Success (and Failures) at Citizenship
An Article of the Modern Survival Guide
If you live in the world today, as odds are you do, your status in a wide number of situations can be boiled down as follows: you exist somewhere on a spectrum from being a citizen, to being a subject, and all the way at the other end… something worse. Where you fall on that line is critical to your survival in the modern world, so you would do well to know where you land, because there are things you can do that move you around on that spectrum. In this article we’ll discuss what that means and what you should do to stay on the “citizen” side of the line.
So, what does it mean to be a citizen? Well, a citizen has rights and a voice in their government, and is expected to provide support for their nation in return. A subject has lost either their rights or their voice in their government, or both, and is obligated to provide support for their rulers. There are worse things to be than subjects, and I’ll talk about a couple of them later, but they share a common trait: not only is the person in some way not fulfilling their responsibilities as a citizen, the are actively harming their nation.
A citizen has and exercises their rights in exchange for contributing to the welfare of a nation (note phrasing: a nation, not “the state,” not “the rulers”). Citizens have responsibilities to do things for the nation, but a lot of the time it’s not obligatory, or not as obligatory as it would be for a subject. A subject is required and coerced to support their ruling class without any expectation of rights, privileges, or say in their government in return. A citizen is an involved participant in the body politic; a subject is not. Citizens have obligations to counterbalance their rights. Subjects just have obligations. That’s the difference.
Now, before the Freedom!!! crowd gets started, no, having to pay taxes does not make you a subject. Nor does being forced to obey the law. Freedom is never absolute, and always subject to restrictions under the law. What we call “freedom,” means that, at some level, we agree to abide by the law and get a say in how it’s made, and within the remit of the law we are free to act as we please. Therefore there are degrees of freedom which can and should be debated in any reasonable nation.
Being a citizen means you get the freedoms, you get the power, and you have the obligations. It also means you take on responsibility.
I used two different words in this last section that sometimes get conflated, so before we move on let’s break those apart. An obligation indicates a task or job that you are required to do. A responsibility indicates a task or job for which you have accountability. You must do an obligation, or you get in trouble. You should meet a responsibility, or you have failed at something. Obligations are external, responsibility is internal. A citizen meeting their responsibilities has an impact… as does a failure to do so.
Responsibilities of a Citizen
In general, I would say that each citizen has the following six responsibilities. They may have other obligations as defined by the law; but these are the responsibilities that make someone a “citizen” in function as well as form:
- A citizen exercises their right to determine their government: If you don’t vote, you may be a citizen in name but you are a subject in actuality, as you have abandoned your right to determine the direction and actions of your government. A citizen votes, utilizing knowledge of the candidates and their own position to determine their needs and values, and assigning their ballot accordingly.
- A citizen obtains and maintains knowledge of the law: You can’t follow the law if you don’t know it, but the law can be enforced upon you whether you know it or not. “Freedom” means freedom under the law. If you don’t know what the law is for your particular circumstance, you are not participating in freedom, you are participating in anarchy, which is something quite else.¹ Citizens obey the law as best they can — and understand the circumstances under which obeying the law is no longer a valid option.
- A citizen understands how their government works: If you don’t know how your government works, and you attempt to do just about anything in your society, you’re going to run in trouble because governments touch just about everything. At best, your actions will have unintended consequences. In the middle option, you fail. And at worst, you hurt someone else as a result of your ignorance.
- A citizen contributes to the support of their society: Citizens pays taxes. If you aren’t paying your taxes, you’re not being a citizen. Yeah, I said it. Taxes are the fundamental support mechanism of a nation, and money makes the world go ‘round. If you are benefitting from a society, but not paying for its upkeep, you are at best a parasite and at worst actively contributing to your society’s downfall. But taxes aren’t everything. A citizen also identifies areas of their society that need non-government support, and supports them. This can take the form of donations, organization, volunteer time, etc.
- A citizen helps others as a rule, not an exception: To be a citizen is to be a part of a very large tribe. That’s all a nation is, really. Just a trick of rhetoric to convince our caveman brains that people who don’t look, think, act, or even necessarily believe as we do, are nonetheless part of our tribe and therefore worthy of life, protection, and support. In time, perhaps we will be able to extend this definition to the whole of humanity; perhaps not. In any case, a citizen looks out for other citizens at the very least, and avoids actively harming their fellow citizens wherever possible.
- A citizen works to defend their society from harm: A nation is not just a government and some people, it’s a whole slew of ideas, organizations, and culture that all come together with that government and those people to make a greater whole. A citizen understands this, understands that certain elements of society must function in order for society as a whole to work, and does their part to ensure those elements are functional or, if needed, adapted to new circumstances.
This begs a question — what happens if someone is only performing some of these responsibilities? Are they still a citizen? Well, yes, legally they are. Functionally, no. They’re either subject, a parasite, a Scrooge, or a fanatic.² I use these terms according to my own vernacular, and I’ll explain what I mean.
A subject is someone who has no rights, only obligations. If you don’t understand or are not being afforded your rights, you’re a subject, whatever the law says, because you can’t claim the benefits of citizenship. The most fundamental right, on which all the others rest, is the right to vote; if you don’t claim it, you’re a subject because all of your life choices are being determined by someone else, whether you know it or not. There are a lot of subjects out there, judging by voting statistics.
