Sunday, December 21, 2008
Compassion is as compassion does
I am reading Amity Shlaes' outstanding history of the Great Depression, The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression
As soon as A observes something which seems to him to be wrong, from which X is suffering, A talks it over with B, and A and B then propose to get a law passed to determine what C shall do for X, or in the better case, what A, B, and C shall do for X... What I want to do is look up C. I want to show you what manner of man he is. I call him the Forgotten Man. Perhaps the appellation is not strictly correct. He is the man who never is thought of....
He works, he votes, generally he prays -- but he always pays....
Curiously, surprisingly, and to his credit, New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof made a related point yesterday. It was especially timely in my particularly case, since it helped me prove a claim I made earlier in the week to a liberal friend, that conservatives are, on average, more generous in their charitable giving than liberals.
Perhaps liberals believe that "compassion" toward needy strangers is something the government must do because they have a hard time imagining people doing it on their own.
In separate and perhaps related news, I note with a mixture of pride and dismay that this blog raised more than half the total sum contributed to the Community FoodBank of New Jersey during Monday's blogburst. We got links and/or contributions from a whole host of conservative bloggers, and not one from a lefty blog. Perhaps a coincidence.
16 Comments:
By 
D.E. Cloutier, at
Sun Dec 21, 06:50:00 PM:
Most of my Liberal friends are thinkers and most of my Conservative friends are doers--in all areas, from creating meaningful jobs to picking up beautiful women.
By Brian, at
Sun Dec 21, 07:51:00 PM:
There is of course the church-giving issue - how much of that giving is standard charity versus a fraternal organization. Same thing goes with arts on the left, as Kristof notes.
The other issue is whether they dissociated being liberal from other factors, like youth, income level, etc.
Most of us could do a better job than we do....
By Assistant Village Idiot, at
Sun Dec 21, 08:13:00 PM:
Much as I'd like to give conservatives all the credit I can, charity is actually a religious divide. Regular attenders, liberal and conservative, give a good deal more. Because more conservatives are religious, the group as a whole gets a statistical boost. But it's not really a political divide.
Hey, go down to the soup kitchen and see what groups have signed up to work next month. There'll be a school, a fraternal organization, and a bunch of religious groups on the list.
By Counter Trey, at
Sun Dec 21, 09:36:00 PM:
It is an excellent book for reminding us about the bumbling and ineptitude of the FDR administration; how government always crowds out the private sector; and how FDR undermined, if not outright violated, the US Constitution.
By 
, at
Sun Dec 21, 10:37:00 PM:
Because God fearing men allowed the government to take over helping the poor we now have the welfare state of America. Before the early 1960s the local churchs helped the poor. The local church determined the level of support that individuals received. We bought LBJs snake oil for the great society and moved into government welfare.
Welfare is a blight on the US. Welfare is to today's citizen what the food and beef allocations were to the indians in the 1800s -- slavery.
Dave
By Anthony, at
Mon Dec 22, 12:27:00 AM:
"Forgotten Man" is a great book, one of the few I seriously consider rereading. Schlaes' discussion of the policies of the Hoover and FDR administrations, and the continuity between them, showed mr just how poorly the history of the 20s and the Great Depression was taught when I was in school -- and still is.
By JorgXMcKie, at
Mon Dec 22, 12:38:00 AM:
DEC: how odd. Almost all of my liberal friends only think they're thinkers.
By , at
Mon Dec 22, 12:43:00 AM:
Perhaps liberals believe that "compassion" toward needy strangers is something the government must do because they have a hard time imagining people doing it on their own.
I believe that's called "projection".
By , at
Mon Dec 22, 02:06:00 AM:
We got links and/or contributions from a whole host of conservative bloggers, and not one from a lefty blog. Perhaps a coincidence.
Liberal blogs ask for money for themselves or candidates they like, but NEVER for the suffering for others of disasters in far off countries they blame this country for and never miss a chance to look a gift horse in the mouth and complain we don't give enough.
