A Neat Inversion
A Neat Inversion
As an American visiting South Africa I was struck by the near ubiquity of domestic servants among white South Africans. Households that are in all other ways decidedly middle class have at least one and often two or three domestic servants. This bespeaks the enormous inequality of wealth that prevails in that country, one of the most unequal in the world. It is, of course, incompatible with a healthy, just society, and it goes hand in hand with another striking phenomenon there: the prevalence of security systems, razor wire, electric fences, etc. protecting nearly every white home (and those of wealthy blacks, Indians, and coloreds too).
System-wide, it is not a pretty scenario: extreme poverty creating a huge pool of people desperate to be nannies and gardeners. On the level of the individual household, though, the matter is more complicated. Sometimes these workers practically become part of the family. Is it wrong to hire them and thereby participate in the capitalist system of privilege and exploitation? Or is it one’s duty as a privileged person to offer employment to impoverished people who are desperate for it? In South Africa, as in many countries with a high degree of wealth inequality, many people consider it a social obligation to hire servants if you can afford them – even if you don’t really need to. It is incumbent upon a person of means to take care of the less fortunate.
The same debate applies more generally, to the realm of philanthropy, charity, and any work that directly benefits the less fortunate without changing the system. A leftist critique of these goes something like this: “Sure, treating the domestic help well, giving to charity, housing the homeless, even walking an old lady across the street… these are all nice, but they do nothing to change the exploitative, ecocidal system of global capitalism. On the contrary, charity, philanthropy, and individual acts of kindness only perpetuate that system. Here’s how:
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If you think you know what this article is all about just from what you have read above, you are wrong. Go to the link, read the article, and return with insight.
:~)
Perhaps we could look at acts of direct human-level compassion as complements to, not substitutes for, action on a social or political level. I can offer two reasons why. For one thing, they come from the same place: a desire to serve the well-being of something beyond the separate self. What we practice on a personal level conditions us to act from the same place generally. To choose care for another over self-interest, for example to sacrifice comfort and security to serve an aging parent or disabled child for years and years, takes a kind of courage, trust, and fortitude – no different than the courage required to confront injustice, the trust required to make peace, or the fortitude required to persevere in the face of political setbacks.
Secondly, consider what lies at the foundation of the system of oppression. In South Africa, a man from the townships told me that the reason his people acquiesce so readily to the economic status quo is that, after five hundred years of colonialism, they have almost no self-esteem or independent identity left. They hardly dare believe they deserve better. No longer embracing ubuntu, the young generation in particular fills the void left by the destruction of their traditional story of the people (my words not his) with consumerism, individualism, and all the rest. They, like most people living in civilization, have been infected by the Story of Separation, within which our economic system, our exploitative relationship to nature, our deterrence-based criminal justice system, agricultural system, medical practices, and so forth make sense.
A leftist critique of these goes something like this: ...
When I hit a sentence like this... I stop reading. It is equivalent to "Here comes a straw-man!!!"
If this "leftist critique" actually exists, and if it is endemic... then Mr Eisenstein shouldn't have too much trouble giving us a few links. He does not.
Straw-man.
I am truly miffed as I think you did not read the article. If you had, you would see next the" here comes the conservative straw man" and finally, analysis of whatever lies in the midst. I am truly disappointed in your unwillingness to read and discuss the material Bob,,,practice what you preach!
Since I don't want you miffed, Larry, I read the whole thing. I realize that I was carrying a negative predisposition, but my reaction to the whole article remains much the same.
His five critiques are poncifs as are their inversions. He makes it all sound very thoughtful, but that's easy to do with straw men.
Important point about Confucian nobles / administrators: when one of them abused their power, it was accepted practice to lynch him.
I don't know the answer to fixing South Africa's problems. But, I think we should all do what we can for other people. Everyone needs a hand, every now and then, whether it is economically, or just fixing a flat tire, etc. Where there is a need, look for it, and try to answer it. Of course, most people won't agree with this. But, that's my personal thought.