Once, many years ago, I had a conservative woman write me to ask what I thought about her being on welfare. It has been a long while, so the details may be a touch off, but the gist of it was that her husband had lost his job and both of them were scrambling to make money. They felt like they genuinely needed to take welfare to get by right now and feed their kids. She said she felt ashamed of being on it, but hoped they wouldn’t need to be on it much longer. She said that she wondered if they should just say, “damn the consequences,” get off welfare even though they were qualified for it, and go from there.
What I told her in response may not be what you expect.
It was essentially, “It’s a government program, you’re qualified for it, you need it, and you feel bad about being on it. Stay on it, get back on your feet, and then do your best to never have to get back on it again.”
The “feel bad about being on it” part was critical for me because you’re SUPPOSED TO FEEL BAD about taking charity from other people. That doesn’t mean you don’t need it and it doesn’t mean they shouldn’t give it.
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