Class Contempt

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Sat, 2008-11-22 09:16

Tommy_Paine

Class Contempt

"It was then that I realized that what I was looking at was actually a piece of hate mail. It wasn't directed at the usual suspects - racial, religious or ethnic minorities. Indeed, using a black or native face would have been counterproductive since it would have raised hackles about racism. Instead there was an implicit appeal to a prejudice that hardly ever gets noticed but is remarkably widespread - class contempt."

-- Stan Hister, " 'White Trash' aren't "

Maybe someone can post the link, and then tell me how to do it. I can't seem to figure it out on this new format yet.

While I agree with Hister, I think he doesn't go far enough in leveling criticism on the left, or in his term "liberals". The lack of regard, let alone respect for working people is a by product of class analysis being eclipsed years ago by identity politics.

While it should not surprise us that the Conservatives would be unabashed in their contempt for working people, or that capital "L" Liberals feel the same but keep it quiet to keep their "bait and switch" politics viable, it should surprise us that the field of representing working class issues has been dropped by the NDP and other supposedly more progressive elements.

And it should further surprise us that in being jilted by the NDP, working people who still bother to participate in politics participate in political parties like the Conservatives and Liberals who show, or can barely contain, their contempt for working people.

Sat, 2008-11-22 09:51

ElizaQ

Tommy, just highlight the text, then click on the chain icon in the comment section and a box will pop up where you post the url in.

Sat, 2008-11-22 11:41

Unionist

Great post, Tommy, and a vital discussion to pursue. Which political party will put "working class issues" on at least an equal priority as others? And I don't mean just workers as consumers (ATM fees, credit cards, and other cheap gimmicks).

Sat, 2008-11-22 11:52

Refuge

Is this the article you wanted to link to?

http://www.portside.org/?q=showpost&i=5128

Sat, 2008-11-22 11:53

Polly B

Tommy_Paine wrote:

Maybe someone can post the link, and then tell me how to do it. I can't seem to figure it out on this new format yet.

http://rabble.ca/news/white-trash-arent

Sat, 2008-11-22 13:22

remind

Tommy_Paine wrote:
it should surprise us that the field of representing working class issues has been dropped by the NDP and other supposedly more progressive elements.

And it should further surprise us that in being jilted by the NDP, working people who still bother to participate in politics participate in political parties like the Conservatives and Liberals who show, or can barely contain, their contempt for working people.

First observation, please do give examples of how the NDP have dropped working class issues?

Secondly, I find this hugely funny, as a statement, given the numerous and sometimes endless yapping sessions here about the NDP's use of "working families", "worker's" and "working people", in their campaign literature, and how they should NOT be using such language as it is not inclusive. Some people went to great length here stating that such a term offended them and their families. Demands were even made that those in the NDP loop go back to the NDP and suggest other terminology. Subsequently, we saw the NDP drop the use of any words with "work" in them.

So, it is extremely fucking funny to now see people carry on about how the NDP has dropped workers issues, without providing any evidence of course. What a set up, damned if you do and damned if you don't.

Thirdly, perhaps workers who join the CPC or Liberals have a great deal of self loathing because of class stigma and they want to believe, falsely, that they are part of the power play?!

Fourthly please do prove that the workers who have joined those who do not have their best interests at heart and who indeed may loath them, have been "jilted" by the NDP, just saying so, does not make it so!

___________________________________________________________
"watching the tide roll away"

Sat, 2008-11-22 15:40

KenS

I think that working class participation/representation in politics [or not], and class contempt are 2 very different issues.

As related as they are- they are very different phenomena.

The kind of class contempt Mallick expressed I see as essentially a cultural phenomena- located in a particular time and place. Politics may have a lot to do with it- but it is in the final instence a cultural phenomena.

And thinking back to the 1960s- I think the intelligentsia just ignored us then. Class contempt was at least as strong- but sort of like they didn't need to bother expressing it.

Sat, 2008-11-22 16:12

M. Spector M. Spector's picture

Stan Hister looks at a picture of "a man in his twenties, bearded and with unkempt hair. He was slouched on a couch, legs splayed apart, in an undershirt and with a beer in his hand," and he assumes this is a representation of a working-class man.

So whose stereotyping and class prejudice are we talking about here?

Sat, 2008-11-22 17:08

rural - Francesca rural - Francesca's picture

I was struck at a meeting recently - metaphorically that is - at class difference, and it was at a poverty meeting, that discussed class difference.

The presentation was on the "Bridges Out of Poverty" program, that first educates those that work with the poor, on how the poor 'think' and what is important to them. Essentially it highlights why the poor make the decisions they do, and that it isn't wrong, it's just not middle class thinking.

Where if falls apart for me is how the second phase is to educate the poor on how to think like the middle class.

I won't go into too much detail about all of this as it will detrail my point.

I got 15 minutes on the agenda to talk about local efforts. Well I stood up and identified myself as "one of them".

The presenter kept lasping into describing the poor as "them", although you could tell she was trying to be inclusive.

I also pointed out that there were poor people in the room. We had invited some low income people to come and hear the presentation. Interestingly enough, they all sat at our table - safe space. Not to mention they love listening to my sarcastic mutterings as I listened to the presentation.

So in pointing out (there is a point I'm getting there) there were poor people in the room, I reminded them that none of them were getting paid to be there, there was no mileage paid to them, no honourarium.

Later that night I was at a Labour Council meeting and mentioned a situation with a client, and in describing the labour related challenge, someone slipped me $50 to give to the client, to help out.

It really struck me, if the first meeitng was full of trade unionists, instead of management staff, and they heard there were poor people there, contributing without compensation, they would have passed the hat.

I've seen it happen enough.

But here were management types, just squirming in thier seats.

And yet the class distincition we were being taught about was that middle class values were valuable, and poverty values caused problems.

Piss on them, I'll take the values of the poor and working folk over middle management any day.

(Upper management has slipped me $ before too, but the wealthy don't think too much about that)

Sat, 2008-11-22 17:11

#10

Unionist

Thank you, Francesca, for eloquently linking the two topics that were interleaving but not overlapping in this thread. The very poor and the working class do indeed share common interests. After all, there's a lot of migration between those two countries...

Sat, 2008-11-22 17:49

#11

Cueball

Good thread. I have to agree with Spector about Hister's assumptions about the image. Hister, however can be forgiven for that because this image is interchangably used for working class males and the urban poor. The cross linkages between this image, which is often used to reference the urban poor and working class males, and criminals is all part of the same prejudiced media package.

