| I had the good fortune of being born Australian. Through sheer dumb luck I'm entitled to: - Free healthcare
- Free education
- Free roads and parks
- Free safety and security (i.e. a relatively well functioning police force that will protect me from violence) These entitlements are far from perfect, and come with the caveat that if and when I start earning money, some of it will be taken from me (by threat of force, if necessary) to go into a communal fund to provide other Australians with these benefits. That sucks a bit, but on the other hand I have a legal right to decide, along with other citizens, on the proportion of my income that is taken, as well as on the people in charge of managing these communal funds. Perhaps more importantly, I get to live in a society where other people get these things too. I'm not saying this from a touchy-feely standpoint - there are huge benefits to the individual living in such a system. Because virtually everyone in my country has food in their stomach, a roof over their head, and a shot at improving their situation through hard work, I rarely feel unsafe. From a purely selfish standpoint, I am extremely grateful that most of the people in my country feel they have more to gain by defending 'the system' than by attacking it. As a business owner, I also have access to a large pool of highly educated people to work with and millions of (relatively) wealthy people to sell my products and services to. I'm not sure where I'm going with this. I quite liked the article and often think about how silly and arbitrary things like nationalism and citizenship are. And yet... Sure it sucks that I never really had the opportunity to opt out of the system, but on the other hand - boy am I lucky that it was opt in by default. |