The Homosexuality Debate

Gay Marriage: What’s the deal?

A Hawaiian court, in December of 1996, called a legal ban on same-sex, or gay marriages, a violation of previously-instated anti-discrimination laws (“ACLU Answers” 1998). This trial, which came about after two lesbian couples and one gay couple were denied access to marriage licenses in 1991, was the first of its kind in United States history and was appealed to the Hawaii State Supreme Court. While the Supreme Court took its time deciding the constitutionality of a gay marriage ban, eventually deciding in December of 1999 that it would not extend marriage rights to homosexuals (Stritof 1999), the gay marriage debate hit the mainland U.S., leading to the present, heated debate over the definition of marriage. In the 2006 interim elections, several states voted on amendments and other bans on gay marriage. Arizona, Colorado, Idaho, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Virginia, and Wisconsin all voted on amendments that would define marriage as a “contract between one man and one woman (“Key Ballot Measures” 2006).” All of these states, with the exception of Arizona (whose votes are still being counted), voted to define marriage as a union strictly between a man and a woman, and many states banned the possibility of future civil unions and other legal unions. The debate will not be ended soon, it seems, so the issue must be understood if it is to be resolved.

What follows is a brief discussion of the arguments for and against same-sex marriages, with an analysis of Abigail Garner’s website, Families Like Mine. Care has been taken to present each side of the argument in an unbiased manner, so as to leave my personal opinions for the very last section, which also features a pair of interviews with members of my immediate family. It is my hope that by considering the issue of same-sex marriage from all angles, I will better understand not only the issue as it currently presents itself, but also individual motivations behind choosing sides and arguing them.

The Argument against Gay Marriage

Arguments against gay marriage, though numerous and varied, stem from hegemonic (while not described as such) definitions of sexuality (Connell 2002), defining marriage as a contract between a single man and a single woman. Traditionally, in America, marriage is defined as a contract between a man and a woman, and, as such, it is argued that it should not be changed. Arguments from antiquity often center upon the idea that traditional methods are somehow more natural and true. Take, for instance, the differences in the relationships between humankind and nature in American Indian society and today’s; certainly the earlier, Indian way was better-suited for the future of the planet. It is then argued that a heterosexual relationship is natural, the way sex and marriage ought to be, and homosexual relationships are unnatural. Evidencing this argument is the fact that heterosexual intercourse can result in conception, while homosexual intercourse cannot. Surely, then, that which is natural is that which is capable of producing offspring and furthering the human race. Stemming from this, it is argued that any family environment other than a traditional, heterosexual one is not conducive to raising children. Homosexual couples who adopt, employ artificial insemination, or have children from previous heterosexual relationships are simply not as equipped for raising children as heterosexual couples; a child is best raised in a traditional home, one with a male father and female mother. While an overwhelming proportion of the argument against same-sex marriages comes from the heterosexual population, several gay and lesbian individuals denounce the act, calling instead for a revolt against the patriarchal institution of marriage. Historically, many feminists and lesbians argue, marriage has been used as a means of control by men over women and, as such, socially just and active individuals should not participate in the otherwise ‘holy union (Thompson 2004).’

Most of the Americans against gay marriage also argue from a ‘Biblical, Christian,’ and fundamentalist stand-point. The ‘sanctity of marriage,’ they argue, must be upheld, as ordained by God (Giles 1904). Pointing to the origins of life, and therefore, marriage itself, they uphold the definition of marriage as a holy and binding contract, made before God, between one man and one woman. Genesis 1:27 claims, “God created human beings in his own image; in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them (Oxford Study Bible 1992).” Referring to this passage when responding to the Pharisees (Giles 1904), Jesus says in Matthew 19:4-6, “That is why a man leaves father and mother, and is united to his wife; and the two become one flesh. Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, man must not separate (Oxford Study Bible 1992)." From the beginning, God made humankind male and female, and made them to marry one another, one man with one woman. Fundamental Christians also look to the writings of the apostle Paul for guidance in these matters. In the first chapter of the letter to the Romans, verses 24 to 27, Paul refers to the perversions to which God gave up all of humankind, such as “men…giving up natural relations with women, burn[ing] with lust for one another (Oxford Study Bible 1992).” Essentially, God gave humankind the ability to choose which side to be on, to be either righteous or immoral. Any marriage or sexual relationship other than one man and one woman is morally reprehensible from the Christian view. All gay relationships, not to mention gay marriages, are immoral before God.

Socially conservative Americans see the issue of gay marriage as a threat to traditional marriage, the family institution, and American society as a whole. Proponents of the gay marriage ban assert that the extension of marriage rights to homosexuals would undermine all that marriage is meant to be, as outlined by society, not to mention God. Redefining marriage inevitably changes its meaning. As mentioned before, conservatives argue that gay marriage would destroy the family, as same-sex couples would not be able to raise children in acceptable and necessary ways. Again, as with marriage, a redefinition of the family inevitably changes what a family is. On the societal level, it is argued that, as gay marriage is largely an untested social experiment, there may be unforeseen disadvantages and problems. There are, on the other hand, many projected and foreseen problems. Many argue that a redefinition of marriage would be the beginning of a slippery slope in which marriage would include polygamy, incest, and bestiality. An inclusive definition of marriage would also affect how insurance and taxes are handled in the U.S., as both of these operate with married individuals differently than unmarried individuals. Overall, the need for a redefinition of marriage leads to the belief that granting homosexuals the right to same-sex marriages is a ‘special right’ (Stein 2001), in the sense that homosexuals would be receiving something they previously had no access to.

While all of these arguments offer a different view of the marital institution and can stand on their own, they, in reality, serve to strengthen one another and often become indistinguishable when the question is considered by the average American. Combining traditional, relatively secular arguments with arguments originating in religion, a large and powerful portion of American society objects to extending marriage definitions to include same-sex couples. Polls conducted in late October of 2006 by CBS News and Newsweek show that between 38% and 40% of Americans are against both gay marriage and civil unions, while the other 60 to 62% of Americans favor either civil unions or marriage, with roughly half of the 60% favoring only civil unions (“Law and Civil” 2006). The issue, however, goes much deeper than marriage. A poll conducted by the Pew Research Center found that while 56% oppose gay marriage and 42% oppose allowing civil unions, 52% of Americans strongly oppose allowing gay and lesbian couples to adopt children (“Law and Civil” 2006).

These numbers seem to support Stein’s arguments that social conservatives, first, feel very strongly about giving anyone, much less homosexuals, ‘special rights (2001:15)’, and, second, assume that ‘the personal is political (20).’ Conservatives declaring ‘special rights’ rhetoric make the argument that homosexuals choose to become gay, and, as such, should not be given rights beyond those they already have as unmarried citizens. All arguments considered, it seems that the stance against gay marriage centers upon a view of homosexuality as unnatural, immoral, and, therefore, dangerous. With this mindset, then, social conservatives apply their personal lives in their political agendas. As such, they feel that they are fulfilling their duty, as outlined in Matthew 5:13-16, to protect society from depravity and evil, and to provide a standard for morality and righteousness.

