Everyday Sociology Blog

Equality in Justice: Cognitive Dissonance and Fame

By Sally Raskoff

Two cases involving the rape of a young girl have been in the news: one involving Roman Polanski's arrest and the other about Elizabeth Smart's court testimony. While these cases have the “adult male-minor female” rapes as their basic similarity, most other things have been very different, especially in news reports and public reactions.

The “Polanski” case actually involves this Academy Award winning director’s flight from sentencing after his guilty plea and conviction in the rape of the 13-year-old girl. After 32 years, he was arrested recently in Switzerland to await extradition back to the United States for sentencing and additional charges of evading justice. The news reports focus on what a terrible time he’s had in life, from his family’s losses in the Holocaust to the murder of his pregnant wife by the Manson “family”, and on the fabulous movies he’s produced since living in Europe after he fled Los Angeles.

Until recently, little had been mentioned of the rape survivor, who is now an adult woman. A recent article fully identifies her and discusses the apparent civil settlement in which Polanski allegedly was to pay her half a million dollars, although no public documentation can confirm that she received those funds. Her lawyers’ requests to the court for him to pay the settlement past its due date ceased about the time she wrote a public letter stating that she thinks he should be able to return to the country, ostensibly to attend the Academy Awards show when he was nominated in 2002.

The "Smart" case involves the nine month long abduction of Utahan Elizabeth Smart. Her alleged kidnapper, Brian David Mitchell, subjected her to a “plural marriage” ceremony and according to Smart repeatedly raped her. She is now 21 and gave her testimony at the mental competency hearing of Mitchell just before leaving on her religious mission to France. Mitchell is cast as a religious fanatic who told her that he was doing what the lord wanted him to do. As of this writing, he has not yet been convicted of the crime as it has not yet been established if he is mentally competent to stand trial.

Let’s look at these cases sociologically.

Note the language used in the reporting of each case. Is it clear who the victim is in each case?

Many news reports and editorials about the Polanski case lament his treatment by the justice system, and some even suggest that he is the victim. Some articles discuss the cost of bringing him back to court, which makes the taxpayers the victim. Some articles focus on how the rape survivor, the actual victim, said that he should be free to live his life and if she says that, well, we should let her decide, which reinforces the idea that he is the victim.

The Smart articles focus on her as the rape survivor and certainly do not cast Mitchell as a victim. They cast him as crazy or as a crafty rapist who acts like a religious fanatic so as not to take the blame for his actions.

The headlines use “Polanski” and “Smart”, not “Mitchell” or “Geimer”.

Polanski’s name is certainly a familiar one since he is famous. Smart has become famous as an icon of parental fear – the girl who was abducted from her bedroom at night. As is typical in rape cases, Samantha Geimer’s name was withheld when she was a minor yet she herself went public when she wrote the letter in support of Polanski. Mitchell is not a name familiar to people even though most know that some man abducted and raped Elizabeth Smart.

From this point forward, I will refer to the “Smart” case as the Mitchell case.

Note the basic features of each case: an adult man raped a young girl.

Is this contested in either case? Yes and no. Mitchell has been in a mental institution since his arrest in 2003 and the recent hearing was to establish whether or not he could stand trial. Polanski testified that he did the crime (although in his plea agreement he plead guilty to “unlawful sex with a minor”) and his latest issues revolve around his flight from the justice system to escape sentencing and serving more time. Mitchell has not been convicted yet Polanski has. However, in the news articles, Polanski’s guilt is downplayed and Mitchell’s is assumed.

Note the social class differences in each case.

While Polanski is clearly a member of the upper socioeconomic strata, Mitchell and his co-defendant wife are in the lower strata. Polanski was able to flee to Europe, continuing to make his films and generate his substantial income. While the social class status of Ms. Geimer is not fully apparent, it is likely that she and her family live a middle class life, even if she did not receive the settlement. The Smart family are firmly in the upper middle class of suburban Salt Lake City, while the Mitchell couple were basically homeless and firmly ensconced in the lower echelon of society’s social class levels.

Social class alone can explain much of the dynamics of these cases. Those with the higher class status tend to gain more favorable coverage in the press. Polanski received more favorable coverage than his victim did, and Smart certainly received more media attention than her abductor did.

One might hope that people who have been victimized would receive more careful and supportive press coverage, this certainly didn’t happen in the Polanski case.

Note the issues of fame and social power in each case

Social power derives from social class but also from fame. Smart was featured on America's Most Wanted and has spoken in public and to Congress about sexual predator issues and legislation.

Most particularly in the Polanski case, fame insulates the perpetrator from paying his full debt to the justice system. So much so that some even call into question his guilt even though that had been firmly established in court. (See Harvey Weinstein’s quote about the “so-called crime” in the Los Angeles Times). Reaction to the Polanski case avoids discussion of his guilt in this crime of rape and focuses on other issues that are not salient. Consider how Mr. Weinstein might react if a female family member of his had been the victim in this case - might he advocate the release of that person as he does Polanski?

The exploitation of women in the entertainment industry is a related topic— some may not see why having sex with someone at a photo shoot was wrong – even if she was underage and under the influence of alcohol and drugs. Some also point to the mother who dropped her off at the house where the rape took place as culpable.

However, only the rapist is responsible for the rape, no matter what bad decisions others might have made.

What isn’t being talked about?

In the Polanski case, the exploitation of women is not a topic that many are choosing to discuss. How many other girls and women have been raped by people with power over them? We’ll never know, especially if those powerful people are not held to the legal standards that govern our society.