It's been a long time since the state sanctioned left made any real effort to avoid stygmatizing the urban poor that also find themselves pursuing criminal activity just to survive. Rather, it has jumped on the right-wing "tough on crime" bandwagon.

A lot of my friends have been in trouble with the law at one time or another, and a good portion of those have served time, and as my favourite lawyer likes to say, "my clients aren't bad people, they just have bad days."

The so called "criminal element", are also a constituency, a constituency which all of the state sanctioned parties jointly act to marginalize. Any kind of nuanced perspective on the causes of criminality, is increasingly a no go zone in main stream politics.

Sat, 2008-11-22 18:12

#12

Malcolm

"Class contempt" certainly exxists on the left. My own experience is that it tends to exist most strongly among those who are most critical of the democratic left. There are certainly those who are happy to stand in solidarity with the working class just so long as they don't have to stand near them.

Sat, 2008-11-22 18:48

#13

Tommy_Paine

Thank you Eliza Q, Polly and Refuge for the technical assistance.

First observation, please do give examples of how the NDP have dropped working class issues?

Well, that's just the thing. If the NDP were championing working class issues, then the nattering about what we call ourselves wouldn't matter quite so much. It puts me in mind of Douglas Adam's books, where the useless third of Golgafinchion society set up shop on earth and coudn't invent the wheel because no one could agree on what colour to paint it.

Examples? In the English language leadership debate two elections ago, between Harper, Martin, Layton and Duceppe, it was Duceppe that drew attention to the theft from the E.I. fund, and called Martin on his claims that he and the Liberals "paid off the deficit"-- reminding people that it was Canadian workers who paid off the deficit.

Duceppe-- not Layton.

It's not an abandonment by deed, it's an abandonment through omission, for the most part.

And, I don't think it's part of any grand conspiracy, or becasue leadership in the NDP is "bad". I think it's an unavoidable consequence of trying to be inclusive, and putting the emphasis on a person's gender or ethnicity or sexual orientation before their economic status. And I wouldn't argue that this wasn't a very necessary thing over the past twenty to thirty years.

But now it's time to realize that gay people work, that women work, that people of all ethnic backgrounds share a common bond in that we can change all the laws regarding descrimination on this basis, make the halls of government and our public and private institutions as inclusive as possible, but if we do not address the economic descrimination that faces us all, all that stuff is for naught.

We have made it political suicide, for the most part, for even right wing politicians to descriminate or say stupid things about people of colour, gays and women. Yes, it still happens-- but it is met imediately by public outcry.

Not so descrimination on the basis of economic status. It is alive and well, and is in fact enjoying a resurgence. Due in no small part to the various factions on the left who allow the wealthy a clear field to play in.

Sat, 2008-11-22 18:53

#14

KenS

"My clients aren't bad people, they just have bad days."

I like that.

Although I think I have tended to think of it as "stupid days".

But how do you characterise it as bad/stupid days for the friends or family members who put a lot of deliberated planning into their stupidity.

Just another of life's mysteries I guess.

Sat, 2008-11-22 19:02

#15

Tommy_Paine

unionist wrote:
Thank you, Francesca, for eloquently linking the two topics that were interleaving but not overlapping in this thread. The very poor and the working class do indeed share common interests. After all, there's a lot of migration between those two countries...

And there's going to be a hell of a lot more migration in the comming year or two. I may well be one of them.

Cueball's example of "tough on crime" is interesting. In the election before last, the NDP jumped on board because they wanted to avoid being "Willie Hortoned", for which I cannot blame them.

Also, from a working class perspective, it's notable that workers who commit crimes tend to commit them against workers or the poor, and the same can be said of poor criminals. It might be said that governments who ignored crime would be engaged in class warfare against us. I certainly see lenient judges as so engaged.

But the NDP didn't seem to address this aspect of getting "tough on crime", nor did it introduce the idea of a "tough on crime" policy for Bay Street criminals, or criminal wrong doing in the professional class. Or, if they did, it was done in a way that did not grab headlines.

Leaving workers and the poor to think that maybe it's because the people who run the NDP rather enjoy the professional and middle class priveledge of having electronic security on their houses, and a get out of jail free card, and the worst that could happen to them is a few uncomfortable days on the hot seat at our seemingly endless amounts of Public Inquiries.

Sat, 2008-11-22 19:45

#16

Cueball

Tommy_Paine wrote:

Cueball's example of "tough on crime" is interesting. In the election before last, the NDP jumped on board because they wanted to avoid being "Willie Hortoned", for which I cannot blame them.

Also, from a working class perspective, it's notable that workers who commit crimes tend to commit them against workers or the poor, and the same can be said of poor criminals. It might be said that governments who ignored crime would be engaged in class warfare against us. I certainly see lenient judges as so engaged.

You know, this is pretty much a common knowledge truth that gets talked up a lot. My impression is that this is partly because much of the common knowledge understanding of criminality is derived from our knowledge of ghetto crime in the US. I don't know how true it is of Canadians, since our communities tend to be more mixed. Another thing is, its important to distinguish between petty crimes, such as common assault, and serious property crimes, such as "car theft", which Layton wanted to create a minimum sentence for, because I guess he thought that would curb gang related "drive by shootings" or some such nonesense.My sense is that poor people who resort to crime, are quite concious of the money value of their targets, and also loathe to get a bad reputation in their own communities -- "don't shit in your own back yard", so they say.

Some people clearly have no ethical standards about who they rob from, but there is a pretty pervasive ethical standard that asserts that certain kinds of crimes, such as shoplifting from Supermarkets, or big businessess amount to "victimless" crimes.

Tommy_Paine wrote:
But the NDP didn't seem to address this aspect of getting "tough on crime", nor did it introduce the idea of a "tough on crime" policy for Bay Street criminals, or criminal wrong doing in the professional class. Or, if they did, it was done in a way that did not grab headlines.

Leaving workers and the poor to think that maybe it's because the people who run the NDP rather enjoy the professional and middle class priveledge of having electronic security on their houses, and a get out of jail free card, and the worst that could happen to them is a few uncomfortable days on the hot seat at our seemingly endless amounts of Public Inquiries.

It's interesting that one of the concrete measures Layton did suggest was minimum sentencing for car theft, which is a property crime, whose victims would be middle or upper class.

Sat, 2008-11-22 19:49

#17

Tommy_Paine

"You know, this is pretty much a common knowledge truth that gets talked up a lot. My impression is that this is partly because much of the common knowledge understanding of criminality is derived from our knowledge of ghetto crime in the US."

I'm going by my neighborhood, which is solidly working class, and yes borrowing from the American experience which seems to back up my annecdotal observations.

