(no subject)

[emmagrant01]

One of my students sent this to me; it's an email that's been making the rounds:



A Day in the Life of Joe Republican

Joe gets up at 6 a.m. and fills his coffeepot with water to prepare his morning coffee. The water is clean and good because some tree-hugging liberal fought for minimum water-quality standards. With his first swallow of water, he takes his daily medication. His medications are safe to take because some stupid commie liberal fought to ensure their safety and that they work as advertised.

All but $10 of his medications are paid for by his employer's medical plan because some liberal union workers fought their employers for paid medical insurance - now Joe gets it too.

He prepares his morning breakfast, bacon and eggs. Joe's bacon is safe to eat because some girly-man liberal fought for laws to regulate the meat packing industry.

In the morning shower, Joe reaches for his shampoo. His bottle is properly labeled with each ingredient and its amount in the total contents because some crybaby liberal fought for his right to know what he was putting on his body and how much it contained.

Joe dresses, walks outside and takes a deep breath. The air he breathes is clean because some environmentalist wacko liberal fought for the laws to stop industries from polluting our air.

He walks on the government-provided sidewalk to subway station for his government-subsidized ride to work. It saves him considerable money in parking and transportation fees because some fancy-pants liberal fought for affordable public transportation, which gives everyone the opportunity to be a contributor.

Joe begins his work day. He has a good job with excellent pay, medical benefits, retirement, paid holidays and vacation because some lazy liberal union members fought and died for these working standards. Joe's employer pays these standards because Joe's employer doesn't want his employees to call the union.

If Joe is hurt on the job or becomes unemployed, he'll get a worker compensation or unemployment check because some stupid liberal didn't think he should lose his home because of his temporary misfortune.

It is noontime and Joe needs to make a bank deposit so he can pay some bills. Joe's deposit is federally insured by the FSLIC because some godless liberal wanted to protect Joe's money from unscrupulous bankers who ruined the banking system before the Great Depression.

Joe has to pay his Fannie Mae-underwritten mortgage and his below-market federal student loan because some elitist liberal decided that Joe and the government would be better off if he was educated and earned more money over his lifetime. Joe also forgets that his in addition to his federally subsidized student loans, he attended a state funded university.

Joe is home from work. He plans to visit his father this evening at his farm home in the country. He gets in his car for the drive. His car is among the safest in the world because some America-hating liberal fought for car safety standards to go along with the tax-payer funded roads.

He arrives at his boyhood home. His was the third generation to live in the house financed by Farmers' Home Administration because bankers didn't want to make rural loans.

The house didn't have electricity until some big-government liberal stuck his nose where it didn't belong and demanded rural electrification.

He is happy to see his father, who is now retired. His father lives on Social Security and a union pension because some wine-drinking, cheese-eating liberal made sure he could take care of himself so Joe wouldn't have to.

Joe gets back in his car for the ride home, and turns on a radio talk show. The radio host keeps saying that liberals are bad and conservatives are good. He doesn't mention that the beloved Republicans have fought against every protection and benefit Joe enjoys throughout his day. Joe agrees: "We don't need those big-government liberals ruining our lives! After all, I'm a self-made man who believes everyone should take care of themselves, just like I have."

Comments

[http://users.livejournal.com/_inbetween_/]

will spread this to my tax-dodging colleagues ...

[helens78]

Woohoo! Everything good in the universe is because of liberals, and nobody could ever have done anything positive if it weren't for government forcing us to do it!

[emila-wan.livejournal.com]

I sure hope that's sarcasm ... *G*

[helens78]

You know what bothers me the most about this? It's the "whiny liberal", "stupid liberal", "[insert your own insult here] liberal". Yeah, Rush Limbaugh makes cracks like that from dawn to dusk, but this is one of those things that makes it sound like anyone who disagrees with more powerful government is a hateful person who'd rather insult people all day long than just get on with their lives and do the best they can with the situation they've been handed. It's so frustrating -- and so insidious here. Not all Republicans are rude and hateful people, but the way this is put together -- "this is an average day in the life of an average Republican" -- basically puts those words in the mouths of every average non-liberal out there, as if to say that while we're wandering around at our grocery markets and whatnot, we're also thinking really spiteful thoughts at liberals everywhere. Thanks so much for giving us a heartbeat of credit in terms of believing any non-liberal, anywhere, can get through a day without thinking seventy spiteful thoughts and being generally evil. *is thoroughly disgusted by both sides, but let me tell you, this sure as hell doesn't make me think the liberals are nice people*

[sciencegeek.livejournal.com]

US politics confuse me. Hell, Canadian politics confuse me.

[ashkitty.livejournal.com]

Amen.

[emmagrant01.livejournal.com]

Right. There's a reason I posted this as-is, with no commentary. It's pretty clear it was written and sent around as a joke, but there's an element of truth in it, IMO. It made me think of my mom and stepdad, who are Republicans not because they oppose government intervention into their lives, but because they really believe that the vast majority of their tax dollars go to support bums, welfare mothers, and freeloaders.

