Who I am, redux

I am a warrior, and words are my weapons. I fight for those who have no voice, by making my voice loud and clear, and as thoughtful as I can make it. I do this both professionally, and as a hobby. I strive every day to make the world a better place for all the people on it, and I fight bigotry, ignorance, and oppression everywhere I find it.

The personal is political, and those of us who have been on the forefront of the fight for civil rights, women's rights, LGBTQ rights, and other human rights movements know that better than most. I live and breath the struggle for the rights of those who have little or no power, and I fight it daily, and rarely set down my pen for any length of time. It is who I am, and I shine the light of my fight on the world, and do not keep it hooded in fear.

It has come to my attention that some people in my life think I'm anti-Christian. That is not even remotely true. Jesus Christ had some of the most radically humanistic notions ever to be put down on paper: Treat others as you would be treated (Love your neighbor as yourself); Do not commit violence against others, but offer them peace even as they offer you war; Not only support but respect the sick and the poor and downtrodden, for they live a blessed life; Your life is to be valued as it is and yet, it is vitally important to contribute to making the lives of others better as well. These are all supremely important values and I strive to live by them every day, as well as similar values in the Jewish, Hindu, Buddhist, Islamic, and Pagan faiths.

What I object to, what I have always objected to, is Fundamentalism. The idea that any core belief about people, whether it be Christian, Islamic, Market, Environmental, Vegan or Constitutional, can be written down as "perfect" and ever after be immutable is not only wrong, but demonstrably and tragically wrong. Fundamentalism has led to terrorism and violence among both left- and right- wing populations, and among my mentally ill clients, it gets caught up in delusions that make their lives immeasurably harder than they otherwise would be. Fundamentalism stops a thinking mind. Should a great mind, or a good mind, or even a half way new mind have a new, original thought, or even an innovation, that goes against a fundamentalist belief, it is not only stifled, but sometimes ripped out, buried, and murdered in a flurry of fear and loathing. When something is fundamentally, immutably true, any deviation from that "truth" must be firmly, often violently, put down, as it is a threat to a power structure that depends on that "truth" and serves those who profit from it.

What I am seeing right now, in my country, possibly in direct response to the radical fundamentalizing that is occurring in Islamic countries as a response to colonialism and other pressures, is a radical fundamentalizing occurring in my own beloved country. To some extent this is happening on the left, as we see increasing signs of a police state, of a global warming catastrophe and of a corporatocracy that leaves out the ordinary American, but far more, this is occurring on the right as Market fundamentalism and Christian fundamentalism merge into an unholy alliance that is beginning to strongly resemble proto-fascist Italy and Germany, complete with eliminationist rhetoric and demonizing of two (three?) distinct groups; Muslims, Hispanic immigrants, and (liberals?)

People that I have loved and respected, both friends and family, have, in the name of God and government, spoken some of the most hate filled, horrifyingly ignorant, and dangerously backward (empirically so) statements in the last two years that I have ever heard. Critical thinking has fallen by the wayside, replaced with ignorance spoon fed by Fox News, Rush, Beck, and their ilk, which can only lead to violence and unrest and continued economic catastrophe in this country and possibly the world. Friends and family have stopped speaking to me when I called them out on their bigotry, sometimes directly, sometimes obliquely, and I have smarted from those snubs, but not budged on my passionate defense of reason and inclusion and humanity.

It makes me unbearably sad that I now get a twinge of uneasiness every time I see "God" or "Jesus" on a bumper sticker. Jesus certainly wouldn't be supporting giving a big tax break to the rich... he was pretty clear both on how easy it was for a rich man to get into heaven, and how important it is to give Caesar (lawful government) his due. Jesus would not be going around preaching hate about Muslims and immigrants, lawful or otherwise. His views on Samaritans and his own immigration status in Egypt spoke pretty plainly about that. Jesus wouldn't be supporting the wrongheaded idea that folks with an addiction don't need food stamps, cash assistance, or medical or mental health care. Not only was he the wine supplier for several of his friends' parties, he also showed at least one large group how easy it was to feed everyone if everyone shared their loaves and fishes.

