I suppose if a human is making the rules yes. Nature does not so much grant these concepts. Who “deserves” to be alive and who IS alive are not philosophical in nature, they’re pragmatic. When two animals fight for their lives or resources they do not determine who wins by who is more deserving, who wins determines who was more deserving.
We humans are animals too, and we came from a history and a world where if we did not work at survival, we would not be guaranteed a life.
Now, humans society and human technology have mitigated this over time. We are still at a point where someone has to work for someone else who doesn’t do survival based tasks to survive. Most of us get our primary food source from farmers who grow the food and workers who process food. At most we go to a store to get it, or someone else does or we have it delivered. The average farmer does not farm only from the goodness of their heart and desire to feed the world though. They need to pay their bills and…
.. perhaps they want to buy art and entertainment and items others make that they cannot make themselves because they are farming. If there weren’t items made by others for the farmer to use, the farmer wouldn’t have time and likely wouldn’t bother to farm enough for everyone because they would need to make their own cleansers and music and clothing too. We’d all have to be farmers and spinsters and so many other things to supply ourselves what we need. So we have this complex system where we all rely on each other. We all provide things the others need so that we can get the things that we need. Of course in enlightened society. We don’t simply cast out those who can’t for whatever reason produce, the children and geriatric and injured and so forth. We support them. So certainly the human system does have some concept that people deserve a living even if they aren’t productive at the time.
Where we truly start to get uncomfortable and conflicted is when we examine the weights and measures by which society decides a humans worthiness to a livelihood. We don’t say just anyone deserves a life, we have conditions. To the contrary we even label those we believe DON’T deserve a living. Perhaps it is the homeless man a person passes at and sneers assuming he deserves to be there for being “probably a junky.” Perhaps it is the welfare family who “shouldn’t have that many kids if they can’t afford one..” or “should have made better choices..” etc. it doesn’t even take a crime- a single mistake or act that contradicts our beliefs can see us label a person unworthy of a living- but crime is a great example, where one criminal act in a persons life can follow them possibly forever.
That one act can bar them from all manner of opportunities to serve their community or fellow man and be productive in society. Some countries will refuse to allow people in who have criminal backgrounds. Labeled un deserving to live in that place before you even get a chance to show who you really are in the moment. And maybe that’s the wrong phrasing? Maybe some will question the use of “un deserving.” Ok- would it be any better if we said: “society doesn’t think you’re un deserving, it understands you deserve a chance at a living, it just finds you getting that chance to be un desirable or problematic?” Now many are quick to point out that those such as criminals make a “choice” and if they become seen as undeserving it is by their own actions. I question that.
In what society can a person give up basic human rights? Like- you can’t just write out a contract that says you waive your right to be alive, and then it is legal to kill you. You can’t write a contract that gives away your rights to not be sold into sex trafficking. It doesn’t matter if you literally wanted to be a slave for some reason, if it is discovered you are working for free and living in slave conditions, most developed countries have a legal obligation to step in wether you want them to or not, because even if you want to work for free- there are limitations on what is allowed and literally slavery is not allowed. It is deemed offensive to basic human dignity of all men. The US is in an uproar right now due to an argument over wether a collection of human cells is a person. Many of the same people seeking to protect the rights of a fetus as a human are people who are fine if adults are killed, fine trying certain child criminals as adults, fine walking, talking children…
.. not having food or clothing or homes if it means lower taxes or les welfare spending. Perhaps we can debate how an adult criminal owns their situation- but if our point is that a parent shouldn’t be able to make such decisions for a fetus which cannot decide on its own or protect itself, what about all the little kids in danger? Oddly, many seeking to protect fetuses are the same group who roll their eyes or even fight against social justice movements in the wake of a long string of brutal police murders and assaults. We won’t get into mass shootings, but if banning guns isn’t the answer- maybe banning abortions isn’t? What if, as many have suggested in the former, we gave fetuses little bullet proof vests and hoped for the best? That seems like if it applies to one problem it would work just as well for the other…
.. but this isn’t an abortion debate- this is just to illiterate the imbalance we have when it comes to the concept of who “deserves a living” and why. The more we examine it, the more horrifying and arbitrary it becomes. We aren’t quite to the point where no one needs to work to live. We may not get there, but we are close enough that we could almost do it. We almost have the technological and production capacity that we could provide for basic needs of most or all people through intelligent supply chain and use of machines. It would likely be centuries if ever that we could fully replace the need for people to do certain tasks, but imagine a world where everyone went to school and learned to fix the machines that make life run. That’s what everyone learns. We have enough people that no one would likely need to work full time. Each person might need to spend an hour a week or something like that, taking turns, just keeping things running.
The problem comes back to people as it usually does. Some people just want more. What is “necessary” for life isn’t universal in a personal sense. People tend to want more than what the next person over has or what is their “fair share.” In simple relatable terms, if you buy a pizza and there is enough for all to have one slice, one slice won’t fill most people up. If it is good pizza, most would want to eat more even if they don’t NEED to. There is usually one person who will take more than their share, take some from someone else. This again shows how we thing in terms of “deserving a living.” In the eyes of most of us, we value our lives above others. Most of us value our wants above others wants, and most of us value our wants above others needs.
The concept of “not deserving it” is largely a coping mechanism. The worst human beings on earth generally don’t wake up thinking they are “bad people.” We all tend to think we are good, and the bad we do is “necessary” or lesser than the bad it prevents. To keep thinking we are “good people,” to justify why we have what we have and others don’t, for that notion of inherent good or simply for self justification and ego, they must be deficient in some way we are not. In religion, those who suffer in life are often seen as those who are “wicked” or of weak faith. In business they are seen as lazy, foolish, meek etc. we find a way to write someone off as not deserving. “They could work hard and overcome it..” “they should stand up for their rights” etc.
It’s a convenience. It’s a left over from when we as humans walked barefoot gathering what we could find to eat. In a world where some succeed and some fail, and so much of that is luck of where we were born, our genes, chance opportunities and coin flips, we feel powerless. We seek answers for why some succeed and some do not. To say some deserve it and some don’t makes the whole matter clean and easy. It allows us to live a life where we aren’t in constant fear the other show will drop or feeling guilt. But again, in a system carved out within the rules of nature by man, what is telling about us is who we label deserving or not and why. Those are decisions we make. Choices we make on who we believe has worth and what worth another has.
We humans are animals too, and we came from a history and a world where if we did not work at survival, we would not be guaranteed a life.
Now, humans society and human technology have mitigated this over time. We are still at a point where someone has to work for someone else who doesn’t do survival based tasks to survive. Most of us get our primary food source from farmers who grow the food and workers who process food. At most we go to a store to get it, or someone else does or we have it delivered. The average farmer does not farm only from the goodness of their heart and desire to feed the world though. They need to pay their bills and…