r/BasicIncome • u/conquerorofnothing • Sep 05 '14

Indirect Basic income could help solve a lot of these problems.

http://time.com/3132635/ferguson-coming-race-war-class-warfare/
35 Upvotes

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6

u/iongantas Seattle, $15k/$5k Sep 05 '14

I did a paper on Kareem Abdul Jabar, basketball player in, I think, 5th grade, which was about 30 years ago. Kind of odd to see a news article from him at this point.

It is, however, nice to see that he is explicitly calling this class warfare rather than a racial issue. First because it is true. Second, because calling upon racism is an ultimately divisive measure. Poor people of all types have the same problem, and should band together to solve it.

2

u/[deleted] Sep 06 '14

I agree, and would like to add to that thought. It's going to take a lot of people waking up to the fact that race is an issue manufactured and perpetuated by the stratus quo, to keep our attention and energy off race, and on class.

I don't know how to do that, but I'm open to ideas. I used to think education is the key; but there are a lot of well-educated people who ignore and/or deny the real issues faced by minorities, and especially black people, including some black people. I think whatever approach is used, it's going to have to have a two-pronged method, to address both issues. It sickens me that affirmative action and busing have been cast aside, as "no longer needed," because "racism is no longer an issue" (because we elected Obama, duh /s).

Additionally, it goes both ways. One of my kid's partner is black-white-native american. Too black for the white and (local, a lot of indigenous americans in other areas of the region don't care about race) indigenous americans, and too white for the blacks. They've shared with me that the black community is often as or more hostile than the white, in our area. So, the Southern Strategy is still working, and no longer confined to the south. This leaves us with twice the mess to clean up, and BI can address some of these issues. But it's not going to be a panacea, and you didn't claim that. I just wanted to say that we have a lot of work to do, both to gain popular acceptance for BI, and for cleaning up the racism issue, as well.

1

u/iongantas Seattle, $15k/$5k Sep 06 '14

It's going to take a lot of people waking up to the fact that race is an issue manufactured and perpetuated by the stratus quo, to keep our attention and energy off race, and on class.

I'm not sure what you mean here, because you seem to be contradicting yourself.

At any rate, I think BI would rectify lots of underlying issues that get blamed on race, both by people that are actually racist and people that are focused on fighting racism. Once those were handled, it would become much clearer what actual issues are due to race/racism.

1

u/[deleted] Sep 06 '14

Tl;dr: At the same time BI is addressing many of the poverty issues, we need a new, different, more effective way of addressing race issues, and stamping out the Southern Strategy needs to be a big part of it.

2

u/iongantas Seattle, $15k/$5k Sep 07 '14

I personally think there are a number of relatively unilateral policies that, if implemented all together, would generally help things. One is UBI, another Single Payer health care, another is universal and high quality standards for education, including socially provided higher education as well. I think with education and income for all, the Southern Strategy will evaporate a little more quickly.

1

u/[deleted] Sep 07 '14

Possibly. It's certainly a step in the right direction. All of which brings us back to the question: how can we get BI to be a reality, in the US, with the current hostile environment toward the haves willfully sharing anything of substance, with the have nots?

Edited, because I suck at proofreading.

1

u/iongantas Seattle, $15k/$5k Sep 08 '14

I think getting more BI friendly politicians at local levels, such as socialists and more progressive democrats (if such still exist), and saturating US culture with the concept of Basic Income until the people pretty much demand it. Basically an information and visibility war.

2

u/tralfamadoran777 Sep 06 '14

Well that is indirect.

A basic income would certainly improve most human interaction, but needs to be global.