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Saturday, August 31, 2013

War, War, and More War!!

I mean, lets do it!! What are we waiting for?!  A little "limited" strike never really hurt anyone right?!  I mean its a win win for everyone involved.  We get to stick to it to Assad for "provocating with us", our military industrial complex gets to use those shiny weapons it makes billions of dollars off of, the Syrian rebels and all of their unknown and/or undesirable benefactors get a little help in creating government(s) in their own image(s), the 1,000+ dead from the chemical attack get "revenge" for being killed - "Justice" is done!  Those dirty peaceniks get to "feel good" about standing up to tyranny, crying foul for the lack of evidence for invasion.  But the US gets to save face for our little "red line" quip about Syria going too far.  France gets to be called our "oldest ally", the UK gets to say, "hey, we're not actually your lap dogs, we just play one on Iraqi TV."  Both leading to "high fives" in the US's corridors of power at how ingenious we are at manipulating our imbecilic allies and global pubic perceptions.  Not to mention..... FRENCH FRIES RETURN TO THE PENTAGOONS!!  The NSA, while obviously jealous of the fries, contents itself in knowing that attention has been deflected from sitting in our living rooms and getting off on our phone sex, and that Obama's Canadian Bacon styled maintenance of power will keep allowing it to tap that!

Meanwhile, back in the desert.  Egypt gets to keep killing its protesters and tightening its grasp.  Syria gets to retaliate against Israel - and I mean who in the middle east doesn't want an excuse to retaliate against Israel?! Hezbollah of course gets to fire some rockets... and the Palestinians too! (who of course can't see who their shooting at over that giant wall and 400 calorie a day haze).  Iran gets a good sporting show rooting for and training with Hezbollah, while Saudi Arabia gets to keep making money behind the scenes, and Al-Qaeda gets even closer to another lawless enclave to operate from (western Syria anyone?)!!  Given all this "Muslim warmongering," Israel of course can then start blowing shit up throughout the entire region.... never a bad thing there!!

Chaos (oh excuse me, "instability,") reigns, the US and some smattering of the Coalition of the Willing, Part Deux gets to broaden the blank slate its been building in the middle east to bring a more "equitable balance" of power, and eventually set up Burger Kings, oil rigs, and "free" markets for the priceless loot of another ancient museum.  Corporate gain and jobs for all!!  Our alleys can of course share in the riches, both privately and publicly.  We can send them more money for their militaries to keep their own people in line, look the other way when they use cluster munitions on their own people, and get a little extra cash and sport for taking, feeding, and advancing the enhancement of interrogation techniques on those rabble-rousing prisoners soon to be formerly of Guantanamo bay.  The UN then of course gets a little more work out of all this, because they get to go in and do some inspecting.  There Maldivian or Bhutani soldiers of course get "a little something extra" in their blue helmets to use on the ladies.  Doctors get steadier work when cholera breaks out across boarders.  NGO's, not to be despaired, can then run in like superpeople with their willy activist agendas and hugs for all!  Rich people back in the West can feel good about themselves for donating their hard earned inheritances to saving those poor little starving babies with flies on them from dieing of diarrhea and an exploding toy.

Russia of course gets to call the US names.  Vlad gets to go bare chested on horseback again with a giant elephant bazooka talking about how he could single-handedly wrestle a US tank into submission with one handle while beating Obama and a gay guy in a game of spades with the other.  Of course during all this, Edward Snowdon sits by a cozy fireplace in Siberia reading Seven Habits of Highly Effective People with his new tennis playing model girlfriend - all the while feeling that much more secure that Russia won't give him up as a diplomatic pawn.  China, quietly and pensively sitting and watching this train wreck, gets to go on loaning money to the US, making billions of dollars on the interest payments, and gobbling up all the resources in the rest of Africa.