Absent from the discussion of the Mitchell case are the cultural underpinnings of how religion played a role in the abduction and rapes. The “plural marriage” as it was called when she was first rescued, was code for rape yet the word "rape" was not uttered for some time after she was freed. That this particular crime took place in a specific religious and cultural environment with a history of patriarchy (and, decades ago, of plural marriage) isn’t a coincidence. Elizabeth Smart was raised, as most of us are, in a culture of male dominance and female obedience.

It is also likely that Smart, like Patty Hearst and many other children abducted by sexual predators, was experiencing something akin to the Stockholm Syndrome. When she was first discovered, she did not readily identify herself. When held long enough under certain circumstances, people may “go along” with their captors and not escape when they might have had the chance.

So, how can we explain the different ways that we are reacting to these cases?

While both cases have at their core the rape of a 13- or 14-year-old girl by an adult man, public discussion and reaction to these cases is notably different. Social class, power, and fame all have their influences yet cognitive dissonance is also taking place.

Cognitive dissonance occurs when people have to reconcile two conflicting ideas at the same time. We often try and alter one of the ideas to be consistent with the other. For instance, people generally want to like and respect people with fame and power. When those people do bad things, we can react in many different ways but in the Polanski case, so many years after the event, some want to believe he paid his debt to society by having lived such a troubled life. Thinking of someone as both a good person and a rapist is very difficult to reconcile. Normally we decide that someone who commits rape is no longer a good person. In this example, many people, especially many in the entertainment industry, have chosen to downplay his actions to maintain the idea that their conflicting image of him as a good person.

But the justice system doesn’t see it this way, and after all, time spent living in a Swiss chalet isn’t the same as “doing time”. How do you think we would talk about the case if Elizabeth Smart’s alleged rapist had fled the country for more than three decades and evaded justice?

Biography + History = Opportunity

By Karen Sternheimer

I recently read Malcolm Gladwell’s bestselling book Outliers: The Story of Success, and highly recommend it to anyone interested in a sociological perspective of what factors enable some people to achieve more than others. Although not a sociologist, Gladwell is a journalist with a knack for explaining sociological and social psychological concepts in a clear and interesting manner.

While the American ethos of success suggests that it is the result of talent and hard work, Gladwell examines factors that sociologists refer to as social structure—things beyond our individual control—to understand what else successful people have helping them on their journey. Let’s be clear: skills and hard work are important, but so is timing. And one of the most important things to time well is something none of us can choose—when we are born, and to whom we are born.

Sociologist C. Wright Mills describes the importance of timing in his classic 1959 book, The Sociological Imagination, where he notes that all of our life chances are shaped by the intersections of our own personal biographies and history. Gladwell provides numerous examples of this, finding that the so-called Robber Barons who became America’s captains of industry in the late 1800s were mostly born within a few years of each other. People like Andrew Carnegie and John D. Rockefeller were born just a few years apart in the 1830s, as were many other business titans who amassed great wealth. Was there something particularly profitable in the water back then? Lessons taught in school at that time that would have led to their incredible achievements?

As Gladwell points out, their timing couldn’t have been better. Yes, they likely worked hard and had brilliant business minds. But they also came of age just as the industrial revolution was exploding in America. They were able to get in on the ground floor of advanced capitalism.

Of course people have gotten very rich before and after this period, and Gladwell describes how being born in the mid 1950s was particularly fortuitous for those interested in computer programming development (think Bill Gates and Steve Jobs, both born in 1955). It also helped to be geographically near what were then called supercomputers, the gigantic predecessors to the thing on which you’re reading this post. Back in the 1960s, when Gates and Jobs were coming of age, a supercomputer took up a whole room and was not something most youngsters would have had a chance to see, let alone work on. But because of their proximity to actual computers, both Gates and Jobs had a leg up on others their age and had the chance to spend hours and hours (10,000 of them in Gladwell’s estimation) learning about programming.

We can apply this model to more than just financial success. Think about what opportunities your own biography and history have afforded you. How has when, where, and to whom you were born shaped your life today?

I tried to think about the intersection of my biography and history to imagine how timing might have led me to write this post or to read Gladwell’s book in the first place.

As a member of “Generation X”, I was born following the massive baby boom. As you can see in the graph on the left, after a peak in the mid 1950s, the number of births sharply declined. How might this have affected me? As Gladwell describes, children born after booms like I was have the benefit of smaller class sizes. An unprecedented number of schools were built for Baby Boomers in the years before I was born. When my cohort was ready to go to school, there were newly-built buildings waiting for us, especially for people like me who lived in well-funded suburbs. (My hometown boasts that residents have never rejected a school levy in its entire history).

When I was in elementary school in the mid 1970s, there were so few students that many classes were combined: first and second graders had the same teacher, as did third and fourth graders. Looking back, this provided me with some unusual opportunities.

For one, a child in my district often had the same teacher for two years in a row. This teacher had the opportunity to know us better, and help us develop our strengths and provide lessons that could target any weaknesses. They would recommend us for special enrichment opportunities based on our talents too; there was a “Special Talents Program” we called STP where a few kids would spend time with the art teacher, in the music room, or reading additional books if we seemed particularly interested.

Another advantage: because children would necessarily have different skill levels in the same classroom, and might be nearly two years apart in age, a big difference for six- and almost eight-year-olds, the teachers would work with us in small groups, and sometimes one-on-one. Having small classes helped with that effort too.

We would be placed in small groups, sometimes based on reading level, sometimes based on more random factors (like where we happened to be sitting that day) and learned lessons with far more individualized attention. We were also given “contracts” by our teacher, who would meet with each student individually and assign lessons from workbooks based on our own level of achievement in reading, math, or another subject. We would then be able to work individually, return to show our work to the teacher, who would sign off on the “contract” that we had completed the assignment. We would also get individual help if we needed it from the teacher or occasionally from a student teacher if our classroom had one at the time.

