Basic Income

            There’s this concept being experimented with right now called Basic Income. Some countries already have it and some others are testing it, but I don’t think there is nearly enough information about it given out. The essential concept is that the government gives everyone of the age of majority enough money to live off of – and, after that, all you get told are the details about how the system works – not why it is being done.

            Based on that surface information, there are a number of different responses that jump straight into people’s heads. The ones that really get to me are the people who complain about the government giving money to people who aren’t working for it – a response that shows they have no idea either how an economy works, or how people think.

            The latter isn’t really their fault – we’ve been trained to think that work is unpleasant and that, given the opportunity, no one would work. This has fostered the belief that anyone on any kind of government support is simply lazy and feeding off the rest of society, which is completely untrue. Sure, there are some people who abuse the system, but the majority of people getting money from the government A. need it for one reason or another and B. would much rather be working for their money.

            The truth is that we humans need work. It’s not merely a way to make money; it’s a method for passing the time. Without it, we’d go stir-crazy. Sure, the idea of playing video games all day every day may appeal to some people, but after about three months of that our brains long for something different (yes, I’m speaking from experience) – and that’s where work comes in. We need a variety of things to do, and work helps break up the time, making enjoyable activities more enjoyable.

            Apart from that, no one wants to just be handed money. Oh, we think we do, but it’s just as unrewarding as spending the entire day on the social media website of your choice. It feels horrible to be living off the charity of others, so, given the option, most people avoid it. So why does anyone accept these ‘government handouts’ then? Because money is needed to survive – and our strongest instinct is to survive.

            So, how does this Basic Income thing help? First, it makes it for everyone, meaning that the stigma associated with accepting government money are lessened, making it seem like a less horrible option. Next, it makes it easy to get on to – being automatic for everyone. Finally, it encourages everyone to get off of it: it’s only enough money to cover basic expenses, so if people want cars, houses, the latest books or videogames, TV channels, or any of that, they still have to get a job. However, it doesn’t just vanish as soon as someone gets a job, it simply fades out as the person makes more money – but at a rate where the person is still earning on top of their basic living expenses. In essence, you get given, say, $20,000 per year – if you start working, your income goes up by half your earnings until you’re making about $40,000 per year, at which point the Basic Income drops out.

This means that people with disabilities are able to work fewer hours and get a better income, while still having the security that, if worst comes to worst, they won’t end up living on the streets. In fact, it means that no one need ever end up on the streets again! Just like that, a bulk of the homeless problems are solved.

            But wait, there’s more! Think of all the drastic changes a system like this makes to the whole society. Students won’t need as much debt to go through school, people who lose jobs won’t have to panic about finding new jobs, and people can work fewer hours to get the money they need to survive – which will improve mental health across the board.

            Then there’s the work environments – remember that horrible boss you had once? Or that dangerous work environment? The co-workers who made you dread going to work? You couldn’t quit, because you needed the money to survive. But with a Basic Income, you could safely take the risk of quitting and finding a new job, knowing your base expenses can be paid. That may seem a small thing at first, but think – how many bad bosses will there be if their employee’s aren’t trapped working for them? How many unsafe environments if the employees feel safe walking out? The system would actually force work environments to improve. Employers would be forced to earn their employees’ respect and loyalty.

            Then there are all the would-be entrepreneurs out there. Starting a business takes a lot of money and risks. How many more brilliant businesses might start if there is a guaranteed safety net?

            Hang on a moment, though. This is still money being given out by the government. That means it comes from our taxes! Well, yes, but that’s the most brilliant part of it. You see, there are people out there who would have you believe that the best thing for the economy is to give more money to rich people, so they can spend that money on more extravagant things, which generates more jobs and pays more people. Yet, however hard they try to prove trickle-down economy, people are always able to find holes in the arguments and math.

            The truth is that the opposite is true. The economy functions through the movement of money, and the poorer someone is, the more likely they are to spend their money. People with a lot of money have a stockpile of it. If you give $20 to a corporation, they don’t turn around and spend it – they put it in a holding tank, where it may take ages for it to get passed on to someone else. That’s where the economy goes to die. On the other hand, if you give $20 to someone who barely survives from paycheck-to-paycheck, they’ll spend every penny of it and fuel the economy.

            So, yes, the money comes out of taxes, but even though it looks like it’s being given away for free, it’s actually improving the economy. But, in truth, it shouldn’t be thought of as the government giving away the taxes you worked so hard to pay – it should be thought of as a country investing in its people. Once the system is up and running, taxes will be more like paying off the money that was invested in you while you were building your life. And, once you start thinking about it like that, you’ll be happy to pay your taxes, secure in the knowledge that they’ll be going to someone else who is still building their life. Perhaps even your own kids.

            Imagine if a Basic Income could be implemented around the world – converting poverty into unlocking everyone’s full potential.

Check out my YouTube channel where I tell the stories of my D&D campaigns.

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

Also, make sure you check out my wife's blog and her website.


