Rutgers!!

Ahhhh....... :) After five years, three applications, a whole host of struggles thoroughly documented on this blog, and a whole lot of work fostering relationships with faculty there, I have finally been accepted to Rutgers Anthropology program!  :)  I can not tell you how big of a deal this is to me.  As my mom said, the only other thing in my life that really compares is being offered a place on the West Virginia Football team when I was a senior in high school.  At that point in my life I had been working for all 17 of my years to make myself the best athlete I could.  It was my dream to play Division I football, and on a trip to Morgantown, WV the recruiting coordinator extended his hand and an offer to play for them.  They had finished third in the country that year, and I was going to be playing for them.  I'd worked so hard, endless days running, catching, pushing myself to physical exhaustion - fighting both to make myself better, and against all the people that said I'd never be able to to it.  But I did, I made it.  And while what I did with that opportunity involves a lot of youthful indecision, and adult regrets, I learned from it.  And now I will be going to "play" at one of WVU's former Big East rivals!

I wasn't expecting much more from Rutgers than I got last year when I was put on their waiting list again this year, but over the last week they'd sent me a few hints that I needed to still be patient.  I didn't want to think to much in to it and start hoping, but I did return to their website and reenvision myself there if even just to be able to compare with Binghamton.  I spent most of this week in Binghamton, and was going to be writing a blog post about that visit today, however that post has just been high-jacked by a phone call I got while nestled in the depths of 25 Central Park West's servants entrance to apartment 7Q.  I'd just rung the doorbell to the servants' entrance with no answer, the guy the takes you up the elevator and monitors that you don't go crazy or steal things, decided to try the front door just as my phone rang.  A 908 area code, Jersey!  It was not stored in my phone.  Immediately I thought of Rutgers and said F-it, I've gotta take this.  I answered and it was the director of graduate studies.  Immediately I thought, there's NO way he'd be making a personal call to me to say I did NOT get accepted!!  He then said, "I'm not sure if you've read your emails" (I said I hadn't), but I wanted to give you an actual phone call to offer you a position in our program, with funding."  I can't even explain the emotions I felt, the senses, the moment, it all went hazy, emotional, exuberant.  I couldn't express to him enough how great it was to hear this!  I quickly had to tell him though that I was at work and couldn't talk, but said I would check my email and try to get back to him if I got a chance while at work!  

The funny thing though, was that I didn't say yes on the spot.  I knew better given past mistakes, like the decisions I made involving leaving football at WVU. Thus I now always sleep on any decision of consequence.  Also, one of the first things that ran through my head was Binghamton.  I had just spent two full days attending classes, meeting professor, and feeling comfortable with a future there.  They have such great people.  The students, the faculty, the administrators.  I really enjoyed my time there, and know there are a lot of things that I could do there, even things I couldn't do at Rutgers.  A radical department for a radical scholar such as myself!  But my emotions and innate reaction to this news from Rutgers didn't allow for a decision, wei wu, action without action.  My body, mind, and soul knew right then and there were I was going to school.  I don't know how I am going to tell the people at Binghamton.  But I told them this may be the decision I had to make and that it would be tough to turn down a top ten Anthropology program.  But it is not just that.  The offer comes with four years of funding.  The first year in the form of a fellowship for $22,000, and the next three as a Teaching Assistant fro $26,000 per year. There is a full tuition remission and healthcare throughout.  While the cost of living is less in Binghamton, their three years at $15,000 per and a tuition remission, is still less, nevermind that I'd then have to pay for healthcare there.  But all told, its a no-brainer, and the people I met there, that either were honest about the two options or were in Anthropology and knew what Rutgers had to offer, thought I'd be crazy to even consider it!  But to me, I think the main difference is the organization and faculty mentoring at Rutgers.  Binghamton is largely self directed (a big positive), but with discombobulated support and institutional structures/guidelines.  I never got the same story from anyone regarding what the process exactly entailed with their evaluation process and their "area papers", but it wouldn't have kept me from going there, especially as they are actively working to rectify it.  I felt very confident that I could have navigated the program.  I did get a lot of students that said they struggled to find a "mentoring" role from above, that guidance was sporadic and dependent.  One faculty member when directly asked about mentorship said "oh, we definitely mentor students that we believe in" [my italics].  At Rutgers, I felt like there was so much love.  Students, and faculty alike.  I felt like they genuinely seemed to care about me, especially the second time around when I went to open house this year.  Even the offer email says:  "We are a program that values close mentoring relationships between faculty and students, a supportive rather than competitive environment, and a rich and lively community of scholars."  This is not to say I would not get that from Binghamton faculty.  I met several that I immediately clicked with.  And BU is not a bad program.  It's full of a history of truly revolutionary scholarship and hopefully a wonderful future.  I am finding this really difficult to write as I had such a wonderful time there.  To look the people in the eyes that I stayed with, talked with, had a drink with, and say I'm not coming will be tough.  There is so much talent there, and so much I would have learned.  I will have to figure out how to stay involved with them, but like I said, my body knew where I was going as soon as I got off the phone.  My heart has always been with Rutgers.  A program that embodies me in every which way shape and form.  And I will even get to go to the football games!! 

I called everyone, and smiled for the rest of the day.  Even now, I can't stop talking about it...  ;)     

Moving toward the/a future

So in all the here and there of trying to make decisions about schools and where to go a very definitive moment and circumstance has been illuminated for me.  Months ago I looked at some European schools and settled in on the University of Ljubljana as a good option for me, and one that I was guaranteed to get in to.  The educational merits are there for me to attend this school.  Third ranked school in Eastern Europe, Interdisciplinary program, done in four years max, 1.5 years there and then back here to do (required) coursework at foreign institutions and my research (i.e. could study at Rutgers), etc.  Just prior to hearing back from Binghamton, when the rejections were starting to rain in, I started really thoroughly examining this opportunity.  And it quickly became more about a career and life choice than a school choice.

