NPR Crapiness - "woman killed self & child in my house--why'd she do...

[AP]

...this to me?"

On Morning Edition on the 16th, I heard an appalling story which sums up NPR for me. NPR's mission seems to be to encourage the shallowness, and self-centeredness, and the greed of upper middle-class white America. I think if you think it's all about you, you forget important thing like, that our government is making lots of people miserable. It makes people care less about society and politics. Focussing on the interior and yourself, I believe, is an extremely conservative impulse.

The story was,
'No Place Like Home': Reclaiming a 'Haunted' House

From the NPR web site's discription of the story, :NPR's Susan Stamberg continues her "No Place Like Home" series with the tragic story of Howard Norman and Jane Shore's home. Last summer, the poet and author left their home to an acquaintance, who later killed herself and her young son. Norman and Shore tell Stamberg what it was like to return home.

The Shore's read from their poems about how mad they were about what happened to them. There's a recurring line in one of their poems: "This was not our story, it was yours," which the Shores explain with the introductory line, "Not that you don't want to empathize..." Well, they clearly don't.

Not only don't they empathize in this story, but they name drop, telling us what "our dear friend David Mamet," told them, just to remind us what's really important in life (ie, that's it's not what you know about how other people experience life in America, it's WHO you know).

Mamet actually sounds like a decent person in this story (and you have to wonder what he's doing hanging around with the Shores). Mamet, using allegory to help them get a little perspective, told them, as Mr Shore relates, that, "if you see a house on fire, you're not allowed to be glad it's not your house if you're a good person." Mr Shore intereprets this story as Mamet telling him that, in a situation like this, you should "comport yourself with dignity."

Mamet should have made it more plain for this self-centered a couple: if a women murders her child and commits suicide in your house, you're not allowed to call NPR and tell them about how it made you mad, and how it's all about you, and read your poems about what it did to you.

[LiberalBushFan]

1. David Mamet the script writer?

the man who brought such disasters as "Heist" and "The Spanish Prisoner"? WORST writer ever.

[Fridays Child]

115. And he isn't just a friend. In true name-dropping style...

...he is a "dear friend."

This sort of blot-out-the-sun egotistical display makes me embarrassed for NPR.

[BigMcLargehuge]

2. I was listening last night to an interview with the

head of the North Sea Museaum, the largest Aquarium in Denmark, and one of the largest in Europe, if not the world... They suffered a catastrophic fire two days ago and many species of fish on exhibit there but nowhere else are either already dead or in terrible jeopardy.

I guess the interviewer NEVER visisted an aquarium because she was an idiot. Her line of inquiry was like:

Are the fish okay?
How do you know the fish aren't okay?
Can you see the fish from outside?
How come the fire hurt the fish?
Why did the fish die in the catastrophic fire?
The tank is leaking?
How do you know the tank is leaking?
The fire was bad?
How do you know the fire was bad?
Are you upset?

I wanted to reach through the radio and slap her. The biologist who's made The North Sea Museaum his life's work sounded absolutely despondent, but she didn't even how he was coping with the loss of the aquarium. Nothing.

It's the worst interview I've ever heard.

[AP]

3. That's sort of the opposite of my complaint about the Shores.

[BigMcLargehuge]

5. just another complaint about NPR though

and indicative of the problem with the network. As a whole they play to the center right upper middle class white people. Just look at how many goddamn Jazz themed shows they have on. Not that Jazz is music of and for white people, but they guys they present and the music they feature is the same crap you can hear in expensive Jazz bars in the white part of town. That sort of crap plays to the same group of upper middle class white people that read the turgid fiction they discuss.

You are correct though, they do focus virtually every non-political story on feel-good crap from upper middle class people.

[AP]

8. Yeah.

I guess caring more about fish than people would be right up NPR's alley.

[Logansquare]

76. Yeah, my husband calls it "schmazz"

Music for cigar bars...

[Mercurius]

79. I thought I was the only one

that had noticed that about NPR.

As a whole they play to the center right upper middle class white people.

I agree. That's why they just have feel good PR crap all the time.

[Bertha Venation]

20. was it one of the two new ATC anchors?

They are both lousy interviewers, IMHO.

[cprise]

4. That is so NPR

I'll never forget the time they compared Eminem hate lyrics with "feminist-themed" (anti-white-male) songs and how the radio is rife with them; The example they used was a song where a woman wanted to kill her husband for cheating on her (the song was not directed against "men", but a particular person). They don't even understand stereotypes and discrimination.

I think NPR is upscale and novel.
And that's about it.

[BiggJawn]

6. Let me guess-"ATC", last segment before the top of the hour?

I want to pull the radio out of my dash and throw it when I hear that Yuppie-whining agnst drivel they put on in the last segment before the top of the hour.
Last year, it was the weekly report from some alleged psychiatrist who would spend 5 minutes or so free-associating about her "golden child" and the scary people they'd see on the subway and other crap that made me yell "You wanna see something scary? It's raining. I can hardly see the tailights in front of me. There's no place to safely pull over!"...
Yeah, the "Rich Man's Burden"...

I HATE those stories.

[AP]

7. Shockingly, no. Morning Edition! That ATC-feeling is bleeding into ME.

Isn't that sick? They are really pushing the whining, "oh, it's so hard to be middle class" drivel on ATC is sick.

It breeds a perspective that is shocking. I mean, even Dr Phil is willing to do a story about a couple with so many kids that they risk slipping from middle class to poverty if they don't get some help. And how 'bout COPS where you get to see a 19 year old latina in school who still has to consider prostitution because she's so poor.

Both of those shows have their own problems, but, compared to NPR, they're llike looking at Dorothea Lange photographs.

[Ardee]

9. gee an attack on liberal radio

where oh where have I seen this before? Oh well, I happen to listen almost exclusively to NPR (KQED). I find them to be scrupulously fair in their attempts to bring all sidesof an issue to the debate. I find their programming to be rather varied as well. I heard that story about the murder suicide and its affect upon the homeowners and somehow it didnt evoke a diatribe against the entire NPR system or policies.

Perhaps you prefer Michael Savage, Rush Limbaugh, Clear Channel radio and the like, as for myself Ill stick with NPR, but thanks anyway.

[AP]

10. ME and ATC, when they spin right (eg, Mara Liason, Cokie Roberts, etc.) is

MORE dangerous thatn Fox, Rush, CC, etc., because at least with the latter they wear their bias on their sleeve. With NPR, it has an undeserved imprimatur of neutrality and a veneer of rich people thinking it's good.

Do you understand what's so ridiculous about the story I'm talking about?

No matter where you get your information, it's always smart to turn on your bullshit detector.

And to think that the right wouldn't try to influence NPR is ridiculous. They reach 10 million people a day. The right has taken over everything else. They're not about to leave NPR to the liberals, or to people who just want to provide the facts.

[midnight armadillo]

21. Corporate sponsorship

How about those corporate 'extended underwriter credits' (aka ADS)? To think that support from upright corporate citizens such as ADM doesn't influence them is self-delusion.

The rest of their support comes from upper-middle class white folks. The same people that are managers at those sponsoring companies. No wonder their coverage is slanted.

I'm still waiting for a labor-oriented counterpart to the "Marketplace" show to come on NPR.

