Debunking the 'self made man' myth

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Things can change and communism in its true form would be ideal....that hasn't existed yet though.

Well no sh*t, why do you think I ahve a problem with the current system, though I disagree that your 'only' coherent solution is really the only solution. If there was no power to be had there would be no need to limit it, but the trouble is we have a system that encourages people to strive for being the most powerful.

Straw man. He's already said that not everyone depending on public assistance is using it like a hammock. I swear we could really get somewhere one of these times if not for the ever persistent straw men.

Are you suggesting that there is some system out there that removes both power and the pursuit of it from the equation?

No it doesn't exist yet.

The OP didn't really make a point, but posted a link. He has a history of arguing for what I would not call a government at all, but an all-powerful, all-intrusive State.

I read only the first page of the linked article, which is clearly an extended riff on the old, old argument that various successful men attended government schools, accepted government grants and scholarships, walked on government sidewalks, and so on ? and therefore it's proper for government to provide all those things. This does not bear five seconds' scrutiny, however, since one can easily point out that while a slave depends on his master for food, shelter, clothing, and so on, this does not justify slavery. (I hope nobody would tell Frederick Douglass that he should be eternally grateful to the masters who thus provided for him.) So I took the opportunity to remark on more fundamental issues.

The fallacious assumption behind such arguments is that 'if the government did not provide X, then nobody would.' But this is absurd ? obviously there is an actual demand for universities, sidewalks, sewer systems, and so on. If government did not provide such things, the market would rise to the occasion.



What if a government official is negligent, or even corrupt? You see the stamp of approval on a cut of meat, but you don't know if it was actually inspected or if the inspector gave a damn. Why assume that the businessman is evil or incompetent and the bureaucrat is goodness incarnate?



Call it what you like. I find the Left's deep suspicion, if not outright hatred, of any sort of businessman ? and blind trust, if not fawning admiration, of any sort of government official ? to be outrageous and bizarre.

Like anybody else with a family to shop for and a house to maintain I deal with assorted businessmen (and women) every day. Without exception they try to get and keep my business by pleasing me, by offering goods and services I want at a price I'm willing to pay in a pleasant environment. That is how they make their living: by pleasing customers. It certainly isn't businessmen who want to dictate what sort of voluntary contracts I may enter into and with whom, or who forcibly take my money and give it to sundry foreign dictators, or give it to their cronies, or use it to kill people halfway around the world who pose no threat to me. That would be politicians.



No, not being an anarchist I don't define statism as any belief that there should be some form of government, but as the doctrine that man's life belongs to the State ? the nation, the people, Society, der Volk ? and that the State may dispose of individuals as it pleases, in the name of the collective good.

Federal food inspection isn't the worst thing our government does, but I still think we'd be better off without it. One, like everything else in government it is wildly inefficient and wasteful, there being little incentive to do otherwise. Two, it inspires a complacency in consumers, who think that conscientious officials are monitoring everything when that is not the case.

I worked for a number of years in a food processing plant. It was a small independent firm with a not-great record, so supposedly it was watched closely. However, I often saw the USDA inspector sitting in his little office for hours, doing crossword puzzles, inspecting doodly squat. The FDA inspectors came by once or twice the whole time I was there. Friends who worked in plants belonging to well-known national brands tell me they never saw inspectors of any kind.

The firm dabbled for a while with kosher and halal foods. In a free society obviously there would be a demand for some kind of inspection service, and I suspect it might work on the model of the associations which certify kosher and halal food. There are a number of such entities, independent of government, all having slightly different standards. People who care about such things look for the stamp ('triangle K' or 'circle U') of the organization they trust. These organizations rely entirely on their reputations ? if it became known that one was growing lax about pork contamination, it would be finished ? so they have a strong incentive to do a good job. The government's only involvement is in prosecuting those who attempt to display those symbols fraudulently.

I would much rather trust one of many competing firms, which could stay in business only so long as it was known to be conscientious and honest, than rely on an anonymous bureaucrat who gets paid whether he does a good job or not.



Yes.

Last edited by luanqibazao on 29 Oct 2014, 12:05 am, edited 1 time in total.

