Merit and Motivation

[virginia_fell]

The next time someone tells you that poor people don't deserve help because the real problem is that they don't work hard enough to deserve food, health care, and homes, remember how many of them are being deliberately obstructed.I know that we like to act in America like our culture is a perfect meritocracy, that rich people earned their money and

Comments

[motherwell]

The worst part is, I've heard this from poor people. They don't even know they're being lied to, so they go right ahead and hate themselves because the people who benefit from their poverty tell them they deserve to be hated.

It's not quite that simple: poor people who are trying to get decent jobs and/or benefits don't hate themselves, they hate other poor people who are trying to get the same benefits while making stupid or self-destructive choices, like not taking available jobs, doing drugs, committing crimes, or cranking out more kids than they can care for. And one really can't blame them for thinking that way: if funds are limited (and they always are), and I need some of them to feed myself and my kids, then the LAST thing I want to see is some other halfwit jumping the queue for the same funds while getting fired for being drunk on the job, or trying to feed kids she shouldn't have had in the first place.

[virginia_fell]

Or they assume that other poor people are making destructive choices. Maybe it makes it easier to stand being refused for benefits if they can believe that services are wasted on those other jackasses. Maybe it's easier if they don't have to think about the fact that someone else might need it more, because surely no one deserves it like they themselves do.

I really think it's often more about the perception of making irresponsible choices than the commonality of the choices themselves. Low-income women frequently end up with more kids than they can care for because they're denied access to family planning services. Poor people sometimes commit crimes because at least in prison they'll be fed and safe, and the illegal drug trade is sometimes the only economic engine left in certain areas, along with illegal prostitution

[virginia_fell]

I can't believe I just used the phrase "the people who benefit from their exploitation." I need to go wash the Marx out of my mouth. >_o

[motherwell]

One may not know exactly WHICH other poor people are making stupid and/or destructive choices, but's pretty obvious to everyone that a lot of them are making such choices, and that said choices are at least part of the reason why they're in need of state assistance. So if you're trying to do the right thing 24/7 and you still need help, you're bound to feel a good bit of resentment toward people who are doing the wrong thing and still competing with you for the same help. The hate is not "directed inward," it's directed at others in similar situations. They're not quite the same thing. It's a bit like hating someone of your own race or religion for reinforcing a stereotype harmful to you. It's not self-hatred, it's hatred of something or someone that makes you look bad or otherwise impedes your own progress

[gidster]

It is also infuriating/amusing to hear pundits demand that these folks "Just pull themselves up by their bootstraps"! That becomes much harder to do when circumstances have taken your boots as well!

Unfortunately we are deep in the nasty side of capitalism. Only the strong survive, and the strong do not want competition. This is the capitalism that Marx railed against, unregulated and pursued by greedy men with too much wealth already.

Where did yo get the last excerpt? I would like to follow up on that one.....

[virginia_fell]

Same page.

[admnaismith]

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

[lepusdomesticus]

Thank you for the link. That article was absolutely chilling. What struck me most about it, though, was the consistent theme of these women not graduating high school or completing their GED because they had to get some awful job just to survive. People can pull themselves up by their bootstraps with a lot of luck if they have an education so that they can get a good job. It's not enough to have a public school system. We have to make sure every student can actually complete her schooling.

We are often told that we (Americans) are our government. But it's not true. Congress is not even close to actually being representative of the population in terms of diversity of life experience and understanding of the lives of the most disadvantaged. And the system of seniority, committees, favors, and corruption in our gevernment actively prevents new voices getting in, perpetuating the culture of self-service and leading to travesties like Georgia's TANF system as illustrated in the article