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Re: [ProgSoc] Have you registered to vote yet?



Bryn Davies wrote:
 That said... I think the system is somewhat better than the
government directly pouring taxpayer money into charities to which
many may be apathetic, and some outright hostile.  This is not a new
problem though, and applies to all government spending.
It seems a little ridiculous to me that people would get a warm gooey 
feeling for donating money to a charity (which are often affiliated with 
a religion), and feel resentful about paying their tax (which is 
administered by a professional institution, the government of which you 
elect, that is (ostensibly) separated from The Church). I'd rather pay 
tax than support a charity, not least because it's easier to do only one 
set of paperwork. It'd be nice if politicians and public servants saw 
role as charity administrators do their own.
On that note, think about this: if you appeal to a charity for help 
you're seen as worthy of pity, and if you appeal to the state then 
you're seen as a bludger. That doesn't make sense to me.
I'd prefer to live in a country where the state saw their role as being 
there to help individuals who asked for help and to conduct large-scale 
public projects, than as an authority that dictated what people can and 
can't do.
 Why hasn't the computer/jetcar age fixed this for us yet?
We can't fix it with computers until we fix our social attitudes. This 
is the 'full transparency' problem. We're going to have to stare that 
down some time over the next ten or twenty years. So much of our culture 
(and law) is built on a lie. Lies are easy enough to ignore when they're 
not made patently obvious, and when some form of privacy protections are 
in place.










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