20. January 2012 by Mad Sociologist.

We can’t have this kind of…um…person (?)…in the White House

With regard to Gingrinch’s (Yes, I’m spelling it that way intentionally!) plan to replace school janitors by forcing poor children to clean toilets…

I didn’t comment on this initially because, frankly, I really believed that Gingrinch would hold a press conference and apologize for the grossly insensitive comments that he made about poor children. If nothing else, in grand Gingrinch style he would have been sorry for our misinterpretation of his remarks. Regardless, this nonsense would have been over and we could have moved on to the general insanity that is the Republica primary. However, not only is this idiot not apologizing, but he’s defending his atrocious plan and even building on it.

In the latest debate Gingrinch received thunderous applause from a Republican audience by defending his Dickensian scheme to lay off hard working “union” janitors who are making way too much money (yeah, who doesn’t want to be a school janitor and bring home all that chaching?) and replace them with poor children. His expressed goal is to teach poor children “the value of work.” Cleaning toilets for their peers would make these poor children feel good about themselves. Of course it would!

As if this wasn’t going far enough, Gingrinch expanded on this strategy. He added that he would fire one janitor and replace him with “thirty-seven” students. Those students would make money that they could take pride is as they bring their checks home to their poor parents. Thirty-seven students for one janitor? How much money would they make? Is Gingrinch suggesting that we pay each student one thirty-seventh of the wages that we pay our janitors? And, if not, how does his plan save the school system money, as he has claimed? Here in Lee County the starting salary for a custodian is an ostentatious $9.33 an hour.¹ To break even on this deal, Newt Legree would have to pay children twenty-five cents an hour. An eight-hour workday would vouch these children a gross income of $2 a day. In exchange for this gracious supplement to the family income, the child will only sacrifice all of his education.

Maybe these children under the Gingrinch plan can go to college after all. Not as students, of course. They could replace those overpaid college custodians and continue to scrub toilets for their better-heeled peers. According to Gingrinch, there is nothing demeaning about cleaning toilets while your peers read Oliver Twist in English class. Toiling for pennies on the dollar and sacrificing any hope for a meaningful future will teach the poor the value of work.

Hey, Newt! Here’s a more radical idea. How about we teach poor children the value of work by, oh I don’t know, helping them do classwork. The research indicates that poor children don’t suffer from not cleaning enough toilets. Poor children suffer from a lack of educational support structures. If anything, they need more time behind the computer and in the books, not more time behind the mop handle and in the dirty bathroom stalls.

Suggesting this, according to the man whose heart is way more than three sizes too small, makes me an elitist! Yes. Only an elitist would suggest that it’s demeaning to exploit poor children as cheap labor by making them clean their peer’s crap for pennies on the dollar. That’s what elitism is all about.

Really? Can we afford to have this medieval-minded, sinister bastard anywhere near the White House?

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¹ For those of you who can’t help yourselves, this wage amounts to $19,406.40 a year before taxes. My, how do we ever afford to pay such exorbitant wages for janitors?

Posted in Politics, Education | Print | 1 Comment »

17. January 2012 by Mad Sociologist.

Economic tyranny is no different from political tyranny

I received a call from a former college student of mine the other day. I use blogs in my college courses to inspire discussion and interaction. I allow students to express opinions so long as those opinions are supported with data, sound, logical thinking, and sociological perspectives. In this case, the student contacted me and asked to have her blogs removed from the site. She was one semester from graduating and feared that the opinions she had expressed on my class blog-site would paint her as a, “right-wing extremist” and handicap her ability to get a job in her chosen profession (I do not know what that profession is).

Of course, I followed through with her request, and eliminated the “offending” blogs. In fact, her opinions were well thought out and supported with data. They were what I would call right of center opinions, but far from “extremist.” Also, I’m not really convinced that these posts were a threat to her profession.

Regardless, this student perceived that her opinions made public would lead to serious negative consequences. Rather than take that chance she chose to censor herself. This is an example of governmentality at work. In other words, no force or coercion from the state was needed. Only the perception of negative social consequence was required to convince this young woman to censor herself. That the threat may not have been real is of no consequence. This student was, in Foucault’s words, bound by the chains of her own ideas.

If this was a case of a bright young woman fearful of government reprisal for exercising her right to free speech we would call this tyranny. That this is the consequence of economic power, however, makes this no less tyrannical. In the United States we pride ourselves on the assumption that we will not be persecuted by the state for expressing our opinions, that we have a Constitutionally protected right to free speech.

Of what value is this freedom, however, if it can be squelched by those who control the purse-strings. How many thoughtful young people are out there, preparing to enter into one of the harshest marketplaces in our history, afraid to speak their minds lest they lose what little opportunity is left in this, the wealthiest nation ever?

Posted in Power | Print | 1 Comment »

6. January 2012 by Mad Sociologist.

On Fake Conservative Angst Over Recess Appointments

On cue, conservatives are aghast…aghast I tell you!…that President Obama has used his Constitutional authority to make recess appointments. Of course, Republicans are not upset that Obama has circumvented the appointment of a candidate that is mutually agreeable to both parties. That really would be questionable. They are, rather, upset that Obama has actually grown a backbone and has demonstrated his willingness to stand up to Republicans. It’s taken a few years, but it’s a welcome sign. After all, conservatives have made it perfectly clear that they no nomination from this president would be suitable for positions on the National Labor Relations Board or the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Conservatives believe that no such bodies should exist.