You'll have to forgive me, Cueball, for forgetting your location. But here in London, as it is in many places in the Windsor/Quebec corridor, neighbourhoods have been economically stratified for a long time. There are still pockets of old sections where there is a "mix", but more often than not it due to the process of "gentrification".

As for not shitting in your own backyard, I think that has fallen by the wayside. The desperate edge that drugs like crystal meth, crack and oxycontin puts on a person rarely makes them think too much about where they do break and enters. Likely, they pick targets that aren't too much of a walk to the person they owe money too, who in turn probably doesn't live too far from a pawn shop.

Sat, 2008-11-22 19:59

#18

remind

Tommy_Paine wrote:
But the NDP didn't seem to address this aspect of getting "tough on crime", nor did it introduce the idea of a "tough on crime" policy for Bay Street criminals, or criminal wrong doing in the professional class. Or, if they did, it was done in a way that did not grab headlines.

Seriously, have you been living in an alternate world or something?

Quote:
NDP PRESSES CONSERVATIVES FOR ACTION ON CORPORATE CRIME

Thu 20 Sep 2007.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
SEPTEMBER 20, 2007

NDP PRESSES CONSERVATIVES FOR ACTION ON CORPORATE CRIME

OTTAWA – Today NDP Finance Critic Judy Wasylycia-Leis sent a letter to
Finance Minister Jim Flaherty urging the government to adopt an NDP initiative
to take on corporate, ‘white-collar’ crime.

“Government inertia is standing between Canadians and the world-class
investment protection they deserve,” said Wasylycia-Leis. “We’ve seen a
government focus on a national securities regulator but no action on other
urgently needed improvements. The new session is the perfect time for Parliament
to tackle white-collar crime but we need government leadership now.”

Today’s letter follows up on the NDP’s call in May for the government to join
in a major across-the-board offensive to fill legislative gaps to toughen
corporate rules, strengthen enforcement and improve Canadian investor
protection.

“Everyday families want corporate crime dealt with,” added Wasylycia-Leis.
“It’s bad for investors and it’s bad for the economy. The NDP takes corporate
crime seriously – it’s time this government did as well.”

http://judywl.ca/page/208

Quote:
Federal NDP calls
for a Canadian Securities Commission

Party launches campaign to crack own on corporate
criminals

Ottawa (25 May 2007) - The New Democratic Party is
calling for a Canadian Securities Commission with clout to replace the toothless
network of provincial securities commissions that now 'protects' private
investors in Canada - including worker pension funds.

The proposal is the
centrepiece of a national campaign launched by the NDP on Thursday to put a
brake on corporate crime in Canada.

“Since the Bre-X scandal ten years
ago, there have been dozens of corporate swindles that have bilked average
Canadians out of millions of dollars and no one is in jail because we don’t have
the laws to put them there,” says Winnipeg MP Judy Wasylycia-Leis, the NDP
finance critic.

“We must overhaul corporate accounting practices and
insider trading laws, and introduce accountability provisions. We must demand
better from our public companies. The ‘wild west’ of financial markets must find
a new sheriff,” she says.

Canada lags behind the
world

Canada is the only G8 countries that has not done
anything in recent years to toughen its laws on corporate
accountability.

“Germany, France and the U.K. all have new laws in the
post-Enron era,” notes Wasylycia-Leis. “The United States and Australia
introduced tough legislation on accounting and whistleblowers, both under
conservative governments. We’re calling on victims of corporate crime to take
the lead and join us in fighting for reform. That’s the only way this minister
will act.”

The campaign coincides with the Conrad Black trial. The
Toronto tycoon is currently in the midst of a multi-million-dollar trial in
Chicago. At the heart of the case are tens of millions of dollars in tax-free
"non-compete payments" that prosecutors allege were paid fraudulently to Black
and his associates.

The Ontario Securities Commission - which sets the
standard for other securities commissions in Canada - has distinguished itself
by doing virtually nothing to call Black to account throughout his long and
controversial corporate career.

Wasylycia-Leis said the NDP campaign has
three key elements:

Protecting
Canadian Investors by:
• Establishing a Canada Securities
Commission to which all provincial securities commissions would have to
report;
• Creating new accounting oversight committees with independent
auditors;
• Forcing Canadian executives to face higher standards of
disclosure, and,
•
Ensuring that independent corporate board
members are truly independent.

Fighting for
Canadian workers by:
• Pushing for genuine whistleblower
protection, and,
•
Establishing new rules for corporate perks
and disclosure.

Policing the financial 'Wild West'
by:
•
adopting an expanded and independent mandate
for the RCMP's Integrated Market Enforcement Team (IMET);
• Raising
Canadian corporate accounting practices and laws to tougher international
standards, and,
•
adopting laws to prevent non-compete
payments.

The National Union of Public and
General Employees (NUPGE) has long supported the concept of a national
securities commission to assist in protecting Canadians from white-collar fraud
and corporate wrong-doing. NUPGE

Web posted by NUPGE: 25 May 2007

http://www.nupge.ca/news_2007/n25my07b.htm

Quote:
Finance Minister Jim Flaherty urging the government to adopt an NDP
initiative to take on corporate, 'white-collar'
crime.

"Today's letter follows up on the NDP's call in May for
the governmentto join in a major across-the-board offensive to fill
legislative gapso toughen corporate rules, strengthen enforcement and
improve Canadian investor
protection."

The NDP have been calling for it loudly since 1997 and it was part of this elections campaign platform even.

http://www.ndp.ca/xfer/campaign2008/Platform_2008_EN.pdf

http://www.nowpublic.com/tag/white+collar+crime/news

Quote:
Although corporate white-collar crime is not as high profile
as gun violence, .... The NDP finance critic from Manitoba has
launched a campaign to protect ...

Normal
0

"There is broad-based interest in Parliament on this
issue. Both the House of Commons and
Senate committees have expressed support for a common regulator.

Normal
0

As for the national media, this is what the Globe
and Mail had to say last week: "

“Instead of seeing the creation of a national
regulator as a capitulation, the provinces need to understand that a truly
national body is the only way to drag Canada’s antiquated securities market
into the 21st Century.”

Moreover, it is not the NDP's fault the corporatist controlled media, part and parcle of the white collar criminal crowd, do not report on actions in this regard by the NDP. The NDP are driving it in the HoC as they have been since 1997.

Also from this campaign:

Quote:
NDP platform focuses on 'working families'

NDP Leader Jack Layton unveiled a platform Sunday aimed at helping Canadian
families, focusing largely on child care...

