Frogs and Ravens

The Problem of Assuming All Americans Are Middle Class

...with a sprinkling of the rich on top.

Reading some of the discussions about Social Security and Medicare and other forms of assistance, it occurs to me that we're seeing one of the dangerous side effects of the rhetorical reliance on invocations of "middle-class Americans."

That is, our national mental landscape now consists of rich people and middle-class people, with a few vague others in the background - voices that we never hear, lives we never see, unless we are among them. Given that, it's hard to advocate for programs that address actual poverty and want, since that's outside the experience of the groups who are not struggling in those ways.

A very simple example: the number of times I've had to explain to family and friends why obtaining medical care is not a simple and straightforward thing for us. And those explanations still are met with bafflement: you're sick, why wouldn't you see a doctor? You have insurance; of course it will cover what you need. The idea that insurance doesn't cover everything, or that you can't easily afford the costs of what it doesn't cover (let alone understanding that the cost of self-insuring is itself quite expensive) is so foreign to their own experience that any explanations to the contrary don't register. It's worse than speaking a foreign language; it's speaking apparent nonsense.

And I can't think the national reluctance to acknowledge the existence of actual people dealing with the challenges of poverty - as opposed to stereotyped caricatures of "the poor" - helps with this.

Happy Earth Day!

Happy Earth Day!  Today I encourage you to go outside, if you are physically able, and marvel at this splendid world we inhabit.  Look around at the people on it, the animals and plants that surround you, the water you drink, the air you breathe, the soil you walk upon.  Simply enjoy being a being alive in a world filled with other living things.

Energy conservation and being a green consumer are excellent things to do -- please keep doing them! -- but also remember that a lot of the problems our planet faces are much larger than the actions of individual people, and most of them can't be solved by Buying More Things.  So, in addition, think about our values as a society, and your own values as a person, and ask yourself whether they will lead to future generations living in a world that is rich in life and healthy to inhabit.  If not, what can you do to change that?

It's not merely enough for us to stave off disaster and death; we must also commit to defending and promoting the beauty and liveliness of our world, so that we're not merely avoiding death, but encouraging life.  Happy Earth Day!

By the way, yes, I know this is a cool image.  Yes, I know it would be neat to have it on your own blog.  HOWEVER, if you want to use it, please download your own copy and host it on your own site.  Do NOT simply link to it.  This is called HOTLINKING, and it is a really rude thing to do - and if you're the sort of person who likes this image, I'm sure you'd prefer to do the right thing.  Thanks.

For more info about hotlinking and how to avoid it, go here:  http://www.webweaver.nu/html-tips/hotlinking.shtml


 

Dots

Some dots to connect:

