An example of American Cultural Myopia
As some of you know, former NBA player and now former blogger Paul Shirley was dumped by ESPN for his blog on the disaster in Haiti. There have been numerous denunciations of his position, which is left on his blog here to read, although how long is unclear, and you can read the whole thing for yourself. I don't wish to denounce Mr. Shirley per se, but I do wish to use his ideas as a centerpiece example of what is called "cultural myopia" from which many Americans suffer.
Cultural myopia in general can be defined as as state in which "information entering into the colonized mind is focused solely through a limited worldview, and anything existing outside of that limited worldview cannot be seen with clarity." A definition of American cultural myopia would be:
The belief among many Americans, that people around the world want to be like us, and have the means contained within themselves to be like America. Those that are not like America are either stupid, lazy, or both. It further means that people in the United States that are poor, or not living up to the middle class potential, are also stupid, lazy or both.
Many people in the United States believe this intrinsically, even if they may not say it explicitly (for reasons of not seeming "concerned" or for political correctness.) This myopia drives both foreign and domestic policies here. For example, the invasion of Iraq was predicated on an idea that Iraqis really want to live in a Western, liberal (small "L"), democratic nation, with lots of material possessions and freedoms for all. The only thing stopping it was Saddam Hussein and his gang of thugs running the country. So, the prevailing view was as soon as Saddam Hussein was removed, the Iraqis would come to Western liberalism like a thirsty man in the desert would run to an oasis.
Of course, we all know how well that went. The war was directed by people with no knowledge of history, culture, the nature of Islam as practiced by its adherents, or any clear conception of the long standing ethnic and ideological feuds in that area. It was hardly surprising that Iraq split into competing groups, the government today has only a smidgen of legitimacy among its people, and violence is back on the rise as these groups vie for position. And Iraq is a garden spot compared to our other attempt at nation building in Afghanistan.
These wars, like Mr. Shirley's comments, are not really the point of this article. Rather, Iraq and Afghanistan shows that American Cultural Myopia exists on the highest political levels as well with the person in the street. On a domestic level here is an example:
A few years ago, when Hurricane Katrina hit the city of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast, there was immense devastation in the area. As I teach sociology, I felt it necessary to do something practical to show how sociology is connected to the world. So I offered my students extra credit if they would either 1) donate at least $5 to American Red Cross relief efforts, or if they couldn't afford it, 2) donate at least one hour packing food, blankets, and other items at a local Red Cross headquarters for shipment to New Orleans.
Most of my students came through with flying colors, and I figured out from all the donations in all the classes that we sent well over $2000 to New Orleans and gave about 150 work hours to the Red Cross. It was great!
However, a few of my students saw no reason to do anything for the people there. They asked questions like "Why didn't they just leave before the hurricane hit?" "They *know* the city is sinking, why do they stay there?" and "They have nothing, what are they trying to save?" And there were a few that said "Hey, they're poor and they seem to like living that way, so why should we help them?"
These students were living under Cultural Myopia, and they firmly seemed to believe that everything that befell the poor people there was their fault, so they don't need help. I'm not going to go into how I tore apart their arguments, since this post will say the same thing in general, but we can see that the average person in the USA can be just as affected by Cultural Myopia as our leaders.
Now, onto Mr. Shirley's post as a present example. He starts his missive with this:
I haven’t donated to the Haitian relief effort for the same reason that I don’t give money to homeless men on the street. Based on past experiences, I don’t think the guy with the sign that reads “Need You’re Help” is going to do anything constructive with the dollar I might give him. If I use history as my guide, I don’t think the people of Haiti will do much with my money either.
In this belief I am, evidently, alone. It seems that everyone has jumped on the “Save Haiti” bandwagon. To question the impulse to donate, then, will probably be viewed as analogous with rooting for Charles Manson, John Wayne Gacy, or the Spice Girls.
Now of course, no one is going to tar and feather him for his own personal opinion on this, and the decision to give or not give to any charitable cause is something the individual must do. However, Shirley's defenders are making him out to be a martyr for expressing his opinion, which is foolish. When we say something in the public arena, we may very well be slammed for it, and we can't cry "foul" when those that disagree get upset with us. So the fact he might be seen as horrific as Gacy, Manson, or Posh Spice is immaterial.