Back here in the US spirit is amazingly high! The poor, the black, the brown, and the hoorah type all get to go back to war!  The former alleviating their little unemployment issue by going into the army and getting their recently felony convictions for sneezing in a black neighbrhood pardoned and the right to vote back for becoming war heroes while defending our porous boarders from all evils foreign and Mexican!  The later of course, well, they get to kill a-rabs, towel heads, and Muslim jihadi heathens alike!  Hoorah!!  Government spending of course gets to be reallocated with more discretion towards its "rightful" allocations - away from programs for those dirty, lazy, no work wanting free loaders (high school seniors) and back where it belongs: putting those dirty, lazy, no work wanting free loaders into an aMerican ass kicking freedom fighting uniform! Hell yeah!!! But not only that, it stimulates the economy too!! The bumper sticker makers get to sell more "support the troops" and "my son Kicks Ass-ad" stickers! Flag and coffin makers prosper, the media gets to cover it all under a hale of advertising dollars, gas companies profits sore amidst rising prices and Canadian pipeline bliss! Shitty oil for all!! (obviously opposition drops to energy dependency amidst these blatant national security concerns.)  Hydro-Fracking companies obviously see opposition fall as well due to the precariousness of that pesky oil dependency issue. And of course in terms of sustainability this is the ultimate win-win for all involved!!  We get closer to resource independence, companies make billions of dollars (and create six new jobs for people in southeast Azerbaijan) and people in gas regions get free heat in their kitchens and bathrooms (save the cost of a match!).

I just think this is the greatest idea ever.  Let's do it.  Lets go kill more people.  I mean, why would they want to live?  Life sucks.  It was Buddha that said all life is suffering right?  So stop trying to fix it and just end it. We can all go to our chosen denoted parcel of heaven or the like right?  So I don't see any reason why we shouldn't just go ahead, send a couple innocent little strikes over there to the middle east.  Everyone wants it.  Men, women, children, they don't want to live. I mean, its gotta be really hot in those head scarves. Plus, what's a little peace in the middle east without a little spilled milk?  (except in Palestine, where they don't have any milk).  So Fuck it, lets just go kick ass and take money!  Hoorah!!

Oh... wait.  Yeah, I was just thinking about this from a human-centric perspective.  There is of course that whole earth thing to think about as well.  But now that you mention it, all in all, it wins out as well.  There'd end up being LESS PEOPLE, less population to consume it.  I mean, from cancer in Pennsylvania, to those pesky children in Palestine, to the dirty jihadi's in well... geez... everywhere it seems we get to wipe millions of people of the face of the earth.  I mean, yes, some would say it would come at the cost of a little climate change or "pollution" given the massive industrial ramp up to create war, fly around the world marketing it, and then rebuild everything afterwards.  But you know, when you really break that whole climate change thing down, that stuff isn't even really a proven science anyway!  So not so much of a worry after all!  Woo Hoo!!  Let's do it!  Hoorah!!

[beating of drums, beating of drums]

Thursday, March 28, 2013

Marriage Equality, The Same as any Equality?

I find this debate over same sex marriage incredible.  That is, that at this point in America's existence - and after all the social struggles we've been through - that we are even having this debate.  Just step back for one second from emotions and the flood of positioned journalism, and you will quickly see the problems with the existence of even having this debate.

If, as a logical foundation, you take each individual person and view them as their own personal and legal entity - which I believe is safe to say we as a country do - then each individual is one person, one human being, one legal entity.  Each one with rights, civil liberties, goals, dreams, aspirations, etc.  With this concept of a person in mind, we should theoretically all be treated in a way that allows us as individuals to interact, communicate, and enter into contracts and such with each other equally, and where one or another person should not be disallowed entrance into any type of interpersonal or legal engagement for whatever reason.