Families Like Mine

Abigail Garner’s website, Families Like Mine, exists to decrease both the tangible and intangible isolation that members of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender (LGBT) population experience on a daily basis by providing advice, open discussion, resources, and a means of voicing opinions and feelings about life (Garner 1999). With estimations of the number of gay and lesbian parents in the U.S. rising above 4 million, there is a distinct need for such a site (“Parenting Options” 2006). Garner’s book, sharing the name of her site, was one of the first of its kind, speaking to the experiences of individuals raised by gay parents in hopes of changing popular misconceptions about gay families. The current national debate is argued on both sides by citing evidence from the family institution, so Garner’s input into this discussion of same-sex marriage is especially enlightening given her own membership in a gay-parent family. My personal knowledge of gay families is extremely limited, so everything that I encounter on the site is new and exciting.

Garner’s father came out to her when she was five years old, so she was nearly always raised in an open and accepting household. Despite this openness, her experiences in school and other peer situations proved to be a trial. Generally, in society, homosexuality is not acceptable, and teachers and students were more than willing to provide Abigail with homophobic attitudes. Teachers were sure to reprimand students who told racist and sexist jokes, but homophobic jokes went unnoticed. In much the same way, she learned in school that AIDS was a ‘gay disease.’ Just like racism and sexism, homophobia exists largely as systematic institution of discrimination in America.

An important section of Garner’s website is her advice column. Three of the most common questions asked point to the fears and concerns of those considering gay parenting. The first question asks, “Should I, how do I, and when do I come out to my kids,” suggesting that there is a very large amount of concern as far as the issue goes, not only from conservatives, but from gay parents as well. The second and third questions reflect the same concerns: “Will having gay parents affect my children?” and, “What about my kids’ sexual orientation?” In her answers, it seems that Garner goes to great lengths to show her readers that there is no difference between heterosexual and homosexual families when dealing with these matters. In most cases, fears about coming out arise out of popular misconceptions about homosexuality, and stem from general societal homophobia. A child’s orientation will not be affected in any way by the sexual orientation of his or her parents, and Garner has found that families that are open about sexuality, especially families with gay parents, are much more healthy and loving.

There were many questions in the advice column that I did not expect. I expected, for instance, that gay and lesbian parent families would be very open and accepting of their children as far as sexuality goes, but the questions evidenced a general fear of gay parents that their children would be gay. Gay parents seem to feel pressure to pass some sort of test, to allow their children to ‘adjust well’ to living with gay parents. Such pressure points again to the idea of heteronormativity in our culture; heterosexuality is the norm, while homosexuality is the ‘other.’ Gay children, Ryn Gluckman says, are sometimes ostracized by their gay parents. While in its infancy in our culture, gay parenting is a social experiment to many, a chance to see if gay parenting is a viable alternative to heterosexual parenting. If gay parents produce gay children, something is wrong. Furthermore, in trying to prove their ability as parents, children of gay parents, including Garner herself, feel the urge to be over-achievers, often graduating from high school and college years before peers of the same age. Rather than being ‘normal’ to prove normalcy, children of gay parents must be above average to pass as ‘normal.’

The take-away message of the site is that families headed by gay and lesbian parents are as safe and natural as those with straight parents. Many conservatives stress that problems arising in gay-parent families are the natural result of an unnatural family setting. Garner, however, argues that problems unique to gay-parent families are simply the result of societal homophobia and indifference. As with other minorities such as Blacks and Hispanics, gay and lesbian families experience systematic discrimination on a daily basis. Gay parents are not seen as viable parents in the U.S., cannot be married, and in some states cannot adopt children. Efforts at changing opinions about same-sex marriage center upon informing otherwise conservative individuals about the nature of homosexuality and homosexual relationships and families (Stein 2001). In this way, Abigail Garner’s book, Families Like Mine: Children of Gay Parents Tell It Like It Is, and website of the same name serve to strengthen the argument for the gay community by passing along information to those who seek it.

An Argument for Gay Marriage

The argument for gay marriage begins in equality. Proponents of gay marriage argue that not extending marriage rights to all individuals is in direct opposition to freedom and liberty. Denying gays and lesbians the right to marry inevitably denies them other civil liberties associated with marriage, from the right to visit their partners or their children in the hospital to inheritance rights upon the death of a partner (“ACLU Answers” 1998). An argument from equality often assumes that there is no difference between gay and straight couples and that both are equally natural. What evidence is there to back this claim?

West and Zimmerman, among others, suggest that all individuals “do gender (1987),” meaning that gender is a socially constructed field of human thought. The gender structure, then, endures simply because we, as human and social beings, constantly recreate what it means to be masculine or feminine or anything in between by acting according to or straying from current definitions (Connell 2002). As such, definitions of gender, sexuality, and marriage remain fluid and exist only to the extent that individuals and societies choose to adhere to set definitions. Proponents of gay marriage look at the debate through this lens, asserting that there is nothing fundamentally ‘untraditional’, ‘unnatural’, or ‘immoral’ about gay marriage or homosexuality. Rather, they identify the current outcry against oppression as shift of definition, similar in nature to those changes that have already occurred.

Historical analyses of sexuality and marriage evidence variations in how sexuality and marriage are defined. Foucault, for example, examines the differences between Eastern and Western societal definitions of sexuality (1978), while one can easily track the evolution of marriage in the U.S. within the last century and recognize its tendency to change (Seidman 2003:126). Bans on interracial marriage existed, albeit nominally, until 2000 in Alabama (“Alabama repeals” 2000). Arguments against gay marriage that call on tradition or nature hold no value but that which one unjustly places on them. Given the variations in sexuality and marriage definitions in our own society, proponents of gay marriage ask that the definitions be changed, once again, in order to be all-conclusive and equal.

Opponents of gay marriage place much weight on the morality of gay marriage, not to mention homosexuality itself. Religious fundamentalists in the U.S. assert strongly that God hates homosexuality and that same-sex marriage should not be allowed in America. To what extent, to use Stein’s language, can fundamentalists make the personal, political? Proponents of gay marriage argue that the right to keep the institutions of religion from passing an amendment to the constitution condemning same-sex marriage is protected by the 1^st Amendment, which states, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…” While this amendment certainly allows for religious fundamentalists to adhere to a moral code condemning homosexuality themselves, it does not allow for one religious faction to impose any and all of its moral code upon all citizens of the U.S. Furthermore, and with the utmost respect, gay marriage proponents assert that religion, also, has changed its stance on many issues many times, such as slavery and interracial marriage, and should be wary of claiming the moral high-ground. Freedom of religion, many argue, also entails freedom from religion. Judith Butler argues that religious and moral arguments tend to turn the gay marriage debate into an argument of dichotomies, pitting the legitimate and illegitimate, the moral and immoral, the natural and unnatural, and justifiable and unjustifiable (2004:105). She suggests, however, that the debate is not, in reality, that simple. The dichotomous and political nature of the debate asks each individual to “take a stand (2004: 107)”, but this is not entirely possible, as the idea of gay marriage seems to position itself somewhere between the poles of the legitimacy scale. From this thoughtful analysis one finds support for a shift in societal norms and definitions regarding sexuality and marriage.

