Guest guest Posted June 8, 2009 Report Share Posted June 8, 2009 Mark wrote: " Most poor people in the U.S. are working poor. They work, often in multiple jobs, but they are still poor. Only a minority of U.S. poor do not work. " responded: " Public school is offered to everyone. There is no reason (besides disability) even in the worst schools, why a person cannot receive a decent education. There is no reason (besides disability) why a person cannot, even in the most economically deprived neighborhoods, rise above their station in life and earn more money than it takes to sustain them. " American history has proven repeatedly that even someone who is born into abject poverty can rise up to a much better position in life when they are convinced they are deserving of more than abject poverty. For example, the following Americans found ways to rise above their 'station' in life, so to speak. With little in the way of a formal education, Louis Chevrolet learned car design while working for Buick and started designing his own engine for a new car in 1909. He sold his half interest in Chevrolet 6 years later to his partner, Durant, who already owned Buick. Yes, he died nearly penniless in the end but the years in between were far from destitute for him. " " Durant dropped out of high school to work in his grandfather's lumberyard. By 1885 he had partnered with Josiah Dort to create the Coldwater Road Cart Company. During the late 1920s Durant started construction on his own personal castle in northern Michigan. He lived his last few years on a modest pension from his time at General Motors however the yeras in between were far from destitute for him as well. Thirteen-year-old Eddie Rickenbacker's schooling ended in grade seven after the accidental death of his father in 1904. He found jobs to help support the family. Driven by an intense admiration for machines, Rickenbacker taught himself as much as he could, including enrolling in a correspondence course in engineering. In 1927, he bought the Indianapolis Motor Speedway where he had raced cars so often in the past. He merged Eastern Air Transport with Florida Airways to form Eastern Air Lines, an airline that eventually grew from a company flying a few thousand air miles per week into a major international transportation company. In April 1938, after learning that GM was considering selling Eastern to D. Hertz, Rickenbacker met with GM's Chairman of the Board, Alfred P. Sloan, and bought the company himself for $3.5 million. His retirement years were well funded to say the least. Abraham Lincoln was born in 1809 to two uneducated farmers homesteading in a one-room log cabin and we all know what became of Abraham Lincoln! " Ya, ya, ya, " you're probably saying, " but those are the working poor from forever ago. " How about Barack Obama then? He was born at the Kapi'olani Medical Center for Women & Children in Honolulu, Hawaii to a Kenyan father and an American mother from Wichita, Kansas. His parents divorced when he was 2 and her second marriage didn't last either. A single working mom, she was employed as an archeological field worker which isn't exactly a case of earning wages that allow the family to live high off the hog. It would appear that even in this generation, someone from the working poor side of the tracks can, if he or she is determined to do so, make it out of being part of the working poor and climb to a loftier financial position in life. So, Mark, when you state that " most poor people in the U.S. are working poor " and " [t]hey work, often in multiple jobs, but they are still poor " have you taken the time to ask yourself what, if anything, those working poor have done for themselves and their families to better their financial situation? Raven Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 8, 2009 Report Share Posted June 8, 2009 A minority of folks have the chance opportunities and twists of luck in, life that make these stories. Most don't. Have you taken the time to ask yourself why there aren't tens of thousands of stories like those? when you state that " most poor people in the U.S. are working poor " and " [t]hey work, often in multiple jobs, but they are still poor " have you taken the time to ask yourself what, if anything, those working poor have done for themselves and their families to better their financial situation? > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 8, 2009 Report Share Posted June 8, 2009 Hi; I've watched this thead with interest. (having met people who refuse things like financial counselling to help manage their resources, and others who learn what they need, to do more than just survive) 1. Maybe some are able to rise above their peers (friends, relatives etc) and make the most of opportunities, Some are encouraged by parents teachers etc, some are also very inner directed. 2. while others chose to stay 'down' by not moving beyond their peers. staying in poverty and lack of education, whether due to an inner lack of motivation or lack of outer encouragement or both? renaissanzelady "My cat Rusty is a servant of the Living God."(adapted from a poem by Smart) Subject: Re: Now: Points of view.To: FAMSecretSociety Received: Monday, June 8, 2009, 12:03 PM A minority of folks have the chance opportunities and twists of luck in, life that make these stories. Most don't. Have you taken the time to ask yourself why there aren't tens of thousands of stories like those?when you state that "most poor people in the U.S. are working poor" and " [t]hey work, often in multiple jobs, but they are still poor" have you taken the time to ask yourself what, if anything, those working poor have done for themselves and their families to better their financial situation?> Yahoo! Canada Toolbar : Search from anywhere on the web and bookmark your favourite sites. Download it now! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 8, 2009 Report Share Posted June 8, 2009 " A minority of folks have the chance opportunities and twists of luck in, life that make these stories. Most don't. Have you taken the time to ask yourself why there aren't tens of thousands of stories like those? " Luck is rare. Luck is fickle. It's what you do with what you have and what you are given that determines one's ability to succeed. Not everyone who's lucky rises from the ashes to success either. Some win the lottery and blow their winnings over a very short time period. Administrator Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 9, 2009 Report Share Posted June 9, 2009 environmental1st2003 wrote: >>I said that certain aspects put forth by Marx and Engels were appealing. I did not say that I liked Marxism itself.<< : What aspects do you find appealing? >>Neither are necessary or needed in this day and age. We have sufficient laws in place to protect both minorities and the disabled. As with any minority or other subjugated group, part of over-coming one's subjugation is to prove one's worth to society so that one may become accepted by it.<< I dislike the basic dynamics of neoclassical (neoliberal) philosophy, i.e., global capitalism. The problem, as I see it, is not so much with the positions of minorities in Western societies. It is with the dominance of global capitalism. That is, by the way, the substance of what I teach in my Social Problems classes. Most of us where I work (at least full-time faculty), including me, teach that course from a Marxian perspective. >>The only minority which seems to have trouble with integration are African Americans. For some odd reason they are disliked and distrusted by nearly every minority in the US.<< The ancestors of most African Americans came to this country against their wills. The plantation system, especially in the Mid South (Western Tennessee, Mississippi, etc.), destroyed the Black family. >>Autistics have value, but they need to demonstrate that value for others, not by suing for it, or demanding it, like an irate and irritated child demanding undeserved desserts in between soup kitchen meals, but by raising awareness.<< Consciousness-raising entails understanding one's position in the matrix of social domination and taking responsibility to become emancipated from it. >>Public school is offered to everyone. There is no reason (besides disability) even in the worst schools, why a person cannot receive a decent education. There is no reason (besides disability) why a person cannot, even in the most economically deprived neighborhoods, rise above their station in life and earn more money than it takes to sustain them.<< Poverty in the U.S. is multidimensional. Education is not the only obstacle. It is the intersection of these obstacles which are problematic. >>I used to work for a firm that regularly received demographic information from actuarials, and the profile of the working poor was quite pathetic. Without spin doctors, these are people that one could hardly pity. They fritter away opportunities for education when it is given to them. They may have TVs or radios, but chose not to watch or listen to educational programming.<< How many people watch educational programming? As I said, the problem are multidimensional. Poor people do not, by and large, want to be poor. However, they often become frustrated (and even give up) after experiencing repeated disappointments. They are, like the rest of us, human. >>When given the option between eating healthy foods and junk foods, they choose the junk foods. They take poor care of themselves medically speaking. They have more kids than they can afford, make unwise financial decisions, and can stretch their money only so far because they are unable to resist temptations such as alcohol, drugs, cigarettes, lottery tickets, and wagering/gambling.<< Eating junk foods is not limited to the poor. Americans in general have an awful diet. Taking poor medical care is a result of not being able to afford adequate health care. The poor may be poor. That does not mean they are stupid. U.S. poor, contrary to media-driven popular beliefs, have the *lowest* number of children per family of any economic sector. >>The worst of it is, they are most inclined to vote people into office who are just like themselves, which is why certain aldermanic wards in big cities are perpetually poor from generation to generation while adjacent wards with upwardly mobile people in them continue to improve.<< I do not expect politicians to do much to fix anything. They are working within the same deficient structure which has produced the problems. >>Maxism tries to be the great leveler of society, and at the expense of the people who do the hard work. Going back to the GM example, what ought to happen is that the proletariat workers who have exploited the bourgeoisie ought to have their benefits cut, their pensions denied, and their wages cut so that their company can be competitive with Japanese auto-makers, whose workers work harder for less money.<< Proletarian workers exploit the bourgeoisie? How can you believe that and still say that you find certain aspects of Marxism to be appealing? You have just rejected its major premise. -- Mark A. , Ph.D. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 9, 2009 Report Share Posted June 9, 2009 Raven: >>American history has proven repeatedly that even someone who is born into abject poverty can rise up to a much better position in life when they are convinced they are deserving of more than abject poverty.<< >>With little in the way of a formal education, Louis Chevrolet learned car design while working for Buick and started designing his own engine for a new car in 1909. He sold his half interest in Chevrolet 6 years later to his partner, Durant, who already owned Buick. Yes, he died nearly penniless in the end but the years in between were far from destitute for him.<< There are always people who are able to move up the social class ladder. In some cases, as with Oprah Winfrey, it relates to getting the right breaks (combined with basic intelligence and drive). However, most people are just average. >>So, Mark, when you state that " most poor people in the U.S. are working poor " and " [t]hey work, often in multiple jobs, but they are still poor " have you taken the time to ask yourself what, if anything, those working poor have done for themselves and their families to better their financial situation?