Yes, Suzanne, We Are Right To Be Disgusted…

Suzanne Moore on how we are becoming ‘disgusted by the poor’ (and how this is terrible of us, of course):

Poverty, we are often told, is not "actual", because people have TVs. This gradual erosion of empathy is the triumph of an economic climate in which everyone, addicted or not, is personally responsible for their own lack of achievement. Poor people are not simply people like us, but with less money: they are an entirely different species. Their poverty is a personal failing. They have let themselves go.

Some of them have. Or doesn’t personal responsibility count in Leftie BizzarroWorld?

Three years ago I was on a panel with Vince Cable at The Convention of Modern Liberty, when Cable was still reckoned a seer for predicting the recession. He said then that the financial crisis would mean civil liberties would be trampled on. But what stuck in my mind was a sentence he mumbled about the pre-conditions for fascism arising. Scaremongering? The emotional pre-condition is absolutely this punitive attitude to the weak and poor.

It’s always ‘fascism’ that’s the fear of the Left, isn’t it? We’ll just skip over Stalin and Pol Pot…

The answer to poverty, you see, lies with the poor themselves, be they drain-dwellers, Greeks, disabled people, or unemployed youth. We will give them bailouts, maybe charity, and lectures on becoming more entrepreneurial. The economy of empathy has crashed, and this putsch is insidious and individualised. No more cruel to be kind. We must be simply cruel.

Yes, we’re really, really cruel in the UK.

Look at how we treat the ‘less fortunate’:

The woman’s lawyer, Irena Sabic, told the High Court in London that she has a personality disorder, extreme paranoia and a history of self-harm and drug abuse.

Her needs were recognised by the council until last May when direct payments – which allowed her to live in a supported home – were withdrawn.

Ms Sabic said the council was ‘legally obliged’ to lay on a full care regime for the woman and disputed claims that she ‘requires no care services whatsoever’.

What she needs is not to be enabled any more, but no longer having an army of carers pander to her every whim and provide the opportunity and resources to continue with her unhealthy lifestyle.

If only we were ‘cruel’ (to be kind) but instead, it seems we are going to continue this farce:

In a preliminary ruling, Judge Stephen Males QC said the council was being unlawful and ordered it to arrange a temporary care regime to cater for the woman’s ‘immediate and urgent’ needs. This will be enforced until a full hearing of the case takes place in May.

And if she loses, will she have to pay back the money?

*crickets*