# My best friend drank the the proverbial Kool-aid... **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [August 17, 2009, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-best-friend-drank-the-the-proverbial-kool-aid/506752 "2009-08-17T17:36:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![mischievous](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c2a13f/32.png) [@mischievous](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mischievous)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2009, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-best-friend-drank-the-the-proverbial-kool-aid/506752/21 "2009-08-18T15:25:35Z")
> [@Duckster](#): > > Send him this link: > Source: [http://consumerist.com/5332831/hiring-consultant-warns-no-connection-between-credit-history-and-job-performance](http://consumerist.com/5332831/hiring-consultant-warns-no-connection-between-credit-history-and-job-performance) You probably missed this in my post, but at the time, he concluded that pulling a credit report on prospective employees was unwarranted for _most_ jobs, but not a bad idea for this _specific_ job, because this specific job involved handling confidential corporate financial data that could easily result in successful insider trading. It made sense not to put someone with a crushing debt load into that kind of temptation. And it doesn’t matter now, because that company has closed and he is at a different job. ---
**Author:** ![Machine\_Elf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/82dd89/32.png) [@Machine\_Elf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Machine_Elf)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2009, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-best-friend-drank-the-the-proverbial-kool-aid/506752/22 "2009-08-18T16:22:44Z")
> [@ElvisL1ves](#): > > Know what? A helluva lot of poor people work just as hard, or even harder, and stay poor anyway. Situational specifics and just plain luck play a large part in financial gain too, you might acknowledge. Sorry, did not mean to suggest otherwise. You’re right, I am fortunate to have had the good genes and upbringing to enable me to earn a PhD and hold down a high-paying job, as well as the ingenuity to produce in my spare time products I can sell for extra money. But why does the fact that I’m fortunate mean that someone else is entitled to so much of what I earn? > [@jackknifed juggernaut](#): > > Would the successful start-up have made the same amount of profit if it was started up in, say, Mozambique? Probably not. Since his hard work only materialized in significant profits due to the ability of our society to purchase his product, it’s only fair that he contribute a portion of it to help maintain or improve the society…so that someone else can have a successful start-up as well. The idea that we’re all greedy and selfish is one of the tenets of capitalism. If you believe in capitalism, you have to understand why taxes are necessary. I do not suggest the rich/successful should not pay taxes, or even that they should not pay more taxes than others. My objection is to the fundamental position held by so many that the rich as a whole are undeserving of their wealth, and/or that they should be heavily taxed simply because they are rich. The American business climate may reward someone for being productive, but it’s a two-way street: the American society reaps the benefits of entrepreneurship, whether it’s the jobs provided by a businessman who opens a factory, or the products cranked out by that factory. I agree that it is fair to ask a financially successful person to contribute in proportion to his success, and a mildly progressive tax structure is even justifiable. But when a solidly middle-class worker is paying about 15% of his salary in taxes, and someone bringing home half a mil is being severed from more than one third of his income, well, that seems like quite a large disparity to me. If your answer is that the the rich should pay so much “simply because they can afford it,” or because “they don’t need all that money,” that is precisely the attitude I object to. ---
**Author:** ![athelas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5e9695/32.png) [@athelas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/athelas)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2009, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-best-friend-drank-the-the-proverbial-kool-aid/506752/23 "2009-08-18T16:34:02Z")
> [@Jackknifed\_Juggernaut](#): > > Would the successful start-up have made the same amount of profit if it was started up in, say, Mozambique? Probably not. Since his hard work only materialized in significant profits due to the ability of our society to purchase his product, it’s only fair that he contribute a portion of it to help maintain or improve the society…so that someone else can have a successful start-up as well. The idea that