guilt
I interviewed with four people for my current job. I talked about my work in Guatemala with all of them, but one of the interviewers in particular stood out. He asked me to describe the work I did there, and when I was done he asked me how long the guilt lasted. I knew exactly what he meant. How long until I didn’t think constantly about how privileged I was, how I could never do enough to help the people I worked with. My response to him was to ask, “The acute or the chronic?”
The acute guilt after being exposed to poverty like I saw in Guatemala, Kenya, Mexico, and now here, doesn’t last. When you are removed from constant exposure to it, seeing it every day, the acute guilt fades. Sometimes it takes a few weeks or months, occasionally, after a truly difficult experience, it takes years, but it does fade. The chronic guilt, on the other hand, never goes away.
And I would never want it to. It is that constant reminder -- of the woman who is nothing more than skin and bones from TB, or the two year old child who can’t walk from malnutrition, or the child who wants to be held constantly because that is his only comfort, or the dogs who are too scared of being hit to come close to a person --- that keeps me doing what I do. It keeps me from driving my car, makes me go to the thrift store instead of buying new clothes that were made in sweatshops, encourages me to go to anti-war protests even when that is my one free day of the week, and has me joining and supporting the local food co-op which provides cheap healthy food to people who are food-insecure.
However, part of me wonders if “guilt” is the right word to use for this, since it implies responsibility for the outcome. Some might argue I do not have control over the circumstances that have led to the various tragedies in the world, so my responsibility is limited to fixing them as best I can without taking ownership for their existence. But that approach ignores the privileges I have possessed since birth, as a white upper middle class intellectual born in the richest country in the world. That approach ignores how those privileges came into existence, and how they have been maintained over the course of my life.
I did not ask for those privileges, but I continue to benefit from them, and those benefits exist because someone else is paying the price. So while I cannot claim single responsibility for the existence of poverty, inequality, discrimination, oppression, and violence, I have benefited from the existence of those evils, and have participated in their perpetuation through my very existence—through using clothes, books, food that were made by people earning less than a living a wage, by creating more pollution than any 10 people living in developing countries, and in countless other ways.
So, yes, guilt is the best word for this, because I do hold some responsibility for the existence of the systems that have caused such suffering. My responsibility for fixing them, therefore, lies not only with my altruistic belief in human equality and social justice, but also with my debt to those who have suffered for my privilege.
posted by Disease Cowgirl @ 9:56 PM
1 comments
1 Comments:
I think I have to go along with those who think guilt is not really relevant in the arena you are discussing. It is very easy to understand why someone might feel sorrow, despair, disgust or anger—I have felt all of these—when confronted with the realities of global capitalism. However, the origin, continuation and demise of capitalism have to do with the actions of collectives of various kinds. While collectives are made up of individuals, in a classical dialectical way, the whole is far more than the sum of its parts. Guilt is probably more relevant where an individual’s actions (or inactions) directly impact others, that is, where there is some control. To paraphrase a bit…..to refuse to give medical care to someone who needs it should make you feel guilty. However, there is no guilt in asking why people have no medical care; all that does is make you a communist.
In a similar vein, to feel guilty about being “white” or “upper middle class” is not only misplaced, it is also a bit presumptuous. It implies that you are responsible for your status in life while in fact, that has little to do with individual choices. Being white may have its privileges but that has more to do with the entire social fabric and not anything any one person does. Moreover, racism is a very mixed bag; its effects are mitigated by class and gender, and although its impact is profound for everyone, it is often in subtle and indirect ways. If being white evokes guilt, why not also feel guilty about doing “science”? It has done as much harm as any other component of the system.
Having made the study of the “middle class” a major component of my intellectual life, I will argue that being middle class is far more a product of broad social, political and economic context and circumstances than individual efforts. Capitalism has spread unevenly, very unequally and often very harshly. My father barely survived his early childhood because of malnutrition in Europe while at the same time the people who suffer most now were doing alright as they were fully as yet incorporated fully into the capitalist orbit. Your ancestors embraced a life in the disease ridden, over crowded, poverty stricken, sweat shops, and slums of U.S. cities because it represented a “better life. In response to their situation, they formed collectives that questioned the entire viability of the system and forced a redistribution of wealth. This redistribution transformed the working class into a “middle class”. I, and more acutely you, have been a major beneficiary of this redistribution. I suspect my father’s comment on your upper middle class life, would be …”nothing is too good for the working classes”. By your logic, one should feel guilty about the fact that my parents and others received few material rewards, and less in terms of recognition (degradation and persecution is a more accurate description) for their efforts. I personally feel no guilt. I do however, give them the gratitude, recognition and respect they deserve.
Much of the accomplishments of your forbearers has been, and continues to be, eroded. That has affected, and will continue to affect us all. When you view others in a far less fortunate position than yourself remember grandma’s response to Z’s living with the homeless. “There but for the grace of God go I” (and there went your forbearers.). Unfortunately the needed collectives aren’t always there. That in itself is a measure of how pervasive and damaging the capitalist system has become and this is acute in the richer countries. Even the most fundamental of all collectives has been eroded, and particularly among the “upper middle class.”
The question then becomes “What is to be done? (Lenin). I don’t have an answer although I am always looking for one. The things I have tried to do have proven futile. Perhaps you will find some that are more successful, lasting and significant. Your career choices may work to make life just a little easier, more palatable for some and that is not insignificant. Perhaps riding a bike to work or only buying used clothing will also accomplish something significant. However, there is always the danger that some activities actually end up fragmenting rather than promoting collectives. Most people have little choice but to drive to work; they only can afford to live far from their jobs, they don’t have the time for biking and public transit is too often lacking or inadequate; they are just too busy surviving to do something else. And clothing is relatively cheap; accessible even for those with very restricted disposable income. Grandma, after she started living with us, actually had a few extra pennies. She bought a red backpack that she didn’t need and wouldn’t use. I asked her why. Her response… “…because I can and it’s red”.
As to the position of guilt in your life I can offer restricted “pearls of wisdom” based on years of experience. (1) Commit yourself to collectives, from the most fundamental on up, and work like hell to build on these and broaden them. (2) If you must feel guilty a hierarchy of guilt could be productive. Place those things that you personally can do something about at the very top. Try to avoid “after guilt” but rather embrace “before guilt” (i.e. feeling guilty before you do something and then don’t do it). (3) Or take Dad’s advise… “Fuck guilt”.
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