<< Working multiple jobs? -- Mark A. , Ph.D. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 9, 2009 Report Share Posted June 9, 2009 maurice wrote: " A minority of folks have the chance opportunities and twists of luck in, life that make these stories. Most don't. Have you taken the time to ask yourself why there aren't tens of thousands of stories like those? " As a matter of fact, I have asked countless people over the years why they haven't been able to climb out of the hole they claim to be in and with only a very small handful of exceptions, the answers have all strongly underscored a lack of commitment to the themselves as individuals as well as to their family (if they have a spouse and/or children). Some of the responses heard repeatedly include: " It's too hard to go back to school at this point in my life. I'm too old. " " I feel stupid telling people I don't know much about [insert identified subject here]. " " Learning stuff that's going to get me a better paying job is going to interfere with my weekends / paryting / down time / [insert excuse]. " " I want something that's going to make me rich faster. " " I only get [interest rate] on my investment and that's not enough. Besides I really want a [insert latest craze toy here]. " " People are going to laugh at me if I go back to school now / change careers. " " People are going to think I'm a snob if I don't party with them on weekends. We've been doing this for [insert proper number for the individual] years. " " I don't wany anyone to think I'm getting uppity. " " I was thinking of buying a lottery ticket instead. I heard that the Powerball / 6-49 / whatever lotto is in your area is a whopping [insert ridiculous number here]. " What I have found is that those who had humble beginnings who made it out of the working poor ghetto actually applied themselves and didn't really give a hoot what their partying friends thought of them or their efforts. What mattered to those people was getting ahead in life. Raven Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 9, 2009 Report Share Posted June 9, 2009 Raven wrote: " So, Mark, when you state that " most poor people in the U.S. are working poor " and " [t]hey work, often in multiple jobs, but they are still poor " have you taken the time to ask yourself what, if anything, those working poor have done for themselves and their families to better their financial situation? " Mark responded: " Working multiple jobs? " Since working multiple jobs has proven ineffective for those individuals who are still part of the working poor, they have not done anything to better their financial situation. Improving one's self and education in order to earn more or secure a better paying job would be an example of an individual doing something to better their financial situation. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. In other words, if you continue as you always have with the level of education you have always had, you will always rise to the same heights you have risen to in the past. Working multiple jobs only proves that someone can do the same job twice in the same 24 hour period. That doesn't do much at all for improving one's financial situation at all. Raven Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 9, 2009 Report Share Posted June 9, 2009 Probably for the same reason a lot of the perpetually poor remain that way: they believe in destiny and entitlement, and do such statistically stupid things as play the lottery, which a college math teacher I had joked was " voluntary taxation for the mathematically inept " and as such, stupidity for people that do take such chances that are statistically highly improbable, while not taking the necessary chances to be recognized as a worker that puts their body, mind and soul into their jobs, thereby making their " luck " instead of waiting for it to go by them on the ship that comes in... eventually. The reality is this: if you take chances, sure, you might end up still being poor, but at least you'll have a much better chance (assuming it is a chance that requires work, instead of the laziness of state-sponsored gambling or anything like it) of actually getting something: if you have any understanding of the Bible, consider the parable of the talents as a good example of that. What kind of chances am I talking about? Those that are based in wisdom and intelligence: work a bit harder for someone, and take all opportunities possible to self-educate above what you currently know about something that may be marketable, and take risks of being inventive, and be willing and able to put forth the effort of creating something new, even though " that can't be done, things don't work that way! " conventional wisdom would indicate otherwise. Here's the thing: all of these things take some amount of time and effort on the person involved, which, admittedly, if they choose incorrectly, may never get them rewarded in any monetary manner, but, at least they'll have the satisfaction of having expanded their horizons and even if they've failed to achieve some arbitrary goal of financial success, at least they'll have been a successful failure, where they made an effort and legitimately failed, rather than a failure failure, where they whine about how they never managed to do something, merely because they never even tried. A more common example of people that have made it (or not) involve those that dream of becoming professional athletes: to some degree, sure, this requires the physiology to achieve top ranking, but there's even been statistically-improbable (read: abnormally short) professional US basketball players, while being no Jordan, have nonetheless " made it " despite the " disability " of being runts in the game, and even that of being unusually short for the general male population (Spud Webb, IIRC is the name that comes to mind). A lot of professional sports athletes get where they get and are very successful, completely in spite of money: how do they do it? The same way you get to Carnegie Hall: Practice! Practice! Practice! I can't recall the title of the book, or study, or whatever it was that named this, but I remember reading/hearing on TV or online that someone deciphered the biggest key to success at any given task where you can become really good/proficient at it: it requires at least 10,000 hours of dedicated effort. Curiously enough, a college education, if it isn't something you can already whiz through, will often require at least that many hours of in-class and other studying to earn a bachelor's degree. Hmmm.... Here's the thing: even those that work 80 hours per week (far from being uncommon in the US, for various reasons) still have plenty of other hours left in the day, after taking care of eating, sleeping, etc. that they can spend at a local public library, which is completely free, to do whatever they wish there, in terms of reading/studying books, even if they don't have internet access at home, and even if they don't have a home! Will that mean that they likely have no social life? Certainly, that's quite probable! But, if you are forever in a situation where you need to always work 80+ hours per week because you haven't improved your employability, it's not like you're going to have a great social life expectation that's reasonable, either, and there's a lot of truth in the old saying, " birds of a feather flock together " which means: those that don't work towards improving themselves are most likely only going to be consorting with those that also tend not to work towards improving themselves, and basically have the same goals: to maintain their personal status quo, and quite likely, whine about how the world is so unfair, how they're the working poor (assuming they're actually working) and how the big bad world owes them, and how their luck sucks. Oh, and very likely, if they do work, they'll hate their work: because it is likely to truly be the four-letter word version of work, and is more likely to be dull, dirty, dangerous, etc. where they're effectively expendable: after all, it's not like they can't be readily replaced, because it doesn't take any great specialized knowledge and experience to do that job. People that go about life and don't take chances, well, that's still taking a chance by itself: you risk that you'll be left behind, and, more often than not, you will be: the world and technology keeps on changing, and that's the only constant thing in life, is change, and if you aren't willing and able to change, chances are you'll be stuck begging for change sooner or later, because you've been too constant and inflexible. The people that are most likely to be truly successful, even if never overly wealthy, take an interest that perhaps starts out as a hobby, and find a way to make a living at doing that: those that take a job and try to make a living at that, with no passion/interest, will be working for the rest of their lives, and detesting their lives and their work, unless they somehow find that they actually love the work. Taking on such work tends to require that you turn yourself off between the hours you work, and that sooner or later tends to spread to the rest of the hours of the week, all 168 of them that we all have. One of the greatest flaws of any communism/marxist/whatever program is the assumption that all workers are interchangeable, because even if they all have the same intelligence and physical characteristics otherwise, the reality is that people aren't all truly interchangeable for work, if only because everyone has a personality, and we aren't all mass-produced cogs built within some tight tolerance of each other, and communist programs in the past, from my best understanding, haven't exactly given workers much choice in their assignments, but if anyone knows differently from experience, please, inform me! Oh, just a quick statement answering the question: How do you know that there aren't tens of thousands of stories like this, and that the biggest reason it isn't easy to point them all out, is because to some degree or another, there's far more stories of people reaching their goals, or at least bettering their lot in life, starting out poor? This, Maurice, is just.... the American Way. Most stories aren't told far and wide, because... it's rather ordinary, and not worth the effort to publish it, because they're too common. I can find many immigrants that arrived in the US, often illegally, with nothing but the clothes they were wearing, who now own houses, cars, etc. and haven't had them given to them: I go to church with them. > when you state that " most poor people in the U.S. are working poor " and " [t]hey work, often in multiple jobs, but they are still poor " have you taken the time to ask yourself what, if anything, those working poor have done for themselves and their families to better their financial situation? > > > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 9, 2009 Report Share Posted June 9, 2009 I said: "I said that certain aspects put forth by Marx and Engels were appealing. I did not say that I liked Marxism itself."You asked:"What aspects do you find appealing?" My reply: I like the idea of public ownership of the means of production, distribution, and exchange. But I don't think the state ought to be a dictatorship of the proletariat, and I do not think that any public ownership can actually take place WITHOUT the dictatorship of the state because while most people like to own, few people want to manage and work. Thus giving the proletariat ownership of production, distribution, and exchange is like giving a monkey control of its own environment. Put another way, if you have a few people (bourgeoisie) that have figured out a way to beat all the competition with fast production, quick distribution, and excellent exchange, why would you want to screw that up by implementing a system supposedly beneficial for all but which will have to be much slower due to the fact that not everyone can work at the previously established optimum? Another reason it cannot work is because the second YOUR country slows down