Of course, the so-called liberal media doesn’t bother to express outrage over the fact that conservatives continued “pro forma” meetings of the Senate every three days in order to block such recess appointments. By “pro forma” they mean that they met for a few minutes every three days (one such meeting lasted only about 1 minute). What was the conservative justification for such a tactic? It must have been the United States Constitution; after all, Republicans are the self-appointed guardians of the Constitution—well, at least those parts of the Constitution that they like. In fact, the Constitution does not prescribe any such time standards for recess appointments.

Well, if not the Constitution, then what? Actually, their tactic was based on a legal brief from the Clinton Justice Department. Yes, let me say that again. It was based on a legal brief from the Clinton Justice Department. William Jefferson Clinton. Yep, that Clinton.

Regardless, when it comes to recess appointments, Obama remains a lightweight.

Here’s a graph from Think Progress controlling for years in office.

When it comes to recess appointments, Ronald Reagan was the champ. Go Gipper!

Don’t expect that to be a Republican Talking point.

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3. January 2012 by Mad Sociologist.

…A year for the history books

For me, 2011 will always be the year that democracy took a deep breath and long stretch on its way to awakening. That this was a global movement inspires me with awe. That this awakening began with a fruit peddler in Tunisia rather than in an American university or political think tank is even more revealing of the nature of man and the tenacity of humanity’s greatest idea. Through this we learned that freedom, equality and a respect for basic human rights and dignity are the driving forces for all people all over the world, regardless of culture, religion or heritage. Democracy is not the exclusive domain of “Enlightened” western Christians; it is also the hope of a Muslim, North African working man who was willing to give his life for an ideal. From Tunisia, to Egypt, to Iran to Madison, Wisconsin, to Liberty Square, NYC, the principles of democracy have re-awakened after generations of repression.

The United States opened its sleepy eyes to its own anemic democracy. It became obvious that the game was rigged when the government stumbled all over itself to bail out corrupt corporations from their own financial malfeasance, then left common people to suffer while our so called representatives debated the most reasonable austerity measures for the struggling masses. In cities throughout the country, we heard protestors shouting, “They got bailed out! We got sold out!” What used to be the bailiwick of the radical left, that our government is nothing more than a wholly owned subsidiary of the corporate elite, is now a topic of mainstream discussion.

This is thanks to the outstanding Occupy Movement. In the Occupy Movement many and disparate voices came together in assembly to redress their grievances. Perhaps they were anarchist, socialists, progressives. Often they were just young people wondering if there were any opportunities left in America; young men and women who did what they were told, worked hard, went to school, did their homework, only to be told that they were just going to have to settle for less than their parents had—austerity…times are tough, don’t you know. Some were the same folks who were shaking their fists in Chicago, 1968 and Seattle, 1999. There was union support, teacher support, even police support. Many voices added to the growing chorus of democracy throughout the United States saying, “here we are! You cannot ignore us anymore! We are not leaving!”

In some cases the homeless joined the ranks of the Occupiers, perhaps in solidarity, but more likely for access to food, shelter and security. After all, the homeless, regardless of circumstance, are still part of the 99% so lauded by protestors in the streets.

And yes, there were the dingbat Zionist conspiracy theorists and requisite loons that go with any movement and seem to get the lion’s share of attention by the media. We cannot, in fairness, discount them.

Regardless of who showed up for the General Assemblies, who populated the many and varied working groups, who arrived on the scene to showcase their own opinions, the underlying theme was the same. There’s something fundamentally wrong with our country when the overwhelming majority of people are left to fend for scraps that fall from the bounteous tables of a tiny, elite minority.

This is what Mohamed Bouazizi was saying when he set himself on fire, his immolation giving birth to the Arab Spring. There is something wrong with my country. This is the refrain of protestors in Madison, rioters in London, Paris and Greece. There is something wrong with my country that it does not represent me, my neighbors, or any universal principles of human decency when it demands that the masses suffer for the largess of the few. This was the message, which the media refused to acknowledge, of the Occupy Movement.

The corporate controlled media, the fourth estate, sneered at the occupiers, whining that a growing protest movement throughout the nation was without a message. Without a message? Without a message? Yet the corporate media could not explain how a movement without a message was spreading so rapidly. Of course, there was a message, one that the corporate elite refused to acknowledge. The message was, “there’s something wrong with our country.”

There’s something wrong with our country when we must bribe the “job creators” to create jobs; and after they take the bribe without creating more jobs the only suggestion made by our punditocracy and price-tagged politicians is—bribe them some more. There’s something wrong with our country when a corporation is recognized as having the same rights as an individual, but real individuals trying to speak, to assemble, to vote must struggle to against the state for a fraction of that recognition. There’s something wrong with our country when there are almost four million homeless people in a nation with eighteen million empty homes. There’s something wrong with a country that would sacrifice its teachers, police officers, firefighters, nurses, social workers before it will raise the taxes on the wealthy even one quarter of one percent. There’s something wrong with our country when politicians are willing to poison hundreds of thousands of people, countless ecosystems, just to maintain a dying petroleum industry. There’s something wrong with our country when those who crashed the economy of the entire world can continue to live in lavish luxury while thousands guilty of nothing more significant than smoking the wrong kind of plant languish in jail. There’s something wrong with our country when corporate executives, responsible for killing countless people throughout the world, destroying the lives of millions more are allowed, nay encouraged, to perpetuate their corruption, while men like Troy Davis are executed based on tarnished evidence.