• Attempts to impose restrictions on voters (such as voter ID laws) are on the rise.
• Redistricting has increased the number of "safe" districts, meaning that more races are uncontested, and more candidates feel safe taking extreme positions.
• Voting machines remain hackable, and pressure for quick results over accurate results means that the demand for computerized voting systems will continue.
• Voter apathy (in no small part due to the above situations) means that political decisions are increasingly made by smaller and smaller groups of people, and those groups are more likely to hold extreme views (as a fervency of belief is part of what encourages people to go to the polls) (which reinforces the trends in the second point).
• The Citizens United case doubled down on the concept of corporate "personhood," so that it is possible for corporations to buy campaigns and political representatives.  Witness the current Republican primary, the way the current administration treated BP with kid gloves after the oil spill, the way that "too big to fail" is now a valid approach to doing business, and so on.
• The media is also increasingly dominated by pro-corporation thinking, and the majority of its pundits, newscasters, and the like reinforce that thinking rather than bite the hand that feeds them.
• The mainstream media has fallen into the habit of he said/she said journalism, and prefers stories that fall into existing narratives and which require little training (or funding) to produce.  There is also a preference for profit over fact-finding (again, the latter costs money and requires trained reporters).  As a result, stories that entertain and stories which reinforce common wisdom and the spoonfed narratives of the powerful predominate.  At their worst, you get the trifecta, as when Sarah Palin was covered as a political candidate (thus as "serious news"), as an authentic "real American" (reinforcing tropes about who Americans are, that is, white, conservative, small town or rural, gun-loving, religious, etc.), and as a hot babe (thus as telegenic celebrity).
• Groups like ALEC and the Koch brothers are emerging as sources of coordinated political action and funding, and consistently they favor legislation that reduces individual civil liberties and undermines social networks and protective regulation while strengthening the powers of politicians and corporations.
• Prisons are increasingly privatized, turning the justice system into a for-profit enterprise.
• Privatization of public goods, such as roads, libraries, and schools decreases public input into the management of said entities, replaces public good with profit as the primary goal, and makes it easier to paint the government as restrictive and expensive rather than as the provider of useful services.
• Related to this, the insistence that public schools teach primarily "to the test" encourages passive, black-and-white thinking among students, rather than an ability to engage critically with complex situations and problems.  (Case in point: global climate change.)
• As college education is increasingly priced out of reach due to the reduction of state and federal funding, and the expansion of administrative staff and salaries, higher education is less prepared to provide a corrective to what happens in the lower grades; at the same time it is less able to cover more complex issues in deeper detail.  Simultaneously, those rising tuition rates leave new graduates deep in debt and thus vulnerable to economic coercion on the part of employers.  The emphasis on liberal arts education at the expense of vocational education (like plumbing or carpentry) also reduces the options for students who are more manually oriented.  (Many of them will either end up going in debt for educations that are not functional as job-producing credentials, or taking other options such as military service.)
• Police around the country are gaining increased access to military-grade hardware and training in its use; such equipment not only increases police lethality, it also makes it easier to surveil populations without their knowledge or consent, and the laws governing such technology (such as drones, cameras, and tasers) lag far behind their use.
• The rhetoric of terrorism has enabled the government (at state and federal levels) to expand its powers of surveillance, arrest, and detainment, while at the same time decreasing transparency and promoting an attitude of passive acceptance to increasing intrusions on privacy, on the part of the general public.
• Legislation aimed at restricting access to abortion has led to increased government interference in women's exercise of bodily autonomy, and increased expectations that members of the medical profession function as punitive arms of the government, and because this legislation is enacted piecemeal state by state, there is no national conversation about what is a de facto overturning of Roe v. Wade.
• Legislation aimed at reducing companies' responsibility to include contraception in their insurance policies reinforces the message of women's unreliability and second-class citizenship, frames religious freedom in terms of the restrictive beliefs of a few religious groups, privileges corporate decisions (also framed as "religious freedom") over individual religious beliefs, and continues the trend of declining employer-provided health care insurance.
• Responses to the above legislation are used to reinforce a message of "I got mine, why should I pay for yours" (as through Limbaugh's castigating of Fluke as a "slut") and are consistently and erroneously framed as a "taxpayer" concern; this both reinforces the selfish message just mentioned, and reinforces the idea that taxes should not be used to pay for social services, whether those take the form of welfare for the poor, or mass programs such as single-payer health insurance programs.
• Other responses to the above legislation take the form of mocking the logic of those laws by proposing that similar invasions of privacy be applied to male bodies as well as female.  While this satirical approach is understandable (given the media's unwillingness to cover complex issues unless they can be reduced to an entertaining soundbite) it reinforces the idea that legislative interference in medical decisions and patients' exercise of their right to bodily autonomy is okay (if it is applied "fairly" to both genders). 
• Rape culture reinforces the idea that consent is not something we should be concerned about; hence it is possible for legislators to opine that a coerced ultrasound (transvaginal or not) is okay since a woman who is pregnant has already "had something up there," implying that consent is meaningless, or that one instance of consent should be construed as global consent in perpetuity.
• Laws such as Florida's Stand Your Ground law reward vigilanteeism and the murder of people who happen to be non-white, while reinforcing the notion that the Second Amendment right to bear arms is more important than laws governing personal safety. 
• Media narratives about "lone" gunmen, who are "crazy," and viewed as surprises or exceptions, reinforce a world view in which violence (especially violence against women, people of color, and abortion providers) is viewed as a random, freak occurrence, rather than part of a larger system of beliefs about the nature of power and dominance.  As a "bonus" the mentally ill are further marginalized and stigmatized by such narratives.
• Such narratives about the mentally ill also are wielded against those who speak out against the system (OWS for example is marginalized both as being a bunch of "lazy, dirty hippies" and as consisting of large numbers of homeless people, which is shorthand often for "crazy people") and to minimize the real and serious danger posed by people with money and power who espouse extreme views (e.g. Santorum is often framed as "crazy" in order to justify not taking him seriously).
• Continuing high unemployment is used to enable further incursions against individual privacy, as when people on unemployment are asked to take drug tests, or when job applicants are asked to turn over their email and social media passwords and user names to potential employers.  Some incursions are even sanctioned by legislation linking contraception to employment, as in the Arizona legislation making it legal for employers to question their employees about birth control use and to fire them on the basis of what they discover.
• The minimum wage is lagging, often severely, behind the cost of living in every state of the union.  This comes at a time when the costs of housing are rising, the costs of health insurance (let alone uninsured costs) are rising, and when unemployment in general is rampant.  This leaves the population vulnerable to exploitation by unethical employers, and too stressed by the demands of subsistence to educate themselves about the issues, let alone mount an effective response to them.
• Global climate change is imposing severe stresses on an already stressed system, from increasing forest fires, an earlier (and more northerly) tornado season, droughts in our food-producing regions, immigration fueled by environmental devastation and economic downturns elsewhere, increasing demands on our fossil fuel reserves for cooling and heating during seasons of extreme temperatures (high and low).
  
