Ms. Ehrenreich,

Your essay smells as if it's the brainchild of a spikey haired red lip-sticked Power Women's Group member from the (now defunct) Alex Station in Tyson's corner. (Cock a doodle do!). Macy's window is looking good about now isn't it?

miftin, I do all my talking here, where nobody knows me. It's only a matter of time before the secret police visit each neighborhood, going door to door and asking who in the community is disloyal, different, a malcontent, or just "doesn't fit in".

They gotta fill all these new prisons that are being built, and corporations of the future will be looking for slave labor.

Do you think that Barbara Ehrenreich is exploiting suicide for her career's sake? Even if it were so, does that mean that we should not care about increases in suicide that seem to accompany economic and social stresses?

Economic distress affects all kinds of people, including the cheerful, the sad, the weak, the strong, the self-centered and the giving. I know farmer suicide is up in India, soldier suicide is increasing. We know that unemployment leads to more cases of family violence and it seems to be common sense that suicide would also go up in times of economic distress, especially if the suicide would help solve money problems for loved ones. (I am not advocating this nor condemning it either. It is just too sad for judgement.) Does anyone know if suicide has increased?

I have a feeling that the reasons for suicide are not often known nor noted in the press. Sometimes suicide is disguised, overdosing on drugs, driving recklessly or provoking confrontations with police. We can see only statistics and the occasional vignette. I agree with empathic posters like r jackowski and heav y runner and others who suggest we should collectively lend a helping hand to those in dire straits.

Well actually it was me, but if you want to give Camus the credit that's fine. After all, the car he was driving suddenly swerved off a straight stretch of road and directly into a tree on a sunny day with clear weather conditions. There's hardly any possibility of forging a more authentic community around these parts. They already think they have an authentic community and that us "liberals" need to leave because "we don't take to your kind around these parts." If you get into a debate with some local and you don't agree with their pre-packaged little corporate soundbites and you continue to absolutely tell them that their statements are irrational and you continue to stand your ground, they suddenly erupt into shouting and screaming and threaten to call the police on you.

"Suicide is one of the bravest acts one can commit. "

Is that Camus?

I see Camus' point. Suicide means looking yourself and staring your existential condition, your very being, right in the face.

Living in a capitalist society alienates man and makes her consider her existential condition apart from all other people. Suicide in this case is weak. Bravery means going beyond the self to forge new more authentic communities and and to see more clearly that one's own being is intimately tied to the being of others.

There's no place like America.

Where else do people feel so in danger of falling out of society and losing everything? Where else do people have such fear and lack of confidence in society that they actually end their own lives?

Matti
Excellent post!! Right on.

One of the questions posed in this "discussion" is:

Why do the People not react as they did in the past and revolt a bit?

To this I would "say" a few things:

1. We may just not be there yet. The revolts that the Author's source and the Author herself mention occurred AFTER a full-on economic collapse. Whatever one thinks about the likelihood of such a Collapse, one must admit it has happened quite yet.

2. We may never get there under current conditions. No one has mentioned that one of the most obvious differences between the two past eras of revolt and today is the TV. I'm not really shocked by this failure to note the very obvious on a "discussion forum" -the Subconscious Fear that the whole make-believe Telecommunications culture, and therefore the Internets themselves, might be just as dangerous as TV must be pervasive "here" in this False Place. TV -and perhaps Telecommunications in general- with all its destruction of Community, Family, and Sense of Place seems to me a quite likely Culprit for the "isolation" that some here have noted. But that is because I have read Jerry Mander's 1977(!) book "Four Arguments for the ELIMINATION of Television" and have spent years thinking about the actual EFFECTS of a machine that puts images in your brain that are virtually indistinguishable from images from the World-below the Conscious level of the Mind- on individuals and Society. I won't go into his arguments here -as I am already quite long "winded" when I "speak" through a keyboard- but I do Urge all of you "here" to read the book for yourselves.

3. Current conditions are apt to change. Remember that TV and many other Control Systems that are now numbing the response -or turning it inward as this article tries to show- are themselves either Commodities or dependent on the Consumption of Commodities. Let's see what happens when people can no longer afford Cable TV. Let's see what happens when the War on Poor People that the Justice system has now become can no longer afford to pursue, arrest, try, and inprison all of those who "break the Law".

Remember the IWW action in Spokane? Probably not. But ever hear of it? Its not really secret, its on a Utah Phillips Album. Anyway that's what got the Townspeople to back off on their "Free Speech Zone Style" ordinance against streetcorner rabble-rousing- too many Workers in the jail was too many mouths to feed. Do not fear Arrest! Insist on your Right to Trial!

I think it is going to get Interesting.

I don't think that the Collapse can be prevented, only forestalled and made worse.

I also don't think this Collapse is inherently a bad thing.

I think that it need not be some sort of Apocolyptic General Conflagration.

I think that that thought (wish?) is just Fear and Ignorance (the insult is not from the one who names a condition, but from the condition itself) talking.

We have the technological (in the broad sense of all Human Artifacts -including Government and Culture and many other things not usually thought of as "technology") capabilities to improve the current system and prevent such shocks and thefts - we just aren't using them.

This Change, both Internal and External is the essence of "progress".

Promoting it, allaying Fear, and being part of actually making it happen (for really, real happen, not "happen" in the way that CD is a "place" where people "discuss" things, or how the Netroots are a "group" of "people" with "interests") should be a major part of how a "Progressive" person spends their Day -even the Mystics who see in longer Cycles than the "economy".

Finally, I suggest we attempt to have a Good Time doing all this. There is an awful tendency on "our side" toward Gloominess -almost as bad as the tendencies toward Elitism, Absolutism, and Sectarianism- and this must be quashed. I believe it hurts both the accomplishment of "our" Purpose and the rallying of the People to it.

So everybody find some Friends, have some beers, take some tokes, do a little dance, make a little Love and just lighten up and have some fun.

Even a Storm can be fun till it kills ya.

And no one gets out of here Alive, right Jim?

Personally, I'd rather stir the pot a bit and not give in to Fear and go out Young and Painfully, then stay in Fear's grip and do nothing and go out Old and Peacefully.

But then again I'm confident that it's not a "fade to black" when we die -I'm positive threre's a lot going on outside of Carnate life- so even the "leaving people behind" thing can't kill my Fun. I mean, they'll catch up eventually, and I won't mind hanging out and making sure we all go the same way, would you?

So let's open our Eyes, see the Problem, work for a Solution, and Have Fun while we're at it.

Farewell O "people"-who-may-actually-exist-and-I-would-therefore-like-to-apologise-to-for-my-way-of-expressing-myself-if-it-annoyed-you!

Perhaps one day we will meet in the Atual World and I can prove to you that I'm just as bad in Actual Discussion.

Have Fun,

-matti.

If the U.S. itself is looked at a one huge debtor facing possible foreclosure, I wonder what will become of us if the debt is called due?

I think that madlib above (July 28th, 2008 11:30 pm) has it right. People in the United States are basically isolated and don't believe in collective action.

The thing about the financial violence of capitalism is that the victim is made to feel that it is all her fault. The game is rigged, but no one says it, and it doesn't enter the mind.

I think the economic shock being carried out now in the United States is deliberate. The practices that U.S. oligarchs used abroad to bend the population to its will are now being used domestically, i.e., debt as an instrument of aggression and control. It's more effective than physical violence.

When President Nixon was plotting a coup in Chile, to overthrow the elected President Salvador Allende, he told his cabinet to "make Chile's economy scream." This shock doctrine practice is the theme of Naomi Klein's book of that name. It describes what the U.S. government, industry and capitalism (as advocated by the Chicago School of Economics) did to people abroad, which also included torture.

