Entitlement

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The virtues of the poor may be readily admitted, and are much to be regretted. We are often told that the poor are grateful for charity. Some of them are, no doubt, but the best amongst the poor are never grateful. They are ungrateful, discontented, disobedient, and rebellious. They are quite right to be so. Charity they feel to be a ridiculously inadequate mode of partial restitution, or a sentimental dole, usually accompanied by some impertinent attempt on the part of the sentimentalist to tyrannise over their private lives. Why should they be grateful for the crumbs that fall from the rich man’s table? They should be seated at the board, and are beginning to know it. As for being discontented, a man who would not be discontented with such surroundings and such a low mode of life would be a perfect brute. Disobedience, in the eyes of anyone who has read history, is man’s original virtue. It is through disobedience that progress has been made, through disobedience and through rebellion.

Sometimes the poor are praised for being thrifty. But to recommend thrift to the poor is both grotesque and insulting. It is like advising a man who is starving to eat less. For a town or country labourer to practise thrift would be absolutely immoral. Man should not be ready to show that he can live like a badly-fed animal. He should decline to live like that, and should either steal or go on the rates, which is considered by many to be a form of stealing. As for begging, it is safer to beg than to take, but it is finer to take than to beg. No: a poor man who is ungrateful, unthrifty, discontented, and rebellious, is probably a real personality, and has much in him. He is at any rate a healthy protest. As for the virtuous poor, one can pity them, of course, but one cannot possibly admire them. They have made private terms with the enemy, and sold their birthright for very bad pottage. They must also be extraordinarily stupid. I can quite understand a man accepting laws that protect private property, and admit of its accumulation, as long as he himself is able under those conditions to realise some form of beautiful and intellectual life. But it is almost incredible to me how a man whose life is marred and made hideous by such laws can possibly acquiesce in their continuance.

Mr Cameron gets into government, and does away with DLA.

There's those people who think the world owes them something. ...that the earths resources, human labor pool, the rivers, all the land, all the forests, all the oceans, and even the contents of mountains belong to them and that they have the right to use all of this however they want to advance their selves. I'm of course talking about the extremely rich.

There's those people who think the world owes them something. ...that the earths resources, human labor pool, the rivers, all the land, all the forests, all the oceans, and even the contents of mountains belong to them and that they have the right to use all of this however they want to advance their selves. I'm of course talking about the extremely rich.

There's those people who think the world owes them something. ...that the earths resources, human labor pool, the rivers, all the land, all the forests, all the oceans, and even the contents of mountains belong to them and that they have the right to use all of this however they want to advance their selves. I'm of course talking about the extremely rich.

The bounty of nature belongs to those who have the will and the means to partake thereof. The alternative would be this: in order to pick one apple from a wild apple tree, one would have to ask the permission of every human on earth. That is clearly not feasible, so the apple go to the one who can reach it.

ruveyn

Yup.

Our dear Prime Minister, David Cameron, is a millionaire. He had a son who sadly died a few years back. The boy was ill, and disabled. So Mr Cameron claimed Disability Living Allowance, a non-means tested benefit for the disabled (hence millionaires can claim if they fit the criteria), to help with extra costs they may face in life. At most this would pay about £150 per week.

Mr Cameron gets into government, and does away with DLA.

And he says those who are angry about this and other government cuts - by and large, the poorest in society - have a 'sense of entitlement'.

I really don't like him.

I find entitlement has nothing to do with class, nor does it have anything with what your skin color. It has more to do with personality and character. I know poor who feel entitled, I know poor people who don't. I know middle class folks who feel entitled and those who don't. I've met (don't hang around much rich folk, but I'm related to a few) rich people who feel entitled and I've met those who don't. I know black people who feel entitled and know some that don't. I know hispanic people who feel entitled and I know those who don't.

Those who feel entitled are loud and obnoxious. They want the world to know how much they "deserve" things. It creates an illusion of the group appearing larger than what it really is. It's the same with extremists.

The bounty of nature belongs to those who have the will and the means to partake thereof. The alternative would be this: in order to pick one apple from a wild apple tree, one would have to ask the permission of every human on earth. That is clearly not feasible, so the apple go to the one who can reach it.

ruveyn

I see entitlement in two groups. The rich and the poor.

The middle class, not so much.