Because I was a bit precocious as a child, this school structure really enabled me to thrive. Rather than get bored by a lesson designed to reach children at all levels, I could work as quickly as I wanted to and sometimes discover topics that I wanted to learn more about, and do separate research on my own. I also had college-educated parents who had taught me to read well before I entered school, frequently bought me books and could answer most of my questions if I had them.

Couple these factors with the lingering 1960s ethos which promoted experimental methods of learning and you have a better understanding of how the accident of my time and place of birth created an additional advantage. By the 1980s, when I went to middle school and then high school, this individualized learning model disappeared in favor of more traditionally structured classrooms, as the political backdrop shifted. There was one centralized lesson, one assignment for the whole class, and less one-on-one time with teachers. I got bored a lot more often.

So that’s the history portion of how my opportunities might have been shaped. Let’s bring biography back in.

You might have read about my elementary school days and thought, what’s to stop a kid from doing as little as possible? And what about children who aren’t willing or able to work independently?

I’m guessing there are many children who would not thrive in this independent environment that was so well-suited for me. Having the teacher meet with another group or another student one-on-one presented many opportunities for chit-chat and goofing off (I did my fair share of that too). So individual personality, work ethic, and talents do matter. They’re just not the only things that matter. How has your biography intersected with history to produce opportunities (or barriers) for you?

Cultural Perspectives and Assumptions

By Sally Raskoff

We see the world through our own particular perspective and often assume that others share our views. Public events reveal these different perspectives, such as the conflict between Professor Henry Louis Gates and the police officer called to Dr. Gates’ home about an attempted break-in. Thoughts on this incident varied based on one’s experiences and cultural perspectives.

As I read thought about the differing views of the Gates incident, I was reminded of a summer trip we took in 2006 to the Little Bighorn Battlefield in Montana. This is the place commonly known as the site of Custer's last stand. We were on the trip with some people who were really into discussing the battle and the strategies that the U.S. Cavalry could have used to prevail. I wasn’t comfortable with that particular discussion for many reasons.

For those who don’t remember their history, this is the notable battle in which Native Americans (specifically, Lakota-Sioux, Cheyenne, and Arapaho) and the U.S. Cavalry (and their Native American scouts) ultimately clashed and both sides suffered tremendous loss of life. The twelve companies of the cavalry fighting this battle perished, including its leader, General Custer. My travel companions and many others feel that the cavalry underestimated the number of Native Americans or that their strategies were insufficient. Although the native peoples “won” this battle, they too suffered tremendous loss and they ultimately did not win the war.

The battle took place in June of 1876, and my visit was on the 130^th anniversary. The terrain there consists of beautiful rolling hills, and it is hard to see who or what is on the other side.

Once you get to the battlefield, the most obvious feature is the monument on top of Last Stand Hill. In 1879, three years after the battle, this location officially became a National Cemetery controlled by the War Department; in 1881, the twelve foot high granite monument was placed on top of Last Stand Hill.

Also at the top of Last Stand Hill is an enclosed area that delineates where Custer and many of his men fell. The fence around this area and the headstones invoke the common cultural markers of a cemetery.

If you move back from this hill, the view is quite grand (see photo below) and the granite marker and the cemetery fence are visible from many different angles.

The park map (see below) also shows this area as the focus of activity both historically and currently. Most of the tourists in this area were quiet and reverential, realizing that many people died at this location.

White headstones are placed wherever cavalry members fell. When you look over the expanse of the terrain, the white markers are obvious in contrast to the grass.

These two photos (above and below) were taken atop Last Stand Hill, looking south and east. The darker green grasses grow closer to the enclosed area mentioned above while the rest of the area is left to grow naturally.

If you’re at the top of this hill and you turn around to look to the north/east, you will see the image below – an iron sculpture of an Indian riding through the hills.

What you are seeing is the top of the Indian Memorial.

In 1940, the National Park Service took control of the cemetery and in 1991 it was renamed the Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument and plans began for a memorial to the Native Americans who perished here. By 1997, the design was selected and construction began.

The memorial is on the other side of the hill from the Custer cemetery but one can still see the granite marker atop the hill. This new memorial consists of a round area with inscriptions on one side framed by the sculpture of the riders on the other side.

I found it to be quite beautiful and reverential, comparably as moving as the cemetery on the other side of the hill. However, my reverie in this space was interrupted by families traipsing through, children running and jumping up and down the steps in front of the sculpture. Tourists behaved appropriately on the other side of the hill, quieting their children and, if they were old enough, pointing out why. Few ventured to this side but many of those who did, in the time of my visit, seemed to forget they were still in a cemetery.

The quotes on the inside portion of the wall reminded people of what had happened there, yet I noticed that many of the tourists did not take the time to read them. (see photo below of two markers) They were walking through the space as if it were a rest area.

The design of this memorial was intended to serve many functions but also to serve as a ”weeping wound” in the earth.

As you leave Last Stand Hill and take the many trails throughout the rest of the park, there are some other interesting sociological aspects to notice.

Off the main trails, there are headstones. There are paved paths to the white headstones. In addition to those white headstones for the cavalry, there are dark red granite headstones for some of the Native Americans who died. Those that are relatively close to a trail also have a path to them, although they are not paved. The photo below shows two vistas with headstones, red granite on top, white on the bottom, from one of the trails.

I noticed immediately that the red headstones were quite difficult to see whereas the white markers were obvious, even from quite a distance. I was curious as to why the white headstones had paved paths while the red headstones had identifiable yet unpaved paths.

