Must read- Instead of being disgusted by poverty, we are disgusted by poor people themselves

[malaise]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/feb/16/suzanne-moore-disgusted-by-poor
<snip>
At what point, though, can we no longer avoid the poor, our own and the global poor? Or, indeed, avoid the concept that frightens the left as much as the right: redistribution, of wealth, resources, labour, working hours. Whither the left? Busy pretending that there is a way round this, a lot of the time.

The idea that ultimately the poor must help themselves as social mobility grinds to a halt is illogical; it is based on a faith for which there is scant evidence. Yet it is the one thing that has genuinely "trickled down" from the wealthy, so that many people without much themselves continue to despise those who are on a lower rung.

The answer to poverty, you see, lies with the poor themselves, be they drain-dwellers, Greeks, disabled people, or unemployed youth. We will give them bailouts, maybe charity, and lectures on becoming more entrepreneurial. The economy of empathy has crashed, and this putsch is insidious and individualised. No more cruel to be kind. We must be simply cruel.

The argument that there is enough to go round is now a fairytale, like winning the lottery. Poverty is not a sign of collective failure but individual immorality. The psychic coup of neo-liberal thinking is just this: instead of being disgusted by poverty, we are disgusted by poor people themselves. This disgust is a growth industry. We lay this moral bankruptcy at the feet of the poor as we tell ourselves we are better than that.

[stockholmer]

1. "The idea that ultimately the poor must help themselves as social mobility grinds to a halt" MADNESS

[xchrom]

2. if money is a 'resource' -- and that 'resource' is becoming more scarce --

even a little bit right now -- it will have psychological impacts on the population.

[tblue37]

49. Money is not a "resource," but a convention--i.e., a set of agreed upon expectations.

As it stands now, most “money” doesn’t even exist as objects in the physical world, but rather as a series of ones and zeroes in computers.

[xchrom]

51. I put it in quotations for a reason - for ordinary people

Money is a resource that has become more scarce - In particular in the western societies.

Squeezes on wages are most notable.

[tblue37]

52. Agreed. nt

[n2doc]

3. k n r

Exactly what is happening in the US too. Led by RW hate radio and cable tv.

[dkf]

4. To the contrary...we are seeing a huge movement in the advance of the poor of the world in China

and India and other emerging countries. But then we scream that they are taking our jobs.

The hard working and newly educated poor are starting to see the fruits of their labor. Its the poor who can't, don't or won't take advantage of educational resources that aren't budging.

[PotatoChip]

5. The undeserving poor. Blame the victims.

Nice.

[dkf]

7. The number of people China has moved out of poverty equals the entire population of the US.

The poor of the world are advancing. We just don't want to see it.

That isn't blaming the victim, that is acknowledging success and what it takes to achieve success.

[libtodeath]

16. By whose figures

and what actually determines what poverty is in China?

[dkf]

18. UN program

http://www.undp.org.cn/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&catid=18&topic=4&sid=4354&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0

[libtodeath]

21. But it doesnt

define poverty as it relates to that society so could be an apple and oranges argument.
Their well off could still be as bad as our poor.

[dkf]

22. Well this report is already old and we know Chinese GDP is healthy.

If anything it's better than presented.

[sudopod]

29. I've got $10,000 that says you wrote that on a Mac. :3 nt

[Zalatix]

61. China's middle class was built by taking jobs from educated Americans.

Which means the poor of America are not advancing. Their success has come from robbing America.

This will end soon - because we will run out of jobs to rob. And then China will collapse.

[dkf]

63. China's internal demand is starting to get to a point that can be sustaining.

[Zalatix]

64. Then if this is true we can take our jobs back and save our workers, right?

[eShirl]

8. it's the jobs, not education alone

a degree won't feed you when there are no jobs

[dkf]

12. I do think that Government has a role to play in creating a field that is conducive to hiring.

Beyond that we've seen the limits of what can be done even when we've got great intentions to create jobs.

If government jobs solved economic problems, Greece wouldn't be in the situation they are in. They had a huge government sector.

[lumberjack_jeff]

41. If government jobs didn't solve economic problems

you'd be typing this on a typewriter and posting it on nearby fences.