For the most part, the assessment of what was wrong with the country was accurate. Our nations have put their faith in markets rather than in people. Our wealth has been squandered in search of short-term profit, investment schemes, dwindling resources rather than being invested in the long term best interests of everyone. We have so called republics that represent the smallest fraction of the top 1% while the 99% are belittled as lazy, uneducated, unmotivated. The economic crisis was blamed on poor people, black people, civil servants and teachers, rather than on the very culprits who caused the crisis. Not surprising. You don’t accuse your dining buddies of skullduggery, especially when they are certainly guilty. It’s uncouth. Our world is, more and more, settling under the thumb of a great corporate behemoth. Governments fall in line, becoming inconsequential in addressing the needs of common people.

The democratic demand of people all around the world was “represent us!” Again, the corporate run media refused to hear. Like idiots, mindlessly repeating the last thing they heard, they kept asking, “what are their demands? They have no demands.” And the people in the street shouted through the human microphone “represent us! REPRESENT US!!” and the mindless media trumpeted in return, “what are their demands? They have no demands.”

Last year also revealed what those of us who believe in democracy are up against. It’s one thing to gather en masse in tri-cornered hats, prattling nonsense about watering the tree of liberty and second amendment remedies. If you are regurgitating far-right, conspiratorial talking points about saving the country from socialism and Kenyan/Muslim Manchurian candidates bringing Fascism to America by taking over health-care, even if you are armed, then you are not considered a problem (and, of course, you shouldn’t be). Your rights are protected so long as you exercise them for nothing more than spouting absurdities.

If, however, you have the audacity to demand a redress of legitimate grievances, and you refuse to stop demanding redress, then all the power of the state will come down on you. Throughout the world tyrannical governments did everything they could, through propaganda, through violence, to suppress the democratic voice. The United States was no exception. Peaceful protestors throughout the nation were subject to ridicule and lies, called dirty hippies, spoiled children, criminals. They were tear-gassed, pepper sprayed, clubbed, beaten, shot with rubber bullets. This done in the name of “public safety and sanitation,” as if littering was an excuse for paramilitary assaults.

Regardless, the legacy of 2011 will always be the rise of democracy as a global phenomenon. This movement does not end with the coming of a new year. They are ongoing. In the US, Occupy has laid the groundwork and networks for limitless, innovative forms or activism such as occupying foreclosed houses. In Egypt, religious uncertainties and an entrenched military aristocracy challenge democracy. People are still dying in the streets of Syria. In Europe, people are waking up to the cold realities of failed austerity programs.

The foundations are set for a global mind-shift toward democracy, toward an awakening of human self-worth. Yet many obstacles remain in place, dented, but unmoved. It is impossible to know the direction this new route of history will take us. One thing is certain, however. Where democracy takes flame, where human beings act collectively to demand respect and a recognition of their rights you can expect that corporations and the states that represent them will use any means in their power to stamp the fires down.

It is also certain that such trespasses of power won’t work in the long run. We no longer quietly accept the lies and constraints of governments. We no longer have faith in markets. Thanks to 2011!

Posted in Occupy Movement, Personal Message | Print | 1 Comment »

24. December 2011 by Mad Sociologist.

Toward the End of War

On February 15-16, 2003, an almost miraculous event took place. Millions of people in over 60 cities across the globe took to the streets and, in a unified voice, protested a war that had not yet begun. While the Bush administration was beating the drums of pre-emptive war, as many as ten million people worked toward pre-emptive peace. Nothing like this had ever happened before, a global protest to keep an unjust war from happening. It is my belief that, at that moment, we saw the beginning of a paradigm shift that may, albeit in the distant future, create an environment in which politicians and power brokers dare not even consider justifying war to secure their ends. In that distant future, a future where parents never have to suffer the pain of sacrificing their children to bombs and bullets and poison, I believe that historians will locate the realistic conceptualization of a world without war on February 15, 2003.

I was proud to be a small part of that giant movement. Like many others, I did not just take to the streets and wave signs. We networked, sharing information and intelligence with each other. Then we endeavored to share this information with others. The goal was to educate as many people as we could to the lies being spread and the fear perpetuated as a justification of the war. Of course, the mainstream press was no help in this endeavor. News sources from the New York Times to the big four networks were marching to the steady beat of official propaganda. Dan Rather, one of the biggest names in news at that time affirmed just after 9/11 that “George Bush is the President, he makes the decisions and you know, as just one American wherever he wants me to line up, just tell me where,” forever tarnishing his reputation as a journalist.¹ After all, wars sell advertising space.

Before the lead up to war I wrote numerous letters and guest editorials to the local paper. Usually I wrote on environmental issues, but also addressed politics and human rights. I was even receiving letters from local people appreciating my liberal perspective—a rarity in South Florida—as if I had a nascent fan base growing. My essays were never rejected from the local paper and rarely ever edited for anything more than a misplaced comma or my penchant for passive voice. I was even asked to sit on a community panel to help plan the future of the paper.

When President Bush started beating the war drum, and I submitted essays contradicting the administration’s claims, however, a strange thing happened. Most of what I wrote appeared in the paper heavily redacted and cut (presumably to make it fit into the editorial scheme). Eventually, the paper stopped printing my essays altogether. The last piece I wrote was based on interviews I saw with weapons inspectors and experts who were familiar with Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction (WMD) capacity—or rather incapacity. These inspectors destroyed the Bush case for war, a case built upon the claim of WMD’s in the hands of a madman intent on America’s destruction. What these experts had to say, however, appeared nowhere in the mainstream media, including our local paper. My essay was never published.