Social research (not to mention individuals like Abigail Garner) proves that there is absolutely no reason for opponents of gay marriage to worry about gay families, the family or marriage structure, or the children of gay families (Seidman 2003:129). Furthermore, those in favor of same-sex marriage argue that extending rights to gay and lesbian couples would not threaten the institution. Rather, extending rights to all people would, in fact, strengthen the institution. Marriage is a staple, fundamental institution in American society, despite its relatively shaky nature prior to the gay marriage debate (Seidman 2003). Given the inequality inherent in current marriage laws defining marriage as a contract between one man and one woman and the inability of the religious institution to impose its moral code justly on all of society, proponents of same-sex marriage argue that there is no alternative other than adapting the definition of marriage to allow same sex unions.

My View and Interviews

In order to get a more complete understanding of the debate at hand, I conducted two interviews with members of my family and asked them what they thought about gay marriage. The interviews were conducted with my grandma, Jane McColgan, who seems to be getting a little wary of interviews with me, and with my father, Tom Foster.

My grandmother has never ceased to surprise me. She has always been a member of the Methodist church and has always worked hard to get my immediate family to come with her. Despite all of this, however, she never struck me as particularly religious or pious. One could imagine my surprise, then, when I came home for Thanksgiving break and she is in the middle of telling about her lasted crusade: she managed to persuade the local Rite-aid manager to change their marquee from “Merry X-mas” to “Merry Christmas.” “They’re taking Christ out of Christmas,” she argued, and she was not going to stand for it. I immediately thought about my plans to interview her, and began to think twice. Nonetheless, I conducted the interview and, as always, stumbled upon some surprises.

Jane falls somewhere in the fundamentalist camp when it comes to gay marriage, but she does not attend a particularly fundamentalist church. “Gay marriage is wrong,” she claims, “because it says in the Bible.” Grandma could not quote any specific verses, but held that marriage is to be between a man and a woman. I informed her that the Episcopalian Church allows gay ministers and reverends, and she remained bolted to her position. She has never really known any gay people, but guesses that they are not all bad. Even so, they should not be allowed to get married. My grandmother is a little more open to something like a civil union. After hearing about the ways in which gays and lesbians are discriminated against by way of unfair taxes, insurance, etc., she felt that they should be free to live their lives the way they wanted and get the same things as everyone else. But the equal rights stops short of marriage.

Mawmaw, as I lovingly call her, has, in my memory, been backward on any number of issues. She complained before the interview of the black couple that had just moved into the apartment next to her. Apparently they had to move in at around two o’clock in the morning and mistakenly tried to open my grandmother’s door. Scared, my grandmother described how she hurried to find something to throw down the stairs at the “cussing niggers” when they got in. I recognize a general fear in Jane of anything outside the ordinary, day-to-day life that she lives. Unwed mothers, as well as blacks and homosexuals will quickly lose her favor.

My father, Tom, was a little more accepting of my interview. Dad sees gay marriage as just something else that is going to have to change; it is just another part of a growing and changing society. “Homosexuality is becoming acceptable.” When he was a kid, dad says, the only place you could find openly gay people was the bus station and bar. Now, on the other hand, it’s different. People are accepting of homosexuals, because they find they cannot help who they are. My father struggles to know whether homosexuality is “right or wrong.” My father has never been particularly religious, but believes in God and has always, it seems to me, had a distinct sense of morality. He decides that the issue will not be resolved at the moment, and concludes that they should be given the right to marry. I asked him, then, about heterosexual marriage. “Won’t straight marriage be affected by allowing gays to be married?” He doesn’t think so, having gone through two divorces himself. If two people love each other and can make it work, then they deserve to give it a try, especially when other rights before the state are on the line. Dad does not think that gay marriage will be allowed any time soon. “People are just too backward and hateful,” he says, and adds in a whisper, “like your grandmother.” Furthermore, dad thinks that his life will change very little if gay marriage were allowed.

While he seems to be thinking in a forward direction, I asked my dad about what role gay jokes play in this whole debate, as I remember many times his sharing of gay jokes he had picked up at work. In this setting, of course, he regrets having made those sorts of jokes. He admits that gay jokes, just like racial or ethnic jokes, do little to further the cause of equality and acceptance.

When I look at the opinions of my father and grandmother, I see a few different things. I see the way that class affects views about gay marriage, but it seems that my findings are in direct opposition to Stein’s findings. My grandmother, who is upper-middle class and lived a relatively affluent childhood, is opposed to gay marriage, while my dad, who was raised on welfare, has a rather liberal attitude toward gay marriage. I think this may be cause by my father’s identifying himself with the plight of other underprivileged individuals. My grandma’s view seems to stem from her comfort and complacency as a relatively well-off individual. This is, of course, rather anecdotal. I also wonder if the differences in opinion are affected by the generation gap between my father and grandmother. Perhaps my father, as a younger, lower class man, is more accepting of change than my grandmother. Of course, looking at the religious backgrounds of the two, my grandmother is more involved in church, and may be affected more by religious arguments against gay marriage.

My own position on gay marriage seems to me to be quite unique. I began attending what I would now call a fundamental, evangelical Christian church when I entered high school and was, of course, taught that I should “love the sinner and hate the sin” when it came to homosexuality, among other things. I spent little time contemplating the lessons I was learning and less time evaluating the things that I heard on Wednesdays and Sundays. My church attendance was largely based on the sense of acceptance that I experienced both in and out of church, despite the fact that this acceptance took some time to achieve. The best friends that I now have became my friends in church. While I failed more often than not to really think about what I was being taught, I sensed that my life was better in church than out of it, all friends and acceptance aside; I would have been into church even if I had no friends there. As such, I am reluctant to give up totally on the Christian faith, much less faith in general.

That is not to say that I agree at all with the Church’s analysis of homosexuality and gay marriage. Upon entering college, I was separated from my church and all of those who would keep me responsible for keeping up on commitments and the like. Needless to say, my freshman year was a time of questioning and of a certain intellectual rebirth. I was forced to look at the faith that I had professed for a good part of my young life and evaluate my thoughts and feelings from an outsider’s point of view. Cognitive dissonance ensued. I realized that much of what I professed simply made no sense when applied to the real world. Among these things that made no sense from the fundamentalist perspective was its view on homosexuality. One event upon entering my freshman year at Wesleyan involved the campus Christian group, Cru. An acquaintance of mine in my hall came back from a Cru meeting one night and explained to his roommate, a Catholic, that the leaders at Cru suggested that his homosexual feelings were caused by demon possession, not nature. After praying, however, the leaders became discouraged and sent him on his way. I simply could not deal with things like this, and I felt ashamed that I had considered myself for so long a part of this sort of thinking. Personally, I can vouch for Stein’s analysis of evangelicals as a welcoming, yet extreme group of people. I try to blame their politeness and acceptance of certain people on my blind belief and acceptance of their views, but realize that part of me loved the fact that I was “right before God” and others were not.