Government jobs are the foundation, the infrastructure, of the economic system.

[Zalatix]

62. the poster you're replying to = yet another free trader who finds that NOBODY agrees with him.

[geckosfeet]

10. Right. As if all the farmer peasants in China suddenly got a bacehlors degree in engineering

or economics.

Education in this country is meant to serve industry. Teach the drones to run the machines and do the paperwork for minimum wage. All this does is increase the number of working poor and provide income streams for banks and other college loan institutions - if the drone can afford to pay back the loan.

Real education is reserved for the upper classes, the elites ad the rich or perhaps those who they deem worthy.

Like Carlin said, it's called the American dream because you have to be asleep to believe it.

[dkf]

15. For those without education, diligence, flexibility and skill can work too.

Apple’s executives believe the vast scale of overseas factories as well as the flexibility, diligence and industrial skills of foreign workers have so outpaced their American counterparts that ‘Made in the U.S.A.’ is no longer a viable option for most Apple products.”

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/apples_china_comes_home_to_haunt_us_20120216/

If you are poor and don't have those traits, it will be much harder.

[geckosfeet]

17. "Apple's executives" - enough said there.

[dkf]

19. Aka employer

[geckosfeet]

20. Yes. Worship and grovel at their feet for a few crumbs.

[dkf]

24. Crumbs = a job? Is it really that insignificant to you?

[LiberalLoner]

28. The people in China are slaves. So much so the Foxcon site had to put up nets to stop the suicides

If you are saying that's what we need to do here in the US - become slave labor in order to become competitive - I am horrified by the idea of the entire world being nothing but slaves leading hellish lives just in order to create wealth for the 1%.

[lumberjack_jeff]

39. If "made in the usa" isn't a viable option for apple, "sold in the usa" shouldn't either. n/t

[Zalatix]

42. If "made in the usa" isn't a viable option for apple, "sold in the usa" shouldn't either. REPEAT!!!

Repeat 300 million times!

[PA Democrat]

26. Gresham's dynamic, not lazy poor people in the US is responsible for the outsourcing of jobs.

Gresham's dynamics: a process in which bad ethics drive good ethics out of the marketplace. The Gresham's dynamic tilts the world in favor of fraudulent firms operating in fraud-friendly nations. It also tilts the world against workers in the developed world.


From an article on Apple by economist William Black in response to an Apple executive's claim that the US was not producing employees with the skills that Apple needed:


The statement seems to be absurd. The U.S. produces people with the substantive skills to manufacture iPhone and iPad components. Most of the jobs are low skill processes involving tasks learned at the job site by workers with no job experience. America has millions of unskilled workers. The real argument is about our supply of engineers, which is limited. But the kicker is the unusual skills that Apple's suppliers are looking for in their engineers and managers. The suppliers want engineers and managers who will selectively apply their substantive skills. American engineers and managers cannot be counted on to provide the necessary selectivity. Apple's suppliers' often seek managers willing to order their workers to exceed the lawful workweek, to refuse to pay them for significant portions of the wages they have earned, to unlawfully employ child labor, and even to coerce abortions. American managers are often unreliable in terms of their willingness to engage in these forms of illegality. American engineers are generally even more unsuited than American managers for exercising the selectivity required of engineers working for Apple's suppliers. Apple's suppliers must recruit engineers and senior managers who are willing, as the second NYT article illustrated, to produce high quality components, cheaply, with limited regard for worker safety if safety would impair either of the primary goals.

In January 2010, workers at a Chinese factory owned by Wintek, an Apple manufacturing partner, went on strike over a variety of issues, including widespread rumors that workers were being exposed to toxins. Investigations by news organizations revealed that over a hundred employees had been injured by n-hexane, a toxic chemical that can cause nerve damage and paralysis.

The engineer did not order the workers to use the nerve poison because he hated the workers. It was "just business." The nerve poison reduced cleaning time, so an engineer knowingly ordered the workers to use it and scores of other engineers did nothing to prevent the usage. U.S. engineers have the skills to recognize the greater efficiency of forcing workers to use a nerve poison to clean the screens. However, even if motivated solely by concerns about their own health, it is difficult to believe that more than a handful of American engineers would have ordered workers to use a nerve poison to clean the screens.

