The Left and The Unreformed Scrooge

I was thinking of writing about which side Santa Claus takes - is he liberal (progressive) or conservative but that subject gets written about pretty often. Here's one example pushing a conservative Santa. Instead I thought I would write about Scrooge and which side of him reflects which end of the political spectrum.

At the beginning Scrooge is cheap. He denies his clerk additional coal. He objects to Cratchit, the clerk taking Christmas off. When asked to give to a charity to help the poor he says that the poor should be taken care of by the state. He even makes a comment about them dying and reducing the surplus population.

After his conversion Scrooge is a believer in direct action. He gives a large donation to charity and a huge turkey to the Cratchit family. He personally assures that Tiny Tim's health improves. It was said of him that he knew how to keep Christmas well.

Of course, Dickens was a social reformer who meant the book as a morality play. The reader was supposed to be transformed along with Scrooge.

Before I begin matching things up I will admit that conditions in the mid-19th century were a far cry from today and that many institutions are not equivalent. Never the less.. I believe that Scrooge before his conversion most closely matches todays progressives and his improved version comes closer to today's conservatives. Here's my reasoning.

Scrooge hated to light extra lights or burn extra coal. Compare this with today's anti-global warming sentiments. Al Gore would applaud Scrooge (but not live like him).

Scrooge does not want to give his employee time off for Christmas. Many liberals, lead by the ACLU, want Christmas to be a private affair, celebrated within the family but not recognized in public.

Scrooge does not believe in (presumably faith-based) charities. Charities including faith-based ones provide a number of services for the poor. Progressives believe that this represents a failure and want the government to assume all responsibility for the poor.

Scrooge suggests that it would be good to get rid of the surplus population. Progressives and environmentalists have said similar things for decades. The main difference is that they are more extreme than Scrooge. Where Scrooge only suggests that the poor who refuse government aid (poor houses) should die, the left wants a significant portion of the population to die off. An Australian minister recently suggested taxing children to discourage population growth. An English couple had an abortion and sterilization so that they could continue flying on vacation, secure in the knowledge that, by relieving the earth of their offspring, they were living a carbon neutral lifestyle.

After the ghosts visit Scrooge, he is suddenly a believer in private charity and conspicuous consumption. He starts taking personal responsibility for the people around him instead of deferring responsibility to the government. He also has a lot more fun.