Yes, our laws create limitations to equality of entry on some issues.  But these issues are mostly based on economic grounds both stemming from a capitalist based social system and the creation, usage, and control of money (which is an inherent exclusionary barrier for those without it).  This barrier is however exclusionary in many ways both for haves and have-nots - especially if you look at money in a "value neutral" way.  Everyone can't apply for social services, everyone isn't taxed the same, everyone doesn't use state services like roads and police the same, just as those with money can buy, go places, and do things those without can not.  But capitalism and economics is a different story.  The point of this debate on marriage inequality is along the lines of race, sex, and creed - things the constitution and laws of the United States says we can not discriminate against.

I can not tell you that you can not do something simply because you are a woman, or black, or Asian, or whatever (though unfortunately people still try).  This issue with the marriage equality debate, and what makes it so absurd, is that to be against this type of equality is to try to say that you as a woman can not pick who you want to marry (or get benefits within a marriage) based solely on the sex of that person you marry.  Those against the allowance of marriage equality says that if I as a man marry a woman, not only am I allowed to do this, but I am entitled to certain things, certain legal benefits.  However, they then say that if I marry a man, then I am not entitled to these same benefits.

That inherently states through its inherent and unavoidable action and outcome that men and woman are NOT equal, or at least not legally of equal standing in United States based SOLELY on their gender and relationship to other genders.  The fundamental problem though is that if this were correct, does it not directly juxtapose a United States constitution that states that "all men [and presumably women] are created equal"?  By telling me that I can or can not marry another person based on no other reason than their gender, you are telling me that the sexes are not equal.  But while many people, including myself, may feel that a gross injustice of inequality exists between men and women in this country, especially in terms of outcomes, historical standing, current day power relationships, is it a fundamental and core value of the the United States that men and woman are NOT equal in one-to-one human terms?  Are not capable of entering freely into social and legal engagements with one an other?  Almost everything/one (including morals, ethics, and everything in between) tells us that this unequal stance is not only the wrong way for our country to proceed, but all together wrong on a basic human level of existence.

Marriage Equality is not a gay or straight issue, a sexual preference or what someone's kids call them issue, and it is most definitely not a "states rights" issue, it is a gender equity issue.  That every human being - no matter their gender - is of equal personal and legal standing to the next person and is legally allowed to interact with everyone in the exact same manner.  Of course, this gets tricky though in some senses.  Because I have NO idea what we're going to do moving forward.  God help us once corporations start trying to get married!!

Wednesday, March 20, 2013

The Back Door

I want to take a moment to examine the idea and conceptualization of the service entrance, the servant, and the segregating of social classes/places/people, etc.  In my recent work as a "delivery boy" for an upscale supermarket, I deliver food throughout Manhattan's midtown and upper east/west sides.  I spend my time going in and out of the buildings "service entrance", and entering apartments many times - especially in the older buildings - literally through the back door.  I have also been reading the People's History of the United States by Howard Zinn, and the two of them have gotten me thinking about the history of segregating out "servants", and the way that America has both reinvigorated and fostered over hundreds of years a class based society where the rich or "better off" do not have to see or come in contact with those they either see or place as their "inferiors".

Yes, I use this word "inferior" because as per my observations, this is the design of the concept of service entrances.  There are generally as I see it three uses of the service entrance/elevators.  One is construction, the hauling of materials, dirty men, and tools up to a construction site.  Two is moving/shipping and receiving in which people need a larger elevator or don't want giant sofa sets or bed frames to scratch up the main elevators.  Third is the day to day use for deliveries.  Pizza, groceries, whatever. 

All of these buildings that I am delivering to above five floors have both main elevators and service elevators, and NYC and the area I'm delivering in specifically has hundreds of these buildings.  They most all have doormen and elaborate teams of workmen (yes, almost always men) that run these buildings.  Sometimes this means over one hundred workers for one building.  There is a front entrance where the residents and their guests enter, where the doormen cater and fawn over any request (lest they not receive their Christmas tip money).  There is then a person at the service entrance checking people in and sending them on their way - with much less fan fair or niceties I assure you.  Some buildings let you come in the main entrance now and again, after hours, etc, and show much more openness with it.  Others are down right contemptuous about it.  Not to mention some tenants.  I was told two days ago by a doorman that he doesn't like one tenant because the tenant said to him "what are you doing in this elevator? You can't be in here."  The guy works there, sorts his mail, delivers the food he eats.