production to accommodate every worker, some other country, which has some other socio-economic system will attempt to undbercut yours with capitalistic methods...and they will succeed, which means that marxism will outsource any chance it has of being beneficial. (How will it be able to raise the standard of living of its people in either a protectionist society or a society in which no one will want to buy products from it because they can buy products faster, cheaper, and quicker from somewhere else?) Marxism can only work if all factors (meaning everything from the weather to the world economy) are finite and unchanging. Throw some new variable into the mix and you can wind up changing the whole system out of necessity. I like Marx's view on what free market capitalism does to people: "Karl Marx Wage Labour and Capital "Effect of Capitalist Competition on the Capitalist Classthe Middle Class and the Working Class "We thus see how the method of production and the means of production are constantly enlarged, revolutionized, how division of labor necessarily draws after it greater division of labor, the employment of machinery greater employment of machinery, work upon a large scale work upon a still greater scale. This is the law that continually throws capitalist production out of its old ruts and compels capital to strain ever more the productive forces of labor for the very reason that it has already strained them – the law that grants it no respite, and constantly shouts in its ear: March! march! This is no other law than that which, within the periodical fluctuations of commerce, necessarily adjusts the price of a commodity to its cost of production." There is just one problem with Marx's writings, and that is that no one is obliged to buy anything. The consumer can stop producers of products in their tracks by simply not purchasing anything from them. We are seeing this now with the US domestic auto industry. Thanks to the proletariat workers demanding high wages, underserved benefits, and ridiculous pensions, the auto-makers were forced to price themselves out of the market. Meanwhile, foregin competition which suppressed the proletariat demands rake in extra profit to sustain themselves. They are able to price their cars cheaper, and as a result, they have not needed government bailouts, and consumers are quick to go to them. People also boycott manufacturers for ethical, moral, and religious reasons, and they have succeeded in significantly impacting profit margins. I agree with Marx's position that many in society are miserable, and that the reason for this is that people are racing on treadmills, but I also think the people, through their own consumerism, are directly responsible for their own situations. If they don't want to have to work as hard, then they can buy less and consume less. We don't need a TV in every home. Not every family needs two cars. Much of the food bought in the US goes to waste. We throw out perfectly good toys, electrical appliances, and clothes all the time. Well, gee whiz, if no one bought the stuff in the first place, they would not have to work as hard to earn the money to buy it. Let some other country purchase our products and services. That would enable us to work less and save more. There are plenty of things Marx writes of that I agree with, but I think his core argument - that unassuming workers through no means of their own are exploited by means old capitalists- is absolutely absurd. No one forces a worker to do anything. I have read "The Jungle" by Upton Sinclair. My first reading of it was when I was 12. I read it for the gore factor. I had a morbid interest at that time of wondering what goes into the food I ate. Soon I saw that it was nothing more than a socialist propaganda manual. I was led to believe that we are to pity Jurgis Rudkus and his family as they are shipped off to the stockyards to work there under the ruthless slavery of the meat processing companies. But I cannot pity these people for long. Did any of Jurgis's family think to write anyone living in the states first about where would be the best place to go and find work? Did they think to investigate what sort of work was available once they arrived? Did any of them think that perhaps there was an existence outside the stockyards? Nope. Literally what happens is that they all hop on a bus and ask where to go, and someone sends them towards the yards. When Jurgis abandons his family close to the end of the novel, he goes traveling around the countryside earning money picking crops. Why did he not attempt to do this straight away? Did he think all of the United States of America was one big slaughterhouse and that's where everyone worked? And then the family was bilked out of their home because they were too foolish to understand the concept of principal and interest. Is this the lender's fault? Absolutely not. It is there's. Anyone in their neighborhood could have warned them. Part of the reason they could not make payments was because they blew all sorts of money on a huge wedding and also because they did not anticipate that any of them would get hurt in the slaughterhouses. Did these people realize that when winter came, they would need to buy gloves for the kids instead of beating them in order to get them to walk gloveless through the snow to the slaughterhouses each day? Did these people consider that if they should have a baby (as they did) that this baby would cost money not only to deliver, but to feed, and that one person would not be able to work so that this baby could be taken care of? Well how stupid do you have to be to not plan ahead? Even the initial tour Jurgis takes of the slaughterhouse where everything was made to look like a marvelous production line was something that I laughed at at the age of twelve because anyone could see the dangers and hard work involved in the industry. But, like most proletariats who live on the lowest level of the sea, he was bedazzled by the prospect of wealth without thinking that wealth is something uyou acquire through very hard work. We are made to waste hours reading pages as the characters bemoan their situations, and all along I am thinking to myself "Go back to your native country, why don't you." At the age of twelve, I had a job working part time for minimum wage, I was cutting five lawns on my block and trimmed trees and bushes on the weekends. Forgive me if I could not understand why these kids who worked a level that stuffed sausage casings werewhining about their jobs. I said:"The only minority which seems to have trouble with integration are African Americans. For some odd reason they are disliked and distrusted by nearly every minority in the US." You replied: "The ancestors of most African Americans came to this country against their wills. The plantation system, especially in the Mid South (Western Tennessee, Mississippi, etc.), destroyed the Black family." My reply: Agreed. It was cruel that these people were dragged awy from their own countries against their will and then forced into slavery. Likewise, it is cruel that they have been discriminated against until 1965 when segregation was ended. It is wrong that they are discriminated against today. However, nearly every single minority that came to this country has been discriminated against and it did not take them so long to be accepted. the Japanese were interened after Pearl Harbor, and now they are one of the most respected minorities in the US. We buy lots of good cars, stereos, video games, and audio equipment fmrom them. Further, nothing prevents those who do not like Americans society from pooling their money and going back to their native homelands. Migratory mexican and South American workds do this seasonally. African Americans wishing to reconnect with their ancestral roots can travel back to their countries of origin. You said:"Consciousness-raising entails understanding one's position in the matrix of social domination and taking responsibility to become emancipated from it." My reply: "Emancipation" suggests that we are enslaved. The mere fact that I refuse to believe that I as an autistic am in any way subjugated or enslaved means that I do not have to waste time pondering my supposed slavery or rebelling against it. I have held jobs. I have supervised other workers. I have made lots of money. All this despite my diagnosis. One might say that I was a budding bourgeoisie due to my own successes. Nothing prevents other autistics from succeeding to the extent that they are capable of succeeding. If they have disabilities, then they should receive assistance as anyone else would who is disabled. But they should not receive favoritism, nor should they receive pity. Nor should they make the argument that they are repressed by virtue of their diagnosis. Most people are unaware that people with AS, people with HFA, people with PDD-Nos even have autism. People who are fully autistic, or who have Rhett's are a different story. It may be that their autism is apparent to others. I will not deny that prejudice against autistics of all types does exist. To combat this means a campaign against ignorance - not a bulldozing of legislation upon the non-population at large. Upon receiving my diagnosis, nothing caused me to suddenly say "My God! I have been repressed all of these years. By God I need to unionize and try to get the UN to declare autistics a minority!" I don't see why, once we cross the line of diagnosis, we should jump out of the "rat race" and expect for the rest of the rats to kiss our behinds. You said:Poverty in the U.S. is multidimensional. Education is not the onlyobstacle. It is the intersection of these obstacles which are problematic. My reply: I am well aware of all the vectors which must converge to create the cyclone that we call poverty. But I am also aware that not all these vectors are circumstantial, and not all of them converge at once. We lead a linear existence through time, and events happen one after the other. Even if a plethera of catastrophic events happened at once, nothing but serious incapacitation prevents us from beginning anew. You asked:"How many people watch educational programming? As I said, the problemare multidimensional. Poor people do not, by and large, want to be poor. However, they often become frustrated (and even give up) after experiencing repeated disappointments. They are, like the rest of us, human." My reply: If they don't watch educational program, that is fine, but they should recognize that others WILL watch educational programming and get ahead of them by doing so. Every time a person misses a chance to advance themselves, they risk allowing someone else to jump ahead of them. Perhaps two people can grow up in the same impovrished neighborhood. One stays ignorant. The other self-educates himself. One stays poor they other becomes rich. Should we now take away from the self-made bourgeoisie to give to the ignorant and foolish proletariat? I think not. The proletariat is just as self-made as the bourgeoisie. You said: "Eating junk foods is not limited to the poor. Americans in general have an awful diet. Taking poor medical care is a result of not being able to afford adequate health care." My reply: Nothing prevents a poor person from going to a free clinic. Little except themselves prevents them from getting a job with health insurance. At any rate, soon the Obama administration will make us all poor through a health system that won't work for everyone, so that playing field will soon be leveled. You said: "The poor may be poor. That does not mean they are stupid. U.S. poor, contrary to media-driven popular beliefs, have the *lowest* number of children per family of any economic sector." My reply: I beg to differ. they are the least likely to be able to afford consistent birth control, the least likely to afford an abortion, the most likely to use welfare, and the most likely to keep having kids to keep themselves on welfare. You said: "I do not expect politicians to do much to fix anything. They are working within the same deficient structure which has produced the problems." My reply: They were elected by the general populace, and the largest segments of the general populace