If It's Not One Parent...

...it's another. A couple years back, I had a silly bit of spam forwarded to me about immigration from one parent, and now I get another. Here's my reply:

Oh, dear. You really do have to be careful who you send this stuff to, you know. Says your son, who's been on welfare. Or did you forget that?

(Heh - you should see the one [XXX] forwarded to me about immigration.)

Well, on to the story (with a teeny bit of commentary):

----- Original Message -----

From: [XXX]

Subject: Fw: This guy makes a good point!

----- Original

Not very, no.

This was written by a construction worker in Fort MacMurray ... Read on...

Bullshit. This is a form letter I've seen a half dozen times in a half dozen years. Any guesses why the font suddenly changes when it comes to the town name?

I work, they pay me. I pay my taxes and the government distributes my taxes as it sees fit. In order to earn that pay cheque, I work on a rig site for a Fort Mac construction project, I am required to pass a random urine test, with which I have no problem.

Really? Which site? Because that's not legal in Canada (though this is "under review" by the current administration). You wouldn't happen to be lying now, would you? Because even in the U.S. welfare isn't exactly the easy way to go.

What I do have a problem with is the distribution of my taxes to people who don't have to pass a urine test.

Like, say, farming subsidies? Highways crews? Canada Council Arts grants? Help me out, here!

Shouldn't one have to pass a urine test to get a welfare cheque[...]

Ah... THEM! The great unwashed masses.

[...]because I have to pass one to earn it for them...?

Actually, you don't.

Please understand - I have no problem with helping people get back on their feet. I do, on the other hand, have a problem with helping someone sit on their arse drinking beer and smoking dope.

And the difference is...?

Tell me, precicely please, how drug testing is going to stop people from collecting a welfare cheque.

In fact, do you know any damn thing about what someone on welfare has to do to qualify? Any idea how humiliating most of us find it? Do you know that the average person who does go onto welfare stays on for SIX MONTHS? Do you know that most welfare payments are to single mothers? Can you suggest a way for them to look for work and raise her children at the same time? Is that what you had in mind when you went on this idiotic screed, or are you still stupid enough to buy in to the ancient Ronnie Reagan lie of the welfare queen picking up her cheque in a limo?

Could you imagine how much money the provinces would save if people had to pass a urine test to get a public assistance cheque?

And one more clue that this was probably copied from the U.S. - which type of "public assistance" were you thinking of? Welfare? Child subsidy? Unemployment insurance? Canada Pension Plan? Good lord, those damn seniors are loaded to the nuts on all sorts of drugs! Why should they get off scot-free? Shouldn't the beer be tested for, too? Alcohol is, after all, a drug. So's tobacco, come to think of it - and a lot more people piss their money away on smokes of the legal variety than of the non-legal sort. Or is sitting on one's "arse" drinking beer and smoking Players Lights considered acceptable?

Please pass this along if you agree or simply delete if you don't.

Hell with that noise! If I read something stupid, I react to it. Terribly sorry about that.

Hope you will pass it along though, because something has to change in this country, and soon!

Really. And why is that, exactly? Because we're suddenly going broke? We're being overwhelmed by Them Dirty Hippies Corrupting Our Youth? Because lawlessness and anarchy rule the streets?

Tell me, oh please do!

Eagerly awaiting a reply,

Thursday

***As a side note, let me just say that I hate hate HATE transferring forwarded spammail into Blogger!***