That isn't true, but that's what they believe, and it's why they vote Republican, for the most part. I get the feeling that the anonymous person who wrote this was thinking of someone very much like my parents, and was trying to point out the irony of people (whose daily lives really are positively impacted by the actions of the government) complaining about how the government's wasting their money on various minority groups and not helping them.

My big personal example is that neither of my parents saved money for my sister and I to go to college. They could have done, but it never occurred to them to do so, for a variety of reasons. My sister and I both got through college on Pell grants, federal student loans, and part-time jobs. Yet, my mom thinks those programs are a waste of taxpayer dollars because they provide support for people who don't work hard or deserve a college education! This, despite the fact that my sister and I both got where we are today in large part because of the Pell grant program, and despite the fact that she didn't help us at all, other than being poor enough to qualify us.

This email essay is cleearly tongue-in-cheek, and we all know the "other side" puts out stuff that's just as outrageous -- and also contains a grain of truth that connects with folks, on some level.

[helens78]

Both sides put out a lot of crap, I'll give you that right off. But this just hits me in the chest because I'm so very, very not a "liberal", and... Well, honestly? To me, it feels like having a good friend tell a bad racist joke the day before my wedding. Did my friend honestly believe the crap he was saying was true about me, personally, or my family? Maybe not. But that doesn't change the fact that his snide, spiteful jokes were about me. About me, personally. I'm part Asian, and I'm not a liberal. Asian jokes hurt, and this sort of funny email forward feels ugly and spiteful.

[emmagrant01.livejournal.com]

While I recognize that this made you angry and even hurt your feelings, I don't think telling a "Republican joke" is morally equivalent to telling a racist/sexist/homophobic joke. You were born part Asian, but it was your choice to be a Libertarian. There's a big, big difference between telling a mean-spirited joke based on something innate (that the teller finds offensive) and something a person has chosen to believe or participate in (taht the teller, again, finds offensive). To be honest, I think the claim that they're no different trivializes the impact of racism, sexism, and homophobia on people.

I get Republican-oriented emails from my family all the time, along with emails blasting people who aren't Christians. My family knows I'm an athiest and a tree-hugging liberal, so I do wince when I get those, but honestly, I don't take it that personally. They're just forwarding on something they thought was interesting or funny, and they're sending it to everyone in their address book, including me and the few other democrats in my family.

[helens78]

*sigh* Yeah, I figured I'd get a response like that. I give. I'm crawling into a fandom hole until the election's over; I don't need to deal with this shit.

[emmagrant01.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry you feel that way, but you don't have to click on links. No one made you read this. If I'd been sending you these emails and demanding you open them, read them, and respond to them, that would be different.

You're more than welcome to disagree with something I post on my blog, of course. I've enjoyed the conversations we've had, and you've make me think. Your response to this seemed unusually emotional, and I figured you were just having a bad day. Maybe not. At any rate, I'll miss your input, your opinions, and your perspective on the issues.

[hansbekhart.livejournal.com]

I'll second that amen. That's a great forward.

[helens78]

Okay. You're right that I was having a bad day, and you're right that I didn't have to click on anything. The shit that was tough for me to take was hearing "you have no right to feel that way". Whether you think it's appropriate for me to feel as offended as I did or not, that doesn't change the flat fact that I did feel that offended. I didn't say "this is as bad as racism"; I said "this hurt me as much as a friend expecting me to laugh at racist jokes". Because it did. Whether you like that or not, that's how far it went.

I've been pondering something for a while, though, since you mentioned it: whether belief systems are chosen. We're both atheists; could you choose to believe in God? I don't think I could. I'm not sure I'd consider being an atheist a choice. Likewise, I do choose to vote Libertarian (though I might not if Washington turns out to be a swing state), but did I make a choice to be a "small-L" libertarian? I'm not so sure about that, either. I do remember when I shifted from believing in authoritarianism to believing in individual responsibility, but I don't remember that being a volitional choice so much as a shift in worldviews, no more controllable than my "decision" to find women attractive in my later years of high school.

There are a lot of things that are choices, really, for narrow definitions of "choice". Being fat. Being an American, for that matter -- I wonder how many people are really going to emigrate if Bush the Younger is reelected. Phobias are choices, too -- claustrophobia, agoraphobia, social phobia. They can be struggled through, overcome with therapy, conditional training. If you can choose your way out of them, then are you choosing to keep them by not choosing to overcome them?

There are atheist jokes, American jokes, blonde jokes (hey, being a blonde is a choice), fat jokes. It's interesting that I've never heard a phobia joke, now that I think of it.

I see the humor

[(Anonymous)]

I find Joe Republican all that much better because I actually know republicans like that. Granted, not all of them are that ignorant and stupid, but the ones running our country into the ground are. Kuddos to you for posting it. What all those neo-cons need is some good eye-opening slash. Then they wouldn't be so hateful. I know I'm nicer and happier once I've gotten my daily dose.

Kitty
Kittyeatsyou@gmail.com