Also. liberals complain about the environment as they are the biggest consumers. Does Al Gore dry his clothes on a line as I have been doing for 15 years?
By Tully, at
Mon Dec 22, 02:43:00 AM:
"A liberal is someone who feels a great debt to his fellow man; a debt he proposes to pay off with your money. --G. Gordon Liddy
It's not news to some of us. I noticed long ago while doing community work that volunteers who wanted to actively help people themselves leaned GOP. Those who wanted to help people by telling other people what to do lean Dem.
By , at
Mon Dec 22, 02:44:00 AM:
It is well within the financial power of the liberal community to end most all of the US-based "social ills" which they constantly decry.
Instead, they devote their efforts towards trying to bend government to their will, which involves making others pay to accomplish their values and goals.
All I can conclude from this is that liberals are not actually concerned about hunger, or poverty, or illness, or AGW, or . . . any of those hot-button issues.
What's most important to them is that they be able to order other people to hold liberal values, and finance liberal goals.
They don't care what we do, as long as they told us to do it. Feeding the hungry isn't a goal, it's a means to an end. If we're forced to give up money to feed poor people, liberals can sit back and nod at each other smugly and say "we made them do that - we're in charge!"
Which would be okay, except they don't make good decisions about what everyone should be doing, which results in things like comeplete meltdowns of mortgage-backed securities, millions and millions of deaths from malaria, Pol Pot offing vast swaths of his society, families breaking up rather than losing the dole, blacks in the professions being viewed with quota-suspicion, governments deciding that proposed urban yuppie theme parks should rightfully have the ability to bulldoze your neighborhood and kick you out for your land . . . .
Long list. Not enough time.
By pst314, at
Mon Dec 22, 09:24:00 AM:
"It is well within the financial power of the liberal community to end most all of the social ills which they constantly decry"
Heh. And yet they too cannot solve those problems by throwing money at them. As we have seen, poverty cannot be solved through government hand-outs; indeed welfare only makes poverty worse by fostering dependency and a sense of entitlement, destroying motivation and the moral codes that are the foundation of economic and social success while fostering attitudes that are destructive to society. If liberals had to pay for welfare programs on their own, they would be quicker to recognize this, just as they would be more supportive of law and order (and the Second Amendment) if they were forced to live in crime-ridden neighborhoods. And so on and so forth.
By K T Cat, at
Mon Dec 22, 10:27:00 AM:
Conservatives are also funnier, happier and our housecats write better blogs.
:-)
By , at
Mon Dec 22, 12:20:00 PM:
I saw this or a similar study a while ago, where the most- to least- charitable groups were: religious conservatives, religious liberals, secular liberals, secular conservatives. So as AVI said, it's a religious divide, not a political divide. But "conservatives more generous than liberals" makes a great story, because it seems counterintuitive to those writing the stories (ie, liberals). "Religious more charitable than atheists" is a dog-bites-man story, so nobody bothers to write it.
By Dawnfire82, at
Mon Dec 22, 12:50:00 PM:
"But "conservatives more generous than liberals" makes a great story, because it seems counterintuitive to those writing the stories (ie, liberals)."
It's also a questions of mathematics. Way more conservatives are religious than liberals (many of whom are militantly secular) which means, therefore, that more conservatives are generous than liberals.
Maybe the headline of such stories should be, 'Atheists revealed to be selfish assholes.'
Labels, labels...
By chuckchuck, at
Mon Dec 22, 06:50:00 PM:
I know GOD tests our faith as he continually tests mine (witch lately has been weak), but be make aware that none of us are not alone. As Christmas approaches I will be thinking of those who are in need to endure a trial which tests their faith, and pray for those who to endure. As I look at those who are less fortunate nearby the Spirit of Christmas sends tingling chills throughout my body and raised the hair on my arms. It has helped awaken my dormant, suppressed spirit which is a gift given me by Him who we celebrate. My family whether here or in far off land, to those far less fortunate and to your family and you will be in our hearts and prayers along with the rest of those who suffer.
