A vignette from a nation in the final stages of dementia:
Last night, in between approving city expenditures and other routine agenda items, the Topeka, Kansas City Council debated one rather controversial one: decriminalizing domestic violence.
Here’s what happened: Last month, the Shawnee County District Attorney’s office, facing a 10% budget cut, announced that the county would no longer be prosecuting misdemeanors, including domestic violence cases, at the county level.
buy desyrel online ecnsweb.org/img/ecns2018/jpg/desyrel.html no prescription pharmacyFinding those cases suddenly dumped on the city and lacking resources of their own, the Topeka City Council is now considering repealing the part of the city code that bans domestic battery. […]
Since the county stopped prosecuting the crimes on September 8th, it has turned back 30 domestic violence cases. Sixteen people have been arrested for misdemeanor domestic battery and then released from the county jail after charges weren’t filed. "Letting abusive partners out of jail with no consequences puts victims in incredibly dangerous positions," said Becky Dickinson of the YWCA. "The abuser will often become more violent in an attempt to regain control.
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"
Well, at least we have our priorities straight. Better to decriminalize things than to pay enough in taxes to allow the government to enforce the law.
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And if you have to decriminalize something, why not start with wife beating rather than, you know, something important like possession?
Yes, I understand that part of this is a political pissing match between the city and county, each trying to embarrass the other as they quibble over shrinking budgets.
That said, legalization schemes of this type are like cannibalism: if you're seriously considering it, you're either beyond desperate (say, on a desert island) or completely divorced from reality. We're beyond desperate, alright – desperate to cling to a failed, debunked political and economic ideology no matter how absurd the costs.
Tim says:
One wonders if this will be a new party plank for the republicans. It's not really out of place with some of their more extreme views on women.
ConcernedCitizen says:
/southern accent
"I like my beer like a like my violence: domest-"
What, too soon?
wetcasements says:
I used to be pretty certain that, like the UK, the US would fade from being a superpower to being a second-tier nation with a few burps and hiccups but no real national trauma. China, India, and possibly Brazil would emerge as the most powerful nations of the 21st century.
But no, we're gonna collapse. Hard.
Middle Seaman says:
And now, finally, the Republican will bring back slavery.
Mike says:
You omitted this nice little detail:
"As an alternative to the 'decriminalize domestic violence plan,' the county DA has also offered to continue prosecuting the cases in exchange for a one-time payment from the city."
In a separate announcement, the fire department stated that it will continue putting out fires in exchange for "a small consideration."
Xynzee says:
You summed it perfectly with your final two sentences.
While DV is wrong from all perspectives, there's another little side to this. If the DAs office is strapped for cash then certainly the Public Defender's office is beyond fubared too (or does that come from the DAs budget?). I still believe in the concept of innocent til proven guilty, and fair trials, even in DV. So there we are. What they couldn't kill through "The Patriot Act" they'll kill in the name of austerity.
Glen.h says:
You know, once upon a time we in the outside world used to look up to the United States as a model of what we could be. Now we tend to think of it as what we must avoid becoming…
freeportguy says:
This while wanting to apply American laws to Americans doing drugs on FOREIGN SOIL!!
ADM says:
A question: the city council of topeka voted 7-3 to repeal a law that made domestic violence a crime. Does this affect local law all the way down? Can the sheriff's office respond to domestic disturbances, or would some state law enforcement agency now have to respond? Does the sheriff respond as usual and leave it to the topeka prosecutor to then categorize the offense as it sees fit? Is this going to be like an episode of the Wire where the only way to get ahead in Law is to be a stat-juking junky?
Tim H. says:
I suppose the war on (Vulgar) drugs continues, meaning wife-beaters are considered preferable to dopers. We're going to Hell.
Major Kong says:
Sounds like they're trying to surpass Texas as Molly Ivins' "National Laboratory for Bad Government"
ADM says:
I asked the same question as above over at LG&M and it got answered there. According to rea, this only affects which prosecutors prosecute; nothing changes for any other agencies.
In case anyone else was curious.
Arslan says:
Kansas truly is a hellhole, I know as a former guest of Ft. Riley.
