It’s BOTH What You Say AND How You Say It

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Over the weekend, I happened to interact with a young lady who complained about a couple in front of her at the grocery store using EBT, AKA food stamps, saying something to the effect of “Tonight, I bought my dinner at the grocery store and the couple in front of me used their EBT card, and they are eating better than my family. Sigh.”

UGH!

As a libertarian, I abhor the idea of a government-run “safety net” to help those who find themselves in need. I think that we can provide that safety net for our family, friends, and neighbors without the use of force by no longer outsourcing that responsibility to government and taking it on ourselves. After all, before The New Deal, that IS how we handled it. Why would we want to let a wasteful entity like government determine need, its distribution and method, and the administration and overhead necessary to make it happen?

The main issue I took with this approach to discussing a safety net program was that it attacked the individual recipients’ choices and lifestyle, which is not how you would win over those who may be on the fence about the program or the idea that government should administer “charity” through force. It gives an impression of envy, a lack of compassion, and an uninformed statement about the lives of those recipients.

Talking about this subject in terms of the individual program also hyper focuses the discussion on THAT program. Rather than discuss EBT specifically, you’ll likely be more persuasive by talking about the role government took in “charity.” Rather than get into the specifics and details of the program, talking about taking back the outsourced responsibility into our homes, neighborhoods, and communities has a far greater impact. We can discuss philosophy more broadly without getting caught up in a minute detail. It’s similar to how Governor Gary Johnson was pinned down to “baking the Nazi cake” by a fellow candidate seeking the Libertarian Party nomination, rather than focusing on the broader picture of freedom of association. 

We can also ask thought-provoking questions about why they find it more important to prolong, preserve, and protect a program founded on the use of government force. By focusing the conversation this way, we can discuss how to end government’s shoddy performance to actually address those in need, while taking from others to pay for it.

A more efficient government is not in our best interests. We know that individuals operating in a freed market and free society can better serve our community’s needs.