The second article also gives the example of aluminum dust at two of Apple's suppliers. The Chinese engineers had the technical ability to know that the dust posed a high risk of explosion. The Chinese managers at one of the suppliers were expressly warned that the build-up of aluminum dust posed an immediate risk of explosion. The managers and the engineers refused to act on their expertise, in response to the warning, or even (in the case of the plan with the second explosion), in response to the explosion of aluminum dust. It would have been expensive, however, to close the plants and fix the problem and Apple was demanding the fastest conceivable delivery of the new generation products, so the engineers had to use their expertise to improve the quality of the components and produce them faster while not using their expertise to protect the workers from what could have been catastrophic explosions. Apples' suppliers do not trust American engineers to ignore the risk to workers in order to increase production efficiency.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/william-k-black/congress-threatens-to-sow_b_799016.html

[hifiguy]

31. Well said. +1 nt.

[CreekDog]

38. Stop pitting the poor in China against the middle class here --it's not a zero sum game

in Europe they've figured out how to have modern economies, eradicate poverty as we know it (or it's worst effects at least), maintain a highly educated population and workforce, employ people in high talent and high paying jobs.

somehow they've done it. the idea that our dwindling middle class must face poverty so that Chinese people can leave poverty is ridiculous.

BOTH can improve their standards of living.

[Zalatix]

44. You deny that our jobs are moving to India and China? Or that it's impoverishing our people?

We're being made poor to improve other nations.

What happens when America runs out of blood to give?

[jwirr]

46. So exactly what kind of education should my severely disabled daughter who is a victim of water

pollution by farm chemicals try to get? You are right that China's poor are working but they are also mostly still poor.

[geckosfeet]

6. Hmmph. At some point the poor will help themselves - just not in the way we expect.

At some point, when the economic divide is at an even greater level of obscenity, the poor will take what they need because they will have nothing to lose.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/feb/16/suzanne-moore-disgusted-by-poor

Three years ago I was on a panel with Vince Cable at The Convention of Modern Liberty, when Cable was still reckoned a seer for predicting the recession. He said then that the financial crisis would mean civil liberties would be trampled on. But what stuck in my mind was a sentence he mumbled about the pre-conditions for fascism arising. Scaremongering? The emotional pre-condition is absolutely this punitive attitude to the weak and poor.

Our disgust at the poor is tempered only by our sentimentality about children. They are innocent. We feel charitable. Not enough, perhaps, as a Save the Children report tells us that one in four children in developing countries are too malnourished to grow properly. Still, malnourishment isn't starvation, just as anyone who has a mobile phone isn't properly hard-up. Difficult to stomach maybe, but isn't all this the fault of the countries they live in?

At what point, though, can we no longer avoid the poor, our own and the global poor? Or, indeed, avoid the concept that frightens the left as much as the right: redistribution, of wealth, resources, labour, working hours. Whither the left? Busy pretending that there is a way round this, a lot of the time.

The idea that ultimately the poor must help themselves as social mobility grinds to a halt is illogical; it is based on a faith for which there is scant evidence. Yet it is the one thing that has genuinely "trickled down" from the wealthy, so that many people without much themselves continue to despise those who are on a lower rung.

Eventually, the poor will learn to despise those who have despised them. Eventually they will determine a way to level the field.

on edit: added excerpt and following comment

[dkf]

9. So let's say they do take it at a point of uprising...

How does that ensure they will get those things in the future? It seems very short term thinking and not a very productive long term solution for getting what you need to have a good life.

[geckosfeet]

11. I do not pretend to know the mindset of the poor. And clearly you have not a clue either.

I would simply cite history. Depression era Germany, Italy and Europe for example. Not saying this is an ideal to aspire to, but one has to recognize that desperate people will take desperate measure.

[Redstate Bluegirl]

13. Yet there but for the Grace of God.....

Good post.

[SammyWinstonJack]

23. Exactly what those who have little themselves but are not yet on the lowest rung

do not get.

Yet there but for the Grace of God...

Never thinking that it could happen to them and if it does, it surely won't be their fault, not like the poor who they now look down on.

