-Caveat Lector- from: http://www.zolatimes.com/V3.38/pageone.html <A HREF="http://www.zolatimes.com/V3.38/pageone.html">Laissez Faire City Times - Volume 3 Issue 38</A> ----- Laissez Faire City Times September 27, 1999 - Volume 3, Issue 38 Editor & Chief: Emile Zola ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Poverty and Government Control by Peter Topolewski Like the tide, civil unrest comes and goes. Throughout Canada, particularly in British Columbia and Ontario, unrest has definitely come. The acronyms, some old and some new, have begun to play more prominently on news broadcasts, neighborhood posters, and in the newspapers: PAN (Poverty Action Network), MWAL (Marginalized Workers Action League), OPAC (Ontario Poverty Action Committee) and so on. According to the news and many of their own proclamations these groups are fighting for what’s owed them: an adequate welfare check delivered on time and without harassment, belittlement, or strings attached. In fact, these groups are fighting just another battle against government control. And unfortunately unless they make some drastic changes all their efforts and angry fights look to be, in the long run, fruitless. In the short term many anti-poverty groups aim to act as advocates for individuals having problems with the local welfare office. Seeing their strength in numbers, they protest and picket and if need be "occupy" welfare offices until a check is issued. Some, such as PAN, have been condemned by the working public and fellow anti-poverty groups for bold tactics like taking over the then premier’s constituency office and picketing outside his home. Whatever the specific tactic, and whether condemned or not, often they achieve the goal. A meager check, however reluctantly, is issued and the recipient is able to survive another month with that smallest amount of security. This battle of wills between the poor and the state is of course waged in a larger context. In Canada the backdrop is a dedication to social programs, made much of in theory and often referred to, but like much scenery it is mostly taken for granted. Many Canadians, some would suggest a majority, point with pride to a national system and history of commitment to the poor. But when it comes to pinpointing the mechanism and the cost of such a system, and more especially the contribution required of each citizen to make that system work, most seem woefully ignorant. The vaunted Canadian social programs quickly slip from the taxpayers’ minds when the news informs them of another anti-poverty or welfare protest. Instead tired cries of "get a job" more often ring out. Rather than go on living in a state of contradiction, the proud taxpayers would be better served by listening to the welfare protestors, for in the details they would find the problems with their government laid bare. In British Columbia welfare protestors are fighting everything from the occasional 5-week check run (which forces recipients to live for a week longer on the same amount of money) to humiliating and de-humanizing psychological attacks, to the establishment of a system of institutionalized poverty. The tactics are all directed at increasing government control of poor peoples’ lives. Keeping in mind that welfare is a social service to which the BC government is publicly committed and of which it openly boasts, its seemingly unreasonable policies and tactics for intimidating and controlling the poor run the tried and true government gamut. Welfare applicants face incessant and indiscriminate qualification changes. The typical bureaucratic nightmare consists of constantly rotating caseworkers who do not use or (for unspoken reasons) do not have computers; producing application forms that inexplicably change, along with program euphemisms; and turning incorrect spellings into delays only a bureaucrat could understand. These are fairly run of the mill tactics used to wear out and humiliate and frustrate people. The stakes have been raised, however, and the protestors in BC have found new voices, because of some radical changes the government have recently instituted. The Natural Diversion Rate The current government in BC is called the New Democratic Party. It is historically a socialist party, associated with unions, environmentalists, and the poor. In a move meant to placate taxpayers and businesses who watched them send the province into enormous debt, the NDP government rolled out a plan to cut the size of the welfare rolls. Common sense would have it that if there are fewer people on welfare there must be more jobs. The NDP strategy, however, is simply to have fewer people on welfare, jobs or not. Government estimates show that of all the people who contact welfare offices, one third will not become welfare recipients. This is due to a phenomenon called the "natural diversion rate". The goal of the NDP is to increase the diversion rate from 33 percent to 38 percent, for supposed (but miscalculated) savings of $16 million. The plan of attack is many pronged. It begins with a new, drawn out pre-application process called "Early Intervention", as though applying for welfare is a personal problem like drug addiction that can be cured if identified early enough. Pre-application includes attending an orientation wherein individuals are warned of random home visits from "Verification Officers" checking addresses and marital status. (Welfare protesters have astutely noted that given the government’s eagerness to take children from their families, this alone is enough to keep many single mothers from continuing the application process.) Pre-applicants are required to sign up for a training program that will teach them how a personality adjustment, a haircut, and a re-formatted resume will get them a job. After joining the list at a local "job shop" – a privatized office which maintains worker files listing experience and education – they will be called upon to provide free labor in exchange for on the job training. If