I keep meaning to write about Making Money Make Change, which I’ve been massively processing since I returned from the Bay Area. There are a million things to say about this conference, and I’ve written a little about it here. One of our Enough correspondents who was in attendance is compiling notes from MMMC for us to post, so look for a more detailed description soon. But meanwhile, I wanted to share a little piece of what I’ve been thinking about.
In doing economic justice work with other class-privileged folks, I struggle with what often feels like a fine balance: trying to constantly betray and oppose the oppressive systems I benefit from while also having real compassion for myself and other folks who are struggling to find their way out of those systems in lots of different ways. Each year at MMMC we do an anonymous survey to collect data about how much money participants have and how much we’re giving away, and then present the results in a slideshow during one of the plenary sessions. It’s always shocking to see the results: millions and millions of dollars owned by the small group of people right there in the room (mostly inherited from wealthy families), and a minuscule percentage of it being given away. It’s pretty disturbing to sit in such a major locus of massive wealth accumulation – even more disturbing because we represent some of the very few rich people attempting to challenge economic injustice. It’s an incredible illustration of how deeply the messages of capitalism – to hoard, protect, and grow wealth – penetrate. I spoke with several anti-capitalist MMMC attendees after the survey about our shared inclination to shout, “People – what are we doing!?? We are the problem!”
I try to remember that alienating people with lengthy rants against capitalism doesn’t actually make me a good organizer. Because I also inherited wealth, I understand how strongly we are taught to hang onto our resources and privilege with a lifelong death grip. I want to help create space for us to challenge ourselves in a way that’s about a deep commitment to justice, rather than about shame and guilt. I try to remember that my rage against these systems is not objective or theoretical, but is a lot about how much I hate being in a role that often makes me complicit with massive global exploitation and oppression. I think my indignation and tendency towards ranting can be ways to push the pain of this away – like if I just constantly articulate some really well thought out critique of capitalism, and write things all the time dissecting the ways that privilege functions, and drag all the privileged people I know into these really complex critical conversations, then I can distract myself from how much it all hurts and is sad.Â
I’ve been really feeing that lately and it’s been so painful. But actually feeling it is good – feeling it when these things create some massive block in my relationships, or when I mess up in some way and feel horrible about it, or when I fight with my family about money and think we’ll never understand each other, or when I feel stuck in my organizing because of all this. Dean and others have written really good things on cruciferous about the trouble and contradictions of trying to exist in a just way in an economy that makes it almost impossible not to participate in exploitation if we hold any kind of privilege. I want to get better at talking about these things in a way that is patient and not rooted in judgement. I want us all to challenge each other to do better and have compassion for each other too.
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so much love to you, tyrone. thanks so much for this.
Dearest enoughers,
I recently had the pleasure of sitting next to the one and only Tyrone while eating a delicious meal in California. Do you
know what he told me over breakfast? He told me that although he is mainly pleased with his and Dean’s site here, he wishes more people would comment. I thought to myself, these fine geniuses have done far too much to be left high and dry with the erection of this creation they have provided for us! Unacceptable!
What could possibly be keeping the masses from spilling their souls into the ether? What could be keeping me from writing? God knows I, probably above anyone else, am hoping to impress the both of them.
I would bet that the lack of conversation isn’t solely because everyone is too busy. I’ve been reluctant to share because I’m afraid that what I am going through is just personal stuff no one else needs or wants to hear. But I am leaving a comment anyway, because I don’t think I have anything to lose. Besides, I want to. I hope more people take the same risk. Even if we are saying the same thing over and over, at least we will be saying it together.
So here goes. I’m class and race privileged, and I have been dealing with guilt on a daily basis because of it. I‘m seriously ready to get over it. It hurts me all the time, and it isn’t helping anyone for me to be feeling this way. I feel as an informed adult I should take responsibility for my privilege, but I’m not sure how. If I had money I would give it away, and I am not satisfied with simple answers like, “just get involvedâ€, or “get over it, you’re a good person.†I can’t just get over it, and I’m not sure I am a good person. I am aware of wanting to do good things in the world just to make myself feel better about being privileged. I don’t like this, it doesn’t feel honest, and I don’t know whether that matters.
For example, the other night I was having a come-to-Jesus with a friend, and I told her that I wanted to write something into this website that I really liked, but I was simultaneously intimidated and far too vain to do it. Every time I thought of what to write I was way too scared to begin. If I ever could manage to muster any confidence it was in the form of fantasizing about how potentially admired I could be if I wrote something really great (hey, a girl can hope).
