Agree to Disagree
Tim Fernholz may be “mad as hell,” but that doesn’t mean he’s right.
By Courtney E. Martin
November 29, 2007
(AP Photo/Douglas Healey)I certainly stand corrected on one thing: Tim Fernholz is mad as hell. He’s also rash enough to make sweeping statements about my point of view without even doing a simple Google search of my work. First I’d like to just correct a few of his misrepresentations, then I’d love to get onto the good stuff—building on some of his really fantastic arguments.
Fernholz has a mistaken idea about my experiences of and thoughts on protesting. He wrote, “Martin would like to see today’s young activists adopt the tactics of the 1960’s student radicals—protests, theatrics, and the like… But, for Martin, a change in political control doesn’t count unless someone’s waving a sign.” But in a piece I wrote this October for The American Prospect Online, I talked about a rally I attended: “[W]e—by and large—felt like we were imitating an earlier generation, playing dress-up in our parents’ old hippie clothes. I marched against the war and my president called it a focus group. The worst part was that I did feel inert while doing it. In the 21st century, a bunch of people marching down the street, complimenting one another on their original slogans and pretty protest signs, feels like self-flagellation, not real and true social change.” I have major doubts about the effectiveness of ’60s-era methods of activism, and I am instead arguing that we need to continue to strive to reinvent what it means to be active citizens in the contemporary world.
Fernholz also seems to have misconceptions about where I did my reporting. He said, “Mike Connery, a blogger who focuses on young people’s role in contemporary politics, points out that only 21 percent of all 18-29 year-olds currently attend college; even fewer are enrolled at the elite institutions at which Martin speaks.” But the majority of the schools that I have recently spoken at—Transylvania University in Lexington, Kentucky, Illinois College in Jacksonville, Illinois, Goshen College in Goshen, Indiana, and the University of Missouri-Kansas City, to name a few—would hardly describe themselves as “elite institutions.”
Third, Fernholz talks about how I neglect one of the recent major examples of successful protesting, writing, “Two recent examples of successful youth activism were driven by activists who don’t fit Martin’s mold: The protests in support of the Jena 6 were brought to national attention thanks to youth-produced online campaigns.” But I actually wrote an entire piece, again for The American Prospect Online, about how America’s reaction to Jena 6 was heartening, and still not enough to make fundamental changes to continued racism in this country.
Last, Fernholz takes issue with the fact that I’ve been ignoring the accomplishments of his own university. He wrote, “Martin proves to be completely unaware of the effective student activism taking place today. For example, at my own college, Georgetown University, students have organized a successful living wage campaign that led to the unionization of sub-contracted workers and helped negotiate a raise for security guards.” But I actually wrote about Georgetown’s accomplishments at the Huffington Post as recently as this month. I wrote of how the Columbia University hunger strikers pay “homage to the 2005 Georgetown University hunger strike in which 26 students abstained from eating for ten days, pushing the administration to agree to pay the campus’ lowest paid workers a living wage. Zack Pesavento, one of the students involved in that successful campaign told Campus Progress, at the time: ‘We did all sorts of research, we issued reports, we were as professional about it as we could be and when it finally came down to it they just weren’t willing to move and we felt that we had to take some sort of direct action to bring this to a conclusion.’”
Okay, now on to the interesting part. First off, I think Fernholz has created an exciting recent history of youth activism that can serve to hearten any cynic and motivate any slouch. He does a fine job of bringing lots of sources and organizations together in one tightly packed refutation to the commonly held belief that youth activism simply doesn’t exist. Bravo to him. For all the research he neglected to do on my writing and thinking, he went above and beyond with regards to the research needed to document what youth are doing to address injustice.
I actually wasn’t arguing that youth activism doesn’t exist. Instead, I was pointing out that this generation (my generation, by the way, though Fernholz makes it sound like I’m already getting my AARP magazine), tends toward the safe, the institutional, the domestic. I think many of the examples that Fernholz gives actually confirm that argument: voting and running for office. I agree that working within the system can sometimes be an extremely efficient method of influencing the political climate. I love that our generation has a more pragmatic, educated approach to change than our parents ever did. We are far more effective in so many ways.
But—and here’s where Fernholz and I obviously part ways—we are also part of a generation that is far less likely to feel powerful in the world. There is a deep malaise affecting too many young people that has been documented by countless psychologists and sociologists. These young people aren’t involved in the actions he so painstakingly lists, and don’t feel inspired, important, or focused. Though I appreciate and commend active and exuberant young people, I don’t write for those who are already galvanized like Fernholz; I write for the students I meet who are full of potential, oozing with compassion and enthusiasm, but feel stunted, unable to find “their people,” struggling to make their mark in a world that makes them feel invisible. I want them to feel seen.
