From: Clint O'Dell (clintodell@hotmail.com)
Date: Sat Oct 09 1999 - 10:24:30 MDT
>Street people aren't on the street because they can't take
>care of themselves.
Of course not. I said they are there by choice.
>They are there because the have social problems. They
>either don't want help or they drive away people who could help them.
And so why help them? If they don't want help then don't help them. If
they drive people away, then don't help them. Now, if they drive people a
way because they stink and they ask you to help rid them of this problem
then you can help them.
>Actually, if all it took to kill ourselves was to wish to be dead for 1
>second, we would all be dead. If someone truly wants to kill themselves,
>then fine.
>But in most cases people who are 'rescued' are grateful.
>Don't argue with societies impulse to protect its members. Argue with the
>harmful, dysfunctional way it does it.
I doubt it. Having lived with hundreds of suicidal people and can say that
is not true. Most people play the game. I've talked with so many suicidal
people who say "I'm glad to have been saved from myself" because that is
what is expected of them. They are looking for a 'norm', to belong, and by
saying those things they don't realy mean they try to fit in. It gets them
out of the hospital faster. Of course, at least 75% of these people try to
commit suicide again. You can say it's a clinical depression and in there
genes so they realy don't mean it. Well, you can say all our thoughts are
clinical and its in our genes. That's all the better reason to let them
kill themselves if they wish. I have seen a dramatic increase of retarded
adults and children in just the last few years. Are we going to breed
humanity into a retarded species? People who try to commit suicide and fail
and later say they are glad they didn't, well the ment it at the time and
had they succeeded they wouldn't be alive to think other wise. They are
dead, there life to them having never meant anything because they aren't
alive to preceive it. They don't exist, they don't matter.
I'm not saying you can't help people. It wouldn't be a very fun society if
nobody did. I'm saying don't force your help onto people who don't want it.
As for your hungry dog scenario. The dog is hungry but will bite you if you
feed it, so you drop a steak around the corner and the dog happily gobbles
it up not knowing it was you who gave it to him. That's fine. You didn't
make the dog do anything he didn't want to do. You didn't kidnap him and
take him home so you could care for him for his own good.
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