I think that fundamentalist arguments are a gross misinterpretation of the scriptures. While evangelicals claim the total inerrancy of scripture, I hold that if God did indeed create humankind, then we were created with intellect and reason. Scripture, then, should be interpreted using all of the faculties that God gave. I, personally, refuse to adhere to any religious doctrine or command that fails to make reasonable sense. Thus, I arrive at a position that seems to me to be sound: homosexuality and all that goes along with it is just as natural and moral as heterosexuality. If, however, homosexuality was, somehow, fundamentally immoral, as defined by God, even this would make no difference in the debate, as the U.S. has a democratic form of government, not a theocracy.

Many of the arguments against gay marriage make absolutely no sense to me. If homosexuality is, indeed, unnatural and on that basis should not be allowed, then we must also disallow surgery and eye glasses. One could not keep gays from marrying on the basis of their inability to produce children without keeping all infertile couples from marrying as well. The argument that gay parents will raise gay children is ridiculous, because not all straight parents raise straight children. Also, I am really opposed to the idea of civil unions because “separate” is not equal. Gays and lesbians should have the right to marry, and it must be defined as marriage, not a separate but equal civil union.

While I have worked to separate myself from backward, fundamentalist, evangelical thinking, I long to, in some way, unite faith with the truth that is obvious all around me. I do not think that the two are fundamentally incongruent. I sense and hope that there must be some place where science and faith meet, where one proves the other and vice versa. As such, I look forward to the day same-sex marriage becomes legal in the U.S. I look forward to the day when no individual is discriminated against, or mocked, or given unequal rights. Perhaps this is where the two truths will meet. Perhaps truth is found somewhere in the meeting of God and social justice.

Link List

(In-text citations referring to articles without authors, and those with authors not found in the Bibliography may be found in the links below)

- http://pixnaps.blogspot.com/2004/11/gay-marriage-arguments.html

- http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20061109131232AAoqXYW

- http://www.aclu.org/lgbt/relationships/11845res19980630.html

- http://www.bidstrup.com/marriage.htm

- http://marriage.about.com/od/samesexmarriage/a/hawaiisamesex.htm

- http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2006/pages/results/ballot.measures/

- http://www.swedenborgdigitallibrary.org/vismarr/marr1.htm

- http://www.pollingreport.com/civil.htm

- http://www.nogaymarriage.com/tenarguments.asp

- http://grove.ufl.edu/~ggsa/gaymarriage.html

- http://www.buddybuddy.com/parent.html

- http://archives.cnn.com/2000/ALLPOLITICS/stories/11/07/alabama.interracial/

- http://usinfo.state.gov/usa/infousa/facts/funddocs/billeng.htm

Bibliography

Butler, J. (2004). Undoing Gender. London, Routledge.

Connell, R. W. (2002). Gender. Cambridge, Polity.

Foucault, Michel. (1978). The History of Sexuality: Volume 1: An Introduction. New York: Random House.

Oxford Study Bible. (1992). New York: Oxford University Press.

Seidman, S. (2003). The Social Construction of Sexuality. New York, W.W. Norton.

Stein, Arlene. (2001). The Stranger Next Door. Boston: Beacon Press.

West, C. and D.H. Zimmerman. 1987. "Doing Gender." Gender and Society 1:125-151.

Domhoff and the Power Elite

West Virginia’s Most Powerful: David C. Hardesty

David C. Hardesty currently serves as President of West Virginia University, a position he has held since 1995 (Hardesty, 2006). During his presidency Hardesty has successfully grown WVU into the nation’s leader in biometrics and healthcare research, bringing many of the world’s top minds into West Virginia, as well as recruiting many from within West Virginia to study and further their education. Hardesty, in many ways, embodies the exemplary West Virginia citizen by promoting leadership qualities, serving in local and state government, and serving on several boards to further understanding and education (“West Virginia’s Most”, 2006). Dominant views of society would, indeed, set Mr. Hardesty upon a pedestal as a model American, but it is possible to look deeper into the life that Hardesty has made for himself in an attempt to classify him as a member of what some have called the “power elite”.

Using strategies similar to G. William Domhoff’s in Who Rules America? Power, Politics and Social Change, I will first gauge David Hardesty’s status as a member of the power elite of West Virginia. Secondly, I will move on to also assess the extent to which Hardesty uses his power and influence over such aspects of society as government and public opinion to make a more favorable situation for himself and other members of the power elite.

Domhoff defines a member of the power elite as one who successfully positions himself within three important spheres, namely the social upper class, the corporate community, and the policy formation organizations (2006). Members of the social upper class are identified not only by their high economic status and income, but also by their memberships in exclusive upper class clubs, societies, and educational institutions. In 2005, Hardesty’s salary as President of WVU was raised from $250,008 to $275,000 as a “reflection of the board’s endorsement of [his] outstanding and consistent performance”, and his contract was extended three years further to ensure his presidency until 2010 (Lofstead, 2005). When living in West Virginia, a state in which the United States Census reported a median household income of $31,397 in 2003, Hardesty’s yearly salary seems to put him unquestionably in the upper economic class (2004).

It does not seem, however, that Hardesty’s upper class qualifications are confined to his higher-than-average salary. Hardesty has a humble background, but came to show strong leadership qualities while in the West Virginia public education system, as evidenced by his activity in the community as an Eagle Scout (Hardesty, 2006). After graduating from WVU in 1967 as Student Body President with a degree in Political Science, Hardesty received the prestigious Rhodes Scholarship from Oxford University. While at Oxford, Hardesty pursued Philosophy, Politics, and Economics and was also a member of the Queen’s College Rowing Club. Leaving Oxford after his two-year stay, Hardesty moved on to Harvard University Law School and graduated in 1973. Later on, he returned to Oxford to gain a master’s degree in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics (Hardesty, 2006). In 1972 Hardesty became an associate and partner in the law firm of Bowles, Rice, McDavid, Graff, and Love in Charleston, WV, a position he held at two different times from 1972 to 1977 and 1981 to 1995 (Hardesty, 2006). The three years from 1977 to 1980 were spent as State Tax Commissioner under Governor John D. Rockefeller, IV (“David C.”, 2006). According to one account, “Hardesty’s legal career was wide-ranging and included considerable experience in banking, taxation, and general corporate and economic development law (“David C.”, 2006).” If Hardesty was not a member of the social upper class from birth, he has certainly worked to obtain this status.