"Our plan does not include a corporate tax cut. Our priorities are those of
the kitchen table, of helping families make ends meet," Layton told a rally at
his riding of Toronto-Danforth.

"The plan includes promises of giving families a new baby bonus, ensuring
Canadians have better health care, and giving more financial help to First
Nations people and students."

___________________________________________________________
"watching the tide roll away"

Sat, 2008-11-22 20:08

#19

Tommy_Paine

"Seriously, have you been living in an alternate world or something?"

It's quite apparent I am.

I recognize the argument that the NDP has difficulty grabbing headlines with a media that is controlled by the very people who probably feel very threatened by calls for government action on white collar crime. And I would admit that it's a problem.

It's also part of the job of the politician to get around this problem. So I am reluctant to give it the attention that you do, and perhaps in fairness, it deserves.

Either way, the stuff you site, which I know is there in the NDP platform, is not making inroads into the alternative world of the working class.

Sat, 2008-11-22 20:08

#20

WillC

Thanks Remind. As a mostly lurker here, I appreciate it when someone brings a note of reality to counter the usual "Let's attach Jack" posts.

Sat, 2008-11-22 20:14

#21

Cueball

KenS wrote:

"My clients aren't bad people, they just have bad days."

I like that.

Although I think I have tended to think of it as "stupid days".

But how do you characterise it as bad/stupid days for the friends or family members who put a lot of deliberated planning into their stupidity.

Just another of life's mysteries I guess.

I don't know. What I do know is that I have seen a lot people criminalized because of poverty, and racial bias. I have a friend who admittedly was on a pretty bad path to start of with, who essentially got criminalized for a minor crime (DUI -- first offence, no accident, no victims, just pulled over for being native while driving) and has since spent the better part of the last 2 years in and out of jail on bench warrants for parole violations and missed court dates, even though she already served her 2 week term for the original offence, while waiting for trial.

The fact is that overworked duty councels simply can not defend the poor in court, and "bad days" can turn into pretty substantial criminal records, without the proper legal advice. For the same offence upstanding citizens, who could afford proper legal advice would walk within hours.

I have a friend who was pulled over for Jay Walking, then busted on an immigration warrant, searched, and then spent 3 months in jail, waiting for a hearing on an associated drug charge, even though the search was later discovered to be illegal, since Jay Walking is not a criminal offence, and Immigration Warrants are not "criminal" warrants.

The Crown cut a deal on Jay Walking fines, and admitted that even had he been able to proceed on the drug charge, the time served waiting for trial far exceeded the likely sentence of the drug conviction on the first offence.

Who figured out the search was illegal? The duty councel? No. The free immigration state funded law service? No. The crown? No. It was the clients bail officer. LOL.

A huge number of people spend ridiculous amounts of time waiting for bail even on minor criminal charges, especially the poor, who have no rich friends, and are not of the category of persons (middle class, or working people with assets) who judges feel they can release on their own recognizance.

The poor are regularly railroaded and criminalized by the judicial system, simply because they can not afford the proper legal advice, and even though I have known a few people who were actually "career" criminals, by and large most of the people I know who have served time, are of the variety of those people who are just having bad days, without any planning whatsoever.

Sat, 2008-11-22 20:22

#22

KenS

Mine wasn't really a serious comment Cueball- or at least not in direct relation to what you said.

Even if it isn't a line you can rigorously apply, there's a difference between 'the criminalized' who commit petty crimes. And then like you said there are those what are essentially 'career criminals'- where the label fits even if that isn't all they do to get by in life.

I happen to be blessed with both among friends and family.

Anyway- I knew who the lawyers comment was directed at. And I agree how apt it is, and that the clients are the bulk of who the justice system is 'processing'. In fact, the career criminals very often come off no worse in the system, even if they are also legal aid clients.

Sat, 2008-11-22 20:24

#23

Tommy_Paine

And in the last two years, I have had two close aquiantences that have have had not a "bad day" but a momentary lapse of judgement in an emotional situation that landed them in an astounding amount of legal difficulties. And in both cases-- the more recent more than the one two or so years ago, things were exascerbated by their deffence councel that told them not to bother showing up for a routine court appearance, that they'd show up for them.

In both cases, the deffence councel's were, I dunno, busy that day. Fortunately for one of my aquaintences, while it did result in a bench warrant for arrest on failure to appear, it did not result in jail time. Not so fortunate for my other friend, who spent two days in jail getting it straightened out.

One, I guess could be called "poor", the other certainly working class.

I wonder how many deffence councel's forget to appear for clients who wear three piece suits like they do?

Meanwhile, Dr. Smith tells lies on the witness stand for years, gets poor and working class people jailed for heinous crimes they did not commit, and he walks free amoung us.

I'd like to believe the law is just capricious, but it's not. It's a leading foot soldier in the class warfare against us.

Sat, 2008-11-22 20:28

#24

Cueball

KenS wrote:

Mine wasn't really a serious comment Cueball- or at least not in direct relation to what you said.

Even if it isn't a line you can rigorously apply, there's a difference between 'the criminalized' who commit petty crimes. And then like you said there are those what are essentially 'career criminals'- where the label fits even if that isn't all they do to get by in life.

I happen to be blessed with both among friends and family.

Anyway- I knew who the lawyers comment was directed at. And I agree how apt it is, and that the clients are the bulk of who the justice system is 'processing'. In fact, the career criminals very often come off no worse in the system, even if they are also legal aid clients.

Right, the system basically works to criminalize the class entirely. No worse no better. The legal aid system assures the same treatment regardless of the actual misdeeds.

Sat, 2008-11-22 20:35

#25

remind

Tommy_Paine wrote:
Either way, the stuff you site, which I know is there in the NDP platform, is not making inroads into the alternative world of the working class.

Now you are backing off from saying the NDP weren't doing anything, to faulting them for not getting the message out that they were. It was in all the news media at the time.

And you know, engagement in democracy is not a 1 way street. Perhaps the disengaged working class needs to pay attention to what governments and political parties are doing, or not doing? That some are not, is to their own detrement and at some point they need to stop blaming others and take responsibility for their own actions and ignorance, and these lack of actions are very close to bringing about their own downfall. Blaming others, and pretending to be victims, is starting to get boring and tedious, say nothing of creating the appearance that some want to be coddled by a parent state instead of growing up and taking direct action in their own lives and for the lives of their children and grandchildren.

Moreover, if you knew it was in the platform why did you say the NDP were doing nothing?