Who is to say that economic shock won't be similarly used here in the United States?

Thanks everyone for their posts. I feel like you people bring out the best in me, which is yet another reason why I can't stay away.

lpenek-I may look into meditation. One problem I think I have is that my mind gets so cluttered. I always have a million things running through my mind, and as a result, at times I have trouble concentrating or managing my time. My grey matter needs a disk defrag. lol.

I am a major league daydreamer too. I've always been that way. :) I'm always thinking of how much better things can be for all of us.

I 'aint dyin' 'til I'm at least 80. :D There are too many people who need me and too many people who'd be toasting my demise. This is all one big lesson, one big trial. The Cosmic Trickster wants me to know struggle.

Thanks again, this was a classic thread.

STAROF THE SEA: Your post was eloquent, but I still feel strongly about what I stated. YOU are in a minority, particularly with respect to Oprah's audience. The vast majority are at a THINGS and GETTING IT level of consciousness, therefore to provide a basis for magnetizing through the focus on mind on yet MORE of same is a teaching incompatible with the SIMPLICITY and need for GRACE in the face of what we already do have. In other words it lacks ecology. And Oprah may have Al Gore come on for THAT message, thereby focusing on each as separate entities which is not a positive thing for one projection in many respects nullifies the other.

She is the queen of the commercial realm, an icon of endless consumption. I feel equally disgusted with her putting Dr. Phil on the map... this pseudo doctor who is now facing divorce is a hybrid of a Baptist minister & football coach, a born authoritarian. (He l00% fits his sun-Saturn virgo combination!) You can defend Oprah if you wish, fine... to the one much is given, much is expected. I think she put STUFF first and she has a HUGE impact on people.

GRANDMA: Glad to meet you. I very much enjoy and feel strong affinity with many in this forum. However, in all honesty, if my career in TV & Radio and writing many columns for diverse media had not ALL come to a stop in l994-l995 NEVER to resurrect (as yet) again, I don't think I would so enthusiastically bring to this forum a perspective some appreciate, some challenge, and some denigrate. Of course, variety IS the spice of life, and the Aquarian Age depends upon the grand mass awakening... the realization that what we are all chomping against is a dying paradigm that impacts the way we live on ALL levels. In this forum there are the political sages like RICH M and the economic sages, and the history experts, and the biology/ecology savants... it's often gratifying that so many intellects honed to different passions and perspectives bring our perspectives together for the new hybrids that may result. May the stars be with you... eclipse on August 1, in LEO, sign of kings, and realm of the heart where LOVE IS ALL.

Those on the right used the "divide and conquer" strategy to prevent a repeat of the social unrest seen at the turn of the 20th century, in the 1930's and in the 1960's. The greatest success of the "Reagan Revolution" was in dividing people along economic lines; America became us (regular people) against them (the poor). This time around, much of the public doesn't seem to "get" the fact that America's poor are the canaries in our coal mine.

siouxrose and all - This is the most amazing (and honest) conversation I have ever heard at CD or anywhere else. And to LambsieDivy - when I said I wanted to know WHAT HAPPENS NEXT I didn't mean what happens after death - but what will happen next in this present world. But your misunderstanding of my remark opened this incredible door here at CD. Thanks.

siouxrose - as you know, I'm with you; I was a past life therapist for over 30 years. I have no idea how many people I have guided back to explore their past lives. You represent the spiritual part of all this, I, the physical (and usually the spiritual too). And one thing I've learned is that we all make our own karma and will work it out in this lifetime or the next, one way or another. But suicide is never the way to go unless it is the only way to save others. Sometimes it is; but sometimes we are more helpful if we stay and help the "others" the best we can. (Note - there are no "others.") We are all in it together.

Love you all -

So many beautiful posts that remind me of why I became connected to CD in the first place.
Veracity----your first offering was especially beautiful and profound. I am buoyed up by it.
Siouxrose, as usual you bring the mystic's perspective to this forum, but I would not be so hard on Oprah. Just because she has been extravagantly successful on so many fronts, should not set her up for attacks by those of us who feel purer and somehow free from our lowly perches. She's simply a soul having a human experience. No one is expected to get it all right. Surely she is no more at fault for American's obsession with conspicuous consumption, than any number of other celebs, and even some who consider themselves New Age gurus. I consider her more a reflection of the mass consciousness than a creator of it.

As to The Secret, I saw the film and took away from it a very different message than the one you cited. Most folks probably got excited for fifteen minutes and then realized that what was required was just too much work anyway.
The masses may very well not be ready for the metaphysical teachings of the Ascended Masters
but for those souls who really are receptive, I trust they will take the best and discard the rest. It is important to avoid a kind of spiritual elitism.

We are all in this together, a seamless cloak. Perfection is not achievable or expected. We all just contribute what we have to offer and leave the rest to the Universe's Infinite Wisdom to send those seeds out to fertile ground.

As for the subject of suicide, I feel it is not my place to judge another's limits or tolerance for pain---physical or psychic. I feel only compassion---for the one who resorted to it and the ones left in its wake. Judgement seems entirely beside the point.

I do think that man can be one with God, Nietzsche, not by way of belief or ideation, but only through present moment awareness.

I've really appreciated this comment thread for the article. A few quotes came to mind; apologies for throwing dead men's words before you.

Marx personifies political economy: "He changes the worker into an insensible being lacking all needs, just as he changes his activity into a pure abstraction from all activity...To him, therefore every l u x u r y [I don't know how to do italics here] of the workers seems to be reprehensible, and everything that goes beyond the most abstract need--be it a realm of passive enjoyment, or a manifestation of activity--seems to him a luxury....Thus political economy--despite its worldly and wanton appearance--is a true moral science, the most moral of all sciences. Self-denial, the denial of life and of all human needs, is its cardinal doctrine. The less you eat, drink and read books; the less you go to the theatre, the dance hall, the publichouse; the less you think, love, theorize, sing, paint, fence, etc. the more you s a v e--the g r e a t e r becomes your treasure which neither moths nor dust will devour--your c a p i t a l. The less you a r e, the more you h a v e; the less you express your own life, the greater is your a l i e n a t e d life--the greater is the store of your estranged being. Everything which the political economist takes from you in life and in humanity, he replaces for you in m o n e y and in w e a l t h; and all the things which you cannot do, your money can do. It can eat and drink, go to the dance hall, and the theatre; it can travel, it can appropriate art, learning, the treasures of the past, political power--all this it c a n appropriate for you--it can buy all this for you: it is the true e n d o w m e n t. Yet being all this, it is inclined to do nothing but create itself, buy itself; for everything else is after all its servant. And when I have the master I have the servant and do not need his servant. All passions and all activity must therefore be submerged in a v a r i c e. The worker may only have enough for him to want to live, and may only want to live in order to have [enough]."

Or in the simpler words of There Will Be Blood's Daniel Plainview, an excellent film on the violence of capitalism--far better than Mafia films, "I drink your milkshake".

And, finally, from Jean-Paul Sartre: "Freedom is what you do with what's been done to you."
and
"We only become what we are by the radical and deep-seated refusal of that which others have made of us."

Good post chessgame56. I do believe the mystics, and most of the ones I have read (Eckhart, John of the Cross, Rumi) would disagree with you that man cannot be one with God. I also believe in working toward an ego death.

People are born with varying dispositions. I am unwilling to judge people who cannot see the Light. I believe if they were able to see it they would feel compelled to follow it.

What if committing suicide somehow locks one in the despair that precipitated it; we just do not know.

Nietzsche: man is not God, but a 'thinking beast' who deems himself to be a god. If you believe the mystics, man can potentially express the divine, but prefers the thrill, pain, and hardship that comes with ego. If the Light that dispels ignorance is available, then man has only himself to blame. The tragedy of mankind is that it clearly prefers the darkness.

