Life in Activism: Another Way to Overcome Your Fear of Republican Attacks on Social Security

Or almost anything else, for that matter

Photo by Vincent NICOLAS on Unsplash

As I have often indicated, I read every reply to every email I send out at Bowers News Media, the email-based grassroots activism organization associated with Wolves and Sheep. This has been very helpful, as it has given me insight to many of the common fears shared by readers of Bowers News Media and Wolves and Sheep.

One of those fears—in fact, perhaps the biggest one—is that Republicans will cut Social Security payments.

Even though Republicans have not made any legislative attempts to privatize Social Security for 20 years, and even though Donald Trump and all Republican congressional leaders vowed there would be no attempt to cut benefits or privatize Social Security, Republican control of Washington is causing widespread fear about threats to Social Security benefits among senior citizen Democratic grassroots activists. 

I have received scores of unsolicited emails and questions from readers indicating that they are saving money to protect themselves from the supposed forthcoming cuts. This is even though there is literally no current effort in Congress to cut or privatize the program in any way. At all.

What could be causing this fear? One reason is conservative media spending decades talking about the need to reduce Social Security benefits or privatize the program. Another is the fact that George W. Bush actually tried to privatize Social Security, at least partially. Yet another reason is that a lot of powerful Republicans, such as Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, clearly favor privatizing Social Security. In short, conservatives and Republicans have done a good job making seniors afraid that they will cut and/or privatize Social Security, no matter what Donald Trump and Republican leaders say now.

However, in addition to these reasons, a lot of prominent Democrats and progressives unfortunately stoke the fear that Republicans will try to cut or privatize Social Security instead of providing reassurance that they will not. In the same way that there are people who are making a lot of money off of grassroots Democratic and progressive anger, there are also people who stand to gain from grassroots Democratic and progressive fear. 

While some rando like me can try and tell you that there is no danger of your Social Security payments being cut or privatized for at least the next seven years, if the former Democratic governor of Maryland who was also the commissioner of the Social Security Administration tells you in early March that Social Security might "collapse" by early June, who are you going to believe, me or him? I know perfectly well there is little I can do to contradict fears that come from messages like that.

Then again, maybe there is something I can do. After all, the entire point of Life in Activism is to help grassroots Democratic and progressive activists overcome their political anxieties so that they can make better political decisions, stay engaged in politics over the long-run, and simply enjoy their lives more.

In the past, I have advised people to practice their fears in order to help overcome them. It is possible that, for at least some folks, such a practice may work when it comes to a potential reduction of Social Security payments—perhaps by seeing what it is like to live on only 77% of your current Social Security payment, which is the amount that the 2025 Trustees report on Social Security says it will be able to pay after 2033. This is a practice based on the ancient advice that Seneca gave to his friend Lucilius, and it is a practice that I found extremely helpful in overcoming my fear of leaving my job to start my own media and activism organization.

However, I know that such a cut may simply not be doable for some folks, especially those who are already living on an extremely tight budget, and practicing living without Social Security at all in the event of a benefit interruption or program “collapse” will be infeasible for even more people. So, below the fold for paid subscribers I will suggest an entirely different way to overcome your fear of Social Security payment reductions—or really, your fear of pretty much anything.