I started constructing a rationale in my head that made, what could be seen in many ways as a defeat (if I did not get in anywhere here), into a victory.  The problem was that the rationale was in fact, way to sound. As you start to think about your future and creating a place of joy for the long term, you start thinking through things of personal and social importance.  Where you want to get old, what type of society you want to live in, if you had kids what kind of society would they grow up in, does your country embody your beliefs both at home and abroad, and perhaps most importantly what are does a country and its socio-economic prospects for the future hold?

For me these questions made me want to move.  Getting a PhD in America means setting ones self up within the American system, and best positioning oneself for a job here in America.  Going abroad does the opposite.  If I went to Slovenia (a small country of 2 million people, formerly part of Yugoslavia, that is nestled within Italy, the Austrian Alps, and the islands of Croatia on the Adriatic sea and carries a rich history of egalitarian economics and slavic language and culture) I would stand a very good chance of creating career opportunities there.  If I spent four years there I would both ingrain myself within the European academy and Slovenia.  I would speak Slovenian and maybe Serbo-Croatian to some extent, to go with my Czech and the German I studied in college.  If I studied Occupy and the US's suppression of the movement, I would have a strong American studies resume that would make me very marketable on the teaching market throughout Europe, nevermind the areas of Central Europe that I feel at home in.  If I go to school here, the degree could still open some of those doors if I do it right, but not the same social and linguistic ones.  More readily though, it sets me up for a life here in the United States, as part of the Academic and socio-economic system I so readily struggle with.

More importantly though with this logic is that it is a bet on America moving forward.  This right now is not a bet that I feel very comfortable taking.  America is in decline, and the only people (sadly a majority living here) that don't believe this are people blinded by nationalistic rhetoric, our sensationalist media, and/or are just plain ignorant of the signs showing this.  Forget about China's assent and the shear numbers of people in Asia, and the rest of the trajectories of the outside world and lets just focus on America.  We are a disaster.  We are incredibly in debt, of which more than half of that is owned to foreign creditors who now carry US dollars to buy our goods with, except we are not producing as many goods for sale.  That money we borrowed, rather than spend it on investing in our own production (infrastructure, economic production and investment in manufacturing and services for sale to the world) we spent it on wars and tax breaks which are not being spent here at home as much as in larger investments in places cheaper to invest and with higher rates of return (i.e. Asia, Africa, South America, etc.).  This is basic capitalism 101, the capital will flow to areas of lower costs and higher returns.  The US does not fit in to this model at all as it carries high wages and regulations that require companies to do humane things like limit work weeks to 40 hours, provide safe, sanitary conditions for workers, and not lock factory doors so all the people die if there is a fire.  The problem is though that with all this regulation and investment, we are not doing it right.  Our political establishment is deliberately incapacitated and disastrous.  Tomorrow we are about to have this mandatory sequestration that cuts government spending across most all boards by up to 10%.  The politicians are intractable ideologs beholden to a system owned by corporate and private interests that carry soooo much more weight than individual people that would love to think they have democratic control over the country.  While economically speaking we should be increasing public and governmental spending to stimulate the economy we are giving tax/regulation breaks to people and companies so they will stimulate our economy.  But - again - they are all following the basic rules of capitalism and for the most part not investing locally, nevermind in infrastructure and the foundational elements of an economy that expand the economic multipliers for every business (roads, bridges, research, etc), not just those in their supply chain.  Technological advancements, and cheaper labor options abroad are taking higher level jobs away from the American workforce, while the advertisers emphasis on debt fueled consumerism only creates low wage retail and service type jobs fueled mostly by the growth of population and perceived "needs" for new gadgets, widgits, and elves on shelves.  Real wages (meaning adjusting for inflation) have been dropping since the seventies, and since 2008 50% of the jobs we've lost were at a middle class wage level, while on two percent of those that we've regained since the start of the crisis are middle income.

It now takes two incomes to provide what one wage earner used to for a family.  So we go further into debt with credit cards, home equity, medical bills, and soon to become the worst bubble of them all: student loans.  Given the crunch on jobs, and more aptly decent paying career type positions, as these jobs are shipped abroad, our workers become "redundant" and un/underemployment rises.  Education is of course shown as the ticket to a better paying job.  Thus we all have to roll the dice and try to be the one in 500 to get that job, but we have to have the degrees or you don't even get considered.  So we take the loans, go to school, and then nearly 50% of us end up in jobs that don't require degrees or pay for them.  So we struggle to or can't pay back our loans as we don't have enough income, meaning we will forever be financial behind (with no possibility of bankruptcy on federal student loans).  This stagnated struggle of course limits the capacity for the "american dream" of home ownership.  This of course then hurts the housing market, leading to lower values and less jobs.

It seems the only market to get into would then be education, as it is fueled by government subsidized loans that you can't default on, and which financial companies churn and burn through a system of hedges, safety measures, and insurance/derivative options to allow companies to still make money even while consumers fail.  Schools though keep raising tuition, 5-10% every year to upgrade facilities to try to bring in the best students, but this is all based on debt as well and will eventually prove unsustainable.