If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.

Laughing at the Pain

            It has occurred to me that in our culture there is a distinct link between humor and bullying. Or, rather, a lot of out humor comes from one form of bullying or another – and it just might be that this leads to bullying for the sake of humor.

            Let’s start with the most obvious one: slapstick. This is a type of humor based entirely around pain being caused to other people in humorous ways – such as accidentally getting struck from behind by someone carrying a long plank and getting pushed headfirst into a bucket of whitewash. Although a more modern version would be the videos of people accidentally hurting themselves that make up a large portion of the viral photos on the internet. We watch these things, and we laugh, believing it is harmless – either it was staged, and no one was really hurt, or it was some hurt to someone in the past and it wouldn’t have been posted on the internet if it wasn’t okay to laugh at them.

            Is it so harmless, though? We are witnessing pain, and laughing. More than that, we go on to share it with others – family, friends, children – and encourage them to laugh as well. It seems to me that this could very well desensitize people to the pain of others, and even encourage violence – because it’s funny. Especially when it happens to someone we think deserves it.

            Teasing is another one – it’s very common for people to playfully tease those they are close with. Again, it’s often harmless – or at least meant to be. But sometimes it goes too far. Sometimes the person being teased doesn’t even mention they’ve been hurt, so no one knows that it’s gone too far. Other times, the person says something and proceeds to get teased for having been hurt. We cause pain or embarrassment, then we laugh. It might not be so bad if we kept it to ourselves, but we then pass it on to the most impressionable people around us, who carry it on and spread it. Causing pain in certain ways then becomes synonymous with amusement, and leads to bullying.

            We can see more examples in the comedies we watch. We have shows that normalize making fun of certain cultures. How often do you see nerds being made fun of for being weird? How often do you see jocks being made fun of for being stupid? How often do you see mental illnesses being used for comic relief? And we take all of that back out into the world and spread it around – because it’s funny, and if it’s funny, it can’t really be bullying, can it? Meanwhile mental illness is stigmatized and people find themselves ostracised because of their interests.

            I think we all need to take a very good look at the things we find funny and consider, why are we laughing? More than that, we need to consider the harm that might be caused by passing this specific sense of humor on to younger generations – keeping in mind that they won’t necessarily understand the subtleties of the joke.

            Above all, we need to ask, is this humor, or is it bullying?

Check out my YouTube channel where I tell the stories of my D&D campaigns.

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

Also, make sure you check out my wife's blog and her website.


If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.

Finding the Middle

            This week I stepped into the middle of a dispute between friends on Facebook. I don’t like to harp on a similar topic two weeks in a row, but such are the times. I’ll tell you what I saw.

            It started with a democrat friend, outraged by recent events, making a blanket statement about republicans. A republican friend of both of us objected to the statement. What followed was a back-and-forth (not too heated, but clearly emotional on both sides) where each stated their opinions on the ideals of those with the opposing viewpoint.

            Normally I don’t say much on Facebook (or elsewhere – I really am a very quiet person), but this time I had to step in. Here was a pair of people, friends, arguing, all the while saying absolutely nothing – communicating no actual information.

            I pointed out to them that this was the exact problem in politics. It isn’t that the opposing side is unwilling to listen (although that plays a part), it’s that when people have differing viewpoints no one bothers to look at or explain why they hold that specific opinion.

            The sad truth of the matter is that most people can’t truly understand something outside their own experience. The most generous people in the world are the poor – people who know what it is to have little, so they share as much as they can with those who need help. People who have never had close experiences with people with mental illnesses (or had one themselves) don’t understand why mental illness is such a problem – and often think people with mental illnesses are just weak or lazy. People who haven’t experienced something don’t have the same frame of reference as those who have – and, as such, they form different opinions.

            But no one bothers to explain; all people do is shout their already formed opinions at each other. Then they dislike each other and go their separate ways, choosing to only spend time with those who agree with them. Then there become two large groups, isolated from each others’ frames of reference. Their own ideals are amplified by sharing them with people who agree, and the two groups grow further apart as their disputes grow bigger. The world gets divided into “us” and “them”.

            On the other hand, if both sides are willing to listen – to question, to explain – then there is truly some hope. Opinions are formed based on our experiences (or just taken from a source we trust), making an opinion on its own meaningless. When two people take the time to figure out why they have opposing opinions, they have a chance of finding common ground or swaying each others’ views. Or they might find they still disagree, but at least they’ll understand why they disagree. That might not seem important, but it is – it’s the difference between thing someone is a stupid, mindless sheep, and understanding that they reasoned out their opinion – even if they did end up with different results.

            When it comes down to it, there are very few people in the world that genuinely want to cause harm. Everyone wants what they think is best. Often they value the same things – they just see things from a perspective so different that it’s hard to relate. But if the two sides come together to share how they reached their views, they might very well find some middle ground – and that middle ground will be all the more solid because of the work it took to find it.