Once back at the Visitor Center, we attended a park ranger talk. I was fascinated to learn that all the rangers who do the talks about the park are themselves Native American and they tell the story that is not often told. They tell the story from the Native American point of view. Thus we learned more about how this was the culminating battle in which they were fighting to keep their way of life from these invaders.

They mentioned that the paths to the red granite headstones were not paved because that honored their culture while the white headstones were paved since that was in sync with that particular culture. Thus, when ceremonies were done to honor the dead, people used the paved paths to lay items on the white headstones and people also took the unpaved yet very clear paths to the red headstones. I also learned that the red headstones were placed in 1999.

We also learned some new facts about the battle. The conscripts in the cavalry at that time were mostly new immigrants, Italian and Irish, who did not necessarily speak English well or at all, thus the troops did not always understand the officers’ orders. This added to the problems that army was having in fighting this battle.

On the main building of the Visitor Center, the words of Black Elk are clearly placed (see photo below). I would have loved to ask everyone who passed by how they interpreted those words, but alas, I did not.

Visiting this site with acquaintances who were focused on calvary strategies challenged me. I used my sociological analytical skills to see as many sides of the situation as possible and to consider the impact of culture on its creation and on how people experience it as tourists and local residents.

I would encourage everyone to visit historical locations and use your sociological imagination to assess what you see. Don’t rely on your first impressions or assumptions. Instead, gather information about what you see so that you can compare the different sources and decide what makes sense to you. Consider alternative viewpoints, especially those that are contrary to your own.

Click here for further information about Little Bighorn.

Celebrity Doctors and the Health Care Crisis

By Karen Sternheimer

This summer has presented an interesting contrast regarding health care in the United States: those who have excessive access and those who have none.

The investigation into the sudden death of Michael Jackson has led to questions about doctors who bend over backwards to please their wealthy patients—sometimes living with them, being on call 24 hours a day, and allegedly overprescribing medication. This discussion is taking place while the nation is trying to figure out how to provide basic health care to millions of uninsured Americans.

Think about how many details from the Jackson investigation you know: the name of the drugs he allegedly used, names of former doctors, and his medical conditions. Now think about how many details of the proposed health care legislation come to mind….Judging from the breadth of misinformation out there (like the canard that the plan promotes "death panels" to kill the elderly), I’m guessing that most people are clearer on the problems that come with having a celebrity “doctor feel good” than they are on the more common problem of having no doctor at all.

We’ve heard the reports alleging that Jackson's doctor was paid $150,000 a month and was living in his house, and that Jackson supposedly had prescriptions filled by numerous doctors, sometimes under false names. Because of my research on celebrity culture, I have been asked to comment on this issue several times this summer, mainly on why a doctor might compromise ethical (and in some cases legal) standards when their patient is a celebrity.

Doctors are like anyone else who can be lured by the excitement of joining a celebrity’s inner-circle. Certainly not all doctors or even all who treat celebrities would feel this way, or would let such feelings violate good medical practices, but there can be huge financial rewards in doing so. Other wealthy people might be excited to seek this doctor’s care if he or she becomes known as a “doctor to the stars,” and this perceived exclusivity can mean a lot of money, even if the doctor is no better (or is even worse) than the average physician. A celebrity’s doctor can even become a celebrity themselves, with a reality show or their own product line and speaking engagements that keep the money coming in as insurance reimbursements decline.

When the potential for money and fame enter into the medical decisions a doctor makes, trouble can follow. Most of us who need to see a doctor go to their office; they don’t come to us. They see us on their schedule and often keep us waiting well beyond the agreed upon appointment. By contrast, celebrity doctors might see the patient whenever the celebrity needs them, thus realigning the balance of power normally maintained in a doctor-patient relationship. Celebrities could become clients before patients; if they don’t receive the services they believe they are paying for the doctor might risk a large income decline.

The vast majority of us will never have the problems that result from a doctor trying too hard to curry favor with us because of a big payday. In the same city where celebrities can have doctors living in their homes, thousands recently waited in long lines to see a doctor during a week long free clinic set up by the Remote Area Medical Foundation, a non-profit agency that was first created to treat people in developing nations and remote rural areas. In the nation’s second largest city the uninsured often get no treatment on a regular basis.

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If we are insured, either through private insurance, Medicare or Medicaid, doctors receive pre-negotiated and shrinking reimbursements for the services they perform. Some doctors have even stopped treating patients with Medicare or Medicaid because they cannot afford to stay in business if they do so. Still others are no longer “in network” providers for any insurance company, meaning that even insured patients have to pay the difference between the insurance reimbursement and the doctor’s bill.

Celebrities serve as visible representations of wealth in America. Rather than thinking about these differences in health care as only between celebrities vs. non-celebrities, it’s important to consider how social class more generally predicts the amount of access to health care we receive. And increasingly, this lack of access is not just a problem of the poor.

A growing number of people considered middle income have no health insurance; according to The Commonwealth Fund Biennial Health Insurance Survey, 50 percent of low-income families, 41 percent of moderate income households and 18 percent of middle-income families went without health insurance for part or all of 2007. Fewer employers offer health insurance, according to a 2008 report by the National Coalition on Healthcare.

Traditionally, middle income families have received health insurance from their jobs. But that is changing. According to the Commonwealth Fund’s survey, in 2000, 70 percent of employers offered insurance; in 2007 just 60 percent did. For employers that do offer insurance, premiums have also skyrocketed from an average of just over $7,000 a year in 2001 to over $12,000 in 2007, making health insurance increasingly unaffordable to many working families who earn too much for state or federal aid. According to a 2008 report by the National Conference of State Legislatures, the number of uninsured Americans rose by 8.6 million between 2000 and 2006.

