As for extreme language, the saltiest word used in the comment at 19:14 was prig. That’s a long way from ‘asshole”.

Contrast with this:

The geese here have a huge, smothering blanket of victimhood and a paradigm of a vast helpless populace

You’re a nitwit, Mr. Helpless-in-the-Face-of-a-Thieving-Government.

What’s the matter? Have you not read Jane Eyre? I guess you only read Dickens.

“voluntarily” is a very noble word. volition. look it up. It is actually the entire point here. It is not ambiguous. When the government takes my money at the point of a gun and gives it to someone else not of my choosing, that is involuntary (to put it politely). When a person with need engages me and makes a case for me to help him, and I give time or money, that is voluntary.

The geese here have a huge, smothering blanket of victimhood and a paradigm of a vast helpless populace, making a case that this gigantic portion of the populace cannot actually exercise volition and sustain their own lives. When pressed to look closer at this group, only extreme cases of the truly dependant are cited, with the implication that the gigantic swarms of the poor are all helpless. Millions and millions of Americans and Canadians who have become unable to function. What a world.

To this constructed belief is added the moral obligation of all others to attend to this huge dependant population without judgement. However, the idea of simply calling forth a moral requirement as a means of destroying poverty lasts for about 3 seconds, immediately to be replaced by the opposite of volition, the compulsion of delegating the government to confiscate wealth from those not in the pool of dependency.

No one need speculate on my meaning for tough love; here it is in no uncertain terms: Any person capable of helping themselves who instead demands help from others should be shut out completely. Let them eat nothing.

I’d like a straight up fight with these losers because the minute some stands up to them, they set the land speed record in crying for their mommas (and daddies).

My favorite part is that she herself suckles at the teat of goverment programs, but belittles them out the other side of her disgusting mouth.

I certainly wouldn’t begrudge someone using a government program when they’re down and out and in need of all the compassion our society can offer, but to then sass against it is beyond mean-spirited and hypocritical, it’s downright duplicitous.

“Child”: n., pl. Children; English term lacking Randroid equivalent. See also: compassion; morality; literature. [Many common English words lack a direct Randoird equivalent--Ed.]

* * *
Section III: Common Phrases

It can be difficult to engage the true-believer Randroid in a converation armed only with a dictionary. There are legion phrases used by the Randroid the meaning of which entirely escapes a reasoning human or that has a different meaning from commonly-accepted English counterparts. A close study of the phrases and terms in this section will benefit anyone who engages a Randroid on even an infrequent basis. . . .

“Helped, voluntarily, by the rest of us”: Fanciful phrase used as a rhetorical crutch to avoid fact that the disabled, mentally disturbed and chronically ill were historically left to die in the streets before widespread government aid programs. Generally precedes claim that government taxation prevents charity from meeting all genuine social needs. For historical counterexample, see generally, pre-1900 European history; specific study of Victorian Britain and the Gilded Age in the United States is highly recommended.

Similar famous quotations: “Are there no prisons? Are there no workhouses?”; “Let them eat cake”; “Since he is of no use anymore, there is no gain if he lives and no loss if he dies.”

You’ve dropped this weaselword ‘voluntarily’ a couple of times. What does it mean?

Does it mean that selfish, attitudinizing prigs like yourself can opt out of welfare schemes anytime you like and leave your more compassionate fellow citizens to pick up the slack?

Keep your ‘tough love’. It has a bad smell.

And the smarmy, insulting attitude? Give it up, John. You’re not the smartest person in the room. Not by a long shot.

Good day, sir.

“systemic exploitation and oppression due to class, gender, and/or race” as the cause for a large number of people being poor or homeless? I don’t buy it, it’s too easy and broad a sinkhole for an excuse, sorry you gave a canned kneejerk response.

my position is not out of ignorance, let alone willful ignorance.

Samwise, i stipulate your figure for the moment; what does it mean? Children are not responsible for getting themselves into poverty, nor responsible for gettting themselves out of it. What was your point? Even your sarcasm was too simplistic to make a point.

Of the roughly 39 million poor in the U.S. (as defined by the Census Bureau), about 13 million, a full 1/3, are under the age of 18.

(http://factfinder.census.gov/servlet/STTable?_bm=y&-geo_id=01000US&-qr_name=ACS_2006_EST_G00_S1701&-ds_name=ACS_2006_EST_G00_&-redoLog=false&-CONTEXT=st)

The problem as I see it is that by exporting our manufacturing base overseas all of the good jobs for little hands are going to kids in China, Pakistan, The Dominican Republic, etc. and there just isn’t the market for boot blacking and selling wormy apples that there used to be. Good thing they can all be fabulously talented but little understood architects and network engineers, if they would just get off their little asses and show some initiative.

I know well over 1000 homeless people personally, and I can tell you as a matter of record that the VAST majority of them are either physically or mentally ill or both, and many of them also suffer from systemic exploitation and oppression due to class, gender, and/or race. The number of people with developmental disabilities and such physical conditions as juvenile diabetes, traumatic brain injury, and major recurrent depression alone account for more than half of your theoretical 1000.

The remainder almost entirely DO work, but wage structures are such that they generally work physically demanding or dangerous jobs for very low wages without insurance, and inevitably they become unable to continue to work those jobs. AND those jobs do not pay enough for a decent place to live or a decent diet without assistance.

So yeah, I detest ignorance, and I particularly detest willful ignorance, so I detest your position,

But we do have a problem with spiteful, mean-spirited, shrieky, hateful people. For the moment. Big Government is working on yet another drinking-water drug for that. Just hang on and be patient, please. We’ll handle this.

And some delusionally uninformed opinion. Since Ms. Shaidle is such a fan of the US, I am surprised that she has not moved here to enjoy our great medical care and excellent bus transport.