            The dispute between my two friends? Diffused, with both agreeing with the points I made. I suspect they would have gotten there without me anyway, but I like to think I helped to get them (and others viewing the thread) thinking about resolutions. That’s what we need more than anything right now – mended fences and common ground, because the United States are falling apart and there’s only so much the rest of the world can do to pick up the pieces.

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

Also, make sure you check out my wife's blog and her life coaching website.


If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.

Augmented Reality and the Future

            In the past couple of weeks, the internet (and, indeed, the world) has exploded about the new augmented reality game, Pokemon Go. There are two major opinions – the people who love the game and those who think it’s stupid. To me, though, the important thing to look at is what this game means for the future.

            Last year, I shared the story of the Zombies, Run! app and how it got Colleen and myself out exercising regularly when otherwise we could hardly dream of it. Pokemon Go has done the same thing across the whole world – people who would normally be inside all summer playing video games are now outside, exercising, exploring and socializing. People with mental health issues, such as depression and PTSD, are reporting improvements.

So, what do those two games have in common? They make exercise fun, rather than a chore.

            Now, the term “Augmented Reality” is something I’ve become quite familiar with over the past year. Why? Because one day, while out running from zombies, I said to Colleen, “Wouldn’t it be cool if someone developed a technology that would let us actually see the zombies that are chasing us in the story?” I then went on to hypothesize that you could take a virtual reality headset, mount cameras to feed in the scenery and then add in the digital characters.

            I figured I couldn’t be the only one to come up with this idea, so I did some research. What I found was astonishing – in particular, a company called Magic Leap that is working on a piece of technology far beyond what I had been imagining. My brain was flooded with ideas for the possible uses of this technology – yes, games were at the forefront, but there are so many practical purposes as well. It functions as an immersive mobile computer, an art platform, a communications device. With it, people have the potential to holo-comute to work.

            To me, though, the best application of augmented reality is the ability to combine work and play. Imagine being able to go into work and have the work you do become part of a game. You could have high scores that you try to beat each days, achievements and awards for completing a certain amount of work at a certain speed. Goals and praise that can break up an otherwise dull and tedious work shift. From an employer’s standpoint, it could be used to improve worker output and even work quality through turning work into a game.

            Pokemon Go is just the tip of the iceberg. We’re entering a future where science fiction is becoming a reality, and it has great potential for improving life in innumerable ways. All it takes are some deceptive photons and a little imagination to make the world a better place.

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

Also, make sure you check out my wife's blog and her life coaching website.


If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.

In Sickness and in Health

            I don’t get sick much. It’s something I should be happy to say, I suppose. I preferred the version of it that went “I never get sick”, though. Back in high school, my friends said I was an elf because I went over ten years without getting sick.

            I know I’m lucky in my health, only getting sick every two or three years, but it has its downsides. The biggest problem with having a really good immune system is that, on the rare occasion a sickness sneaks through, it’s usually a pretty strong one that is hard to get rid of – such as the one I’m currently just getting rid of that’s been here just over a week.

Another downside is that I’m remarkably unprepared for getting sick and, as a result, I’m not the greatest at handling it. As a mind-over-matter person, I always try to carry on with my life like nothing is wrong. I’ve always held that I mostly stay healthy through sheer stubbornness. It works to a point. Unfortunately, once a sickness sets in, it tends to lower physical efficiency and/or shut down the mind’s functionality. Working through that is hard when it means either bending metal or creative writing.

            It got me thinking about a saying I picked up somewhere. “Good health is only appreciated by the unhealthy” or something like that. It’s really true, in every sense. Whether it be a passing cold, a chronic disease or a mental illness, no one appreciates what it means to be healthy like someone who is not. No one wants to be healthy more than them.

            Everyone gets sick at some point in their lives, so everyone should have an understanding of this. Yet, as soon as we become adults, our sickness becomes our responsibility. We’re to get healthy as soon as possible so we can get back to work, to the daily grind. It’s as if we chose to get sick.

            Again, I’m lucky in this area because I’m self-employed and have a very loving wife. The only one pushing me to get better and back to work is myself, and I know my limits. But many people out there don’t have that advantage. The mentality is get better, get better, or at least take these pills that will make you stay sick longer, but at least you’ll be functional. Meanwhile, all this extra stress weakens the immune system and makes it harder for the person to get healthier.

            You’d think that, in a society as advanced and aware as ours, we wouldn’t do that to people. People who get sick shouldn’t be afraid they won’t be able to pay their bills if they take a few days or a week off to recover. People who are chronically ill shouldn’t have to work through that sickness just to survive, let alone have a hope of recovering.

            You’d think we’d have figured out how to take care of each other by now.

To all the sick people out there, I hope you get better soon. I’ve almost got my health back and I promise that – at least for a while – I’ll appreciate it as much as you, and I’ll be wishing that there was enough of my luck to go around.

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

Also, make sure you check out my wife's blog and her life coaching website.


If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.