Most importantly though the education market is predominantly fueled by governmental spending - either through loans, grants, or subsidized tuition - and most importantly to this condemnation of the American system moving forward - is the ideological pathway we are headed down.  In the 50's and 60's when America was  in the midst of its "greatest generation's" heyday, we had as high as 90% tax rates on the rich which progressively went down from there, that tax bracket was down to 35% and below last year.  Capital gains, inheritance, back then the government still made money and spent money - and lest you think this is about entitlement programs, it's not - its about investing in our country's ability to make its way forward economically, and to provide for its citizens and its business endeavors.  I no longer believe that this is what we are doing.  We are cutting everything.  40% of our bridges are in desperate disrepair, not to mention roads, we are destroying our environment with every second we don't act, we sped money on weapons that destroy economic capacity and lives rather than build upon them, all the while "leaving education to the states" while we both cut and "cherry pick" their funding.  We have created an ideological and populist fear of taxes, that is and will slowly strangle us into a privatized, capitalist, profit driven noose that will not invest in common interest projects for the betterment of our economy and society, but rather in short-term individualized profit.  This is not an investment in the future that I think will really create a wonderfully sustainable place to live.

Look at New York City alone.  Go anywhere in the world it seems and most subway systems in major cities are beautiful shining examples of care and functionality.  They look like places meant for people.  The NYC subway system is grossly infested with disrepair and just as much dysfunction as the rest of the city.  Our politicians are grossly corrupt, and we have a draconian policing strategy that has spread throughout the country and infects all of our communities with stiffing repression of minorities and economically disadvantaged people.  And it's only getting worse.  I go into these buildings that I deliver to and see palaces that cover entire floors, two floors even.  Tens of millions of dollars for home after home in a city with a median income below the national average and a cost of living almost double the next closest city.

Fact of the matter is that NYC, like America is going down and ideological pathway that is untenable for the economic and social future of the country and planet.  So how do I, with an eye on my future, make a choice to be a part of that?  Yes, things are easier for me here in many ways as my family and friends are here, day to day things make sense, I know how it works and am rarely surprised functionalities, but still, I am left tremendously wanting.

And the most troubling things is that as I have been reading a People's History of the United States, it is eiry how little things have changed.  New technological faces on the same old systemic problems.  But of most importance in thinking bout this book and life here, I have found myself seeing things through the eyes of the settler to America, the European outcast, the immigrant that picked up there things and family and said I'm going to bet my future on something else than my current existence.  They looked at their lives in Europe, China, wherever, and left.  They didn't know what they were going to, but just knew they didn't want to be where they were.  I don't believe that short term unsettlement is as bad as the decades of the decline that my surroundings are likely to go through.

But is Europe any better?  I mean, the same neoliberal pathways are being followed there as well these days.  But at least they are starting from a place of strength.  Universal healthcare, lives not based solely on work, vacations, safety nets, etc.  I was always happy with the way the systems around me worked when I was there, even if I struggled at places within it.  I came back to the US with the goal of getting a PhD so I could have the qualifications to go live anywhere I wanted and to be able to get a legitimate job and support myself while I was there.

I have no idea where that place is, but I do know that right now what I see out of America makes me feel like those that emigrated from their own countries and came to America.  I feel a lack of hope, a desperation in my surroundings, that makes me think that there are other places to look to for better future prospects.  But where do you go in today's world to escape capitalism?  I don't know that there is any escape.  It's a global epidemic.

So I guess there is no answer.  But I tell you, when I allowed myself to look at a life in another place, less assuming, less aggressive, less competitive and ambitious, with a quieter pleasanter life, I found myself idolizing it.  Shorter time in school, solid job prospects, and a clear transition strategy.  Sigh, now I still have other schools to hear from and Boston (northeastern) and Hawaii are a different place than Binghamton for sure, as is York in Canada, so we will have to see.  But I tell you, Ljubljana - with its juxtaposition to this American future - feels like a nice alternative to spending seven years preparing to spend the next several decades competing in a job market and economy that I've already spent more time losing in than I've even been in.  Plus, we have military bases and kill people without trial or impunity all over the world to satisfy our aggressive global imperialist/unethical agenda.  I don't like saying that I am a part of that, do that, or represent that.  Maybe I am not proud to be an American, or of what America is.  I don't know.  Maybe its time to look elsewhere.

Addendum to the Barriers to Entry

Ooops.....  update to the Barriers to Entry..... it seems that the $17,000 I made in 2011 exceed the $15,600 threshold I need for the fee waiver on the application fees.  It doesn't matter that in the last year I haven't made $5600 dollars, only that over a year ago I made slightly more than the threshold.  What about now?  What about that I haven't made much of anything since and have been living off of the assistance of others right now?  As if the only people that need fee waivers are the perpetually poor, not the recently unemployed or underemployed.  Does poverty only exist in line with the tax year?  No, it is endemic and symptomatic of American society, yet we can't even offer education for our citizens to bring themselves out of poverty.  Basically, the system that's fucked you, just keeps on fucking you.  That's no meritocracy.  That's capitalism.   

The Barriers to Entry

So I am applying to PhD programs again this year.  But as is the American motto, it takes money to make money (or even to try to get the chance to learn how to make money).  This is an issue for me.  I am poor.  I have made maybe 4 to 5,000 dollars this year so far.  I've been staying places for free, working whenever I could find money - political fundraising, childcare, construction, catering, whatever.  All the while looking for real work and doing volunteer stuff.  Nothing has been materializing in my over/underqualified world.

So here I am, back to the old dream and applying for schools.  This of course is met with a broad smack in the face at America's true shame: the barriers to entry faced by low income individuals.  To get into programs I need to "apply widely" (as I've been advised) to increase my chances of entry.  This is something I intended to, but did not do last year for various reasons mostly revolving around my involvement with Occupy.  But the shear barriers to be able to apply to a number of programs are immense.  Between application fees, the cost of sending GRE scores ($25 per school), and transcripts ($25 to send them from all three schools that I attended), is a lot of money.  If I want to apply to ten schools, that is $250 for the GRE scores, and then another $250 for one set of transcripts each (though many schools require you to send two), before you even look at application fees.  The cost of fees which are usually between $75 and $100.  So that's $12-1500 to apply to ten schools.  I have 18 on my short list and 12 that I feel that I need to apply to.  So I'd be looking at $1600 minimum and over $2000 to apply to the bulk of them and give myself the best shot at getting in.  NOt to mention the cost of my time to do the research and write the applications.