are the middle and lower classes, with an increasing number of the middle class moving to the lower. In short, it is the proletariats who run the country - the Obama administration being the best example of this. He has had only one term as senator in office, and he spent that term campaigning. He skipped numerous senate votes and voted neutral on many more. All of this time spend "addressing issues" that have already been addressed by previous administrations have yeielded worse results than anything as yet achieved. Yet he is a man for the people because he was elected by the people. Now answer me this: If this men represents the type of person who voted for him, and if this man is destroying our country, why should we go out of our way to protect the people who put him in power? Why should we further enable him by making their lives better? The way in which we should resolve the situation is assess each and every person's contribution to the economic and political problems in our country and in some way tax them mercilessly. -Every person who could not read or understand a mortage agreement for example, or who did not hire someone to read it and understand it for them and who had to go to foreclosure... -Every person who maxed out their credit cards knowing full well that with each purchase they were courting bankruptcy... -Every worker who formed a union to demand unsustainable higher wages and benefits... Should be found out and taxed mercilessly and forced to be educated in basivc economics. Through their own ignorance and willful stupidity they brought the entire economy down upon the shoulders of the bourgeoisie who built it for them, and so they should be made to pay for this damage they sustained. In reality, there IS not division of classes. There IS no bourgeoisie or proletariat. There is only a socio-economic situation which is constantly in motion. People can ascend and descend within it pretty much at willunless they are in some way severely disabled. But IF you are going to divide classes into bourgeoisie and proletariat, ask yourself this: If our society was purely agrarian with each person given forty acres and a mule (as it was in the old days out west) and assuming that land was usable and the mule in good health, do you really think that we would all be happy and equally productive. No. People would gamble. People would drink. People would use drugs. Some people would work harder than others. Some people would not follow prescribed and proven planting and harvesting methods. Some people would use superstition to make their crops grow, while others would employ labor and others would work hard alone. It is the choices we make as individuals that determine our destiny, and the attempt of any governmental or political entity to solve society's problems on an overall ubiquitous level arrogates a political party to a position not wanted by a vast segment of the populace they are appointed to oversee. The system as it is, is an excellent one. I will not say it is faultless, but what it does is put lazy people who have a strong sense of unearned entitlement in their rightful places as bottomfeeders on the tree of abundance. You asked: "Proletarian workers exploit the bourgeoisie? How can you believe that and still say that you find certain aspects of Marxism to be appealing? You have just rejected its major premise." My reply: I said I certain priciples, but not Marxism itself. Administrator Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 9, 2009 Report Share Posted June 9, 2009 Mark said: "There are always people who are able to move up the social class ladder. In some cases, as with Oprah Winfrey, it relates to getting the right breaks (combined with basic intelligence and drive). However, most people are just average." My reply: While your comment was directed at Raven, I feel the need to respond. I am the prime example of Jurgus Rudkus gone wrong. Though I had many jobs as a child, my first job as an adult was as a janitor, then a janitor and a courrier. Then a janitor and a courrier and a bookkeeper. Then I supervised a bookkeeping department and kept my job as a janitor. Then I changed careers and became an administrative assistant to the Vice President of the third largest consulting firm for non-profits in the world...and still worked as a janitor. My degree is English and math is my worst subject, yet my bookkeeping departmet, which balanced the books for 150 branches of the third largest banking corporation in the world, was one of the most efficient in the bank due to the way I managed it and due to the accuracy which I demanded from my workers. I daresay that ANYONE could have done what I did, yet the biggest adversity I faced was with those who thought for some reason that they were "owed" my position when I applied for and received it. they thought they were "owed" my position because of their degrees, or their number of years with the bank, or because they knew someone in an executive position in the bank. Nothing got me my jobs except hard work and the delivery of what I promised my employers: Maximum bang for the buck. The result was all the benefits of the bourgeoisie. Raven said: "So, Mark, when you state that "most poor people in the U.S. are working poor" and " [t]hey work, often in multiple jobs, but they are still poor" have you taken the time to ask yourself what, if anything, those working poor have done for themselves and their families to bettertheir financial situation?" Mark replied: Working multiple jobs? My reply: Lazyiness plays a large role in poverty. The first thing a person in poverty ought to save up for (provided they get electricity to their home) is a freezer. That enables them to buy everything on sale rather than paying full price. If you buy 20 pounds of chicken quarters on sale at $1.00 a pound, you don't have to worry about paying $2.50 a pound for chicken quarters on an ad hoc basis. The money you save allows you to buy other things on sale. Savvy purchasers can buy EVERYTHING this wayand they can live the lives of bourgeoisie even if they hold proletariat jobs. But most poor people want their pot, their alcohol, their video games, and their wide screen TVs and their rent to own furniture (which they always rent but never wind up owning) first. Believe me. I have witnessed this for myself. As I have stated, I have worked for a consulting firm for non-profits. I know how the other half lives and why. plus, I have relatives living that way. I just want to add that ignorance, laziness, and circumstance are of course not the sole factors which determine poverty. Foolishness is another. Let's look at the great autism-causes-vaccines debate for a moment. From having done the research, from having communicated directly with key figures in the autism world, from having met one on one with representatives from autism organizations and medical professionals, it is evident though studies -not anecdotal evidence- that autism is NOT caused by vaccines, nor is it caused by mercury poisoning. Some people regardless persist in beleiving that there is a vast conspiracy out there in which researchers, government agencies, vaccine manufacturers, and the entire medical profession are working to either deliberately infect the world with autism or else deny that such an infection has taken place. It is nonsense, and hard to believe that in the civilized world that people could believe this. Believers of this conspiracy theory impovrish themselves by wasting money on chelation therapy, hyperbaric chambers, GFCF diets, ABA, Secretin, and various snake oils in their misguided and ignorant and deliberately foolish attempts to treat and cure autism. Some people have even killed their children via these "treatments" and "cures." Yet the articles which reiterate the studies which have disproved any connection between autism and vaccines go ignored, as do the articles about a someone getting blown up in a hyperbaric oxygen chamber, or a kid dying during chelation therapy. When you try to talk to these people on any sane level, they become irate, or they accuse you of being one of "them" but they can give not logical argument for their beliefs, nor can they produce one shred of accreditted and peer-reviewed scientific evidence in their facor. Often these people are ones that believe aliens are walking among us, or that trees can pull themselves up by their roots and walk, or that roses can sing. I have heard stories from clients of my former employer, the consulting firm for non-profits. One of the world's leading fundraisers for impovrished children is extremely frustrated by the superstitious beliefs of the people they try to assist. If you have seen Sally Struthers doing a commercial on TV for waif-like children, then you have an inkling of which organization I am talking about. One of the things they do is dig wells for villages so they have clean water in Africa. Another thing they do is build schools in Africa. Well imagine when they return to the villages years after the wells are dug and the schools built and find the wells filled and the schools torn down. The wells were filled in, you see, because the water was "clean" and not blessed with the mud of the land. The people believed that since they came from the earth and returned to it, you were depleting yourself of the physical nutrients needed to sustain your body by drinking water without mud in it. They blamed dysentary on murky water rather than muddy water, and were quite suspicious when it was suggested that water without feces (dirt) in it could be nutritious. And the schools had been torn down because an education was not important to them as courregated roofs on their homes and wood to burn in their cooking fires. Also, they did not see the sense in children wasting their time getting an education when their were crops to be harvested and cattle to be tended and fish to be netted. Do you see what we are fighting against? Even when it was explained to tribal leaders the purpose of the wells and the purpose of the schools and the reasons why they should be used and maintained, the tribal leaders explained that though they understood, they could not resist the will of the people, who were suspicious of these white people who came from overseas and knew nothing of the land, the climate, the weather, and the people themselves. And if it were black people that came from overseas, they were still regarded with suspicion, because obviously they were tainted by the whites. In some ways, the people thought the relief organization was exploiting them. They didn't know how, but they believed it was happening. Now one could argue that education could change them, but they serve as a metaphor for the poor: Why learn new things, save a long time, invest, and get rich to have a jar of cookies later when you can eat the single cookie that is right in front of you now? How much effort are we supposed to make on the behalf of those who exploit the well-meaning by their willful state of ignorance? I have lived four decades watching "Feed the children" commercials on TV without seeing any noticable or remarkable improvement in the countries we have been sending our money to? (And climactic change/famine cannot account for this continuing poverty either.) At what point do we realize that some people are -through their own deliberate actions- destined to always remain poor and move on with our lives? Administrator Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 9, 2009 Report Share Posted June 9, 2009 environmental1st2003 wrote: **>>I like the idea of public ownership of the means of production, distribution, and exchange. But I don't think the state ought to be a dictatorship of the proletariat, and I do not think that any public ownership can actually take place WITHOUT the dictatorship of the state because while most people like to own, few people want to manage and work. Thus giving the proletariat ownership of production, distribution, and exchange is like giving a monkey control of its own environment.