4 ms·

It's not that they have to give information, like name, age, SSN, address, etc., it's that they have to answer very private questions about their lives, like wh

It's not that they have to give information, like name, age, SSN, address, etc., it's that they have to answer very private questions about their lives, like who they are dating, how often they have sex, do they use condoms, do they have medical conditions, etc. It's not right to make someone answer these questions just to survive and help their kids survive, because they have literally zero other options.

49531 8y ago
Especially with the rise of austerity welfare, some states want to prevent single mothers from receiving benefits if they are sexually active. It's incredibly intrusive.
tomjen3 8y ago
I can totally see that. But the other side is that they money they are asking for has to be taken from people who were responsible and can afford their families. Shouldn't we at a minimum require that if you seek help for family members you can't afford, that you take the same steps others take to not get any more kids you can't afford? Because unless you have a good counter argument to that, you won't get anywhere politically.
- mikeash 8y ago
  It does sound quite reasonable when you put it that way. On the other hand, you could also describe it as, "we should starve poor families to death if the mother is sexually active and doesn't use approved birth control." Which sounds decidedly less reasonable to me. But ultimately my counterargument would be that we should focus on helping people who need it, rather than on not helping people who we think don't deserve it. This country has a puritanical mindset about public help, where we're outraged at any person who receives it who we see as being in any way unworthy. For a pervasive recent example, look at drug testing for welfare recipients. It's more expensive than not doing it, but people love it because we see drug addicts as being evil and therefore unworthy of help. We need to teach compassion, or at the very least rationality, rather than a punishment mentality.
  - PurpleBoxDragon 8y ago
    The solution needs to be long term viable, which means that voting tax payers have to find the people who receive help sympathetic enough they don't vote to change the system. It's a hard balance to strike.
  - tomjen3 8y ago
    >we should starve poor families to death if the mother is sexually active and doesn't use approved birth control. We also murder people who have expired tags, as long as they don't pay the fine, don't show up in court, resist the police officers enough to get them to shoot them. In reality essentially everybody stops before it gets to that point, and in your example the women buys (or ideally gets) a bunch of condoms, use them and no more children nobody can afford is brought into the world, and maybe she also avoids some STDs. Look I don't want to compel her to do it, but at the very least make sure that she understands that the people who pay for her children have certain justifiable expectations. >people love it because we see drug addicts as being evil and therefore unworthy of help. If you work hard at a crap job that pays say 22 usd/hr, you don't want to pay for somebodies meth bill. If you want a system that can help people then you need it so that it is politically palatable enough -- or you won't be able to focus on it at all.

49531 8y ago

Especially with the rise of austerity welfare, some states want to prevent single mothers from receiving benefits if they are sexually active. It's incredibly intrusive.

tomjen3 8y ago

I can totally see that. But the other side is that they money they are asking for has to be taken from people who were responsible and can afford their families. Shouldn't we at a minimum require that if you seek help for family members you can't afford, that you take the same steps others take to not get any more kids you can't afford? Because unless you have a good counter argument to that, you won't get anywhere politically.

mikeash 8y ago
It does sound quite reasonable when you put it that way. On the other hand, you could also describe it as, "we should starve poor families to death if the mother is sexually active and doesn't use approved birth control." Which sounds decidedly less reasonable to me. But ultimately my counterargument would be that we should focus on helping people who need it, rather than on not helping people who we think don't deserve it. This country has a puritanical mindset about public help, where we're outraged at any person who receives it who we see as being in any way unworthy. For a pervasive recent example, look at drug testing for welfare recipients. It's more expensive than not doing it, but people love it because we see drug addicts as being evil and therefore unworthy of help. We need to teach compassion, or at the very least rationality, rather than a punishment mentality.
- PurpleBoxDragon 8y ago
  The solution needs to be long term viable, which means that voting tax payers have to find the people who receive help sympathetic enough they don't vote to change the system. It's a hard balance to strike.
- tomjen3 8y ago
  >we should starve poor families to death if the mother is sexually active and doesn't use approved birth control. We also murder people who have expired tags, as long as they don't pay the fine, don't show up in court, resist the police officers enough to get them to shoot them. In reality essentially everybody stops before it gets to that point, and in your example the women buys (or ideally gets) a bunch of condoms, use them and no more children nobody can afford is brought into the world, and maybe she also avoids some STDs. Look I don't want to compel her to do it, but at the very least make sure that she understands that the people who pay for her children have certain justifiable expectations. >people love it because we see drug addicts as being evil and therefore unworthy of help. If you work hard at a crap job that pays say 22 usd/hr, you don't want to pay for somebodies meth bill. If you want a system that can help people then you need it so that it is politically palatable enough -- or you won't be able to focus on it at all.