The Jackson investigation reveals more than a single human tragedy; it also exposes some of the inequities in our health care system. Ironically, having too much attention from doctors probably contributed to Jackson’s demise and the coroner’s decision to rule his death a homicide, while many millions more suffer from too little medical attention, negatively impacting their health and well being.

Stuff: Reduce? Reuse! Recycle.

By Sally Raskoff

We just spent a week cleaning out our garage. Since we’ve lived in this house for over 25 years and have raised three kids here, there were a surprising number of things that we forgot we had and that had now attained the status of junk. We were sorting and throwing things into piles: for trash, for recycling, for donating.

During this process, a truck drove up, marked with the logo of metal recyclers and filled with old appliances, metal rods and poles. The driver asked if we had any metal they can have. We were happy to give them the old hubcaps, poles, curtain rods, and other metal items we had identified for recycling.

This reminded me of the controversial Herbert Gans article on "The Uses of Poverty" in which he lists the positive functions that poverty plays in society, including how the poor buy items that wealthier people don’t want thus extending their economic value with second-hand and third-hand markets.

The article concludes by suggesting alternatives. However, none of the alternatives Gans mentions relate to how goods bought new by one group then sold over and over to other groups who may not have afforded them at their original prices. His only mention is that the second and third hand markets would cease to exist if poverty didn’t exist.

That article was published in 1971, a time when recycling was handled very differently than it is now.

I have lived in different social class strata over the years and have been part of the secondhand market exchanges in different ways. Our household tends to give regular donations to the Goodwill or the Salvation Army. This is a great way to recycle items we have outgrown or no longer use so that they do have an extended life. It’s also a nice little itemized tax deduction – a nice middle class perk.

We have also made use of the storefronts of these organizations, purchasing items that others have discarded and of which we have made good use. Years ago when I was an economically struggling single parent, I used these and other discount outlets out of necessity. More recently, for example, my spouse proudly wears a jacket he found for $3. Articles in the local papers list these stores as havens for bargain hunters; interestingly, more of these lists have appeared as the economy has worsened.

Secondhand items are not just purchased by those who are in poverty, although they may be the sole source of “affordable” and accessible items for that population. Shopping at thrift stores doesn’t carry the stigma that it used to. Secondhand items are also attractive for people who shop for “fun” bargains or those who like vintage clothing these outlets often carry.

For example, here in Los Angeles, a number of thrift stores specialize in designer clothing, items worn by celebrities, or used in television shows. Those stores can mark their prices a bit higher than most but they are still selling a used product that is priced much less than the original.

I was shocked at the excessive amount of we found in our garage; we found embarrassing numbers of boxes and packing materials, multiple clay and ceramic pots for plants, screwdrivers and other tools (both broken and intact), nails and screws and other fasteners (both rusty and in their original unopened packages, old telephones and walkie-talkies, even two toaster ovens. Realizing the waste that those items represented as they sat in our garage, unused, and, in some cases, for years, the material basis of middle class life in this society is quite appalling. Some people have rented storage spaces to store their unused material goods – we had just stuck them in the garage when someone moved out or the project was over and overlooked them when making our previous donations.

The environmental impact of consumerism may have some bearing on the capitalist meltdown we are experiencing. However, revisiting the Gans article on the functions of poverty, it is clear that re-using items is not just for the poor anymore.

On the other hand, there are a number of other issues that have changed. One might argue that more of us are poor – or headed that direction – due to the dynamics in our societal economic structure. Many of us don’t recognize how close we are to being homeless – for many, that situation may be one or two paychecks away.

Recognizing the true cost of the goods we consume – including packaging, later uses, and ultimate disposition – may help solve some of our societal excesses and environmental impacts. If we thought more about how the items we want will live their lives with us and after us, we might not make the same purchases.

Our society has been changing in fascinating ways. Re-using items in those second hand markets is more acceptable for people in different class levels because of the current economic woes. The re-framing of recycling and reducing waste has been a trendy yet important strategy to reinforce our societal infrastructure. Since our society is not based on a sustainable structure, ecologically and economically speaking, the importance of “reduce, reuse, and recycle” increases as we move through time. Reducing use, re-using items, and recycling is no longer the province and positive function of the poor.

Economics, Education, and Anomie

By Sally Raskoff

It’s been really hard not to see the world from a Marxian perspective in recent days.

As my home state, California, implodes financially and other states and the federal government experience instability, I keep hearing Marx whispering in my ear, “Our material conditions and productive activities create and maintain all other societal institutions.”

As the economy has faltered, other societal institutions are following suit. Cuts to education have already begun and welfare services seem to be next. As unemployment remains high – and those figures only count those who are actively looking for work – more businesses are failing, storefronts empty out, and more people are on the street selling wares or fruit or holding signs asking for money, shelter, or food.

It may be easy to forget that government exists to distribute our societal resources, those public goods to which we all must have access. To do that, they depend on tax revenues as their funding to then provide services to the people. Services such as education prepare future and current generations for civic life and jobs, public health infrastructure to keep us healthy with clean water and sewage systems, welfare services for those who cannot provide for themselves in the short term or the long term.

The government has less money to spend in these lean times, since their income depends on productive work by businesses and people. Thus government must be as efficient as possible, cut programs, and/or raise tax rates in the efforts to balance budgets.

The Los Angeles Times recently reported on legislators’ discussions to cut programs, regardless of the other two issues. For example, many states are considering or already cutting educational programs and services, such as classes and educational loan forgiveness programs.