Now granted some schools offer application fee waivers for low income applicants.  But not all.  Three of my first six don't.  And it is $275 for those three.   I had been counting on them all having waivers, but there are solid schools for me that I really have to apply to for the best chances of admission.  Two of these I have connections at already working for me that are strongly encouraging me to apply.  But I may not be able to now.  To everyone that thinks America is a meritocracy take a second look.  I may not even be able to apply to some schools because just I don't have enough money.  And one of these mentioned is my fall back school.  I have to apply, it is the only way to try to guarantee my acceptance.  

But what if I was rich?  I could apply to 20 schools, 30 school, whatever.  My chances of getting in would be greater, thus my chances of success in this field greater.  But no.  Not mine.  I'm low income.  I have to make strategic decisions (such as the one that I made last year and then didn't get in anywhere).  I have barriers to my entry.  The Lohan's, Kardashian's, and Hilton's, and Drake's of the world throw money around on glitter, bottles of champagne, strippers, and superficial material things, yet a person looking to go back to school and make both themselves and hopefully some day the world a better places can not do it for the simple cost of one of those bottles of champagne. 

How can anyone say this is the greatest country there is?  We claim to be a place where you can do anything!  Well I may not be able to apply to go to school because I am not wealthy enough.  In most places in Europe, school tuition is free, never mind applications.  If you are good enough to go, you get to go.  I may not even be able to apply, and for no other reason than that I am poor.     

The Meaning of September 17th.

September 17th - the start of the Occupy Wall St. protests - was the day that would start a true test for the United States of America.  Whether you believe in the message of the Occupy protests or not, what truly has been tested here, to me, is whether America still stands for the freedoms generally thought to be our founding values (the historical validity of those values/freedoms are an entirely different story).  Thus far, one year in to the Occupy protests, I do not believe that we do uphold our ideals.  Freedom of speech, the right to peaceful assembly, to march through the streets and act out against injustice and tyranny?  These are principles deeply ingrained within the America's principles tough to so many from such a young age.  These ideas are what we are said to be founded upon. 

What I have seen though, through my involvement with the Occupy protests, is a systemic crack down on freedom of speech, on protest, and on messages that the people ruling the cordons of American power do not seem to want disseminated.  From the top down, federal, state, and local governments have colluded and systematically squelched or failed allow the movement to be heard.  Most importantly though it is not just the government but the politico-industrial complex that has stifled what they consider atypical political expression.  Collusion and corruption of the corporate and governmental apparatus has been amazingly efficient and effective.  What have you heard of the occupy protests of late?  Maybe you heard something on May 1st, maybe you if you looked for it you read something last week about Occupy supporting the unionization and victory of restaurant workers at Hot and Crusty in NYC, or supporting stop and frisk protests.  Maybe if you get our newsletter you know more.  But most people don't.  It hasn't been covered by the main stream media, or even much of the marginally mainstream media, since not long after the park was cleared.  Occupy "was no longer a story", something without need to be covered.  Even when an unprecedented collaboration of labor, activist, and community contingents teamed up to put perhaps as many as 100,000 people on the streets of NYC alone on May 1st, the media's coverage solely reported a claim that Occupy snarled traffic and 25 people were arrested.  They did not report why, or the reasons for the protests that day.  No witness accounts, no ground level reporting.

The police were at the same time doing everything they could to suppress and divide the protesters on that May 1st .  The top down collusion between Mayor Bloomberg, police chief Ray Kelly, and the entire NYPD has been criminal.  It lead to a 200 page report by the NYU and Fordham law schools that universally condemned the police's response as continually violating the 1st amendment and human rights. 

Mayor Bloomberg of ourse has a tremendous amount to gain in all of this.  Worth billions of dollars, the message that occupy pushes - ending corporate and governmental corruption and bringing economic and social justice to everyone (the 99% & the 1% included) - is not something the wealthy and powerful in this country and world seem want heard.  We are looking for better schools, living wages, sustainable employment, and a functioning electoral system.  Regulation of the banks, public private collusion, and the environment.  Equal opportunity for all races, ethnic groups, sexual preferences, genders, etc.  We want a world where the 1% does not control everything.  Where power is dissipated more towards the rest of us.

Now I can understand that those in positions of power would not want this.  They like being in charge.  But I can also tell you that as per America's bespoke values and purpose their personal power-lust should. not. matter.  If we are a country based on freedom, equal opportunities  civil liberties, and justice, then it should not matter how much money you have, you should be able to have a voice.  That voice should be able to be heard - and not just once a year in the ballot booth where the electoral options are already rigged by the powerful.  We should be able to see and have solid ethical journalism that is not controlled by private interests, that covers real people's stories, and the way real people live (75% of America lives on less than $50,000 a year, 20% below the poverty line.  We are not the Khardashian's nor aspire to be).  We should have elected officials that we can actually chose, not a one on one winner take all corporately controlled election of the rich.  We should have economic and educational opportunities that include everyone - no matter their socio-economic status at birth .  I mean our America today does not provide basic healthcare 50,000,000 people.  We are diving down a long steep slope and need to be allowed to speak up and slow this process.  To stop it.