___________________________________________________________
"watching the tide roll away"

Sat, 2008-11-22 20:39

#26

Cueball

remind wrote:

Tommy_Paine wrote:
Either way, the stuff you site, which I know is there in the NDP platform, is not making inroads into the alternative world of the working class.

And you know, engagement in democracy is not a 1 way street. Perhaps the disengaged working class needs to pay attention to what governments and political parties are doing, or not doing? That some are not, is to their own detrement and at some point they need to stop blaming others and take responsibility for their own actions and ignorance, and these lack of actions are very close to bringing about their own downfall. Blaming others, and pretending to be victims, is starting to get boring and tedious, say nothing of creating the appearance that some want to be coddled by a parent state instead of growing up and taking direct action in their own lives and for the lives of their children and grandchildren.

Moreover, if you knew it was in the platform why did you say the NDP were doing nothing?

___________________________________________________________ "watching the tide roll away"

Stockwell Day?

Sat, 2008-11-22 20:47

#27

remind

What are you talking about cue? Other than your usual nothings of course..

___________________________________________________________
"watching the tide roll away"

Sat, 2008-11-22 20:54

#28

Cueball

The discovery that you aren't really that "left wing". I have been cofused for some time, and now I understand. The "blaming others, and pretending to be victims" meme attached to some rant about being "coddled by the parent state", in the context of a discussion about poverty, criminality and the state, is something I am more used to seeing from the likes of Anne Coulter, than Emma Goldman.

Sat, 2008-11-22 20:56

#29

Tommy_Paine

"And you know, engagement in democracy is not a 1 way street. Perhaps the disengaged working class needs to pay attention to what governments and political parties are doing, or not doing? That some are not, is to their own detrement and at some point they need to stop blaming others and take responsibility for their own actions and ignorance, and these lack of actions are very close to bringing about their own downfall."

Actually, Remind, I do that with my peers. And, if you hung on every juicey morsel of wisdom I impart here like you should*, you'd remember that in several posts since returning from my latest hiatus, I have been pointing the finger at my compadres in the working class just as you point out.

I imagine there all things bright and wonderfull in the NDP platform, or policy. I've sat at too many conventions etc, to know otherwise. But which of these policies get the royal jelly depends on a lot of things. Some of it pragmatic attention to election dynamics, some of it not. And I fear class contempt plays a role, or more kindly and fairly, class analysis gets short shrift in that internal process.

Sat, 2008-11-22 21:00

#30

Unionist

remind wrote:

And you know, engagement in democracy is not a 1 way street. Perhaps the disengaged working class needs to pay attention to what governments and political parties are doing, or not doing? That some are not, is to their own detrement and at some point they need to stop blaming others and take responsibility for their own actions and ignorance, and these lack of actions are very close to bringing about their own downfall. Blaming others, and pretending to be victims, is starting to get boring and tedious, say nothing of creating the appearance that some want to be coddled by a parent state instead of growing up and taking direct action in their own lives and for the lives of their children and grandchildren.

What is this - comedy hour?

Sat, 2008-11-22 21:23

#31

Cueball

Pretty contemptuous if you ask me.

Sat, 2008-11-22 21:31

#32

Tommy_Paine

I wouldn't extrapolate that Remind is saying "people should pull themselves up by their own bootstraps".

I am of the opinion that if I am correct that working class people and the poor have withdrawn from politics because the system is so skewn against them, and that there is no political party that represents their interests, then they are more than justified in believing it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.

As someone once said.

Sat, 2008-11-22 21:40

#33

remind

Nope reality, as much as some would like to deny it, or silence said opinion. Or indeed give a solution of "not voting".

I have been to way too many union meetings, in differing unions even, with a memberships of 500+, where somewhere between 10-20 have shown up to the monthly meetings, and maybe 30-40 for the yearly.

I have lived in a town, which is almost no more, that had 98% of its workers unionized, with 11 different unions presents as well as a CLC office, and they voted in Jay fucking Hill. Because of their lack of involvement, in both their union structures, and politics in general. And trying to get them to look past; playing golf, sports hunting and fishing, and the dart league, was impossible.

You can deny union member apathy all you want, and disparage me for saying so, all you want, but the apathy reality is there, and it is a problem. I am pro union all the way, but yet I still understand that there is a problem and I recognize it needs to be voiced. Hell, my best friend is CUPW, and when I asked her if she voted, in either the federal or civic elections, she told me she was too tired for one and had a party to go to for the other, but yet she had me join the facebook group to save Canada Post from privatization, and write letters to the gov.This electoral disconnect and apathy is real, and workers must take responsibility, for their actions, or lack thereof. And perhaps this economic crisis and what it means is a wake-up call?!

Just as the apathy of non-union workers is a problem. Women fought to get the vote, and our other rights, we did not sit around whining waiting for dispensation of it.

___________________________________________________________
"watching the tide roll away"

Sat, 2008-11-22 21:49

#34

remind

Tommy_Paine wrote:
I wouldn't extrapolate that Remind is saying "people should pull themselves up by their own bootstraps".

No I am not, as a matter of fact, but no worries I understand that my 2 favorite detractors would love to detract and give inferences that were not there.

___________________________________________________________
"watching the tide roll away"

Sat, 2008-11-22 21:59

#35

Unionist

No one gave inferences, remind. Your words speak for themselves. I've often asked you to reflect again on some such passage, but somehow you always always take that as a condescending attack on your integrity. So I won't ask you to do that this time. Instead, I'll just answer you. If you meant what you said about the working class, then you are wrong. It is the working class that houses, clothes, and feeds you materially, and is responsible for every social advance in our society in the past century and more.

Think about that the next time you stoop to lecture workers that they should "pay attention to what governments and political parties are doing", and that workers should "take responsibility for their own actions and ignorance".

Sat, 2008-11-22 22:39

#36

remind

unionist wrote:
No one gave inferences, remind.

Yes there was.

Quote:

Your words speak for themselves.

Yes they do! So kindly refrain from putting words/inferences where there were not any such thing. Even Tommy got what I was saying and it was him who I was challenging. Thanks in advance.

Quote:

I'll just answer you...It is the working class that houses, clothes, and feeds you materially, and is responsible for every social advance in our society in the past century and more.

I agree with this, whole heartedly. But I am also correct in my perceptions, that many are resting on laurels of the past fights won, and indeed are choosing not to be actively engaged in their union and with politics, and there is not 1 damn thing wrong with saying so. In fact, there is more wrong in denying it is occuring. When something is not named, it cannot be addressed.

Quote:

Think about that the next time you stoop to lecture workers that they should "pay attention to what governments and political parties are doing", and that workers should "take responsibility for their own actions and ignorance".