At my own college, our trustees voted to cut our second summer session. This doesn’t sound like a huge problem since we still have the first session. However, our first session was designed to be small to deal with budget issues in this fiscal year while the second session was to be rather large. We had expected many university students to come to our community college and take lower division courses since their universities had cut those types of classes in their summer sessions. So, cutting the second session leaves us with a tiny summer session and the lack of opportunity for both university students and our own students who had that one last class to take before transferring to the university. We know that more cuts are coming for the fall session too.

Cutting these programs bars people from opportunities, from transferring to universities and from re-training into new jobs. Couple these lack of educational opportunities with the cuts in other social programs, and one might wonder how we will be able to create a functioning economy!

While our economy is in need of some radical re-structuring – I often wonder how the feudalists felt as their economic system was crumbing and capitalism was emerging around them – the institutions tied to it will also require some rebuilding. It will not be easy living through these times but it is quite exciting, sociologically speaking. Such change certainly does not occur quickly, although its does seem that things change more quickly now than they had in the past.

Emile Durkheim would identify the division of labor and interdependence in such a complex society as the social glue to keep us functioning as a society. While computer programmers, nurses, café servers, and teachers all do contribute to society and do depend on each other, what happens when those people lose their jobs? Durkheim also noted that during times of flux like these anomie, or a sense of normlessness can develop, where people don’t feel as connected to one another and are therefore more likely to violate rules and laws.

Returning to a Marxian perspective, we might also ask, “Who benefits from the status quo?” Who may be profiting from maintaining one of the few industrialized nations with limited access to higher education?

Unemployment and Socioeconomic Status

By Karen Sternheimer

Being unemployed can be an incredibly stressful experience. Difficulty paying bills is the most obvious stressor, but there are others: the threat of losing a home, feeling rejected while looking for a new job, and declining self-esteem are others. How do you now answer the question, “what do you do?”

Yet the challenges of unemployment are not equal opportunity experiences. An individual’s socio-economic status (SES) makes a big difference; two people standing next to each other in line at an unemployment office might have very different realities.

Socio-economic status is a collective measure of status based on education, income, wealth, and occupation, as well as an individual’s family background: parents’ education, income, wealth and occupation. All of these impact how a person will experience unemployment.

For instance, someone with more education is less likely to be unemployed. As you can see from the graph below, people without a high school diploma were three times more likely to be unemployed as those with bachelor’s degrees were in 2008. And because median earnings are higher with more education, people with college degrees might be more likely to have savings to dip into should they become unemployed.

Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics

And yet for those people who are highly educated and unemployed—note the 2% with doctoral degrees who were unemployed in 2008—the sense of personal failure might be more significant. One possible silver lining to being unemployed during a recession is that a person might know many others in the same situation and therefore take their situation less personally. People with higher levels of education may feel more isolated if they are unemployed.

Another factor defining SES is occupational prestige, which can also shape how someone experiences unemployment. For example, a friend of mine who held an executive-level position lost her job when her company was bought out by a competitor. She was given nine months severance pay of her full salary and decided to start her own business, knowing that she would still collect a significant paycheck for several months. For other people accustomed to not just a high salary, but the power and authority that comes with a high-prestige position, it may be tough to accept that a high-level job might not open up for them.

This is one example of the downward mobility many people are experiencing right now. Aside from having less money to spend and having to alter their lifestyle, finding a job with less prestige also means a shift in one’s social standing and sense of self.

But for some people, who maybe identified too much with their work, unemployment seems to be liberating. In a recent article, the Los Angeles Times described how some people, mostly young and single, experienced “funemployment” by going to the beach, hanging out with friends, and even doing volunteer work. “And at least till the bank account dries up, they’re content living for today.”

Another Times article describes how to have fun in Las Vegas after losing a job by going to the cheaper restaurants in the older, downtown area of Fremont Street. “Vegas is not just the high-priced adult Disneyland I used to revel in. It has spirit and (dare I say it?) soul, and it was totally worth dipping into my severance package.”

The author also described how her newly unemployed status meant she would be mingling with a different crowd that she was used to: “Signs warn patrons not to smoke in line and not to steal the glasses. How enchantingly old school. But the jeans-and-T-shirt-wearing crowd said ‘Midwestern tourist’ more than hip gambler.”

It’s interesting how the author conflates downward mobility with people from a certain region of the country (as a native Midwesterner this rankled me a bit), but it is also a way of trying to distinguish one’s sense of self at others’ expense. A letter to the editor later chided the author for going on vacation at all while she was unemployed.

Clearly having a severance package, previously holding a high paying job, and not having a family to support might make the unemployment experience easier. So too might having a social network with valuable job connections, and family members willing and able to provide financial support and/or a place to live in the meantime. What other factors might make unemployment easier? What might make it more difficult?

From the Dog House to the Big House

By Colin Jerolmack

Michael Vick, the former star quarterback of the Atlanta Falcons who was convicted of running a dog-fighting ring in 2007, was released from prison in May.  Bankrupt and disgraced and currently under house arrest, he is seeking a comeback in the NFL. While he could be back in action as soon as this fall, there are indications that Vick may be suspended much longer from league play.  He has been told that he will never appear in a Falcons uniform again—management claims Vick has “betrayed” them.

Vick has been labeled a killer, a savage, a barbarian, and worse. The NFL commissioner has stated that Vick must demonstrate that he is “truly” sorry for his crime before he can be reinstated, and People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) has demanded that he undergo a brain scan first to determine if he is a psychopath. It seems that NFL fans, like the Falcons’ management, also feel betrayed.  They wonder: How could Vick risk it all for so little?  Worse, how he could endorse the maiming and killing of innocent animals? 