Thanks for your response, borisshootnikoff. Sometimes I get the feeling that my posts aren't getting through, because I rarely get any acknowledgements. You've made a good point--I just wish I had a plan to deal with this dominant paradigm.

And iwarrior, I was really moved by your post where you wrote: "I really don't have much to add other than this is sad and scary." So you're 34 and feel burned out? You've got a head start on me. I'm 54 and feel burned out. Sorry, I don't have any magic platitudes for you, or any hackneyed advice about "pulling yourself up by the bootstraps." By the way, my bootstraps already tore off a few years ago.

Thank you for sharing your story.

iwarrior: you were eloquent and heartbreaking. I have a 32 year old daughter who is in a similar situation. She has seen me work my life away with little to show and no hopes of retiring.Unlike my hardworking parents, I cannot help her with school.
When my daughter heard about the circumstances of the Balderrama suicide she called to ask me would I ever take my own life? I love her and my two granddaughters too much to consider suicide even though I'll face losing my small condo in November when my loan goes up.
To both of you I'd say work to reclaim America from the theives that are destroying hope for the future.

"Suicide is one of the bravest acts one can commit. "

When the act itself is isolated completely from all other surrounding circumstances, perhaps. When you then consider those circumstatnces, the bravery may increase or decrease.

Suicide is one of the bravest acts one can commit. It's a voluntary leap into the unknown darkness. It's the deliberate eradication of the ego. Most people who are dying on hospital beds actually died years before. When you can no longer do what is most vital to you and you no longer have what is most important to you, death by suicide is a reasonable alternative to death by breathing.

I have a new appreciation for the intelligence and the kindness of my brothers and sisters on cd.

"Well, jakenewton, you are the last person I expected to hear profundity from. "

Well thanks, but I didn't think it was too deep. Debt could be a tipping point, but so could many other things. It's seemingly the last thing, and we might focus too much on that.

Well, jakenewton, you are the last person I expected to hear profundity from. This time we agree. There is more going on here than debt.

Humans are strange and extremely unlikely animals: part beast, part God, knowing all the answers but continuing to make the same mistakes.

We (humans) can cope with almost any misfortune, endure almost any hardship, struggle through adversity that most of us think we cannot deal with, but when the shit hits the fan most of us respond admirably, even heroically.

The reason for our remarkable adaptability in accepting gracefully any disappointment is that we have made up a story which explains to our satisfaction the world we live in.

The best example of such a story is religion. Everything that exists, everything that happens, can be explained by this story.
But the story can include anything that gives our lives meaning: family, land, country, a sense of place in the universe.

Mere misfortune has no power to sicken the soul, but if a soul becomes convinces that being, at its core, has no meaning, i.e. if conditions cannot be made to fit the story, my life becomes much less valuable.

Most stories include the belief that the universe in which we live is for us rather than against us. I still take comport in the lie that my country cares about my well being.

I believe (with slightly more evidence) that my neighbors, my family, the people on cd wish me well. I lie to myself that all this goodwill has no limits.

When I can no longer believe in this version of reality (true or not, it makes no difference) life becomes difficult, sometimes impossible.

People who have been in a war can no longer lie to themselves about human nature, about themselves, about God, about the universe making some kind of sense even if we can't see it.

Sometimes they can make up a new story, sometimes not.

Try to live by a life story that is as close to reality as possible, even if that is hard to accept. You will live longer.

-------------------------

Suicide is the meanest thing you can do to the people around you. Don't do it unless you are sure there are no other options.

Suicide is often the FINAL TANTRUM. In cases such as facing financial disaster, well, I think more should realize there are other alternative before it is too late. However, suicide is often the best alternative when you are faced with a hopeless illness and are faced with living in some squalid shelter. If you have your health, then all things are possible, including forming groups to take down the thieves and hoodlums who have stolen our country, lied and sold us a bag of tricks.

Hamlet's soliloquy is worth repeating here:

To be, or not to be: that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them?
To die: to sleep;
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks That flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd.
To die, to sleep;
To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause...

Suicide is not the answer.

VERACITY: As always profound analysis...

KENT SHAW: Strings or otherwise, MYSTICS have always known about this continuum and respected it.

I WARRIOR: You ARE everyman, and part of the group of awakened souls who will help to change the paradigm so that this type of suffering, a product of centuries of elite conditioning, is no longer free to hold mankind in check and limit its expressive possibilities.

The system IS designed to leave you in an invisible debtor's prison! Think of this achievement on the part of elites, cheaper than actual prison maintenance and just as effective!
You could perhaps USE less and wait out the fiscal storm whose clouds are already gathering, the horizon darkened... the paradigm IS exploding. Whether we observe the sheer math--our debt (as a nation) relative to our output; or NATURAL CAPITAL: Nature can't do IT anymore to the extent that She has been doing it. Systems are imploding. Or the blowback of karma... a nation that makes war for profit and leaves MILLIONS in agony and misery has no right to claim comforts for itself.

The trifecta of these three streams of energetic emphasis will bring this nation into a new path... and the birth pangs are NOT easy. Be glad you have less to lose... some think the elites will be protected, but I think those who have come by their mulah the dark way will indeed meet The shadow. It's universal Law.

Arvy is right that rebellion doesn't have to mean shooting someone, not yourself and not "the bad guys". The Service Employees International Union (SEIU) held protest rallies in a number of cities on July 17th protesting the orgy of debt imposed on the economy through Wall Street's 20 years of Leveraged Buyouts (LBO) of corporations. This is debt that didn't buy any new plant or equipment. It didn't go to any new Reasearch & Development. It just screwed th workers, screwed the taxpayerss and went to make a handful of corporate/wall street insiders obscenely wealthy.
I went to the protest in Washington, DC staged in front of McCain's headquarters. There were 200 SEIU members and me, even though it was fairly well advertised on the internet. Let's start protesting and hold off on the idea of killing people. Martin Luther King didn't kill anyone. Ghandi didn't kill anyone. The protest are starting. Let's participate.

iwarrior July 29th, 2008 1:41 am

Do not cringe at your writing. You speak with eloquence for the plight of the common man. You are "everyman". I wish I had your insight when I was 36 years old. I'm 58 and I still don't have any answers. The more I learn the more I realize how much I don't know.

Kent

The Suicide Solution

"Dry your eyes, already: Death is an effective remedy for debt, along with anything else that may be bothering you too. And try to think of it too from a lofty, corner-office, perspective: If you can't pay your debts or afford to play your role as a consumer, and if, in addition — like an ever-rising number of Americans — you're no longer needed at the workplace, then there's no further point to your existence. I'm not saying that the creditors, the bankers and the mortgage companies actually want you dead, but in a culture where one's credit rating is routinely held up as a three-digit measure of personal self-worth, the correct response to insoluble debt is in fact, "Just shoot me!" " Barbara ThirdReich

I can't wait until the MSM is prosecuted for crimes as these.

Rocyahsoul@yahoo.com
Dan

She prolly spent much of her money at the dog track in Taunton.

Casinos, horse, buggy and dog tracks are being touted as the way to save US...who cares if the jobs went overseas, gambling will save US.

At the casino in Halifax Nova Scotia, there has been a rash of suicides in the parking lot outside the last couple years.

Can I open casino, say out of my house? of course not, organized crime has the corner on that.

Who is Bush? part of the Bush crime family.

No soup for you!

"There is no arbitrator — but each of us alone acting, either in harmony with the needs of others or not, as we all intrinsically act selfishly ( and I do NOT mean this derogatorily ) as that is our personal perceptional representation ( the "illusion" is that we are not at our core, selfish )."

