depressed musings
Nov. 6th, 2002 05:32 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mamajoanThis occurred to me last night while listening to John McCain talk about his campaign finance reform bill on NPR, and it only got stronger when I woke up this morning and got the full impact of the bad election news.
Basically, the way I see it, the problem with big money controlling politics is that we can't change it in the courts or in Congress. We can keep enacting laws, like the McCain-Feingold law, but there will always be loopholes and there will always be lawyers willing to do legal challenges. As long as there are corporations making a lot of money and wanting to own politicians, there will be corporations that own politicians. They will find a way, no matter what laws we put in place.
And the same principle applies in all the other major areas too: gun control, education, health care, abortion, environment, and so forth. The problem is that you can't solve these issues by making new laws. The American legal system is already fiendishly complicated, and adding new laws all the time is not helping. The bigger solution would be to change the people, the society. Instead of making it illegal for companies to buy politicians, we need to make politicians who don't want to be owned, and companies that don't want to own them. Instead of making it illegal for [fill in category here] people to buy guns, we need to make people who don't want to use guns in bad ways. Instead of making it illegal for companies to dump their waste into rivers, we need to make companies that don't want to dump their waste into rivers. Instead of making tougher laws to punish men who abuse their wives or duck out on child support, we need to make men who don't want to abuse their wives and who do want to fulfill their responsibilities to their children. And instead of making people file lawsuits every time their civil rights are violated, we need to make (really, re-make) an America where civil rights are respected and valued in the spirit, if not the letter, of the founding fathers' intentions.
The trouble with all that, of course, is that's it's such a daunting proposition. Truthfully, it seems impossible. It's not even "how can we make such a society," but "can we make such a society?" I have real doubts about that, and that's why this whole thing depresses me so much. It's hard enough to get laws passed that fit with our beliefs, but to try to imagine altering a whole society to fit those beliefs...! It feels hopeless and helpless.
I talked to my mom about this at length this morning. She, of course, is just as upset by the election results as we all are, but she managed to give me a bit of a pep talk. She reminded me of Rosa Parks, who did the same seemingly small, seemingly meaningless, seemingly pointless act of rebellion over and over for a long time until finally the time and place were right and it sparked a movement. Mom also reminded me of Nelson Mandela, who was in prison for *decades*, and it certainly seemed likely that he would die of old age in prison because he would never get out -- but he did. And mom added that, as bad as it seems now -- and it does; there isn't even one race we can point to and say, "well, at least *that* guy won" -- things don't remain "flat" (her word) in societies, by which she meant that the constant getting-worse-ness of things over the last bunch of years will have to turn around at some point. And it's important to keep fighting, even if in small ways. Or so my mom said, and she has seen a lot more of this scary depressing world stuff than I have, so I gotta believe her.
It's hard though. Mostly I just want to cry or scream or hide. Right now it seems very bleak.
On the semi-bright side, pretty much all of my coworkers feel the same way so it's easy to find someone to commiserate with. One coworker said that when he woke up this morning, he watched about five minutes of CNN and almost decided to call in sick.
Basically, the way I see it, the problem with big money controlling politics is that we can't change it in the courts or in Congress. We can keep enacting laws, like the McCain-Feingold law, but there will always be loopholes and there will always be lawyers willing to do legal challenges. As long as there are corporations making a lot of money and wanting to own politicians, there will be corporations that own politicians. They will find a way, no matter what laws we put in place.
And the same principle applies in all the other major areas too: gun control, education, health care, abortion, environment, and so forth. The problem is that you can't solve these issues by making new laws. The American legal system is already fiendishly complicated, and adding new laws all the time is not helping. The bigger solution would be to change the people, the society. Instead of making it illegal for companies to buy politicians, we need to make politicians who don't want to be owned, and companies that don't want to own them. Instead of making it illegal for [fill in category here] people to buy guns, we need to make people who don't want to use guns in bad ways. Instead of making it illegal for companies to dump their waste into rivers, we need to make companies that don't want to dump their waste into rivers. Instead of making tougher laws to punish men who abuse their wives or duck out on child support, we need to make men who don't want to abuse their wives and who do want to fulfill their responsibilities to their children. And instead of making people file lawsuits every time their civil rights are violated, we need to make (really, re-make) an America where civil rights are respected and valued in the spirit, if not the letter, of the founding fathers' intentions.
The trouble with all that, of course, is that's it's such a daunting proposition. Truthfully, it seems impossible. It's not even "how can we make such a society," but "can we make such a society?" I have real doubts about that, and that's why this whole thing depresses me so much. It's hard enough to get laws passed that fit with our beliefs, but to try to imagine altering a whole society to fit those beliefs...! It feels hopeless and helpless.
I talked to my mom about this at length this morning. She, of course, is just as upset by the election results as we all are, but she managed to give me a bit of a pep talk. She reminded me of Rosa Parks, who did the same seemingly small, seemingly meaningless, seemingly pointless act of rebellion over and over for a long time until finally the time and place were right and it sparked a movement. Mom also reminded me of Nelson Mandela, who was in prison for *decades*, and it certainly seemed likely that he would die of old age in prison because he would never get out -- but he did. And mom added that, as bad as it seems now -- and it does; there isn't even one race we can point to and say, "well, at least *that* guy won" -- things don't remain "flat" (her word) in societies, by which she meant that the constant getting-worse-ness of things over the last bunch of years will have to turn around at some point. And it's important to keep fighting, even if in small ways. Or so my mom said, and she has seen a lot more of this scary depressing world stuff than I have, so I gotta believe her.
It's hard though. Mostly I just want to cry or scream or hide. Right now it seems very bleak.
On the semi-bright side, pretty much all of my coworkers feel the same way so it's easy to find someone to commiserate with. One coworker said that when he woke up this morning, he watched about five minutes of CNN and almost decided to call in sick.
no subject
Date: 2002-11-07 05:52 am (UTC)