Or put another way, we value life more than we did 100 years ago.
The book I am reading now "The Better Angels of our Nature" discusses this in depth.
It wasn't too long ago that people starved to death their children in favor of the stronger ones, that it was perfectly legal to beat and rape your wife, that children were sent into coal mines because the tunnels were too small for adults.
Public executions were entertainment (in France they used to "buy" criminals from neighboring towns so they could provide entertainment for their citizens).
Liberal Democracies (liberal as in Hobbes & Locke, not AOC) have improved the quality of life everywhere.
Some people like to lament the "weakness" of today's culture and long for the past, thinking things are so bad now.
In truth modern society is more peaceful and just than ever before.
It is in everyone's best interests as a society to take care of those we can.
If the system is flawed, it should be improved, not abandoned.
My counterarguments would be...
The Middle East, who everyone in the west loves to criticize and call barbarians. They (Jordan at least) are saying 10 years in jail if your caught outside. So would you say they value life more than america because they are going even more extreme to keep 1 person from getting sick and dying? An argument could be made.
I would say valuing life isn't measured in how many years someone lives. Someone could live to be 100 doing nothing never taking a risk. Someone else could travel the world and only live to be 60. We all take years off our life by taking AAS, but we believe it gives us a better quality of life because we like how we look, we get more attention, etc.
So we accept living less years on earth but enjoing the years we do live more. That is a risk. Same with food. Most people eat what they want to eat and don't care about being healthy. So I personally don't think we actually value life, or the meaning of it more. We just live in a more coddled , entitled society where parents cant spank their kids, everyone gets a cell phone at age 12. Our entitlement makes us think "oh something could kill me, society owes it to me to protect me."
We are all spoiled even the poorest people have it better than people did 100 years ago due to technology and I do believe it has made us weaker. The saying...tough times create strong men, strong men create good times, good times create weak men, weak men create tough times.
I believe all of us today in the west have grown up in good times and are weak. We view a relative dying, mostly due to old age, as something tough. IN some countries they have had tanks roll through their entire village and soldiers come out and rape and pillage and kill an entire family. Thats some bad shit. A relative dying old age Is not bad, we mourn rather then celebrate their life.
I personally think we do live in an age where people are overly emotional and emotions guide our thinking over logic. Another problem in addition to people just being spoiled and entitled is a lack of understanding of basic economics. I don't believe ive ever met a single person in person who understands supply and demand. That is basic stuff. Mot people don't understand what a loan is and they go around complaining about their "college debt". Again, people in other countries starve and face real oppression and our kids complain because they have to pay a loan back.