I’m thrilled that Fernholz is not one of these students. He can serve as a leader for those who feel disenchanted. But I caution him and others like him: The best leaders are those who approach social change with a truth pursued, as opposed to a truth possessed, model. It is critical that writers like me recognize the amazing work young people are doing, and, thanks to Fernholz’s prompting, I will aim to do a better job of it. It is also critical that students like Fernholz recognize that there are still too many young people who don’t feel like they can make a difference in the world. After he’s done celebrating his own community’s achievements, it would behoove him to take the risk to ask those outside of it: “Why aren’t you involved?” And really, really listen to the answers.
Courtney Martin graduated from Barnard College in 2002 and is a writer and teacher living in Brooklyn, NY.
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Comments
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Bravo.
— LS - Nov 29, 04:26 PM - #If someone doesn’t feel a natural inclination to be involved, it’s all for the better that they aren’t.
Feeling alienated and apathetic is an elite affectation, essentially a luxury. If they still feel that way, we know the situation in this country hasn’t gotten all that bad (And frankly, I’d argue that all things considered life in America tends to hum along just fine).
If things do get ‘that bad’, the incentives will naturally fall into place for people to get deeply involved in affecting change, whether they initially feel they’ve got ‘agency’ or not. None of the hand-holding you recommend will be necessary.
Now, on to another point: Why on earth is the living wage campaign considered a progressive cause? It’s activism, sure, but I’d argue it’s quite regressive and counterproductive. I’ve yet to see a living wage proposal offered that reflected even a basic understanding of economics or moral agency.
(And yes, when the living wage campaign was going on here at Georgetown, I was loud and active in opposing it, for explicitly liberal reasons.)
— Joe - Nov 29, 07:59 PM - #how is a living wage not progressive? making sure people get a decent wage seems like a brilliant idea to me.
— matt - Nov 29, 09:57 PM - #I think you both hold good points, but arguing it out like this is a bit petty and doesn’t speak much for either of you.
— Alex T - Nov 30, 01:32 PM - #I would like to see Joe’s reasons why a living wage campaign isn’t a progressive cause. More importantly, I’d like to see why he thinks it’s a bad idea. My view: if someone is expected to work full-time, they should at least receive enough compensation to pay their bills. If Joe’s view is that guaranteeing a living wage hurts the economy by penalizing business owners, I’m not buying that as a “liberal reason”. That argument has been used by captains of industry for over a hundred years in the face of progressive wage proposals. Full disclosure: I am a small business owner myself. I don’t want to make a profit on the backs of people who can’t afford to pay their rent.
— Robert - Nov 30, 02:42 PM - #The liberal argument against the living wage goes roughly as follows:
The standard capitalist assumption is that you’ll pay someone what their labor’s worth.
If you want to pay the more than what their labor’s worth because you want to help them, that’s charity. Charity’s all well and good, but are there people worse off than the people employed below the minimum wage? In other countries, for instance?
If so, why aren’t you helping them instead?
Charitable dollars are not infinite — it makes sense to direct your charity toward the greatest need.
Those in favor of the living wage would say, “But those people in Darfur are half-way around the world — and these people are right on your doorstep.”
That amounts to narcissism, plain and simple. “The closer someone is to me, the more they deserve charity.”
Setting that aside, there’s the societal argument — society needs a system for providing a basic standard of living for all its citizens.
As a liberal, I agree!
The question, then, is “Is the living wage the most efficient way of providing that social safety net?”
No, it isn’t.
The living wage doesn’t discriminate between whether you need the living wage (adult supporting himself) or you don’t (high school teenager with his first job).
The costs of a social safety net should be distributed fairly across society. The living wage PREVENTS that fair distribution — a company like Goldman Sachs that employs few low-wage workers won’t be paying much towards it. A small business that employs lots of low-wage workers, like a family-owned supermarket, will see their costs much more impacted.
As a liberal, I believe that some income redistribution is good — but that redistribution should be done with fair taxation, rather the unfair, inefficient ‘living wage’ system.
A radical expansion of the Earned Income Tax Credit would be a much fairer, more efficient means of helping the poor.
There’s just nothing about the living wage that makes sense, from either an economic or a moral perspective, once you think it through.
— Joe - Nov 30, 03:10 PM - #