[chimpymustgo]

52. AP, I heard that sick story the other morning. I was aghast.

What was this CRAP doing on my radio? Who gives a pickle? Thank you for identifying the upper middle class white (donor) me me me, bs.

[AP]

63. thanks for the support.

I'm surprised by the amount of hostility here on this thread.

[BigMcLargehuge]

11. the same 'liberal radio' that gets their morning political commentary

from Cokie Roberts? Employs both conservative pundits Juan Williams and Mara Liasson? Lets Daniel Schorr refer to Shrub as "Hero President" virtually everytime he speaks about him?

Yeah, NPR is better than Fox, it caters to the same folks who would watch Fox if they earned only 25K a year.

[Suspicious]

18. You know you need to be wary

when they mention their sponsors at a certain point in the programming and you hear "Microsoft"...

[Ernesto]

12. Thanks Ardee, for speaking out

against this waste of time thread.

[AP]

13. Waste of time? I like NPR. I listen to it all the time. I never turn off

the BS detector, however.

And if you think this NPR STORY wasn't a waste of time, then listen to it and make an argument about it.

[AP]

14. No alternate theories?

[Ernesto]

128. Get a life, you might enjoy it!

[AP]

131. I enjoy exercising my critical faculties.

I enjoy having an informed opinion.

I enjoy not being a tool.

[Isome]

15. Speaking of threads...

This is a good one!

It requires thinking beyond which candidate we want to win. Instead, it prompts us to engage in introspection, and perhaps a re-examination of why we, our neighbors, or friends hold the beliefs we/they do. That would lead us to a greater understanding of the way we feel about some political issues, which in turn compels us to become more cognizant of the way our respective candidates intend to represent us.

Great use of a thread AP... well done!

[Ardee]

65. not a waste of time

if this was reaching the directors of NPR which it isnt. I am more than puzzled at this diatribe against the best of the lot on our airwaves though.

Sometimes idealism omits hard realities, such as the fact that NPR is dependent upon the checks we all write to support them. Their programming is ,by the necesity of mass appeal, broad based and occasionaly irrelevant to some. Given the number of shows they have done on corporate excess I wonder at the inferences of some here(most actually)that they lean towards placating these corporations. I have listened to NPR for a decade or more and I do not believe that this has merit.

So all those who rail against NPR programming are certainly free to find a better source of independant news and unbaised opinions, in fact I dare you to do so! They have some of the finest on air people in all of radio and TV and that is the absolute truth.

[AP]

80. Are things so bad that we have to ignore obvious BS just because NPR's

clears a very low bar for passable journalism? I don't think so.

It isn't MASS APPEAL that NPR's responding to. There's nothing inherently massively appealing about trying to affrim among middle class people that they're emotions are the most importnat thing in the world.

Here's what's conservtive about NPR acting like the most important thing to do when someone commits suicide in your house is to indulge in your selfishness: because it makes you think it's not the government business to stop making people's lives miserabel.

I think the Arlie Hochschild interview at Buzzflash sums this up pretty well:

Hochschild: Bush is the upper-class mess-up who ends up on top anyway. It is subliminal: If you mess up, don't worry. The reason that becomes important, I think, is that we live in a culture of individualism. And if you lose a job, it's your fault you lost the job. It's your credit if you do well, and your fault if you do badly. And so for him to be the mess-up that gets ahead anyway is sort of an end-run around this whole burdensome ideology of individualism.


If NPR is so critical of corporations, why do they have, literally, DOZENS of shows that that give voice to the interests of capital and management, but NOT A SINGLE show which gives voice to the concerns of labor?

I'm not saying that everything NPR does is bad. I'm just saying that when it is bad, it's worth noting. This story was definitely BS. I'll give you another example: Weekend Edition once did a story on an independent toy manufacturer. The reporter's angle was basically that this small, independently onwned toy manufacture plugged away but had a hard time competing with larger toy companies. The reporter gave as a reason for their problem competing several explanations. One theory that was emphasized was the expense of having to protect against product liability claims. The reporter than asked the owner of the company about product liability claims to which the owner replied, "it's no worse than anyone else." My interpretation was that this quote TOTALLY contradicted the reporters claim immediately before the quote, but I realize the reporter was trying to create the impression that ALL manufactures have a HUGE problem with product liability claims. It's a total lie.

Why does any small company have a problem competiting with huge corporations in America? Well, our tax code burdens small companies way more than large companies. Larger companies lobby the government for special treatment in every area of business. Because monopolistic synergy is the halmark of late 20th and 21st century American "capitalism."

Product liability is (as the owner of this small company noted) not the reason they couldn't compete. The Weekend Edition reporter, by lying in the process of giving voice to capital, is giving BIG capital a very generous heap of helpful propaganda.

Please tell me you understand how this works. Do you think I should ignore this just because a lot of middle class people like the way the feel when they listen to NPR? I'mm supposed to ignore crap like that just because, other than Democracy, Now!, it's the best of bad bunch?

I don't think so. Don't forget: there are no sacred cows in the media. It's always smart to be a critical thinker.

As for this thread not reaching NPR directors, I don't know. However, I think Susan Stamberg is posting down below under an assumed identity.

[BiggJawn]

25. Must be out for coffee when Mara and Cokie come on, eh?

BTW, I hardly call critiscm an "attack", but I guess I'm just not "sensitive" enough.

Sorry, not buying it. Everything is not OK, and I will not "remain calm" no matter how long you stand in the middle of the street yelling it.

[Ardee]

66. well someone is yelling any way

get this straight your testosterone induced twaddle doesnt impress me at all. I am in no way bothered by NPR shows portraying centrist views, and apparently ,considering those supporting the centrist Dean, neither are many others.

If your debating techniques must include rudeness then please just do not respond to my posts.Having a differing view is not a crime nor is it an opportunity to display childishness instead of thoughtful discourse on the subject.

[BiggJawn]

72. Uh, did you mean to respond to someone else instead of me?

Because I fail to see the "testsoterone" in my previous "Twaddle", and if you think my reference to you being out for Coffee was "rude" I would like to offer you a golden opportunity to REALLY experience what I'm like when I'm intentionally being rude.

And a differing view not being a crime goes BOTH ways, Ardee.
But you bring up something interesting. I don't have a problem with "centrist" views on NPR, bt let me ask you this, if one with dirty hands could be so bold as to address someone as learned as you:
What about those occassions when NPR seems to be shilling for the GOP, or do you mentally tune out the mouthings of Cokie, Mara, and Juan?

Sorry if this isn't as polished as you'd like to see, but my Po' White Trash background didn't include training in the finer points of debate.

[Ardee]

73. opinions etched in stone tablets are not open to debate

so i wont try. Your response to me:

BTW, I hardly call critiscm an "attack", but I guess I'm just not "sensitive" enough.

Sorry, not buying it. Everything is not OK, and I will not "remain calm" no matter how long you stand in the middle of the street yelling it.

...is both childish and insulting and your retreat to some mythic "poor white trash" BS dont fly buddy.If you think you are being cute, you aint. If you think I am going to continue to debate one who insults and then calls a response to an insult an insult then you are very,very wrong...bye now.

P.S. Im too busy listening to "Who's Line is it Anyhow" ......

[AP]

81. You aren't going to answer the question re Liason, Roberts and Williams,

are you?

