No, I haven’t forgotten this site. I’ve been slowly making my way through a nightmare recently, and believe me, elements of what I’ve gone through will end up here, as there is a lot of privilege involved. But due to what I’ve gone through, it may be a while before I have the headspace and energy to get worthwhile articles written.
In the meantime, I’ve been thinking about a few other topics I want to write on. For example, anarchy and my concern that maybe the concept of fairness was the most harmful thing humans ever manipulated each other into aspiring to. If you knew life just wasn’t fair or equal and you were on your own, how would you have lived your life? Would you have been a selfish asshole, or would you have cooperated with others in mutual interests? If no one told you, “be patient, the government/daddy/the lawyer/etc. will fix it”, how many situations would you have fixed yourself, to your benefit, that instead you left to fester and cause you harm? Those of you who have reliably been able to get help from the government/daddy/the lawyer/etc. might wonder what I’m talking about. Those of you who – like me – did not have much luck with the people we were supposed to be able to turn to for justice might.
Another topic: how much does financial poverty contribute to abuse cycles in families? Money equals survival in a post-hunter/gatherer society. When people don’t feel secure, that leads them to either internalize or externalize the insecurity. Meaning, they either take it out on themselves or others, so it seems to me poverty tends to create families full of abusers and willing victims. And whatever good you may personally find in religion, it has undoubtedly been offered as a panacea to poverty. Just using Christianity as an example: it’s easier for a camel to squeeze through a needle eye than for a rich man to get into heaven. The meek shall inherit the earth. Etc. Chock full of delicious reassurance that we’ll be rewarded for taking shit. That’s a great way to set up a whole big class of people who will take abuse, and if you deny that religion has ever been used for that purpose, I’m not going to take you seriously. Being religious does not preclude admitting that bad things have been done in the name of religion. In fact, I would think it puts more of a burden on you to recognize those evils.
Possibly the best story in the Bible, for both topics, is the Prodigal Son. This son gets Dad to give him his inheritance early, and he blows it and ends up destitute. Comes home. Dad welcomes him and takes care of him. Meanwhile, the other son – who did his duty – wonders what the fuck is this shit. That’s the Bible being honest with you, kid. Get used to it. Do the responsible thing, and no one cares. Everybody loves to be a big fancy forgiver of sinners, so hurt them often and hard, and they will give you everything you want and then some. Irresponsibility always gets rewarded.
I don’t have a finish for this post – like I said, lack of energy and headspace – so I’m just going to stop. Comments are welcome!
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{ 9 comments… read them below or add one }
I never got that Prodigal Son story. Dude, you squandered your inheritance, your more responsible brother shouldn’t be expected to pick up your slack.
Someone said something at the last meeting, that if the world lived life by the Twelve Steps, there’d be no need for religion. They’re basically about taking responsibility for your actions and their consequences and making amends where you can.
Scarlett(Quote) (Reply)
I don’t agree that poverty causes violence. Violence causes violence, but it can also cause poverty in the screwed up family. And you could probably make a good case that wide gaps between the rich and poor are another form of violence.
Actually, I wanted to point you to this, only I got distracted:
http://aspergersquare8.blogspot.com/2009/08/checklist-of-neurotypical-privilege-new.html
I see you don’t have anything listed under fully abled privilege (vs disability). Maybe it’s buried under another name?
Anemone(Quote) (Reply)
I never said poverty causes “violence.” I said abuse. Even when abuse is physical, and therefore violent, it’s the emotional component of it that does the damage (imagine that a family member is sleepwalking and hits you – how hard would that be to overcome, versus that person hitting you, fully conscious, with full intent to harm you?). And I think I can make a strong case for how poverty sometimes frustrates people to the point where they decide to relieve the frustration by belittling family members cruelly, or programming their kids to feel worthless, or feel ridiculously entitled, etc.
I think we have mentioned the privilege of not being disabled around here, but I have never written an article on it because it’s a privilege I have and I’m still sorting out thoughts on the topic. Fellow writer Anna has been instrumental in this process for me.
The Asperger checklist is very eye-opening. It’s interesting how much of it actually has to do with the diagnosis/label, rather than just having the syndrome. I.E., if you were undiagnosed, a doctor couldn’t possibly dismiss medical symptoms as part of the syndrome. So, you know, you’d think getting a diagnosis like autism would be helpful, and instead it could be the opposite.