As a vegan, I find it hard to empathize with Vick’s heinous actions. But as a sociologist, I ask why it is that Vick serves two years in prison and must now convince the league that he deserves a chance to play football again while Cleveland Browns wide receiver Donte Stallworth recently received only a thirty day prison sentence for killing a man while driving his Bentley under the influence of alcohol. Why can’t Americans forgive Vick for this transgression, as we have done with his previous antics and with the many sins of other players, and fixate instead on his highlight reels?  What line in the sand has been crossed? Though we could simply indict the individual, the Vick case provides a perfect opportunity to examine how context shapes the ways we think about and treat animals.

The condemnation of Michael Vick highlights our cultural obsession with—and moral elevation of—certain animals designated as companions, especially “man’s best friend.”  Also, a racial and economic subplot adds flavor to this story of a sports icon’s tragic downfall. Vick is most abhorred for not subscribing to mainstream America’s valuation of the dog, which is an historically emergent, middle-class, and Anglo-European phenomenon. 

Keeping dogs as pets was virtually unheard of before the urban bourgeoisie began to bring them into the home as accessories and status symbols in the Victorian era. Only those with excess income could afford such a luxury. As a result, it became common for the poor to steal pet dogs and sell them back to their owners; and newspapers had a field day mocking the hefty ransoms paid by the well-to-do for the return of their beloved pooches.

Certainly, times have changed. Today, pet ownership has diffused across the socioeconomic spectrum. In addition, seventy-five percent of dog owners “consider their dog like a child or family member;” and pets now comprise a $41 billion economy. Indeed, certain animals have won their way into the domestic sphere in the past two centuries. However, such understandings are still socially contingent and mutable. 

Vick grew up in a place where life was cheap. A product of public housing projects located in a crime-ridden Virginia ghetto, Vick’s environment was a place where drug dealing and drive-by shootings were the norm. As Philippe Bourgois and Elijah Anderson point out in their research on American ghetto life, the poor and minorities have historically been subjected to more violence in cities than have middle class whites. 

In contexts where many people are deprived of even basic necessities, dog fighting may seem far less remarkable to ghetto residents than the animal practices that are the norm for the Beverly Hills set—where some people kiss their dogs, spoil them with trips to the spa, and provide them with booties and raincoats that could be the envy of human children. Unfortunately, violence against dogs and other animals is often just another aspect of the routine cycles of violence that so many poor and minority Americans must endure in their neighborhoods.  Designating animals as pets—and feeding, vaccinating, pampering, spaying, and declawing them—not only are luxuries most people living in poverty can ill afford but might also be actions that some might never conceive of doing.  Hard as it is for much of mainstream America to believe, in such settings dogs may not be given honorary familial status. 

Another young black sports celebrity from a modest background turns out to be the most astute cultural critic on this issue.  Basketball player Stephon Marbury complained, “we don’t say anything about people who shoot deer or shoot other animals.”  Marbury raises the specter of a dubious double standard.  He need not say who the predominant group of hunters is:  it is rural white Americans, the mirror opposite of those usually associated with dog fighting.

Isn’t it blasphemy to say that killing dogs for sport is no worse than killing deer?  It depends on whose cultural script you are following. Are those who subscribe to animal slaughter by eating meat on firm moral ground to make judgments against Vick?  Marbury’s challenge lies in making middle America confront its own moral contradictions.

Who's Helping the Evicted?

By Matthew Desmond

Doctoral Student and Ford Foundation Fellow

University of Wisconsin—Madison

Accordingly to the Center for Responsible Lending, over a million foreclosures already have occurred since January.  That’s 6,600 homes lost every day.  By the time you finish reading this post, roughly ten foreclosures will have occurred somewhere in America. 

After things had gone sour in 2008, , Senate Democrats introduced the Foreclosure Prevention Act of 2008, which offered aid to struggling homeowners, even if it did much more to help businesses than working families. It passed in the Senate by an eyebrow-raising 84-12 vote. Then, lawmakers passed a $700 billion economic bailout plan intended in part to dam the wave of foreclosures sweeping the nation and rescue the housing market from financial collapse, even if this plan seems more concerned with getting bankers, not homeowners, back on their feet.

But as the fed wraps its arms around the market in the manner of a father embracing a prodigal son, and as politicians debate how to help homeowners staring down foreclosures, one must ask: What is being done for the evicted? What relief is being proposed for those languishing at the very bottom of the housing market?

Along with foreclosures, evictions have skyrocketed since 2006. National data on evictions do not exist; but regional studies show alarming trends. Evictions in Milwaukee County, for example, reached an all-time high in 2007, according to a recent study by researchers at the University of Wisconsin—Milwaukee. In an average year, the county processes roughly 500 – 800 evictions each month; last year, it processed 800 – 1,200 evictions a month.

What are the consequences? Homelessness, job loss, family breakups, and a drop in children’s school performance, just to list a few. One study even has linked eviction to suicide. And it goes without saying that prospective renters face significant obstacles when trying to find decent affordable housing after they have been forced out. “As long as you don’t have a conviction or an eviction,” landlords like to tell prospective tenants who confess to having bad credit.

While following poor, evicted families in Milwaukee, I’ve heard this phrase again and again and witnessed the families—tainted by eviction—get turned down dozens of times. I’ve also seen firsthand the hardships that accompany eviction. One family of six lost virtually all they owned, their things snatched up by neighbors after movers placed them on the curb. The two parents and the four kids moved into a run-down trailer, where everyone sleeps on the floor. One woman was eight months pregnant when she was evicted. She and her boyfriend sent three other children to stay with friends in Green Bay, while they and their two-year-old struggled to find housing. It took them two months to land an apartment. Yet another family moved in with friends, an action that violated the latter’s lease and resulted in them getting served an eviction notice.