<< : Marshall Tito of Yugoslavia established something like worker governance. It collapsed after he died, not because of its inefficiency, but because of ethnic conflicts. Unfortunately, there were certain groups which placed their national aspirations ahead of their model economy. Yugoslavia was among the most prosperous countries in the Soviet bloc, and it enjoyed a fair amount of independence from the Kremlin. (Tito was a good diplomat.) >>Put another way, if you have a few people (bourgeoisie) that have figured out a way to beat all the competition with fast production, quick distribution, and excellent exchange, why would you want to screw that up by implementing a system supposedly beneficial for all but which will have to be much slower due to the fact that not everyone can work at the previously established optimum?<< I place conscientization and the emancipation of socially dominated populations ahead of bourgeois ideals. >>Another reason it cannot work is because the second YOUR country slows down production to accommodate every worker, some other country, which has some other socio-economic system will attempt to undbercut yours with capitalistic methods...and they will succeed, which means that marxism will outsource any chance it has of being beneficial. (How will it be able to raise the standard of living of its people in either a protectionist society or a society in which no one will want to buy products from it because they can buy products faster, cheaper, and quicker from somewhere else?)<< Marx spoke of global emancipation, i.e., " workers of the world unite. " Otherwise, the bourgeoisie in other countries will likely attempt to continue their oppression from off-shore. >>Marxism can only work if all factors (meaning everything from the weather to the world economy) are finite and unchanging. Throw some new variable into the mix and you can wind up changing the whole system out of necessity.<< Like the application of something close to classical capitalism ('s idea of trickle- or percolate-down economics) during the Reagan and Thatcher administrations has, after a couple of decades, resulted in near global economic collapse? Reagan and Thatcher tried to deregulate everything. They failed to do so completely, but their right-wing anarchism (libertarianism) still did damage. I like Marx's view on what free market capitalism does to people: " Karl Marx Wage Labour and Capital >>There is just one problem with Marx's writings, and that is that no one is obliged to buy anything.<< The idea of " buying " things is itself questionable. Many Marxists advocate the complete elimination of currency and (as it is now understood) commerce. Marxist socialism and communism are not a gradualist reformism - fixing the market economy. The objective is not to fix the market economy, but to eliminate it. >>I agree with Marx's position that many in society are miserable, and that the reason for this is that people are racing on treadmills, but I also think the people, through their own consumerism, are directly responsible for their own situations.<< Consumerism is promoted by elites. They are the ones who construct (and dominate) societies, including the minds of those who live in them. >>There are plenty of things Marx writes of that I agree with, but I think his core argument - that unassuming workers through no means of their own are exploited by means old capitalists- is absolutely absurd. No one forces a worker to do anything.<< If someone refuses to work, she or he does not eat. Marxism is not the Welfare State. I can't comment on the novel, since I have not read it. Unfortunately, like many people on the spectrum, most fiction makes no sense to me (unless I write it, as in: http://moyshe.markalanfoster.com and http://yh.markalanfoster.com). I can't relate to fictional characters without seeing them. >>However, nearly every single minority that came to this country has been discriminated against and it did not take them so long to be accepted. the Japanese were interened after Pearl Harbor, and now they are one of the most respected minorities in the US. We buy lots of good cars, stereos, video games, and audio equipment fmrom them.<< The Japanese who are here immigrated here. Their segregation in the American concentration camps of World War II, while horrendous, was relatively brief. However, in spite of the difficulties African Americans have faced, they continue to do better. On average, Native Americans are poorer than African Americans, but they are fairing better now, as well (partly because of the casinos). >> " Emancipation " suggests that we are enslaved. The mere fact that I refuse to believe that I as an autistic am in any way subjugated or enslaved means that I do not have to waste time pondering my supposed slavery or rebelling against it. I have held jobs. I have supervised other workers. I have made lots of money. All this despite my diagnosis. One might say that I was a budding bourgeoisie due to my own successes.<< From a Marxian standpoint, we are enslaved to a capitalist system. However much the average person may make, it is a drop in the bucket compared with the salaries and benefits of corporate executives. >>Nothing prevents other autistics from succeeding to the extent that they are capable of succeeding. If they have disabilities, then they should receive assistance as anyone else would who is disabled. But they should not receive favoritism, nor should they receive pity. Nor should they make the argument that they are repressed by virtue of their diagnosis. Most people are unaware that people with AS, people with HFA, people with PDD-Nos even have autism. People who are fully autistic, or who have Rhett's are a different story. It may be that their autism is apparent to others.<< " Favoritism " is the Welfare State model. It is simply a reformist modification to capitalism. I am not a member of the Democratic Party, or otherwise a social liberal. I am a Marxist. >>I don't see why, once we cross the line of diagnosis, we should jump out of the " rat race " and expect for the rest of the rats to kiss our behinds.<< I believe in a kind society - one which meets the needs of all of its members through appropriate enablements. >>I am well aware of all the vectors which must converge to create the cyclone that we call poverty. But I am also aware that not all these vectors are circumstantial, and not all of them converge at once. We lead a linear existence through time, and events happen one after the other. Even if a plethera of catastrophic events happened at once, nothing but serious incapacitation prevents us from beginning anew.<< I am not a gradualist or a reformist. IMO, the system itself must be abandoned. If that produces catastrophic events, so be it. However, I don't want people to tolerate their domination due to a fear of the unknown. >>If they don't watch educational program, that is fine, but they should recognize that others WILL watch educational programming and get ahead of them by doing so. Every time a person misses a chance to advance themselves, they risk allowing someone else to jump ahead of them. Perhaps two people can grow up in the same impovrished neighborhood. One stays ignorant. The other self-educates himself. One stays poor they other becomes rich.<< The problems are embedded in communities. Without appropriate (and sufficient) role models, people simply repeat the same mistakes. However, the biggest mistake, IMO, is to tolerate domination. >>Should we now take away from the self-made bourgeoisie to give to the ignorant and foolish proletariat? I think not. The proletariat is just as self-made as the bourgeoisie.<< You think most bourgeoisie are self-made? Actually, that is no more true than to say that most proletarians are self-made. >>Nothing prevents a poor person from going to a free clinic. Little except themselves prevents them from getting a job with health insurance.<< Most places don't have them. Even when they do, they are horribly understaffed. >>At any rate, soon the Obama administration will make us all poor through a health system that won't work for everyone, so that playing field will soon be leveled.<< I have no faith in any political activism in the context of global capitalism. Even good ideas can't survive with corporate domination. >>I beg to differ. they are the least likely to be able to afford consistent birth control, the least likely to afford an abortion, the most likely to use welfare, and the most likely to keep having kids to keep themselves on welfare.<< Statistically, that is not so. A poor person may be poor. She or he is not necessarily stupid. Rates of child birth are negatively correlated with social class. *You said:* " I do not expect politicians to do much to fix anything. They are working within the same deficient structure which has produced the problems. " >>In reality, there IS not division of classes. There IS no bourgeoisie or proletariat. There is only a socio-economic situation which is constantly in motion. People can ascend and descend within it pretty much at willunless they are in some way severely disabled.<< Again, that is not supported by the data. Most people either remain in the social class they were born into (or one close to it). -- Mark A. , Ph.D. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 9, 2009 Report Share Posted June 9, 2009 : >>I daresay that ANYONE could have done what I did, yet the biggest adversity I faced was with those who thought for some reason that they were " owed " my position when I applied for and received it. they thought they were " owed " my position because of their degrees, or their number of years with the bank, or because they knew someone in an executive position in the bank.<< The idea of being " owed " is a capitalist one. Capitalism is a creature of the Enlightenment with its individualism and rationalism. >>Lazyiness plays a large role in poverty. The first thing a person in poverty ought to save up for (provided they get electricity to their home) is a freezer. That enables them to buy everything on sale rather than paying full price. If you buy 20 pounds of chicken quarters on sale at $1.00 a pound, you don't have to worry about paying $2.50 a pound for chicken quarters on an ad hoc basis. The money you save allows you to buy other things on sale. Savvy purchasers can buy EVERYTHING this wayand they can live the lives of bourgeoisie even if they hold proletariat jobs.<< Most poor people are responsible. While cigarettes may be a relatively inexpensive diversion for a poor person, most poor people are no less responsible than members of any other social class. >>But most poor people want their pot, their alcohol, their video games, and their wide screen TVs and their rent to own furniture (which they always rent but never wind up owning) first.<< All I can say is: I am a sociologist, and what you are writing does not represent most poor people. >>Believe me. I have witnessed this for myself. As I have stated, I have worked for a consulting firm for non-profits. I know how the other half lives and why. plus, I have relatives living that way.<< There are responsible and irresponsible people in all social classes. >>Some people regardless persist in beleiving that there is a vast conspiracy out there in which researchers, government agencies, vaccine manufacturers, and the entire medical profession are working to either deliberately infect the world with autism or else deny that such an infection has taken place.<< Conspiracies, like mythologies or human origins, thrive with an absence of knowledge. Part of the problem is a rampant " scientism " (not science). Scientism refers to the belief that the sciences can answer every imaginable question. It is scientific idolatry. Many people look at the accomplishments of the sciences, and they cannot fathom how researchers have not come up with a " cure " for autism. That is when the conspiracies take over. >>It is nonsense, and hard to believe that in the civilized world that people could believe this.