I will lecture whomever I want, thanks, just as you do, and there is no stooping involved. Nice attempt at framing conceptions wrong, yet again. I am fully aware of who fought for what, my parents and grandparents were on the front lines doing the fighting. However, I am also fully aware that many are taking past fights and endeavours for granted, just as some young women do today, regarding their acheived rights and show disinterest, at best, regarding the current threat to them and acheived women's rights. That kind of apathy is dangerous to what we, and our parents fought for.

My partner and I are both union members, BCGEU and PPWC respectively, though you know this, I thought I would indicate it again, as I am NOT union bashing. I am apathy and self-imposed ignorance bashing. And I was a shop steward for many years and my partner was too, until laid off last year. And we have both seen the apathy, that you so readily deny it, is amazing, to say the least.

Calling out apathy and stating that some need to take responsibility for this action, is not bashing the efforts of those who came before and fought for what we have. Nor indeed of the efforts of union and non-union workers that keep society running. However, I believe the apathy/negligence of the union and electoral processes is the greatest disrespect there is.

___________________________________________________________
"watching the tide roll away"

Sat, 2008-11-22 23:11

#37

remind

CMOT Dibbler wrote:
All that having been said, many in the working class are good people who have horrendous burdens to deal with and we should not stereotype all of the people in that absolutely massive group as lazy.

Ya, I know, I count myself amongst those who have, and had, horrendous burdens to deal with, while working, raising a family (being the youngest child of many years difference from siblings, of aging parents at the time of my birth, I had to deal with elderly parental care, while being a parent myself), and was still being an activist. And I did not stereotype "all" the people, only those who willfully disengage from the union and electoral processeses..

Quote:
P.S. Can you really blame someone for wanting to go trout fishing rather then subjecting themselves to boring political meetings?

Yep, and I do. ;)

___________________________________________________________
"watching the tide roll away"

Sat, 2008-11-22 23:14

#38

remind

Stop putting words in my mouth cue, just as you do with everyone else!

___________________________________________________________
"watching the tide roll away"

Sat, 2008-11-22 23:17

#39

CMOT Dibbler

Quote:
I have lived in a town, which is almost no more, that had 98% of its workers unionized, with 11 different unions presents as well as a CLC office, and they voted in Jay fucking Hill.

....and if those people had attended all the meetings and read up on what all the parties stood for, they might still have voted for a rightwing barbarian. Political opinions don't come entirely from books. They come from culture too. If you have deeply held beliefs about guns and small government, no amount of education will sway you.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Takes more than combat gear to make a man Takes more than license for a gun Confront your enemies, avoid them when you can A gentleman will walk but never run -Sting, an englishman in new york

Sat, 2008-11-22 23:23

#40

Cueball

remind wrote:
Tommy_Paine wrote:
I wouldn't extrapolate that Remind is saying "people should pull themselves up by their own bootstraps".

No I am not, as a matter of fact, but no worries I understand that my 2 favorite detractors would love to detract and give inferences that were not there.

___________________________________________________________ "watching the tide roll away"

It is the same arrogant contempt put to another purpose.

And thanks very much for giving us your pro-union resume. Very good. Let's be clear though, the greatest numbers of the people who you have shit upon, work in non-union shops, and have none of the protections of privileges of the union movement, which you are right in pointing out has been very much co-opted by short sighted objectives. The "working class", does not begin and end with union movement, nor does it represent a majority of persons who might be deemed "working class", in this country.

Sat, 2008-11-22 23:39

#41

Cueball

remind wrote:

Stop putting words in my mouth cue, just as you do with everyone else!

___________________________________________________________ "watching the tide roll away"

We are definitely not talking about fairly well satisfied workers with above average wages, working conditions and protections, but those who are extremely exploited and impoverished to the point where they engage in crime to supplement their income. They are not busy "Trout fishing" while you are getting free coffee and donuts in a union hall, they may be waiting for bail, talking to lawyers, or any one of a number of things.

All you have to offer is your contemptuous arrogant civics lecture about their "ignorance" as an "invitation" to political action, blaming them for a corrupt courts system, and manifetly undemocratic electoral system, as if it is their fault for defending themselves directly rather than spending time at NDP meetings, or reading your pearls of wisdom here at this web site.

Sat, 2008-11-22 23:41

#42

CMOT Dibbler

Quote:
In the main here, we are not talking about fairly well satisfied workers with above average wages, working conditions and protections, but those who are extremely exploited and impoverished to the point where they engage in crime to supplement their income. They are not busy "fishing" while you are getting free coffee and donuts in a union hall, they may be waiting for bail, talking to lawyers, or any one of a number of things. And you offer your contemptuous arrogant tirade about their "ignorance" as an "invitation" to political action, blaming them for a corrupt courts system, and manifetly undemocratic electoral system, as if it is their fault for defending themselves directly rather than spending time at NDP meetings.

Leave her alone Cue. Everybody says thoughtless things out of frustration sometimes. Please stop.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Takes more than combat gear to make a man Takes more than license for a gun Confront your enemies, avoid them when you can A gentleman will walk but never run -Sting, an englishman in new york

Sat, 2008-11-22 23:54

#43

Cueball

Hey. I have worked in those union towns in rural Canada, and I know what you guys are talking about, there. But what may not be evident there, watching those bully boys driving around with there giant sized Tonka Toy trucks with their 4 wheelers or Ski-doos in tow, is that something very different is going on in urban Canada. The dispossessed are being marginalized and criminalized as a class.

I know people who have thousands of dollars in unpaid fines for begging. What could be more bizarre than having the police, and the courts intervene in order to demand money from beggars?

No longer is it the case that the people we see begging on the streets are the volunteer homeless, or kids out for the "experience", but in fact quite normal people, who otherwise would be working, had they the chance, and who only really look dishevelled and stressed because abject poverty makes you that way.

The dispossessed will not be convinced that supporitng minimum sentences for car theft, alledgedly as a measure to prevent "gang violence" is an indication that the NDP understand and is on their side, nor will it convince them to vote for it. Criminal activity, more often that not, is not a moral dysfunction but an economic one -- that is the left wing line.

Sun, 2008-11-23 01:17

#44

remind

Again cue, you are putting words in my mouth about whom I was talking about. You may be talking about "The dispossessed are being marginalized and criminalized as a class.", I however was quite clear whom I was speaking about in my first response to Tommy, as per the quoted section, I responded to. And subsequent posts, never once did I mention "the dispossessed".