[BiggJawn]

84. Maybe after "Who's line is it"

But I wouldn't hold my breath.

Obviously I bore the dear lad.

[BiggJawn]

83. I'm very glad you feel insulted.

The feeling's mutual.
BTW, you didn't answer my question about Cokie, Mara, and Juan.

[Suspicious]

16. I heard this, too,

and I was incredulous at the self-centered, uncompassionate attitude of this couple. They came across as clueless, heartless highbrows - and the poetry bit added insult to injury. The impersonality of the entire segment was breathtaking.

[Cheswick2.0]

17. I can understand why this upsets you

But I can also feel sorry for these people. I would consider someone commiting murder and suicide in my house as a somewhat hostile act. I have felt suicidal in the distant past, I would not do this to someone. But then the woman obviously wasn't thinking of anything but her own pain when she killed her child and herself.

Yes, society must change to take care of people like this woman and help them out of their lousy lives. I can also feel sorry for these people, someone really did invade their life in a very lasting way. I hope friends like Mamet can continue to help them to try and see the big picture. Maybe they can set up a memorial of some sort that helps them take control of their greif rather than reacting to it.

[AP]

28. If it had been murder only, I could understand anger. However, this woman

was clearly disturbed. This was a great tragedy for a lot of people other than the Shores and it might have been preventable. Feeling like your house has been soiled is a shockingly selfish response. These are the kind of people who are offended by the sight of homeless people, I presume.

http://www.buzzflash.com/interviews/03/12/int03326.html

This is the Buzzflash interview with that Berkeley sociologist who talks (I believe--i've only scanned the article) about how making everything about hurt feelings ignores the fact that there social causes for problems and that society and government has a little responsibility for making sure there isn't a ton of misery in the world, and actually has some capacity to solve social problems through ACTIONS.

If we look at peoples' problems and think the response is to write poetry about how WE feel after we get back from a VT vacations, and after talking to (but not listening to) their famous friends, then, well, we might as well tell Democrats we don't need them.

Incidentally, when Howard Dean says the last frontier for dealing with civil rights is by addressing subconscious feelings, he's talking about people like the Shores.

[Cheswick2.0]

53. AP, it does no good to look at this from one angle only

1) Yes this woman was disturbed and made a choice that was only about her and her feelings.
2) You don't really know if these people understand or do anything about societies larger problems. You have simply latched onto the idea that because these people are selfish and uncaring because they wrote a poem about a perfectly understandable feeling. You accuse them of exactly what you are guilty of.. the inability to understand or care about other people's phsychic struggle.


PS... quoting Dean doesn't help you win your point with me. Unlike some people, I don't generally let other people run my brain. I have no problem with what Dean said. I just don't think it changes my position.
You said above that you assume they are offended by the sight of homeless people. That is quite an assumption. You base your whole opinion of them on one interview. Then you refuse to understand their very natural feelings of betrayal at someone using their home this way, forcing them to live with the memories. How sensitive is that?

[AP]

118. My referring to Dean is not something I'm doing casually.

I think there is a very close connection to the emotions to which Dean tries to appeal when he says that subconscious FEELINGS are the final frontier in race relations, and when NPR tells us that when a woman kills herself and child, the most important thing is the FEELINGS of people at the near periphery to those miserable lives.

The government can and should solve some of these problems and make sure that people get to freely exercise their civil rights, and get good health care. NPR is trying to convince people that the we're individuals who succeed or fail because of what we do, and that we don't need government or society to get ahead. That way, when we look at Bush's wealth and power and our poverty, we pretend it's somethign that was earned, rather than legislated.

[Bertha Venation]

19. Sounds like you should say this to Susan Stamberg.

Did you send these comments to NPR?

[AP]

29. Not yet. However, I welcome it if others would cut and paste it

and send it to the omnibous.

I've sent countless letters to the omnibous complaigning of things exactly like this, and the omnibous NEVER responds to them in his regular column. They do note when they get a ton of responses to a specific show however.

[Plaid Adder]

22. Here's my "white professional self-pity" NPR rant. Enjoy.l

To show that this is not necessarily a recent phenomenon...

About...let's see, 6 or 7 years ago there was this guy who had been an assistant professor at Columbia who wrote a book about what happened to him after he didn't get tenure and couldn't get another academic job. Ultimately, he became a house painter. The idea of a white male who had once been a professional being 'forced' to work with his hands was apparently horrifying and sensational enough to sell his book.

Being in graduate school at the time, I read the excerpt from his book that was printed in the NYT magazine and got appalled. It sounded to me as if he was so wrapped up in his own sense of entitlement and his identity as a yuppie that he basically made his family miserable. Instead of, say, trying to get a job in a different profession (which most of my friends in graduate school ended up doing when they couldn't get academic jobs) he became obsessed with getting another academic job to the point where he was out of work for months because nothing was coming open and nothing else would do. During this period, apparently, he fantasized about finding other ways of supporting the family in particularly melodramatic self-dramatizing ways, such as selling one of his younger children into slavery.

My amazement at watching this doctorate-holding homeowning white guy recast himself as the protagonist of *The Good Earth* or one of those other third-world dirt-poor watching-my-children-starve type heroines was compounded when I heard him interviewed on NPR. He came across as exactly as self-absorbed, bitter, and convinced of his own entitlement as the book excerpt suggested. What was weirder to me was that nobody called him on it. Nobody even pointed out, for instance, that he was not as he put it 'laid off,' he just didn't get tenure--something that happens to a lot of people, and which happens to virtually *every* assistant professor who's ever hired at Columbia. So he coudln't get another academic job. They're hard to come by, pal. This justifies all this bitching and moaning and melodrama?

Plus, is it the worst fate in the world to become a house painter? I have a friend from grad school who married a plumber. We all thought it was a fabulous match. Plumbers make good money, will always have work, and they can fix stuff for you around the house. Yeah, the job doesn't do much in terms of encouraging the life of the mind, but you can generally knock off around 5:00, which leaves you plenty of time for reading on your own, right?

But no, the interviewer just sat there encouraging him to complain.

And they wonder why our country is screwed up. No class-consciousness, anywhere, plus you have everyone giving a grown man positive reinforcement for acting like a two-year-old when the system takes his toy away.

Yeesh,

The Plaid Adder

[AP]

30. Whenever a white man falls from the top to the bottom of the ladder, NPR

and the NY Times treat it as front page news. They can't believe this would happen in our society. I think it's front page news when so many people who aren't white can get their foot on the first rung.

NPR, however, treats poverty like it's fun, so long as you didn't start off rich. They do a whole series on bad jobs and the only one that made it sound like it sucked was one about a single mother in Maine, but they ran that one during National Marriage Week and ran a story after it talking about how unmarried people are poorer than married people, implying that this poor, unhappy woman should just get married.

Also, I remember the story you talk about and I was similarly appalled.

If white America's sense of entitlement isn't fulfilled...well, I guess it's news.

[Retrograde]

33. "Nickel and Dimed"

I wonder if that's why Nickel and Dimed was so popular. I have mixed feelings about(Been there, done that, as did most of my acquaintances)

However, a friend who had a fairly privileged upbringing thought it was the most amazing revelation - she didn't realize that there were real people in these jobs were just about getting by!

