[Vitoethiche]

I found this video on Youtube it isquite interesting it was shot by a group of college students on one of the campuses in California. Basically it is a spin on the argument for Wealth Distribution but using students GPA and redistributing the grades from the higher students (I.E. 4.0) to the students that have lower grades (I.E. 2.0 & Below) It is quite interesting to see the responses from the students, most are in favor of wealth redistribution but not grades. Here is the Youtube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lOyaJ...eature=related or this Youtube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHZQ_vmMHoY&NR=1

[Cyncceply]

I saw this video earlier when WJ posted it in another thread, and I can't for the life of me remember which one at this point. I did find this to be an interesting jump of logic from many of the students' replies. I will concede this, the potentially negative consequences of poor grades are significantlly less detrimental (at least on the short run) than being in a situation of absolute poverty. I'll also concede that the term "land of opportunity" seems a little bit mythical at the current employment rates, especially to those falling into hard times.

I'll have to submit though, I think more employment opportunities are actually out there than employment figures would make it seem, a lot more. I think a lot of people turn away from genuine opportunities to turn things around because the positions available do not meet some personal standard they have and they'd rather just apply and decline the opportunity later to keep that welfare check coming regularly. Call it laziness or unrealistic expectations or whatever, while somewhat accurate, can be kind of harsh because being in that situation puts people in a very difficult position. It's psychological really, a person's self-esteem can become severely impacted by a continuing lack of employment. They often degenerate into a state of malaise where their confidence becomes shot and they'd just prefer to just not put themselves out there out of what realistically are quite irrational fears. It's a situation very similar to obese individuals trying to change their fitness lifestyle or those with other destructive habits that they simply give up recovering from as a result of backslide.

The problem is collectively we as a nation seem to feel that just throwing money at the problem will eventually make it go away. Especially when we can collect from those who've accumulated a healthy excess as a result of a well-compensated employment situation, which is a purely socialist approach. The problem being that this is realistically a form of enabling. For these people to really recover their own lifestyles they need to make that conscious decision to turn things around despite all personal fears rather than flee to a government or parent-provided security blanket. Unfortunately the only real solution may be to take away that security blanket and force a person's hand when a situation has lasted to a certain point.

I think the only viable solution is in acknowledging how we as individuals respond when we see this situation with our own family, friends, and acquaintances. We help the individuals when the situation is life-threatening but don't fall into the same patterns of enabling that keeps people in the situation. We can include strangers among the ones we try to help but it's important to commit enough personal time towards making sure you're not lending them a $20 bill to get a carton of cigarettes or another bottle of booze.

Other than that, there are a lot of really decent charitable organizations out there dealing specifically with this type of thing. If helping the impoverished really falls on a person's priority list, a dollar contributed voluntarily to one of these types of organizations stands a much better chance at really helping someone than a dollar collected by Uncle Sam to be distributed indiscriminately.

One thing that's almost expected of college students is to be young, idealistic, liberal and ready to solve world hunger, yet incredibly naive with no realistic plan to actually go about it. I wouldn't necessarily expect them all to understand how short-sighted simple redistribution of wealth can be, GPA notwithstanding. How and when they will become more educated is hard to say, how do we cure a personal sense of entitlement? I would be interested in hearing people's ideas and/or experiences in dealing with these issues.