Joe Bageant

The False Gospel of Work

Dear Friends:

I can't help but share this article with you from the pages of Christianity Today, sent to me by my friend Chuck Richardson. Out of the blue comes a lucid Christian critique of what's wrong with America. It's time we start considering the reality of the steadily escalating war between politics and morality on the economic battlefield. The root of this struggle -- both politically and morally -- is going to be authoritarian vs. libertarian. McCarraher's article is all about this without ever saying so. This is the best union of Christian thought and social responsibility I have read in years. Maybe ever.

Click here: http://www.christianitytoday.com/bc/2006/004/5.26.html

Sincerely,

Joe Bageant

Broke and so screwed it's not funny

Dear Mr. Bageant,

I've read some of your stuff. Good points. We raised six children on $30,000 a year, in North Carolina and in Pensacola, Florida. We live in a neighborhood made up of working class whites, blacks, and Asians, reflecting our demographic.

I went back to school in the mistaken belief that if I just got my BA degree in journalism I'd be hired by the local newspaper. Didn't happen. I am the wrong age for the "lifestyle" section of the newspapers. They are looking for 20-30 year-old age demographic persons in their attempts to hook that age group into reading the papers. So I did freelance for a number of years which paid $35 per article and $10 for photographs. In other words, grocery money at best.

Adam Smith Meets Cousin Ronnie's Boy

That ain't no class underclass; it's 250 million rugged individuals being pissed on.

By JOE BAGEANT

Unbelievable as it seems today, there was a time when such people as doctors and lawyers did not necessarily live apart from the dirt front yards and Saturday night domestic scraps of the laboring class. The doctor who delivered me in 1946, the most prosperous in town by all accounts, lived just a few short blocks from the rundown Kent Street "white trash and nigger street" my parents called home. His fee for dragging my screaming ass into the light was an exorbitant $100 -- and for a caesarian birth at that -- because the US Army was writing the check. The good doctor lived close enough that my old man could walk a five-dollar payment over to his house on payday, close enough that I could see his rooftop from my upstairs bedroom window. As a kid, knowing such an educated, prosperous man lived so near was somehow comforting. And at least it gave an example of what one might possibly aspire to, given the education.

Living better, healthier with much less

Hi Joe,

Your essay "The Beauty of the System" is an outstanding portrayal of the futility of the suburban middle class life and the increasingly frenzied, but futile, attempts to remain in the shrinking middle class and "improve" one's lot in life. Although I now live in the heart of fly-over land, I grew up in northern Virginia in the 60s and 70s. I still have relatives there, who moved out of the inner suburbs to the "affordable" confines of the nightmare called Ashburn.

It's not the heat, it's the humility

Joe,

When we were kids, running through a fog of DDT sprayed off the back the old township jeep, we thought the good toys were American and the trash came from Japan. If you had an ink pen whose metal clip said "Made in USA" and if there wasn't a period after the "U", the "S" and the "A", we all said that came from Usa, Japan, and we all laughed at your cheap shit.

Growing up poor in a housing project

Joe,

A uniquely American institution, I'm sure you'll agree, is BRAGGING to folks about how poor your family was when you grew up. "What? You call that POOR? That ain't SHIT! Lemme tell you how poor WE were, junior ... Yevver heard of a mayonnaise sandwich? Yabbut, how about with only one piece of bread?"

Not easy to say 'enough is enough'

Joe,

Jesus, you've summed up beautifully the mess that many feel trapped in. Even the less rich ones, who have to cling to their shitty jobs due to the iron fist of the insurance industry clutching their necks. And, at the heart of all this is the ethic that "more is better." Each of us under an obligation to "give our children more than we had," the capitalist system of always having to make a profit and expand just to be able to cover the interest charges on everything starting out with the money supply leased from the Federal Reserve, and extending to all the investments at every turn. It's a nightmare of bondage and bad karma.

The Beauty of the System

A tale of shopping, blackmail and slow death in the lost Cul de Sac

By JOE BAGEANT

America is a dark half continent of grotesque notions made manifest, such as Scientology, the GOP and the McDonald's "Big Bowl" meal. Americans seem to possess psychic flypaper that attracts strange unsavory notions. Worse yet, we act upon them. One notion we got into our heads right after World War II was that each generation must live better than the previous one. Not such a bad idea at the time, considering the number of folks in the previous generation who grew up during the Depression and knew what it was like to scratch with the chickens to survive.

Gays don't need any special help

Joe,

I consider myself a leftist, but not a liberal. And your mention of Brokeback Mountain with its gay cowboy plot twist touches on the reason why I am not a liberal -- the American liberal groupthink obession with identity politics and, in particular, with gay issues.

I have been out in the world for quite a few decades, and I have come into contact with quite a number of gay people. In my opinion, gays don't need any special help. They get along just fine, and in fact, better than most. So why is gay rights such a key aspect of American liberalism? Who knows?

In real life, there are no gay cowboys

Dear Mr. Bageant,

I just finished your essay, "Contemplations from the Cheap Beer Zone" and enjoyed it immensely. Virgil reminds me of some of the codgers I knew from my small hometown in Iowa, that I left behind for more liberal pastures. However, I have a bone to pick with you about the joke you made about "Brokeback Mountain", or as you called it "Buttfuck Mountain". Granted that it falls into the category of Pop Culture, it has also become a cultural touchstone and a major milestone for the gay community.