USA: Land of the Weak Man Left Behind
Texas is the latest example of neoliberalism trimming the fringes of society, one crisis at a time.
As the whole country is watching climate change put Texas on ice (and Senator Raphael skip out to Cancun), we’re also watching “leadership” use this disaster as another opportunity to widen the social divide.
As with the 2008 crisis and 2020 pandemic, we’re led to believe that the problem is not the way our political + economic systems are structured. The problem is in the people’s lackluster response to the chaos those systems have wrought.
Instead of blaming the private companies who skipped upgrades on their vulnerable infrastructure, “leaders” attribute the crisis to people who complain about the power grid shutdown.
As if they’re saying:
“the crisis is not the complete demise of our electrical infrastructure as a result of privatization and deregulation, leaving our entire state frozen solid and/or flooded…. The crisis is you bellyachers who can’t saddle up and figure it out yourself!”
I’m not putting words in anybody’s mouth so much as I’m trying to clear up their neoliberal jargon. The most clear-cut, head-shaking example is this Texas mayor who outright told families they ought to fend for themselves:
“The City and County [which are funded by your tax dollars], along with power providers or any other service [who are funded by your monthly payments] owes you NOTHING!”
The irony is incredible. Literally incredible — I cannot believe someone could type out this rant without seeing the irony in every sentence.
“I’ll be damned if I’m going to provide for anyone that is capable of doing it themselves!”
said the public servant.
Tim’s facebook rant here is indicative of a much deeper sentiment of neoliberal USA, which is: “Strong men survive, weak men get left behind.”
Yes — “men” — because stereotypical gender roles dovetail neatly with the strong-man narrative.
It’s why we won’t punish the politicians who dumped stock before the COVID pandemic news reached the public. They were just “being smart.”
It’s why we didn’t change anything about our banking system after our financial disaster nearly took down the entire world’s economy. We were just “doing business.” Now we get the pleasure of seeing some “familiar risk creeping back.”
It’s why we think of globalization in terms of winners and losers.
It’s why we can’t get along.
We have to believe we’re a winner. And for us to be winners, there has to be losers.
If you are thinking about joining Medium, please use my referral link here. It costs the same, and it will help support me as a Medium writer.
Subscribe for email notifications every time I post a new story!