  I think that's enough for now.  Are you starting to see a picture emerge?

Double-Dip Cicadas

At the tag end of summer

Cicadas plummet from the trees

Like meteors, flamed out, no longer bright

When the shadow of giant fate

Looms close, some

Buzz and struggle

Others hunker passively

I lift them up on leaves

And from the base of trees

Some begin to climb

Overwhelmed, remembering the dream

Of green leaves, and sky, and song.

Beyond Hope, Revisited

When you give up on hope, you turn away from fear.

And when you quit relying on hope, and instead begin to protect the people, things, and places you love, you become very dangerous indeed to those in power.

In case you’re wondering, that’s a very good thing.

via www.orionmagazine.org

 

I've linked to Derrick Jensen's "Beyond Hope" before.  This summer, and particularly this month, I've been watching people lashing out in fear and anger on all sorts of progressive sites, and I can't help but see echoes in events like the London riots.  It's been painful to watch, and, when I've joined the conversation, it's been painful to participate. 

I think people are desperate, and afraid, and it's becoming slowly more obvious to even the most oblivious of us that we are in a world of hurt.  That much is clear, but what is far from clear is what is to be done about it.  It's that frightened uncertainty that I think is fueling the savagery I've been seeing in comments; what we are seeing is not a just a community in crisis, but a community confronting the bitter fact that the crisis was precipitated by the very systems that were supposed to protect us in such moments.  Some people are clinging frantically to the idea that if we all wish hard enough, if we pay enough attention, the system will work the way it is supposed to - for example, that if we continue to vote thoughtfully, and write letters to our representatives to tell them what we think and feel, the right people and the right actions will emerge from the chaos to fix things.

Here's what's terrifying:  they won't.  We can't count on the people in power to do the right thing any more, no matter how you define power - we've been betrayed by politicians, by corporations, by the media, and all of them have worked in collaboration (some deliberately, some simply by dint of taking the easier path) to remove themselves from accountability.

Here's what's terrifying:  we're going to have to fix this ourselves.  Moreover, we're going to have to do that in the face of the same structures that put those who work against us in power, and we're going to have to do that knowing that those on the top of the heap will resist - some passively, by being dead weight resistant to change, some actively by denouncing efforts to create a more humane world as impractical, and some still further by not only declaring such actions as impractical but illegal and traitorous.

I don't want this, and I don't think any of my friends want this.  We're being dragged kicking and screaming to this conclusion, because any normal person wants to live in a society that works, that doesn't require vast efforts of its citizens to survive and look out for each other.  Facing the fact that we don't live in such a society is terrifying, and it's far easier to argue over minutiae and wishful thinking, because most of us barely have the energy or time or money to run our daily lives, let alone start a revolution.

I don't know what the answer is, or what's going to happen.  All I know is that people are worried and afraid and they have no good outlets for those emotions, no good way to find and obtain relief.  And that scares me.

Recession Realities

In comments, Shaker CassieC writes:I was wondering if there could be a thread for shakers to share what this recession/depression/catastrophe is doing to them and their friends and loved ones. ... I've just been reading people's accounts here and there, on various threads, and I know how strong the pressure is not to tell these stories of personal difficulties in the US, because of our society's f-ed up code of personal success/failure, which makes it so difficult for the personal to be seen as a collective, legitimate phenomenon. Here it is.

via shakespearessister.blogspot.com

D and I are not in as desperate straits as some of the folks posting here, but we are both currently unemployed, with no work visible on the horizon. To say that we're worried is an understatement.  My own contribution to the thread is copied here below the fold.

Are We Irrelevant?

Have the American people outlived their usefulness to the rich minority in the United States? A number of trends suggest that the answer may be yes.

via www.salon.com

 

Reading the article linked above, it's striking to me the parallels with our political situation. Between the two major parties, they've shut the door to any alternative parties, or at least made it very hard for them to get in.

In the state where I live, for example, any party who wants to be on the ballot has to jump through a bunch of pretty onerous hoops... unless they've been on the ballot for several elections running. So, of course that means the two major parties are automatically on the ballot, while any other party has to spend extra effort and money meeting the entry requirements. Add in the costs of buying visibility, and challenging incumbents, and it gets worse.  Then, if the challenger is also running on a platform challenging corporate power... what we end up with is two major parties who have a large inflow of money and many structural advantages facing smaller parties with minimal inflow and many structural disadvantages that require money to overcome.  I trust you can do the math there.