But this shouldn't be shocking. Georgia has some program called "Georgia works" which basically entails working for free on "training programs", Maine has been talking about lowering age limits or raising the amount of hours per week that underage workers can do. It's all back full, all the way to the guilded age. And we American workers deserve this to some extent because we bought into American exceptionalism, the idea that America is a classless society, the myth of the "Middle class", and the Communist bogeyman.
c u n d gulag says:
Call me cynical, but if the Mr. smacks around his Mrs, or Ms., or Miss, just to keep in practice, the cops will turn the other way
But if the Mrs, or Ms., or Miss, decides to show off her culinary skills by pounding her Mr.'s skull with an iron skillet, the money will be found to prosecute her.
I could be wrong.
But I douby it…
c u n d gulag says:
I also doubT it…
Hazy Davy says:
Look…this is reducto ad absurdum to illustrate things to people who want law enforcement budgets reduced. Had they instead chosen something less blatant, it wouldn't have demonstrated the lunacy of the austerity drive.
[reads Mike's comment]
Really? F—ing kill me. They're taking ti seriously. OMG.
Elle says:
That's because using a weapon kicks it up to felony domestic violence. (I took this from the comments over at Feministing.)
Arslan says:
"That's because using a weapon kicks it up to felony domestic violence. (I took this from the comments over at Feministing.)"
Ladies of Kansas, first of all- WHY ARE YOU IN KANSAS? Anyway, I recommend investing money in practical martial arts such as Judo, Brazilian ju-jitsu, and Thai or Western boxing. This way you can hand him his ass while not getting any charges.
c u n d gulag says:
Then I suppose Lorena Bobbiting him is also a felony.
Maybe the women of KS can work on getting legislation that will classify a man's hands as lethal weapons, like with boxers. This way, using either a skillet or a fist will be a felony.
A yup, THAT'S gonna happen…
jeneria says:
It's all part of the plan to force women back to the home and out of the workforce. Beat us, deny us birth control, deny us health care, make it harder to get student loans, don't provide day care, destroy the public schools so kids have to stay at home and we'll have to rely on men for everything. Then the men can go back to work. Unemployment solved! Lack of white babies solved! Getting back to a fantasy 1950's America that never existed solved!
Arslan says:
Jeneria, I do think that is part of the motivation of many of these people, but from the perspective of the ruling class, more women in the workplace is good, because they get away with paying them less.
It's only a matter of time before they start going after young teens as well.
Andy Brown says:
The cynic in me says this is just another reason for right-wingers to love tax cuts.
Dookie says:
Yes taxes should be 100% so there will be no problems.
jeneria says:
Arslan,
I agree with your point, but I just think that the current obsession with morality is overriding the common sense of economics.
JohnR says:
Ideology is fundamentally Procrustean – you keep chopping 'undesirable' bits of society away until it fits your fantasy ideal. When it doesn't fit, you just cut off a bit more. The actual and inevitable outcome is like Harpo and Chico doing cooperative moustache-barbering as in Monkey Business. Then, of course, you throw a tantrum, blame it on the invisible (and therefore guilty) scapegoat(s) and hand the mess over to the luckie-duckies and abscond to join your money in Switzerland.
c u n d gulag says:
JohnR,
Yup, and the one thing you won't ever hear from them is, "That's-a onne-a snoop-a too many!"
They want to "snoop" until there's nothing left to snip.
Edward says:
I think in this country we are doomed to reinvent every political wheel that has ever been discovered by mankind. Nothing is too basic that we can avoid discovering its necessity the hard way.
bb in GA says:
We may have a “Duke Lacrosse players case – Lite”.
Many libs here have launched on warning w/o a full accounting w/ the assumption that this is just another case of those eeevil Rs doing their thing.
I was only able to do a trivial amount of research here on the facts:
Shawnee County Kansas, which includes the State Capital of Topeka, has a population of about 178, 000 (83% White, 9% Black, 7% Latino, 1% other)
They voted for McCain for Pres by 241 votes (< 0.3%)
County Commissioners:
Shelly Buhler (white female)
Mary M. Thomas (white female)
Ted Ensley (white male)
No party affiliations were apparent at the website
The county commission is all white but is 66% female (considering the population is about 50/50)
City of Topeka:
City Council:
Bill Bunten, Mayor (white male)
Karen Hiller, District 1 (white female)
John Alcala, District 2, Deputy Mayor (not a white male)
Sylvia Ortiz, District 3, (Latina from her picture and surname)
Denise Everhart, District 4 (white female)
Larry Wolgast, District 5 (white male)
Chad Manspeaker, District 6 (white male)
Bob Archer, District 7 (white male)
Andrew Gray, District 8 (white male)
Richard Harmon, District 9 (white male)
10 people in the power structure of the City:
60% white male (5 council members plus the mayor)
30% female
20% minority (we have one twofer)
Again, no party affiliation is discernible at the city website.