<< As a sociologist, I find it very understandable. You have parents, many of whom may lack a higher education, and scientists, physicians, and just con artists waiting to take advantage of them. When people are desperate, they often suspend any native skepticism which they may ordinarily exercise - just as some out-of-work people fall for the Nigerian-type scams. >>When you try to talk to these people on any sane level, they become irate, or they accuse you of being one of " them " but they can give not logical argument for their beliefs, nor can they produce one shred of accreditted and peer-reviewed scientific evidence in their facor. Often these people are ones that believe aliens are walking among us, or that trees can pull themselves up by their roots and walk, or that roses can sing.<< Yes, that has happened to me. I am one of the organizers for a large annual Autism conference in Kansas. Last year, I was verbally assaulted by one of these parents. >>Do you see what we are fighting against?<< Yes, superstition. Chelating these poor Autistic children (a type of child abuse, IMO) is nothing but superstition. >>How much effort are we supposed to make on the behalf of those who exploit the well-meaning by their willful state of ignorance? I have lived four decades watching " Feed the children " commercials on TV without seeing any noticable or remarkable improvement in the countries we have been sending our money to? (And climactic change/famine cannot account for this continuing poverty either.) At what point do we realize that some people are -through their own deliberate actions- destined to always remain poor and move on with our lives?<< Elites tend to keep the wealth to themselves. That is why President Kim is doing in N. Korea. -- Mark A. , Ph.D. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 9, 2009 Report Share Posted June 9, 2009 ravenmagic2003 wrote: >>The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.<< Not insanity, but lack of opportunity. The insanity is in capitalism and statism. -- Mark A. , Ph.D. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 9, 2009 Report Share Posted June 9, 2009 wrote: " But most poor people want their pot, their alcohol, their video games, and their wide screen TVs and their rent to own furniture (which they always rent but never wind up owning) first. " Mark responded: " All I can say is: I am a sociologist, and what you are writing does not represent most poor people. " Actually, Mark, it IS an accurate representation of most poor people. Grab a folding chair and park yourself in the common areas in subsidized housing anywhere in the United States or Canada and what has described is exactly what you will see and hear going on in nearly every single one of those units. What's more, you will hear arguments erupting between drug dealers and their clientele and you will hear discussions on how to get more money via break and enters at various businesses that appear to have minimal security in place. You will experience the 'welfare state debate' on how the government is doing people over by insisting that tenants pay more money for their units when those tenants get a raise at their jobs. There will be the oohing and aaahing of neighbours as the 'rent to own' truck pulls up and either delivers or repossesses the big screen television, the huge barbeque, the latest gaming system, overly large (for the kitchen area) fridges and stoves, rooms of furniture and more. If you are talking the poor who are not living in subsidized housing, then by all means, grab that folding chair and park yourself in an inner city neighbourhood park. You'll hear the same sorts of discussions going on and you'll see the same sorts of deliveries and repossessions. You may be a sociologist but reality tells a far different story than the one you are trying to sell here. Raven Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 9, 2009 Report Share Posted June 9, 2009 Raven: >>What's more, you will hear arguments erupting between drug dealers and their clientele and you will hear discussions on how to get more money via break and enters at various businesses that appear to have minimal security in place.<< Drug dealers terrorize subsidized housing complexes. The people you see are those with the courage to come out. Many (sometimes most) stay inside in order to avoid those problems. The majority of the poor in low-income areas are victims, not perpetrators. >>You will experience the 'welfare state debate' on how the government is doing people over by insisting that tenants pay more money for their units when those tenants get a raise at their jobs.<< Because the raises are seen as a way to make ends meet. The increases in rent threaten it. >>There will be the oohing and aaahing of neighbours as the 'rent to own' truck pulls up and either delivers or repossesses the big screen television, the huge barbeque, the latest gaming system, overly large (for the kitchen area) fridges and stoves, rooms of furniture and more.<< There are irresponsible people in all social classes. Sometimes, they are driven by a need for diversion. Nonetheless, most poor people, like most people in general, are responsible. >>If you are talking the poor who are not living in subsidized housing, then by all means, grab that folding chair and park yourself in an inner city neighbourhood park. You'll hear the same sorts of discussions going on and you'll see the same sorts of deliveries and repossessions.<< As sociologist Merton wrote, most members of a society have the same hopes and goals, including material ones, for themselves and their children. The poor are no exception. However, as Merton said, the poor experience a strain between those goals and the means to attain them. This will sometimes lead people to make irresponsible decisions. However, there is irresponsibility in all social classes. However, when it occurs among the poor, it is sometimes more obvious. Capitalists exploit the poor and their problems, too. Perhaps the most vivid example, at least in the U.S., is the Jerry Springer Show. IMO, Springer is a corporate criminal. >>You may be a sociologist but reality tells a far different story than the one you are trying to sell here.<< I do have first-hand experience. My ex-fiance was poor - very poor. She lived in a trailer court in Mississippi (I lived in Mississippi for 4 years.) She was molested by her older brothers at the same time as both her parents were in prison. I got to know her and her friends quite well. I am very grateful for my own upbringing - growing up in nice neighborhoods in NYC and on Long Island. I am also grateful for my own professional success (despite my childhood problems as an Asperger's Autistic). However, I try to keep in mind the problems of the poor and innocent. Mark Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 9, 2009 Report Share Posted June 9, 2009 "Marshall Tito of Yugoslavia established something like worker governance. It collapsed after he died, not because of its inefficiency, but because of ethnic conflicts. Unfortunately, there were certain groups which placed their national aspirations ahead of their model economy. Yugoslavia was among the most prosperous countries in the Soviet bloc, and it enjoyed a fair amount of independence from the Kremlin. (Tito was a good diplomat.)" As I have stated, there will always be something personal that interferes with any political system. Diplomacy can only work so long. Once it ends or fails, then old conflicts arise. The alternative to Diplomacy is repression. In either cases, it is causing people to lose their identities. "I place conscientization and the emancipation of socially dominated populations ahead of bourgeois ideals." I do not see any segment of society as being dominated. In the western world, anyone is free to move out of their station in life in either an upward or downward direction. "Marx spoke of global emancipation, i.e., "workers of the world unite." Otherwise, the bourgeoisie in other countries will likely attempt to continue their oppression from off-shore." You speak as though there is some conspiracy or design to repress entire segments of the population. The motivating factor is only survival. "Like the application of something close to classical capitalism ('s idea of trickle- or percolate-down economics) during the Reagan and Thatcher administrations has, after a couple of decades, resulted in near global economic collapse? Reagan and Thatcher tried to deregulate everything. They failed to do so completely, but their right-wing anarchism (libertarianism) still did damage." The idea failed because society did not act according to how Reagan and Thatcher thought it would, proving that any political or economic system must take into account the actions of its people and be flexible enough to change with them."The idea of "buying" things is itself questionable. Many Marxists advocate the complete elimination of currency and (as it is now understood) commerce. Marxist socialism and communism are not a gradualist reformism - fixing the market economy. The objective is not to fix the market economy, but to eliminate it." If you eliminate the currency system, then what happens. May a person take what they need? Or is each person allotted the same amount of what the state thinks they need? In the first instance, one person may take everything they can get their hands on, and if you try to stop them, they will feel enslaved by the state, and wish to be emancipated from it. In the second instance, if everything is distributed equally, some people, believing themselves to be more deserving, will also wish to be free from this repression. The only way to prevent social unrest in either case is re-education, jail, or punishment, in which case the state or whatever politcal system exists becomes the repressor. "Consumerism is promoted by elites. They are the ones who construct (and dominate) societies, including the minds of those who live in them." Consummerism is caused by greed and also what we can simplistically call Maslow's hierarcy of needs. "If someone refuses to work, she or he does not eat. Marxism is not the Welfare State." Yes. Now we are into Skinner. If the rat does not perform as required, remove a positive stimulus. The most basic needs we have according to Maslow are food, shelter, and our health. Only when these most basic needs are met do we become healthy and productive members of society...except for the working poor, who seem to require more than their share before they will actually work hard for a living. My question to you is: Who gets to deny the non-working person food? The state? How repressive. In a capitalistic democracy, we give the starving food stamps."The Japanese who are here immigrated here. Their segregation in the American concentration camps of World War II, while horrendous, was relatively brief." My point was that it did not take people long to view Kamikaze pilots and Bataan Death March soldiers as the most respectable human beings in Asia, and perhaps the world. Other minorities have failed to achieve this in hundreds of years."However, in spite of the difficulties African Americans have faced, they continue to do better. On average, Native Americans are poorer than African Americans, but they are fairing better now, as well (partly because of the casinos)." And ignorant statement, which I am not going to get into at the moment. Hopefully Raven will call you out on that, she being Native American. "From a Marxian standpoint, we are enslaved to a capitalist system. However much the average person may make, it is a drop in the bucket compared with the salaries and benefits of corporate executives." When the average worker knows as much as a corporate executive does, does everything a corporate executive has done, and does what a corporate executive does, I am sure they will be paid as a corporate executive. Under your system, such a person would then have his legs cut out from under him and robbed of all the wealth he is justly entitled to."Favoritism" is the Welfare State model. It is simply a reformist modification to capitalism. I am not a member of the Democratic Party, or otherwise a social liberal. I am a Marxist." There is Favoritism in Marxism. If a group of Maxists are going about something wrong and only one can see it and refuses to work out of protest, he is denied food because he is not working while the rest continue to favor themselves even though they are unknowing working against themselves and against marxism. "I believe in a kind society - one