more class warfare

[arguchik]

fyi, here's another article about the reinforcement of class difference. this time the focus is on how the (often working) poor are affected by the inaccessibility of even basic dental care. of course, as i should have mentioned the other day, class stratification and racialization articulate together in the u.s., to produce our society's hierarchical structure along both of these axes.

Comments

[alice-at-night.livejournal.com]

"For you always have the poor with you, and whenever you want, you can do good for them."

sure, it sucks to be poor in this country, a bit more than in sucks to be poor in other affluent countries. But also certianly less than it sucks to be poor in other less prosperous places.

A society can't fund everything. I'm finding it hard to value dental care for the adult working poor above other things, like education, child welfare, environmental issues . . .sure, our rich may live too well - but seriously - dental care? funding for expensive root canals over cheaper extractions because they are cosmetically preferable? what next - public funding braces? (Boob jobs?) I'd rather public funds go elsewhere.

"Most Washington adults who qualify for Medicaid can get some free dental care, including checkups, cleaning and fillings." (though not "many root canals and crowns") seriously, and we're complaining?

ok, some tweaks seam in order, so guy with "four inflamed, infected wisdom teeth" should be able to get help before things get worse. But other than that, dunno, hard to buy into this being a serious frontline issue. Going back to: a society can't fund everything.

[arguchik.livejournal.com]

yeah, my point is that differential access to things like dental care, medical care, healthy food, etc., reinforces class difference by marking peoples' bodies in particular ways. put more simply: class changes your body, affects the trajectory of your embodied narrative, in these specific ways, and through these specific pathways. to the extent that you have enjoyed class privilege, your body will reflect that privilege, and you will likely continue to have access to it, in the form of better housing, better chances on the job market, better education, etc. to the extent that you have not enjoyed class privilege in your life, you body will reflect that as well, and you will have a more difficult time finding better work, better food, better places to live, etc. the sad fact is that capitalism extends into every nook and cranny of our lives, shapes everything in ever intensifying processes, so that "bodily capital" not only means something, it means more now than it did 50 or 100 years ago.

in this post, i wasn't trying to make an argument about what should be done, only putting "out there" the observation about one of the ways that class stratification works, how it persists. as for how class stratification should be addressed...that's a matter for a much longer post. but you know i'm a big pinko, so i'm sure you can guess where i'd go with it.

but what i think about how it should be addressed is kind of moot anyway. in the communist manifesto marx and engels say that "capitalism creates its own grave diggers" (not a verbatim quote--sorry, i can't go look it up right now). in other words, as the contradictions of class stratification intensify--which they have been, and will continue to do if left unchecked (look at the statistics on the difference between CEO salaries vs. the salaries of people working for those companies)--the lower classes will rebel against the structure that keeps them in the lower strata, whether anyone's telling them they should or they shouldn't. it's the phenomenon of immanent critique: when you have a society structured in dominance, that structure produces its own opposition, and that opposition can grow into a violent revolution, not just a peaceful reform movement. it's not fully predictable...

[arguchik.livejournal.com]

actually, i don't think "bodily capital" means *more* now than it did 50 or 100 years ago...that's actually an incredibly dumb thing to say... it means *differently*, though. bleah. i need to think that through more thoroughly.