This attitude is certainly prevalent in many of these buildings.   And when I say these buildings, some of these buildings - especially those overlooking Central Park are incredible.  I was told by one elevator operator (yes, one person who's job it is to sit in the elevator all day and make sure the servants get where they are supposed to get to without getting into mischief , that not one person in the building had a net worth of less than one hundred million dollars - 15 Central Park West.  Amazing.  

Anyway, the real point that I would love to examine here is the construction of and the concept of a servant, and thus the segregation of servants from their "masters".  Why is it that the wealthy do not see it fit to co-mingle with their "inferior" servants?  It takes me back to the people's history, of the slaves, indentured servants, woman, and "Indians", upon who's backs this country was founded and developed upon.  For time immemorial these groups - all historically inclusive within the lower classes - have been entering through the back door.

What does this do to a society and to people?  Now I understand that there was certainly a history of cleanliness and such going back centuries, but in current day sanitary conditions we are all human beings carrying no more disease than the next person.  Yet still there is a purposefully constructed barrier between the classes in their residences.  Why is it that the servants are not treated as equals?  Why are they not allowed to use the same entrances and same elevators and same doors as everyone else?  Would the lobby become over crowded?  Would the people in these buildings be forced to address and see the lives servants lead, the people doing their work for them?  

To many people in these buildings, their goods and groceries seem to just appear.  They go shop, and then get home later and there are their groceries in the kitchen.  They don't care to know about the low income delivery person that carried all eight bags of their stuff through the alley and down the steps in the basement at the back of the building, tried to open the double security doors while hold the groceries, using their head when necessary, then struggled throughout the maze of the basement to find which elevator is that person's - while being monitored the whole time.  Up the elevator, with a guy to watch even as you knock on the back door service entrance to an apartment that covers an entire floor of a building over looking Central park.  The maid, or nanny, or housekeeper, accepts the groceries (and servants never really give a tip).  Then the meager delivery servant is sent upon his or her way.  shoo shoo...  Poof!!!  Your groceries are in your kitchen!!  Rich people (most anyone that lives in this area of Manhattan it seems to me really, and by global measure as well), don't want to know or see these people.  

Yes, there are average people, with single apartments that accept their own groceries and do give you a couple dollars, but the process in the building is the same.  You are subservient, beneath the residents.  You will enter through the back, be monitored, leave the things and go.  My real question and interest with this though is what has this created in terms of the separations of people and classes in a society, and in the creation of class based frames of reference and the construction of a view of the self.  For rich people to never see their servants means that they will never understand or see their lives.  That these people are regular, normal and intelligent people simply struggling to make their way in a world that has not been as kind to them as their masters.  That these are a group of people that have been institutionally suppressed and been made to either feel or see themselves as inferior.

With every building built, and every policy put in place that requires this continued segregation of the classes and people, our society perpetuates the concept of an underclass and an upperclass; that some people are beneath others.  Rather than creating a society based on equality and human dignity, we structurally induce hierarchical social arrangements and ignorance of other people and their lifestyles.  Not sure what kind of a melting pot that is.  