The second sphere that Domhoff includes in his analysis of the power elite is the corporate community, as members of the social upper class oftentimes invest their wealth in business endeavors, serve on boards, and even start corporations. When this trend repeats itself across the phenomenon that is the social upper class, a network of people at the top of the socioeconomic ladder tends to form. This network is, according to Domhoff, the corporate community. The corporate community is made up of all of the corporations and for-profit organizations that tend to overlap with others by virtue of the fact that members of their boards of directors also serve on other corporations’ boards (Domhoff, 2006). Hardesty made his entrance into the publicly-traded corporate world in October of 2005 by declaring his ownership of stock in a company called CONSOL Energy, the United States’ largest producer of bituminous coal since 1927 (“History”, 2006). Currently, Hardesty directly owns 3,041 shares of CONSOL stock which is, as of September 7, 2006, worth $106,648. Hardesty’s profit on this business endeavor has, in less than a year, come to the grand total of $29,688.87 – only about $2,000 less than the median household income in West Virginia (“Insider”, 2006). Not only does he own stock, but Hardesty holds a position as one of ten board members for the company (“CONSOL”, 2006).

A quick overview of the other board members of CONSOL Energy exhibits to the fullest what Domhoff means by a networked corporate community. Every board member, with the exception of David Hardesty, is currently, or has at some time served as CEO, board member, or both, in at least one publicly traded company listed on the NASDAQ or New York Stock Exchange (“CONSOL”, 2006). These connections network CONSOL with innumerable other energy resource companies, not to mention several think-tanks, policy groups, and energy corporation organizations. Hardesty also serves on the boards of many corporations associated with WVU by virtue of his position as president. These board appointments reside in roughly six companies and corporations that include WVU Hospitals, Inc., WVU Research Corporation, WV United Health Systems, Inc., The Blanchette Rockefeller Neurosciences Institute, and the Mid-Atlantic Technology, Research, and Innovation Center (MATRIC), which is currently a tenant of the WVU Business Incubator Project (Hardesty, 2006). Certainly these facts do not imply that Hardesty is a member of the corporate community to the degree that some are, as highlighted by Domhoff, and Hardesty cannot necessarily be held in suspicion in light of appointments to boards because of his position with WVU, but the fact that Hardesty is, first of all, branching his interests and priorities into the corporate world and, secondly, associating himself and making decisions with others more-deeply embedded in the corporate community is to be both noted and strongly-considered, as these facts paint him as a member of the corporate community.

The last sphere of Domhoff’s analysis, the policy-planning sphere, looks at how a member of the social upper class serves in various foundations, think-tanks, and groups with the ability to shape public opinion and affect policy (2006). In a way similar to the study of the corporate community this unit of analysis looks at how networks are formed as one member operates in multiple arenas. Hardesty, indeed, is a member of quite a few organizations that have the power to shape economic and political policy, but in order to make this analysis of Hardesty’s involvement in these organizations helpful, I have broken his memberships into different categories based on how he came to be involved with the organizations in question. The first, most-basic forms of memberships held by Hardesty deal with the positions that arise by virtue of Hardesty’s position as President of WVU. One could surmise that the president of West Virginia’s largest institution of higher learning might have the opportunity to affect policy, researching, and funding within that institution. Currently, Hardesty holds four board memberships on committees in conjunction with WVU, including the Big East Conference, the Bowl Championship Series (BCS), the WVU Alumni Association, and the WVU Foundation, which holds assets of approximately $814 million (Hardesty, 2006). Secondly, Hardesty holds positions on boards that, essentially, hold importance for WVU, but are not necessarily associated with the university in any way. These memberships include organizations such as the American Council on Education, the National Association of College and University Attorneys, the National Association of State Universities and Land Grant Colleges, the National Security Higher Education Advisory Board, and the NCAA Task Force on the Future of Intercollegiate Athletics (Hardesty, 2006). Thirdly, Hardesty serves on the board of trustees of civic organizations, such as the National 4-H Council, and is actively involved in organizations regarding the legal profession, such as the American and West Virginian Bar Associations, and the United Methodist Church (Hardesty, 2006). A long and impressive list of prior memberships includes appointments to various state boards, scholarship committees, and the West Virginia Wesleyan College board of trustees.

Upon first glance, this rather long list of board memberships and foundational responsibilities is impressive and awesome; obviously David Hardesty is a citizen to the fullest extent of the word, operating in his community on a level that few people do. This same list, however, can be used to cement David Hardesty in yet another position - full-blown member of the power elite of West Virginia (Domhoff, 2006). G. William Domhoff would no doubt point out the journey on which Hardesty embarked that eventually landed him in the position he now enjoys. First, while Hardesty was raised in the public education system of West Virginia, he quickly raised himself above the rest and attained the prestigious Rhodes Scholarship. The move from humble backgrounds to world-renowned scholarships and universities set in motion Hardesty’s rise to the power elite. While attending Oxford and Harvard for a combined total of about ten years, Domhoff would argue that Hardesty attained exactly the connections that he needed with members of the social upper class in order to be assimilated himself. Secondly, Hardesty built for himself a rather lucrative career as a lawyer, which opened the way for his appointment to State Tax Commissioner under Rockefeller. Ties in the government and law community no doubt furthered his membership ties in the social upper class and increased the degree to which he himself held the wealth common to members of the social upper class. The third major step in Hardesty’s acquisition of the title “power elite” was his nomination to the presidency of WVU, which was likely obtained by virtue of his memberships on several college scholarship boards and trustee positions in state colleges such as West Virginia Wesleyan. His position as president has opened a variety of opportunities, such as the opportunity to purchase stock in and serve on the board of the largest coal producer in the United States, as well as the ability and, indeed, obligation to single-handedly affect the policies of the largest institution of higher learning in West Virginia. Without a doubt, then, Hardesty has obtained for himself the title of “power elite” by finding a place for himself in the social upper class, securing his membership within the corporate community with his share of ownership in one of the nation’s most important corporations, and placing himself in the position to affect the way a state thinks about higher education, research, and energy. Essentially, Hardesty built upon his experiences, letting one aspect of his life affect the others, until he grew into the power elite he is today.

The truth of this sort of synergy proves truer than dominant views of society often allow the general population to think. Again, while Hardesty’s intentions and good-nature can be taken at face value, there is value in examining the ways in which he uses his power to improve his position and create a better environment for himself. In order to examine this power structure, I will begin at the position in which Hardesty holds the most direct influence, namely West Virginia University. As president of WVU, Hardesty sits on the boards of many small corporations, foundations, and associations as a direct result of his presidency, such as the WVU Research Corporation, which holds a particularly large amount of power by virtue of its ability to add or remove funds from university research projects (Hardesty, 2006). An exhaustive list of WVU’s research programs shows that there are 12 separate research programs that explicitly work on healthcare and medicine and 4 programs that directly research the coal mining profession and the safety issues inherent therein. These 16 programs alone account for over 40% of all research programs currently funded at WVU (“Office”, 2006).