I agree.

To put it bluntly, this is the modern, enlightened, self-help version of the Racing Cars' "They Shoot Horses, Don't They?":

Here we go
Round and round the floor
Together
In time

Here we sit
It looks like this is it
Whatever
This time

It's makin' no sense
But we'll stay here till the end
Whatever-er
This time

They shoot horses, don't they
They shoot horses, don't they
They shoot horses, don't they-ey-ey

Carousel
A crazy wishing well
Whenever
You fall

It seems so lo-o-o-o-o-ong
Just like a marathon
The bell of
The ball

They shoot horses, don't they
They shoot horses, don't they
They shoot horses, don't they-ey-ey

Choose not suicide, but homicide.

iwarrior --
I'm 46, so consider me "big bradda," or at least I will be for a moment. Your comment comes as a familiar refrain, though perhaps a bit dimmed for me since I've gone on to different concerns, but probably no more urgent ones. To a certain extent those idiot conservatives are right (and in ultimate ways they are dead wrong), the problem lies with you, but only in so far as you need to develop the tools you need to deal with your circumstance. This might sound very silly, and a bit of a letdown, but...have you considered taking up meditation? Wait, bear with me. You seem to me the kind of person who's very tapped into your world and a little overwhelmed by it. Meditation, pared of any religious connotation, can be extraordinarily useful in toning you to your surroundings, without tuning you out to them. One of the biggest objections we westerners have to something like it is that we are in some ways trying to insulate ourselves from the troubles of the world. This is not the case, but in order to see it, you actually have to try it. You will still be a concerned citizen, you will just be a more effective concerned citizen.

One thing meditation can teach you is that you are free, and you always have been -- free, that is, to act!

I urge you to try, and perhaps join a group in your area.

My very best wishes.

Bring on the Greater Depression. Obese America needs to burn off some karmic weight.

"Metaphorically speaking" my ass; we know where they live.

"When you got nothing, you got nothing to lose" --- Bob Dylan

And don't forget, Nothing exists.

I really don't have much to add other than this is sad and scary. I can't think of anyone I know who isn't in debt. Hell, I'm in debt. I had a student loan that I paid off, then I got braces, had to take out a loan for my mom to get her car fixed since her credit is shot. Then people tell you that you "need" to have a credit history, so I got a credit card...ugh.

6 years ago, I had no debt. I refused to go into it for anything for so long.

If we're going to cancel 3rd world debt, and we should, we also need to cancel it at home. I don't see how any of it is fair and just. It only serves to keep the rich comfy and working and poor people on their knees.

A sign that this is growing: I keep seeing more and more cash advance places opening, predatory lenders. And I'm seeing them in unfamiliar places. I keep hearing radio ads for debt relief and consolidation swindles.

You think that if we gave people a decent living wage and a free education, we wouldn't see people needing to go into debt at all?

Yes lots of people live beyond their means. But they only do so in order to have some joy in their lives. People work hard and want some sort of leisure. They want to watch a movie or eat in a restaurant. Sure there are ways you can enjoy yourself w/o money, but most people aren't conditioned to be able to do so.

I do it too. I buy dvds and books and comics. I saw a movie last weekend. Ya gotta eat too.

I dunno, it could just bemy generation. I am a Gen X'er, and we've been chastised for not wanting to make sacrifices.

I mean, if I really scrimped and saved and just bought nothing, I could climb out of it. But can everyone do that? I Might be able to do it. But just because some people find themselves in debt due to poor choices and can climb out of it doesn't mean that there isn't something wrong with the system.

You can blame consumerism too. Should we just not buy anything else ever again?

What should I do, sell all my stuff? I've been working since I was 19, and I still feel like I am getting nowhere. My parents have little to show for their labor. You just get ground down. I almost can't even bring myself to go to work anymore. 4 years there. Never been late. Never called off. I'm getting to a point where I'm too tired to do much of anything aside from work. Im forcing myself to read and post this stuff right now. It seems as if the older I get the more everything feels like a struggle. I have to push myself to exercise my body, my mind, to write, to get up, to wash the dishes, to do the yardwork, pay this bill or that bill. My weekends fly by, and I feel like I accomplished nothing. All I really want to do anymore is sit. Sit and think.

I'm 34, and I feel like I'm burned out on everything.

I know I'm not alone and that there are those much worse off. I'm not looking for pity. I know that there are those people, the go-getters, the ones who (so they say) have it all covered who are just dying to give me that speech or tell me to go into debt again to learn this "hot" field and that if I just get it together, discipline, sacrifice, I'll "make it." And of course these same people tend to be conservatives who have this bizarre notion that my progressive views are a result of failure or depression, and that if I just got that great job I would thusly find that wife, and therefore be too happy to be a socialist or even care about politics at all.

I talk to conservatives about this stuff sometimes (often unbeknownst of their views), and they start to tell me what my "problem" is. There is something wrong with me, not with society or the world, oh no...ME. When I find their advice ridiculously impractical or in conflict with my beliefs (I get told to 'just go enlist already' by a lot of people), I then get kicked in the stomach. I get told that I don't want to make sacrifices, that I'm lazy, or stupid, or unAmerican, unmotivated, you name it.

I chase the carrot too at times. I sometimes internalize the classism. I've had people from high school want to reconnect with me, and get cold feet because I find out that they have a better job than I do and that I no longer feel I can relate to them. What do I tell 'em? I will admit that I often feel ashamed of my lot in life. You can't get away from it.

I feel like I worked hard. I feel that I am intelligent.

If I came from a wealthier family and had the connections, would things be different?

I try to tell myself that it's all designed to make me who I am. if I did have that cushy life, I might not be who I am. I'd be some MOR person who voted for Bush and liked top 40 music. The music I love wouldn't exist had its inventors been royalty. I feel that I'm meant to experience all of this.

I'm still pushing my way through Zinn's A People's History Of The US, and the deadly class-based struggles he documents. Those people were desperate. They had nothing else to live for it seemed.

I chide myself a lot for not doing enough, for not being enough of an activist even though I blog about politics and argue with people about it, even narrowly avoiding getting my head beat in and tolerating harassment as a result. But I don't know how much further I can stretch myself. What else can I do? Can I afford to go guerilla and let everything else in my life go to pot? What good will I be dead or in jail? Will anyone care if I become a martyr? Why does it even have to be that way?

The desperation looms larger and larger, but do most people see it? Do they want to see it? Or do they just keep trudging along because they feel powerless to stop it?

Kloro mentioned how history proves it can be done. Zinn digs into the dirt of the past to find examples of solidarity, even in the most dangerous and brutish and dire of times. All I can do to keep going is remember those victories, those people I never knew who fought for me and you and reach down for something extra, remind myself of our numbers, and that untapped thunder.

We have our tomorrows. At least for now, there's always one more day. There's always the ghost of a fallen ally from yesteryear I can conjure through Zinn. There's always the hope that someone else who's going through what we're going through will have that epiphany or critical thought.

I'm going to bed as I'm half asleep. I'll cringe at my writing and my hyperbole fer sure. :) Hopefully the morning sun will do something for me. THEY can't take that from us. That's one cue that we are given that all is not lost. WE can weather the storms that THEY create, and someday we can bring THEM, that certain sliver of the populace to justice and light.

This thing of blaming our country and people like Oprah for being the cause of suicides is ridiculous. There have always been people that for one reason or another thought suicide was the easy way out of their problems. My wife had a nephew who was a bright, sports loving senior in high school who took a gun and finished himself off when he had everything to live for.

