I've been thinking recently (well, since this past election) about how life- morality, specifically, but really all of people's choices in life- can be summed up as an expression of priorities. There isn't good or evil, there are shades of self-interest and self-importance. This can be as a result of ignorance or as a result of Randian selfishness. Warning: I am going to make sweeping statements, I am aware that I cannot speak for everyone, certainly not everyone I disagree with. However, these are statements that have been expressed to me by, generally, multiple people. Take issue with them if you wish, I'd love to hear other viewpoints, but my phrasing will be general. Please know I am aware these issues are too complex to have what I am writing here as the only viewpoints.
What got me started down this path was the presidential election. I live in a town that has mostly factory jobs (although it is next to a college town, so academia is present as well... but for now, we're staying on my side of the river). Most people here are blue collar, even when financially they are well-off. The well-off seem to be the exception, though- estimated household income for 2009 for Lafayette was estimated at $34,998. That is less than 200% of the federal poverty line for a family of three (as of 2009), and as anyone who has looked at the federal poverty line and then the expenses associated with living knows, the federal poverty line is laughable. In 2009, out of 6,423.113 citizens of Indiana, 1,197,492 received Medicaid. I can't find statistics for Lafayette specifically, so I will try to not speculate, but it is not unreasonable to assume that the number is slightly higher than that rough 1/6 of the population figure here.
So, knowing that many families are living at or near the poverty line, it would make sense that self-interest would drive them to vote Democrat. However, families who benefit directly from programs that Gov. Romney wanted to cut, wanted him in office. Now, after some conversations about why people would vote directly against their own interests- leaving social issues out, only fiscal issues- something became clear to me. People were voting for the circumstances they aspired to be in, not the circumstances they were in. I had a women who is currently renting a house tell me that she didn't want Obama in office because he wanted to tax the proceeds from the sale of a home. Well, she didn't own a home now, but she wanted to- shouldn't policies be in place to ensure that when she owned one... then sold it... she wouldn't need to give the tax man a cut of her money? It doesn't matter that she's gotten other people's tax money, in the form of student aid, medicaid, Head Start slots for her children, SNAP, etc. Her priority is on her family- not anyone else's. She cannot conceive of a world in which her family doesn't get these benefits. I do no begrudge her these, don't get me wrong! I hope they have enabled her to someday get her family into a tax bracket where she must pay income taxes, because she has used the social support she has received to build a strong career. Her priority is herself and her family- not others in her situation. And you know what? I can understand that. I can understand feeling marginalized by the systems in place, feeling "less than" for getting "handouts". If she does become wildly successful in the future, I imagine her feelings on politics won't change.
Let's look at the other end of the spectrum, now. A family in town who lives in a McMansion. Million dollar home, another hundred thousand dollars, easily, in furnishings. The man is an engineer who is head of a large firm, the woman currently stays home to raise their five children. Of course they prefer fiscally conservative policies. He pulled himself up by his bootstraps, why can't others do the same? His white privilege is invisible to him. His priority is in keeping his money. After all, everyone else has the same opportunities. Affirmative action makes him a victim, for God's sake!
Now, in both of these, the common target- the people who they don't wish to benefit- is invisible. In the first scenario, the woman is in this group, but believes herself to be the only one-or one of a select few- who is worthy. In the second, the man cannot envision a person or group of people who don't have the same skills and benefits that he does- coming from a home where he learned, without realizing it, how to handle money. Having the right name and skin color to give him that extra little boost. Their priority is the self.
Moving from fiscal concerns, let's look at specific morality. I'm going to use myself here. I'm a vegetarian. I have been for 9 years now. My ideology really lines up with veganism. Am I vegan? No. While my ideal is veganism, my priority is, currently, on ease of obtaining food, and- yes- the fact that I enjoy dairy products. I know I'm not alone.
How about abortion? Putting aside people who are sorely misinformed about the procedures (I actually had a coworker tell me that a saline injection given as part of a later-term abortion BURNED the fetus... saline is the stuff in eye drops, it doesn't burn), their priority is frequently in more life=better. An abortion is a missed opportunity. If Justin Bieber's mother had chosen an abortion, popular music would be entirely different (...or it would have a different face). What if you aborted the next Nelson Mandela? This stance assumes that people do not understand what is in their own best interest. I am going to be callous here- what are the chances that, without intervention, the unwanted child of an addicted single mother is going to have a positive outcome? I don't even mean a college degree. I mean a life where the child grows into a content adult with the ability to care for himself and not resort to crime. Freakonomics pointed out that crime rates dropped significantly in the decades after Roe v. Wade. Are we playing roulette with lives now? But the priority of some is that more life is better life.
I am officially in tl;dr territory now, but can someone argue with me that I have it all wrong and moral actions are not a matter of personal convenience and priority?