The checks and balances we used to actually have are nice. Now apparently the president can directly contradict legislation or come up with his own legislation. The presidents have been working towards this since Theodore Roosevelt and I wonder how Teddy and Franklin would have felt about how far it's gone.

What we really need are laws to keep lobbyists in check, and actual enforcement on the widespread issue of inside trading of stocks. I mean come on people, there's a reason that incomes suddenly skyrocket when folks take up a federal post. The executive branch, not just the president, has turned into a bloated monster and now the country is being held hostage on issues like the Keystone pipeline just because Mr. President has a friend who could stand to lose money if we buy oil from Canada. Sure let's just keep buying oil from Saudi Arabia, that's much more ethical.

But I digress. What I mean to say is that if you look at how things functioned before the civil war and the simultaneous birth of the IRS, it was the state that spent money and primarily the state that collected taxes. How can we expect this small group of people to do all of this oversight when it could just as well be relegated to more local statesmen, people we can clearly hold more accountable and in smaller population groups where our opinion over our own situation isn't contradicted by others all the way across the country? Before the Civil War people said "I'm a Virginian" and "I'm a New Yorker". If you didn't like the situation in one state you moved to another.

And if we truly went back to a system that restrictive we would be able to define for ourselves who a "self made man" is state by state. I would be very happy to agree or disagree with any of you and we'd have a whole hell of a lot more choice.

Well, no. I repeat, conservatives denigrate anyone for using the social safety net as a hammock, whether it's true or not.

I'd much rather say I'm an American than that I'm a Washingtonian. In fact, in my part of the country, the far west before the Civil War, people had been living in more than one state or territory in their lifetime, and so hardly had established any regional identity besides being Americans, as opposed to southerners or easterners. That, and all my people arrived in America in the latter 1800's, after the Civil War, and so never had any identity since becoming Americans but Americans, despite having lived in South Dakota, Oregon, California, and Washington in one lifetime.

You're preaching to the choir on that one.



I'm not sure that would be enough, I mean I can chalk a lot of things up to the personal greed of politicians and bureaucrats, but other areas, such as drone assassinations and other excesses of the security state, seem more about raw power and can't really be blamed on lobbyists and conflicts of interest.

You think that's actually possible? Why?

On a small scale it could be possible, currently I doubt it would happen on a large scale as people are too obsessed with power, status and wealth to let it go probably. Why I think it is at all possible though on any scale is there are other humans open to such ideas so perhaps someday.

Well, good to see Fnord back and so happy to hear a success story of a self-made person with the somewhat challenging disorder of a form of Autism Spectrum disorder.

And yes, there is another guy here who has reported a similar and perhaps even remarkable story of a self-made autistic person.

There was this guy, that had a language delay until age 4, and could not speak in oral presentation and write well until his 40's and 50's, but no he did not let that discourage him from success in life.

He also was a very frail child and picked on for looking strange and basically told he did not deserve to exist, but no he did not let that get him down and just worked harder to get stronger, and more normal looking, and there is even proof that he has formed himself out into a physical specimen of what looks very much like those statues of Greek GODs with obvious proof as he is also a nude self renaissance artist and a poet at age 54, per the photos thingy or it didn't happen.

And this person's family scenario, is the father with the money left early, to leave the mother with little money to raise the children, in relative poverty by the time there was any possibility of going to college, but the now young man did not let that get him down, so he got three jobs; yes at the same time, one as janitor, one as bookstore clerk, and one as research associate in archaeology to make ends meet running a more than full schedule per semester for college work eventually graduating with three degrees from college. No, there was little time for sleep.

But still without written or oral language skills, the job market was bleak, so he ended up working in a military bowling center at close to minimum wage but that did not get him down, as he just went one step at a time handing out shoes, and loved his job all the same.

Oh, and then there were the people that said he was too strange to ever get married but that did not get him down, he kept his head up, and ended up marrying what most people in his area, consider as one of the most beautiful girls in his area, at that time, and fairly running that way still now as she is age 44, by observance of the men folks in his local area. In fact, just today, a college professor noted that she looks too young to be married.