To get back on the topic of NPR: the two things that annoy me the most are their East Coast bias - if it happens in NYC or DC it must be important - and the crappy, hissy sound I get on my car radio. I stopped listening mainly because it's hard to understand with all the ssses buzzy.

linda

[AP]

34. kick.

[QC]

43. Here's an interesting article from the British press about

writers who "slum" in order to tell about the lives of the poor.

Lady Bountiful tries life in the slums

Here's a key passage:

We know that the gap between "rich and poor" has grown in recent years: yet this gap is rarely framed in terms of class, which would be to acknowledge the cultural and psychological differences that help perpetuate it. Polly Toynbee can try out being poor, but she can't try out being working class; her middle-classness is built into the very fact that she feels her activities and what she has to say matter.

I tend to agree with the argument, that it's not such a bad thing for people to do this, but that it might be far more interesting to hear from the poor themselves, who still have very little voice in the "mainstream" media.

[eileen_d]

114. Nickel and Dimed! Yes!

I was definitely NOT the target audience for that book, which I admit I only read for 30 minutes during a looong wait for a prescription refill. But most of what I saw made me roll my eyes, as a worker of both shit and non-shit jobs.

As for NPR... I used to listen when I had a long commute in Seattle, to the NPR affiliate that had all talk and no jazz/classical. The NPR affiliate where I live now seems to be all jazz ("schmazz") and classical, neither type of music is enjoyable to me, in fact classical music makes me grind my teeth. So that's that.

[QC]

36. AP, you're talking more about class entitlement than race entitlement.

Like you, I have grown tired of these tearjerkers in places like Salon and the Times about professionals who have had to suffer the indignity of manual labor. Yes, it really is bad that these couples used to make $300k together and now have had to give up the McMansion and Lexus and take jobs painting houses and the like. Seriously, I really am sorry for them. They got shafted. But there are plenty of people in this country who have never had a shot at anything but menial labor and know better than to expect anything different.

The thing is, I think the attitude we're seeing here is class entitlement. The unemployed former miners in Appalachia that were profiled in the Boston Globe a few weeks ago, whose life expectancy is dropping to around 50 thanks to lack of access to health care, drug addiction, the daily stress of extreme poverty, etc. are not the ones who feel entitled to yuppie status. They know that the establishment couldn't care less about people like them. You'll probably never see them complaining about some inconsiderate person who had the unmitigated gall to leave a bloody mess in their rental house.

Likewise, those people who just lost their jobs when PillowTex closed in North Carolina, many of them white, do not have the sense of entitlement that this NPR story assumes. I come from generations of people like them, and I can assure you that these people do not have half the sense of entitlement that my affluent students have. You want to see real entitlement? Talk to a rich, white college kid who was set for life the moment he was conceived.

Not all white people are middle class, and I think it's best to call bourgeois entitlement what it is, rather than lump the Appalachian poor in with the McMansion set simply because they're both white.

Class still matters in this country. If anything, given Bush's campaign to turn America into a feudal society, I think class matters more now than ever.

[AP]

37. I agree that this is a class issue in reality. But I'm...

saying that NPR and the New York Times play it out as a race and class issue, because the Republicans are trying to appeal to white people's sense that the white man is the victim of all these changes in society that the Republicans don't actually want to improve with having better, fairer policies.

It's all in this article: http://www.buzzflash.com/interviews/03/12/int03326.html

Everything I've been saying about gender, race and class since Jan 2001 is in this article. This article explains why NPR does what it does with these shows.

[QC]

40. You know, I read that interview, and found it interesting in some ways

but lacking in others.

I won't go into a lot of detail. Suffice it to say that I would be much more impressed if this sociologist had actually gone out and asked some real, live blue-collar white guys why they vote as they do.

Without some real connection to its subject, the article strikes me as something a bright, middle-class student might write for an introductory gender studies class. Perhaps that's just because I'm an academic and thus hear people blaming the patriarchy for stuff every day--it just doesn't have much impact on me anymore. Perhaps it's because I come from the class under discussion here and am thus sensitive to generalizations about it. (Like the business about blue-collar men wanting their women to be dishrags. The blue-collar women I grew up with are actually far tougher than the pampered middle-class men and women I work with now in the so-called ivory tower. They have to be. They also know better than to think that the world owes them anything, unlike the unemployed Texas yuppies who have been appealing to local charities for help with their $4,000 house payments, club dues, and private school tuition.)

Again, I don't disagree that gender plays a role here. I just tend to be suspicious of people who try to explain complex things by resorting to simple explanations.

But my main point, which I'm happy to know you agree with, is that what we so often call "white entitlement" is really "middle-class white entitlement." There's a big difference, and I wish we on the Left were more willing to talk openly about class, because Lord knows the Right is very well aware of the reality of class.

[AP]

41. UC Berkeley has high standards for their faculty. I believe this woman

has written at least two books. She's not a "bright, middle class student" writing a paper for an introductory class.

And she is relying on extensive surveys of blue-collar, working class people explaining why they vote the way they do.

This article is right on about what Bush is trying to do, and how he does it with policies and through cultural tools.

[QC]

42. I guess it's a difference in perspective.

Since I spend most of my working time around people who have degrees from elite institutions and write lots of books, and have found some of them to be brilliant scholars and some to be intellectual mediocrities who are good at playing the game, I tend not to be so dazzled by credentials alone.

As I said, I don't dismiss what she's saying out of hand, and I don't doubt her intelligence, sincerity, or scholarly ability. I just think that things are more complex than the interview implies, and I am especially sensitive to the way we tend to discuss the working class at DU--as some distant and strange subculture on the fringes of civilization.

At any rate, I agree with your critique of NPR. I've been bothered for years by the way that so much of their programming presupposes an affluent, white view of the world.

[AP]

44. Do you work at a university as good as Berkeley?

Berkeley has a committiment to these issues that is really unsurpassed by any other university in the country. They take their mission very seriously, and it's reflected in the quality of the faculty.

Do you think that working with academics might be giving a reverse prejudice that makes you less likely to accept this woman's argument? Perhaps if she were not an academic, you take her arguments more seriously?

I think if you take another look, you'll see that your concern above is addressed -- she's actually relying on what blue-collar workers have said about themselves. Her theories didn't come out of nowhere. And, for all we know, she's from a working class background, which would explain her peculiar insight.

I think what she has said is a brilliant summation (emphasis on summation) of what's been going on the last 3 years.

Regardless, I'm glad we agree about what NPR's doing.

[QC]

46. Why so combative?

I also have great respect for Berkeley and what she is doing. But, as you point out, my own work has probably made me somewhat cautious about what happens when academics deal with class.

There are some good reasons for that. The academy is actually a highly class-rooted institution, despite the conviction of most of its members that it is a pure meritocracy. (I can recommend two great books dealing with this: This Fine Place So Far from Home: Voices of Academics from the Working Class and Strangers in Paradise: Academics from the Working Class.) So, when academics take on the subject of the poor and working classes, they are most often doing it from the perspective of someone outside looking in. And since middle-class people tend to universalize their class perspective, that can lead to problems. (The "Lady Bountiful" article I linked above has some interesting things to say about that.)

So yeah, I'm cautious when prosperous, comfortable people undertake to explain my own people to me. I don't dismiss them out of hand, but I do approach their work critically.

