Trust is tough, unless it's your first day on this planet and you're feeling off-kilter, which would explain fans of Two Broke Girls. But we can't function without investing confidence in others unless we want to be overtime World of Warcraft pretend people, and even they rely upon forming bonds with virtual nerds. You can't let broken people break you, unless your goal is to demand that people owe you when they enter higher tax brackets.
Sadly, the present dominant political motif refuses to place any faith in people, at least not those outside the corridors of grabby planning. But we can size each other up just fine and deal with those of sufficient character for our own reasonable judgments. eBay still seems to work, as feedback motivates anyone to improve and behave.
There's no reason to accomplish something when you can talk of something, unless you're worried about unimportant things like results. But aren't words nice? Liberals claim to believe in humans while conservatives actually go out and do it. Commerce and charity are nice concepts realized. The contrast between claimed high ideals and real results resembles the difference between a law that is supposed to reduce health costs and the quantity of uninsured that makes both numbers worse.
Believing people can handle themselves leads to self-reliance. We don't need a government mandate to work together, unless we're the sort of helpless sacks of mush who can't ever hope to make nine bucks per hour without a rule.
And items are even more trustworthy, as they are indifferent to your puny human feelings. You should accept the reality that guns won't hurt you, and neither will most of their owners. As for those of the latter with malicious intentions, they are best kept in line by knowing they may have to confront someone packing a similar amount of heat.
Progressives are always shocked that people can be trusted to carry firearms without the devices shooting randomly or people blasting each other carefully so victims' organs can be harvested. Armed Americans congregating while actually not shooting each other is as unremarkable an occurrence as it is astounding to liberals.
It's as if people are rational enough to not pop caps in each other for the fun of it or sake of wallet-collecting simply because they possess bullet-propelling devices. Of course, practical self-preservation is a motive, too: it's easiest to keep everyone honest if they know everyone else might be armed. Whether the reason is decency, calculation, or both, most keep in line with just a little bit of guidance.
The same goes for profitability. We come together to make the economy work, but only if we're not coerced. Humans will work to pay for a solution if there's a need for something. The natural process of acquiring and offering value reduces poverty in a way things like housing projects never quite seem to do.
And those who have demonstrated the ability to interact civilly over the course of creation are the same types of folks who would help those that come up a little short. We know that assistance is more rewarding when it's volunteered. By contrast, assuming there would be no funding to feed hungry people and whoop cancer without political guidance is a way of tacitly announcing the belief that everyone but yourself is rotten.
Advancing in life is not a matter of murdering competitors or even plundering their stockpiles. Instead, mutual exchange offers the opportunity for a largely self-supervising life. Selling a desirable product or deploying a skill at someone else's concern is easier than finding a dependable getaway driver.
We organize on our own, as making overbearing rules about the structure merely dilute the results. The only guarantee with federal intervention is for unfulfilled helplessness. People who have spent their lives investing faith in the government naturally assume life is an empty jar, as they're accustomed to an existence packed with mind-numbing orders. America must break the cycle of placing confidence in unseen bureaucrats instead of nearby humans.
Experience can't ruin us. It's undoubtedly difficult to trust again after encountering some dastard who's determined to illustrate humanity's potential for loathsome behavior. But all those pop songs and Jennifer Aniston movies tell us we must press on and be willing to try again even if some jackass inflicts pain. One person shouldn't submarine another's nature anymore than one lousy president should crash everyone's faith in America.
People must work diligently to avoid being defined by breakers of confidence. We observe and respond the consequences of acting disreputably all the time. A shady business enterprise can't last despite bizarre protestations that ravenous capitalists can profit indefinitely by ripping us off. At the same time, those who commit felonies using firearms don't ruin it for the rest of us, not to mention that the best response to that violation is to fire back. Interactions lead us to learn whom to never trust again, but that doesn't mean we should decide we're unable to trust ever.
Anthony Bialy is a writer and “Red Eye” conservative in New York City. Follow him at http://twitter.com/AnthonyBialy. Download a free ebook of his 2012 columns at https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/270599.