Of course, that’s one of the ultimate lessons of war. War thrives on lies and ignorance and smothers any truth that might deny the creature its devious nourishment. The Iraq War is the ultimate example of such monstrous policy devouring a nation’s prosperity, posterity and reputation among nations. The entire war was built on lies from the start, and these lies weren’t well hidden as is the case with most other wars. No, the Bush lies were right out in the open for anyone who had a heart and a mind to see.

It should have come as no surprise that the United States would end up in another war with Iraq². One of President Bush’s first official acts as Commander in Chief was bombing Iraq, two years to the day before the afore mentioned global protest. After 9/11, Bush wanted nothing more than to pin the terrorist attacks on Saddam Hussein. He instructed Richard Clarke, Chairman of the Counter Terrorism Security Group and National Security Council Advisor, to find evidence linking the 9/11 attacks to Saddam Hussein. When Clarke wrote up his investigations, he concluded that there was no such link. The memo was returned with a note stating “Please update and resubmit.” When Clarke went public with Bush’s obsession with Suddam Hussein he was denounced as a liar…until it was clear that Bush was, in fact, the liar in this case.

The Bush Administration mantra on pre-emptive war was best summarized by Donald Rumsfeld’s brilliant observation that “the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.” Of course, he was right; but absence of evidence was still…absent evidence. Despite lacking evidence, the Bush Administration marched in lock step to the drums of war. National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice joined the mushroom cloud chorus of fear-mongers. She reminded us repeatedly that we don’t want the “evidence” to be presented as a mushroom cloud over a major American city.

Everywhere the Bush cabal went, and in every speech given, the phantom specter of the mushroom cloud was invoked. After 9/11 this was the best kind of psychological warfare to aim at citizens already shaken by the sudden realization of their vulnerability. Bush Co. played it perfectly. They played up the Axis of Evil card and invoked imagery from The Day After. Fear is the most fertile field in which to sow your lies. People reacting to fear are not thinking, they are searching for safety, searching for protection, running like children into the waiting arms of tyrants. There was Bush and Cheney, daddy and grand-pa, waiting with open arms.

Bush claimed that Hussein was reinvesting in a nuclear weapons program. He offered aluminum tubing as evidence. The aluminum tubing turned out to be, well, just aluminum tubing not suited for nuclear technology. The administration claimed that Iraq had attempted to purchase “yellow cake” uranium to be used in his mythical nuclear weapons program. When US Ambassador Joseph Wilson blew the whistle on the false allegation the Bush Administration responded by denouncing Wilson and exposing his wife, a CIA Operations Officer named Valery Plame, perhaps endangering the lives of countless other agents working with her. But since her husband tried to shed light on the shadow loving lies of the Bush Administration, she was “fair game.”

Lies stain everything, and everyone they touch. When President Bush announced that Colin Powell would be his Secretary of State, even stalwart liberals like me hoped that the general, famous for his character and clear mindedness,³ might provide a moderating voice of reason in what was otherwise a right wing cult. The unimpeachable character of Secretary Powell was irreparably impeached after his presentation of lies delivered to the entire world via a UN council. When UN Chief Inspector Has Blix annihilated Powell’s credibility about a week later the Bush Administration and the media dismissed his assertions. Just because Blix had actually visited the places in Powell’s satellite photos, finding nothing, could not, as far as the media was concerned, take away from Powell’s “slam dunk” case against Iraq.

The lies continued with assertions that Saddam Hussein was in cahoots with Osama bin Laden. Like the mushroom cloud mantra, no speech that included the name Saddam Hussein and Iraq excluded bin Laden and al Qaeda. The American public was told that Saddam had provided protection and training to al Qaeda. That he and Saddam were secret buddies making backroom deals to get the great Satan America. Of course, we can’t leave out the ultimate psychotic rhetorical mash-up. Once Saddam Hussein got his hands on nuclear weapons, he wouldn’t hesitate to hand them over to his BFF bin Laden. More lies. Bin Laden hated Hussein’s secularism, calling him an infidel. All claims linking bin Laden to Hussein, to secret meetings between Iraqi ministers and al Qaeda operatives were all lies.

When Bush finally ordered the invasion of Iraq he announced that the United States had done everything we could to avoid war. He claimed that Saddam had refused to give up his weapons of mass destruction. Of course, this could be explained by the fact that Hussein did not, in fact, have weapons of mass destruction to give up. It’s like expecting someone to prove he did not steal your wallet. He claimed that Hussein refused to cooperation with weapons inspectors. This was also a lie according to the actual inspectors. Donald Rumsfeld stated with stumbling boldness that the administration knew where the weapons of mass destruction were. They were around Tikrit, “east, west, south and north somewhat.” You don’t get any clearer than that…at least not from Rumsfeld. Fortunately, there was nothing to worry about anyway because the Iraqi people would welcome us with open arms. They would throw rose petals at the feet of our soldiers. They’d forget about the fact that we’d been bombing and starving them for twelve years before we even bothered to invade them. (Okay, I threw that last sentence in there, but the rest comes from the Bush Administration).

Finally, we’ve learned that lies don’t die easily, especially when they clearly demonstrate our own stupidity. Today the paradigms explaining the invasion of Iraq conspicuously avoid mention of weapons of mass destruction and dissembling about al Qaeda. Instead, the politicians and the media lap-dogs (or the other way around, it’s getting hard to tell anymore) reminisce about how the United States selflessly entered Iraq to liberate the Iraqi people from their bloody tyrant. We muse about how US soldiers hung around for over eight years to make sure that the Iraqi people were all snug and toasty in their fresh democratic sheets before we finally turned out the lights this month. We bemoan how unfortunate it was that our best intelligence at the time showed that Iraq had WMD. Had we only known that this evidence was spurious we would never have undertaken such a costly mission. These claims are lies. And these lies are working. Essays from my high school students demonstrate that they accept these fables without criticism.