So it can’t be a bunch of evil white republican males imposing their will at least as far as the county commission is concerned.
The City could have a white/gender imposed solution to any problem if majority rule is the order of the day (5 -4)
Maybe some of y’all who are interested can do better…
My time is UP
//bb
Amused says:
Let me see, they've decriminalized wife-beating … but not prostitution? And not smoking pot?
Elle says:
@bb in GA
(Sidenote: I am probably misunderstanding something due to foreign-ness, but that County Commissioner system looks like it has a few deficiencies on the democracy front. I actually scoffed out loud at the idea that you couldn't get a political party from the website, but sure enough you can't. Nor does it seem to have any kind of register of interests for commissioners, or any other details that might be salient. Reading it, I had the theme from Dukes of Hazzard running through my head.)
I think you're making a rookie mistake in confusing descriptive and substantive equality in political representation. You can have all the women you want in power, but if their ideologies align with Phyllis Schlafly, then no institutional bras are going to be burnt.
We (the world) is only at the beginning of responding well to domestic abuse. Criminal justice systems across the globe have no difficulty in responding (however inappropriately or bizarrely) to violence perpetrated by men against men in public spaces. Abuse in private spaces is hovering on the edge of de facto lawfulness in most territories, even if it is de jure proscribed. We are still at the point of needing balancing measures to encourage reporting, prosecution and effective sentencing for perpetrators. We are at the very beginning of the kind of whole culture attitudinal change programmes, and bystander programmes, that might reduce the incidences of violence.
In most national budgets, violence against women (or components thereof, including domestic abuse) is funded separately from the criminal justice mainstream. Sometimes it's funded through equality structures, or has ringfenced funding within the criminal justice budget topline. While still necessary, until the culture changes within police forces, prosecutorial structures, and so forth, this means that it's, in some senses, still a marginal expense that can be trimmed when times are hard.
Obvious point is obvious, but from everything we know about domestic abuse, the point of sanctioning misdemeanor level offenders is to intervene before the violence escalates. By implementing a gender-blind policy of ignoring misdemeanors, Topeka is literally putting people's lives in danger.
bb in GA says:
@elle
"I think you're making a rookie mistake in confusing descriptive and substantive equality in political representation."
You would be right if that was what I believed, but I don't.
My point is that on the surface, the stereotyped, templated liberal story line of evil male republicans bustin' the chops of the women of the world is at first blush not confirmed here.
I also made the point (which you confirmed) that we don't know what the hell any of these people are politically.
All the women in this story may be Phyllis Schlafly clones…and maybe (and probably) not given that this is about even territory between Obama and McCain in 2008. This ain't GA.
Y'all (commenters in general) may not like what they have done with valid objections because of the potential consequences, but I still believe this is a case of Duke Lacrosse Player liberal prejudice until we have more details.
Then you can say "See, I told you so, you right wing %$#@" or politely and humbly….yeah right.
//bb
Elle says:
@bb in GA
There is no point unless you are confusing descriptive and substantive equality. It doesn't matter whether the actual representatives are male or female (or white/black, disabled/non-disabled, gay/straight), if their political selves are indifferent to equality. There is a long and ignoble tradition of women taking the 30 pieces of silver to sell their sisters politically down the river, just as there is a long and noble tradition of men working in solidarity with women in pursuit of women's liberation.
I did a bit of googling, and the party affiliations of the Commissioners are: Ted Ensley, Democrat; Shelly Buhler, Independent; and Mary Thomas, Democrat.
The Topeka Council website doesn't have a party affiliation for its councillors. (Is this usual?) I googled a bit, but couldn't find any kind of list or breakdown, although commentators writing about the budget vote are writing about a 'Republican council'.
