"I don't think about class and stuff, hard work pays, I'm just blessed"

[JanMichael]

Ugh. Heard that one recently.

So I suppose those that are homeless, or financially devastated, or the victims of abuse, or abandoned with children to feed and clothe, or broken by healthcare costs, God just doesn't like? Truly the thoughts of the self absorbed. The inwardly focused and intentioanally obtuse personality type.

Fucking imbecile. Jackass.

"Blessed?" That is SO elitist as well as a total rationalization.

Bite me. Sometimes I really don't like the effect that some churches have on what should be fairly intelligent individuals...

[GOPisEvil]

1. Just think of the inherent contradiction in that statement.

I don't think about class and stuff...I'm just blessed.

Did that person ever stop to think that their "blessings" are actually benefits of being in a particular social and/or economic class? Typical "I got mine" attitude so prevalent today.

[FreedomAngel82]

4. Really

Or how about being born in a certain type of family?

[FreedomAngel82]

2. It's heartless

As you said: does God not like those who are poor? :eyes: Jesus was poor. He was a carpenter's son for goodness sakes.

[mcctatas]

3. Hard work pays????

The working poor work harder in one day then most of corporate America or trust fund baby repukes do in an entire lifetime! I would like to see these "blessed" people pour concrete, sling burgers, perform "unskilled" nursing care on our nations elderly and infirm.....I am so sick of that hard work pays off shit I could spontaneously combust!!!:grr::grr::grr:

[FreedomAngel82]

5. That should be the new reality show

They should have a new reality show where each week a wealthy person should have a poor person's job and see how long they'd last and when they start whining they'd lose.

[Theres-a]

21. 2 jobs

Good idea.

[Fridays Child]

8. Hard work...

cleaning hotel rooms
picking crops
washing cars
preznitting

Three of these things belong together
Three of these things are kind of the same
One of these things doesn't belong here
Now it's time to play our game
It's time to play our game

[ComerPerro]

27. Well, the argument goes: work hard, then you get a better job with

more money and eaiser work.

That way, it covers people who just make tons of money and sit on their fat ass. They can say, "I paid my dues. I worked very hard in my day"

but its all bullshit.

Bush, for example, has probably never actually worked a day in his life.

But if you listen to the republican mythmakers, he worked six jobs, 120 hours a week, before he made his money.

[stillcool]

6. You might enjoy this;

http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0930-25.htm

<Ironically, Hitler pandered to the middle class and they provided some of his most enthusiastically violent supporters. The fact that he did this while simultaneously destroying them was a terrible achievement of Nazi propaganda.>


<Along with millions of people, organized labor died in the concentration camps. The camps were not only the most depraved of all human achievements, they were a part and parcel of Nazi economic policy. Hitler’s untermenschen, largely Jews, Poles and Russians, supplied slave labor to German industry. Surely this was a capitalist bonanza. In another bitter irony, the gates over many of the camps bore a sign that read “Urbeit Macht Frei” – “work shall set you free”. I do not know if this was black humor or propaganda, but it is emblematic of the deception that lies at the heart of fascism.>

[Theres-a]

22. Deserves it's own thread. nt

[stillcool]

23. it's on the greatest...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=103x160929

[DBoon]

7. Blessed means it ain't just hard work alone

Does this person perhaps have the same last name as the company owner?

I've known people "blessed" in this manner.

It's also been called "being born on third base and claiming you hit a triple."

[Sugarbleus]

9. LOL JM.... tell us what you really think...

You stole my line: BITE ME

I heard people talking like this too. Not as much these days as I don't "hang out" anywhere near people like that anymore.

For a couple decades, certain church types used that rationalization for their good fortune: "God Blessed us". Today, if I were to hear that sentiment, I'd be thinking "Why I oughta...." :nuke:

Love your post... infuriating facts, but true.

[mestup]

10. Have you ever noticed cars in church parking lots?

They're so "stepford." Fairly new, minivans and compacts. Nothing old or beat up.

The poor will always be among us. Thank God. That way we know the rest of us are "blessed."

[Raksha]

11. Well, I feel blessed that I wasn't born to fundie parents...

and not at any time in my life have I allowed myself to be brainwashed into believing any of that b.s., either the intolerant b.s. or the anti-scientific b.s. Thank God for Reform Judaism and secular humanism! I've had a lot of bad luck in my life, but God was sure watching out for me in THAT regard!