By 1999, after eating pork and beans and chicken quarters to save enough money for a down payment on a house and purchase of such, starting in 1993, the young man still only had $1000 dollars in the bank, which is not much wiggle room for emergency.

And so then after a child died in 1997 and fortunately there was enough insurance money to pay the 300K medical bill, the wife then comes down with epilepsy and can no longer work, but no that did not get him down or her down, they just cut back some more.

And by the time 2007 rolled around and after 7 years of threats on job security, and going higher up as government employed Community Activities Director and Athletic Director, the now 40 something year old dude, managed to save several hundred thousand dollars in yes, just 7 years for the rainy day that was soon to come in 2008, with 19 medically documented disorders including the worst pain known to mankind, type two trigeminal neuralgia, a stint with almost 40 days without sleep, except for one hour each of the first 35 days, and none the last 5 of 40, in a truly Dante like inferno of increasing rings of hell, each day.

Well, not able to use eyes or ears effectively for 2 years due to the pain like having one's teeth drilled without Novocain, except it was in the eye and ear instead of teeth, he was locked in his mind, with no where to escape, and no effective drugs to help.

So he started writing just to escape some way, lists at first, and then more words and paragraphs and eventually millions of words, one excruciating word at a time with that incredible eye and ear pain. But one word was a step and he kept going for three years, until eventually he was miraculously healed of all of this pain and disorders, with only a miracle explanation by qualified professionals assessing his medical conditions.

So it was time to start again, and he decided to go in a new direction and yes, became a well known, and yes considered famous dancer in his metro area. In fact, measured at over 2500 miles now all around his metro area, in a dance walk style, by Nike GPS Sports watch, in a little over 14 months; and a poet with some international feedback; and a martial artist, considered as a Kung Fu expert, by training expert in the field.

And no he didn't even need a lesson, to accomplish this, he did it all on his own, with the help of mother nature's instinctual human nature ways, aka GOD.

So yes, I am self-made man per the lone wolf thingy, but nah, I did not build it alone without Mother Nature true aka GOD.

So yeah, GOD made me.

And yeah, I've got documented proof of this, down to the 810 LBS I press with my legs now, in case anyone doubts that real human miracles and GOD exists.

But will I ever judge another person for needing help or taking it: Hell no, as I've been to real HUMAN hell, and know the dark part of life, all to well.

And if one lives long enough, chances are pretty good they WILL GET A TASTE OF REAL HUMAN HELL TOO.

Let's just say it's a valuable lesson in humility and human empathy for one that makes it through REAL HUMAN HELL, AND THE DISEASE I HAD IS CALLED THE SUICIDE DISEASE FOR GOOD REASON; YOU can bet the ranch on that. :)

I have all the money I can possibly spend for one reason and one reason only: MONEY MEANS NOTHING TO ME, AND REAL FLESH AND BLOOD HUMAN CONNECTIONS IN REAL LIFE, SACRED UNCONDITIONAL LOVE, AND MY HEALTH MEANS EVERYTHING, AND THAT IS WHY I ENDED UP RELATIVELY RICH, PER THE HERD OF HUMAN BEINGS, WHETHER I WANTED TO OR NOT. :)

NOTE: CAPS ADDED in for emphasis, I AM NOT screaming; in real FLESH AND BLOOD life I'm as calm as a butterfly like Yogi, inside. :), WITH YES, RELATIVE FREE WILL, the closest thing to self-made man that exists in the history of mankind, believe it or not, it's true.

And to be clear: relative free will, not me.

Last edited by aghogday on 29 Oct 2014, 11:22 am, edited 1 time in total.

Umm actually its
1. The rich stole our money.
2.created the recession
3. destroyed our jobs
4. the rich made the world's poor that poor.
5. We want our jobs back at at least survival wages and we want justice!
You really do need to get informed and stop going to that "right poop" sorry "right scoop" site that you quote as authoritative. Tho I admit they did display journalistic excellence in their coverage of Elvis still being alive!

Remind me whether it is the left or the right advocating for globalisation, removal of trade barriers, and increased foreign aid?