The litany of lies that we can attribute to the Iraq war are just too many to mention in a simple blog post such as this. Today we all applaud the end of this miserable war and the removal of US troops from Iraq. Absent from our discussion is the continued presence of thousands of mercenaries paid by the State Department who will now pick up where American soldiers left off. Who are these people, and to whom do they answer? They will represent the United States, you and me, before the world yet are not accountable to you.

And now that we have Iraq out of the way, we can hear in the distance, the crescendo of…more war drums. This time they beat for Iran. As the pundits tighten the skins and the war hawks in Congress sharpen their arguments we the people must always remember that war is a lie. It’s conceived in lies, it grows and develops in lies and even after the war ends, the lies live on. Let’s build on the movement of February 15, 2003. Let’s not fall for another lie.

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¹ Rather’s loyalty to the Bush Administration during this time of crisis was repaid when his reasonable inquiries into George Bush’s questionable military history was smashed when it was discovered he had unknowingly used forged documents to make his case. Though the story was still relevant, and the facts indisputable even without the forged documents, Rather was ridiculed and humiliated, his career as a major journalist brought to an end. That’s what “getting in line” will earn you.

²An official war, that is, not the twelve years of bombing and inhuman sanctions that was the US/British policy for twelve years before the actual war started. Let’s not be mistaken.

³Whether Powell actually deserved such a reputation is an issue outside of the topic for this essay.

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12. December 2011 by Mad Sociologist.

Why has the godless GOP declared war on Christmas? Obviously, if they were real Americans, they would be having a “Christmas” party and not some politically correct “Holiday” party. If you think I’m making this up, contact the e-mail and ask them yourself.

Posted in Politics | Print | 1 Comment »

7. December 2011 by Mad Sociologist.

And insist on their brutal and destructive “austerity” policies

Somehow, conservatives have sold the idea that national health care, unemployment insurance, retirement, and economic assistance is government over-reach and an encroachment on our freedoms. Entitlement programs are a breath away from the scourge of tyranny (despite the fact that nation providing much more lucrative entitlements are among the freest on earth). However, according to conservatives, to take away these entitlements or transferring the oversight of these programs to private, for profit, institutions, is nothing of the sort. A government that provides for its citizens during times of crisis is big government Stalinism, but the same government imposing punitive austerity on the same citizens is a bastion of liberty.

Why do conservatives hate America and Americans so much that they are willing to make the suffer for the sake of keeping a few bucks in the vaults of the rich.

After all, isn’t that what Soviet Russia did? Enforce bitter austerity to mitigate the nation’s economic inadequacies?

What will those Stalinist conservatives do next? Impose rations?

Posted in Personal Message | Print | 1 Comment »

4. December 2011 by Mad Sociologist.

Crime, the Economy and Common Sense Notions Proved Wrong

A few of months ago criminologists were shocked and amazed that, despite the decrepit economy, the crime rate went down. Now, it’s true that the crime rate has gone down, and has been going down for quite some time. However, I cannot vouch for the statement that criminologists were “shocked.” If it’s true that criminologists were shocked, then there’s only one reasonable explanation for this. Criminologists, at least those interviewed by the press, did not pay attention in their mandatory sociology classes.

Most of the articles that I read asked economists to explain the poor correlation between crime and economic integrity. None of them really offered an explanation. They cited interesting research such as the exceptionally high crime rates in the 1960s despite general prosperity as compared to relatively low crime rates during the Depression. One article did offer sociological analyses. For instance, the 1960’s experienced the Baby Boomers entering prime crime commission age, the teens and early twenties. They speculated that the Depression was so severe that communities had to come together to survive, thus decreasing crime. That’s why, in these instances, crime did not follow the economic trends.

The press is playing on the common sense notion that economic hardship leads to higher crime rates. After all, crime rates are higher in poor communities than they are in economically sound communities. This makes sense to the layperson and even to the sociologist. When a person doesn’t have legitimate access to the resources they want, they must turn to illegitimate means of achieving those resources. In sociology this is referred to as Strain Theory. Strain is the inability to satisfy socially accepted goals, such as economic prosperity. Strain, however, doesn’t happen in a vacuum. Regardless of strain, most people do not turn to criminal behavior over all. Most people conform to the norms and values of their culture. Like most common sense notions, this presumed link between the economy and criminal behavior is wrong.

Criminal or deviant behavior is the result of a breakdown in the influence of norms (rules) and values on human agency (the decisions of individuals). Human behavior is influenced by socialization. Socialization regulates human behavior through internal and external controls. Internal controls are values that are internalized by individuals. They are the reason why we recoil when we see people do something we know to be wrong. They are the reason why we feel guilt when we do something wrong—the reason why we hesitate in the face of a deviant act. External controls are the mechanisms in place for identifying and dealing with deviants, such as surveillance, police and corrections policies in society or discipline plans in schools or families. When individuals are certain that they will get caught committing a deviant act and will suffer significant consequences, this is sometimes enough to dissuade their straying from the accepted path.

Crime is likely when these controls fail. What brings people to turn their backs on the norms and values of a society to which they are socialized? Well, of course here we make the assumption that we are all socialized to respect the same norms and values. That’s not necessarily true. Some are taught that the conventional rules do not apply to them and are socialized with contrary norms and values. This phenomenon exists in impoverished communities, subgroups and counter-cultures, but it is also apparent among the elite whose status offers them a certain protection from external controls and whose aristocratic arrogance reinforces an ideology of superiority.