[Hello_Kitty]

12. Well I think about class all the time

And I realize that I'm just LUCKY. Damn fortunate that I was born the right color, in the right country, and happened to hook up with the right people at the right time. There is nothing special about me. Nothing. I work hard sometimes, and sometimes quite frankly I don't. I lucked into a good job with good benefits and as long as that holds out I'll have a roof over my head, healthcare, and a few bucks in my pocket. That's why I try to help others whenever I can and why I'm a LIBERAL.

[Tracer]

18. ccbombs .... I agree with you completely, but you left a few things out ..

... I was LUCKY enough to be born at the right TIME, when houses were affordable, when one job would support a family, when $30,000 a year was UPPER MIDDLE CLASS.

I was LUCKY enought to be born with a talent that has supported me and my children (as a single mother) all my life.

I was LUCKY enough to have been born to parents who were quite well off for the time, and who educated me and my siblings.

God had nothing to do with it. I was just damn LUCKY.

[Fridays Child]

13. Reminds me of the neighbor who said that her son survived Iraq because...

...she prayed. I pointed out that the mothers who lost their sons probably prayed, too, but she said that their attitudes were not good enough.

!

Her son was injured, though, and has lost the use of an arm, probably for the rest of his life. So I asked her if the mothers whose sons came home uninjured had attitudes that were better than hers. Her answer to that was that God put her son where he was needed, knowing that he could handle his injury--as if those who returned unscathed were just too spiritually weak to overcome injuries.

I was deep into the psyche of a Bush voter and the territory was surreal. I had a double White Russian.

The conversation was so mind-numbing that I couldn't even begin to get into it with her about how many soldiers have died while saving the lives of their comrades or about how not one single soldier comes home from Iraq uninjured, psychologically. I was afraid that her answers would cause me to poke out my ear drums with a sharp stick.

[raccoon]

14. That kind of thinking really ticks me off,

Same as,

"I prayed for that job/to win the Miss Whatever title, etc., and I did."

As you said, this kind of thinking implies that God likes the speaker and doesn't like the others who weren't blessed, didn't get the job, etc.

I have no patience with such stupidity and arrogance.

[Greyhound]

15. Amerikans just hate to admit that they're lucky.

It means the myth of the 'self made man' is just that, a myth. I've yet to meet a repug ass-hat that will admit he/she got their position because of connections/money. As a result they believe it's their inherent superiority.
Of course, I live in ass-hat country.

[JanMichael]

16. Two things that will disappoint you.

1. the speaker is a Dem, I know this for a fact.

2. the speaker is not "white".

[Greyhound]

24. Why do you think that this would disappoint me? n/t

[JanMichael]

26. I think that I meant to post this where it was assumed the speaker was...

..."white".

Also it still disappoints me when Dems act like this so perhaps I was projecting?

[Greyhound]

28. Ah, I see. The dems have disappointed me my whole life.

The only reason I have anything to do with them is that, right now, they are the much lesser. It is also the reason I don't hold any hope of them changing anything when they take back the House & maybe the Senate in the mid-terms. Virtually all of them are just as corrupt as the repugs, and those very few that aren't (Kucinich for example) are without standing or power within The Party. He is relegated to the role of "voice of the extreme left", and ignored.

[PurityOfEssence]

17. god helps those who help themselves

So if you're just a flaming greedhead of breathtaking proportions, god REALLY loves you.

[WritingIsMyReligion]

25. ROFL

[Occulus]

19. Hard work in and of itself doesn't necessarily get you anything.

All it takes is one single person standing in your way, or pulling the rug out from under you when you're already unbalanced. Sometimes, it's a disaster affecting hundreds; sometimes, it's a death in your family.

Sometimes it's a vindictictive, punitive parent. Sometimes it's getting framed up by an angry ex-wife and a greedy stepson. Sometimes it's mistaken identity, or even something as innocuous as the alarm clock failing to go off in time to get you to work.

Shit happens. Conservatives need to learn that hard word all by itself does not stave off the shit that happens, nor does hard work necessarily pick up all the pieces; sometimes, hard work only leaves you with barely enough to keep your head above water.

The axiom I was taught as a kid- "you can do anything you want if you put your mind to it"- is a dangerously seductive lie. What it amounts to inevitably the reverse: "you didn't try hard enough," even when the failure to perform or succeed or advance is due to circumstances completely beyond one's own control.

Conservatives love that phrase, though; it relieves tham of any responsibility to provide meaningful aid to others. After all, it's all "their fault" in the first place, right?

[raccoon]

20. Great post. I heard that one too, as a kid,

"The axiom I was taught as a kid- "you can do anything you want if you put your mind to it"- is a dangerously seductive lie. "

It certainly is, and it's also a crock.