Howdy Joe,
I read your book Deer Hunting with Jesus. I picked up your book in Rue de Rivoli during a short business stay in Paris. Not bad for the voice of a Redneck to reach so far! Globalisation also has its benefits, huh? Your book is excellent. Couldn't put it down. Your story is clear to me, and being a European liberal, I have no problem agreeing with a lot of views that would be described as "leftie" by contrast in the USA. However, I will not dull your mind by stroking your soul with only praise.
I grew up in a lower middle class family in southern Sweden, in Malmö, in those days also best described as a town, today certainly a city. I made it to university even though neither of my parents even made it to high school. Possessing a curious soul, I have studied languages, science, mathematics and business. I have had, and still have, a rewarding professional life, having performed executive jobs in four countries in Europe, offering perspective as well as financial reward. As I am writing this on a TGV (fast train) from Paris to Lausanne, I will be moving back to Sweden after two years in Switzerland this coming Sunday. And, you know what the greatest thing about it is? As I too was not born with a silver spoon in every body cavity, I really do appreciate my good fortune. Still, it is never self-evident or matter of fact to me! I think you feel the same way.
Joe, your heart is certainly in the right place, a bit to the left. Your descriptions of what is wrong with the world (in some cases mainly USA), and implicit hints of what ought to be, are full of warmth and soul, albeit I sense a touch of the odour that comes from the "menopausal" male's flirtation with "the good ol' days of the past". And this is, at least to me, also the biggest intellectual problem of the "left". The "good ol' times" were not so good for all!
Through natural and imposed protectionism of a not yet globalised globe, the western world (a minority consisting of most of your continent and half of mine) kept the rest of the world in the no way out suffering of no end toiling that you now ascribe to the working class of America. You ask in the book, "So you think we all should be reduced to the level of some guy on a sampan in Asia?" And the question that begs an answer to me is why the Asian guy should be worse off in the first place.
I am a European liberal, soon to be forty years of age, a godless creature, a matured atheist. And I cannot believe it is a God-given (or otherwise produced) law of nature that Americans (or Western Europeans for that matter) by default should be any better off in life than Asian guys. Though it too certainly has its drawbacks, I essentially subscribe to that American tune of competition in a free market. It is after all the notion of "meritocracy over aristocracy" that once gave birth to USA and made it, in record time, at least one of the greatest nations on earth. Unfortunately, it only takes a few generations (perhaps only one?) to become an aristocrat oneself, unwilling, by birth right alone, to stoop to the level of simple Asians.
This very issue is to me the main problem of the "left" today. Solidarity is easily hailed by the working man when his perspective only extends to his own well off nation. But when the global perspective becomes unavoidable, and when it changes the board completely, and the worker finds himself suddenly to be on the giving rather than on the receiving end of solidarity, then it is suddenly not so clear anymore, and his voice formerly strengthen by his "righteous" cause, loses its pitch, as he crows the out of tune melody of a singer without real confidence.
Now, I don't have the solution. Admittedly the competition based global market economy, nowadays hailed by the West as a semi-religion, with its hard line meritocracy, certainly has its drawbacks in that it is so cold. Meritocracy is cold, "we won't love you for who you are but for what you do". Yet the opposite, "we will love you and nurture you no matter what you do simply because you are one of us -- an American", is an "excluding" aristocratic notion, and history (and it ain't warm and fuzzy) shows that this system can only be upheld by handing someone else the short end of the stick, whether it be blacks and Mexicans within the nation's borders (which is inconvenient because then the social injustice is more conspicuous) or by butt-fucking some foreign nation, out of sight, out of mind and out of love.
Cold as it may be, I would take global meritocracy over any form of aristocracy (even the lefty kind) any day if it can be seasoned with that American original flavour of at least a strive for "equal opportunity for all". The problem, also well described in your book, is a failure to allow for class mobility produced by a blurred comprehension and recognition of class and unfortunately cemented by the prevalent "proud" anti-intellectualism of the working class. Problem easy enough to define -- solution hard to implement.
I do not easily buy into conspiracy theories. I do not think that a gang of people, Republicans or not, got together and decided to deliberately poison the working class with propaganda TV and consumerism to subdue their questioning of their lot in life. Actually in this respect I have much greater faith in the transparency of the world today, in comparison to what it was like some 50 years ago, when it was probably more likely that a handful of potentates could rule supreme and get away with murky plans and schemes.
Some change is certainly for the better. Nevertheless the working class is subdued with consumerism and with navigating an ever wider information landscape without the compass to tell north from south, to which the obvious response is to stand still and keep your truths simple. Desire for education is certainly the key, but how to bring it about? I guess neither you nor I have the answer?
Anyway. Good book. Great insights!
Respectfully yours,
Anders
Switzerland (soon back to Sweden)