After being handed her eviction notice, a fifty-six-year-old woman turned to me and whispered, defeated, “They are really hard on us. They don’t have to be. We can’t help it if things happen.” Perhaps, but it is too simplistic to place all the blame squarely on the landlords. Evictions are costly for them as well. Many times landlords incur steep court fees even when they know they have a slim chance of ever seeing the uncollected rent. In rare cases, some are left with a destroyed apartment, a sad parting gift left by angry tenants.

Given this grim scenario, why hasn’t the federal government come rushing to the aid of families at risk of eviction, a disproportionate number of whom are poor African Americans and Latinos? Why, with all this talk about mortgage bailouts and home foreclosures, is the eviction crisis so rarely mentioned?

Foreclosure relief is necessary. It might even slow down evictions by giving property owners some breathing room, but, I suspect, not by much. Foreclosure relief will allow landlords to hold onto their property—we hope—but it will not cause them suddenly to drop their rents, forgive their debtors, or pull their notices.

More direct intervention aimed at tackling the eviction crisis is needed, and lawmakers should develop a federal emergency renters’ assistance program. Such a program could provide interest free grants and loans to low-income tenants at risk of losing the roof over their heads, as do local nonprofits such as the San Francisco’s Eviction Defense Collaborative. It also could offer tenants free legal services and advice, since most tenants served an eviction appear in court without representation (if they appear at all), as well as housing counseling and information about their rights and responsibilities pertaining to eviction.

A federally-based eviction prevention program does not have to be created from scratch; it could model itself after plenty of effective local initiatives. Whatever form such a program might take, what is certain is that we cannot in good conscience apply a generous poultice to the mortgage industry and financial powerhouses with deep-pocketed executives, while turning a blind eye to millions of empty-pocketed renting families, who daily live one misstep away from homelessness.

Photos courtesy of Matthew Desmond

Pink Flamingos and Social Class

By Karen Sternheimer

On a recent walk through my neighborhood, I noticed an abundance of plastic pink flamingos on several families’ lawns. They immediately stood out as unusual; they hadn’t been there days before, and they appeared on several lawns on different streets.

What was behind this new fad? Are pink flamingos the new must-have for lawn decoration?

I thought this would be unlikely in the neighborhood, an upper-middle class area populated by Los Angeles professionals. Lawn ornaments have symbolic meaning, and pink flamingos—fairly or unfairly—have been linked with a lack of taste and tackiness. Urban professionals, especially in image-conscious Los Angeles, are more likely to try to project an air of sophistication.

Homeowners around here spend a great deal of time and money on their gardens, and very few if any have plastic lawn ornaments. As you can see from the pictures below, many homes have lush landscaping and residents are very devoted to tending them (or paying others to do so). Landscape architects’ signs frequently grace front yards, and those in the know can recommend the “hottest” designer to their friends and neighbors.

You can see just a few examples of neighborhood yards. In fact, beautiful gardens are so valued here that a local club regularly offers tours of some of the community’s best gardens. Being included on this tour is quite an accomplishment. Yards with plastic lawn ornaments are unlikely to garner positive attention, and yet they have appeared on more and more lawns….
I found a clue to this mystery while walking past a local church that had a particularly large flock of plastic flamingos on its well-tended lawn. A pink banner hanging above said “The Flamingos are Coming!” and I figured that the plastic birds must have something to do with a church-sponsored program.

Then I noticed a sign hanging from one of the flamingos on another lawn; as you can see in the picture below, the flamingos were placed there by someone other than the home’s resident to get the homeowner to donate money. In order to have the flamingos removed, the recipient needed to make a donation. The recipient is also encouraged to “flock” a friend’s lawn in order to get them to contribute as well.

After looking online I found that other communities also use pink flamingos for charitable events. A company that sells the flamingos in bulk provides ideas about how to use them to run a fundraiser; one suggestion even includes requesting that those who have been “flocked” pay extra “insurance” to make sure that they don’t get re-flocked by someone else.

The site flockofpinkflamingos.com describes those who get flocked as “victims” of a “hit list”; clearly the pink flamingos are chosen in part to embarrass the recipient. While not explicitly stated, the assumption is that flocked people will be too mortified to keep the flamingos on their front lawn and will make a donation ASAP.

This assumption only works if enough people find the pink flamingos tacky or fear that their neighbors will, drawing on notions of social class. French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu noted that social class is not just about how much money we might have, but it is in part defined by aesthetic distinctions we make about our clothes, food, and yes, our homes.

According to Bourdieu, we derive cultural capital by knowing the unwritten rules of a certain social group. For instance, knowing which fork to use at a formal banquet, what to say and what not to say in certain social contexts, what brands to buy and avoid all are examples of cultural capital. The flamingo fundraiser is based on the presumption that those flocked all know that pink plastic ornaments are not a gift but rather a way to nominate someone for social derision.

In neighborhoods where lawn ornaments like pink flamingos are common, this fundraiser wouldn’t work. It also wouldn’t be effective to flock a stranger’s house: they could just throw the flamingos away. By flocking a friend, the recipient is more likely to feel social pressure to contribute and avoid appearing stingy.

This is an example of informal social control, where our behavior is influenced by those closest to us. We might not have a problem hanging up on a stranger calling for a donation or throw away a letter asking for money, but it’s harder to say no to somebody we know. This is especially the case for people we see regularly, or in the flamingo example, are members of the same church we go to.

We can learn a lot about the intricacies of social class just by taking a walk. What lessons about social class have you found in your neighborhood?