Need or value? Freedom or servitude? In a recent Crusader editorial and response letter, the merits of welfare and an Obama administration proposal requiring students to do community service work have been debated. I will ignore such semantic inconsistencies as “required volunteer work”, move past the flawed comparison used by Ms. Kentner of the basic right of freedom to the privilege of driving, and reject the argument that it is the government’s place to teach responsibility to young adults. It is important we focus on the heart of this issue.
Should people be required to sacrifice their money, work, time and talent – that is, their value, when the needs of others are brought as a claim against them? The proposal to require community service illustrates a kind of thinking that has become popular today.
To say that people should be required to do service work in their community is to admit believing that an individual has less right to his own life than does society. Many people believe that the haves should be required to help the have-nots. They believe that the wealthy, because of their wealth, are morally inferior to the poor and see no problem with taking money from those who have earned it and giving it to those who have not. All this falls in line with the time honored principle “from each according to his ability, to each according to his need.”
Perhaps some people are willing to live in the state of indentured servitude that would result if this line of thinking was carried out to its logical conclusion, but I am not. I want to be free to exchange my value for what I deem to be of equal value. I want to “selfishly” hold on to my joire de vivre.
Many people enjoy volunteer work or philanthropy because they are helping others and derive satisfaction from doing so, but those individuals will do so voluntarily regardless of government policies. These people are trading their value for the personal benefit they get out of such activities.
People should have the liberty to pursue their own happiness. If this statement puts me at odds with government policy then our country has a problem. After all, instead of a “people’s republic”, we have a government that is of the people, by the people and for the people – right?