September 29, 2005
Double-dipping
There is growing consternation in the general public that the charitable institutions to which they have donated for disaster relief are also being compensated by governmental funds. Why should this be objectionable?
Regarding the appropriateness of having charitable intitutions compensated by the government for their expenditures. Why should this be objectionable behavior?
Well, for one thing it's double-dipping. Let me explain what I mean by that.
Whenever someone accepts a gift, there's an implicit expectation, if not obligation, for the recipient to pay back with the coin of gratitude and appreciation. If then the donor is paid back by a third party, he's being compensated twice.
Then, of course, there's the problem with religiously oriented charities that their activities are Constitutionally required to be separated from the state or government. There's a good reason for this requirement. When the government, which retains the ultimate physical power to coerce some kinds of behavior, combines with organizations whose mandate is to coerce the mind or spirit of those they offer to assist, then the individual recipient is virtually stripped on any autonomy and thus of his humanity. It was the combination of the physical and spiritual coercive powers that the framers of our Constitution wanted to avoid when they incorporated the separation of church and state.
And it is, of course, the totalitarian effect of this combination which the proponents of authoritarian control seek to promote when they enlist the assistance of religious institutions to distribute benefits which, by all rights, the citizens are entitled to receive without strings--physical or spiritual.
Now, it is, of course, possible for individuals to take or accept benefits without any concern for an obligation to reciprocate in any manner. And, indeed, this capacity seems to be increasingly prevalent in people who have set themselves up as leaders of our nation. So, perhaps they don't even recognize the emotional and psychological stress they are imposing on individuals for whom the coin of gratitude is freighted with the realization that they are being forced to chose between the survival of the body and the survival of their spirit.
Nevertheless that's the choice the lust for power is imposing on the survivors of Katrina. It is also the choice that is being imposed on the citizens of Iraq. "Believe what we tell you, or die" is the message from the occupation. And that, in my book, is the essence of evil.
Posted by Hannah at September 29, 2005 11:17 AM