"Solidarity"

I finished up my year with JVC last week...but this is something I wrote a couple weeks ago in my journal. I may perhaps update again with some general thoughts on my year.

I am not poor. I have never been poor. One of the goals of JVC is to foster a sense, a feeling, of solidarity with the poor. Standing with them. Of course, I am not really poor. At the end of every month I knew another $100 is coming. My housing is paid for. Heck, I even got a car to get me to work that I pay no bills on. And if anything really serious ever came up, I knew I could ask my parents for help. So I've never felt what many people in the neighborhoods that Verb serves undoubtedly feel.

I have never had to worry over when a next paycheck would come. If I qualify for government assistance. If my EBT will cover the food for my children.

But I do feel a changed perspective--a more nuanced understanding. I know the frustration of relying on publi transportation in a sprawling city wiht an unreliable schedule. The tenuousness of plans when they rely on such a system. Even how it can cost someone their job. I have felt a small (tiny) dose of the shame that comes from not being able to afford things. In a consumer society so much of a person's value is inherently linked to what they can afford. And for a man that is so intrinsically linked to ones masculinity and perception of self. You grow bitter not being able to take your girlfriend out on a date--embarrassed, less self-confident. This I've struggled with a lot. Our sense of self is so tied up with wealth or lack thereof.

How can we, as a society, criticize the poor for providing their children with video games or smart phones when so much of our society expects and pressures people to conform to certain standards. We judge people based on their possessions, so how can we stare down our noses when a parent tries to spare their child the shame of not-having? I see this sentiment so often and it breaks my heart.

Until you cannot afford those things you take for granted, how can you understand how wrapped-up our sense of worth is tied to our net worth? How can you judge another for trying to escape the shame placed on them by the people who have--the people who decide the norm?

It's embarrassing to not have money. I don't know how to even describe my money situation this last year. I feel vulnerable, open to mockery or just at risk of not being understood. I am trying to explore the danger of associating my self worth with my income. And yet I so often fail. I worry about dates, housing, marriage in the future, kids, careers, vacations...the things I want down the road, and so I tie myself tighter to these destructive ideals. A man's worth especially is so intimately entwined with his bank account in our society.

"Solidarity" is a sometimes frustrating word and increasingly meaningless to me. I honestly couldn't define it for you at this point in my life. I know I am not truly standing in the same place as those I have served this year. If I were I'd live in gang territory. I'd feel persecuted for the color of my skin. I'd know someone dead from drugs or violence. All on top of the normal consumer desires thrown at us constantly on tv, in music, and every other facet of our popular culture. And I'd know I can't afford any of it. Not if I'm going to stay off the streets. But the world teaches our young people they need things. To fit in. To be judged as acceptable. We are shamed into spending our money, and the poor are villainized for trying to conform.

I only know a little of what it feels like to feel the shame of being "poor." But I do know that as a society that so defines itself on its wealth is a society that needs advocates, that needs analysis and change and greater equality and understanding.