Dear basic income posters: I don't care about your weird alternative to UBI

 So, something that comes up in UBI related spaces a lot are these weirdos coming in with crazy idea that aren't UBI, and their entire purpose of being there is to tell us UBI is bad and won't work for some reason, and that we should try their hare brained idea instead.

Normally, these ideas involve something that is kinda similarish to UBI, but very different in some ways. The most recent one that inspired me to write this was some variation of "social credit", which basically amounts to lets make a currency that's not money, but runs parallel to money, and we use it to exchange with each other for goods and services. But often it has some different quality to it. Either its limited in how it can be used, or it expires, or something like that. Why not just use money? Then they just use the boogeyman of inflation to say UBI can't work or something, even though we've had these arguments many many times in the past. 

Or, we end up with some sort of work fare program where they think UBI will make people lazy and let's make a similar idea except we force them to work. Or let's give people universal basic services because either people are too irresponsible with cash or evil capitalists will exploit it. Or what about baby bonds, or some one time grant we give to people when they turn 18 (which in our predatory system would just lead to being eaten up by our higher education system). Or something something crypto and blockchain. 

I mean, there's no end to these stupid proposals. Maybe some of them aren't bad in and of themselves, but if I'm in a basic income space talking about basic income, I want to talk about UBI. Most of these other proposals are inferior in some way or have drawbacks, and most of us want UBI for a reason. But these people won't take the hint. They think they came up with the greatest idea ever and it's like, not only is this not new, we've seen variations of this many times over. Or it's some weird idea so complex you need a PHD in mathematics just to understand it. Either way, not interesting.

UBI's strength is in its simplicity. It's universal, it has no real requirements to get it other than citizenship. It's money it can be spent on what people want. It meets peoples' needs while also giving them freedom. And Im not saying we should JUST have a UBI and have no other ideas at all. Im for universal healthcare, free college, and some sort of fix for housing after all. I'm for keeping elements of social security retirement and disability. UBI is the centerpiece but it's not the whole meal. It's like turkey at thanksgiving dinner. Not the only thing you'll eat, but it's the big thing everyone goes on about. 

Either way, I'm sick of people coming into pro UBI spaces, bashing UBI, and then proposing some solution literally no one else cares about. We're not interested, we've seen people pushing these weird ideas for years, we just want a UBI.