We have many people now that cannot seem to realize that compared to most of the worlds inhabitants, they are well off. Instead, they only look at those that apparently have more things or a better job or longer vacations, etc. That is a result of improper raising of children who are allowed to think they are here to enjoy life without putting forth much effort, and when times get rough, they are not prepared for it.

Suicide may be an answer for hopeless sickness or disability, but never because one has gotten into excessive debt or lost a job. There is always someone or someplace to get some help and keep going until things get better.

TREE FITZ: Thanks for the honest sharing.

ARVY: Much wisdom in your posts. Looks like you've regained your passion for purpose!

GAIL MOORE: You realize that since Buddhism acknowledges reincarnation, suicide only will mean the individual will meet again whatever lessons they bailed out on. There is so much that's going on that seems impossible to cope with, and yet history is filled with other periods of grave danger and depraved indifference.

R JACKOWSKI: I'm glad you brought up OPRAH since she has a lot of influence on mainstream citizen/consumers. In my view she advocates a model of conspicuous consumption. I seldom watch her show but recall programs where every member of the audience is given the latest groovy gadget. There's so much emphasis on THINGS, i.e. materialism at a time when the great Earth Mother is showing unparalleled paroxysms of overkill! What American society needs more of is LESS than. Simplicity! Grace! The realization of all the blessings this overweight, over-consuming, care-less citizenry takes for granted. In some respects, lots of these bad house loans fall into that category. People went for image and status, and the banks and creditors went along... one big con game with LOTS of guilty parties. However, I think the wisest thing to be done is to renegotiate the loans so we do NOT have millions homeless, and the same banks like sharks eating the carcasses (in the form of abandonned homes) they helped to create.

I had this intimation about Oprah which makes me think that she is to TRUE spirituality what Colin Powell is to true patriotism. She sold out. By pushing THE SECRET, which does OWN some metaphysical Truths at a public that is not ready for them, a public that will use the info to GET MORE STUFF, is like granting false license to empty souls to just consume more when Earth is in many ways DYING. It was a tribute to greed, a testament to mammon in the name of something far more grand... and I think one day she will realize that she misused a High teaching by disseminating it to the Uninitiated, at a time that could not be more corrupt.

As one with a legacy of spiritual disciplines, there is an understanding that the teaching be given when the student is ready, and that readiness is not based on appetite, but the maturity evidenced in how a person lives.

The most interesting question posed by this essay is what changed about American society since the 1930's? Certainly, at that time, there were a lot more manufacturing workers. There were a lot more immigrants from Europe. There were still socialist, communist and anarchist movements around that had not been plowed under by McCarthyism.

For me, the thing that jumps out is that people used to feel a sense of connection to their community and to the plight of others. Also, these people don't seem to be worried about the possibility that the evictees might be somehow "to blame" for their plight. If a person thinks they are somehow "to blame" for their plight and that this makes them a "failure" or an f-up then that would bias them to suicide more than just losing a home which is bad enough. Also, undo materialism might cause a person to feel that loss of a home means loss of all meaning in life, who knows.

But this is a very important question because the necessary social change will come about to the extent we can understand how we may have lost some of our previous solidarity as a people and how we could begin to rebuild it.

After the second world war, US citizens have slowly changed from citizens to consumers.

The change was executed by those whom control the social reward/punishment system: corporations and the wealthy.

Because our national psyche has been radically transformed, many of us don't know how to deal with other people and organize to change the above reward/punishment system.

Many of us don't know our past and it doesn't permeate the increasingly virtual, electronic culture we live within.

grandma (July 28th, 2008 5:27 pm) says:
"But me, I will always wonder WHAT HAPPENS NEXT? One of the great human questions, the heart and soul of science."

Grandma, think about that great-grandchild before she was born. All comfy, no demands, fairly quiet, floating... and then BANG, CLANG, she's here in this world! Bright lights, no floating, people yelling, slapping, wiping, and expecting her to become someone, learning, making mistakes, etc. Here's WHAT I think HAPPENS NEXT.

Life after death is to life before death as life after birth is to life before birth. Life after death is an order of magnitude more complicated and less comfy and more demanding and more rewarding than life before death, just as life after birth is an order of magnitude more complicated in every sense than life before birth. Look at the universe. Look at microorganisms. Evolve, evolve, evolve.

I don't know exactly what life after death will be like, but I believe it will be thrilling and challenging, and I'm getting ready. One thing about which there is no doubt in my mind: knowing how to accumulate wealth and possessions will have no value or use.

Lambsie

"when a Hermes handbag costs $40,000 and that same $40,000 could feed and clothe God knows how many suffering people, the purchaser of that handbag needs to rethink his or her priorities."

You allude to "greed" I assume. The problem here is that greed is almost always an attribute assigned to someone else. Who is to be the arbiter of this?

Someone posted a comment on the weekend CD that asked "what has been taken away from you through greed and corruption?"...I think there are answers in many of these posts.

Well-said fivecorners,

One of the basic and primary reasons so many are suffering today amidst so much evident wealth and plenty has less to do with positive thinking and more with the continued sucess of the dominant paradigm.

We can envision a better world, we can even find small pockets of real-life utopia (or near-utopia). We can't replicate this on a large scale because the dominant paradigm is just that, dominant.

Indigenous people are pushed aside or slaughtered. The natural world is plundered and poisoned. Goverments, churches, institutions are corrupted or co-opted.

Why do conservatives worship the Invisible Hand of capitalism? Because the Hand is an irresistable force. It crushes everthing that stands in it's way. The Hand eats the souls of men for breakfast and the spirit of democracy for dinner. Moral Hazzard and Adverse Selection are like a mid-afternoon snack.

There will be ebb and flow. Boom and Bust. Bull and Bear. War and Peace. But in the end the Hand will choke this world to within an inch of it's life before those who are left realize that their survival depends on chopping the fucker off. In the meantime I'm keeping my axe sharp.

Yes, the level of apathy in our society is absolutely amazing. I don't think we'll ever see the activism of the 1890's or 1930's. Back then, just about everybody in town was in the same economic boat, and there was perhaps a clearer distinction between "us" and "them." Today, most people in my neighborhood keep on consuming--and assuming that they'll eventually become one of "them" (the super-wealthy people we despise). That is, until they lose their job at 50 and find out that nobody wants to hire an "old" person. Or they get sick or disabled. Or disabled just enough that they can't handle starting over at an entry-level job (but not disabled enough to qualify for disability benefits).

I agree with r jackowski that there is too much "Oprah-think" in our culture. The only people who really benefit from this belief are the people selling those frowns-into-smiles books, tapes, etc. For everyone else, it creates unrealistic expectations, self-loathing and victim-blaming.
Changing my mind-set will not make me younger or change the perception of the person on the other side of the desk during a job interview. Nor will it reduce gasoline prices, health care costs or food costs. For most people (including myself), it's not about, as Kernel put it "...a bigger house with a three car garage full of new gas guzzlers..."

Of course, there are people out there who are in trouble because they think more "stuff" will bring happiness and contentment, and they end up going way over budget. Sherra writes: "For me it's pretty much books, flicks, pets, nature, the colour of light...and Doonesbury." There's something to be said for enjoying life's simple pleasures.

However...

It's hard to enjoy those things without a roof over your head, heat in the wintertime, three square meals a day...and your health. And the cost of maintaining all of that is becoming very difficult for a displaced worker who had to take a job for 25% less pay a year after 9-11. Even those books and flicks are becoming an unaffordable luxury. Cable TV? Forget it! I can't handle another monthly bill. I hang on to my internet service because that's how I found my last two jobs.

