[pengaru]

> When you can buy twinkies and pork chops you're not actually poor. When you are really poor you eat rice and beans and some vegetables you grow for yourself. And then you don't have diabetes typically.

The EBT program here in the US completely distorts the situation.

My local grocery store serves a very poor community, most of the customers pay with EBT. I get to see what kind of things these folks buy, it's idiotic. We could do a lot of good if EBT were only applicable to fresh perishable goods like produce/eggs/milk/fish/meat.

It almost seems like people on EBT hate themselves for being poor and lean in on being self-destructive while at the store paying for things with EBT. They largely buy processed/prepared junk food, it's unbelievable, but if you view the food they buy as another drug prodding the reward centers of their brains, it's making them feel good in the short-term while giving them diabetes and other ailments in the long-term. EBT enables affording it by being almost equivalent to cash.

[jfritsch1984]

As I said: These people should be educated and motivated. They have to learn about the consequences of these decisions. Only if that does not work I would restrict EBT to healthier foods.

On a personal note: I agree with you. It‘s hilarious what people buy even when they are on a tight budget.

[ficklepickle]

Is it hilarious? Is the misfortune of others humorous?

Perhaps it's the people with poor impulse control and lack of education that end up economically poor. Maybe they never learned better.

Taking pleasure from those less fortunate than yourself is a trick of the ego. It makes you feel better about yourself by labeling someone else inferior. It comes from a place of insecurity about one's own worth.

By simplifying the problem to a group of people simply being inferior, you miss all the nuance, the complex system of factors that created the result.

It's much easier to dehumanize. But if we don't counter these primitive tribal urges, we are bound to repeat the tragedies of history.