What I have realized over the last year are in fact that our oppressors are powerful and deep rooted.  But the minute you squelch free speech - in AMERICA - the "land of the free and the brave" - you are quickly nothing more than an oppressor.  Federal, state, and local, governments have done this.  Local and federal law enforcement offices have done this.  Corporate money and back room dealings have done this.  The media has done this.  Thus, the general public has done this as well - if you believe we live in a Democracy.

September 17th to me is the day that America tested itself.  And one year later, if I am the one giving out the grades?  We've failed miserably.  The top down control has managed the information and propaganda and its social control mechanisms, while the bottom up will of the people has not materialized.  Will we rise up to the challenge and make amends?  Will we recapture our core values and freedoms?  Even in the face of losing power for some, will they do what is right and say, hey, this is America "home of the free and the brave", we have to let these people speak!  My inclination is no, they won't.  They will not, and that is why Sept 17th is the start of us trying to take our country back from our oppressors.  Sadly, that oppression started in the 18th century when the country was founded by the same people stifling us today.  The same rich, white, monied interests that didn't see African-Americans, Native Americans, or even woman as people of equal merit, but as tools, pawns, or niceties.  Amazing how we are fighting the same fight today that we fought back then.  Maybe that should tell us something, that those ideals of freedom and such are not actually what America has always been about... but maybe still, what it should be about, and what it will someday actually be!




   

Why there is no money in changing the world

It's simple and systemic.  We live in a world based on power and the accumulation of capital as its principle means of expression.  Power does not want the world to change.  The powerful, like it the way it is.  The Romney's, Goldman CEO's, Bush families, Koch Brothers, and such (yes, there are plenty of lefty rich people out there to include here as well) that are just fine with their lives.  The rest of us sadly though struggle to become more of them, less of ourselves.

I have a friend right now that splits time doing real work trying to keep greedy businessmen from stealing land from indigenous people in the developing world, with editing food and cooking publications.  Seemingly one actually matters to people's lives and the other does not matter as much.  People being dispossessed of their land, their livelihoods, and their power, in the name of someone else's profits, somewhere else's appetites, and somewhere else's energy or mineral needs is abominable.  But it happens - last year to the tune of land the size of France.  Recipes and tasty tidbits of the 1st world are well... not important.  I mean, yeah, I like a good meal.  But the fact that there is plenty of money in editing gourmet cook books and so little in saving people's lives and livelihoods is to me the cornerstone of the problem in the world today.

This is the same situation I am in and have been in for years.  There is no money for changing the world, thus so many fewer jobs.  She wants to work full time and support a life doing food and agricultural justice work, yet it doesn't pay enough.  I want to do similar things with economic and social justice, but I'm not getting anything there either.  The labor market is simply too tight with too many people applying for the same positions.  The powers that be don't want the world changed, and the powers that be are the ones with the money.  Thus they have no interest in funding change in the world.  So the non-profit and activist community scrapes by.  There are just never enough jobs, never enough money, never enough help for those around the world (and in the US) being dispossessed, having their land stolen, their lives stolen, trafficked, killed, raped, whatever.  It is these crimes in far away lands that allow us in the "1st" world to have enough food and time to buy cook books and experiment with new types of food, as opposed to using what food is available, eating as nutritionally as we can, and trying to simply maintain enough human security to live happy productive lives for ourselves and our communities.

The problem is simple, for all of us to find economic and social avenues towards success we need to change the power structures affecting us.   That is just exactly what my friend and I want to do, but we can't commit ourselves fully every day to it.  The greed and feeling of entitlement to power those with it have is so entrenched as to never allow us enough money to change it (I'll write more on the entitlement component of that later).  This hold has lead to all sorts of outcomes.  At the behest of this power, governments are cutting grants and funding programs, corporations have become people, private individuals are driving things with their agendas, and the average everyday person can't find the means to fund or work full-time towards true change, nevermind food and shelter in many circumstances.  So what do we do?   How do we bring change without the tools needed to change?  What is the power of the powerless?

Politics, the Art of Making Money

So here I sit in my cubicle, thinking I'm fighting for the good cause, fighting the political fight, trying to raise the minimum wage in NY.  Turns out that while that might happen at some point in a future as of yet unseen, really I'm just here to try to make money.  Actually its a little more nuanced than that, I'm not exactly here to 'make' money but here to get people to give me money.  And while the difference in wording is really just about semantics, in reality, politics is as much a business of making money as anything else in America.  Where I am REALLY struggling with all this is that I spend my days and weekends protesting to get money out of politics, and then I am spending my evenings trying to get money in to politics.  Now granted, at this organization we don't take corporate money and I'm simply calling individuals and asking for small monthly contributions, $5-10 in most cases.  But all the same, even politics 'light" in America is all about money.  

It doesn't matter how many people I get "involved" (sign petitions, write letters, pledge to vote for the party, or just activate and inform), its all about money at my job.  I am blowing away the quotas for everything but the fundraising goals.  Yup, that's right, I'm having lots of interesting and informative conversations about the issues, getting people excited and activated, engaged with the issues and the party itself, but this isn't enough.  I have now seen first hand of how politics really all works.  I guess it would be really easy if they took large sums of corporate money, but they don't (hence their appeal to me and many others) so the whole operation becomes simply about making money.  I suppose that is why the entire organization is a group of fundraisers.  The two ways into the organization are through door-to-door "canvasing" and telephone "organizing" (both just fancy names for asking for money either on foot or by phone).  The organization only promotes from within, i.e. from either of those two avenues.  