The above scenario, however, should not explain changes in crime rates unless there are significant changes in the relevant populations. So how do we explain a differential acceptance of social controls? Once socialized, these controls are very potent. Yes, we all challenge them in relatively minor ways, but for the most part, we accept the legitimacy of what we’ve learned to be right and wrong. For us to abandon our values the very legitimacy of our socialization must be challenged. This can happen in a number of ways.

First, along the lines of strain theory, the individual may recognize that the values of the society are out of his or her reach. Through the resources and networks at her command, it is impossible to achieve higher status through socially legitimate means. Therefore, one might be inclined to pursue illegitimate means to achieve at least a representation of the desired goal, or will reject the goal outright and establish more local goals. However, this can’t be the only variable, otherwise one would predict that during times of economic hardship, more people will innovate to achieve the desired ends. At best, strain can only be one variable contributing to higher crime.

As a check against strain, social constructs exist that define the misfortunes, or dare I coin the term “disfortunes” of those with the least access to life chances and valued resources as proper, right and even natural. According to these constructs, for instance, society might define those who are poor as being undeserving of wealth. In the United States, such people are blamed for their condition. They are defined as lazy. Today, they are often framed as being parasitic, leaches on the welfare state with no incentive to pursue wealth or improved status. If they would only commit themselves to work and self-improvement, they would reap the benefits of our great nation.

Such a construct is no different than defining the “disfortunate” as being intellectually or, genetically inferior. In this instance, programs for improving the lives of the impoverished are nothing more than wasted resources.

In some societies, the dispossessed are so due to the whims of God. Perhaps they are cursed by God. On the other hand, God may be preserving the poor for a greater reward in Heaven. The legitimacy of iniquitous access to resources, according to this paradigm, is the will of God. Who are we to question the Almighty.

Regardless of the constructs, if those on the wrong end of the status ladder accept their position as right, proper or natural, then they will likely internalize the accepted norms of the society despite their status. However, when these status positions are called into questions, for instance when we see slothful dilatants living the high life, while our own toils go unrewarded, when we are witness to the profits gained by the morally reprobate while we are induced to righteousness, we may call into question the rightness, propriety and nature of our position. In this case, inequality, or shall we say conspicuous inequality, may invalidate established social controls.

Another factor that may contribute to crime is a breakdown in institutional legitimacy. This could result from paradigm shifts that demonstrate the iniquitous and often oppressive nature of accepted institutions. Philosophies recognized as otherwise radical may be vouched popular appeal, calling into question the values that hold our institutions together such as the concept of the social contract during the Ancient Regime. Perhaps a significant exemplifying event may force us to question our values, such as the death of Ann Hutchinson, or the Triangle Shirtwaist fire, or the Kent State massacre. Successful claims may be introduced to the popular discourse, such as feminist critiques of male primacy in the family, scathing Enlightenment critiques of nobility and religion, or the application of the fairness principle in the Civil Rights and LGBT movements. These movements have a moral center, but can serve to destabilize, at least temporarily, institutional legitimacy.

The above happens because, often, the institutions that provide stability and moral legitimacy are, in fact, iniquitous. Patriarchy, racism, sexism, homophobia, economic exploitation, are vulgar foundations on which to establish social stability. An unjust society may be able to enforce, coerce or institute stability for the short term, but not in the long term. Injustice cannot be shrouded in secrecy or legitimized in the face of its victims for long. Eventually all injustices will be confronted and all institutions based on those injustices will be either reformed or ruined. During the interregnum, however, we can expect an increase in crime as institutions are the framework by which external and internal controls are supported.

That’s why crime often travels with the young. Adolescents are ripe for questioning the legitimacy of established social norms. Not yet fully socialized, adolescents offer the best critiques of the validity of our institutionalized norms. In some cases the young person can be persuaded to see the light, so to speak, and accept institutional validity. In those cases where they don’t, they can be drugged or otherwise coerced…for a time. This is especially true when the answers to their critiques are blatantly inadequate. It is also true when they understand that their future, in the legitimate sense, is at best questionable.

Economic variables are not the only factors involved in crime. Therefore, it should not come as a surprise that our current calculations of crime show a continuation of its downward trend. However, we should keep in mind that current research is based on 2009 figures. Perhaps it is too soon for the calamities of 2008 to be internalized. However, all of the variables highlighted above, the questionable legitimacy of our institutions, inequitable access to life chances, conspicuous injustice, significant exemplifying events, are all in place today. We established a precedent (not really unprecedented to the historically literate, but unprecedented in the minds of many today) of rewarding those who believe that the established norms do not apply to them, namely the banksters and the Wall Street scammers, with a colossal, tax funded, golden parachute. This was not lost on those who are now expected to pay for the bailouts through punishing austerity measures while the elite toast their success with Dom Perignon.

Moreover, this was not lost on our youth, who learned an interesting lesson about “real” American values. But what did they learn? Did they learn that crime pays, when it’s Wall Street crime? Did they learn that the only way to avoid punishing “austerity” is to get rich by any means? Or did they learn to revile the modern day robber barons and to apply themselves to re-alligning American society with its vaunted values of fairness and opportunity for all? Unfortunately, at this point, there is no way to know for sure. Nobody is asking them. Maybe we should.