Friday, March 15, 2013

Political Profit

In filling out paperwork to register a non-profit company here in the US I have come cross what I see as a substantial problem with the legal structure of the American political landscape.  Of course the ability of corporations to act politically in much the same ways as people is an obvious one, but within the same spectrum, the inability of non-profits to engage politically is equally troubling.  The laws on this vary by state, but to incorporate as a standard 501(c)3 non-profit you must state that your company:
will not engage in prohibited political and legislative activity under 501(c)(3):
No substantial part of the activities of the corporation shall be the carrying on of propaganda, or otherwise attempting to influence legislation, and the corporation shall not participate in, or intervene in (including the publishing or distribution of statements) any political campaign on behalf of or in opposition to any candidate for public office. Notwithstanding any other provision of these articles, this corporation shall not, except to an insubstantial degree, engage in any activities or exercise any powers that are not in furtherance of the purposes of this corporation.
So a regular for-profit company can engage and influence politics all it wants, but a non-profit can not?  Is the profit motivation a necessary precursor for inclusion into today's public political sphere just as being white and male once was?   Now, I understand that many would say that there are conflict of interest issues here.  It could be said that allowing non-profit's - with their tax exempt status and a good deal of their funding usually coming from US government sources - political influence could be seen as "having their hand in the cookie jar".  Yes, of course it could be said that non-profits have every interest in influencing the political realm for their own benefit and that government money could then be circling back to influence the government itself.  Of course there is area for conflict and abuse here.  As we've seen of late, government cuts are defunding and destroying many programs that non-profit organizations live off of.  As a result of these cuts, they are hemorrhaging jobs, services, and capacity more and more every year.  Yet still, in the face of this onslaught, they have no specific capacity to lobby or influence the political process to stop this bloodletting and to be able to maintain their businesses and services.

Still, this voice is now doubly important.  It is these non-profits that are best positioned to pick up this slack and maintain innumerable services, once rendered for public good, as these government cuts and the rush to privatize disproportionately affects many already marginalized communities.  However, without any dedicated political voice in how or when these decisions are made these processes and our legislative apparatus favor those with exponentially more political influence, for-profit companies with the money to lobby for their interests.  The problem is that for-profit companies generally only get involved if they can make money.  Yet how much money can be made providing assistance to the poor, or meals on wheels to the elderly without money to pay for the services?  None really, that is, unless there is money or grants coming from the government.  Without a voice to be heard, the money and these services are more and more readily falling into the hands of for-profit companies (with their outsized voice) as opposed to those looking out for the public good.

The point here is that non-profits rely heavily on the political apparatus for survival, yet they have no ability to advocate for what they want or need.  This on the other hand, is exactly the opposite with for-profit companies.  They have both an incredible amount of political power and a tremendous conflict of interest.  This as well has recently been exacerbated by the Citizen's United decision that corporations are now considered "people" and allows them to contribute unlimited amounts of money to political campaigns.  These contributions continually garner corporations increased government subsidies on corn-based ethanol production and defense or pharmaceutical research, tax breaks/deductions/loopholes that in many cases result in net refunds for companies, and less and less regulations that "hamper" their business endeavors (even if they "serve the common good").  For-profit corporations push for road construction, policing, and patenting that benefits their own interests, they lobby for the use eminent domain to take private property for their own interests, and they help create labor laws that benefit their profits and own interests first and foremost above those of their workers.  The fact of the matter is that for-profit companies are just as largely funded and indebted to the Government as non-profits are.  Yet all companies do not get an equal say in their own economic climates or governance.  A not-for-profit company is still a company, still an economic engine, does it not deserve the same amount of power for political engagement?

One would think so.  But this however, illuminates the actual problem: that corporations in general have such an outsized influence over our political lives.  If we do live in a democracy - which is said to be "rule by the people" - then companies should not have influence in the political realm.  This sphere should be left to individuals, even if those individual are members of corporations who - in acting on behalf of their own economic interests - end up vicariously stumping for corporate interests.  This would still be an individual human interest, not a direct corporate one.  The problem though, is that we do not live in the democracy we'd like to think we do.  It should be simple, if a company is made up of individuals that have the right to vote, why then must a company have another say?  This could very easily be seen as allowing one person two ways to influence the government - both as a person and through a corporation.  This would of course be exclusionary though as most people do not have the clout, power, or resources to either influence politics on their own, let alone steer a company towards political influence via lobbying or through financial donations.

