Monday, August 25, 2014

Divide And Conquer

Here’s something I wrote in May of ’95 that still seems relevant and if I may say so, prescient. It was written in reaction to ideas dominant in higher education at the time. Looking at it now, I see it is woefully incomplete in accounting for the racism that still exists, perhaps naively so. But it speaks from a point that cuts past the liberal/conservative dialog, which had never been helpful. What do you think? 

Divide And Conquer

According to current ways of looking at things, Oprah Winfrey is an oppressed individual. Apparently, the color of her skin (not to mention her gender) offsets the fact that she takes in a hundred million dollars a year. The unemployed Appalachian white male, however, is “empowered”, someone raking in the benefits of a prejudiced system. The incongruity of this juxtaposition goes to show the limits of the current prominent paradigm. Using nationality as a way of categorizing people is accepting the paradigm of the oppressor. Emphasizing racial themes increases racial tension, resulting in tearing apart a majority that should be working together.
A big part of the reason that prejudice exists is because of cultural and economic differences, especially in regard to the African-American. Statistics show that a larger percentage of African-American males are incarcerated than are represented in society. If we look at this statistic through a racial paradigm, we can choose only two options: one, that black males are more likely to commit crimes, or two, that the white-male dominated system is more likely to incarcerate black males. Either way we increase racial tension without relieving the problem. If we choose a different paradigm, however, we see race as an incidental issue. Poverty is a major determinant in crime. An inordinate amount of Blacks are poor. The causal relationship is obvious. While race still plays a part in this paradigm, we can put it into its historical perspective by stating that slavery and bigotry have caused the poverty which now represses the African-American. In this view, we see a greater commonality between the unemployed white Appalachian and the urban black, even though they themselves may not see it.
While it is easy to say that hard work can help the ghetto dweller or the unemployed Appalachian to succeed, the cold hard facts are that the great number of them do not. The occasional success story does not compensate for the countless lives which never had the opportunity to grow. This is not a racial issue. If we were to go into the slums today and make sure that an equal portion of whites lived with violence, poverty and hopelessness, it would not ease the suffering one iota of the people who would still live there. Poverty, not racism, is the issue. Racism is perpetuated by poverty rather than the other way around. If we truly wish to deal with and overcome racism, we must ensure that all people in this nation are given equal opportunity.
Categorizing people by their race or background is a legacy we have acquired from the likes of slave owners who wished to rationalize their inhuman treatment of fellow human beings. We cannot “fight discrimination with discrimination” as Stanley Fish says. Any power grab by a minority group is bound to trigger off a backlash of the majority. Those who erroneously believe in Fish’s assertion are giving fuel to the Rush Limbaughs and hate mongers. In fighting prejudice, it is crucial to avoid accepting the prejudiced categories that divide us.




Thursday, February 6, 2014

The Ten To One Rule


Think for a moment what it would mean to you to make twice as much in wages as you are making now. Imagine what you would be willing to do to make that happen. If you’re like most of us, it probably wouldn’t be possible to double the amount of work you’re already doing or the amount of hours you are already working. You’re probably already working about as hard and long as you’re able. But put aside the reality that there’s no way you could earn twice as much and focus on what you could do with that money. I know I would have a lot nicer car and probably a much nicer house as well. And while we’re fantasizing, think for a minute what you could do if you were making three times as much as you are now. Then your wife—if you have one—wouldn’t have to work and could stay home with the children if she wanted. Plus of course, you’d still be able to afford that nice car and bigger house. And of course, if you were making four times what you are making now, you could have all of the above and retire a hell of a lot earlier than you would otherwise. Face it, you’re probably scared at the prospect of retiring as it is, wondering if you will ever be able to afford it.

It’s fun, isn’t it, to dream of life if we were making many times more money than we are now. Say, for example, five times as much you are making now. Why, with that amount you could have that cabin on the lake you’ve always wanted, along with a couple of fine boats to go along with your early retirement, idle wife, new car and bigger house. But why stop there, let’s indulge this fantasy further. At six times your current salary you could have all of the above as well as be able to take your family and friends to Hawaii or another vacation of your choosing. Every year! At seven times your salary, you could give your real current salary away to a good charity. At eight times, you could do all of the above and make a giant pile of cash and build a big fire with it. At nine times, you could eat out every single day of the year, get a pedicure once a week, hire a personal trainer, and buy a pony yearly. And at ten times your current salary you could…oh, I don’t know, I’m sure you could find a way to spend it.

I like to daydream like everyone else, but I’m trying to make a point with all of this. The point is this: even doubling your income would change your life in many ways, and increasing it five-fold would make you achieve just about all of your material goals. If you were to manage your money at that point, you would do very well indeed. By the time you got to ten times your salary, you’d have to start looking for ways to spend it, or else to save it, therefore ending up with even more money than you know what to do with.