Based on the rough outline above, I would predict that the crime rate, especially property crime, will trough soon and start increasing. I base this not on the economy. The economy doesn’t appear to be getting any worse (yet), but on the conspicuous iniquity revealed after the dust of 2008 settled.

Posted in Crime, The Economy | Print | 1 Comment »

28. November 2011 by Mad Sociologist.

Let’s call it what it is!

What would you call an action perpetuated by one group of people on another group of people that resulted in the deaths of almost 900,000 people? What would you say if you knew that this action was almost exclusively one sided, with one side baring almost all of the casualties while the other side profits enormously?

Would you be inclined to call such an atrocity among the most violent and bloody acts of warfare in the annals of history?

Kondo, et al (graph at left), published in the British Medical Journal, using the Gini Coefficient, an established measure of inequality, concluded that this is exactly what is happening in the United States. They describe a heinous crime of unspeakable proportions expressly and conspicuously ignored by the corporate media. The Gini Coefficient is a measure of economic inequality—the higher the number, the more unequal the society. The researchers used the Gini Coefficient to analyze the mortality rates between the United States and more equal nations like Denmark and against the average Gini Coefficient. According to their analysis, almost nine hundred thousand more Americans die every year than would have died had the United States comparable levels of inequality with other industrialized nations.

This mortality breaks down to class inequality. Those Americans with the highest income tend to live longer than those with the lowest income. Low income Americans are more likely to live in close proximity to pollutants, unsafe and unclean housing, crowded conditions. They are more likely to participate in unsafe and unhealthy jobs, killing around fifty thousand working Americans every year due to occupational injuries and related illnesses. Low income Americans are also more likely to have less access to health care and the most up to date methods of medical treatment, causing the deaths of around forty-five thousand. Low income Americans are less likely to use preventive health services, including pre-natal health care. Those at the bottom of the income ladder are also lacking in pertinent educational resources conducive to longer life and are, therefore, more likely to practice unhealthy and dangerous lifestyle choices.

Central to this discrepancy in mortality, however, is the how income inequality kills babies. Infant mortality rates in unequal societies is higher than in more equal societies, for many of the same reasons outlined above. The United States, arguably the wealthiest nation in history, leads the industrialized world in dead babies.

One out of every three deaths in the United States can be attributed to the fact that huge concentrations of wealth are in the vaults of the top 1% of households. In fact, according the Paul Krugman, we can break that top 1% down into the top 1/10%. That top 1/10-1% is doing fabulously well. There is not recession for the economic elite. They have the best of everything, including the prospects for a long and healthy life, and the probability that their children will survive into adulthood.

In essence, the top echelons of society are literally enriching themselves at the expense of the very lives of those at the bottom. This is intentional, not merely a contingency of social organization. The economic elite actively promote, pressure and coerce our representatives into exacting policies that benefit them at the expense of the lower classes. In some cases, the elite literally write the very legislation that they lobby our so-called representatives to pass. Any effort to promote the general welfare by legislating for clean environments, adequate housing, universal health care, better education, healthier and safer work conditions, a living wage, union representation, jobs programs, maternity/paternity leave, or any of a vast number of rights and privileges enjoyed by working people throughout the industrialized world is derailed by corporate lap dogs in our state and federal legislatures.

Meanwhile, poor and working people are expected to tighten their belts by the very elite that are prospering like never before. Those who are literally losing their lives as a consequence of economic inequality are being asked by the benefactors of this de facto purge to make due with less. After all, times are tough. People can’t expect to have the same quality schools and health care and housing and jobs during an economic recession…unless they’re among the economic elite, that is. They simply have to make due with less. We can’t afford the largesse that the poor and working class have grown accustomed to over the years. Never mind the fact that this system is literally killing hundreds of thousands of Americans.

Any suggestion that maybe the wealthy could make due with a little less is scorned by an aghast corporate class. What? We should be bribing encouraging the job creators to produce more jobs, not tax them more. When it’s pointed out that the so called job creators are deriving unprecedented profit from the lowest tax rates in generations but are still not creating jobs the response is, ‘well, obviously taxes are just too high.’ They lobby against even the slightest effort to increase revenue at their expense while proselytizing the virtues of austerity—austerity that they, themselves, refuse to accept.

The calculus is simple. If the wealth are asked to give a little more, they remain fabulously wealthy and will be forced to do without…um…nothing. The poor, however, will die.

They know this, because they are aware of the research, that austerity policies literally kill people of the lower class. They don’t care. If the corporate elite have to create a pile of bodies to further stuff their already bloated accounts, they do not hesitate. What’s the value of a human life if that human life happens to be poor anyway. The poor and the working class are disposable, barely even human in the eyes of the corporate class. So these people actively engage in ensuring and enforcing austerity that literally kills the poor and working class while enriching themselves.

Explain how this complicity in death can be anything other than warfare? Make no mistake. The class war is very real. It is a war with identifiable casualties and deaths, including countless babies. This war is promulgated by one class against another without consequence…so far.

The greatest weapon that the elite class has against us is ignorance. Even the slightest suggestion that the US is among the worst exemplars of class warfare in the Western World is derided as engaging in “class warfare,” by the punditocracy that serves the corporate elite. Of course it is. It also happens to be true. This war has been going on for generations. It’s time for those of us who are losing to fight back. The first step is to recognize it and identify it for what it is…cold blooded, premeditated, violent warfare.