I think you're perhaps overestimating my interest in whether this is a Republican decision or a Democrat one. I can recognise in Democrat women the usual necessity to throw one's lot in with the least worst option. From an outsider perspective it seems that both parties are scrapping over a wafer-thin strip of centre-right political ground, with all of the interest in women's well-being that usually suggests. The fact that one party seems marginally less interested in bringing about the actual conditions written about in The Handmaid's Tale should not be read as some kind of pro-woman stance.
Desargues says:
The lethal combination of condomless cousin-fuckery and Christianity does that to people. As a commenter above put it, what the fuck ARE women doing in Kansas?
Scott says:
As much fun as it is to bash on Kansas and inbred hillbillies that beat up women, I'm surprised that no one actually tried to understand what was actually going on here.
The city of Topeka repealed its ordinance against misdemeanor domestic violence. This ordinance existed with county and state laws against the same crime. When the city repealed its ordinance, it forced the county in which Topeka is located to take sole responsibility for arresting and prosecuting those suspected of violating the county and state law. Before, there were disputes as to which jurisdiction was responsible for the suspects. This removed the ambiguity and saved the city of Topeka roughly $1 million dollars a year.
Long story short, if you call 911 in Topeka and say your spouse/significant other has attacked you, the police will come and arrest the person if you're willing to press charges. Nothing has changed, except maybe the facility the suspect will be locked up.
Seriously people, don't you think there was a better reason for a city to do this rather than "We hate women here in Topeka." Do you homework rather than jumping to conclusions. Right now, none of you are any better than the fuckbrains on Fox and Friends, especially Ed, who usually does the leg work on these kinds of things.
You can now go back to your flame war, seeing as many of you can not be swayed in your intractable opinions. Nothing to see here.
Desargues says:
Gee, thanks for the details, Scott. They help, but don't quite let Topeka off the hook. For one, why did they choose to save money by repealing an ordinance against domestic violence rather than, say, prosecuting the smoking of weed? Surely that's a great money-saver.
Second, you talk about our intractable opinions as if they were some rigid prejudices based on nothing. Let's look again at where the state of Kansas is, in terms of objective indicators of societal development. You know, things like malnutrition, lack of education, teenage pregnancy, addiction, income disparity, that kind of stuff.
I'll make you a deal. I'll retract my formerly intractable opinions about Kansas when the good people of that state decide to give the religion thing a bit of a break and try to get themselves a few research universities instead.
As to bashing on inbred hillbillies, it's surely wrong of me. God has bashed them cruelly enough already.
Scott says:
Desargues – Keep in mind that even in the citation that Ed uses here, it mentions misdemeanors (plural). I don't know what the other city ordinances Topeka repealed, but the domestic violence misdemeanor was only one. For all I know, there might have been a marijuana law repealed within the city of Topeka. In any event, though, this would not have decriminalized marijuana in Kansas (or even Shawnee Co.) because those laws have not been repealed.
Second, in regards to your intractable opinions. This is what we call a stereotype. Why is a stereotype against Kansans ok, but a stereotype against women, Asians or black people a horrible injustice. Aren't those stereotypes based on something, too? All I'm looking for is a little intellectual honesty. Can you explain to me why this stereotype is acceptable and others are not?
(Also, how many major research universities are in Vermont, the most anti-church and super liberal state in the Union? The University of Kansas is at least comparable to the University of Vermont, if not better).
Carrstone says:
@Scott
How refreshing to come across your comments, accurate, apposite and unsullied, in this place; a stiletto in a world of wet paper edges.
I visit this site from time to time, now that the colder season has begun, in order to make my blood boil at the muck-raking, pot-stirring, mock-affront opinions of Ed and the Pavlovian responses of his coat-tailers. It's a shame, but I can't remember reading any abstract ideas here that haven't been made elsewhere before – and more elegantly!
Maybe I should move to Kansas because this bunch of malcontents will never go there.
Elle says:
@Scott
You seem quite keen to paint any conversation in these comments about gender as characterised by incivility and heatedness. I don't really see how the short, mild exchange above can be described as a 'flame war'.
This is not what the DV advocates describe in the piece Ed linked to. They assert that 16 perpetrators have been released from jail after charges weren't filed. I'm not sure if this means that accused people would normally be remanded into custody until their trial date, and that they were being released because of a lack of charges, or that they were being released with the knowledge that no charges would be forthcoming. Whichever the detriment, compared to the usual process, it seems clear that there is one.