In Roman times, Jesus supported the government's right to collect taxes, when the government was clearly a dictatorship and clearly wasn't "us". In the US, in the 21st century, the government is us, and the taxes we pay can clearly be shown to benefit us, and yet, those programs that are most in line with biblical teachings, those that house and feed and educate and provide health care, are those most opposed by so-called Christians, while those that are most opposed to biblical teachings, such as warrant-less searches, holding criminals without charges or trial, draconian immigration laws, and wars, are those that are supported by US Christians. Jesus wept. And, while I am not a Christian, and don't pretend to be, so do I.

Another idea I've been noodling on...government vs. business as rulers of a society

Nature abhors a vacuum... it's an adage for a reason, and the reason is that it's true. The 21st century populist revival would have us believe that if we should eliminate (or drastically reduce) the functions of government, the free market would "naturally" ("magically" might be a better term) take over these functions and (here's the kicker) do a better job. The first part is largely true. Corporations have in the past and will in the future fill power vacuums and take over many functions of government, including regulating trade amongst themselves, building (some) essential infrastructure, and waging wars.

Where corporatocracy breaks down consistently, and government performs better, consistently and based on tons of historical data, is where the motivation for an action requires long term gain (these days more than a quarter of a year), or where the motivation for an action requires that the corporation works against monetary incentive entirely. There are numerous examples drawn from modern life where this holds true... two recent examples include PG&E's failure to properly maintain a gas line which resulted in a conflagration that destroyed a neighborhood and killed dozens of people, and BP's failure to properly prevent, and plan for, its latest oil spill in the Gulf, which resulted in environmental damage as yet uncalculated, as well as, again, significant loss of human life. These are simply bold and beautiful examples, they are not the only ones by any stretch of the imagination.

However, and this is the thing, the incentives of business vs. the government are vital to understanding whose interests they act in. A government that is nominally a democracy and in reality a republic with entirely too much corporate power (thanks to a series of Supreme Court decisions, most recently Citizens United) is still motivated primarily by keeping its constituency happy. In a democratic republic, the constituency is the voters, though inevitably individual politicians become beholden to, and too responsive to, special interests which offer them direct monetary and political power incentives. The event horizon is the length of a political term, or slightly less. In a corporatocracy, the constituency is those who can afford to buy goods, and the event horizon is very short, generally, again, a quarter of a year to a year at best.

Another vital business incentive is to maximize profit. Some of the direct consequences of this are the need for a cheap labor force, for cheap raw goods, and for a market. One thing that is often overlooked in the government vs. business debate is that a broad middle class in not necessary for most markets, and,in fact, not necessary at all if there is export potential (see, for example, India and China, which, while developing a middle class, could not be accurately said to have a broad middle class).

The average person who supports the maximization of business rule and the minimization of government rule sees him or herself as a potential captain of industry. This notion reminds me strongly of one of my favorite hobbies, which is dressing in Medieval garb and going to Ren Fest. Everyone at Ren Fest is a lord or a lady, everyone "upper class" or "merchant class", with a few scattered "gypsies" and "pirates" scattered in.... characters of privilege, or characters of romanticized freedom from governmental restraint. That is fine for fantasy... but in the real Renaissance, there were very few lords and ladies, slightly more middle class merchants, and lots and lots of poor tradespeople, serfs, and otherwise impoverished people for whom life was nasty, brutish, and short.

Those people who fantasize about being lords and ladies in their new libertarian paradise need to take a long hard look at countries who have tried it, starting in Somalia, from there to Argentina, then take a look at the oil rich countries and at the excesses of our own country from the 1890s or so until the New Deal rescued us from the Great Depression.

A democratic government protects us from the profit motive, which is a good thing, as we are not all captains of industry, and never will be.