This power then becomes doubly worrisome if only for-profit companies having powers such as this as it innately puts companies with one type of interest - that of individualized profit maximization - as more important than another.  Thus, creating an inherent monopoly of political influence that minimizes what could prospectively be competing political voices such as those of community, family, environment, etc, that do not have personhood status or the capacity - either through legal or financial means - to influence political decision making or via for a person's vote.  Our laws thus inherently say that if you are motivated solely by individualized personal/corporate profit you can influence the (public) government, but if you are motivated by addressing things for the public, the good of the people on a whole, or the world we live in you may not.

It would seem doubly to me, that if one type of company is going to have a voice in our political sphere that all companies should have an equal say in any government that effects them.  If democracy will be circumvented by corporations, let them circumvent it equally.  This is of course only until we live in the true democracy that many of us aspire to.  Yes, the democracy "by the people and for the people" that we like to claim we live in, but don't.  Within the illusive true democracy of our dreams, I think it goes without saying that no corporation should be seen as a person - no matter whether they chase profit or the common good.  No corporation should be allowed to engaging in or propagandize within the political sphere.  Yes, this may open itself to numerous questions of structure ranging from how to manage "the media", to how industry would speak to power and allow for a prosperous business climate.  But I would rather see these debates transpire democratically through the people.  Throughout a democratic process that does not monopolize the voices of power in the hands of for-profit corporate interests.  Allow the people's voices to be heard, even if it has to start through diversifying the corporate megaphone to include non-profit organizations who's mandate rests in the interests of the common good.

Business - let alone for-profit business - is no more important than any other component of our society.  No more than a mother, a family, a community, the environment, the common good, me, or you.  Yet companies' voices disproportionately overshadow all other voices in our political sphere.  We must allow other interests to enter into the fray, allow our communities and individuals the ability to compete on an equal playing field with the financial goliaths barricaded within their glass castles.  People over profits, business as a part of communities, and one person, one vote.  


Tuesday, December 11, 2012

Midland Avenue


by Amy Miller

A few days ago I saw posts on Facebook that a community run relief hub at 489 Midland Avenue in Staten Island is being evicted by the city, with an ask to call the Public Advocate's office.

The next day, I received an email forwarded to me from someone who knows I know people at Occupy Sandy. It was from a staff member for the Public Advocate's office asking for more details about the hubs and why they are being shut down. They were concerned and want to help.

The phone number for Aiman Youssef, mentioned in the Facebook post about 489 Midland, didn’t seem to be working. I wondered why they didn’t ask the Mayor directly, or go to Staten Island to find out more themselves.

Yesterday, I got on the subway and the ferry and the Staten Island subway and got off at the closest stop to Midland Avenue.  I saw rows of empty houses, people cleaning them out, and piles of pieces of houses and people's lives.  I came to 489 Midland and tables with clothes and other supplies, a big sign that said Free Food, and a colorfully painted van giving out more food and supplies - it is a church group from Rochester.  Volunteers with yellow t-shirts saying Yellow Team.

I was there for 10 seconds when a reporter with a camera walked up to a gentle looking middle aged man standing eating mashed potatoes and meatloaf off a paper plate. The reporter asks him what organization he is with. He said no organization, "just people." They asked him again, is it a church? He's says "people, churches, everyone."  They asked him where Occupy Sandy is and he directed them to a building a few blocks away, and they left.

I walked up and said hi, and said that I found it funny that some people can't understand why you aren't with a group. He told me that the day after the storm they asked him who he was and he answered, "I am a man with a half-table."  I asked if they are trying to shut him down. He said they tried, but they couldn't. I asked why they would shut him down, he said that he thinks they are embarrassed, that they were not providing help themselves.

He told me proudly about Thanksgiving, saying that they had planned for 800 but had 4,000 show up. He said "Turkey's were coming from everywhere."  Today the group came from Rochester, yesterday from New Jersey.  He was worried about the kids who lost everything and trying to collect them toys. He did not seem worried about being shut down. He said "How can you tell a person not to help another person. You can't."  