I can't speak for anyone else, but your comment didn't contain any information that I didn't have. I read the point of Ed's post as being 'look at the baby we're throwing out with the alternative economic analysis bathwater'.
My point was more specifically about domestic abuse, but I understand perfectly that this has happened as a result of gender-blind implementation of a broader policy about the prosecution of misdemeanours, conceived as a result of austerity budgeting. I can entirely see why the various executives took the policy decision they have taken, and understand that they know they're cutting into flesh and bone, and not just trimming fat. The problem is that developing this policy around misdemeanours, although it was not intended to bite down harder on one particular group, will have a differential impact on women, who, because of the realities of domestic abuse, will be more likely to experience domestic violence as a result. Having any kind of gender-sensitive policy, or budget, process may have helped them to deal with their budget constraints in a different way. (There's no mention, for example, of the costs associated with domestic violence, and the demand on local services thereof.)
Scott says:
@Elle – I wasn't saying this was a gender flame war. At the time I was posting, though, it was turning into a debate between liberals and conservatives with their usual talking points (i.e. Liberal: stupid Kansans hate women, Conservative: stupid PC bullshit, get over it) and not taking into account any of the actual facts about the situation.
The source I had for my information was a lengthy interview on All Things Considered with both the City Manager of Topeka and the Shawnee Co. District Attorney. Both described the situation as a budget dispute and nothing more. Both officials said that domestic violence would be treated in the same manner as before. The City Manager even addressed the 16 people being released without charges. Essentially, the 48 hours in jail is a cooling off period (akin to a drunk tank) and if charges have not been filed by the victim, the suspect is free to go. Those people would have gotten released 2 weeks ago even with the city ordinance still in place. The city manager also mentioned the costs involved; many more services are involved in a domestic violence case than another type of crime so by forcing the county to handle the cases, it is saving the city $1 million a year.
My larger point is that the DV advocates and Ed in posting this piece are no better than the Fox News hypocrites that spread the same kind of twisted information. You all looked at the situation: city repealed domestic violence laws, 16 people were released who were arrested for domestic violence, OMG DOMESTIC VIOLENCE IS LEGAL IN KANSAS!!
How is this any different than the $16 muffin tripe from a week or two ago? Justice Department has a conference at a hotel, bill says $x for "muffins," only y number of people attended the conference, therefore the Justice Department pays $16 for muffins! LIBERALS EAT GOVERNMENT WASTE!!! When all you had to do was contact the hotel and have them tell you that "muffin" is their shorthand for full continental breakfast. Then it starts to make more sense.
I'm not saying that I agree with what Topeka did. All I'm saying is that before Ed (and other DV advocates) start talking about this in terms of psychotic breaks, realize that this is part of a larger issue and not about domestic violence.
Barry says:
wetcasements Says:
"I used to be pretty certain that, like the UK, the US would fade from being a superpower to being a second-tier nation with a few burps and hiccups but no real national trauma. China, India, and possibly Brazil would emerge as the most powerful nations of the 21st century.
But no, we're gonna collapse. Hard."
It really means that we'll be a third-tier bannana republic, but due to size be treated as second-tier. In the end, we'll have massive debt which can't be called in, or it'd collapse the world, and lots and lots of nuclear weapons. It'll take a few decades for our military tech to become second-rate (since it's one of the few things we take seriously and dump infinite cash into), and even once other countries are higher-tech, they'll have to spend a couple of decades putting that tech into their military, and having a trillion-dollar build-up. And even then the USA can act like the USSR did – piss-poor economy, second-rate military tech, but enough volume to be extremely dangerous.
Elle says:
I am not criticising you when I say that this is the problem. National budgets, regional budgets, local budgets, and supranational budgets are usually developed (unbelievably) in a way that is divorced from policy and delivery. One decision-making unit does the numbers, other units work out what actually needs to get paid for to deliver the outcomes required, and there's an ugly dogfight over making the two sides line up when budget lines get devolved to departments for implementation.
When you develop any budget without explicitly gendering the budget process, you end up with situations like the one playing out in Topeka. Budget decisions are taken in a policy vacuum, unintended consequences mushroom, and advocate groups are forced into campaigning mode in response.
