Using Ubuntu absolves the user of personal responsibility?

[Todd Slater]

On 8/3/06, Colin Brace <cb at lim.nl> wrote:
> On 8/3/06, Todd Slater <dontodd at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > When we absolve people of personal responsibility, we often create a
> > situation of dependence.  As shining examples of this, we might look
> > at the "health" care, social welfare, and educational systems of the
> > United States.
>
> I understand the point you are trying to make w.r.t helping newcomers,
> but this is a really poor analogy. Virtually all ubuntu users in our
> environment have more or less equal access to a resource like google,
> but sometimes new users do indeed need some guidance in how to find
> their way around the vast amount of information out there, how to find
> answers to the questions they have.
>
> However, the chronic lack of opportunities poor people in the United
> States face due to systematic underfunding of public services and
> economic stagnation is a completely different set of problems. Don't
> blame the victims.

Colin,

I'm not blaming the victims. It's not about the funding. I don't think
if you pumped more money into the system that poverty and economic
inequality would just go away. I'm saying the social welfare system,
rather than developing independent, self-efficacious citizens,
encourages incompetence and dependence. The system exists to
perpetuate itself rather than accomplish its objectives; if it could
accomplish its objectives, it would be out of a job, so to speak. I
won't go in to detail here since it's so off topic, but you might
google for Ivan Illich (and perhaps dependency hypothesis) for more
information.

Todd