Posted in The Economy, Social Commentary | Print | 1 Comment »

26. November 2011 by Mad Sociologist.

The dehumanizing rhetoric aimed at the Occupy protestors will lead to increased violence

My first impression when I saw the video from which this indelible image was taken was ‘my god, this person is showing absolutely no affect over what he is doing.’ An emotional or empathic understanding of a process that inflicts intense pain, and perhaps even permanent injury is missing from Lt. Pike’s demeanor. He might be spray-painting a fence post for all of the emotion that he is demonstrating. Look at his posture, his face. If you separate it from the context of the moment there is no way to discern that Lt. Pike is in instigating intense violence on other human beings.

One possible explanation is that Lt. Pike is a psychopath, completely void of an understanding or appreciation of the consequences of his actions on others. I think, however, that such an individualistic explanation is too easy, and not entirely fair to Lt. Pike. It’s more likely that Lt. Pike is an average guy, just like anyone else, who was out doing his job. Except his job happens to be enmeshed in a psychopathic sociology that motivates his behaviors and the behaviors of all involved. A psychopathic environment begets psychopathic behavior.

A symptom of psychopathy is the inability to recognize the humanity of others. Well, a psychopathic social environment is one in which the humanity of a group is denied, or in which the group is defined as being less than human. This is done discursively by expressly emphasizing inhuman or dehumanizing qualities when referencing the subject group. For instance, the establishment talking point among conservatives when discussing the Occupy Movement is that of “the dirty hippy.” This is a discursive formation designed to frame our knowledge of Occupy protestors as deviants. “Take a bath and get a job,” is the advice of such luminaries as Newt Gingrich and his crew. They try to define this courageous movement as nothing more than a bunch of deadbeats trying to sponge off the rest of us who are working hard through this economic crisis.

Other such formations link the action of the Occupy Movement with groups identified as being threats to the American way of life, communists and anarchists. Conservatives attempt to convince us that somehow, this democratic movement is the first step to a Stalinist dictatorship. When I attended my first Occupy rally there was one gentleman who admonished our actions as being what he fought against in Germany in the 1940’s.

Yes, the argument can be made that the above frames, dirty hippies, deadbeats, even anarchists are all humans. Indeed, but they are humans who are, culturally, not subject to the same level of respect of deference that would otherwise be granted to the groups of people who really are representative of the Occupy Movement. Therefore, they have less claim to the guarantee of rights and respect that might be expected of any other citizen.

In many cases, the movement is being defined as a “health hazard.” Instances of police brutality and vandalism are nothing more than the unfortunate necessity of the establishment having to move in and clear out the protestors for the sake of the public health. This is easy to believe if the protestors are defined as “dirty hippies.” After all, what would you expect from dirty hippies all camping out in the same place but for a huge health catastrophe in the making. Interestingly enough, though there is countless hours of footage revealing police brutality, I could find no footage demonstrating the health hazards of an Occupy encampment. I spent the first six years of my career in campsites. The last couple of weeks I’ve scoured videos of Occupy camps, specifically studying the background for any indication that the camps were haphazard or possibly hazardous to the health. I found nothing. Nobody has posted footage of health hazards in an Occupy camp that I’ve been able to find. Yet every time there’s a police crackdown on the camps it’s excused by the authorities as necessary due to public health reasons.

Disease is a central theme of many criticisms of the Occupy Movement, from an outbreak of TB in Occupy Atlanta (which was actually from a homeless shelter…imagine that) to the spread of STD’s, all of which are of dubious evidence. Regardless, linking a group of people to the spread of disease prompts the justification for any number of actions that dehumanize the target. After all, diseases do not respect the Constitution, so the Constitution is not a factor in attacking disease.

Of course, the next discursive formation to develop is to define the movement itself as a disease, which many commentators seem to be tiptoeing around, and a couple of blogs have stated expressly. This is the ultimate dehumanizing tactic. One that I’ve elaborated on this concept before. If a certain group can be defined as a disease, then the “eradication” of that group is justified, so a little teargas here and there is certainly excusable.

The dehumanization of protestors is the typical strategy of the establishment. Indeed, the establishment is strategizing the demise of this group as evidenced in this memo to the American Bankers Association. In order for this movement to be effectively silenced, those doing the speaking must be defined as less than human. Dehumanizing tactics provides the contexts in which the Occupy Movement can be ignored, marginalized and ultimately attacked by the power of the state/corporation.

Lt. Pike is just one tiny gear in this great, psychopathic machine. Within this machine he has a job to do. He recognizes teargas as nothing more than one instrument at his disposal for accomplishing this job. So there’s no remorse, no empathy for the human suffering that he is perpetuating. He’s doing nothing more than his job. However, this job is by its very nature psychopathic. Instead of recognizing the rights of students and citizens, instead of finding alternative means to achieve a satisfactory ends with regard to the Occupy protestors, the protesters themselves must be made to obey a system which exists to disenfranchise and exploit them. It is Lt. Pike’s job to make them obey.

Social psychopathy ensues.

Unless this psychopathy is addressed, expect the violence to increase. When it does, it is up to us to point out the humanity of those victimized by the state. That has been the rule so far. The young people being sprayed by Lt. Pike are demonstrably not “dirty hippies.” They are college students who, in any other context, should be hanging out at the frat house eating pizza and trying to pick up girls. We’ve seen Iraq War veterans getting the skulls smashed in. We’ve even seen veteran police officers hauled away for supporting Occupy. It’s hard to dehumanize our friends and neighbors. It’s our friends and neighbors, our brothers and sisters, who are trying to make themselves heard by occupying public spaces. If you hear someone refer to the Occupiers as “dirty hippies” make sure you let the speaker know that they are hating your brothers and sisters.

Posted in Occupy Movement | Print | 3 Comments »