which meets the needs of all of its members through appropriate enablements." Who decides what is appropriate? The state? "I am not a gradualist or a reformist. IMO, the system itself must be abandoned. If that produces catastrophic events, so be it. However, I don't want people to tolerate their domination due to a fear of the unknown." There is no domination going on. Only in the eyes of people who are too lazy to get off their butts and work for a living is there domination going on. "The problems are embedded in communities. Without appropriate (and sufficient) role models, people simply repeat the same mistakes. However, the biggest mistake, IMO, is to tolerate domination." If people in poor communities have television sets, nothing prevents them from switching from rap videos and sitcoms to PBS where they can see people like Washington Carver and Tesla, and Edison, etc. but they make a conscious choice to view what they view on TV, Every time these people commit a crime they make a choice. Nothing forces these people to behave the way they do. "You think most bourgeoisie are self-made? Actually, that is no more true than to say that most proletarians are self-made." A "system" has no sentience. The only thing which can "make" something else in the biological sense is an organism. just as we grow from infants into adults, so too do our minds grow. We are who we are, and we are who we are because we made ourselves that way."I have no faith in any political activism in the context of global capitalism. Even good ideas can't survive with corporate domination." Corporate domination does not exist. No one must buy anything. They choose to. Companies rise and fall based on what people choose to buy. Remember Artari Video games? once the most popular, now history. Sony games are heading in a similar direction. One day Microsoft may be gone. Apple too. If you truly believe that corporate domination must be countered, then cheerfully give up your computer, because your purcahse of it and the programming it comes with has just further bolstered the profits of the corporations that supposedly dominate you. Whether you have purchased your computer or borrowed it, you have CHOSEN to use it. You can just as easily use a typewriter, or write by hand with a homemade pen and ink. No one forces you to do anything. "Statistically, that is not so. A poor person may be poor. She or he is not necessarily stupid. Rates of child birth are negatively correlated with social class." I agree that poor does not equal stupidity. I disagree that rates of childbirth are negatively correlated with social class. "Again, that is not supported by the data. Most people either remain in the social class they were born into (or one close to it)." If they remain in a social class, it is by choice. Administrator Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 9, 2009 Report Share Posted June 9, 2009 "All I can say is: I am a sociologist, and what you are writing does not represent most poor people." I think you need to get out of the classroom and into the barrios my degreed professor. Do some fieldwork. I have dated women from the lower classes. Coincidentally, my first girlfriend lived in Pilsen otherwise known as "the back of the yards" in the same neighborhood that the fictional Jurgis Rudkus resided. The stockyards were gone at the time I dated her. Her family was the last of a few Polish families in a neighborhood of Mexicans that was being encroached upon by African Americans. There were two rival street gangs there. People worked in factories or did not work at all. They were never short of pot and cirgarettes, and never short of firecrackers on the Fourth of July, Fiesta Del Soul, and Cinco De Mayo though. The windsheild repair shop which I could see from her parent's house routinely broke the windsheilds of cars in the neighborhood to drum up business. Most of the residents in the community were illegal. If you called the cops because your neighbor was growing pot, or because a girl was being raped in a parking lot outside, or because someone was writing grafitti on the wall, the Latino police who responded would wait until the "perps" had enough time to make their escape before they arrived. This was because they were taking bribes. If white cops responded, they were prompt, in which case, you were likely to see twenty or thirty people spill out of one house. Men, women, children alike, all carrying kilos of cocaine, or what have you. The winos picked through the garbage cans for aluminum, and the residents would then assault them for the cans that were collected. THEY would take the cans to the recyclers, exchange them for cash, and then go buy cigarettes with them. There were lots of help wanted signs in stores and restaurants and things, but most people did not want these when there was so much money to be made by profiteering from drug sales. People sold their babies, and some women made themselves baby factories for that express purpose. Men sold their wives as prostitutes, and when husband and wife had made enough money, they moved to the suburbs. I could go on, but need not. It's plainly obvioius to anyone who lives or visits such a community what goes on and why. "There are responsible and irresponsible people in all social classes." Agreed."As a sociologist, I find it very understandable. You have parents, many of whom may lack a higher education, and scientists, physicians, and just con artists waiting to take advantage of them. When people are desperate, they often suspend any native skepticism which they mayordinarily exercise - just as some out-of-work people fall for the Nigerian-type scams." Barnum said there is a sucker born every minute. That I can believe. But fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. "Elites tend to keep the wealth to themselves. That is why President Kim is doing in N. Korea." He's a ruthless dictator. When wealth is EARNED, people may rightfully do what they want with it, which means they can spend it, save it, or fritter it away. Administrator Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 9, 2009 Report Share Posted June 9, 2009 Clearly, you are insane, as are Raven and : why? You keep spewing forth your " Mark A. , Ph.D. " (which everyone else here but you will reasonably be concluding that those letters stand for " Piled High and Deep " ) and you keep spewing forth your Marxism theory and insisting, all while living in practice in a capitalistic-based society that allowed you to somehow be entitled legally to use that title-without-real-value by working for it (the american dream, to better one's self by hard work, and earn the rewards according to your intelligence and hard work) that what you say is correct, that Marxism is the way to go, when in reality, if you were truly practicing what you preach, your chances of ever achieving your current position in life would be, at best, left up to the pure whim of all the leadership in whatever realm you lived in. Here's where Marxism fails on the ultimate, most reduced level of explanation: It violates the free will and individuality of all those that are entrapped by it, and doesn't allow the expression thereof to a degree required by human beings. And yet, you persist in calling yourself a doctoral sociologist. Wow, what a flaming hypocrite that makes you! Either that, or a bald-faced liar, because any sociologist that has observed social reality would know that people are individuals first, self-identify with whom and what they want, as their will dictates, and there will always be and have always been those that refuse to follow herd mentality (which is, itself, a free-will choice to choose to follow the herd). Also, as a sociologist, one would expect you to have been a great student of history: no communistic/Marxist system has ever truly worked, as it has always been brought down... by real humans expressing their free wills by their acts, whether it be the leadership or the non-leadership. Also, systems where people do not have a good amount of capacity to exercise their free-will and act on their own behalf towards their own education tends to result in systems of people that, at best, economically, educationally and technologically stagnate, because there's no real incentive for those that " think outside the box " to express themselves: there will be no meaningful reward for it, and more likely than not, they'll be punished for it, because the masses, if they have any ability to assert control over what becomes of the resources, will automatically assert " Hey, all of us should have those resources you want to use for your experimentation, we won't let you risk our welfare on your wild dreams! " and the nature of the general public will be that of being risk-averse. Well, sure, if you take risks, there are times when you lose, and nothing great happens with it, but if you take no risks, you also reap no rewards: you never progress if you take no risks, and if you're constrained by resources and whatever to take no great risks, you'll never have great rewards, and all of this comes down to one simple reality: that of choice and the exercise of free-will, which does not mean that the will is free to use as in monetary sense, but that a person's will is the only thing they have which they can call their own, but if the system represses them from exercising it by working towards what they desire, and taking risks that may reward them, then they are slaves. and Raven are clearly insane, because whatever reality they send back out at you, you do your best to ignore and refute, but it makes no difference, because you hide behind your piece of paper, that, based on everything you've been spewing forth in here, is worth about as much as the toilet paper I used to wipe my butt, and I believe I'm being very generous. And yes, in case you didn't figure it all out by now: I won't mince words, and I'll tell you exactly what I know you to be: a complete fraud, based on all the evidence, and whatever schooling you spent your life on does not make you an educated person, just someone that has foolishly studied books, gotten a piece of paper and the right to put a few letters after their name, but still managed to escape without learning anything useful that applies to the real world. As such, I know I won't be responding further to your fraud, as that's a gross waste of my time. > >>The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over > again and expecting different results.