Statistics such as these, however, mean nothing until they are examined alongside the other aspects of Hardesty’s career. As such, it can be argued that, while these research programs do ultimately serve altruistic motives, they also work to watch over and safeguard other corporations, the boards of which are populated by Hardesty. Healthcare and medical research, which, it must be remembered, are among WVU’s most impressive assets benefit and ensure a future for a number of other WVU institutions, such as WVU Hospitals, Inc. and WV United Health Systems; Hardesty serves on the boards of both of these. Furthermore, WVU’s coal mining research is, in dominant thought, a reaction to the needs of West Virginia, whose economy depends upon coal and coal miners. It is no surprise, however, that this research serves to further the needs of coal corporations such as CONSOL Energy. Again, Hardesty not only sits on the board of directors of CONSOL, but also owns over 3,000 shares in the company. Another key program at WVU is the WVU Business Incubator, which serves to help budding businesses in West Virginia. One tenant business of the Incubator that stands out among the rest because of Hardesty’s position in the board of directors is the Mid-Atlantic Technology, Research, and Innovation Center (MATRIC), which serves companies by providing them with a research and development department (“Introduction”, 2006). Currently, one of the main fields of research to which MATRIC devotes itself is mining safety, which, again, seems to directly benefit not only CONSOL Energy, but WVU and Hardesty as well. CONSOL Energy, in turn, gives credit where credit is due, as several wealthy members of its board of directors regularly give campaign donations to Pro-Coal candidates and political action committees who have the power to lobby congress and ensure that government legislation regarding the future of coal production is bright (“Donor Profile”, 2006).

While no single aspect of the connections between David Hardesty’s position in the social upper class, corporate community, and policy-forming organization is wholly self-serving, it is not difficult to notice the ways in which “business as usual” benefits Hardesty time and time again. Domhoff asserts that the power elite as a unit functions in much the same way. From this assertion he develops what he calls a class-domination theory. Essentially, the class-domination theory states that the power elites of society tend to have things go their way more often than not due to the fact that they have always held a disproportionate amount of power and, as such, have constructed the status quo so as to favor themselves (Domhoff, 2006). If Domhoff’s theory is true, then one would expect to see a perpetuation of the current system of research, spending, and influence at WVU because Hardesty and the other members of the power elite that serve with him as presidents of other universities, board members of CONSOL Energy and other corporations, and leaders in the West Virginia community tend to benefit from it. And this is exactly the way it works. Rather than spending research funds on alternative energy or medicine research, WVU continues to pour money into healthcare and coal mining research that benefits only those who hold personal wealth in those professions. Rather than staying impartial in business endeavors in order to ensure the best atmosphere for education, Hardesty takes sides and buys stock in the largest coal producing company in the United States. Rather than ensuring a democratic system of government, CONSOL Energy and other corporations, for all intents and purposes, by political candidates regardless of party affiliations so that their concerns will be heard by the government. Rather than implementing and enforcing regulations that would force production corporations such as CONSOL Energy to play by rules that would have a less negative impact on the environment, government officials continued to send tons of toxins into the air and water everyday. It is easy to see that in the current system of power, the common citizen is not served; indeed, nothing seems fair. In the end, those who win, benefit, and govern are those who have been winning, getting the benefits, and governing all along (Domhoff, 2006).

Popular opinion does not support the theory articulated by Domhoff and would wonder at the alternative analysis of Hardesty’s position at WVU. Perhaps the average citizen would see it as over-critical, as an attempt to blame a hard worker for the problems of the lazy. Few are willing to listen to a class conflict theory, much less believe that it may hold some truth as to the nature of society. It turns out, however, that this unwillingness to accept the idea of class and class conflict in the United States only furthers the power of the elite few. To an extent, the average citizen may be right. It was the goal of this analysis to try and get at information that is beyond popular opinion and read between the lines so as to find connections that no one else finds. In searching for proof of the class-dominance theory I may have read too far into certain situations and connections, and I may have implied that Hardesty is to be held in disregard because of his actions. This was not my intention. Rather, I wanted to question the ways in which a man such as David Hardesty holds power by virtue of his wealth. Critical information is difficult to find, especially when researching a small-town hero like Hardesty. Hardesty has, to a large extent, been personally responsible for the recent spurt of growth and prosperity of not only WVU, but also the state of West Virginia itself. Certainly, as evident in Hardesty’s personal character, it is not his goal to exploit the system in order to better his position and gain more power at all costs, and, most likely, Hardesty is not aware of the fact that the status quo actively betters him and increases his power. The fact is, however, that no matter how altruistic Hardesty’s actions and intentions, they perpetuate the systems of oppression, poverty, and ideological hegemony that keep power concentrated within the power elite.

References

CONSOL Energy (2006). Retrieved on September 5, 2006 from the http://www.consolenergy.com/content.asp? c=BoardMembers_2004...

David C. Hardesty (2006). Retrieved on September 5, 2006 from the http://www.wvexecutive.com/whoswho/ education_ hardesty.asp

Domhoff, G.W. (2006). Who Rules America? Power, Politics, and Social Change. New York: McGraw Hill.

Donor Profile: Consol Energy, Inc. (2006). Retrieved on September 8, 2006 from the http://www.vpap.org/donors/ results_level2.cfm?Key=ORH000202718&CycleID=L&CandID=H

Hardesty, D.C. (2006). Office of the President: David C. Hardesty, Jr. Retrieved September 5, 2006 from the http://www.wvu.edu/administration/resume/index..htm

History (2006). Retrieved on September 5, 2006 from the http://www.consolenergy.com/content.asp?c=History

Insider & Form 144 Filings – Hardesty, David C. Jr (2006). Retrieved on September 5, 2006 from the http://biz.yahoo.com/t/89/5491.html

Introduction to MATRIC (2006). Retrieved on September 5, 2006 from the http://www.matric.us/about.asp

Lofstead, B. (2005). New Alumni Center Gets Nod: WVU Board OKs Faculty, Staff Salary Increases , Endorses Strategic Plan. Retrieved on September 5, 2006 from the http://www.nis.wvu.edu/2005_Releases/ sept5_bog.htm

Office of Research (2006). Retrieved on September 5, 2006 from the http://www.wvu.edu/~research/centers.htm

U.S. Census Bureau (2003). Historical Income Tables – Households. Retrieved on September 7, 2006 from the http://www.census.gov/hhes/income/histinc/h08a.html

West Virginia’s 50 Most Powerful (2006). Retrieved on September 3, 2006 from the http://www.consolenergy.com/ content.asp?c=History

A Class Background Analysis

New Kids on the Block: Questioning Societal Constructions of Ethnicity, Race, and Class

Currently, I am a 20 year old junior at West Virginia Wesleyan College, pursuing majors in Philosophy/Religion and Sociology. I am a member of the Bonner Scholars Program, the Sociology club, the Philosophy club, and the Honors Program, and also work as a research assistant at the newly-founded Institute for Social and Community Research. My family has always, from day one, supported my academic pursuits, despite the fact that they have not been able to lend much monetary support for higher education. Parents and grandparents have always told me that I would both go to and succeed in college, so long as I kept my grades up and worked hard. Money was never an issue; college was something destined to happen, it seemed. While growing up, then, I was taught not to worry about the fact that I was not as rich as some, or as privileged as some, and so forth, because striving for success would certainly bring about everything that I wanted. After all, money does not make one a better person.

