoughtful or charitable, thought of the largess of the American taxpayer or businessman (not that there is a difference between the two) as a solution to my perceived problem.

Not one of them offered me some kind of help that they could, themselves, give.  No one offered advice, time, or money of their own. Each one of them offered resources that someone else had earned!

In the first two cases, I was advised to beg for money from the government–money that has been forcibly taken from people who may or may not approve of my particular lifestyle–people who would most certainly do more good with their own money than a bumbling bureaucracy can. The third example in part 1 is nothing better than out-and-out theft from someone perceived to be able to “afford” it, by their kind-hearted, but soft-headed employees.

There is absolutely nothing charitable about taking from one person to give to another!

It scares me a little bit that Americans–people I was taught to think of as hard-working, self-sufficient, honest people–have been reduced to the point where they cannot conceive of a life without dependence on government.

It does scare me, but what really keeps me up a night is the fact that these supposedly caring, charitable people couldn’t be bothered to actually contribute anything of their own. (Not that I would have taken it, but this isn’t about me. It’s about some poor person these strangers thought I was.) Shouldn’t we all be at least a little bit worried that, when faced with another person’s difficult circumstances, our first answer is not to offer our own time or money, but to say “There’s a government program for that!” Way to love your neighbor, guys!

If I was not insulted by the insinuation of these people that perhaps they thought I wasn’t doing as well as I could, I am incredibly insulted that, instead of offering their own time or money (which would have been their right to offer!), I wasn’t worth anything more to them than being passed off to the government.

If they didn’t care any more than that, then they should have kept their mouths shut entirely.  And I guess that’s what pisses me off more than anything. It’s not the fact that the government gives out way too much money to way too many people who could work for themselves. It’s not that I’ve been judged wanting by people who don’t know me at all. It’s not even that the first answer is government. These things all bother me, but they don’t drive me crazy. No.

What makes me so mad I could just…spit is that we’ve become such a culture of shallow, surface-skimming, feel-good morons that we can’t distinguish between true charity and Robin Hood-style theft. These people felt like they were helping me! And without ever having to lift a finger! Isn’t modern life in the American welfare state wonderful? Just explaining to someone where they can receive the fruits of someone else’s labor counts as doing good works! Stealing is ok, too, as long as you’re stealing from a guy who can “afford” it.

I don’t know where to end this rant. I wish I had some kind of prescription, instead of just snark. But this problem is endemic to our culture. We have become a nation of people who believe that the government’s rightful job is to take care of us. No one seems to understand that accepting government funds is a thousand times less honorable than taking hat in hand and asking for help from a private charity that will hold you accountable for your choices.

There is little I can do to reverse this soul-deadening trend toward government dependency in our society, other than trying to plant the seed of these thoughts in the minds of others, in the hope that they’ll take root and grow into some real charity for someone who really needs it, somewhere down the road. The human heart can recover from the sting of having to accept private charity, but recovering from the dehumanization of government “entitlement” is damn near impossible.