I don’t hate Florida.
I don’t know it well enough. However,
some of my friends who know Florida better loathe it. But let’s find the point it’s around here
somewhere. Oh yeah, drug testing for
welfare. This pisses me off. I could make a quick list of why it pisses
me off and it would look kinda like this:
- Asshatery
- Bullshit rich people do to poor people
- People have been attacked by empathy vampires
- Fuck humidity
I just wrote that to amuse myself, mostly I find writing "fuck humidity" vastly enjoyable. Here’s a bit more of an
appropriate attack on the issue. This
does not repeal welfare, it just limits who gets it. Now I understand being frugal be you a person,
a family, a corporation or a government.
But drug tests are not free. The
cost of these tests (at least ten tests,
possibly a few million tests, my math is hazy on the subject) have to be offset by enough people being on
drugs and denied money. Cost of test = x. Number of people applying for welfare being
tested = y. Price saved through denying
poor bastards on illicit drugs = z. x*y
must be greater than z. If not you are spending
money to be an asshole and are basically telling all the other states, “Hey, we don’t
like poor people but hey we have Disney right, that’s pretty cool, oh and
Miami, people still like Miami right? It
has Cubans and shit.” According to the
first article I pulled up on the internet*, and the internet is obviously the
most trusted news source around (should I italicize sarcasm, I wonder, to
emphasize?), only 2% of people tested positive.
I think the formula up there is trying sneak away and pretend it wasn’t
written. This makes me happy in many
ways. One it means Florida’s government
wasted money on a bogus political move and we can hope there is enough embarrassment
and shame to stop similar actions – newsflash, it won’t. I am not happy that the state’s money is
being wasted. But I can only hope this
serves to stop such spending after. Two,
it means that the unspoken assumption, that the people on welfare must be on
drugs, has been proven false. Being poor
is not a crime and it doesn’t make you a drug fiend.
I see these issues as a long line of attacks on the have-nots.
And I don’t mean the have-nots as just I’m so poor I’m hungry far too often I’m
talking about an enormous cross section of this country. One
major problem is that the have’s are growing to be a much smaller group and the
have-nots is slowly seeping into that bourgeois populace. Obviously bloody revolution is silly and,
well, just plain uncouth but when it’s only a few thousand people with an
asston of money it isn’t that hard to implement some manner of nonviolent
social justice. Internet math: Aston of money = 90% of America’s wealth or
there about. The way welfare is built is
people who don’t have enough money regardless of their education background, ingenuity,
integrity, values, morals, religious affiliation, skin color, gender, sexual preference,
and a whole slew of other groupings, are
viewed as important enough to be given some amount of charity so they can
afford basic food and shelter. As they
are adults how they spend that money is up to them. We as humans have an intrinsic value. You know life liberty and the pursuit of
freedom. The French thought up that shit
first but being French they used words like fraternity ,meaning ‘brotherhood ‘not
‘date raping binge drinkers’ I don’t know the French for that and I fear the Google
result, I’m looking at you rule 34. But can’t
we expand this concept as people are
worth enough that they deserve, no matter how fucking stupid or annoying they
are, some food and shelter along with the inalienable rights. I’m not talking nice food, but at least six steps
above worm encrusted and probably twenty or below a nice filet mignon. I don’t do math if possible, I was a film
major for fucks sake.
So how do drugs impact a person's worth or whether they
deserve a handout? And yes you 101 philosophy class takers I am talking about intrinsic value of humans. Well assume you are
poor. Being poor is no fun. ‘Starving artist’ is only fun as an image in
your mind. The starving part is no
fun. Last time someone told me they
forgot to eat I looked at them incredulously.
I never forget to eat. I might
not have time to eat occasionally but I’d never forget to eat. Hell, I’m hungry right now and it’s past
eleven at night. Now think you are poor and some douche is saying you can't get money because you smoked weed. Here’s an easy formula
(fuck, math again, it didn't work out last time): poor leads to higher chances
of depression leads to higher chances of depression leads to higher chances of drug
uses. Maybe. That two percent says otherwise.
I think I might have lost point somewhere. I’m tired and my rage is subsiding. It’s possible some logical conclusions as well have drifted away like a Viking boat funeral procession. Damn it, this is economic policy and class warfare
why am I think about burning ships and Viking funerals? It is kinda awesome, Viking funeral not class
warfare. Class warfare is decided not
awesome. Back to the point. Stop putting conditions on charity. Its charity.
You are giving money to people whether they deserve it or not. That’s the point. We can only hope they spend it properly. This is just downright mean political machinations to
pander to assholes. So don’t support
crap like this. America is better than
this. I hope. Liberty, Equality and Fraternity. Or something like that, my apathy might be
kicking in.
"The full cost of the drug testing program has not yet been calculated, but it is likely to be higher than the meager savings of denying benefits to 2 percent of applicants who tested positive for drugs."
Ben
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Thanks for posting. You are awesome!