After talking more about this it became clear that the reason I wanted people to think a certain way about me was because that was my way of knowing I was doing the right thing. The only reason I think so much about being affirmed is because I have such an intense fear of being wrong. God knows I’ve been so harmfully wrong in the past. My dear and emotionally brilliant friend encouraged me to be nicer and let the fears of failure and the ridiculous fantasies of fame and glory be what they are and still try to do what I want to do, even if my motivations are not pure. I am trying this (right now), but I am convinced there is a way to put our selves out there in the world without fighting judgment, without wanting individual ownership, and without fear disguised as a tool for self-control.
It occurs to me that my interest in acceptance might also be a side effect of being young. But I still think questioning motivations and fears is a worthy task for all ages. I know, partly because of this website, that there other people whose shyness, immobilizing fear, and confusion about class (or am I just talking about activism now?) is getting in the way of living their lovely lives to the fullest extent.
I have a theory that getting over fear of judgment and the need for acceptance is rooted in where your focus is. For instance, when I talk with friends I am usually more intent on telling them how I am doing, rather than trying to impress them with information and answers. I know my friends already love me, so I am more interested in being truthful to them than achieving a certain kind of attention. I think being smart and helpful is less about knowing information than it is about identifying the truth, and maintaining and understanding of how temporary and complicated that truth may be. This is really all I want when I think about living a good life: identifying the truth (even if it only lasts for a hot second). To me, telling the truth means what Tyrone was talking about when he said, “I want to help create space for us to challenge ourselves in a way that’s about a deep commitment to justice, rather than about shame and guilt.†The few times I have been successful being truthful have felt like victories. When I don’t try to tell the truth, I literally don’t grow. I don’t even move. When I am preoccupied with impressing others or dodging certain judgments, I can’t tell what the truth is. I began writing this thinking of how those who visit this website would take it. I wanted you to see me as an example of how insecure some of us are. I thought that if we could just say what is really going on there could be hope. Which, I still think, but the TRUTH is ALSO…
Even confessing hasn’t worked for me. I think it is that I believe after my confession there will be some kind of magical conclusion to what I am struggling with. Something is very slowly settling in on me: I need to give up on making my goal to come up with solutions and conclusions for everything I say. When I do that, I’m not telling the truth. I don’t really have answers, sometimes I don’t even have questions. I’ve been trying to get this stupid comment to be perfect for days now, and it just seems to get further and further from being truthful to how I actually feel. I need to take my own advice and not be afraid to just put it out there.
Right now, even after all I just said, if I pay very close attention to what happens in my head, I find that I am still hoping to be right in the things I say and do. This is so appalling, but when I think about being right I think about feeling justified walking away from trying, and being done. Which, in some ways, is just as bad as being a scared and lonely rich person. The point in working on this stuff is to band together and find mutual ground, not prove something and win. So fuck being right (that never happens to me anyway), fuck being done, and fuck being lonely. I’m going to try not to be afraid of being wrong, and I’m not going to expect anyone else to be right. Changing these habits is going to take a long time and a lot of vigilance, but the more of us that are out there trusting each other the easier it will be.
Let it be known that I am absolutely here as a judgment free outlet for anyone who wants to talk about their feelings. If anyone else struggles with anything remotely related (or unrelated) to what I have been trying to convey, please say so. Write it here, or email me personally. I will be waiting and hoping because I am dying to talk with you about it.
All my Support and Love,
Fischer
I am inspired, again and again, by your visions for creating spaces for conversations that are challenging and honest.
Fischer, thanks so much for sharing all that! I think a lot of what you said really gets to the heart of what we’re trying to do on Enough, and I’m always so happy and impressed when people are willing to grapple with the hard stuff that comes with thinking about all of this. What I always think about is that it won’t stop being hard and complicated, but the more we develop ways to talk about class and capitalism and living wealth redistributionist politics, the more we can stop trying to get to a perfect conclusion and just move forward and create ideas together and try new things.