I was about to leave and thought I still wasn't sure if this was the man the Public Advocate's office was looking for. I stuck out my hand and said "I'm Amy."  We shook hands and instead of giving me his name he asked me if I was on facebook, then pulled out his phone and searched for me. I said goodbye and as I walked away I accepted the friend request from Aiman Youssef.

I walked a few blocks passed the "restricted use" signs and saw a community center with tables, a few white tents like at a fair, a sign that says "free store" and some men BBQing and handing out food. I got closer and there was a phone charging station and guy from a phone company standing at the table. He smiled and said "I can charge your phone. And they are Occupy Sandy."  I went inside the gate and noticed some familiar faces.

Conversations are happening.  I hear there has been difficulty getting information out to neighbors and tensions involved in any diverse community, especially when emotions are high and resource scarce. Volunteers and community members in the free store are discussing what it means to take what one needs.  A friend is brainstorming with me about how to communicate needs and organize systems with so many sites, Occupy, other sites, and everything in between.

A few hours later I received another email forward from the Public Advocate's office with information from the Mayor's office. It denied that the sites are to be evicted, and explains that they are going to be condensed. It said that the city is concerned for the safety of volunteers, that hubs will be moved inside for the winter, and that volunteer hubs will be combined with city hubs.  It says that the need for food and clothing has dropped and "the city would like to get things back to normal."

What I saw today on Midland Avenue, is that everyone needs so much, because they have lost everything.  Things are not and cannot get back to normal. When you walk and see house after house that are uninhabitable and business after business that are closed, the most normal thing to come across is a group of tables with household items, clothing and food.  With donations coming in more slowly, the rest of the city forgetting about the storm, these hubs are literally life
savers to meet people's basic physical, emotional and social needs.  

A month ago, the government was unprepared for the seriousness of the storm or unmotivated to help those in the most vulnerable, far from the power centers of city and state.  Local communities and Occupy Sandy have been almost universally praised for immediate and respectful mutual aid efforts. They say now that what people need most is food and safe, healthy, warm, places to live. The government and large relief organizations who intend to help must prioritize respectful on-the-ground communication and community buy-in when making their logistical plans. The leaders of Occupy Sandy who are working in places like Staten Island, and men with half-tables on the sidewalk, are not only the heroes of this disaster but the experts.

Sunday, November 25, 2012

Hard Work

There is a myth floating around about Americans ability to "do work" that looks at the number of hours worked compared to other countries, the focus on jobs and professions, and the innate ideological "frontier" type rhetoric that assumes that American's are self made "hard workers".  Simply put, that those that work hard are destined for success in America.  This of course is a fallacy as there are myriad factors, both social and individual, that play in.  Perhaps a more constructive way to examine the individual's role as a worker would be to look less at what an individual themselves contributes in effort, but more at what or who their contribution is for or on - how targeted, well-placed, and strategic their efforts are.

If a person wakes up in early in the morning and finds a job to do around the house and works hard at it until it is completed successfully they can sit back at the end of the day with satisfaction of a good day, that they worked hard and accomplished something.  This is the same if a person wakes up, gets themselves ready for, and then heads to work at office jobs, construction jobs, as project managers, engineers, retail, whatever.  These individuals go to work where success is measured less in terms of the effort put in, but through daily affirmation from colleagues/customers, in upward mobility, future career standing, etc.  While hard work may gain them this affirmation, it is not as much about how hard they work, but rather by how specific and strategic they work.  Both of these people have put in a solid days work.  But our society values one more than the other.  Working at home is not a paying position, thus does not carry financial value in the same way as work for pay or with a career orientation.  It is not just that you work hard, but what you work at and what the outcomes of those jobs are.

