Obama just delivered his 2015 State of the Union. In it, he painted an entire picture of what has happened during his presidency. Graduation rates are at all-time highs. Solar power is being utilized more than ever. The stock market has reached record highs. But how should we really assess the speech?
You'll often hear republicans say, "At the end of the day, someone will end up poor. Somebody is going to live the hard life and that's fine. It's not the government's job to solve all of those people's problems." Whether they want to admit it or not, that really is a reflection of a kind of social darwinism.
President Obama's rhetoric ("a fair shot for everybody") and policies (executive decisions on immigration, Obamacare, free community colleges) is a reflection of another kind of worldview: utopianism.
Both of those are the extremes, for sure. But, we can see how the ideas from the fringes seep into the moderate forms, because as a democrat who holds to this ideology, Obama is going to try to abolish certain hardships and suffering from America, like the kind of suffering caused by not having health insurance when you fall ill. That's why he calls healthcare a right, because he believes Americans should not have to suffer in that kind of situation.
So how you assess Obama's speech, and even his presidency, will often boil down to where you lie on the spectrum. At the one extreme is total social darwinism, survival of the fittest and total neglect of the needs of the struggling people. On the other hand is an attempt to create a society free of all suffering and hardship, in other words, a utopia. Now, that may sound nice, but books like Divergent and The Giver show us how severely freedoms can be trampled upon for the sake of everybody's welfare. If you fall on the middle, then which sufferings should be abolished from America? As examples, at least with regard to what the government supports or condemns, we've abolished murder and slavery.
So, where do you stand on the spectrum?
My short answer? Get rid of "Bad suffering" You know... the kind that doesn't result in positive change and growth. I'm still trying to figure out my place on this spectrum.
ReplyDeleteSo...let some suffering exist, but not the kind that can't be useful to a nation/its people? Do you mean like, allow poverty because it gets people working really hard and gives a nation a chance to have underdog stories? But not let sex slavery because there is no good that can emerge?
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