This is of course proving to be an issue for me.  For while I'd love to be doing some solid research and analysis on the issues I don't seem to be successful in fundraising like this.  Thus, that chance may simply never present itself as its money or nothing!!!  I of course find this really sad.  Here I sit with all this experience; almost two masters degrees, years of business, developmental, and whatever other kinds of experience I have, and yet there doesn't seem to be much of a place for me.  Sad, guess I'll just have to keep Occupying!  ;)     

Student Debt and House Bill H.R. 4170

So I just thought I'd weigh in quickly on this house bill HR4170 (summary, full, petition) that is trying to forgive aspects of student debt.  And before anyone gets all excited... no you would still have to pay your existing loans - there would just be an end in sight.  I do though have some very serious reservations about the whole thing.  Yeah, great, so the one trillion dollars already accrued in student loan debt may become more manageable for those of us buried under it, but that does NOT solve the problem or the causes.

The bill is marketed as both helping individuals and the economy.

Excessive student loan debt is impeding economic growth in the United States. Faced with excessive repayment burdens, many individuals are unable to start businesses, invest, or buy homes. Relieving student loan debt would give these individuals greater control over their earnings and would increase entrepreneurship and demand for goods and services. (full)

But obviously there are some serious issues that quick summaries and marketing doesn't lay out.  Firstly, debt default does leave a hole in the banks balance sheets (often covered by insurance or hedging with other investments, etc. etc ( and whose loses I don't have much sympathy for)).  It also makes the act of student lending more risky and less profitable - especially with a cap on interest rates at 3.4%.  This is not as I think things should be, but as capitalist lending is based pretty much solely on rate of return.  Thus, there will in the longer term be less money lent to students making school actually perhaps less accessible.  And while, according to the petition, "since 1980, average tuition for a 4-year college education has increased an astounding 827%, [and] since 1999, average student loan debt has increased by a shameful 511%."  So how are we going to cover this gap in the future?

"While current borrowers would be eligible for full forgiveness under the plan, future borrowers would be subject to a $45,520 cap on forgiveness (based on the average overall cost of a four-year degree at a public university). The aim is to incentivize students to be mindful of educational costs and for colleges and universities to control tuition increases." (summary)

(fyi: $45k doesn't cover one year of most any graduate school)

Yes, if we forgive some student debt right now you are going to make the people holding the 1 trillion dollars of debt happier, but you are actually harming the education system in this country for the future as "the bill would not affect funding for existing student aid programs", or the educational and research systems themselves.  The ONLY way to sort out the education issues in this country are to FUND the educations themselves.  Fund the schools, fund the research, fund the students, FUND IT ALL!!

It is great to say things like:

(1) A well-educated citizenry is critical to our Nation's ability to compete in the global economy.
(2) The Federal Government has a vested interest in ensuring access to higher education.
(3) Higher education should be viewed as a public good benefiting our country rather than as a commodity solely benefiting individual students. (full)

It is an entirely different thing to actually do something about it.  This bill is a start to help the people buried under this debt.  But tuition is not going to come back down on its own, nor is people's ability to pay for it going to somehow miraculously appear.  For the future of education (and the economy) you must do so much more.  Among other 'minor' things (like changing the entire way our socio-economic and political system operates), SPEND GOVERNMENTAL MONEY ON EDUCATION!!!!

Billions and billions of dollars.

At EVERY level.

(and EVERYONE knows where that money can come from!!)

Dinner time!!

So we call people in the evenings, 4-9 at night with a 6:30-7 dinner break.  Last night for my break I went flyering for Occupy Town Square IV at Fort Green Park in Brooklyn (Sat, Mar 25th).  We work on the third floor, and underneath us is another politically inclined non-profit.  When I walked into their offices thinking I'd hand some flyers out, I was taken aback by the exact same layout and functionality as ours.  A bunch of cubicles making phone calls surrounded by the obligtor offices with doors.  Wow!!  I bet your saying, that's the way everything always is at businesses.  But more for me it just brought to question many things that run through my head about our political and non-profit world.

It wasn't the layout, it was the purpose and functionality.  Non-profit and political campaigns are simply about asking for money.  They are unfortunately not simply funded as an essential apparatus of the operating of a democratic state.  We do not as a society have an institutionalized funding apparatus for the things that are actually - to me - the most important to a society en large: governance and assistance.  Both of these are corner stones to democratic society.  And when I say governance, I do not mean the functionality of the government or what it does, but its guidance.  While we spend trillions of dollars on governmental programs from war, to social services, to government workers, we have left democracy fully and totally privatized.  There is no funding to amplify those voices being heard in small spaces, nor any funding to assist those not being heard in any spaces get into the public sphere.

No news here, but our democratic process - left unfunded - is left solely to the capitalist system and the free market for regulation.  Everything in the electoral system of any scalable importance is privately funded.  Hence these two organizations I've referred to spending so much time and effort on fundraising.  Why must organizations working so hard to bring to the fore political and socio-economic issues and injustices - so essential to a knowledgeable electorate - be so left upon itself?

Now I know, I am bring up an insurmountable political cauldron, but I am seeking more to just address a question of a principle: political awareness as a human right.  Why not?  The UN's declaration on Human Rights touches on political issues in article 21, but it's of course toothless and offers no substance.  But if anything is of importance, this is the first thing that a society should be promoting and funding: the awareness of our social world in a way that is transparent and builds social and electoral capacity.  Yes, I know, there are a million questions about what gets funded, how, by who, and how it would work in general.  But those are questions beyond the level of the "principle" that popped into my head, and they should be saved for another day.  At its core though, this concept stems from the public financing of elections and runs further into non-profits doing political work, and then even into non-profits doing relief, aid, and empowerment work.