these requirements haven’t scared them away, the job shops will provide "employment counseling services" which essentially sell post-secondary education as the ticket to success. This is simply another form of welfare, for it means a huge student loan, a young lifetime of debt, and a job paying off the bank. The welfare line is moved from the welfare office to the student loan office. Poverty is institutionalized. For those who fulfill the requirements to actually apply for welfare, the consent form awaits. To receive any money new applicants in BC must sign a waiver allowing the government to access an individual’s bank account, vehicle registration, tax history, and marital status. Since no money is provided until the form is signed this is nothing less than extortion. While similar to the government abuse and extortion applied to all taxpayers, middle class and wealthy alike, these injustices are more grotesque. The government has chosen to control nearly every aspect of a welfare recipient’s life. And why not? The poor hardly have a voice and almost no one cares about them. And unfortunately, perhaps worst of all, the protestors who do fight for their rights are working in a social system, and more importantly to grow a social system, that immediately and forever puts them in an unwinnable situation. What the protestors and advocates fail to understand is that the government can only demand subservience, and can only invade privacy, and can only eliminate freedom and choice if poor people accept money from them. Dependence on the government – which the government’s own policies promote – is all that enables the government to control lives. Why would anyone sign a form allowing the government to invade their private business if they didn’t have to? Imagine how much control the government would have over you if you didn’t need the government’s money? Imagine what would happen to the government if you could just ignore it! Sadly, the long term goals of many welfare advocacy groups demand more government attention, not less. Marginalized Workers Action League lists on its web site (www.web.net/mwal) demands for •guaranteed full employment at union rates of pay, •full wage compensation when work not available, •free universal day care and education, •free and complete medical and dental care, •choice of work one wishes to take, •change of work on request, •free access to job required transportation, and •universal equality inclusive of race, gender, age, and sexual orientation. Libby Davies, an NDP Member of Parliament and longtime advocate of the poor, has also called for national daycare. These demands, as dangerous as they are unrealistic, belong on a commune more akin to Skinner’s Walden Two than on a political agenda. To have the government supply such programs is a license for them to rule lives. Do these misguided demands make the protestors irrelevant? Hardly. In the short term they are helping the poor survive, and that can be nothing but admirable. If in the process they can inform and educate the rest of society about government injustices – not about withheld checks, but the price in personal freedom and liberty to get a check – they might convince enough people that the system of government needs changing. It is no mystery that many of, for instance, MWAL’s long term goals are attainable only if government has no role in them. Freedom from government control, extortion, intimidation, and intrusion could finally open the way to completely innovative solutions to our problems. Imagine if you are free from the government – free meaning not under, or not tricked into being in, obligation to the government – you could work when, how, and wherever you wanted. Somehow the advocates of the poor do not see this. And yet if a welfare check now requires an individual to go to work for the government, to provide them access to their personal information and their home, imagine what a national daycare system would cost! It is time for the welfare advocates and the socialists to end the delusion. They must address the root of the problem and help map a strategy to remedy it. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Peter Topolewski was born in Canada in 1972. Against the odds that seem stacked against everyone at birth, he is just now beginning to learn that the society and system of authority one is born into is not the society and system of authority one must accept. He lives and works in Vancouver, where his corporate communications company is based. -30- from The Laissez Faire City Times, Vol 3, No 38, September 27, 1999 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Published by Laissez Faire City Netcasting Group, Inc. Copyright 1998 - Trademark Registered with LFC Public Registrar All Rights Reserved ----- Aloha, He'Ping, Om, Shalom, Salaam. Em Hotep, Peace Be, Omnia Bona Bonis, All My Relations. Adieu, Adios, Aloha. Amen. Roads End Kris DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion and informational exchange list. Proselyzting propagandic screeds are not allowed. Substance—not soapboxing! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory', with its many half-truths, misdirections and outright frauds is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRL gives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no credeence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply. Let us please be civil and as always, Caveat Lector. ======================================================================== Archives Available at: http://home.ease.lsoft.com/archives/CTRL.html http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/ ======================================================================== To subscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email: SUBSCRIBE CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED] To UNsubscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email: SIGNOFF CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Om
