Joe,
I have first-hand experience with the realities of class war. Right out of high school I was active in politics, the old-fashioned corrupt kind -- you know, payoffs and bag money. But this was prior to the liberal "reforms" of campaign financing and the dominance of the Democratic party by systems analysts and an educated and/or wealthy elite. People with no direct connection with working people and whose political agenda revealed an inability to understand the reality of American life other than their own.
It came across as a progressive version of the old leftie "vanguard of the working class." I'm the descendant of loggers and I know history -- the anarcho-syndicalist streak in me got it: they think we're too stupid to run our own revolution, education system, unions, political party. Unlike the old pols who had to pay attention to the rank and file voters. In those days, elections were won, not so much by money, but by turning out voters. As a result, average folks got something out of it like jobs, union contracts, help for local problems.
When it became obvious to me in the mid-70's that the Democrats were abandoning labor, I at first fought, then finally got out. That Demo strategy was not only morally reprehensible, but incredibly stupid as well. They managed to alienate their own political base, and the "Christian" fascists as funded by their neocon overlords moved into the vacuum.
Anyway, I spent more than 25 years as a blue-collar worker, then returned to finish university studies in botany and forestry, and from there to grad school in theology. Your comments that people are cheap and that our lives are a rotation between workhouse and shopping compound are accurate. When I worked in the engine rooms of ferries, the air going into the drive motors was filtered. But we in the crew breathed air full of whatever harmful hydrocarbons came out of the fuels and electrical parts. Obviously, the machinery was worth tens of thousands of dollars while we peasants were easily replaced interchangeable parts. I know here in western Washington logging country, just as in the mining country of West Virginia, we had company stores. Presently, we have an economy where credit card debt is keeping families afloat. Once again, the company stores are living off the energy of the souls they own, off of other people's labor. The old economic vampirism awash in the blood of those they sacrifice through on the job stress. Plus the added bonus of donating their kids' lives in service to the war to make the obscenely rich even richer.
I also have experienced the intellectual irrelevance of much of the academic elite. I studied soil ecology and planned to do research. But as a former (and once again) working class person, it occurred to me that ecological issues could not be solved without confronting the underlying problem of economic inequity. Therefore I learned economic theory. I'm sure you know about the dysfunctional features within the theoretical basis of the system. Like "externalities," the term by which ecological destruction and social devastation are dismissed since they are outside of accounting parameters.
Here's a freebie for you, one David Korten and Herman Daly have both said I'm right about. It may seem ridiculous, but economics is held to be the most rational of the social sciences. And science is supposed to be motivated by the acquisition of knowledge for its own sake. But economic theory posits that the only motivation is the utility function -- in plain English, greed. So if economists are scientists, and therefore motivated by knowledge, then their own theories are deficient. If the utility function holds, then their science is suspect, especially since they are among those most rewarded by their own theories. I've also written on how econ theory amounts to bad theology: an omniscience (the market) which is omnipotent (the invisible hand) whose rules are interpreted for us by a small group of mostly white men (economists) while the rest of us cower. Yet these rules were neither given by God nor the result of evolution. They are the result of human decisions, codified into law.
As for the rest of academia, it is dominated by capitalism as well. What research gets funded? Scientists themselves have written about the horrors of labs functioning as enclaves where it's a race to patent discoveries for corporate use. Exchange of information is impeded by the intense competition. Look at the biggest buildings on any campus, including those with religious foundations. They're the profitable sciences labs and the business schools. Even in the other fields, intellectual cowardice is the norm. Tenure is not awarded to those who challenge the opinions of the department chair. The way to fit in is to go while young, when you can impress someone that your brain can serve as a resource for his (sometimes her) own work. Then pick an obscure, safe facet of that subject and learn it in excruciating detail. Never ever notice the class prejudice inherent in doing "work" far removed from the lives of the people whose money funds the project. Or the disparity all around you; you have a safe haven. You are too valuable to be in the forefront of any struggle. As we labor union types used to say: the liberals are the ones who leave the room when the fight starts.
I was at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley for almost four years. Yeah, "progressive" Berkeley. As I repeatedly pointed out, if that kind of politics, dominant in the Bay Area for 40 years, was so great, why is Berkeley no better for working people than anywhere else in the country? I attended the organizational conference of the Network of Spiritual Progressives, sponsored by Tikkun. Michael Lerner is right that voters went against their own economic interests in the name of something claiming to be moral. The rest of the conference was a bunch of like-minded people reinforcing their own political beliefs. In the workshop on labor, a guy from ultra-rich eco-active Marin County actually used the term "Archie Bunker." My response was that if I had to choose (and don't we?) I would stand with Archie.
In the economic working group, someone proposed explicitly using the term "God" in our statement of principles. That was voted down as possibly offensive to agnostics and Unitarian-Universalists. For a tiny minority, we would write off the vast majority. Then to whom were we trying to appeal? Of course the intellectual elite is the class with whom these folks are most comfortable.
I apologize for going on and on like those boring "progressives." But it's been so hard to live like an ignored outsider when in fact I represent a voice that should have been heard. And was not, even in the liberal theology schools. Your writing has brought me hope. Thanks.
Rafi
Poulsbo, Washington
------
Dear Rafi:
You do not need to "apologize for going on and on like those boring "progressives." You've done no such thing, but rather you have given voice to the ghosts of Joe Hill and all the others who've trod this same path. And I think I can safely say that there are many Americans -- more than anyone even among our own ranks suspects -- who have seen and felt and learned to think for themselves about the so-called American Experience.
It's like Gandhi said: "You fight and you lose and you fight and you lose and you fight and you lose some more -- then you win." I'm not quite sure what will be left to inherit in our victory, but we or some future generation will win simply because the struggle goes on inside working men and women, regardless of whether it is televised or not.
We have been, to put it politely, "marginalized," (the actual word that comes to mind-fucked.) I am no great fan of hope because I think it is the most abused word in the English language. But I am pretty good with playing the odds, and the odds are that the growing Latino solidarity in this country, along with the liberation movements south of the border, from Mexico to Bolivia will prove to be more important than the French Revolution -- assuming there is enough of history left to accomplish it. And if not, well, we of a theological bent know that there is yet more ground upon which to fight than the mere materialistic turf wars currently being played out.
In art and labor,
Joe