A parasite is worse than a subject. This is someone who lives within a society, and may maintain the trappings of citizenship by voting and being involved in government, but fails to contribute to the society’s upkeep. They likely know the law very well, and may have an excellent understanding of the legal system, but instead of using that knowledge for the good of their society they use it to evade their obligations. They degrade the capability of their nation every time they shift money into a new offshore account, or play with tax laws to avoid paying. This type of thing sometimes makes the news in the form of vast international conspiracies, but often it’s perfectly legal — just not something a citizen should do.³
A Scrooge is someone who votes and pays their taxes, but does nothing at all for their fellow man beyond that. They meet their obligations, but avoid their responsibilities as a citizen. Scrooges are also worse than subjects. They degrade the social arena of their society just a little bit with every deliberate inaction. You see Tiny Tim in the street begging for his life, and walk on? You’re a Scrooge. You see a problem affecting your neighbors, but decide it’s not worth your while to help? Scrooge. That kind of thing.
And a fanatic? Fanatics are dangerous people because they have discarded the responsibility to care for their fellow citizens in favor of promoting their own vision above all others. They fail to offer help in some cases, or fail to avoid harm in others. The most common failure of fanatics is the failure to offer alternatives; to pick an example at random, if I’m in favor of abolishing Medicaid, but I don’t offer any alternatives for what happens to the people currently using that service, I’m a fanatic because I failed to figure out how to help my fellow citizens.
Now, before we get too judgy, I would say pretty much everyone claims at least one of these non-citizen statuses at some point in their lives. Exercising your citizenship isn’t always convenient or easy, and so the most common deviation that most of us experience is the slide from being an active citizen to being a subject by not voting. Arguably, most of us start as subjects and eventually work up to being citizens, under the definitions proposed in this article.
Most people do not end up as parasites, if only because most of us do not have enough extra resources that it makes sense to expend the effort to play the system. It’s simply easier for most people to pay taxes. Frankly, if you don’t have millions in the stock market, it’s almost always easier to pay taxes.
On the other hand, almost everyone is a Scrooge at some point. It’s another one of those things that is nearly unavoidable in life. I’ve spoken before about the concept of care calories, the idea that we can only care about a certain volume of stuff at once, and this is an application. If you have an awful day at work, your kids need help, you’re sick, and your dog is eating the furniture… well, you probably don’t have a lot of time left to be a citizen by helping your neighbors. This is another reason why limiting work hours is good for a nation, by the way, and also probably why some people don’t like the concept of limited work hours. If you’re too tired to engage, you can’t fulfill the obligations of citizenship, and that’s that.
And sad to say, lots of people are fanatics. If you can’t support your fellow citizens because they are a black, white, gay, straight, trans, male, female, or of the opposing political party… you’re a fanatic. If you can’t support a service that millions rely on because it violates your own personal views, but you have no alternative to that service, you’re a fanatic. If you’re an elected official, and you simply can’t work with the other party under any circumstances, you’re a fanatic. A quick perusal of Congress will show you several different fanatics in short order.
This is all very similar to a previous essay I wrote about adulting, which is to say that the concept of citizenship in this perspective is fluid. You can be a citizen one day, a parasite the next, and a Scrooge on the third, a fanatic on Sunday, and then go back to being a citizen; it’s more of a spectrum than a black and white issue. That’s not the goal, though. The goal is to identify what makes you a citizen, then try to do that as often as possible, with the assumption that being a citizen improves your community and nation, and therefore helps you. What goes around comes around.
Ultimately, the conduct of a citizen is to strive. Work to shape your government. Work to improve your community. Work to help your fellow humans who trundle around this world of pain with you. There’s very little cosmic justice, there’s just us; a citizen knows that truth down to their core. Survival in our world is not easy and not guaranteed, but having a large number of citizens in the room is a good way to ensure that all the bits of society that help us survive are assessed, developed, and maintained in working order.
Failure to keep a large number of citizens in society is how you get failed states. Be a citizen, whenever you can. The long-term consequences of doing otherwise are… unpleasant.
¹This is a confusing statement — let me explain. Firstly, doing whatever you like all the time is not what we mean when we say “freedom,” because almost by definition you are eventually going to infringe on someone else’s ability to do whatever they like, at which point they will most likely react poorly, thereby impacting your ability to do whatever you like. You can see how a vicious spiral would develop. This is a paradox of freedom — for anyone to truly be free to act, there must be rules, and they must be followed. Anarchy is a state of no laws, which is to say, no rules to which a population can ascribe any sense of overall legitimacy or which are enforced by a higher power. Some people think this is an ideal state. Those people have never encountered a mob, a hostile religious gathering, or an asshole on a back road. Those people are wrong. Anarchy is all fun and games until someone has to sleep.
²There’s a fifth category, which is a traitor, but I didn’t include that here because traitors know damn well that they’re not citizens anymore in anything but name. In contrast, I think that most people in these three categories fondly believe themselves to be citizens.
³Before we get too far down this line of thought, there’s a difference between people who use social services and parasites. While both usually operate within the law, the difference is intent. Parasites are generally rich pricks who can’t be arsed to support the nation they live in, although they could manifestly do so, and consequently move, hide, or otherwise obfuscate their wealth in order to actively avoid paying taxes (or dodge the draft, or use their influence to gain federal handouts for their already profitable business, etc.). People who use social services are generally doing so because that’s the social contract — they paid into the service, and they receive its benefits, quid pro quo. There is a difference.