Our society is bleeding.  Look around both America and the world.  Poverty is our greatest threat.  Disparity of means and wealth, health and wellness, human security.  Not some dictator or terrorist far off, but the poverty that keeps people down and allows them to be dictated to - our own Dictorship.  Our lack of transparency, our lack of democratic and social voice all handcuff us at every moment.   We live in a society where political speech is completely regulated on a systemic level in a way that discourages true democratic engagement and disallows true change. 

Fact is, these two organizations are both contingent upon not just money, but money that currently must come from private individuals, private foundations, companies, etc.  All of these entities have one thing in common: individual AGENDAS!  They all come from places not systemically promoting the greater good.  I want a political system that funds the agenda of itself, the free and fair democratic rule by the people - alllllllll the people.  Not just those with money, not just those with direct stakes in issues, but everyone.

How can this be done?  Well in our current context, we have to fund bringing a voice to everyone.  Meaning political pressure groups would need to be transparent and funded by a state-like apparatus.  Empowerment type groups and community organizations would have to be funded by a state-like apparatus.  All political parties would need to be funded by a state-like apparatus based on the common good.  They all could illuminate their issues to and for the greater good, and work towards addressing - or having their issues addressed - to and for the greater good.

Obviously, this is an INCREDIBLY complex and incomplete thought and does not actually fit well into our current socio-economic structure.  But the point I am trying to make is that a privatization of the democratic process - such as exists in America - does not serve the democratic process itself but rather those who privately can control and affect it through their own private individual means.  Again no mystery here, but still, it was tough to walk into a room and see it all so blatantly obvious, so blatantly preposterous.  That so much human capital was being spent on trying to make money to try to simply engage in the political process on such a basic level.  All this while, so much of our country's financial capital is being given to an effort to destroy both humans and their capital in agenda driven wars and policies throughout the world.  Maybe it wouldn't be such a bad idea to make the Pentagon do door-to-door and telephone fundraising for their wars, just like we have to do for the fight against poverty and for a democratic voice.      

Forever and a day....

So it actually sees like it has been about that long since the last time I posted, and it has been a tough road to get here.  I ended up taking that job, but went through a lot of unpleasantries before and throughout the transition process.  I've moved, had some family issues, got a car, took the job, spent some time living in the woods, lost a few friends, and on the whole have caved in to some of the realities of the life that one seems to have to live to exist in America.  I must say that I have found a decent amount of difficulty living here in the area that I am - I just plainly do not fit in.  It is tough to spend pretty much a third of your life (almost the whole of the adult part) abroad, living in different cultures, seeing different ways of life.  Simply changing as a person.  I seem now to be half American and half alien. 

There are so many things done well and exemplary here in America, but also so many things that I do differently from people here.  My priorities are quite different as well.  I don't just want to get a job and settle into a life here.  I want to make a difference, I want the life I settle in to too mean something outside my little sphere.  I want to make people in the far reaching corners of the world's lives more fulfilling, give them more options.  Yes, there are of course people here interested in this type of stuff, but the contextualization of it all is so different.  And I will say this as well; living in America is taking away some of my principles, waning on my idealistic motives.  You can't survive living the life of an idealist here.  People on the whole will truly respect your passion, the things you want to do in life, the changes you want to make and people you want to help, but American society is so individualized and focused on the local self that there really is little place for the idealist.  Yes, NGO's, non-profits, etc, but I'm in one now and it is so systemically neutered that there is no way to truly bring about change, and certainly not on a large scale.

American culture is to me very limited, very closed.  I suppose this is culture anywhere though, it sees through its own eyes, colored by its own past, its own social context.  But American culture places American ideals, ways of life, and standards of living as the preeminent ones in the world.  An arrogance that only seems to be found in other current or former world powers.  If we are the best, why change?  Maybe tweak things, but why truly change?  The way I live my life, the goals I aspire to, they run against American cultural streams, and change itself runs against every cultural stream.

When you tell people you want to change a world they feel comfortable with, they can easily become cross with you, especially if you are unapologetic about your views/reasons and assertive - two things I tend to be.  Not that we are all the same in America, and that everyone is included in this, but a social system is just that, a system with main streams and separate outliers.  I am an outlier.  The last several months have shown this to me in even more vibrant colors than ever before.

So now I just put my head down, do my job, and hope/work towards another day when I can do what I believe we all should be doing; working towards true systemic change.  The world is neutering me, but I will not allow it to be permanent.  I will not allow it to take away my dreams or my goals.   

Hospital

So obviously its been a long time since my last post.  I stepped off the plane and pretty much disappeared it would seem.  I wish I was just catching my breath.  I unfortunately got sick that night that I came home, and though it leveled off a bit over the few days that followed, by Friday I was in the hospital and in a pretty solid amount of pain.  I was incredibly dehydrated after vomiting and diarrhea that covered several days.  A couple IV bags of fluid though and they sent me home.  I felt horrible, but malaria had come back negative.  So with just 'flu-like' symptoms, no big deal right?  Well by Sunday morning I was in an ambulance, and by Sunday night I was in the Critical Care Unit at the hospital.  Honestly, I don't really remember much of Sunday.  It's all pretty hazy.  They started me on antibiotics for a possible intestinal infection and then a late malaria test by the special blood doctor came back positive.  Of course I'm allergic to most chemicals, antibiotics, and medicines.  Bottom line is that the next couple days were horrible.  Lots of pain, high fevers, delirium, hallucinations, I even heard a frog that no one else seemed to hear!!  Anyway, we talked them into cutting off some of the antibiotics and other craziness they were pouring into me and things started to clear up.

There were some other serious issues though.  I was dangerously close to needing a blood transfusion as my blood platelet count was extremely low.  But started to be able to keep food down and the blood count started to come up.  The malaria medicine - despite the violent reactions I had to them - was working, the parasites in my blood cleared out.  The hospital kept me going, kept me alive really.

