I was in a chat on-line with a republican where the dialogue got to the point of his claiming that I was a "lefty". When I asked him to define that (as I don't like political labels outside of party affiliation because of the assumptions they provide) one of the definitions he provided was "a desire to feel morally superior by helping those in need".
It struck me odd that he believed the desire to help those in need was was driven by a need to feel morally superior as opposed to simply empathizing with someone in need.
They used to call them "do-gooders", among a few other less savory names.
I guess he never heard that many people just have a heart and want to help when they can...and hopefully, get help if they need it in the future...how does it make anyone feel morally superior?
If anything, helping others humbles a person and makes them grateful...and sometimes even frustrated that you can't do more...I don't see morally superiority in that at all...very odd indeed.
You make a good point, with which I agree. True compassion is for the needy, not for our own egos.
However, I take "lefty" as a compliment. I lean left and vote democrat. And I'm proud to do so.
If he had not gone through the trouble of defining what "lefty" meant, I probably wouldn't have put much into the comment. But the (incredibly wrong) definition came along with the name and I (as I am prone to do with confusing comments) had to start dissecting it as it didn't make a lot of sense to me regardless of the political affiliation. I was thrown by the concept of helping people simply to garner the assumption of superiority.
I remain convinced that much of the rights' motivation is "owning libs". Beating the left. In contrast I know that my personal motivation and that of my democrat friends has NEVER been "to own the right". It's social for us, personal for the other side.