If you would have paid attention to my actual words, instead of deciding to see what you wanted to, perhaps you would have observed me being angry at those who have by their apathy and negligence allowed for the dispossessed to be marginalized and criminalized as a class, and because of this many many more are, or are about to, or could become dispossessed and criminalized themselves.

In fact, in the community in which I live now, pretty much half the population is living on welfare and using the food bank to exist, when just 5 years ago they were "those bully boys driving around with there giant sized Tonka Toy trucks with their 4 wheelers or Ski-doos in tow,"

And through not fault of ours, and even though we are union members, and activists, we could be joining those dispossessed ranks fairly shortly, ourselves, and we live as frugally as we can. The number of friends we have had who are no longer alive, because they were dispossessed and/or criminalized, and have either died from drug over doses, or directly at their own hands is appalling, and I too am angry that some on the left were/are so self absorbed, that they could/can not see what was happening...long ago now it seems. Every 2 months almost I go to another persons funeral that died way way too young.

What is that full poem first they came for...will go look... here it is

When the Nazis came for the communists,
I remained silent;
I was not a
communist.

When they locked up the social democrats,
I remained silent;
I
was not a social democrat.

When they came for the trade
unionists,
I did not speak out;
I was not a trade unionist.

When they came for the Jews,
I remained silent;
I was not a Jew.

When they came for me,
there was no one left to speak out.

- Martin Niemoller

This poem describes
the very real dangers of political apathy, as it begins with focused and targeted fear and fosters hatred, which soon escalates beyond those bounds to the greater population at large.

All, those groups that the Nazis came for, remained silent until they came for them, and I am seeing that happen here more and more. It makes me angry and frightened that some people on the left are being willfully negiligent in deciding to remain oblivious.

Edited because cue did,

cueball wrote:
I know people who have thousands of dollars in unpaid fines for
begging. What could be more bizarre than having the police, and the
courts intervene in order to demand money from beggars?

I know, it is like fining those who live in tent cities for not packing their tents up quickly enough in the morning. In fact, a couple months back I posted a whole segment about Harper's plan to create penal colony slaves, and not 1 person responded.

Quote:
The dispossessed will not be convinced that supporitng minimum
sentences for car theft, alledgedly as a measure top prevent "gang violence" is an indication that the NDP understand and is
on their side, nor will it convince them to vote for it. Criminal
activity, more often that not, is not a moral dysfunction but an
economic one -- that is the left wing line.

I agree with the majority of this cue, but the reality, most of the non-dispossessed are still deluded by the notion, no one will come for them. They cannot yet see that is not the case. In the meantime, there is only 1 party which contains people that do realize and that do give a shit, and are desperately trying to stave it off. Perhaps you are correct we should all just let it go and allow the chips to fall where they may and if a revolution happens, sobeit.

However, I myself am hoping and working towards creating a space where it can be addressed, without the destruction of lives for many more generations by warfare and revolution. Moreover, the dispossessed do not vote aleady in the majority, so their fate is in the hands of those that do and who are activists already.

You know today, I was at the grocery store, and the IWA union local leader was at the checkout with me, she has been laid off for 5 years too, but works for the union and as such gets a livable wage. Anyhow, there was a tray full of little jingle bells with a collection box like they use for poppies. She picked up a bell and asked what was it was for, as I was wadding money (bills into a slot made for coins) into it, and I told her it was for food bank donations. Well, she dropped the bell she was holding like it was burning her fingers and literally walked away.

I thought "WTF there are at least 100 former IWA persons using that food bank here in town". And that to me says it all. There is only solidarity if you are currently in that union class, in respect to some anyway. Still deciding how I am going to handle that.

___________________________________________________________
"watching the tide roll away"

Sun, 2008-11-23 03:22

#45

Cueball

That is sufficient explanation of what was a strongly off-colour comment, in the context of this thread, I guess.

Sun, 2008-11-23 11:04

#46

CMOT Dibbler

Quote:
And trying to get them to look past; playing golf, sports hunting and fishing, and the dart league, was impossible.

There are rank right wingers within the working class. People who hate unions even though they belong to them and have benifited from all the good things accrued by their brothers and sisters. Who care for guns more then they care for socialized medicine and despise teachers more then authoritarian police and politicians.

All that having been said, many in the working class are good people who have horrendous burdens to deal with and we should not stereotype all of the people in that absolutely massive group as lazy.

P.S. Can you really blame someone for wanting to go trout fishing rather then subjecting him or herself to boring political meetings?

Takes more than combat gear to make a man Takes more than license for a gun Confront your enemies, avoid them when you can A gentleman will walk but never run -Sting, an englishman in new york

Sun, 2008-11-23 11:07

#47

Tommy_Paine

"Even Tommy got what I was saying ...."

Yeah, guys, even poor thick headed dullard Tommy got what she was saying....

I'm kidding, really. But I just read that and started laughing-- not at anyone or at in contempt of invented umbrage or anything, but it just struck me as very funny.

It's curious, the apathy that Remind points out. Looking back at the great depression, when perhaps there was justification for revolutionary action, there were no revolutionaries. Even the treck to Ottawa wasn't the threat that the paranoid government of day thought it was.

Apparently, the government of Mackenzie King thought a revolution was justified.

It disheartens me just how bad things have to get to shake working people out of their apathy.

In fact, it won't happen until what I call the bourgeoisie of Canadian society starts to migrate into the working class and perhaps the ranks of the poor-- which they will find intollerable, and organize to change the scheme of things. Which will return their fortunes and leave their grape shot fodder-- us denizens of the working class and poor-- no better off in the long run.

It's why, Remind, that while I vote NDP, and am a member of the NDP, and find it very much more to my liking than any other political party, I look upon it's bourgeois leadership with a sceptical eye.

Sun, 2008-11-23 14:24

#48

M. Spector M. Spector's picture

Tommy_Paine wrote:

Looking back at the great depression, when perhaps there was justification for revolutionary action, there were no revolutionaries. Even the treck to Ottawa wasn't the threat that the paranoid government of day thought it was.

Canadian labour history is actually not that simple, as this excerpt from the [url=http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.com/index.cfm?PgNm=TCE&Params=A1ARTA0... Encyclopedia[/url] describes:

Quote:
During the 1920s, many of the IWW's and OBU's former sympathizers drifted into the COMMUNIST PARTY OF CANADA or the "Left Wing" in the TLC unions. Best known was J.B. MCLACHLAN from Glace Bay, NS, who was jailed for his efforts in the CAPE BRETON STRIKE. This experience contributed to the zeal with which McLachlan, Harvey Murphy, Tom McEwen, Annie BULLER and countless other Canadian radicals engaged in the last attempt to build a "revolutionary union central" in Canada during the 1930s: the Workers Unity League. The WUL had originated in the minds of the Toronto-based leadership of the Communist Party, but it evolved into a genuine workers' unity league, especially during 1932-34 when the party's leadership was incarcerated in Kingston Penitentiary. In 1933 a bona fide delegate convention saw significant revisions to the League's constitution; the independent-minded J.B. McLachlan served as president of the League.