My heart goes out to all the Carlene Balderrama's and their families. I guess I would agree that unscrupulous bankers don't "cause" suicide. The same could be said for oil speculators. But these are just two of the fixable problems in our stressed out society that is pushing more people to the edge. I'm getting closer to that edge, and I just hope that I can hang in there (financially and psychologically) long enough to outlive my two remaining cats. After that, I guess it doesn't matter too much what happens to me.

If Louis Farakhan can organize a million-man-march (for what I don't know), why can't there be a million-oppressed-citizens' march?

Stop being a thing-oriented society and start being a people-oriented society. Dr. King was saying this 40 years ago and a sizable percentage of Americans were listening to him.

heav y runner July 28th, 2008 6:58 pm
Whats' wrong with this idea?

Absolutely nothing, in fact its brilliant, and a perfect example of "thinking outside the box." Of course the right-wingers will find lots of ways to pick it apart.

Suicide may not a "solution" as most consider the word "solution" to mean, but it is one choice we CAN make for ourselves, and one we have every right to make. If you're done, you're done, and when people have reached that place, it is cruelty beyond measure to prolong a life they no longer want to have. As a Buddhist, this is not an acceptable position for me to hold, but I DO hold it and support anyone's right and choice to make that decision for themselves. (And, of course, to accept and be responsible for the consequences arising from that act.) We are in control of very little in our lives, and what little we are in control of is decreasing day by day - but if we choose to end our lives, that is, I firmly believe, our right. The criminality of the ARM program, for I believe it to be just that, has to a large degree caused the grievous death of Mrs. Balderrama, and our own insane desire to own things we don't necessarily need is the root of despair such as hers. We're going to see a lot more of this kind of thing unless we learn to share with and protect one another, and it has to start with each one of us. The materialism in the world is killing us - when a Hermes handbag costs $40,000 and that same $40,000 could feed and clothe God knows how many suffering people, the purchaser of that handbag needs to rethink his or her priorities. We ARE each other's keepers, and we'd best start getting with that program.

staying sane (or is it insane)___ We can all see now that you are a great authority on all monetary matters, and I agree that the government agencies fell down on the job since we are getting rid of governmebt supervision. Also the lenders are guilty of greed and misleading uninformed borrowers.

I wonder, though, how the banks and other unethical lenders could have played their greedy game of risky loans if no one had requested a loan that had no chance of working. That is why I maintain that the borrowers have to take their share of the blame for the mess we have.

Historians noted that while there were protests during the Great Depression, people tended to blame themselves for their plight--not corporations, not crooked financiers, surely not thoee fat men who kept saying, "The economy is funadmentally sound!!" This is a return to that frame of mind and an indication we have learned nothing, because our school teachers bought the masochist argument as well. There is no lowering of intelligence: it was never very high.
If anything we are more stupid than then, because then farmers (and homeowners) banded together and refused to take crap from the money boys who got them into the mess. We stop putting up with it, they"ll get the message and change their tune. But we have to change our tune first!!!! THEY have to learn WE are boss, but we have to be willing to rise hell to succeed.

Sherra - Thanks for your support of the "simple life" idea. You mention "the colour of light" - is that your idea or an Impressionist painter's whose name I can't recall? Maybe Monet? And what is the color of light, anyway?

I agree that we live in a society that has gone mad for owning "things." I'm not sure when we changed - but we must change back again to a people who love the earth and all it holds.

I can garden, and I know how to build a comfortable log or stone cabin, using basic hand tools.

See the article posted on CD about the lowering of general intelligence for why this seems to be so uncommon.

Suicide is a natural, and ratonal, reaction in a society that has replaced all meaning and all that is holy with the worship of profit and wealth.

Soon, debtor's prisons will be restored. The Wall Street establishement has been preaching that people who can't contribute, can't pay their bills and aren't young, healthy and expansive consumers are unwelcome in our society.

heav y runner: "Instead of just handing billions or a trillion or two to the stockholders of Freddie and Fannie, why not take that same amount of cash and pay down the mortgages of every mortgage account on a primary residence in the U.S. Give everyone a fair share of the money that is intended for Freddie and Fannie along the way?"

And undo years of work, transferring wealth from the poor to the rich? Have you lost your senses?

Sometimes suicide is an act of love to protect others. If dying was the only way to provide food and shelter for a loved one, it might be considered to be an altruistic act.

There is too much Oprah type thinking - such as, anybody can have anything they want if they just get the correct mind-set. Remember how Oprah peddled the book "The Secret". Just think good and happy thoughts and you can get anything you want....That is very destructive thinking. Imagine having cancer and being told that it was your fault because you were not thinking the right thoughts.

The US has become amazingly lacking in empathy. People ignore the homeless, blame the poor and hungry for their plight - our foreign policy of killing at will in other countries seems to be coming back home to devalue lives here.

My sympathy goes to the family of Carlene Balderamma. Yes, it might have been better if she had pointed the gun at a Hedge Fund manager or oil speculator, but then she would die in prison and her family would be homeless. Why aren't we doing something to control the Hedge Fund managers and oil speculators? Maybe we just don't have enough empathy and humanity to go around in the US.

Death by capitalism will be on the rise.

Whats' wrong with this idea?

Instead of just handing billions or a trillion or two to the stockholders of Freddie and Fannie, why not take that same amount of cash and pay down the mortgages of every mortgage account on a primary residence in the U.S. Give everyone a fair share of the money that is intended for Freddie and Fannie along the way?

That is, pass the money through the mortgage accounts so those debts are lowered on the way to the big lenders. That would put real money in the hands of real people. Their debts would be reduced, so they could refinance and have more money to spend each month. The capital problems at Freddie and Fannie would be fixed. And mortgage brokers and other lenders would make big money with all the fees related to the resultant refinances.

This would also be a windfall for the Federal budget, because mortgage interest is deductible, so with lowered debt, people would be paying more taxes to the IRS, lowering the federal deficit which would strengthen the dollar, thereby making everyone better off.

Why just bail the big lenders without passing the money through the mortgage accounts on the way? It could all be done electronically, and the IRS already has all the information necessary to do it.

Oooops, sorry. Didn't intend get back here...Luddites R Us...

D'accord, Grandma, there's the rub. Simple needs, simple pleasures & appreciations (not to diminish the advent of a brand new great-grandkid, of course). For me it's pretty much books, flicks, pets, nature, the colour of light...and Doonesbury.

This culture of fear, mass gluttony, xenophobia, the maxim of "bigger, better, stronger, faster" that we've engendered has fueled the fires of violence & war, the "they've got what we want" snarl, climatic decimation. More more more. Mouths wide open.

But evidently that's the human condition. Otherwise, everybody'd back off & enjoy a peaceable co-existence of laisser-faire. Obviously too much to expect at this stage of our so-called evolution. But you & I have it figured out, yes?

Kernel writes: "It is easy to blame the government agencies and the lending institutions for all of the housing woes in this country. However, people must take their share of the blame..."

Nonsense, Kernel. You clearly haven't studied Banking. Institutions that lend money to others are lending the money that savers have given them. They are under an obligation not to take undue risks with other people's money. This is why regulating financial institutions is so important. And this is where the government failed so badly; and why the government MUST take responsibility.

You obviously haven't heard of "moral hazard" or "adverse selection", have you, Kernel? Look up the meaning of those terms. It's the responsibility of lending institutions to reduce moral hazard and adverse selection.

I recommend "The Economics of Money, Banking, and Financial Markets" (it's over 700 pages long!) by Frederic S. Mishkin, Alfred Lerner Professor of Banking and Financial Institutions at the Graduate School of Business, Columbia University. "He has been a consultant to the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, the world Bank, and the International Monetary Fund, as well as to many central banks throughout the world."

I think my information on this subject comes from a reputable and knowledgeable source. :)

I hope that the president and vice president will read this article.

