WHAT? ME? A REACTIONARY?
Yes, it happened. One of those epiphany sort of moments. The kind of personal eye-opening, view-of-oneself sort of moments that people wax about in the endpaper fin de siecle in the New York Times Sunday Magazine. Except, in this case, I am more concerned and confused than brimming with glorious obnoxious insight and self-awe.
Hereís the scoop: a few weeks back the cover story/lead article in a Sunday Times Magazine was about when The Father of The House is in The Big House, or something to that effect. Fathers in prison. I saw this and thought, yeah, another bleeding heart article in the Times, expressing social concern and woe over the plight of the families of these men.
The article focused on one fellow in particular. Reading it one learns how he followed a path of crime, got his girlfriend pregnant, then some other girl, too. Managed to accidentally kill his abettor in the course of a robbery gone bad. A thief, a drug dealer, running around with an illegal firearm, committing all sorts of crimes.
The human-interest side was interesting. How he and the girlfriend got together. Their lives, filled with incidents of misfortune. The choices one makes and the actions one takes in their life situations. To a degree it was heart rendering. Choices and actions have consequence. In almost every case, a consequence posing further challenges, compelling their obstacles and the difficulties of their lives.
Out of ignorance, desperation, economic or other influences, their lives are a mess. Very sad. But none of this is what caused my epiphany.
We read toward the end of the article that the father (who is not yet 30, and yet has a bunch of kids and has never held a job or been a productive member of society), now in some prison off in the middle of nowhere in upstate New York, is receiving a higher (college) education.
Dropout, criminal, menace-to-society, man of poor choices . . . AND MY TAX DOLLARS ARE PAYING FOR HIS EDUCATION?!
Now hold on a minute! I have two kids to put through college. My obligation, my responsibility. What is this ñ while I work to save and put away money to fund their education, my tax money is contributing to the enhancement of some criminalís education? This is taking rehab too far.
Let this guy (if and when he ever gets out of prison) go to night school. Let him be responsible for his own education!
Feeding, housing, and institutionalizing the convicted criminal population is an acceptable concept to me as a use of tax dollars. Menaces to society are kept off the streets, they are punished, our tax dollars keep them in what we hope are humane (and not particularly luxurious) quarters.
BUT PAY FOR THEIR EDUCATION? Just what budget-minder approved this? Hey! Lower my taxes the percentage that goes toward educating this guy and his contemporaries. I swear I will use that toward my kidsí education.
Have I become a Republican Reactionary Conservative in my middle-aged years? Yikes, what a weird epiphany.