: What does everyone think about this viewpoint? Me, I completely disagree.In that you and I share an opinion. If the definition of "acting like a man" is acting brutishly, then I'll gladly forsake my gender.
: First of all, theft is wrong in a general sense; if we are to conclude that it's wrong for capitalists to steal the fruits of their workers' labor, then it must also be wrong for people to rob stores
Yep.
:(except stealing for food or other necessities). Secondly, I have more respect for panhandlers because of the implicit statement that they're making.
Right about here I'm going to have to disagree.
: they are saying, 'My claim on your money is going to be imposed by moral force, not by violence. I deserve your money because I am, human and it isn't right that you should have money and I don't.
It isn't right that I toiled for my wages doing something I'd rather not be doing and that he should enjoy the benefit of my effort, given that he or she occupied their time by standing idle with a jar. There is no moral force acting on me where the lazy are concerned- the panhandler be damned.
: If you don't give me money, you will be punished only by your own guilty conscience."
Or I'll shake my head and mutter "get a job."
: In this way, they are implicitly claiming that society's proceeds should be distributed on the basis of need and not on the basis of force or power- they are pointing the way to a better society, while the thief merely continues the same old cycle of selfishness and violence.
Whatever their actions as a whole does imply, it does so by accident. A panhandler's behavior is in truth as selfishly motivated as that of any capitalist- they'd see me work to provide for them while not lifting a finger. It's a waste of a human life to spend one's day begging money on the interstate and crawl to sleep in a gutter. True enough to be a panhandler is better than to be a thief, but beggars are still less valuable than blue-collar, working-class citizens.
If you hold to the belief that human worth is innate you will of course disagree with me. I contend that worth is earned.
And panhandlers simply aren't pulling their weight.
None.
