Blue Notes from a Red Zone

M(e)TV

Last night I was part of a panel on a PBS talk show. This was my second appearance, and much more comfortable than my first. The first time, I was prepared for one topic, which was never discussed. The topic actually on the table was not one in which I have any special expertise, although of course I babbled on anyway. This time, the topics were racism (another surprise) and poverty. Poverty, at least, is a topic I know something about.

Since I am firmly rooted in the red zone, I was the only liberal on the panel, and a muted one at that (at least, I thought I was muted. I never once criticized the current government, which for me was a heroic exercise in restraint). Muted or not, the differences between me and the other three panelists were clear from the outset. It made it a lot of fun.

We disposed of racism fairly quickly, with the other three panelists (including the head of the African-American Chamber of Commerce) dismissing it as a non-issue. The party line was that it is counter-productive to focus on racism as an excuse for poverty, since it only hampers efforts to move forward. This is a seductive point of view, but it only works if racism is truly a thing of the past, which it isn’t. Granted, the KKK doesn’t ride at night that I know of, and the membership is much less than it was. Racist remarks are given short shrift by the vast majority of the population. Friendships among members of the same socio-economic groups cross racial lines all the time, and intermarriages are commonplace. Still, I think racism in subtler form is one of the reasons we lack commitment to fighting poverty. It is easier to maintain screens that shield us from seeing poverty, when we think poverty belongs to minority groups and not to “people like us.”

Thus, we launched the discussion of poverty. This is another issue about which everyone has opinions, but about which I also have facts and figures. One guy launched into a tirade about how the social services (in this case, meaning me) had failed miserably. I was right there with my statistics (courtesy the Washington Post) saying that the programs launched by the Great Society have cut the poverty levels nearly in half (from 20% to 12%). Social Security has cut the number of elderly living in poverty from 35% to 9.8%. Funding cutbacks and the failure of wages to keep up with the cost of living, however, have all those numbers inching up. So social service programs have had a tremendously positive effect, and their removal has had a negative effect.

After that, it was "game on." It was incredibly satisfying to be able to tackle myths and stereotypes directly. When one person launched onto a soap box deriding the lazy, worthless poor people who know nothing beyond a government hand-out, I was there with specifics on the percentage of the poor who work, incomes necessary for self-sufficiency, and current wage scales in the area. When other panelists were saying "parents have to do a better job raising their children," I replied that most parents do want the best for their children, but impoverished parents often don’t have the skills to do so. The average Head Start mother has a more limited vocabulary than a 4-year-old child of the middle class. Her conversation is instructional, rather than wide-ranging - the children don't learn to think because their mother didn't learn to think, and their dad (whose skills are probably no better) is nowhere to be found. That led to an indictment of single mothers, who apparently pick up their children from the cabbage patch.

The experience was quite an adrenalin rush, but pales a bit in the cold light of day. Although my fellow panelists were back-tracking like crazy, the truth is, most people in this area (and probably beyond) share their attitudes and their scorn for the poor. The complex causes of poverty, which can range from mental and physical disabilities; family abandonment; domestic violence; low wages paid even to skilled laborers; lack of adequate child care; inadequate educational opportunities – are all reduced to “the poor aren’t motivated to change.”

Unfortunately, it tends to be the rich who are not motivated to change, and they are the ones with the power to buy government and shape it to their liking. The result is an array of incredibly benevolent government policies that transfer billions of wealth into the hands of the top one-half of one percent of the population. They have no problem giving the Waltons $35 million to pave the road into their corporate headquarters in Arkansas, but they refuse to subsidize child care for poor mothers who wish to get an education. After all, that mother should have thought twice before she had that child. The Waltons (who receive a lot more than just paved roads and parking lots), on the other hand, were very far-sighted, and were responsible for millions of dollars being funneled into the hands of the Republican Party. To the victors, go the spoils.

Let’s be the victors in 2006, and start sharing the spoils with those who need it most. Until we can start bringing the power and resources of government to bear on issues such as racism, poverty, education and the environment, we are all going to be the losers.

posted by Lenore Wilson @ 7:35 AM