we’re all greedy and selfish is one of the tenets of capitalism. If you believe in capitalism, you have to understand why taxes are necessary. Not to take this into GD territory, but I must note that the start-up benefited lots and lots of people in this society, which would _also_ not have happened in Mozambique. _We are better off because of this entrepreneur_. Now it is true that developed countries have this virtuous cycle of good institutions and entrepreneurship, and Mozambique does not. However, this does not mean that you and I contributed a single thing to the success of this entrepreneur, and can morally claim credit for a slice of his earnings - except for such things as his education for which he and his parents paid for through taxes. As I said elsewhere, we do not create society and then allow talented individuals to stay on our sufferance; society is a _system_ that, if we’re lucky, allows both we and they to benefit through trade. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2009, 4:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-best-friend-drank-the-the-proverbial-kool-aid/506752/24 "2009-08-18T16:50:23Z")
> [@Joe Frickin Friday](#): > > But why does the fact that I’m fortunate mean that someone else is entitled to so much of what I earn? You might ask the father-in-law here what makes his lazy-ass daughter and her lazy-ass boytoy entitled to so much of what he’s earned. Or if he earned it at all - the OP doesn’t say where the money came from. Maybe he inherited it just as parasitically as his spawn will? ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2009, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-best-friend-drank-the-the-proverbial-kool-aid/506752/25 "2009-08-18T18:21:27Z")
> [@Incubus](#): > > What does bother me, though, is his very sudden shift in attitude. He’s suddenly become incredibly Libertarian, anti-regulation, anti-union (and given that I’m in a union that I fairly like, pisses me off :mad: ) just all-round fiscally and socially conservative. He whines about taxes and thinks its ‘unfair’ that someone that makes 100k+ has to pay so much in taxes. Have you considered that someone - likely the father of the bride - may have argued him into that position. And if you cannot argue him out of it, maybe you should reconsider your own position? And why are you annoyed at him for holding these views in the first place? America is a free country; he has as much right to hold his views as you do yours. Be annoyed at his views not him; respect his right to hold those views. ---
**Author:** ![Transistor\_Rhythm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/77aa72/32.png) [@Transistor\_Rhythm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Transistor_Rhythm)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2009, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-best-friend-drank-the-the-proverbial-kool-aid/506752/26 "2009-08-18T18:39:38Z")
I had about three seconds of this emotion when I recently got a huge promotion and raise to 4x what I had previously been making. “What? Why do I gotta pay so much taxes? That’s not fa…” and then I punched myself in the mangina as hard as I could and continued on my life. ---
**Author:** ![Machine\_Elf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/82dd89/32.png) [@Machine\_Elf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Machine_Elf)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2009, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-best-friend-drank-the-the-proverbial-kool-aid/506752/27 "2009-08-18T19:11:20Z")
> [@ElvisL1ves](#): > > You might ask the father-in-law here what makes his lazy-ass daughter and her lazy-ass boytoy entitled to so much of what he’s earned. > > Or if he earned it at all - the OP doesn’t say where the money came from. Maybe he inherited it just as parasitically as his spawn will? Quoting the OP: > [@](#): > > Her parents are wealthy because her dad co-leads a startup that actually really took off and is very profitible in the midst of our recession. re: the daughter and her beau, where did you get the idea that they were lazy asses, or that they felt they were entitled to her father’s wealth? Or that the father felt the kids were entitled to his wealth? I’ll wager that the gifts/vacations/support are given freely out of a sense of love and generosity. It’s his money, he gets to spend it/give it however he sees fit. ---
