[quote]DBCooper wrote:
[quote]Silo101 wrote:
And DB stop playing devils advocate, the motorcycle example doesn’t apply. According to your logic if I was shot walking home from the gym because I know there may be a possibility of muggers on the road then I am wrong for being there. Applying the same logic to ANY circumstance where the result is unfavorable would yield the same result.[/quote]
I’m not playing devil’s advocate at all. You assume that each and every choice we make carries with it an equal amount of risk and an equal result of that risk. This is not the case. I assume that riding a motorcycle at a high rate of speed on a windy mountain road carries with it an inherent risk that walking down the street doesn’t. The motorcyclist assumes an unnecessary risk that carries with it a much higher degree of danger. How many people are disabled from muggings every year to the point where they are disabled for as long and as severely as even an average motorcycle accident victim? If I could find numbers on it, I’m sure we’d see that the motorcyclist is engaging in far more dangerous behavior, and it is unnecessary since we don’t NEED to ride motorcycles on the weekend for fun.
Also, if you live in a bad neighborhood or even if you live in a good neighborhood you really have no choice as to whether or not you walk through it and expose yourself to a possible mugging. At some point you MUST venture out into the real world and take that “risk”. Calling this a choice is akin to likening breathing to a choice. Yes, technically I have that choice, but the result of making the choice not to breath FAR outweighs any benefit I may get from that choice to the point where it is not a choice at all.
And this brings me to the crux of what I’ve been saying all along. It’s ridiculous to point to this fat ass and say that there is something wrong with fat people getting disability. There are all sorts of ways people can become disabled. There are all sorts of disabilities that can be suffered through for a variety of reasons. One person may be paralyzed for an entirely different reason than someone else. Essentially, what OctoberGirl has done is she’s placed a value on a particular “disability”.
But this is problematic because it’s impossible to dole out govt cheese based purely on who deserves what given their disability. We don’t even know why this woman is obese to begin with. There are reams and reams of medication out there for all sorts of psychological and physical conditions whose side effects include an inability to differentiate when someone has and has not had enough food to eat. I witnessed a friend gain 50 lbs in less than two months from this sort of medication. Perhaps this fat ass has some even more debilitating disability than obesity, like schizophrenia, and she has actually managed to combat it successfully without ANY govt assistance…except that her medication makes her obese.
Does she get more disability than an equally fat person who is obese simply because they’re a glutton? Right now, yes. I think THAT is what is wrong. Personally, I’m against these welfare programs for the most part, but they are there and they are probably here to stay in some way, shape or form. So if we’re going to have them at all, we may as well compromise by lowering the total payments drastically and handing them out on an entirely equal level, regardless of disability, because it’s impossible to determine what disability is more disabling than others and so forth.[/quote]
There has to be some differentiation between acceptable and unacceptable classifications for disability. The difference in your example is that the motorcycle ACCIDENT VICTIM is getting aid when he would gladly trade aid for having his physical ability and job back. This is currently impossible. The aid given to an obese person doesn’t give any incentive to correct a reversible problem, it actually gives incentive to continue a lifestyle of self indulgence that creates and maintains the problem.
Saying your friend was wrong and stupid to drive in a foolish manner would be correct. But the aid he receives does not replace any other viable option. An obese person has a multitude of alternatives starting right with loosing weight in order to actually perform at a job.
Furthermore, if an obese person has a lower capability to earn than a regular person then what makes that comparison different to say, the comparison between and educated and uneducated person? One can and therefore should earn more. If the obese person wants to earn more they should raise their earning ability. The motorcycle victims cannot raise their earning ability (if you say that a motorcycle victim can get further education, look at the costs involved in that, which are even higher for disabled people - real disabled people - and a fat person can also get a higher education).
As for your point concerning magnitude of risk: You assert that a reasonable person cannot realistically expect to be injured from a mugging and/or cannot really choose whether or not to walk in said place. (This is what you meant right?)
“The motorcyclist assumes an unnecessary risk that carries with it a much higher degree of danger. How many people are disabled from muggings every year to the point where they are disabled for as long and as severely as even an average motorcycle accident victim?”
Firstly, the fact that the inherent danger of the bike accident is much greater shouldn’t be taken into consideration. Its the fact that the person is disabled and can no longer support his/herself that matters. Whether you consider the danger to be greater driving recklessly as apposed to being shot in a mugging, regardless of statistical incidence, a person disabled from an injury resulting from a mugging will still not be able to provide for him/herself and thus still be given aid.
An example to support this point could be a soldier in the military. I daresay the soldier “assumes an unnecessary risk that carries with it a much higher degree of danger” than a motorcycle rider driving recklessly. So this soldier should not receive disability aid when his/her leg is blown off by a grenade because they knew there was a danger of disability when they signed up? See? It doesn’t make sense.
Secondly, you fail to account for a full definition of the term reasonable in this context. If a biker takes an unnecessary chance where he knows he may crash and become disabled he still knows it is very unlikely that he will in reality. Avoiding every situation where you could be in an accident is not realistic anyway. An obese person not only has a huge (lol) amount of warning that obesity is approaching (and thus ample time to avoid it) but also consistently engages in actions or lack thereof which are SURE to ultimately lead to obesity. No chance involved. No sudden loss of ability. So when you say its not a choice at all to never walk in your neighborhood for fear of getting mugged you cannot apply the same logic to the development of obesity because it is definitely a choice to eat that next burger or not.
When you talk about medication causing weight gain, I have two things to say.
Firstly, not all people using these drugs gain weight. The same drug may cause weight gain for some people and weight loss for other people. Almost always, there are alternative medicines which are just as good and do not cause weight gain. The actual amount of people affected negatively and without a better alternative is very small.
Secondly, I am somewhat confused by the notion that taking a certain medication will cause obesity. Think about it. It can certainly make a leaner body less attainable, sort of like the opposite of steroids. This can be done by modifying biological processes, neurotransmitter sensitivity, hormone release etc. But even if your body puts fat on a lot more easily and looking like a pro bodybuilder is probably not gonna happen… Why does that mean You will have to become obese (To the extent that it affects your ability to continue with a regular job)? Weight still increasing? Decrease food consumption. No obesity. It is literally impossible to keep gaining weight if you don’t consume enough food to do so. And this doesn’t mean a person on such medication should have a 10% body fat. Overweight people can still function fine in society. In order to be obese enough to be granted disability aid you have to be somewhere in the extremes.