On Blame pt. 1

"We all assign blame in our own best interest. So one of the most important functions in society is who controls the blame patterns. Why is that so many workers in my country assign blame downwards towards a few welfare chisellers who want to get a little something for nothin', instead of upwards towards a whole bunch of big-time chisellers who steal a whole lot of something for doing nothing at all?" - Utah Phillips

As an organizer, it is often frustrating to hear members of the community clearly opine on topics in ways that seem plainly incorrect: the frustration that the working poor express toward the welfare class is one of these. There are few moments more overwhelming than standing on a stranger's porch, or in the lobby after a meeting, or anywhere these first conversations happen, and find things to be moving along well, and positively, and then an offhand comment is made about how unfair it is that he or she should work so hard, and yet their tax dollars go toward supporting those who do not work at all!

This is a difficult statement to respond to, and many organizers want to simply chalk it up to subtle, quiet racism or classism, but I think it is more often motivated by exactly the type of directed blame pattern that Utah is talking about. If an individual feels fleeced, cheated, then resentment and bitterness is the correct response, especially if they actually ARE being cheated. I suspect, however, that while there is some fleecing going on, the vast majority of unjust tax dollars flow not into the pockets of the welfare class, but rather into the pockets of the elite, of the families and organizations well-represented in Washington.

Today, especially, it is remarkable that Hank Paulson can use numbers like 700,000,000,000 - I use the zeroes because 'billion' sounds almost fake - to describe the number of dollars it will take to bail out the banking industry, and it is still the folks down the street getting $150 a month for food who receive the resentment of their neighbors.

It is the nature of 'down the street,' I think, that helps to feed this ongoing flawed blame structure. Utah himself points to the public school system as the original motivator for this type of belief system (which I don't entirely buy), but it seems clear that it is easier to resent those actually in your neighborhood, that you have to wait in line behind at the grocery store, than these abstract 'bankers' and 'stock brokers' who continue to go on hundred-thousand-dollar 'leadership retreats.'

This is the type of problem which community organizers need to accept and face fearlessly. It is troubling that it is our own neighbors who face the brunt of our resentment when they feed on the crumbs dropped by the men and women at the top.