Does government aid increase bigotry?

Many people believe that because we claim to live in a Christian nation, then the government should be responsible for tending to the poor.  Is this really what Jesus meant when he said we need to "care for the least of these?"

Lets start by defining the least of these. Who could we classify at the least among us? For many the poor would be considered, and indeed Jesus did speak about the poor much (see Luke 11:41; Mark 14:7; Luke 6:20) but were there others that could be considered "least" among us? (Matthew 11:11; 1 Cor 15:9; Luke 9:48) It would seem to mean anyone who does not have a leadership role, for many that would include more than just the poor, the in-firmed, the down-trodden. Our American definition includes anyone who cannot take care of themselves, the disabled, the mentally handicapped, fatherless, widows, elderly and unemployed.

But is sending these people to a government agency really "caring" for them?  Or did Jesus mean something else when He commanded us to "care" for them?  Caring, by definition includes, "to watch over; be responsible for" http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/caring?s=t. This means that we are to be personally involved in caring for them. We have instead set up a system of cold, sterile, and unfeeling agencies that the "least" among us must traverse; usually without assistance by the people who make a big deal about caring for them. But does sending them to the government release us from our personal responsibility to care for them?

For many people, raising taxes to set up government agencies to assist the poor is the only responsibility they feel to them. "I pay taxes that go to the poor, so I don't have to do anything else," has become an unfortunate reality in our world.  We feel good about ourselves because the fatherless are not hungry, the disabled get health care, the elderly are not left alone, and the unemployed are not starving. But is this really caring for them? Or is this simply removing them from our hearts? Do we feel personally responsible, or do we just want to get rid of them?

Are we telling them, "Here is your money, now get out of my sight." Instead of feeding them from our own table, we send them to the nearest food pantry or shelter. Instead of offering to see to the upbringing of the fatherless children we send them to daycare and let the gangs raise them. Instead of bringing them into our homes, we send them to the overcrowded shelters. Instead of giving them a job, we give them some money and send them out to find something themselves. Removing the personal responsibility of caring for the "least of these" and instead pushing them away into a cold unfeeling government maze only increases our own bigotry.

We feel that because we pay our taxes we have done our good deed for them. But instead the process that has been put in place actually makes them feel unattached from society, entitled to what they did not earn, and ungrateful. And who can blame them for being ungrateful when those who claim to "care" about them are so unempathetic towards them? The unfortunate side effect of our so called "Christian" government aid system is less compassion and actually more bigotry.

The new Overseers

I may be beating a dead horse.....but...... During a debate, the comment came up that empowering of the black people is not something any government program can do, it is something that blacks need to do for themselves; but that every time someone rises up to defend and empower blacks they end up dead. If it is true that every time a black leader rises up to empower the black population that person ends up dead......then what can be said about the Reverands Al and Jesse? These two are very much alive, they have become wealthy influential men in the black community, trusted by most blacks, but are they empowering the black community? Here is what I think of Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson:

History, during the time of negro enslavement, leads to the conclusion that some of the worse treatment to black slaves was from black overseers. The white family couldn't be in the fields all the time, so they hired "trusted" blacks to see to it that the work got done, by whatever means necessary, including violent punitive action. The overseers were meant to keep the slaves under the thumb of the plantation owner, to keep them under control; he was meant to keep the slaves busy, never giving them time to foment a rebellion, to realize that they outnumbered the owners, and that the slaves had the power to control their own destiny; which they could have realized through education. In fact when some of the white abolitionists tried to educate blacks, by teaching them to read and/or write, they were turned in by black overseers.

The overseers were not above using whips and starvation to keep the slaves in line, placid, and uneducated. Basically the black overseers were meant to KEEP the slaves enslaved. Al and Jesse are the "trusted" blacks, nothing more than overseers, meant to continue the enslavement of the black community. And any black who doesn't toe the line will be, by force if necessary, brought back into line. This is the reason Clarence Thomas, Herman Cain, Mia Love, Tim Scott, Alan West, Thomas Sowell, and many other conservative blacks have taken such a beating; the overseers are not doing their job and are letting some blacks become too "uppity" as LBJ said.