It used to be that a person could live off of the land and work done anywhere had a value in terms of satisfying life's needs.  You produced your own sustainable existence   That is no longer the case for virtually all of America and much of the world.  We now live in a "capitalized" world.  Our society is no longer based on "use-values" but strictly on "exchange values".  And the means of this exchange is based on money.  You have to make money to be able to exchange it for things even to barter with (or you can use debt, but that is another story, and still requires monetary capacity to obtain debt).  Thus if being able to have things is paramount to success and even more so to survival, whether you are a hard worker or not does not matter.  It is in fact whether you are the "right" kind of worker.

The capitalist system is based on capital being distributed throughout a local area, the globe, whatever and finding the cheapest or most efficient way of producing marketable things.  This capital - or the ones that control this capital - have power in this situation and can dictate what needs to be done both on a macro scale and in individual projects (companies), and jobs.  Thus if "the boss" or "the man" tells you this is the way something has to be done, or what needs to be done, then that is what is important, that is where your value as a worker comes from and where your value as a business asset lies.  It is not in your ability to work hard, this is a secondary factor.  For if you work hard, but do not do the job the way it is asked to be done, you are not a good worker.  You may be given some respite if they saw that you worked hard, but you will not find long term success if you keep doing the job "wrong" or for the "wrong" people, i.e. not the way the powerful capitalist reigning over you deems "right".  Therefore if you want to be successful, it is not about working hard, but continually doing what you are told and then working hard at doing it the way you are told.

This differentiates a lot of people in our society.  A hard worker does everything with a sense of drive and pride in their "productive output" whether their "job" is for "the man" or simply for themselves, their family, friends  whoever.  They approach even the mundane task with a sense of urgency and care that is guaranteed to do a decent job that doesn't cut corners or leave things undone.  A strategic worker works hard when it benefits them directly, and slacks off when it doesn't benefit them.

The problem here lies in that the strategic worker is one that will garner success in the capitalist system.  They do what they must to move forward in the capitalist system, yet may lack the integrity to move forward in another system.  Yes integrity is a strong word.  But isn't putting a genuinely solid effort into everything you do about the integrity of what you are as a human being?  When no one is watching do you cut corners, do you work hard?  When it "doesn't matter" financially or socially do you "work hard"?

No our society isn't made up of hard workers, it is made up of "strategic" workers.  They work when they must to move ahead - or simply survive - in this society.  There are plenty of workers that are actually much harder workers than so many other people but end up with little to show for it in material terms, lagging behind others of perhaps more questionable effort and principle.  The hard worker works hard at everything, and gains satisfaction from the mirror - not the pocket book.

This is even further exacerbated if they work hard in some capacity that runs against the social grain; that someone works towards altering the flow of the capitalist torrent.  Then no matter how hard they work, they are virtually guaranteed "failure" (as per our neoliberal societal measures).  There is no money in changing the system, no matter how hard you work at it.  It is inherently contradictory for a system not to maintain itself, to not self-perpetuate itself through its own unique and intricate system of social and cultural mores, rewards, and controls that maintain and expand upon its own unique status quo, its "equilibrium".  In Capitalism it is wage-labor, career success.  We also wrestle with religious and social factors, nationalism, prejudism, sexism, classism, etc.  But logically, any agent that works to change a system will not inherently be rewarded by that concurrent system unless that current system is in fact change itself.  That actor is bound to struggle and in our society today that individual is bound to be looked at as someone that "can't just put their head down and work hard".  That can't just "fit in and do as their told".  No, maybe they can't do that, but it is because the concept of a hard worker and "putting your head down" does not take into account what they're working on, only that someone in a position of (currently) Capitalist power deemed to be important.  If you're not working hard for them, as they want, you are looked at as not being a hard worker.  This is however so tremendously far from the truth.  Hard workers work hard no matter what they do or why, not just because they are told to or it strategically benefits their broader interests.  It is simply the way they do things.  If only our social and economic systems could perpetuate hard honest work over strategic shortcuts that don't bare as nice a reflection in the mirror...