We deserve. We are worthy.

What makes someone worthy of something?  In adventure stories, a hero is worthy of great honor once they defeat a mighty foe or survive a perilous journey or learn an important lesson.  They are worthy to embark on their quest because they were born at a particular time, in a particular place, of particular parents, or because they are chosen (by someone or some thing).  But real life is much more complex.

In modern society, everyone worthiness must be judged for everything.  People with lots of money are worthy to live an opulent life, with yachts for their yachts and totally unnecessary space travel.  Politicians are worthy to make policies and law that affect every aspect of citizens' daily lives.  People with jobs are worthy to judge whether people without jobs deserve jobs.  People who need any form of government assistance to survive must be needy enough - and in the right ways - to be worthy of food stamps, housing, or medical treatment.  A person's skin tone determines whether they are worthy of humane treatment from police, teachers, supervisors, neighbors, and friends.

Although this practice of constantly assessing individual and group worthiness is ubiquitous, it's not good for humanity.  I believe everyone deserves opportunity and access to love, kindness, recognition of the fullness of their humanity, connection to self and community, health, peace, and well-being.  Not because they meet a set of criteria; just for existing and being human.

I also believe that in our modern society everyone deserves food, shelter, education, health care, a voice in societal governance.  There is plenty to go around.  But so many people don't have some or any of those things because we have decided that dollars determine deservedness.  You must exchange your money for food and shelter.  You must pay your way through the education system.  You must fund your own health care.  And you must pool your dollars with like-minded constituents to bend the ear of elected officials.

Our system of capitalism systematically syphons wealth from the middle and bottom income tiers and pools it at the top.  And it isn't working for most of humanity.  Government could act as a check and balance, taxing the excess wealth of the top tiers and redistributing it to the folks not making enough to meet their basic needs.  The math checks out.  But it hasn't happened yet because the people in power would rather create jobs programs or boost the economy in ways that have only served to widen the current chasm of economic inequality.  They do not yet see that everyone is deserving.

Deserving is a construct.  It's important to consider who constructed it.  As Mab Segrest says in her essay Of Soul and White Folks, "People don't need to respond to what they can pretend they do not know, and they don't know what they can't feel."  As long as the people making policy are insulated from the effects of that policy, they can avoid feeling the devastating sadness at the plight of their fellow humans or guilt for their hand in it, either of which might spur them into immediate action.

Workers deserve better pay and working conditions.  They deserve to share in the bounty of their labor.  No one is worthy to acquire their wealthy and prosperity by depriving others of it.  Hungry people deserve food.  Ailing people deserve healing.  Humans of color deserve equality.  Consumers deserve to fix and maintain appliances and electronic devices instead of being held captive to planned obsolescence.  Humanity deserves a planet with a stable and healthy climate.

We all deserve to set the record straight.  With ourselves and each other.  If we cannot tell the truth about what we're doing, how can we heal?  We all deserve a healthy and rewarding life.  We are all worthy of love and humanity and a future.  Not from the world, but from ourselves and from each other.  It is possible to feed and house and clothe everyone.  It is possible to give everyone access to education and healthcare.  We just have to realize everyone deserves it.

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Information and Inspiration

• Massive Science: Space futurism is stupid
• Futurism: Research Shows Inequality Is Solved With Wealth Redistribution, Not Tax Cuts
• 1-pixel-wealth: Wealth shown to scale
• Good Reads: Born to Belonging: Writings on Spirit and Justice - Chapter 7: Of Soul and White Folks
• CNN: Millions of jobs and a shortage of applicants. Welcome to the new economy
• BBC: Dare to Repair: How We Broke the Future