Hantlers explains why things are the way they are on reservations
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Raising awareness is doing something. What's interesting is that you feel what i'm saying is divisive. Why is it divisive?
Since I continually say all humans are racist, at whom do you think I am pointing fingers?
If bringing positive stories is important to you, then why don't you bring them? Are they that hard for you to find?
Not in reality, but that's the typical portrayal in media.
You could be right. Let me know when you find a news story/column that discusses how welfare is sapping the will to work of people in rural Mississippi, or a similar location.
We're still waiting for you to explain how people are reservations are being demotivated by getting too much from the government.
While I'm sure your comment was ironic, I agree that, like any other human, I'm prone to read into things which are not there. I try to be open to correction, and I'm not always successful.
I'm not going to back down nor apologize for saying that humans don't like living in poverty when around them they can see people in plenty. People on reservations are still human, and have the usual sets of human responses (security, price, envy, etc.). It takes a lot more than a few handouts to remove this drive from any decently-sized population (there will always individual exceptions). If you believe otherwise, I would really like to know your reasoning.
John Crotty
Member
OB - let me ask you two questions.
Does black america have serious societal and economical problems that cannot be blamed on the white man or racism?
Do you think the current welfare system is doing black america any favors?
While Bundy spoke like a true ***, he had some roots of truth in there. And I seriously doubt he had any ill intent or racism in his comments.
Does black america have serious societal and economical problems that cannot be blamed on the white man or racism?
Do you think the current welfare system is doing black america any favors?
While Bundy spoke like a true ***, he had some roots of truth in there. And I seriously doubt he had any ill intent or racism in his comments.
fishonjazz
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You are making a big mistake here JC
John Crotty
Member
I know I am. But I've got 8 hours to kill at work so .... yeah .....
Hantlers
Well-Known Member
It's pretty simple. The more they work, the less money they get from the government.
For example…we've hired natives before. Every single time once they reached the max amount of money they could make in a month while still receiving their nice little checks, they would just stop working.
The high dropout rate from school doesn't show me much either. They know they're going to get at least something, so why bother try for more?
To quote Bill Yellowtail, a former Crow official and Montana state senator, "Successful entrepreneurs are considered sell-outs, they’re ostracized. We have to promote the dignity of self-sufficiency among Indians. Instead we have a culture of malaise: ‘The tribe will take care of us.’ We accept the myth of communalism. And we don’t value education. We resist it.”
They know something or somebody is going to take care of them, so they don't bother trying.
It's the same thing with these rural areas in West Virginia or wherever you that you were talking about. High alcohol rates, high drug rates, high rape rates. These are people that are getting handouts, and it is clearly not helping them.
Now I'm not saying we need to get rid of our welfare system, but I think that it is beyond obvious that we have a huge problem with our welfare system.
John Crotty
Member
Sounds like welfare, there is no incentive to make your own money, unless you are making a lot of money. I mean why work hard and make your own money when you can chill out and make the same amount of money? Often times when you start making your own coin you lose out on other benefits and you are put in a worse place than you were before. So if you can't make a very good living its better to just stay on government assistance. Its a terribly flawed system. I hate to break it to you OB but minorities are in the majority for this problem. Whites are involved too, but not to the extent of minorities.
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Darkwing Duck
Well-Known Member
You're making the inference that complaining about inner city welfare is racially charged. "Typical portrayal in media" does nothing to support your thesis.
I would not know how to begin to separate issues out in that way. When you are impoverished, it affects every aspect of your life. When you are oppressed (whether by race, gender, orientation, etc.), it affects every aspect of your life. If you magically take away the racism, there would still be poverty. If you magically remove the poverty, there would still be racism. I don't know what either would mean.
As opposed to eliminating all welfare entirely? Absolutely. As opposed to different sorts of programs? Every type of program will have advantages and disadvantages; I don't think there is any best solution, and maybe not any better solution.
Such as? You think people want to live in poverty with broken families? Please, explain the roots of this truth in detail, preferably with some evidence.
I don't think he had any ill intent, either. Ill intent is not required for the opinion to be racist.
If you believe that you will never make more money than the government can pay you, I can see why that would be a demotivating. However, if you believe you have a very good chance at being able to earn more by wages, in particular significantly more, than this line of reasoning will not stand. Very few people will take a course of action that they think will keep them impoverished for the next 20-50 years when they fel they have better options.
So, if your reason holds, why would people on reservations feel the best they can ever do financially is no better than government-sponsored poverty?
What were their chances of advancement to, say, twice what they could make from the government? Do you have Native American managers? Did you single any of them out for mentoring or advancement? Or, did they find a sea of almost all white managers over a native population?
Again, why would they choose a life of poverty if they thought they could have more? You keep repeating "why bother try for more", but you don't answer "why settle for poverty"? They don't like having new cars/trucks, larger houses, better food?
You see the same thing in urban areas, where youth who believe they will never get a fair chance refer to their more optimistic contemporaries as sell-outs, doomed to failure against a stacked deck (they are more often right than not, but not always). I know enough about the urban areas to know racism plays a very big part of this belief; they feel the deck is stacked, so they deal out of the game. They don't like being impoverished, but see little prospect for anything else. Do you have a reason to believe it is different on reservations?
By contrast, I never saw a poor white kid called a sell-out for succeeding in school. Have you? If not, what do you think factors into it?
Poverty takes it toll on everyone. How would being more impoverished help these people? Or, are you supporting jobs programs for them?
Looking at economic mobility, West Virginia comes out pretty well:
https://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/22/...-matters.html?pagewanted=all&_r=3&#map-search
An interesting quote:
How do you distinguish between a problem with the welfare system, and a problem whose symptoms are primarily visible in people on welfare?
I found this interesting. Who do you think is contributing to this? Are white people calling that person a sell out? Or are members of that individuals own race calling them a sell out? If so, why?
Exactly. If you believe you will never make more money that you can earn on welfare (which is less than you would make on minimum wage full-time), you won't bother. The question then becomes why all these people believe they won't be better off working than on welfare? What contributes to that, do you think?
Some benefits phase out dollar-for-dollar, but most phase out even more slowly. If earning a dollar means I lose $.50 combined in food stamp benefits and the Earned Income Credit, I'm still ahead $.50.
John Crotty, I'm well aware that minorities are the ones who primarily suffer from this issue. I have news that seems to be surprise to you: for the most part, they are not fond of the arrangement, but they feel they have no better options.
Using words bring images to mind; that's how we think. Because of the portrayal in the major media, the images around "welfare" are racially charged.
No, it's the fellow black students, of course. I was probably insufficiently clear on that, but when I referred to the contemporaries who believe they will never get a fair chance, I did indeed mean the black kids; usually the white kids believe they will get some sort of chance. The white kids use terms to indicate the black kids don't belong, but "sell-out" is not usually among them.
To you they might be. To me they are not.