This kind of thinking is another byproduct of gender-blind budgeting. There have been a few big cost/benefit analyses of domestic abuse services, and the amount of money that domestic abuse costs economies is staggering. Criminal justice interventions, particularly targeted and specific interventions, are super expensive. What they are doing, though, is picking up the pieces from a failure to invest in violence prevention work, and adequate housing, health, education, and welfare provision. The latter are relatively cheaper, but their impact on criminal justice budget lines is rendered invisible by the kind of processes used to develop budgets.
That makes it clearer, but I can still see the DV advocates' point. Sending someone home to their partner with a criminal justice process hanging over his head, and an awareness that there is an official sense that he has done wrong, is different from sending someone home without that sense.
I do take your point that some of the worldwide commentariat have been presenting this story as if the good burghers of Topeka woke up and thought they would give perpetrators a pass. I think the truth – that women are invisible/bargaining chips in a whole range of Topeka-focused budget processes – is more interesting.
Scott says:
Elle – I think we're talking past each other a little bit. I have no idea if the social services that battered spouses receive during or after prosecution in Topeka has been cut; this has not been part of any discussion I have seen. The only thing that is of issue is the associated services necessary for a prosecution (which are considerably more than other kinds of prosecution). The city of Topeka is no longer responsible for coming up with the money, Shawnee County is. Officials are statutorily obligated by county and state law to prosecute domestic violence and that is what will happen.
I'm not going to argue that this pissing match isn't going to result in a decline in quality in services for domestic violence victims, but that is a far sight from the way this issue is being presented in the media.
It also seems that regardless of what Topeka does or will do in the future, you have a problem with the way domestic violence is prosecuted. I'm not going to change your mind and I agree that there are things that can be done better. But remember, that at its core, this is a dispute about budgets and EVERYONE is getting a shitty deal when it comes to slashing budgets, not just women.
Elle says:
@Scott
No, I understand your point (and theirs). My point is that this is a bad way to think about budgets, and to budget, although it is the prevailing budgeting orthodoxy. If you don't do a better job in linking policy and budgets, then you get budget and policy decisions made in silos, without a sense of how they interrelate. Budget cuts on prevention work, and in other policy areas that are weakly related (in terms of process) to domestic violence, end up in criminal justice budgets with a multiplier effect. As you have observed, the criminal justice system is a backstop for everything else that isn't statutory provision.
I don't know where you get the first bit from. I have only the haziest notion of how the US criminal justice system works. I have opinions about what kind of legal frameworks function best in terms of outcomes for women across other jurisdictions I'm familiar with, and some thoughts on prosecutorial policy, but there are national and regional prosecutorial functions that work really effectively on domestic abuse.
It's not true to say that EVERYONE is getting a shitty deal from austerity budgets, in the sense that their impact is homogenous. It isn't. Budgets aren't neutral and abstract. A case in point is the UK emergency budget, which sought to realise £8bn in efficiency savings. A gender audit carried out by the House of Commons library identified that £6bn of the savings were coming from programmes, services, and welfare payments targeted at women, and £2bn from men.
The emergency budget was not only bad for women, but bad for a whole number of other groups, and that's not unimportant. It doesn't make it less important to think about the impact that supposedly neutral processes like budgets have on different groups, including women.
Desargues says:
@Scott
This is what we call a stereotype. Why is a stereotype against Kansans ok, but a stereotype against women, Asians or black people a horrible injustice. Aren't those stereotypes based on something, too? All I'm looking for is a little intellectual honesty. Can you explain to me why this stereotype is acceptable and others are not?
Here's why: for many reasons.
(1) If you take 'stereotype' to mean, 'assertion about all members in a group,' then they're trivially wrong. If you mean them as sweeping generalizations about individuals in a group, then in general stereotypes about women, brown people, Asians, and gay people are false. It's not true that most women are less capable than men (unless you badly skew the criteria to only include, for instance, biceps size or the ability to achieve an erection). It's not true that most gay men are sexually promiscuous. It's not even true that most Asians are good at math ("positive" stereotyping is just as unsupported by facts as negative ones). But, in this sense, it's not really a stereotype to point out that, by and large, states in the American South lag behind on a broad spectrum of indicators for societal well-being.