Pem Davidson Buck suggests that a person’s ideas of race, class, power, and privilege in the world are directly affected by their position in relation to all of these things (Buck 2001). The idea that experiences have the ability to change perceptions is not a novel one, but it is important, nonetheless, in explaining everyday occurrences. As such, it is my goal to find out how my family, myself included, is situated in relation to race, class, power, and privilege. I want to find out how members of my family perceive these factors, how they interact with them, how they view and interact with individuals removed from their respective social standings, and how my standings in relation to race, class, and power affect my everyday views and actions. In analyzing all of these things I will employ information pulled from first-hand interviews I conducted with my father, Tom Foster, and my grandmother, Jane Hemann, as well as take a distanced look at myself in order to see how my racial, class, and ethnic backgrounds affect both my childhood and my life today. I will also use Buck’s analysis of all of these things, Worked to the Bone: Race, Class, Power, and Privilege, to supplement my study of my family’s ethnicity, class history, and current standings (2001).

My family’s ethnic background, I found, is quite diverse, but not an attribute that seems to be an issue of much meaning or pride. In speaking with my father, my oldest direct relative from his side of the family, surnames were used to try and pinpoint ethnic backgrounds. My grandmother on my father’s side, Leonna Napier, had a distant Irish heritage, but was also quite proud of the fact that her grandmother was Cherokee. My grandfather on my father’s side, Ray Marshall Foster, can only be described as coming from “English roots” (Foster 2006). Jane Hemann, my grandmother, has distinctly German heritage, as decided by the surname, but the exact time of immigration from Germany cannot be guessed. Similarly, my grandfather, Jane’s husband, Joe McColgan, has an Irish heritage, but again, it is distant (Hemann 2006). Ethnic backgrounds played little part in directly shaping the lives of my grandparents and parents and seem to have affected my life to an even smaller extent, as our heritage never caused us any ill effects or gains in society.

To say that the ethnic backgrounds of descendants further back in the timeline played no part in their lives, however, would be a drastic mistake. Immigrants coming to America from Europe, and especially Ireland, were often forced into indentured servitude (Buck 2001). As the power elite already established in America at the time worked to keep their power and the economic engine running, they were forced to make new laws concerning indentured servants so as to provide a labor force that would not end after the first generation (Buck 2001). It is safe to assume, then, that ancestors of mine coming from Europe to America, were trapped in a system of servitude for some time after arriving. Certainly this pattern of poverty and, essentially, racism was not abandoned upon escape from indentured servitude, and the cycle of judgment and poverty went on to affect subsequent generations.

Buck, however, describes several periods of change that seemingly step in to break this cycle. As poor immigrant workers from Europe and Africa began to revolt against the exploitation of the power elite a “psychological wage” began to be paid to white workers, essentially redefining racism in America (Buck 2001:87). A schism was created, then, between whites and blacks, that undoubtedly affected how my ancestors saw ethnicity, and affects how my parents and grandparents view Blacks, as well as Asian and Mexican immigrants today. While my great-grandmother on my mother’s side did not own slaves, her family did employ a number of black servants until she was a teenager. My grandmother, then, has always had the idea that she is somehow “more decent than black people,” and this ideology seems to have been passed on by her to my mother, who was always wary of my black friends in high school (Hemann 2006). My father, on the other hand, seems to have been distanced from this sort of racism, but tends to fall victim to a different sort of psychological wage, a wage that favors Americans over today’s immigrants (Buck 2001). I have heard many times from my father that Mexican illegal immigrants come to America and take jobs from hard-working Americans like himself. The result is an overall skepticism toward all Central and South Americans, not to mention Asian immigrants, coming to America in hopes of obtaining a better life. All of this, in my life, seems to have made me more aware of my own thoughts, feelings, and actions about racism in a way that fosters a move away from all sorts of racism and ethnocentricity. I can remember teachers as early as elementary school teaching the importance of diversity and acceptance and, beyond that, the idea that there is only one race, the human race. The result has been a good one, one that, in many ways lessens the degree of racism exhibited by my parents and grandparents.

More so than ethnicity, my family has been affected by class from all angles. My perception of my family before researching and interviewing was that my father’s side was rather poor while my mother’s side was relatively wealthy. Indeed, these perceptions were confirmed and to a great extent reinforced by my research. On my mother’s side, my grandfather, Joe McColgan, came from a poor, working class background. His father had a “good job that paid well with the railroad” as a blacksmith (Hemann 2006). This “good job” was off-set, however, by his relatively large family, in which he was the youngest of ten children. My grandmother, Jane Hemann-McColgan, came from a relatively wealthy family. Her father worked as a masonry contractor and her mother, who came from an exceptionally wealthy family, raised chickens to supplement their income. My grandmother describes herself as moving from the middle class to poor upon marrying my grandfather, as the two of them worked hard to make it on their own, receiving $40 a week each (Hemann 2006). Times became a little more difficult when Grandma became pregnant with my mother and she was forced to quit her job. My grandfather then decided to go to school while working, obtained a degree from Marshall University, and entered into a management position at a steel fabrication plant in Huntington, WV. Upon obtaining the job, my mother’s family was set firmly in a middle class position. According to my grandmother, they “weren’t rich, but got along just fine” (Hemann 2006). My mother, Cindy McColgan, was raised in this setting, then – not rich, but certainly not poor.

My father, on the other hand, seems to have come from a family in which poverty was a given. His mother, Leonna Napier, was raised in a poor family that employed subsistence farming for food and co-owned a timber mill that was used to pay for goods that could not be made or grown. She, also, was the youngest of ten children. Not much is known about my grandfather, Ray Foster, and his life, but upon marrying my grandmother, they lived a middle class lifestyle. Ray worked at a factory in Huntington that manufactured car bumpers, supplying more than enough for their three kids. My grandfather was an alcoholic, however, and divorced my grandmother when my father was six years old, leaving her to support herself and her three children. This change, my father described, left them among the poorest of the poor (Foster 2006). Grandma worked for two or three years as a waitress at multiple restaurants in an effort to make ends meet, but in the end she was forced to drop all of these jobs because of an injury she received in a car wreck at age 16. Eventually, my dad’s family began receiving welfare, which my grandmother received until she died. My father began working as soon as he could to help the family, which seems to have developed a great work ethic and anti-consumerist attitude in him.

When my parents married, they experienced what I am sure many newly wedded couples experience, namely a rough period, financially speaking, when it is difficult to make ends meet. My dad worked, in the beginning, at the steel fabrication plant that my grandfather managed, and my mother began working clerical, secretarial jobs, with brief periods of schooling interspersed. When the financial outlook became brighter, I was born, followed by my brother three years later. Despite the fact that things seemed to be going well, my parents instantly clashed due to the fact, my father asserts, that they were raised differently in respect to how money should be managed. “Your mother,” my father states, “wanted to have everything that your grandparents had as soon as we got married,” and this led to many problems in their marriage (Foster 2006). This apparently became too much to bear and my mother filed for divorce and custody of my brother and I when I was seven years old.