The fact that someone has committed suicide should not come as a shock. Many do in the U.S. Worldwide, over 60 million people attempt suicide each year. "Only" around 1 million never get to breathe air again.

That's the only thing that would make me hesitate to kill myself if I had no reason to live: doing it right, so I didn't wake up in hospital maimed for life, paralysed, brain damaged, etc., or enduring a slow, painful death.

It is easy to blame the government agencies and the lending institutions for all of the housing woes in this country. However, people must take their share of the blame because they did not read the terms of their contract and could not expect that it would be possible to make their payments when the interest rate reset at a much higher rate.

The root cause of the problem began with the absurd notion that a bigger house with a three car garage full of new gas guzzlers would make anyone happy. For many years now, people have fallen for the advertisers telling them they need all of the consumer lifestyle that their wealthier friends have.

Regardless of the greedy lenders and businesses promoting their products, it comes back to the simple solution, just spend a little less than you make and think twice before taking on enormous debts that only lead to what we are seeing now.

URTHSONG writes: "My disabled kid, now a man, costs our goverment, federal and state, over $100,000 per year."

If that is what he needs to survive due to his disability, then it's not a cost, but an income he deserves.

The rich, and the corporations they work for, avoid and evade over $400 billion a year in taxes. THAT'S A COST! And it's equivalent to handing them one million homes worth $400,000 each - each and every year!

We pay for their greed one way or another. And, as corporations get their money from the public, corporations that do not pay their fair share in tax - which is most of them! - are stealing our money.

When I was going through all that, I learned to work the system, dumpster dive, share around and network. When that didn't work, my mind conveniently blanked out. I still don't know what I did for nearly a year and a half as my husband got sicker, the disabled child demanded constant care and the other sons did...what? They were in school. It got better. I learned to pray and use the power of that prayer and begged, bringing help to save our little house twice. The third time around, I had a kind of break down, then rallied and worked the system again. But now we have these loose systems beginning to come unglued. There will be more challenges. My disabled kid, now a man, costs our goverment, federal and state, over $100,000 per year. I'm taking care of my mom and doing well pooling our SS and some Medicaid help. I still work the system. My advice to anyone who is not dying is to network, not kill yourself. Find other options. Help other people. Too many of us are too isolated. Many of us don't have enough community. Get involved in living.

I think most of us here on CD are just playing with ideas. Sure, one always has the final choice. But me, I will always wonder WHAT HAPPENS NEXT? One of the great human questions, the heart and soul of science. For example, I have recently acquired a brand new great-granddaughter. Now she's pretty cute and I want to stick around and be a part of her life. But then it doesn't take much to make me happy - we have hummingbirds at our feeder and Bach is playing on the radio. So what more do I want?

(I also have a computer, of course!)

^^^ Rebellion against tyranny does not necessarily mean "killing the bad guys", but it's clearly impossible to fix the system while they remain in control. It should be very clear by now that they're not going to allow it voluntarily. Nor can one fix a corrupted system merely by repeatedly applying and following the same rules and processes that those "bad guys" have established to perpetuate its corruption.

Frankly, I'm very doubtful about seeing any kind of real rebellion against ongoing tyranny in the "land of the free and the home of the brave", but other than simply surrendering to its inevitable continuance and deciding your own fate accordingly, what's the other alternative. If you don't agree with "only 2 choices", what's yours?

Wow, an article about a woman who takes her life because she is about to lose her home to the system seems to be responded to here, by and large, with a shrug of the shoulders - things are worse than I thought. I hope Ms. Ehrenreich reads the responses her article has prompted.

People apparently have, indeed, given up on "fixing" the system. It seems that the only 2 choices people think are appropriate are killing the bad guys or killing themselves. But it may be true that the longer we wait to fix the system, the closer we will come to the point where these ARE the only choices we have. I think we should fix it pretty soon before it claims more victims....

americans, remember your heritage and the tyrants you have felled.

In a twisted way, I'm looking forward to finding out how long SS and Medicare will keep me sheltered and healthy. When I can no longer afford to live in the cheapest possible place, I'll live in the car. When the car stops working, I'll learn how to be homeless. Eventually my immune system will break down to the point at which I'll just die. I like this plan better than worrying about how to "maintain my current lifestyle" the rest of my life.

Of course suicide is a solution. It's our last available expression of free will. I'm sure there are always myriad factors in making that decision, as TreeFitz pointed out re: the proverbial straw. As shocks & stressors pile up, quite possibly the proverbial straw may be some dick cutting you off in a line-up...whatever. So, Rebel Farmer, kindly show a little compassion & appreciate that, for many, it's simply what one can bear.

And Frederick Johnson – I hear you loud & clear. My goodness, honey, you're going to blow a lung. So how 'bout it, huh? General strike on 9/11/08? Remember "Johnny Got His Gun" (Dalton Trumbo)?

"Funny the haliburton internment camps were mentioned. "

Urban legend.

Funny the haliburton internment camps were mentioned. My thought has been, if push comes to shove, I'll commit some crime that doesn't hurt anyone but carries a good amount of time (not that difficult these days) and retire to prison. It's one alternative to suicide. Hell, I really don't know.

The problem is BIG GOVERNMENT and CORPORATE AMERICA are UNITED AND FUCKING YOU ALL TO DEATH !!! WILL THE GUN TOTERS PLEASE FUCKING UNITE AND TEAR DOWN WASHINGTON AND FORCE CORPORATE AMERICA TO BLEED TO DEATH ?!?!?

This should make John McCain happy - one less to collect her hard earned Social Security.

"jakenewton suggests, in his comment, that something else must have been going on when Carlene Balderrama took her own life. Thanks for saying that, Jake."

Thanks for your contribution.

"Because now that our democracy is toast and the rule of law has been laid to waste, your good thoughts are all you have to protect yourself with. "

I wonder what *I* am using for food and shelter?

LOOK, JAKENEWTON, YOU'VE MADE A FRIEND! YOU AGREE ABOUT SUICIDE!

jakenewton July 28th, 2008 1:10 pm
"there is much more going on with the cited suicide cases than merely debt."

TreeFitz July 28th, 2008 2:17 pm
"jakenewton suggests...that something else must have been going on when Carlene Balderrama took her own life. Thanks for saying that, Jake...mortgage foreclosure did not cause Carlene's suicide...Carlene's inner thoughts and feelings as she decided to make that ugly choice would not be the same as the thoughts and feelings I experienced when I tried to take my life...but I am willing to guess that...[s]he was unwell."

TreeFitz - I hope those "happy thoughts" of yours are edible and shelter you from the cold. Because now that our democracy is toast and the rule of law has been laid to waste, your good thoughts are all you have to protect yourself with. At least you will die with a quiet mind knowing that you did nothing while your country was going down in flames.

It's funny what a growling, hungery stomach can do for the revolutionary spirit. And when enough of those hungry stomachs realize that the only way to sate their hunger is by joining together, then the revolution starts in earnest. And it ain't going to be with pitch forks this time.

Unfortunately, the powers that be saw this one coming. Not only will the revolution not be televised, neither will the mass round-ups and incarcerations. Do you know where your nearest Haliburten internment camp is?

My only hope is that none of us dies silent and alone like Carlene Balderrama. Better to stand together than to die on our knees at the alter of the have-mores and their inhuman greed.

I am not sure Ms. Ehrenreich's connection of suicide trends with the banking/mortgage crisis holds up. This seems, like much of her writing, to be somewhat facile. She takes a catchy thought and spins it out in a basically superficial way.