As for what I do, I'm writing a dissertation on how conventional portrayals of poor whites in Southern literature have served to reinforce traditional Southern notions of hierarchy. So I do have some knowledge of what happens when one class portrays another one from a distance, since it's what most canonical Southern writers have been doing for almost 300 years. But, I still would not ask anyone to accept my ideas uncritically just because I'll have Ph.D. after my name in a few months.

[AP]

56. Not combative. I just think your reticence about accepting this woman's

very solid argument is based on some odd feelings, rather than on the quality of the argument.

[QC]

64. One man's "odd feelings" are another man's life experiences.

But have it your way. The article is a work of unparalleled genius and anyone who disagrees or even expresses the slightest reservations is a fool driven by "odd feelings."

Is that better?

[AP]

82. I think you missed my point.

The most interesting kind of argument here is (1) argument + (2) specific references to the text.

I'm not asking you to praise or criticize. I'm just asking you to make your argument, and then point to the text to support your argument.

Your criticism so far has been (1) she should have talked to blue collar workers and (2) I work with people whom I presume are like her, so I'm suspicious.

Well, (1) her entire theory is based on repsonses by blue collar people in response to survey questions, so she is listening to blue collar people, and (2) there's no real argument that she has anything in common with the people you know. For all you know, she's from a blue collar family.

I'm just saying, whatever opinion you have, it's more interesting for both of us and for everyone reading our exchange if you make an argument and then support it with specific references to this or any other text you want to use.

I think, as does Buzzflash, that this article obviously crystalizes a lot of truths about Bush. It's not necessarily brilliant excpet to the extent that it states some obvious truths which you don't read every day.

In the context of this thread, I think you could transfer some of the arguments it makes a how and why Bush appelas to working class people to what NPR does to middle and upper middle class people. Why does NPR need to cultivate a sense among middle and working class people that their feelings are the most important thing in the world? Perhaps because of something like this:



Hochschild: Bush is the upper-class mess-up who ends up on top anyway. It is subliminal: If you mess up, don't worry. The reason that becomes important, I think, is that we live in a culture of individualism. And if you lose a job, it's your fault you lost the job. It's your credit if you do well, and your fault if you do badly. And so for him to be the mess-up that gets ahead anyway is sort of an end-run around this whole burdensome ideology of individualism.

...

BuzzFlash: That's the key to your commentary, "Let Them Eat War" -- whether or not a male blue-collar worker realizes it, on a conscious level or not, that he is trading off his individual well-being. Bush is hurting this guy's well-being on all number of fronts -- job loss, elimination of overtime pay, reduction in future Social Security, future Medicare costs, long-term care and support, et cetera. Bush is basically adopting a policy of taking as much as he can for the business cronies who support him by taking away income from the working man. Still, 50 percent support him because he's a white guy and he represents the triumph of the white guy in a world that's threatening to him.



Hochschild: If you just take what's happening to the blue-collar guy's kids with Bush's "Children Left Behind" policy, as I would call it, he's basically penalizing schools that have failing kids. If those schools have kids who continue to fail, they get even less funding than they now get. He's actually going to redistribute funds away from the very schools and kids that need it the most, and a lot of those are blue-collar kids. So Bush is taking the future as well as the present away from these blue-collar men. And it's all to sell them a fairy tale.

[QC]

94. I looked for those extensive studies you reference,

both in the commentary and the interview, and only found the voting info and a few bits about how people know the tax cuts favor the rich and don't mind and the like.

Maybe I'm just being pedantic, and it wouldn't be the first time I've been accused of it, but I do like more in the way of documentation.

What raised a slight red flag for me about this piece is that it applies the same standard sort of gender analysis to blue-collar white men that is typically typically applied to all white males of whatever place in society. Remember what I said earlier about middle-class people, even scholars, having a tendency to universalize their class experience? Anyway, the best way to avoid that, I think, it to allow one's subjects to speak. When I see the subject kept at such a distance as in this piece, I become a bit worried.

(As for letting the subject speak, it can yield some very powerful results. If you want to see a great example, take a look at Joseph T. Howell's Hard Living on Clay Street: Portraits of Blue Collar Families. It's a fine book and much more interesting and relevant than any discussion of the patriarchy, the body as text, displacement of whiteness, hegemony, and other such academic topics.)

But, frankly, I don't care enough one way or the other to argue any more over this interview. As I said before, I found it interesting but saw some weaknesses. No big deal one way or the other.

As for your objections to NPR, I would suggest that you take several steps back and consider that the problem is actually with that passes for a Left in modern America. Look at the (admittedly unscientific) income surveys we have done here at DU, and you will find that the lefties here, at least, are surprisingly affluent. Look at that "what made you a lefty" thread and you'll find that, out of well over a hundred responses, only a very, very few deal in any way with issues of class. Most talk about social issues, not liking Republicans and fundamentalists, and the like. This kind of thing is not, of course, limited to DU. By all indications, people like you and me, who think in terms of an economic Left, are a dying breed.

In other words, the perspective in this radio piece that pissed you off so much really might be, for better or worse, the perspective of the mainstream American Left: white, urban, and privileged. Maybe NPR is not the problem here.

[spooky3]

96. Hochschild's book The Second Shift was based on in-depth

interviews with couples from a variety of social classes. I have not read the book on which the Buzzflash interview was based. If she used the same methodology in her present research, it sounds as though that would address your concerns.

In other fields, interviews are not viewed as the best way to gain reliable and valid data. They are viewed as best used in exploratory research. It would be interesting to see if any of Hochschild's hypotheses about why blue collar male voters behave as they do have been subjected to rigorous research and the refereeing process of top journals. As AP said, Berkeley is a top school and unless Hochschild came through the tenure process at a time when "lightweight" work was deemed worthy of tenure (if there was such a time in the sociology dept. at Berkeley's recent history), or has chosen to go that route after getting tenure, it is unlikely that she is unqualified to comment as she has. In any case, this is an empirical question that can easily be answered. Rather than make assumptions about how she developed her views, and make negative attributions about her or other academics, we should read the published work where the methodology is described, and judge for ourselves.

[ikojo]

51. Andover, Yale and Harvard also have high standards or so I am told

but a certain C student got through those institutions. Just because someone graduates from what is accepted as a "good" school does not mean he/she had the smarts to do all of the work or write great papers. For many rich white kids whose parents are able to write out a check there is no such thing as fail.

[AP]

57. University of Texas had higher standards than those schools. So does UC-B.

[spooky3]

97. Being accepted as a student because you are the son (or daughter)

of a rich donor or influential politician is not the same as being hired by and making it through the tenure and promotion system at a leading university.

[ikojo]

49. Excellent post Plaid Adder! About tenure

only in academia and a couple of other professions (the clergy for instance) are people offered tenure. It is a privilege not afforded the mass of working people in this country. Dare I say that 90% of workers do not have any sort of job secuity?
I wish there was tenure for regular working folks.
What makes academics so special? Sure they spent many years studying to get their PhD but many workers spend years perfecting their skills and the end result is often not a good paying job with loads of time off (including sabbaticals) and tenure.

[AP]

58. Tenure allows freedom of thought.

That's why it's still important for academics.

Be careful of misplaced hostility towards education. The universities are what's producing Democratic voters these days.