Although I’m not sure why autism needs to be a “diagnosis” rather than being thought of as a personality type or set of personality traits. I came across someone arguing that point years ago, and it’s stuck with me.
Jennifer Kesler(Quote) (Reply)
I see where we got our wires crossed. I use the term “violence” for all behaviour that harms others, including physical, psychological, verbal, and sexual abuse, since that’s how media violence researchers usually use the term. You were probably thinking violence = just physical abuse.
The autism checklist (I had to double check and see if Bev used the term Aspergers – I don’t think she did) is going to cause a lot of argument amongst ourselves, as does the whole issue around disability or difference, to diagnose or not diagnose, etc? It also depends on where you live, since the penalties (being denied medical insurance) are higher in the US than in other developed countries if you have a diagnosis.
Most of us who get the diagnosis as adults do so in order to access services we need. Usually, we experience it as a disability, not just a difference, but other people get hung up on the differences, not the disability. (They try to get us to change our personalities to avoid having to accommodate the disability.)
I was just curious how someone who knew little or nothing about autism would react to the items. Bev said that some people who weren’t autistic were made uncomfortable by some of the items.
Anemone(Quote) (Reply)
Then you were using violence as I use abuse. While I agree with you, if I’m understanding you correctly, that poverty does not directly cause someone to abuse someone else, my argument is that it creates unnecessary frustration and fear, and those emotions often result in abuse. I don’t think there’s a correlation between poverty and abuse, but I do think some potentially abusive personalities might never act on that potential if they were more secure financially.
Oops – I did realize the checklist was autism. I just got “Asperger” stuck in my head from the title of the website and typed that instead without thinking.
I was just curious how someone who knew little or nothing about autism would react to the items.
I actually know slightly more than “little or nothing” about autism. It was speculated that I might have it to some degree when I was younger. Then the Asperger diagnosis came along and that was speculated on, too – naturally, I read up on all of this for myself. I don’t meet the diagnostic criteria for any form of autism, though I do share some of the traits to a significant degree, and therefore could relate to some of the items on the checklist better than I suspect someone who knew “little or nothing” would.
I can tell you my initial, unconscious reaction was to relate the list items to my own experience so I could lessen their impact. One example ran something like this on the internal monologue: “Well, I’ve had doctors dismiss my every complaint as having to do with my PCOS, as if that explains everything. In fact, I think if you have any outstanding diagnosis, doctors tend to want to link everything back to it.” Which is a valid enough point, but as I consciously considered it, I realized it was an unconscious attempt to avoid the point, which is that autistic people are having a particular experience that I will never have to worry about.
Jennifer Kesler(Quote) (Reply)
I agree that poverty is really stressful. And that economic success could head off violent behaviour if the violentization hasn’t gone that far yet. But it may depend on how the person feels oppressed. In my case poverty is part of my oppression, but there seem to be a lot of rich people (rich from my perspective) who feel entitled to be abusive, so I guess they’re feeling oppressed by something else.
I’m looking forward to your writing this up at some point. Arguments are always easier to understand in detail.
Anemone(Quote) (Reply)
Orson Welles once said “Nobody gets justice. People either get good luck or bad luck.”
E.(Quote) (Reply)
I have my own saying, “Justice is like cake. It’s wonderful, but it won’t appear spontaneously. Somebody has to make it.”
To my way of thinking, “the system” isn’t good or evil, it’s mostly a ragtag accretion of history, with some amount of moral progress in there. And the way forward has to be more moral progress, slow and grinding though that may be.
Julian Morrison(Quote) (Reply)
I’d have to disagree with Julian. The system (or at least large parts of it) is evil, in so far as that the basic services promised are often renegaded, cut down to nothing, or ignored. It’s an evil system which we continual prop up by not doing anything, allowing others to make false promises without consequence, and not really thinking the future through except from the “what I want to happen” point of view. It’s like a poorly planned science fair project where we left too many factors open for the results to mean anything.
The system is really a very vague term though. Perhaps a topic on the privilege many of us feel to harp on and on about the evils of “the Government” while waiting for someone else to come in and clean it up! The privilege of inaction.
Kirsten(Quote) (Reply)