(2) If you take a stereotype to mean a generalization that blames a whole group for alleged shortcomings, then the situation is, again, asymmetric, but not in your favor. It IS unfair to blame women, Blacks, Hispanics, etc. for allegedly falling short of the standards of white guys. IF such shortcomings exist, they're readily explainable by the heaps of past injustice inflicted by white guys upon countless generations of such minority groups. Here's two thought experiments for you, Scott. In one, imagine your family dismantled and sold down the river, to the highest bidder, for five or six generations, then forced into mind-numbing, back-breaking drudgery with no hope of a better future; then imagine their descendants locked up for a century or so in ghettos. Now contemplate mentally all your great-great-great-great-great–great–great-children, and answer honestly: Will you blame them if they don't all get into Yale? Will you applaud us if we call them a bunch of no-good, shiftless Scott-progeny? In the second experiment, imagine your daughters, real or possible, and their female descendants, down to the 12th generation, being confined to the kitchen and the mindless chores of the household. Then imagine us guys complaining about all these weak-minded, emotional, man-hatin' silly little Scott-ladies who want to compete with us for our jobs. You get the gist, I trust it.
But to lay the blame at the door of Kansans is not like that. Governance and the local economy in Kansas are entirely under the control of the people of Kansas (I know that some over there like to shift the blame on that big bad federal gub'mint, but they're wrong). So it's ethically OK to blame Southerners for self-inflicted, and quite avoidable, social problems. I'm not engaging in unfair stereotyping by doing that. Disclaimer: I'm obviously not saying that all Kansans are like that; I'm not that stupid. What I am saying, in fact, is that I blame the stupid, grifting motherfuckers who have been governing these states for so long now, and the lazy, passive assholes who are enabling such shit by either electing these fuckers or not opposing them vigorously enough. Don't worry, Scott, if you're on the right side, I'm not blaming you for anything.
(Also, how many major research universities are in Vermont, the most anti-church and super liberal state in the Union? The University of Kansas is at least comparable to the University of Vermont, if not better).
Really? Vermont? That's pretty lame. "Kansas: we're no worse than Vermont at creating the future." Don't you think you've gone to easy on yourself? Given that a majority of Kansans believe a combination of pre-modern Christian doctrine and laissez-faire capitalism is the secret to societal success, you guys should be doing A LOT better than Vermont. Your schools should be competing with MIT, Caltech, Stanford and Yale, not with the University of Vermont. Or, at the very least, they should stop receiving more money from Uncle Sam than they send it — which is what Kansas has been doing for the last ten years, despite a glorious, uninterrupted rule by defenders of the view that tax cuts and Jebus are gonna make all of our lives better.
More to the point, a majority of people in Kansas ought to consider moving from silly fairy-tales dreamt up by shepherds in the late Bronze Age to the world of reason and science.
Desargues says:
@Carrstone:
Watch out, Andy Borowitz — there's a new sheriff in town!
Desargues says:
@Barry:
Your verdict reminded me of those British diplomats who, during the Cold War, used to refer to the Soviet Union as 'Upper Volta with rockets.'
Major Kong says:
I really don't think people from Kansas are a bunch of "inbred hillbillies".
Just the ones that they elect to public office.
Desargues says:
Agreed. But then how to explain the behavior of those who vote for them, Major?
Major Kong says:
Not sure. My job takes me to Wichita fairly frequently and everybody there seems nice enough. Not sure what happened.
Bob Dole would be a voice of reason compared to the current crop of Kansas politicians.
Scott says:
Desargues – First of all, I'm not from Kansas. I've never been there. Way to assume.
Second, yes, you are absolutely right when the statistics show the South (and when was Kansas considered part of the South?) lags behind the rest of the country in certain socio-economic indicators. However, a much more nuanced argument would be that it's not just geographic position in the country, but a rich/poor dichotomy. The South is [i]poorer[/p] than the rest of the country, not stupider or more intolerant. Having spent enough time in rural Maine (as far from the south as possible) I can assure you that it's not any different, but possible worse, than the rural areas in the South.
I think you've just proven my point with your diatribe against Kansas. In no way can Kansas be considered part of the "South," unless you want to argue that it's in the southern half of the country (the same way Arizona is part of the South, too, right?) So by that logic, it has nothing to do with being part of the mythical South, but something else entirely.
