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meta_gunslingertoday at 12:51 PM8 repliesview on HN

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b3lvederetoday at 12:56 PM

Tell me how someone born disabled made the wrong decision?

After that, tell me how someone who became disabled after an accident which they themselves did not cause, made the wrong decision?

Thirdly, tell me how someone who lived perfectly healthy just happend to have some blood clot shot into their brain suddenly, made the wrong decision?

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flr03today at 1:15 PM

Yes, in my vision on society, I'd happily work to help the survival of somebody else, next.

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inigyoutoday at 1:00 PM

Interesting how this is always post-hoc justified. It's always "you made bad decisions in the past so now you deserve cruelty". It's rarely "you are making a bad decision right now so you should stop that before you deserve cruelty in the future".

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stonyrubbishtoday at 1:04 PM

I am 23 years old. I studied hard, went to college, got good grades, etc-- "did everything right," as far as older people in my life told me. At 19 I became disabled from a sudden rare condition such that I am now very ill and mostly housebound. I thought exactly as you did before becoming disabled. Everyone thinks sudden, rare, lightning-strike style things just happen to others until one day they happen to you.

I don't agree with railing against capitalism either-- it's not clear to me that there's any other system I would do better in, given my disability-- but the idea of, "if you do everything right, nothing bad will happen to you" is basically a comforting lie people tell themselves to feel safe. I believe in the value of hard work, and I am trying my best to better my situation-- switching my entire career from humanities to IT-- but I still am not fully sure how I am going to be able to support myself, and I don't think that's my fault.

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flkiwitoday at 1:09 PM

> "I made the wrong decisions and I want society to bail me out of them".

The irony of you using this in a negative sense when capitalism has profited mightily from exactly this dynamic is not lost on me, in that insurance companies are insanely profitable things. And that's without getting into what b3lvedere notes in the other comment about disability and the absolute, fundamental dependency capitalism has on socialized risk, e.g., limited liability as a corporate model, bankruptcy protection, even the dependence on national military and economic strength to create the conditions for private profit. Note that I'm not even dinging capitalism here. Not at all. It's just that capitalism wouldn't work without whole social risk networks to create the conditions for private profit.

thaumieltoday at 1:05 PM

I disagree.

People are born with disabilities, which doesn't always show it's face until it is too late.

There are people who are completely incapable of saving and investing, because for them the "future" does not have any meaning in it self.

What is the point of investing if money by it self does not have any value?

There are also people who are born who will never be able to work a "normal" 9-5 job.

To put everything on their shoulders is what is wrong with the system.

Capitalism bears a heavy burden for causing a lot of angst.

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essephtoday at 1:04 PM

> Moreover, actions have consequences. Instead of traveling and having fun when you are able bodied, you can work more, save and invest your money for the future and safe-guarding against situations like these. Other people have chosen to do that. In the end of the day, all that outcry about capitalism is the classic "I made the wrong decisions and I want society to bail me out of them".

People don't choose to be born blind, or with a deformed limb, or with a genetic blood disease.

What fucking choice were they ever given?

It's always somebody that got lucky that wasn't born with a disability that makes these statements.

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ModernMechtoday at 1:11 PM

> In the end of the day, all that outcry about capitalism is the classic "I made the wrong decisions and I want society to bail me out of them".

What's the point of society if not being a buffer for bad individual decisions? If I can't count on y'all when I'm down, why should I help y'all when I'm up?