(her book, 9 to 5 was very shallow . . . I say that as someone who has actually had to live poor. . .the way she 'played' at being poor, with credit cards always at her disposal, it was so facile and it still irritates me that so many people think the stuff she wrote in that book reflects what it is really like to live under grinding poverty in this culture ... guess what, Barbara, truly poor people rarely make the dopey choices you made as you 'researched' that book. . . you made choices that quickly put you into economic stress and then you could write about the stress . . . but if you were really poor, you wouldn't have made those choices . . . . sorry, everytime I see her name, I get re-irritated by 9-5)

Suicide has always been ONE possible choice to a stressor. Suicide has always been ONE possible response to economic stress. Is Ms. Ehrenreich's representation that more people are taking the suicide choice in response to economic stress than they used to an accurate representation or is she guessing and spinning and projecting? I think she spins and projects.

Just as I have a close experience/reality as a real-life poor person, I also have personal experience with suicidal ideation. I have made several attempts to take my life. (NOTE: I am doing great these days and I don't think I will ever consider suicide an option again, just in case someone reads this and worries about me.)

I am uneasy. I don't like the way Ms. Ehrenreich has said suicide in reaction to economic stress is on the rise. I don't like how she vaguely attributes her belief that suicide-because-of-economic-stress to the cultural phenomenon of our banking/mortgage crisis. It just seems very intellectually lazy and columns like this impact our culture, shape our collective consciousness. Many people nowadays feel a growing anxiety about how we humans can inhabit this shared space called Earth and we are all aware that our collective values seem to degrade. Many are anxious at the way corporate values are shaping human life. Nobody quite understands how a greedy bank executive in North Carolina can choke the culture of my daily life. . . each time a human being performs an action that affects other human beings, all of us are affected.

We've all heard the saying that when a butterfly moves its wings in Tokyo, the movement of that butterfly wing shifts energy all around the earth. Well, a greedy banker skimming equity from people who can't really afford his adjustable rate loans, which is just like skimming cream off a jug of milk, . . that banker's greed affects everything. Sitting here in Silicon Valley, I am affected by a Florida corporate shareholder's greed, just as I am affected by the butterfly in Tokyo.

When do we stop allowing small acts of greed to pollute and corrode the fabric of humanity?

I don't know the answer. But I have vague hunches, intuitions, much like everyone else. One of my hunches is that we need to begin to uplift our thoughts. We need to focus on our positive aspirations, steadily holding uplifting expectations. The simple act of thinking/feeling is a way to bring about change.

I am putting this here, on common dreams, because commondreams is a platform where we can begin to have uplifting, positive, appreciative conversations. Reading the obituary of Lisa, one of the founders of common dreams yesterday, prompted me to think about commondreams in a new way, as a gift, an opportunity for collective uplift.

I may sound like a pollyanna. I know there are many, many needs in all cultures, not just in the USA and activists need to get down in the muck and deal with ugly realities. I know there are lots of wrongs/injustices.

I spend a lot of time trying to 'see' how to shape a better human future. There are many, MANY things that might be done. But today, I am playing around with the idea that I can change the world, little old ordinary powerless aging disabled poor lonely me, by holding uplifting thoughts.

And I think that people blessed with the amazing platform of being able to publish their thoughts in writing ought to use their sacred, magical platform. I refer, for example, to Ms. Ehrenreich's column: she could decide today that she will only write columns that uplift her readers thoughts. She could decide right now, quietly inside herself, that from now on, instead of writing about what is wrong, she wuill only write about what is right and what positive thoughts, hopes and expectations she holds for the human future. It would be very hard at first to do this. But it would grow easier. And if other writers and thinkers joined her, I sincerely believe that we could shift culture all over the planet.

A positive thought in Silicon Valley can affect a town council meeting in rural Burundi.

I know my cluttered comments might not 'belong' here. . . so why have I been prompted to write in response to this column? Well, I think suicide is a very serious stream in the overall 'stream' of humanity. It is dark and risky. I think it should only be discussed with sacred reverence and love.

And that reminds me of another thing I think is missing from our public discourse: love. Let's bring love back into the progressive element of society. Any activist who gives up dinner with her kids to do volunteer work for a community cause is really practicing love, right? Let's bring more light and love into our public discourse.

jakenewton suggests, in his comment, that something else must have been going on when Carlene Balderrama took her own life. Thanks for saying that, Jake. The fact of the mortgage foreclosure did not cause Carlene's suicide. I know trying to kill one's self is a different inner experience for each different human. . . I know that Carlene's inner thoughts and feelings as she decided to make that ugly choice would not be the same as the thoughts and feelings I experienced when I tried to take my life . . . but I am willing to guess that I have a good idea of what was going on with her. She was unwell. She was disabled.

We have all had the experience of getting a shot of adrenalin course through our bodies. Some outer stimulus, whatever, happens and our body is triggered with adrenalin. A healthy body and mind is not overcome with a shot of adrenalin. I imagine that Carlene experience wave after wave of shocks/stressors, not just the mortgage foreclosure. Maybe one of her kids is struggling socially and maybe her neighbor nagged her about the barking dog. . . maybe she had countless little stresses, just as we all do, and then some of her stresses got bigger and at some point all she felt was shock and stress. Imagine being in a hot adrenalin rush for days, weeks, even months because stress upon stress, wave upon wave of stress keeps coming at you.

Something like this happened to Carlene. I am recalling the saying 'it only takes one straw to break the camel's back'

It is, as I said at the beginning, facile to 'blame' the mortgage industry for Carlene's suicide.

"The alternative is to value yourself more than any amount of money and turn the guns, metaphorically speaking, in the other direction."

Metaphorically? And what are the options? Angry letters to our so-called representatives who continue to bail out their friends who continue to screw as many constitutants as possible? A protest in front of the local Fannie-Freddie offices as each dishes more millions into the pockets of anyone who can help them continue the pyramid scheme?

What "metaphorical gun" do We The People have, exactly, to turn in the other direction???

Not to advocate violence or anything, but if one is planning to go out, maybe taking a few of the thieves with ya isn't such a bad plan... maybe when said thieves see that their heinous, heartlessly greedy behavior has dire and ultimate consequences, they'll learn a much needed f**king lesson...

cicero confused July 28th, 2008 1:00 pm -- is 30s style activism around the corner?

No. The revolutionary spirit that was once the hallmark of a nation dedicated to individual liberty has given way to acquiescence, conformity and, in many cases, total indifference to a corporatized state. In some other cases, where the individual may be more aware but feels equally ineffectual, the result is suppressed rage and quiet desparation.

The sad truth is that Americans have become accustomed to living in fear, not least of which is fear of their own government and its institutions. Although most Americans prefer to think of their attitudes as loyalty and respect, their government's trampling of the nation's constitution and its founding values make it quite clear that something quite different is involved in their failure to resist in any meaningful way.

Rather than suicide, my plan is to become a successful, upper middle class author from an elite university who writes about the poor in socially-liberal magazines and on progressive web sites.

I'm retired. Although I own my little townhouse (987 square feet) I know that eventually I will be taxed out of my home. It has been my plan all along to commit suicide when my funds are no longer sufficient to eat and pay my taxes. However, my plan differs somewhat from Carlene Balderrama's scenario. My exit will be accompanied by arson and taking of the lives of at least two of bastards approaching to evict my ass.

I think there is much more going on with the cited suicide cases than merely debt.

A march on Wall Street would be just about as effective as the marches against starting the Iraq war.

The fat asses in the big offices understand debt very well, and they don't care. They also understand death, but they believe they are immortal.

If you want to change their ways, you need to disabuse a great many of them of the latter notion.

It's reasonably certain that government will do nothing to change the ways of the money people. Government is on its knees before them.

If the country continues as it has for the last several years, there will be blood.