Budget Cuts

Through the glass, the interior is dark.  On each of the front doors, a computer printed sign is taped.  "Due to budget constraints, the library will be closed the first Wednesday of every month."

I walk home past the book return.  The bump-clunk of the metal door closing echoes, a sound like a cancelation stamp in a near-empty post office, the reverberations tasting the distant marble walls.

A man collecting cans in a shopping cart goes by.

Why the "Logic" of the TSA and Its Apologists Is Made of FAIL

(Trigger warnings for all kinds of abuse.)

Person A:  I am a cancer survivor and cannot be exposed to additional radiation.

Response: Here, have an invasive "extended pat-down."  Don't like it?  Don't fly.

Person B:  I am a medical patient with external appliances (ostomy bag, prostheses, etc.).  It causes me pain to be touched and it is medically unsafe for me to be irradiated.

Response:  Don't fly.

Person C:  I am a survivor of sexual assault and I am triggered if my genitals are touched against my will.

Response:  Let us look at you naked.  Don't like it?  Don't fly.

Person D: I am a survivor of sexual assault that involved the public sharing of my naked image.

Response: Don't fly.

Person E: I am a parent of an autistic child who doesn't understand verbal commands and cannot be touched.

Response: Don't fly.

Person F:  I am an American citizen and I object to the way that these screening procedures violate the 4th Amendment.

Response: Don't fly.

Person G:  I am a member of a conservative religious order and I am forbidden to let individuals of the opposite sex see my body or to remove my head garment in public.

Response: Don't fly.

Person H:  I am a member of an ethic or racial minority and I am worried about being singled out for punitive screening on account of my appearance.

Response: Don't fly.

Person I:  I am pre-op transgender and am afraid of being attacked if this becomes public knowledge.

Response: Don't fly.

Person J:  I am fat and am worried about being fat-shamed.

Response:  Oh, shut up, no one's looking at you anyway.  (Or, don't fly.)

Person K:  I am an attractive woman and I am concerned about being ogled by TSA personnel during screening.

Response: "Hey, we got a cutie here for you."  (Or, don't fly.)

Person L:  I am a man and I am concerned about having my genitals touched by another man.

Response: Go through the scanner so we can make comments on the size of your penis.  (Or, don't fly.)

Person M:  I am concerned that this is just security theater, and money is being useless spent that could be used for better intelligence and improving security at the baggage end.

Response: Shut up and just go through the scanner, already.

Person N:  I am an abuse survivor and I don't want to perform extended pat-downs on other survivors.

Response: You're fired.  Too bad about the family that's depending on you.

Person O:  I don't want my child photographed naked or touched by strangers.

Response: Don't fly.

Person P:  I don't want my wife/girlfriend/husband/boyfriend/father/mother touched by strangers or viewed naked.

Response: Don't fly.

Person Q:  I'm a frequent flier required to travel for my job.  I am concerned about the cumulative effects of scanner radiation, and I don't like how long it takes to go through the extended pat-down.

Response: I guess you'd better look for another job, then.

Person R: I have family in another country, and now they are afraid of traveling here.

Response: Sucks to be you.  That's what you get for being related to a bunch of foreigners.

Person S: I would like to travel to your country but I'm concerned about these screening procedures.

Response:  Stay home.  We don't like foreigners anyway, and we don't need your tourist dollars.

Person T: As an owner of an airline, I am concerned about the adverse effect this will have on my business, as travelers choose not to fly.

Response:  Can't you see that we're protecting you from terrorists?

Person U: As the manager of an airport, I am concerned about the adverse effect this will have on our business.

Response: Why should we care?  You can always hire a private company, but it will have to follow our rules, so why bother.

.

.

.

Person 1:  I am terrified by the idea of being killed by terrorists, even though I am far more likely to die driving to the airport or slipping in my bathtub.* I rarely fly, and I don't live in a place that has experienced an actual terrorist attack.

Response:  Everybody line up for the scanners and extended pat-downs! 

 

Why does the irrational fear of Person 1 trump the reasonable fears and concerns of Persons A-U? Feel free to speculate, but the odds are pretty good that it has very little to do with stopping terrorism.

 

*It has been calculated, based on the number of flights and the numbers of passengers, that you have a 1:135,000 chance of dying in a terrorist attack if on average there was one successful terrorist attack every single week.  Meanwhile, your chance of dying in a car accident is 1:7000, or 19 times more likely than the above unlikely scenario.

 

My Travel Wardrobe

Carefully chosen for comfort, warmth, and ease of movement through the screening process.