A Musing About State Representative Michael Clark's Statements

State Representative Michael Clark brought some unwanted national attention to South Dakota this week when he opined on Facebook that businesses should be able to discriminate based on race.  To the best of my knowledge, I have never met Clark, so I have no basis to judge whether he is a racist or merely a person who refuses to think before he speaks. I know this is late, but a part of Clark's comment that got little attention stuck in my craw and I needed to think it through a bit.

Clark's racially charged comments overshadow a statement that revealed some deep cognitive dissonance inside the populist/Trumpist movement, a movement which mislabels itself as conservative.

Clark asserts, "The vote of the dollar is very strong." 

No one should dispute the dollar's power, but the statement contains many implications. In the context with the rest of his statements, one could take it to mean that businesses should discriminate against anyone they chose so long as the business makes a profit. In short, the public can legitimize racism, sexism or any form of otherization it chooses. This reading re-enforces the idea that Clark's comments reflect a deep racism.

The statement may also imply that good, hard-working decent folk will boycott businesses that unjustly discriminate based on race, creed, gender or sexual orientation. This reading implies that the United States has permanently rejected the hateful ideas that produced Jim Crow laws in a wide swath of the nation. This reading implies that human nature has somehow been altered since George Wallace said, "In the name of the greatest people that have ever trod this earth, I draw the line in the dust and toss the gauntlet before the feet of tyranny . . . and I say . . . segregation today . . . segregation tomorrow . . . segregation forever." [ellipsis in original]

While the latter reading may be more generous, the belief that human nature has changed and people will suddenly cease supporting with their dollars and voices those who practice injustice is flawed.

The self-proclaimed social conservatives who make up the backbone of the current populist moment used to hold as an article of faith that "The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked" It's unlikely that the "wicked" will use their dollars to fight injustice. If one wants a secular source, all one has to do is compare the statements made by characters in the Iliad and the entitled pronouncements from professional athletes or other celebrities. If one wants a bit of science, humanity makes up .01% of life on Earth but have destroyed 83% of mammalian life. No amount of dollars seem to change behavior.

In short, trusting the dollar to change human behavior is as foolish and dangerous as advocating legalized discrimination.

Quotation Of The Day: What If Capitalism And The Welfare State Cause The Same Problem?

Ross Douthat prompts the question.

. . . it might be that both capitalism and the welfare state tend to weaken forms of solidarity that give meaning to life for many people, while offering nothing but money in their place. [Emphasis in original]

Related Reading: A guy from Think Progress takes up an idea that's not dissimilar from one Charles Murray suggested.

Quotation Of The Day: Capitalism And Education Edition

Gary Gutting explains capitalism and education::

From our infancy the market itself has worked to make us consumers, primed to buy whatever it is selling regardless of its relevance to human flourishing. True freedom requires that we take part in the market as fully formed agents, with life goals determined not by advertising campaigns but by our own experience of and reflection on the various possibilities of human fulfillment. Such freedom in turn requires a liberating education, one centered not on indoctrination, social conditioning or technical training but on developing persons capable of informed and intelligent commitments to the values that guide their lives.

This is why, especially in our capitalist society, education must not be primarily for training workers or consumers (both tools of capitalism, as Marxists might say). Rather, schools should aim to produce self-determining agents who can see through the blandishments of the market and insist that the market provide what they themselves have decided they need to lead fulfilling lives. Capitalism, with its devotion to profit, is not in itself evil. But it becomes evil when it controls our choices for the sake of profit.

The whole article is a must read. I also loved his analysis of the role of work in creating human flourishing.

Quotation Of The Day: Capitalism, Democracy And An Essay Question Edition

As part of my effort to get ready for a new school year, I thought I'd knock the rust off my essay question writing.  This report makes the following observations:

We live in a representative democracy with a capitalist economy. This means that we hold different values dear in the economic and political spheres.

The authors posit the following conclusion:

In short, democracy must write the rules for capitalism, not the other way around.

 In what ways are the observation and conclusion valid or invalid? Give concrete examples from the United States that illustrate either validity or invalidity. If the conclusion is invalid, explain why capitalism should write the rules for democracy.