The WUL, like the IWW and the OBU, failed to build a stable membership of more than a fraction of TLC affiliates, but it mobilized over 50 000 workers in strikes; accounting for 50% of all strikes and strikers in Canada in 1933-34. The WUL's penetration of southern Ontario's factory belt in those years was a new departure in the history of revolutionary unionism in Canada, and a signal of a force in Canadian industrial life that gained major momentum in 1937. The WUL's high point was 1934 when its militants led no less than 109 strikes. Three WUL-led coal miners were killed at Estevan, Saskatchewan in 1931; army machine-gun carriers were called to fight the WUL in Stratford, Ontario in 1933; brass knuckles and police cavalry were used against an allied oraganization on the Vancouver docks in 1935. The WUL fought for immediate demands, such as the "work and wages" sought by the 1935 ON TO OTTAWA trekkers. Its practical politics were not "revolutionary". An entire slate of WUL supporters was elected to town council in Blairmore, Alta, in 1933; typically recolouring old designs, they spruced up the main street and dubbed it Tim BUCK boulevard.

Revolutionary industrial unionism in North America did not really die during the Depression; rather, its advocates were co-opted into the orthodox political left or into the pragmatic CIO (Committee for Industrial Organization/Congress of Industrial Organizations). Most WUL militants merged with the US-based CIO unions in 1936. Fate was not kind to the revolutionary unionists in Canada, but the situation can be favourably contrasted with that in Europe, the movement's birthplace, where by 1940 their comrades in France, Italy, Germany, Spain and the USSR were behind the barbed wire of the dictators. The "revolutionary" side of the movement proved a chimaera. Its practical side was an effective program for labour, by which "we mean all those who by useful work of hand or brain, feed, clothe or shelter; or contribute towards the health, comfort and education of the human race" (OBU General Executive Board, Vancouver Bulletin No 1).

Sun, 2008-11-23 15:27

#49

Unionist

Remind provides many explanations for the failure of workers to take action. The only one missing is failure of leadership.

Sun, 2008-11-23 15:35

#50

KenS

Anyone have anything to say about actual unmistakable class conempt? IE, Heather Mallicks comment about white trash.

Its one thing for me to call myself white trash, or to make derisive comments about 'my ilk'... even if I genuingly mean it to be derisive rather than turning the label on its head.

Its another matter for people like Heather Mallick to use it and mean it. Who coincidentally [or not coincidentally] know little or nothing about the multi-dimensionality and richness of white trash.

Sun, 2008-11-23 15:43

#51

remind

cueball wrote:
That is sufficient explanation of what was a strongly off-colour comment, in the context of this thread, I guess

It wasn't "off colour", you decided to take it that way. Nor was it an explanation, it was a response to your commentary. It is extremely interesting, to me, that you decided to take it as poor bashing, and another decided to take it as union bashing. Whilst Tommy, realized exactly what I was saying.

Tommy_Paine wrote:
Yeah, guys, even poor thick headed dullard Tommy got what she was saying

Awwww..I am sorry, I did not mean it that way, I meant it as that it was you to whom I was directly positioning commentary towards, though not at you specifically, and that you could have taken it personally and thus might not have seen it for what it was saying.

Quote:
It's curious, the apathy that Remind points out. Looking back at the
great depression, when perhaps there was justification for
revolutionary action, there were no revolutionaries.

In looking at this and contemplating "why" over the years, I think there are a couple of factors, at least, in play.

First, I believe the reason why there was no revolution during and after the depression was because, the populace who in some cases were new immigrants, or first generation, were immigrants because they were sick of violent political strife in Europe and had thought it solved nothing and looked to what they thought was a better way. Also, a good many of them were either WWI vets, or family members, and they were heartily sick of warfare too. If a better way could be found to work things out, then it should be.

Secondly, the current apathy I believe is something along the lines of "if I do not acknowlege it, and stay behind my white picket fence, then it won't touch me, just the 'others'". Which is kinda like people do in respect to illness and disabilities, especially mental health ones. There is this inherent sub-conscious belief that if one feels anything other than pity from a distance, it may rub off on them too, or they may be seen to be one who has such problems, and that is why one is an activist helping.

Thirdly, is peoples fear of the unknown, and their wanting to believe that they are empowered, or part of the dynamics of power. Hence the divisions of class, and the subtle warfare contained in it. They do not realize this mindset has been subtly manufactured and really should not exist. No one person, or persons are an Island unto themselves, society cannot exist in any form without the disseparate components that maintain it. Thus everyone is actually equal, though some would like be "more" equal than others because of delusions of self-worth. How true realization, within the masses, of the truth of universal equality is going to eventually come about, I am no longer sure.

Quote:
I look upon it's bourgeois leadership with a sceptical eye.

I refuse to buy into the notion of "others". So I do not, or try not to, frame anything within my mental construct that would contain a notion of "others". People, from what some would call the over class, which you call the bourgeois, have asked me and wondered why, I can relate to and have relationships with those they deem are people from the under classes to their and what they believed is my own class, and yet still relate to themselves and have a relationship with them. My response is that they see boundaries where there isn't any and thus they conduct themselves that way.

Indeed, in the over classes there is much thought given out that suggests that if one does have a relationship with those who are considered below, one is either participating below ones level of ability and social position and is thus hurting oneself, or that one wants to feel superior in a group of people who are less than themselves. And I call bull shit to either of those perspectives, there is just people, full stop.

A while back, Michelle noted an article and comments about magna cum laude, and summa cum laude, peoples, whereby the article noted the 2 cum laudes could not meet and have a relationship because there were too many differences between them. Which of course is a load of toxic crap. But this same false ideological belief is played out in every instance within our society. It is wrong and destructive, and it needs to stop before society and people can function in a positive manner for the good of ALL.

However, until that occurs, or is prompted to occur, there must be people who can bridge the social disparity lines, much like rural francesca does. And of course there are also many others, like those of whom perhaps you are viewing with a skeptical eye, but who are in fact are doing something to bring it about.

EDT for spelling and clarity

___________________________________________________________
"watching the tide roll away"

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