In the introduction to her book, Buck writes about the “view from under the sink,” an analogy used to express the idea that one’s perceptions change depending on which end of the drainage system one is on (2001:2). While it is difficult to find correlations between my family history and the analogy as Buck uses it to describe the labor system, it is helpful in understanding the different views that my family holds about class. It is safe to say that several times my parents and grandparents experienced periods of change as far as class standing goes. My father and his mother both lived lives almost entirely filled with poverty, experiencing brief periods of relative fortune, while my mother and her mother both lived lives of relative fortune, with brief periods of poverty when newly married. While all members of my family have at one time or another experienced periods in which they were forced to take on a different view, these times seem to have strengthened negative opinions about those outside of their respective classes rather than producing a more sympathetic and understanding attitude.

This phenomenon may be explained by a couple of the ideas that Buck explores in her analysis. First, Buck refers to what she calls a “definition of consumerism and domesticity as morality,” that describes the way many producers and members of the power elite created a system in which those who did not have the means to buy and consume were not considered morally equal with those who could (2001:135). Indeed, those who could not provide new, stylish clothes and complete, nutritious meals for their families and children were seen as morally reprehensible. Secondly, in an effort to promote “true Americanism” in the earlier half of the 20^th Century, the KKK helped develop a definition of what effectively became known as “white trash” (Buck 2001:146). Essentially, this definition meant that those who could not provide for their families and children were not only morally deficient, but also biologically lacking. While it is both difficult and painful to think that members of my own family, my parents and grandparents, would embrace these ideas, it seems to be the case.

My father describes himself as “poor working class” and defines the class structure in America as one containing four classes: lower class, working class, middle class, and upper class (Foster 2006). In a sort of self-serving bias, dad asserts that the working class keeps America going. The lower class drains the economy while the middle and upper classes succeed only in trying to find tax breaks and wasting money as ardent consumers (Foster 2006). Experiencing to the fullest extent the life of poverty in the U.S., my father recalls painfully what it was like to be on welfare as a child. “It bothered me,” he says, “because people looked down on us” (Foster 2006). He remembers the looks that he would get from cashiers at grocery stores when he paid for bread and milk with stamps and having to wear clothes and shoes that did not fit him while he was growing up. Many people singled out and stigmatized my dad and his family, and he seems to have taken this stigmatization upon himself, condemning himself for his situation. Indeed, definitions constructed by the powerful in society carry a great amount of power. In many ways I can empathize with the treatment that my dad received growing up. “It’s different now,” dad says referring to welfare, “people are more accepting,” but he seems, overall, to have a negative attitude toward those unable to escape those that society continually pushes to the side, those perpetually members of the lower class (Foster 2006).

Not only did my father’s peers look down on him and his family, but my mother’s side of the family also passed what seems to me to be an unfair amount of judgment. Despite the efforts of my grandmother to support my father and her other kids, my grandmother on my mother’s side says of her, “she wasn’t of much account” (Hemann 2006). My mother, I remember, specifically called my aunts “white trash” because of the fact that they could not afford to provide their children with the best of things and had bouts with welfare themselves. In fact, I remember that this dislike of my father’s family by my mother went so far that she would not visit my grandmother with me when I was young.

When my parents divorced, then, they were on an equal playing field; essentially, they were both poor and bankrupt. My father immediately returned to live with his mother and help with the bills while my mother continued to try and support my brother and me in the house that we couldn’t afford when my father was contributing 100% of his paycheck. It would seem that when they split, my father once again donned his label of “white trash”, not wishing to hurt his situation any further, and continued to live a life devoid of consumerism in order to get some sort of financial freedom, while my mother tried once again to stay above societal labels and provide her family with things that would pass us off as “normal” and “good” (Buck 2001).

My brother and I lived with my mom, and we experienced financial trouble regularly. I specifically remember having to lie to bill collectors who called from time to time and speaking with the tow truck operator when he came to repossess my mother’s car. We moved many times, as I understand now, to avoid the fact that mortgage payments were many months past due. In the meantime, my father worked with a local labor union and had work spuriously. I kept close contact with my father, and as I matured, the differences between my mother and father became increasingly apparent in my understanding. My father preferred to live far below his means, while my mother seems to have felt that she could continue living above hers. It was always surprising to me, but my mother always looked down on my father for the way that he constantly denied himself simple amenities, such as credit cards and new cars in order to continue living below his means, because it made him appear “lower class.” As I mentioned before, my parents also differed when it came to racial and ethnic understandings as well. I grew up constantly comparing my mother to my father and vice versa, and I always found that my father’s way of life made more sense because it was based on rational decision making, not a sense of “how things should be.” I received two very different pictures of life from my parents, and this has had a profound effect on the way I live now.

As such, I do not consider myself particularly materialistic and have always tried to work hard to get ahead. After all, I was told from the first day of kindergarten that I would attend college. I began working as soon as I was allowed and was working full-time most weeks while finishing my senior year of high school. As mentioned before, I experienced my own ridicule from classmates who felt themselves somehow better than me because of their position in society, but I must admit that I have played the part of the ridiculer as well. Similarly, I would like to think myself a great humanitarian as one who believes in equality and the like, but I wonder, after taking a distanced look at my daily actions, whether I am all that I make myself out to be. I do not have many black or Asian or Indian friends and I seem to have a general apprehension when it comes to even approaching members of a race different than mine. Perhaps, then, ideas of racial inequality and class superiority are more deeply embedded in my consciousness than I would ever like to think. All of these things, however, make me all the more eager in my everyday life to change not only myself but the world around me.

My brother and I now live with my father, who has “worked his hind end off” to get us “out of the hole”, which serves as yet another testament to the ways in which society looks down upon those who cannot make ends meet (Foster 2006). I am currently experiencing the greatest prosperity of my life, but my father has worked hard to get us here. Aside from providing his support to my brother and me through his hard work, he has also allowed us to see a way of life that makes me constantly question the way I live. While I do not agree with all that my father does, the fact that he lived his life in a way different from my mother allowed me to see early on that there was no rule that structured my life for me, but that I was free to choose for myself the right way to live. My parents, rather intentional or not, have allowed me to see that things are not always as they seem, that there are unseen factors operating in the lives of all people, as Buck argues. I have, therefore, especially in my years as a college student, been receptive to different opinions and ways of life, and adjusted my life upon finding a truer and more perfect way to go. I identify myself with a small group of people willing to do the same. If this world is to survive, work must be done to destroy the effects of constructions such as race and class. I have tried to question everything. And I am still questioning.

Bibliography

Buck, Pem D. 2001. Worked to the Bone: Race, Class, Power, and Privilege in Kentucky. New York: Monthly Review Press.

Foster, George T. 2006. “First-hand interview over phone by author.” Buckhannon, West Virginia, September 23.

Hemann, Jane E. 2006. “First-hand interview over phone by author.” Buckhannon, West Virginia, September 25.