What got me started down this path was the presidential election. I live in a town that has mostly factory jobs (although it is next to a college town, so academia is present as well... but for now, we're staying on my side of the river). Most people here are blue collar, even when financially they are well-off. The well-off seem to be the exception, though- estimated household income for 2009 for Lafayette was estimated at $34,998. That is less than 200% of the federal poverty line for a family of three (as of 2009), and as anyone who has looked at the federal poverty line and then the expenses associated with living knows, the federal poverty line is laughable. In 2009, out of 6,423.113 citizens of Indiana, 1,197,492 received Medicaid. I can't find statistics for Lafayette specifically, so I will try to not speculate, but it is not unreasonable to assume that the number is slightly higher than that rough 1/6 of the population figure here.
So, knowing that many families are living at or near the poverty line, it would make sense that self-interest would drive them to vote Democrat. However, families who benefit directly from programs that Gov. Romney wanted to cut, wanted him in office. Now, after some conversations about why people would vote directly against their own interests- leaving social issues out, only fiscal issues- something became clear to me. People were voting for the circumstances they aspired to be in, not the circumstances they were in. I had a women who is currently renting a house tell me that she didn't want Obama in office because he wanted to tax the proceeds from the sale of a home. Well, she didn't own a home now, but she wanted to- shouldn't policies be in place to ensure that when she owned one... then sold it... she wouldn't need to give the tax man a cut of her money? It doesn't matter that she's gotten other people's tax money, in the form of student aid, medicaid, Head Start slots for her children, SNAP, etc. Her priority is on her family- not anyone else's. She cannot conceive of a world in which her family doesn't get these benefits. I do no begrudge her these, don't get me wrong! I hope they have enabled her to someday get her family into a tax bracket where she must pay income taxes, because she has used the social support she has received to build a strong career. Her priority is herself and her family- not others in her situation. And you know what? I can understand that. I can understand feeling marginalized by the systems in place, feeling "less than" for getting "handouts". If she does become wildly successful in the future, I imagine her feelings on politics won't change.
Let's look at the other end of the spectrum, now. A family in town who lives in a McMansion. Million dollar home, another hundred thousand dollars, easily, in furnishings. The man is an engineer who is head of a large firm, the woman currently stays home to raise their five children. Of course they prefer fiscally conservative policies. He pulled himself up by his bootstraps, why can't others do the same? His white privilege is invisible to him. His priority is in keeping his money. After all, everyone else has the same opportunities. Affirmative action makes him a victim, for God's sake!
Now, in both of these, the common target- the people who they don't wish to benefit- is invisible. In the first scenario, the woman is in this group, but believes herself to be the only one-or one of a select few- who is worthy. In the second, the man cannot envision a person or group of people who don't have the same skills and benefits that he does- coming from a home where he learned, without realizing it, how to handle money. Having the right name and skin color to give him that extra little boost. Their priority is the self.
Moving from fiscal concerns, let's look at specific morality. I'm going to use myself here. I'm a vegetarian. I have been for 9 years now. My ideology really lines up with veganism. Am I vegan? No. While my ideal is veganism, my priority is, currently, on ease of obtaining food, and- yes- the fact that I enjoy dairy products. I know I'm not alone.
How about abortion? Putting aside people who are sorely misinformed about the procedures (I actually had a coworker tell me that a saline injection given as part of a later-term abortion BURNED the fetus... saline is the stuff in eye drops, it doesn't burn), their priority is frequently in more life=better. An abortion is a missed opportunity. If Justin Bieber's mother had chosen an abortion, popular music would be entirely different (...or it would have a different face). What if you aborted the next Nelson Mandela? This stance assumes that people do not understand what is in their own best interest. I am going to be callous here- what are the chances that, without intervention, the unwanted child of an addicted single mother is going to have a positive outcome? I don't even mean a college degree. I mean a life where the child grows into a content adult with the ability to care for himself and not resort to crime. Freakonomics pointed out that crime rates dropped significantly in the decades after Roe v. Wade. Are we playing roulette with lives now? But the priority of some is that more life is better life.
I am officially in tl;dr territory now, but can someone argue with me that I have it all wrong and moral actions are not a matter of personal convenience and priority?
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Many saw the upswing in the Canuck Democrat party as a huge policy shift only to be left scratching their heads at the sweeping majority the Cons got in Parliament. A few years on now, enough Poly-Sci students have looked at the numbers and their meanings and blogged about it.
So in a post 2009-crash world the traditional thinking said with the high unemployment rate, The Poor would vote socialist. But they didn't and some of the theories postulated in Canuckistan were...
"People in low-income neighborhoods are the biggest victims of the drug dealers and violent young offenders Harper was promising to lock up. They want relief from the violence they cant escape. They want to rid their communities of the gangs that lure their children into gun-and-gang culture. Crime crackdowns make sense to them."
Pride. Most anti-poverty activists... are not poor. Those who are poor don't have time to fight poverty. They are too busy trying to survive it. So, when the educated middle class come calling with plans to make their lives better, well... they might as well be asking them if they have Heard The Good News.
Low-income voters who have to work dead end jobs resent middle-class (or upper-class) politicians who collect salaries far beyond what they can hope for often find solace in the thought of fewer politicians in the world with a smaller government. Philosophically it appeals to low income workers, more so than the thought of a tax cut (which usually never comes anyways).