And there is my point, that ten times your salary is not only as much but more than you will ever need. And if you have doubts about that, get your head out of the clouds and think about the fact that you will likely have to find a way to be happy with one-tenth of that in real life. That is reality for 95% of us.

That is my point, but my proposal is this: we should make it a law or at least a very strong suggestion that no business leader should make more than ten times the salary of the lowest paid employer. Perhaps making it a law would be too hard to oversee, but we should definitely make it an expectation for those who run businesses. This does not put a cap on a CEO’s earnings, it merely states that the money should be spread around a little more fairly. While I am perhaps not the most productive person at my work, I can guarantee you nobody works ten times as hard or ten times as much or is ten times smarter than I am, or any combination of the above. I’m willing to bet the same about most of you, too.

This will still allow the CEOs to compete with other CEOs as to who has the biggest salary, since at some point that’s what it boils down to for them anyway, one colossal power game. It’s just that they wouldn’t be able to smash those below them down quite as far, that’s all. It would keep some sort of perspective on the whole system, saying that any one person is no better than any other ten people. To be honest, I appreciate the people who clean the toilettes at my work a lot more than I do any of the executives, and it’s a lot easier to tell when they are doing a bad job. Heck, I’m feeling generous, so let’s make it a fifteen to one ratio. That’s still a lot better than what exists at many companies. I feel this is a very modest proposal. What say all of you?

Wednesday, January 29, 2014

An Introduction

Welcome to my third blog. While I do a lot of what I at least consider semi-serious writing in my other blog, The Amazing Morse, I try to limit it to ideas I explore in my fiction writing. This blog will be different in that I will delve into political matters here. Hopefully not the mud-slinging, name calling kind of thing that passes for political debate nowadays, but honest thoughts about the issues of the day without a claim to having all the answers. Ideally, I would like to foster discussion, to bring many different voices into the debate so that fresh answers can be arrived at.

The name for my blog is borrowed from my friend, Joe Euclide; hopefully he doesn't mind me using it. The idea for the blog came from Adam Gauthier, who was interested in linking blogs in order to discuss issues of the day (if I'm inexact in my description, Adam, please correct me). I've come to realize over the years just how much can be accomplished through good communication, and I perhaps naively feel something can be gained from this new blog attempt. But on that note, let me share a post I originally did on one of my other blogs, as it will be a good introduction to what this blog is intended to be and do.

The Solutionist

Here’s an idea in its infancy, a mere babe in its swaddling clothes that could easily perish through neglect or disinterest. And yet the idea, though small as a mustard seed, has vast potential if people can find their way to it. It is not my idea, but already I think that just by my awareness of it, it has already grown somewhat beyond the sole ownership of its originator. See, that’s the thing; I don’t want to tell you what it is supposed to mean, rather I’d like to tell you what it means to me. And from there, you are welcome to share it with others as you see fit, allowing the basic idea to grow as people contribute to it.

Here is a link to a blog post I recently read: http://www.thesolutionist.us/?p=88

It goes beyond a simple question, actually. The author of that brief post is also the author of a book called The Solutionist, which can be found here: http://www.amazon.com/kindle/dp/B0076B3CII

The basic premise, if I may provide my own take on it, is that through working and communicating together we can make the world a better place by improving the processes we use in every area of our lives.

Again, it is a simple idea, but its simplicity does make it any less worthwhile. Most of us care about the world and the people in it and would like to do what we could to make it a better place. But most of us don’t do anything because we really don’t know where to start, or because we are really not sure which is the best way to go about it.

Well here is a place to start. As for the best way to go about it, let’s talk amongst ourselves and together fashion workable ways to solve the world’s problems. Which problems am I talking about? All of them, or at least whichever ones are important to you, whichever ones you think you can assist with. Here is a flag planted in the ground around which we can rally. Let’s start now and get the ball rolling. It can be done, we only need to have the belief required to begin the task. It is not a task any one of us can do alone, but it can be done when a determined group of people work together without personal agendas. It is not about one’s religion, politics, or philosophy, it is about changing the way we do things as a society in order to make the world a better place. It is doable, if we wish to do it. Let’s start today. The world's problems are not insurmountable, though it often can seem that way because we can not see above the ruts in which we are stuck.

As I said, this is my own personal take on the book and the idea of Joe Euclide. But I believe he would not claim the term “solutionist” to refer to himself alone, but to anyone desiring to find answers to the problems that face us today. And as I also said, this is but a single beginning, a rallying point for those interested in improving our world. Who knows what it could become? It has the potential to grow far beyond a simple blog, or a simple book. Where it goes is up to you, and to solutionists everywhere.