re: #347 wrenchwench

Consider: the religious section of the GOP is interested in the spiritual safety of believers rather than the physical safety and wellbeing of human beings. This is present in the dismissal of civil liberty issues regarding freedom of religion—saving people is more important than rule of law—but it’s also present in all the laws “defending” religious beliefs, and anti-LBGT laws, and abortion laws.

All the things they view as wrong with America are moral contagions; corrupting, and thus not “safe” to be matters of personal choice. Among the apocalypse-minded, individual deaths are less important that the spiritual culmination that is the Rapture and the End Times. As propserity gospel and Word of Faith notions expand, spiritual purity is associated more with material success, so those that are struggling are spiritually unworthy.

Souls matter more than people.

Further consider: the economic wing of the GOP and its financial backers operates with the assumption that human capital is of little value. Workers don’t contribute to the success of a business, only great men at the top do. Hence it is a threat to the order of the nation and the world when laborers attempt to negotiate the terms of their labor. Safety in the workplace is luxury; safety from the consequences of hazards (pollution, contamination, exposure on the job) is acceptable loss and/or “part of the job” (even if it’s not part of the job).

This devaluation of people further extends to the exploitation of both illegal labor inside the US, and exploitative labor outside the US.

People at the bottom of the economy don’t matter, because if they did, it would cost.

Final consideration: from a variety of cultural sources, the GOP implicitly accepts a hierarchy of human importance. Race, gender, sexuality, class are all variables.

Some people matter more than others.

As such: do they care people are dying? Fuck no.