# As a Progressive, I am throwing in the towel

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/as-a-progressive-i-am-throwing-in-the-towel/924912>\
**Category:** Politics & Elections\
**Created:** [November 6, 2020, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/as-a-progressive-i-am-throwing-in-the-towel/924912 "2020-11-06T18:31:39Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 184

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**Author:** ![Sherrerd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sherrerd/32/8_2.png) [@Sherrerd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sherrerd)\
**Post date:** [December 6, 2020, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/as-a-progressive-i-am-throwing-in-the-towel/924912/184 "2020-12-06T00:21:44Z")

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> [@Boudicca90](#):
>
> And yes, personal wealth is a great motivator, but it shouldn’t have to be.

> [@Boudicca90](#):
>
> You seem to attribute all of human motivation to capitalism and not to humanity’s creative and innovative spirit.

The far left and the far right have one crucial trait in common: they’ve constructed worldviews that depend on _ignoring human psychology_.

And that’s why no government based on either far-left ideas or on far-right ideas has ever succeeded. Pretending that human beings think and act in some way that they never do, some way that they “should” think and act—but do not—is a recipe for failure.

> [@iiandyiiii](#):
>
> I attribute human motivation to incentives. One of the iron rules of human behavior is that people respond to incentives. If you can’t offer a better incentive for something, you aren’t going to get better human behavior.

^ This.

> [@k9bfriender](#):
>
> Humans are motivated by reward. That’s just how it works. Sure, people will be creative, I’ve written novels, I’ve written music, I’ve even tried my hand at visual arts. I’ve done all that for free, it was fun and rewarding.
> 
> Getting up at 6AM, working your ass off at something, whether or not you enjoy it, and not getting home until 9PM for a couple years, that’s not the sort of thing that people are going to do without a hope of reward.

^ And this.

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