**Author:** ![Blaster\_Master](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/cab0a1/32.png) [@Blaster\_Master](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blaster_Master)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2009, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-best-friend-drank-the-the-proverbial-kool-aid/506752/28 "2009-08-18T19:51:21Z")
> [@Jackknifed\_Juggernaut](#): > > It’s true that no one _really_ knows why he’s changed. You can’t really ever know his motives, since motives are by definition unknowable. However, as long as the OP isn’t leaving anything out, the “sudden shift” in philosophy is a dead giveaway. I don’t buy the idea that he’s never been exposed to this point of view before. He’s a young, seemingly educated, professional. He’s not a high school student. Yeah, he did some thinking alright…:rolleyes: I could disagree more. If anything, the fact that he’s young and educated would imply, to me, that he’s hopefully more open-minded than someone who is older and uneducated because they’re more likely to be set in their ways or have had less exposure to other points of views. I’ll use myself as an example, where my father was (and still is) a fairly standard Middle-Classed Protestant Republican. I held many of those views until I was 18, had a long discussion about politics, maintained my religious views, but by virtue of the fact that I hadn’t be exposed to Libertarian views before, I hadn’t been able to consider them. Did I drink kool-aid because I became a libertarian overnight? Not too dissimilar, I held onto my religious views until I was about 23 and had a long discussion from a perspective that I hadn’t been exposed to before. Did I drink the kool-aid because I stopped being an Episcopalian overnight and adopted different views on certain aspects of Christianity? The sudden shift doesn’t mean anything. The fact that it’s correlated with his engagement to this girl could mean it’s related to her and her financial situation and maybe his views have changed as a result. It could mean that he’s had discussions with his soon-to-be Father-in-Law or his fiancee or some of their mutual friends and they exposed a new perspective to him. Maybe he’s done some thinking and decided to change his perspective with little or no reasons tied to what’s going on around him. Making any assumptions about why he did it is a discredit to someone the OP seems to respect. It seems to me that OP is mostly upset because he used to see eye to eye with him and now he holds an opposing viewpoint and he probably feels like he’s lost some part of the intimacy of that friendship. Rather than saying he’s been drinking the kool-aid, he should talk to his friend and find out why he changed his mind. Motivation is usually more meaningful than result anyway. It’s entirely possible that he really believes that for what he believes is good reason, and if so, then he should try to respect his friend’s opinion. If, however, it is a case of “where you stand depends on where you sit”, then I can understand being upset with him for not standing up for his beliefs or whatever. So, **Incubus** , talk to your friend, figure out what’s going on, don’t let your feelings fester and damage your friendship. Off-topic: Since it happens to be one of my favorite quotes, I just wanted to point out to **Joe Frickin Friday** , that the quote in post 3 is very similar to one that is attributed to Winston Churchill. Of course, it doesn’t mean the same thing anymore because liberal and conservative have very different meanings in today’s politics. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2009, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-best-friend-drank-the-the-proverbial-kool-aid/506752/29 "2009-08-18T20:14:12Z")
> [@ElvisL1ves](#): > > Know what? A helluva lot of poor people work just as hard, or even harder, and stay poor anyway. No, actually this is [not the case](http://books.google.com/books?id=CS9lpYUPn5cC&pg=PA125&lpg=PA125&dq=percentage+of+poor+full+time+worker&source=bl&ots=wpBzuQnD1F&sig=B0ykQPhAORoZuxZmlS_aY4H4JVI&hl=en&ei=IgqLSpuWPIXCNuryub0P&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=2#v=onepage&q=&f=false). Only about [30% of poor workers work full time, year round.](http://docs.google.com/gview?a=v&q=cache%3AJGh9mklK7k4J%3Awww.ers.usda.gov%2FPublications%2FRCAT%2FRCAT82%2Frcat82j.pdf+percentage+of+poor+full+time+worker&hl=en&gl=us&pli=1) (PDF). Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2009, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-best-friend-drank-the-the-proverbial-kool-aid/506752/30 "2009-08-18T20:30:33Z")
> [@Joe Frickin Friday](#): > > Perhaps the OP’s friend was overdue for a shift in personal ideology, and the exposure to his future father-in-law’s perspective was something of an eye-opener. Or perhaps his own in-laws think he’s overdoing it, like those immigrants who become “more local than the locals.” I’ve seen it happen… right now I’m remembering a case of a lawyer who hadn’t so much as held a screwdriver in his life, but when he got engaged to a mechanic’s daughter, all of a sudden he wanted to be Mr Handyman. She had to disavow him of the notion, along the lines of “honey, I love you and stuff, but as I’ve been using power tools since my age was in single digits and you haven’t, I really think I should be the one hammering while you pass me the nails when I ask for them, OK?” ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2009, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-best-friend-drank-the-the-proverbial-kool-aid/506752/31 "2009-08-18T20:31:08Z")
