The morality of neo-liberalism

A man told me today that I shouldn't be so critical of the Conservative government. That I shouldn't be so intolerant, or to pass comment on the morality of their actions. He said that "there are plenty of arguments why different ideologies are better, you simply read the arguments and make up your mind".

I disagreed, and suggested his mistakes.

He assumed that ideologies cannot be wrong.

They can.

Neo-liberal economics doesn't work. Upper class tax cuts help only the rich and hinder the rest of society. Businesses are not inherently more effective than government. People are not rational actors and cannot get perfect information. These are all empirical facts and if you disagree you are simply incorrect.

He assumed that every ideology deserves a hearing.

They don't.

Politics is not a game. It isn't some fun debating society with 60 million people in the audience. You don't stand around afterwards chatting with people over a glass of sherry and some bourbons. No. This is something that fundamentally changes peoples lives.

Large numbers of people will suffer misery and death because of the changes. Very large numbers. People will suffer and die because they could not get the right medicine because the local NHS could not fund it, when previously they could. People will suffer and die because they will no longer have shelter, when they previously have. People will suffer and die because they are unable to support themselves, when previously the government helped to support them. People will suffer and die because they've been made redundant when they previously had a job. People will suffer and die because the government is increasing income disparity. People will suffer and die because the government is cutting scientific research. People will suffer and die because the government is putting the drugs companies in charge of determining what drugs people should have.

People will suffer and die because of the tiny things, too. People will suffer and die because the government cuts meant that the NHS couldn't send out as many letters advising people at greater risk of severe complications and death to get a flu jab. People in the future will suffer and die because their parents couldn't afford to go to university or support themselves through sixth form. People will suffer and die because the government decides what to do by what can most easily manipulate people, rather than what science and simple decency tells us will help them.

People will suffer and die because of politics. Don't ever suggest that politics is not important enough to take seriously, because our lives are on the line already.

Now with that in mind, why are people following incorrect ideologies?

I don't really blame the people who voted for the Tories. Those in power have become very, very good at manipulating the opinions of those they wish to control. We British are exceptionally adept at this, and the current political and social nightmares in places like Sri Lanka are fine evidence of this. We are manipulated through our emotions, those in power causing the fear and hatred of Muslims or homosexuals or Jews because they find it convenient. We are manipulated through our analysis, the politicians and the wealthy newspaper proprietors working together to feed us incorrect or manipulated information because it makes them seem rational. We are manipulated through the very way we think, with certain ways of thinking or certain concepts taught to be anathema to us from a very young age by a system that is supposed to protect and support us. We are manipulated by our own fear of the system, equivocating between two positions because "politicans are all the same".

We are kept down, kept quiet, undernourished and undertaught as children and grow to live as uneducated, manipulatable adults.

Is this the fault of the people who have been manipulated? Of course it isn't.

What of the politicians themselves?

If the rich are responsible then there's an obvious answer. A rich man who makes the rich richer and the poor poorer may simply be being greedy. He doesn't have to be, however - he could genuinely believe that he is helping everyone, and happens to just be incorrect. In that case he would be stupid.

In the case of the changes made by the Tories, I would argue that it doesn't matter which of these is the case. I can pick examples I think are almost certainly one, or as certainly the other.

What matters is that what they are doing is evil.

I do not use that term lightly. I use it because I mean it.

These men are running the country. They directly decide the fates of millions of people domestically and influence the fates of billions of people abroad. And yet they make decisions which every source is telling them is wrong. Don't do this, this will harm people. It will kill people. It will cause untold suffering and misery.

And yet they do it anyway. If that is the case, does it matter if they do it through ignorance or if they do it through greed? If they are pushing policies through that have no effect other than to diminish the lives of the people they are supposed to represent.

Take for example the changes to university funding. What does it do?

It costs the students more.
It represents a cut in university funding, and indeed there will be a multiple year period after the government university funding has been cut before the universities get the benefit of the change in how university fees operate.
It costs the government more.

Who does it benefit? Why would they do this? They have no shortage of expert advice. What about the changes to the NHS? The only medical body that did not criticise the white paper was the association of pharmaceutical bodies, and they only did so because the drugs companies stand to profit enormously from the changes, especially the neutering of NICE that you have been "discussing" with a medical professional.

So yes, they are evil. They are evil because they willingly do things that they know will hurt people.

What other definition of evil is there?