"6+Cola"  wrote

|  However the USA was founded on the idea of NOT "oppressing"
|  your neighbors. The "Just Leave Me The Fuck Alone" principle is,
|  or was, very important.
|
    That's a common misconception. Only RI was founded
on ideas of freedom. The original MA settlement at Plymouth
was made by people who were mad that their own cult of
Christianity was second fiddle in England. They were on a
religious mission. I once read that there used to be
a law in MA that a man found living alone would be given
6 weeks to move in with a family. If he didn't, a family would
be assigned.

   It's only within the past century or so that it's really
been feasible for people to live alone. In pre-mechanized
farming society, a family with kids would have been all but
indispensible. People didn't have kids to brag about their
CEO child. Kids were needed to plow and harvest. (Or slaves.
Or indentured servants. Or other people who somehow
missed out on our famous freedom.)

  And lets not forget "I owe my soul to the company store."
We complain bitterly today about no family leave for fathers,
but unions and labor laws are a fairly recent development.
People used to do little but work, except on Sundays when
they were expected to be at church.

   It's only been about
50 years that it's been considered normal not to be married
and have kids. Now people hang around the shopping mall,
on their parents' dime, and imagine their ancestors fought
the Revolutionay War so that they'd have the right to pick
up entertainment devices on sale at Best Buy. That's not
freedom. It's societal disintegration.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05