So home I came.  I've been here for a couple days now.  I couldn't really walk or stand up for a few days there.  Very dizzy and week, but I'm fnctional now.  All told, I lost 15 pounds and a lot of strength.  It's going to be a long road back.  Amazing that in two weeks you can lose so much.  My body seems to have been cut in half.  Incredible.  But the most important thing to take from it all came in a frank conversation with the infectious disease doctor.  Basically, giving my sensitivities/allergies and general health concerns, with the issues I had, the probable intestinal infection and malaria, if I had not gotten out of Sierra Leone when I did I probably would not have survived this.  Pretty powerful thing to hear.  I was incredibly close to needing blood, and with all the other fluids and medicine I needed and was given, I would not have been able to get it in Sierra Leone.  Tough to swallow.  Guess I'm not Superman...  :-/           

Why Sierra Leone?

I was posed a very good question last night and thought that I should answer here on this page as well.

"You are from the US, what about looking to help the people right here in this country that need it as well?"

 I was caught a bit off guard by the question and I'm not sure why.  I ended up with pretty much a three tiered answer.  Firstly, I do not see myself as an "American".  I know that nationalism is ingrained within us all from an early age - and not just into American's, but into just about everyone.  National pride, the Olympics, holidays, school history lessons, wars, they are all laced with a "what's within our borders" versus/in comparison to "what's within their borders".  I struggle with this because, A, I am trying to minimize as much competition in life as I can, and B, what makes a person born on one side of a line in the sand more or less valuable than someone born on the other?  I consider myself a 'citizen of the world' (Though I hate the cliché), and more importantly I view us all as equal partners in both humanity and our whole ecosystem.  I believe that we all need and deserve compassion and 'human' security as much as anyone else, no matter where we come from or live.

Secondly, and probably most importantly to me, ties directly into the first one.  As I see us all as being of equal worth, then effort should strictly be based on need.  I am poor by US standards, yet I have food, shelter, familial support, education, security, etc.  There are a tremendous amount of people in the US struggling these days - especially given the economic situation we currently face - but imagine what this recession is doing to people in the developing world that rely on US and European investment when there isn't even money being spent here?  Where do they sell their goods when consumer spending is down in the rich countries?  People in poorer countries were, and are, far worse off in terms of basic human needs (as judged by our Western measures).  A great one of these measures is the UN's Human Development Report.  Just think about this, when adjusted for purchasing power (PPP) the average person makes 679 US dollars in one year!!  (in terms of per capita GDP - dividing the population of the country by it's total dollar value output). They measure it all equally in terms of what it can by, looking at each country on one scale.

Now imagine that for yourself?!   If you make $679 in one month in the US you are desperately poor, that is $8,148 annually.  Now imagine a family of four, five, six... making that for the whole year!!  The people in these developing world countries are truly poor.  Not what we consider 'poor' here in the US, we make $45,592 per year in per capita GDP and consider a family of four to be poor if they make under $22,050 annually.  The US is a very rich country (8th in terms of per capita GDP), and it ranks 13th out of 182 countries in the world as measured by the Human Development Report.  Sierra Leone ranks 180th.  Third from last.  That means that statistically speaking, of the 6.8 billion people in this world there are only .006% of people live a worse life than those in Sierra Leone.  99.99% of the world population lives at a higher standard of living than Sierra Leoneans.  They truly need the assistance more than we do.

I should also say though that it pains me to have to 'prioritize' or 'triage' the situation like this.  I read a statistic several years ago that said that 2 billion people will go either without adequate food or clean water that year - and this is a global phenomena that touches even the US.  You can go to either the South Bronx or Appalachia and you will see destitute people.  People that could use help.  Yet they have outlets, social services, food stamps, homeless shelters, educational and training services, etc.  These services are grossly inadequate in my view, but this is what a social welfare system does and can do, it helps to provide for those in need.  In Sierra Leone, none of these services exist, there is not social safety net - and they really need it.

This line of volatile thinking above segway's well into my third point.  I think that if anyone wants to help the US and its poor, that it is never going to start in this country.  The entire system is way to engrained with the arrogancy of itself.  The US is the world's super power.  It is a fully established socio-economic entity that has lead the world for a century.  It views democratic capitalism as the victor, and its political, cultural, and economic systems are far too entrenched to be able to change or experiment with on any level.  Just think of the American political debate, red v. blue, liberals v. conservatives, republicans v. democrats, and NO ONE wants to hear what they other side is saying.  There are no alternatives, mainstream or otherwise, especially and truly revolutionary ones!!    Intractable ideology and closed minds.  Need I say anything more than simply refer to the New York and California State budgets?

America is a mess, but one with such fortified positions and issues, that it is virtually unnavigable.  I believe that to bring about any change in America it is going to taken proven results from elsewhere, and a collapse of the American system and its subsequent standing in the world - which some would say is currently happening.  However, with no alternative pathways for human development and security on a larger scale right now, we are left wanting.  This is where my interests lie, looking to create new pathways to human development that break free of current ideological constraints.

This project is not just about Sierra Leone, it is about the US, it is about Europe, Asia, Africa, the whole of the Americas, everywhere.  Sierra Leone is a place that I have studied and have developed an affinity for.  It is a small country of just under 6 million people that has been devastated by a recent civil war and has a relatively cleanish slate build upon.  Yet it still maintains incredibly proud traditions and history as it was created to be a home for freed slaves, and was once considered the "Athens of West Africa".  Projects undertaken there are not only to assist the local population, but can also be used to learn from and then to be used elsewhere.  If some of the ideas that we are working with can become successful, then the whole world could benefit from them in time - including the United States.  Think local, act global.