> [@Joe Frickin Friday](#): > > Quoting the OP: Ah, OK. > [@](#): > > re: the daughter and her beau, where did you get the idea that they were lazy asses, or that they felt they were entitled to her father’s wealth? These particular ones might not be, true. But quite a few scions of the wealthy are, in my experience anyway. > [@](#): > > Or that the father felt the kids were entitled to his wealth? Quoting the OP (excellent suggestion, btw): "He gets taken out on vacations and gets lavish gifts from his fiancee thanks to her rich daddy (she just finished college, parents support her). " > [@](#): > > I’ll wager that the gifts/vacations/support are given freely out of a sense of love and generosity. It’s his money, he gets to spend it/give it however he sees fit. Could be. But while doing so, he’s inevitably building a feeling of entitlement among the offspring who have never known anything else, or have reason to believe they will have to. Is it really helping your children to exempt them from having to earn their own way? Doesn’t that tend to build a feeling of natural superiority in them that really just makes them worse than useless? ---
**Author:** ![TruCelt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/trucelt/32/523_2.png) [@TruCelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TruCelt)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2009, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-best-friend-drank-the-the-proverbial-kool-aid/506752/32 "2009-08-18T20:41:13Z")
It’s also possible that he is “trying to be” high class. Many people put on a new set of clothes and ideas when they find themselves changing social strata. It’s also very common to assume that the views you describe are those of the “high class.” My experience has been that it’s a false impression. I’ve met a great many more “limousine liberals” than I have “conservative snobs.” Most wealthy people are grateful for what they have, and happy, within reason, to share it. Especially those who have been raised with money. The class-conscious, politically conservative, “snobs” are usually the “new money.” I’ve never met a person from an “olde” famly who wore $500 sneakers, or logos on their clothes/handbag, or who complained about taxes or helping the poor. One I can think of has a family trust in the 10-figures, and drives her Mom’s old Volvo. Your friend’s new attitudes could be a well-thought-out change of beliefs. They could also be symptomatic of his insecurity and discomfort in this new realm. Why not try asking him how he’s dealing with it all, and whether it’s making him uncomfortable? Or, if that’s just one of those things men don’t talk about 😉 then just give him some time to find his feet. It may take a couple of years for him to find himself within this new situation. Give him a little more space if you have to, avoid the topics that will make you flare, and see where it leads. Friendship is a valuable thing, don’t give it up frivolously. ---
**Author:** ![turner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/22d042/32.png) [@turner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/turner)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2009, 10:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-best-friend-drank-the-the-proverbial-kool-aid/506752/33 "2009-08-18T22:47:21Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > No, actually this is [not the case](http://books.google.com/books?id=CS9lpYUPn5cC&pg=PA125&lpg=PA125&dq=percentage+of+poor+full+time+worker&source=bl&ots=wpBzuQnD1F&sig=B0ykQPhAORoZuxZmlS_aY4H4JVI&hl=en&ei=IgqLSpuWPIXCNuryub0P&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=2#v=onepage&q=&f=false). Only about [30% of poor workers work full time, year round.](http://docs.google.com/gview?a=v&q=cache%3AJGh9mklK7k4J%3Awww.ers.usda.gov%2FPublications%2FRCAT%2FRCAT82%2Frcat82j.pdf+percentage+of+poor+full+time+worker&hl=en&gl=us&pli=1) (PDF). > > Regards, > Shodan While I believe I’m on your side of the argument (most “rich” work hard for their money and should be allowed to keep it) I dont’ believe this is evidence. An admittedly cursory reading of this does not point to what is cause and what is effect. Are they poor because they cannot find work that takes them out of poverty (e.g. all they can find is McDonalds like jobs that are typically less than 40 hours a week at minimum wage) or are they not working because the poor don’t work as hard as the rest of us. I tend to believe the former and I believe the fundamental issue is education and the early investment (not dollars wise, but parental interest and priority wise) in a childs education. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-best-friend-drank-the-the-proverbial-kool-aid/506752.md?page=1)