[MarkTwain]

23. Whine. Whine. Whine.

You've got to be kidding me with this drivel? Right? This is a joke, it must be.

Susan Stamberg? One of the finest journalists - to whom I have been listening for well over twenty plus years - that consistently brings color and hue to her reporting and narrative that few in her industry can match. Susan Stamberg who is probably one of the most constant of progressive personalities in th media today? Susan Stamberg who is the dictionary definition of liberal class?

Damn. Not every media outlet in this world is going to be Pacifica Radio nor Mother Jones.

Spare me. For all those gnashing their media teeth in this thread, I respectfully suggest that Ann Coulter cordially awaits your presence as an alternative if Susan is too much for your righteous sense of media propriety and as an outlet for your indignation.

Sheeesh.

[BiggJawn]

26. What's with all these "Support NPR with your WHOLE Heart...

...or GO to The FAUX" postings?

Sounds a LOT like that "Oh, yeah? Well, if you don' LOVE Murka, then you can just go to France....or Cuba....Or the Soviet Union...wait..."
Crap.

Even the FINEST people get told by their bosses to polish a turd once a while. Or they get told that turd polishing is healthy for a continued on-air presence....

[AP]

31. You need to change your handle. Mark Twain would laugh at this post.

[MarkTwain]

35. Much gratitude for your reply which was....

... so full of substance! So eloquent and witty!

Moreover, just so on target in terms of effectively challenging the long appreciated (at least to those who have followed her for over two decades, that is) qualities of Ms. Stamberg as I outlined.

Almost as "good" in style and content as the original post that begins this ridiculous thread - more than substantiating that your acquaintance with either Mr. Twain or his work is, at best, nominal.

Tells us much about your critical abilities and competence in other media arenas like, oh I don't know... radio maybe?

[AP]

38. The substance is all over this thread.

You should read it. And then you should change your handle.

[MarkTwain]

48. The "substance" to which you refer...

... is nothing more than a contrived straw man specific to a presumed class conciousness which Ms. Stamberg, and by extension, NPR, is being falsely accused of either ignoring or promoting. Can't tell since the quality of most of the posts who have jumped on this whining bandwagon are all over the place on the issue.

To those who are on that wagon: It's a radio program. They're a radio network. You don't like it, turn it off. Or, get a life and stop obsessing over one of the relatively few members of the media, Ms. Stamberg, who for over two decades has consistently done very fine progressive work.

You're not familiar with it? Go to their site, do some research. I'm not gonna' do homework for you that some of us have been doing since the middle seventies and which your lack of familiarity with only further substantiates the paucity and impotence of all on this thread who share your misguided assessment.

[throwthebumsout]

55. Bravo!!!! Well Said

I was thinking exactly the same thing. Without NPR, the radio airwaves would be a vast wasteland of brain-dead pablum.

[AP]

59. Such uncritical thought.

It's sad.

[MarkTwain]

71. BWAaaaaaahhhh !

Pot. Kettle. Noire?

This is almost becoming fun watching the flailing about for a argument by the author of this thread who can't even find the debate.

Let us review: Susan Stamberg. A noted and publically acclaimed progressive journalist approaching three decades. Intenational audience of tens of millions over those years. Erudite, witty, and rather charming. Consistently demonstrates a sensitivity rare in the profession; can be equally cunning, incisive, and sharp when the material merits it.

The author of this thread: the thread speaks very well for the comparison.

[AP]

85. So your entire argument is that no point I make about the Shore story

has any weight because you think Stamberg's professional reputation makes it impossible for those criticisms to have any truth?

Mark, if this were a trial, your evidence of good reputation wouldn't even be admissable. I don't think I've made Stamberg's character an issue. I'm talking about this story about the Shores. Even you have to admit that everybody can screw up once, or that some new producer could have been hired who has an agenda.

Why don't you addres any one of my posts in which I make arguments about the Shore story, and which makes specific textual references?

Why don't you make your own argument. And, psst, since Stamberg's reputation really isn't the issue, why don't you base your argument on what's actually said in this story.

Also, what's with your crush on Susan Stamberg? If you have a crush on a reporter, ask her out on a date. Don't make excuses for her obviously lame reporting.

[MarkTwain]

102. As suggested before....

... do your own homework.

And stop trying to be cute by half as you have frequently attempted in this thread with me and other members, it obviously falls flat on its face.

Have a nice Holiday - and don't forget Mama Stamberg's recipe for Cranberry Sauce. It's a perennial holiday favorite for those of us who have followed her for these many years... but, I wouldn't expect you to know anything about it - and I guess that makes me some nineteenth century version of a class-oblivious scrooge.

Bah humbug, indeed.

[AP]

104. Thanks for the Holiday wishes Mr Stamberg. Tell your wife she should

be ashamed.

[Selwynn]

68. Well said.

[AP]

39. By the way, I don't really see how Stamberg's 2 decade track record is...

...relevant to my argument about this story. I've given you my reading of THIS story. So what if you think she has a two decade track record of not doing this? Here's some advice: cite some of her old, "quality" work, and we'll discuss it, or take this story head on and tell me where I'm wrong.

[Ardee]

70. MarkTwain, note the nature of the opposition

to support for NPR. I note and support your derision re this whole silliness. I also support the notion that, if opposition to a post contains no intellectual thoughtfulness it negates the stance of the poster in opposition.

As I read the continual and empty diatribes against public radio (though there have indeed been some thoughful posts about "white intellectual perspective")I began to believe an agenda unexpressed.

Considering the alternatives to NPR I cannot begin to comprehend the motivation of some here....now back to Car Talk and the eagerly awaited This American Life.

[AP]

86. I love Car Talk -- it helps people save money. I love This American Life

because it tells stories about how people (many of whom aren't "good friends of David Mament", as are the self-centered pompous Shores of Stamberg's suicide story) really experience life in America. I love Tavis Smiley because it gives voice to some important voices (like Cornel West, among others).

I am totally willing to call BS bullshit when I hear it. This Stamberg story was BS.

[throwthebumsout]

24. Pray like hell for the dead, fight like hell for the living

I listen to NPR every day, morning drive and evening drive. I heard that story, and reacted in an entirely different way. While suicide is a tragic act, and this one is particularly horrific because of the involvement of an innocent child -- it is also a profoundly selfish act. I knew somebody who blew his brains out with a shotgun. Is that horrible and sad? Sure it is. But he's GONE. It's his little brother (8 years old at the time) who found him, who lives on and has to deal with the trauma and memory of that. My father was a locomotive engineer who, over a career of 30 years, killed more than a dozen people with his unstoppable train (it takes a mile to stop a freight train) because these people chose to use his train as the instrument of their death by standing on the tracks. My father had nightmares for months after each of these incidents.

And these people, who let this women use their home with an expectation that she would respect it -- instead, she leaves them to clean up the mess.

I saw nothing wrong with the story. I found it to contain useful advice that could apply to a lot of situations about reclaiming a space after a tragedy.

By the way -- I know a lot of upper middle class white people who are pretty decent folks. Myself among them. You paint with a pretty broad brush there.

[BiggJawn]

27. Well...Here we have both ends of the spectrum.

Glad to meet you. I'm "Upper LOWER Class White People". used to be Lower Middle-Class until the economy crapped all over the place.

actually, I used to think I was "middle-class" until a thread a few months back where "Middle Class" was decided upon as being about 2.5 times my annual income.