Let's return to the first paragraph, in which the Cultural Myopia is pronounced. Mr. Shirley apparently thinks that the 200,000 or so people that died in the quake in Haiti are just the same as that worthless, homeless bum that is begging for a dollar. Of course, the first problem is the assumption that the "bum" really wants to be out there (too much to go into here, but consider that at least 1/3, if not half, of homeless patients are suffering from mental illness as a starter). This piece of myopia is then transferred to the people of Haiti -- after all, as Mr. Shirley suggests, they are poor, living in tin shacks, and they obviously like living that way or they would change things.
He expands on this idea further down,suggesting:
I’m referring to the circumstances in which people lived. While the earthquake was, obviously, unavoidable, the way in which many of the people of Haiti lived was not. Regrettably, some Haitians would have died regardless of the conditions in that country. But the fact that so many people lived in such abject poverty exacerbated the extent of the crisis.
Obviously, in Mr. Shirley's mind, the fact that the Hatians are poor is their fault, as a few lines down further he pens a sort of "open letter" to the people of Haiti from the rest of the world, saying:
Dear Haitians -
First of all, kudos on developing the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. Your commitment to human rights, infrastructure, and birth control should be applauded.
As we prepare to assist you in this difficult time, a polite request: If it’s possible, could you not re-build your island home in the image of its predecessor? Could you not resort to the creation of flimsy shanty- and shack-towns? And could some of you maybe use a condom once in a while?
Sincerely,
The Rest of the World
And if that's not enough to convince us that Mr. Shirley clearly lies the blame of the extent of the disaster directly at the feet of the Haitians, he also says:
[U]ltimately, the people in a country have control over their government. One could argue that in totalitarian regimes, they do not have much control, but in the end, it is their government. And therefore, their responsibility. If the government is not doing enough for the people, it is the people’s responsibility to change the government. Not the other way around.
This is the mindset of Middle Class America, where we indeed to have the ability to change our government via the voting box. And, he also assumes that the Haitians must have the same ability -- either vote in a new government, or pick up a few sticks and stones and go have a revolution!
As to why he feels this way, Mr. Shirley kindly tells us:
I recoil at the notion that I’m SUPPOSED to do something. I would like to help, but only if I feel that my assistance is deserved and justified. If I perceive that I am being told to feel a certain way, and if I can point to a pattern of mistakes made in similar situations, I lose interest.
Ah, yes, those stupid Haitians -- living in a shanty town, popping out kid after kid, and not doing anything like getting a better job. What idiots you are, and why should we feel sorry for you? I guess.
He closes his post by saying he feels bad for children in Haiti, but:
[A]s far as sympathy goes, much of it should go to those children. But children are brought into the world by their parents. Those parents have a responsibility - to themselves and to their kids - to provide. They have a responsibility to look around - before an earthquake happens - and say, “I need to improve this situation, because if a catastrophe were to happen, we’d be in bad shape.”
The people of whom I write are adults. Functional, human adults with functional, human adult brains. It is not too much to ask that they behave as such. That they stand up and say, “Yes, we screwed this up the first time. We are forever indebted to you. Now show us how we can do it right. So that, next time, we won’t need your help.”
Sounds like an agreeable belief -- after all, these are adults, with adult brains, who can foresee a disaster coming, and should take on the personal responsibility to do something about it, right?
Sure, in Middle Class America, where we have such ability. What mom and pop Haitian should simply do is get a car (just get a loan you deadbeats), buy a nice house out in the countryside and be sure to reinforce it to withstand earthquakes, and all will be well. If only...
The three areas that Mr. Shirley touches on are poverty, living conditions, and birth rate. Let's look at each of these.
Starting with poverty, I'm not sure what Mr. Shirley, or his fellow Cultural Myopians, think the people of Haiti can do about living in such miserable economic conditions. How are they going to grow their own economy when their government -- admittedly horrid, and one that has been supported by the USA -- is incapable of workable economic plans? And it's easy to say "they should just change their government." Consider that swaths of the masses in Haiti are undereducated, just how are they going to create a new master economic plan? And even if the people "took over," what is the economic situation they would find? Wiki tells us:
Haiti is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere.Two-thirds of all Haitians depend on the agriculture sector, mainly small-scale subsistence farming, and remain vulnerable to damage from frequent natural disasters, exacerbated by the country's widespread deforestation. A macroeconomic program developed in 2005 with the help of the International Monetary Fund helped the economy grow 1.8% in 2006, the highest growth rate since 1999. Haiti suffers from higher inflation than similar low-income countries, a lack of investment (increasing however since the recent presidential seating), and a severe trade deficit.