[GoCubsGo]

66. Bingo!

Funny you should say that. Yesterday on my Facebook newsfeed, a former co-worker posted some bullshit meme about wanting their taxes refunded because they didn't want to pay for drug-addicts, people in prison, blah, blah, blah, and unemployed people. Well, the only reason this jackass is working is because of his twit wife got him his current job. Otherwise, he'd likely be unemployed, himself right now. And, this is a guy who only has a high school diploma, and is working in a place where most people have, at minimum, a bachelors degree.

[pampango]

14. Demonization (of the poor, public employees, union members, liberals, gays, etc.) a key RW tactic.

Rather than simply promote their own favorite conservative policy choices, e.g. breaking unions, slashing the safety net, cutting taxes for the rich, etc., RW'ers have realized that successfully demonizing their targets makes winning these battles much easier.

[Solly Mack]

25. K&R

[slackmaster]

27. Neither of those disgust me. I am disgusted by bad behavior, no matter who does it, or how much...

...money they have.

[sudopod]

30. Well, as long as you are properly disgusted

at something.

[slackmaster]

32. Just keep your sudopod off my chitinous exoskeleton and we'll get along fine

[sudopod]

33. :) nt

[stockholmer]

34. lol

[Kellerfeller]

37. +1

[PhoenixAbove]

35. K&R

snark on :Great... if you can help yourself. snark : off

I can't. I'm disabled. Do you know I actually had one asshat (not here) ask me how I could afford the Internet. I used to be middle class. When I was better off I had a computer. I still have it. I'm on the Internet because I have no phone or cable TV. I had to chose between them and since I already had the computer, the net just seemed like the right choice. Why should I have to explain myself?

It seems some people just don't like it when the poor have the nerve to talk back at them.

[woo me with science]

36. K&R

[Zalatix]

40. It's called Social Darwinism, and it's making a big comeback.

[RainDog]

43. k&r n/t

[jwirr]

45. Of course we are back in the Calvanist era where the poor are sinners being punished for their sins.

That is part of the basis for rw theology. In my opinion they are full of it.

[Uncle Joe]

47. I believe that "disgust" is based on fear. The fear of becoming poor leads to an emotional barrier

being erected subconciously in some people's minds as a means of physchological protection seperating themselves from that which they fear becoming, poor.

This same fear can be easily exploited or manipulated by evil scaremongers in dehumanizing the poor and in turn leading to fascism.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/feb/16/suzanne-moore-disgusted-by-poor

"Three years ago I was on a panel with Vince Cable at The Convention of Modern Liberty, when Cable was still reckoned a seer for predicting the recession. He said then that the financial crisis would mean civil liberties would be trampled on. But what stuck in my mind was a sentence he mumbled about the pre-conditions for fascism arising. Scaremongering? The emotional pre-condition is absolutely this punitive attitude to the weak and poor."

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________


I believe that's part of the reason, FDR said this.

Thanks for the thread, malaise.

[suffragette]

56. Was about to post the same point and see you already did

And stated much better than I would likely have done.

+ 1,000 Uncle Joe

[malaise]

57. Thanks for those links Uncle Joe

[LeftishBrit]

48. k&r

[Starry Messenger]

50. k&r

[etherealtruth]

53. another K and R

[Rex]

54. Interesting.

nt.

[WillyT]

55. HUGE K & R !!! - Thank You !!!

[veness]

58. K & R ! n/t

[varelse]

59. K&R

[liberalhistorian]

60. There was a placard saying being shared on FB

the other day that I proudly passed around. It asked "When did the War on Poverty become the War on the Poor?"

USA Today had an excellent op-ed piece Wednesday about the criminalization of and crackdown against the homeless in too many areas of the country. It pointed out that far too many of the homeless are veterans, the mentally ill and young families with children. It discussed the role of the economic and housing downturn in the growing numbers of homeless and described the vicious circle that often keeps them in homelessness. The criminalization of homelessness means that, when they're arrested for sleeping outdoors, as many cities are now doing (if they're homeless and shelters are full, just where the fuck else are they supposed to fucking sleep?), an arrest record will often prevent them from getting a job or renting a place.

[dajoki]

65. K&R