And you didn't even answer my question about stereotypes. The stereotypes I mentioned had to have some basis in fact, otherwise we wouldn't have used them in the first place. The stereotype is not, for instance, that Asian people are excellent animal trainers, it's that they are good at math. Rightly or wrongly, all stereotypes are based on some collective idea regarding their authenticity. So, can we at least get the stereotype correct – rural people are more likely to be intolerant (or whatever nasty characteristic we want to force on them) and not just southerners.
Desargues says:
I see your points, Scott, and I can answer both. But I can't do that now. I'm 3 hours behind you, guys, and I'm overwhelmed by stuff I need to do tonight. But I'll answer your reply tomorrow.
Arslan says:
I have been to Kansas, spent nearly a year there. It sucks. End of story.
Desargues says:
@Scott:
I did assume that you're from the general direction of where Kansas is, but I was prepared to be wrong about that, so I tailored my arguments such that they still stand. Kansas is not in the 'South,' so what? It's still a den of toxic backwardness and pig-headed refusal to enter the 21st century full-scale. I didn't mean to imply that its backwardness is due to proximity to the South (although that may be a remote cause). No, it's due to the number of stupid and intellectually lazy people in the state out-numbering the educated, smart, and rational. If I read you correctly, you suggest the real cause of that backwardness is greater poverty. Then you take that to support your point that there's rural poor people everywhere in America, hence why single out Kansas?
Have you thought about the possibility that the explanatory arrow may go the other way around? You say, "The South is poorer than the rest of the country, not stupider or more intolerant." Well, maybe they're poorer because they're intolerant and mentally lazy (I wouldn't call them stupid; I don't think they lack the grey matter to think for themselves, just the willingness and the traditions to foster autonomous thought, having been numbed by two centuries of stultifying Christian counter-Enlightenment shit). If they were more tolerant, they'd be able to attract more innovative, talented, entrepreneurial people to move over there and keep things moving up. If they weren't so damn unwilling to stop and think for a second, they'd stop voting against their own economic interests all the damn time. They'd stop buying into the Right's union-bashing, hence their many workers would have better livelihoods, and some hope of a better future for their children. They'd stop electing politicians who scheme to maintain obscene subsidies for agribusinesses instead of doing something for smaller farmers. They'd press their state government to build them research institutes and better universities, not goddamn ballparks and military bases. Or they'd ask their Congresspeople to press for an end to outsourcing jobs, not to abortions and gay sex.
I come from working-class rednecks too, but I'd never make the mistake of defending their self-defeating choices and dimwitted decisions. Poor white rednecks deserve our sympathy alright, but within limits: it doesn't relieve them of the duty to think for a second and stop supporting this Nixonian shit that's been destroying their own lives and the future of the rest of us.
As to your point about stereotypes, I'm confused — I'm not sure what your question is. "The stereotypes I mentioned had to have some basis in fact, otherwise we wouldn't have used them in the first place," you say. Um, yeah — a flimsy basis in fact. That's why they're stereotypes, not well-established truth. "The stereotype is not, for instance, that Asian people are excellent animal trainers, it's that they are good at math." Um, perhaps — in some parts of America. Out here where I live, I know a lot of Asian kids who just as non-good at math than their non-Asian counterparts. Anyway, what's the relevance of that? It's a fact, not a stereotype, that in Kansas they elect more terrible politicians than good ones. And, given that they're elected by a system of representative democracy in which people make free decisions, who's ultimately to blame for that crop of awful politicians? "Rightly or wrongly, all stereotypes are based on some collective idea regarding their authenticity." Um, how about: wrongly? "So, can we at least get the stereotype correct – rural people are more likely to be intolerant (or whatever nasty characteristic we want to force on them) and not just southerners." If it's true that rural people are more likely to be intolerant — which it is — it follows rather easily that Southerners are more likely to be so, given that they have a greater relative share of rural populations than states on the two Coasts. As to the nasty characteristic we want to force on them: (1) it IS nasty: intolerance and unwillingness to think for your self are not virtues, but vices; (2) I don't force it on them, they adopted it voluntarily.
Fifth Dentist says:
In related news, Frank Rich is considering changing the name of his book "What's the Matter With Kansas?" to "Seriously, Kansas. What the Fu*K??!?" —
festeringscabofrealityblogspot.com
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the pathetic thing is that they think domestic violence is acceptable. They should have just taken their pot possession laws off the books. What a backslide.
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