The Wiki article also tells us that sanctions, brought up in the early to mid 1990s, were particularly harmful to the economy. The sanctions were brought against Haiti as punishment for the 1991 coup d'etat that brought in Jean-Bernard Aristide and ended Constitutional rule for a period. The assembly sector, where most people who aren't doing subsistence farming rely for work, went to near zero, and has never fully recovered from the blow. (Goes to show that sanctions almost never hurt the government, but can destroy the economy for the common people we claim care for).
In any case, I do agree with Mr. Shirley that the economic system in Haiti needs to be reworked to make it sustainable for its people. But this assistance is going to have to come from outside the nation rather than within, as even if there were a popular revolution to remove the current government -- whether at the ballot box or by force -- the same set of miserable economic misfortunes would continue to exist. There is literally nothing the people of Haiti can do to fix this problem themselves.
Secondly, living conditions. Mr. Shirley's Cultural Myopia on poverty just extends here. "Why do they live on a faultline? Why don't they create better housing?"
This can be easily answered: with what are they going to do this? As the people of Haiti are impoverished beyond belief, with a 50% unemployment rate and a minimum wage that comes to about $4US a day, just where are they going to get better materials for construction? I'm sure Mr. Shirley's house is a nice, upper middle class dwelling that has all the logical amenities that are necessary for comfortable survival, but when people are horridly poor, with no job, no land, and no way to support themselves, and come into a city looking for some kind of work to sustain themselves, any shelter is a home.
If they don't own land, they're going to starve as they can't do subsistence farming. Thus, coming into Port-au-Prince is their only hope to sustain themselves. While Mr. Shirley also experienced "unemployment," being forced to go play basketball in Spain (poor guy), I don't think his economic straits were quite the same as Mr. and Mrs. Haitian.
Finally, birth rate. Mr. Shirley is quite correct that where we see poverty, we usually have a higher birth rate. Haiti's fertility rate is certainly higher than any in the Western Hemisphere (an average fertility rate of 3.81 per woman, meaning 100 women have on average 381 children), but it is considerably lower than most of the underdeveloped world. Consider that Afghanistan has a fertility rate of 5.6 children per women, and the leader, Niger, has a 7.75 fertility rate. The USA has a fertility rate of 2.01, for comparison.
Further, the population growth rate in Haiti -- taking into account births, deaths, and migration -- is only 1.84% per year. As a comparison, industrialized nations like the USA (0.98%), the United Kingdom (0.28%), Ireland (1.12%), and Japan (MINUS 0.12%) have much lower growth rates, while far less industrialized nations such as Uganda (2.6%), Ethiopia (3.21%) and Niger (3.68%) have much higher growth rates.
My point? While certainly the birth rate in Haiti is something to take into consideration, it's hardly the biggest problem they face, and if the economy were to improve, more people would have fewer reasons to have a high number of children, just like in Western, industrialized nations. The key to creating a sustainable population is to increase economic ability, not the other way around, as Mr. Shirley seems to think.
Mr. Shirley's post is indicative of the feelings of some in the United States about poverty and reaching out to people in crisis. While many Americans are extremely charitable, there is also a rather significant minority that takes the cultural values of independence, self-reliance, and status via work to extremes. While we in the United States are in much better shape to improve our lives via education, work, and self-sustainability, large swaths of the world are not, and it's horribly myopic to try to frame crises like Haiti, starvation in Africa, the victims of the tsunamis in 2004, or even in our own nation when considering Katrina, in the same way.
I do agree with Mr. Shirley that long term planning for Haiti is the key to making the nation better and more self-sustainable. However, this must come from outside, and a fairly small amount of investment can make things much better for the people there. They are in no position to do it themselves, and pointing fingers at disenfranchised people is hardly in good taste. Such thinking might make a non-donor feel better about his or her decision to not give, but it will do nothing to solve the problems in such a nation. Unfortunately, such are the effects of cultural myopia.
-V