[AP]

32. Two things: 1) it was a way bigger tragedy for people who loved this woman

and 2) she killed herself because she was profoundly sick. When you treat these events like they matter because they make homeowners feel bad, we lose sight of the fact that these things are preventable, and there are sociall solutions.

[Susang]

47. How do you know they didn't love her?

They gave her their house to use, that's hardly the act of indifferent people. Perhaps you didn't catch the other emotions that they seemed to only be able to express in their poetry?

I agree that suicide is a supremely selfish act. My mother-in-law still suffers the fallout from her mother blowing her brains out and she's 65 years old. My husband has to deal with the effect it had on her for most of his life, as a mother's suicide tends to give the daughter serious issues surrounding motherhood.

She also committed murder. She killed her son in their house. I think they have a right to be angry. I'm sure they feel many other emotions, but speaking from my own experience, when someone close to you kills themselves, anger is the easiest and least painful to express.

Emotions cannot be bad, they just are. I think it's unfair to judge them over how they are reacting to a distinctly unique and horrific situation that most of us will never have to face. Honestly, do you really know how you'd truly feel deep down if this had happened to you?

[AP]

60. How do I know? From listening to the NPR report.

Did you hear it? Did you hear them talk?

They loved their house. They were angry at her for spoiling it.

How would I feel? I hope I'd take Mamet's advice and I'd have a little sympathy. I hope I would call up NPR and ask them to let me read my poems about how this event was all about ME.

[Susang]

74. You still don't know how they feel

Most people can handle many different emotions at one time. You can have sympathy and be angry. You can love and be angry. I think it's far too judgemental to condemn them for feeling anger, particularly when anger is one of the most common emotions relating to suicide. Every book I have ever read on suicide mentions anger as a natural and necessary emotion for the survivors.

The woman committed murder in their house. She killed her child and herself in the place where they felt the safest. I think they have every right to be angry and I still manage to have room in my heart for sympathy and understanding.

I don't know if you've ever been touched by suicide and would never presume to guess, but as someone who has intimate experience in being a survivor, I can assure you that the anger is natural and necessary. Perhaps they offended your sense of decorum by appearing on NPR, but that doesn't make them the unfeeling self-serving monsters you've made them out to be.

On edit: I think this is something you might want to read when thinking about this story. How would you feel if this happened in your home and your friend (and yes, apparently they were friends) was responsible.
The pair was found lying parallel in a pool of blood in the Chevy Chase home of novelist Howard Norman and poet Jane Shore. Vazirani was housesitting for the couple, who spent the summer in Vermont.

On July 21, the Washington medical examiner ruled that Jehan died of stab wounds to his chest, neck and forearm. The wounds damaged blood vessels and his heart and lungs. Vazirani reportedly died after slashing her wrist.

Director of Creative Writing Jim Grimsley wrote in an e-mail that he was shocked to learn that Vazirani and Jehan died so violently.

"It haunts me to think of his life cut so short," Grimsley wrote. "My own feelings are much too raw to be shared in any great detail. am deeply saddened that Reetika felt she had to take such an action."
http://www.emorywheel.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2003/08/28/3f4d798b239c8

[AP]

87. These people got 5 minutes on NPR to tell me how they felt. They read

their POEMS about it, for god sake.

If this happened to me, I'd NEVER EVERY IN A MILLION YEARS call NPR and ask to read my poems about how this affected me, and if I knew David Mamet, a certainly wouldn't go around name dropping in the context of telling this story. That was totally without class.

Grimsley has way more class than Shore and Norman. He seems to care about Reetika. If you listen to the NPR story you don't get the sense that they shared Grimsley's attitude.

Susan, tell me that when you listen to that interview you don't think those people are selfish and self-centered? How did you feel when they dropped Mamet's name? Did you like their poem? Do you think that Mamet's allegory was telling them what Norman interpreted it as meaning?

[Susang]

92. I don't believe they called NPR

The way I took it was that NPR called them, as the show was about houses. That was the subject of the show and that's what they were invited on to talk about. Since the show was the second in that theme, for them to concentrate on their feelings about their house was to be expected.

No, I did not find them self-centered, but perhaps that's because I already knew about what had happened in their house before I heard the show. Perhaps the reason the host didn't call them on their self-centeredness was because she didn't perceive them the same way you did. Shows are edited and to judge someone on a short segment on the radio is irresponsible. We have no way of knowing what was not played.

I certainly felt that reading their poetry was correct as they are poets, as was the woman who killed herself. Even the father of the murdered child is a world reknown poet. It makes sense that poets would communicate with poetry, doesn't it?

As far as the quality of their poetry, I prefer not to play the critic. Poems are intensely personal expressions and sometimes when you react strongly to one, it's not because it's bad, it's because it hits a nerve. I may be biased, as I went to the same college as Norman and have been familiar with his writing (as well as his wife's) ever since I attended college, but I felt their work was of merit. It may not be the most pleasant poetry I've ever sat through, but I certainly understood where they were coming from.

As far as dropping David Mamet's name into it, since I read in Jane Shore's bio that she has been close friends with him since her undergraduate days, I don't think it was intended as "name dropping". I may be wrong, but I doubt someone would name drop someone she's known and been close to for over 30 years. What would she gain from that? In literary and academic circles, she and her husband are on equal footing to Mamet.

Anyway, my whole point in this discussion seems to have gotten a little off track. I would think that most people here would be more aware than to make a judgement on two artists based on 6 minutes of tape. Nobody's saying you've got to like the two of them. But judge them on their own merits. Read The Bird Artist or Happy Family and then make the call. Read some of Norman's books on Eskimo and Inouit folk tales. Then make up your mind.

[AP]

93. Regardless of who called whom, they participated in it.

It was the subject matter of the poem that I thought was in poor taste -- it was about themselves and their selfishness and self-centeredness.

I'm just going to have to say that, because you feel a personal connection to Norman and Shore you might not have sufficient critical distance. I don't know them.

The name dropping was peculiar because I think they misinterpreted the point Mamet was making. Mamet told them that they shouldn't look at someone else's house burning down and think it's about your feelings. You have to look at it from the perspective of the people who live in the house.

They got that message ass-backwards. He wasn't saying that if you watch soemone else burning in your house, if you own the house, you're allowed to think about it selfishly. He saying that this suicide victim is the burning house and you have to stop acting like this is something bad that's happened to you.

I can picture the conversations that made Mamet say this. Mamet must have listened to them obsessing over the same things they obsessed over in this interview -- "why did this woman do this to us?" "Why did she ruin our relationship with our house?" "Why are WE the victims of her selfish act?" He must have said, look, you have got to stop thinking this is about you, excpet he used an allegory which Norman and Shore -- oddly, poets who should know more about allegory -- seem to aggressively ignore.


What do you think Mamet was trying to tell them?

I'll grant you that Shore and Norman may have been edited down to 6 minutes of story that didn't match the full interview. But that's why my criticism is more about NPR and its editorial agenda than it is about Norman and Shore (although I have criticized the way they came across).

In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if NPR went way out of their way to present these people as self-centered people who think their feelings are more important than social-political issues.

I'd love to know, for example, if this woman had adequate health care, or if she had lost a job and couldn't afford medication that kept her stable. (Apparently, she didn't have a home, so I'm going to guess she didn't have decent health care either.)