<< > > Not insanity, but lack of opportunity. The insanity is in capitalism and > statism. > > -- > Mark A. , Ph.D. > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 9, 2009 Report Share Posted June 9, 2009 Mark wrote: " Drug dealers terrorize subsidized housing complexes. The people you see are those with the courage to come out. Many (sometimes most) stay inside in order to avoid those problems. The majority of the poor in low-income areas are victims, not perpetrators. " Having dealt first hand with a number of individuals living in subsidized housing and/or on Social Assistance and/or who are part of the working poor, I can assure you that drug dealers and addicts living in poor areas are generally very good acquaintances. Those who stay indoors to avoid the problems are the outcasts of the neighbourhood and generally do not involve themselves in criminal activities that are rampant among their neighbours. Raven Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 9, 2009 Report Share Posted June 9, 2009 " However, in spite of the difficulties African Americans have faced, they continue to do better. On average, Native Americans are poorer than African Americans, but they are fairing better now, as well (partly because of the casinos). " Ravenmagic intends to respond to this. In between packing bags, I've felt the need to write a brief lecture on Aboriginals and their " plight " as I understand it. Before the whites came to north, south, and central American shores, Native Americans fared well. Artificats and archeological evidence found buried and in caves gives evidence to the existence of First Nations people in North America dating back 40,000 years which means that the somehow they must have survived the Ice Age. This evidence also calls into question the idea that Native Americans are recent residents who crossed over an " ice bridge " in the Artic regions. When the whites arrived, the Natives were in their element. While it is true to say that there were many wars/conflicts going on between native peoples, there was also extensive organized trade going on. The biggest pyramid in North America is in the state of Illinois. http://www.cahokiamounds.com/ Cahokia Mounds was once one of the greatest cities of the world. Cahokia was larger than London was in AD 1250 " Cahokia Mounds is located in ville, Illinois off Interstates 55/70 and 255. Cahokia Mounds is just fifteen minutes east of St. Louis, Missouri. " Artifcats have been found from many native cultures there, ranging from Navajo to North American Plains Indians to East Coast and West Coast Native peoples. This indicates that there was a complex system of trade going on that was known and used by tribes, bands, and nations in North America (and also Mexico). Along came the whites to the eastern United States. With the white came disease, which wiped out many native peoples. As more whites arrived, there were clashes as whites took what they wished at the expense of native cultures. As whites pushed west, they decimated and exterminated those " Indians " which would not agree to be moved, and those which were moved were moved to reservations with poor resources. The Trail of Tears was one such mass-migration imposed upon native peoples by the whites. Residential schools were created in which white culture was foisted on native peoples. Natives were expected to abandon their labguage, their religion, their spirituality, their heritage, their medicine, their way of hunting/gathering, their methods of commerce, etc. Their hair (a symbol of strength and health) was cut. Their clothes burned. In all senses, they were literally stripped naked, and reclothed in uniforms akin to those seen in some prisons. Children were stolen from their mothers and put in these schools, and upon graduating, they were moved to cities with sponsoring white families, who sought jobs for them, and prevented them from returning to their reservations. These schools were in existence in both Canada and the US until 1965 when the natives were finally emancipated. It was in 1965 that natives in Canada first got voting rights. While reservations still existed then and exist today, they continue to be whittled away even now. Impperwash is a tragic example of this. Durring WWII, the Candian government conviscated native land (including burial grounds) and turned it into a military base. When the Natives who resided on the land returned after the war to reclaim their land, they discovered the government had turned it into a provincial park. This month, the government gave the Natives back 100 acres of Ipperwash. There is more acreage to be returned, but the government refuses to do so. The only reason the government made the concession on the 100 acres is because tourists thought it was morbid to run their ATVs over buried dead corpses and/or pitch their tentpoles into them. Many land disputes continue all over North America. Many of these disputes are due to corporations leasing lands from the Natives and then claiming ownership of the lands through squatter's rights with federal governments talking the side of the corporations even though by treaty, the governments have no such authority to make such determinations. In Canada, the government does little to combat prejudice against Natives. It is much more open and blatant than the discrimination against African Americans by whites in the US. It is more like what you would have seen with the KKK in its most prolific days. The land that Natives own these days is not sufficient to sustain Native populations, or, if they are to use the land to their advantage, it would be at the expense of their spirituality, which states that they are caretakers of the land. Trade fails since whites want nothing that Natives produce, and corporations are unwilling to submit to self-ruling Native government entities even when it is to their advantage. In Canada, corporations will advertise to Natives, but they will not employ them for fear of alienating their white clientelle. I buy my cigarettes from Native proprietors. In Chicago, cigarettes can cost up to $80.00 a carton. On the reservation, they start at $10.00 a carton, and without additives to the cigarettes. Natives do run casinos, and whites will flock to them, as they do to any casino, Native owned or not. But whites seldom frequent adjacent Native places of business where they can find very nice western apparel and goods as well as Native apparel, like jewelry, moccasins, artwork, and musical recordings. Some of the Native artwork produced rivals anything seen by the greatest painters in white history. but because society places such a low value on anything Native, it sells poorly and is worth little as an " investment. " I have gotten to know a few people in Native circles, and they are more accepting of me than whites are of them. They believe that god made four types of man from four colors of clay. White, black, red, and yelow, and they held this belief before it was known that white, black, and yellow men existed. They have their own flood story that parallels the Christian one. My association with Native Americans has always been pleasant and never confrontational. There is nothing disrespectful about them. Many Native Americans have succeeded and become rich through their own inventions, enterprises, and efforts...but most people do not know that because Natives are still compelled to hide their heritages. If they fail, it is due to their repression by prejudice and their subjugation by governments. If they succeed, it is by hard work, lots of effort. Casinos have little to do with the success of Native peoples. Casinos to natives are like Alms boxes are to people who really do not need the money. Your ignorance as a sociologist to Native culture and history is alarming. Administrator Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 9, 2009 Report Share Posted June 9, 2009 " and Raven are clearly insane, because whatever reality they send back out at you, you do your best to ignore and refute, but it makes no difference, because you hide behind your piece of paper, that, based on everything you've been spewing forth in here, is worth about as much as the toilet paper I used to wipe my butt, and I believe I'm being very generous. " In your sense of the word, I must say that I resemble that remark. Administrator Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 9, 2009 Report Share Posted June 9, 2009 my take on this; insanity OR lack of opportunity OR lack of innovation?? based on; reading in self help books, that when we are doing something in a particular way, example communicating, and it does not work in a certain situation, we tend to TRY HARDER, rather than try something different. the suggestion was to try something different. personal application: this is fairly frivolous, in my struggles communicating with my work partner, I have tried: explaining; that I don't need a long explanation for what she is asking me, and that I will ask for an explanation when I need one, explaining that too much verbal info overwhelmes me and I lose track of the important stuff explaining that too much overload causes me more stress and I make more mistakes explaining that she and I have different styles, if she needs social dialogue, please chat with the extroverts, not 'poor little me' SARCASM intended with the last. For a YEAR I have been EXPLAINING, so finally I am trying a different appproach: QUESTIONING; example: "i am confused, what do you actually need me to do?" or "what is the relavance of the time this person phoned you, to what you need me to do?" or "is everytinig yiu are saying important, if so slow down, I can't deal with this now, therefore I need to write it all down, then I will deal with it later" This may not 'work' but it is providing variety. This frivolus example of my own lack of innovation, is to illustrate that people do things in a way that is not working or improving their lives but they don't ALWAYS think of doing something different. In my example it only resulted in my continuing to be annoyed, BUT lets consider the following scenario; IF I grew up in a family who was on welfare/state assistance because mom and dad both had disabilities, and THEIR parents did not encourage them to find work that they could do, If my parents watched sitcoms etc on TV, read tabloids, and only talked about local gossip, then I might not have thought of watching documentaries on TV, reading real newspapers etc. and thinking about/discussing abstract concepts or world events... renaissanzelady >>The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.<<Not insanity, but lack of opportunity. The insanity is in capitalism and statism.-- Mark A. , Ph.D. ------------------------------------Fellowship of the Aspergian Miracle is the last series of message boards founded by an original Aspergia member to carry the Aspergia name with the www.aspergia.com website owner's permission. To contact the FAM forum administrator, use this e-mail address: FAMSecretSociety-owner Check the Links section for more FAM forums. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 9, 2009 Report Share Posted June 9, 2009 " If my parents watched sitcoms etc on TV, read tabloids, and only talked about local gossip, then I might not have thought of watching documentaries on TV, reading real newspapers etc. and thinking about/discussing abstract concepts or world events... " But those programs would have been on TV anyway. Wouldn't you have wondered what they were and why they were there and who was watching them? My mother was always watching soap operas and sitcoms, but that never stopped me from watching Nova, and Frontline and National Geographic. My father watched sit-coms and some public boradcasting stuff, but rarely watched TV to begin with. I watched intelligent programming because I knew it was an easy way to learn things. All you had to do was watch TV. Administrator Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 9, 2009 Report Share Posted June 9, 2009 Ok, so your example is that of parents that aren't exactly good role models, but riddle me this: how many people manage to live entirely under the roof of their parents without outside influences to compare against? In other words, your example is... a bad one! The very fact of people watching TV (assuming they're not so dirt-poor to not even have that) is that they'll be very much aware that there's more to life that's available in the rest of the world than is conceived of even by the most shortsighted of parents that are imbeciles and don't care about teaching their kids via leading by example towards things that are gainful, and anyone that thinks that " I deserve better! " and has actual ambition now has enough motivation to at least seek it out, somehow, from someone, something, whatever. In effect, if they aren't deliberately living under a rock under no control of their own, where they have zero outside contact with reality, if they aren't utterly lazy and worthless as individuals, they have at least enough that they can know that they can work towards improving their situation, even if it is very slowly: slow forward progress is infinitely better than pure stagnation and apathy towards one's existence and future. > >>The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over > again and expecting different results.<< > > Not insanity, but lack of opportunity. The insanity is in capitalism and > statism. > > -- > Mark A. , Ph.D. > > > ------------------------------------ > > Fellowship of the Aspergian Miracle is the last series of message boards founded by an original Aspergia member to carry the Aspergia name with the www.aspergia.com website owner's permission. To contact the FAM forum administrator, use this e-mail address: FAMSecretSociety-owner > > Check the Links section for more FAM forums. > > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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