Love,
Tyrone
hi fischer,
thanks for your comment. i have a similar struggle, i think, which i understand for myself as being overly reliant on a reflected sense of self (i think i got that from one of my self help books at some point). it is such a struggle to say things that people might hate, to speak in front of people who might disagree with me, yet i find that i have chosen a life that is constantly filled with this. i recently went to give a talk at a college in California and i knew i wanted to talk about the prop 8 stuff and why marriage is the wrong goal, yet i also knew that all the gay and lesbian and allied students on campus who had brought me to speak had been working hard on prop 8 stuff and were super pumped about marriage. i felt it was essential to share with them another viewpoint, which i had strong reason to believe they have never heard (having come to queer politics during the years of marriage-agenda domination and dissent silencing), yet i was also so uncomfortable with the basic notion of knowing that they might not like me once they heard what i had to say. i gave the talk anyway and it actually went well and, unlike what often happens, no one told me i was dividing the community and ruining their liberation struggle. nonetheless, i think it is really troubling that even in the face of opportunities to share my most deeply-held convictions, i am filled with the basic fears of a middle-schooler that people won’t like me. i get lots of angry emails and have for years about the various things i’ve written about cell phones, gay marriage, and other things that most people love and i am troubled by, and every single one of those emails makes me feel like shit, even though i have a loving supportive community of friends and collaborators who i know agree with me and stand beside me in all this. isn’t it amazing how effective insecurity is? i feel like something about my personality allows me to continue to put things out there that will generate angry responses, maybe it is just disregard for my own feelings, but i have definitely not figured out how to have a strong enough internal sense of self to not be affected by people’s opinions, even when i know i disagree with what they are saying. all of this is just to say thanks for taking risks in all you are doing to talk and write and think about class and money–it is inspiring and appreciated. also, i think as writers we have to assume that we will sometimes write things that we later cringe about (i know i have several such pieces) and that we have to approach that as something exciting about how we grow and change our minds and ideas, not as a source of shame. it’s really worth putting stuff out there, i think. i’m not sure how to overcome the problem of wanting acceptance and approval and how that creates painful interactions when we are sharing ideas that we know will generate disagreement and disapproval. perhaps its just about observing those feelings, letting them be there, and asking for words of encouragement from friends when we need them. maybe we should all keep files of the nice appreciative things people say to us and pull them out and look at them when we are feeling overwhelmed by negative responses? in any case, if you ever need a pep talk about putting your ideas in the world, i’m ready to provide one.
Dean, Tyrone, you are sweethearts and such good teachers. I can’t wait to write more here and try to go further into what I was getting at. Not until this semester is finished up though, so busy bla bla bla. Anyway I wanted to quickly say that I just hosted a community workshop on class and it was so awesome! I had a group of about 20 women (and one guy) show up, which I only mention because I think it may say something about who is thinking about what at my school (or it maybe it’s an indicator of who I am friends with). Either way I, and my friend Jill, facilitated several really simple activities to get people to talk about their personal class experiences with each other. There were a slew of interesting things that came up and I wish there had been more time and more of me so I could have heard each one of them . What I did see happen was that people were very willing to listen to each other and speak calmly. There was pretty much zero defensiveness/offensiveness. This was probably true for several reasons, one- almost everyone there knew each other, and two -I hope some of the reason it went so smoothly was because Jill and I put an abnormal amount of emphasis on being personal. We desperately encouraged everyone to share things about their own lives vs. trying to articulate a world view or a theory. This made for a beautiful process of sharing where we were coming from class wise and how class came up in our lives today. No one could argue with each other, they were just telling life stories. It seemed to me like the participants enjoyed having the opportunity to speak about their lives and hear their peers do the same. I know I did. I worried that making things that personal might make the workshop feel not as challenging as it could be, but I think it was challenging for what it was-a beginning to talking about class. We did not go too far past sharing our stories (although if we had more time I have no doubt the discussion would have gone there), but we did have a great conversation about how we might be able to create a community that shared and co-created a financial lifestyle. And to my total delight one of the main ways people thought could make this happen was to have more conversations about class in social settings, as well as continuing to have more intellectual/informational conversations in school or at work. I told them that in my experience when you approach people with your own fears and questions on class they are more inclined to engage in a conversation than if you come to them trying to teach them something informational. I guess my goal was to try to get people to talk about class with their friends whenever something came up, just like we do with other issues that confuse and disturb us. I think I got my point across when I said, we all love to talk about our messy and seemingly impossible sexual relationships with each other. I think we can talk about class in the same way.
I thought it was going to be hard to get people talking about such as touchy subject as class in such a short period of time, but as it turns out most people just love to talk about themselves, regardless of the topic. My favorite part was that later that night at a table at the bar a group of people who attended my workshop were shouting over the music about their feelings and thoughts on class.
Thank you again for all your encouraging words, they help every time. More soon.
f.
Wow, this is impressive and inspirational. Thank you for sharing. I should be studying for finals right now, but I am enjoying reading every piece of your blogs. I appreciate you sharing with the rest of us. I’m a second year law student, and this semester I had the honor to take Poverty Law with Prof. Spade (Dean). Our class participation included blogging about our reading assignments and other ideas we had for a better future…to be honest, despite the fact that I did not participate as much as I would have liked to, I think I’m starting to like this. Hopefully, I’ll build some courage too and write something interesting.
-m
malou,
i’m so glad you are enjoying enough and i hope you’ll write for the site! I have been hoping some people will write about the different pressures on law students who want social change to be the focus of their work–especially the pressures of debt and the lingering temptation of higher paying jobs. you have such a great perspective on a range of political issues, i hope you’ll share some of them with us on this site.
dean