Don't you think that's the REAL story here?

I don't know about you, but if this happened in my house, after the initial shock wore off, those would be the questions I'd be asking. I'd be asking "what's wrong with our society that this kind of needless shit happens." And if NPR gave me 6 minutes to talk about it, that's what my poems would be about. And I'm not surprised that these ARE NOT the angles that NPR takes a look at with this story.

[Susang]

100. You make way too many assumptions in your post

First, I said that I went to the same college as Norman and was "familiar" with him and his work. That means that I know of him and have read him, not that I know him personally. He attended Western Michigan University over fifteen years before I did. Irene Ryan, who portrayed "Granny" on The Beverly Hillbillies also attended WMU. I don't know her but I sure know who she is.

Second, the woman who committed suicide was in the same class both academically and economically as the Norman/Shores. Don't you know anything about her? She was a highly regarded poet, her partner was a world-reknown poet who won the Pulitzer Prize. Kumunyakaa now teaches at Princeton. They were not poor or disadvantaged in any way. As for being medicated or seeking help, as a highly educated member of academia, I would guess that she had many resources at her disposal. Your theory of her suicide has nothing to do with the facts of the case. It was not about class or economics.

Regarding David Mamet, I feel that you make a lot of assumptions about what he meant by a single comment for someone who doesn't know him. How can you claim to know what he meant regarding this situation when the single comment assigned to him, by his long-time friend no less, is the only basis of your opinion? You concoct dialogue between the parties based on your limited and highly lacking knowledge of the situation? I find that rather presumptious.

Like I said before, I do not know if you've been affected by suicide, but I know that I have. Suicide may be precipitated by class, economics and race, but it is ultimately about MENTAL ILLNESS!

Rich (as well as middle class, working class and poverty stricken) people kill themselves all the time. Doctors have the highest suicide rate of any profession. I could list dozens and dozens of people who committed suicide and would seem to have had everything they could possibly need including *adequate health care* and money to afford medication. This fact doesn't seem to jibe with your theory regarding Raatika Vazirani and her suicide/murder.

She had all the means and opportunities you were assuming she lacked and yet she stabbed her son to death and slit her wrists afterwards. You claim that Norman/Shore were selfish thinking only of themselves. Since the story and this thread, have you read any of Vazrani's poetry? Have you tried to find out anything about her and her suicide, besides what's been written here? Perhaps using her friends' unvarnished honest reactions to her suicide to make a vague point about NPR could be looked at in the same light that you regarded Norman/Shore.

Those are my last words on this subject.

[AP]

105. What do you think Mamet's allegory meant?

Let's just start with that.

[Susang]

109. I told you, I'm done with this topic

You don't seem to have any interest in actually learning more about the people and situation that you've built your theory upon. You've never once addressed any of the points I brought up regarding suicide and it's impact on the survivors. If you are content to live in your highly judgemental opinions, then what chance have I to change that?

[AP]

111. I did address their feelings, and I've said that no matter what they were,

the feelings of the people who loved this woman and her child who live in her metaphorical burning house suffered way more damage than the people who happened to live in the physical house in which she killed herself, but were observing from the road the metaphorical house that was her life in flames.

That's what Mamet was trying to tell them, I presume.

[Susang]

112. You presume way too much

n/t

[AP]

116. But I'm OK with metaphors and analogies.

Again, what do you think Mamet was trying to say to these people?

[Susang]

117. Why do you persist in this single question?

Neither you nor I have any way of knowing what he meant. We were not there, we did not hear the entire conversation, and we don't know the man. Badgering me for my opinion on what he meant means nothing, it has no relevance to this story. Your argument reminds me of my terrier, when he gets ahold of something he shakes it until it's dead and unrecognizable.

There is a whole complex picture here that you appear to be ignoring in order to prove a point that doesn't apply. Asking me over and over about what Mamet's comment meant doesn't even address the central issues of your argument.

You criticize a show about houses for interviewing two people about their house. You feel they didn't show enough empathy. You'd like to think that their friend (of over 30 years) David Mamet agrees with you based on one comment from a conversation recounted by the couple you admittedly despise. Let me ask you, what proof do you have that Mamet meant what you say he meant?

[AP]

119. Because it's an excellent starting point.

If it's so impossible to understand what happened, why did NPR bother to report this story.

Furthermore, the think I care about most is how and why NPR chose to tell this story in this way. To understand that, we have to take the interview as a text, and talk about it. That Mamet quote, and the Norman/Shore's misunderstanding of it is the part of the text around which the meaning of this story revolves.

[Susang]

120. This discussion is pointless

You have obviously chosen not to listen to anything relating to this that conflicts with your pet theory. You listened to the show and judged, judged harshly I might add. Instead of learning more about the situation, you made assumptions about the reporter, the couple interviewed and the woman who killed herself and murdered her son.

You felt that their poetic self-expression was selfish, certainly that's your right. But to assume that you know what's in their hearts based on a radio segment of less than ten minutes is irresponsible. You have every right to hate their poetry, but you have no right to make judgements on their worth as people based on little to no knowledge. Isn't that what we accuse the right of doing?

[AP]

121. Many would disagree.

And from those who don't, I find very little that would constitute a compelling argument.

Again, I'm complaigning about what I perceive as a very conservative mission on the part of NPR. Why should any NPR listener be compelled to go beyond what they hear on NPR to draw a conclusion about what NPR is trying to achieve? NPR's 11 million listeners didn't go do further reasearch on the Norman/Shores before they were influenced by this story. How does it makes sense that I have to look into their stories before I make an argument about how NPR presented their story.

If my argument were that NPR misrepresented these people, I'd care to look further into their stories.

My argument is that NPR has a conservative mission. I supported that argument with specific references to the texts -- the interview itself, and to that Alternet article by the Berkeley professor which explains the inherent conservativism in appealing to emotions and individualism and ignoring the fact that the government can actually solve social problems.

I admit that I was harsh on these people as represented, but that's part of my argument about NPR. They edit a story to make two people who appear to be very selfish and self-centered to seem like they're having appropriate emotional response.

You like them and that's great. But I think you have to be honest about what this story did. I feel bad for you that NPR is using people you like, but they are. And just because you like them doesnt' me have to ignore what's going on in this story.

[Susang]

123. Please don't pity me

And don't bother to patronize me either. NPR did not use me in any way and they aren't trying to. Perhaps I should feel sorry for you that you see things in such a narrow scope that you can't understand people who have reactions that are outside your experience.

This particular interview has nothing to do with your thesis on government solving social problems. What could the government have done to help a woman who had money, friends, health care and resources?

As far as looking into the Norman/Shore story itself, I would suggest that many of NPRs listeners just may have heard of the couple from their extensive literarly works, as I had. And I am a far cry from the rich white entitled liberal you keep assuming NPRs listenership is limited to. You assume (once again) that NPR listeners are sheep to be manipulated. That's a very arrogant and superior viewpoint. But I am starting to think that you and I have very different views on what constitutes a liberal.

So fight on against NPR and be happy. Myself, I'm concerning myself more with targets that are more threatening. After all, what good will it do to crucify NPR when Fox News and Bill O'Reilly rule the roost?

Good luck to you.

[AP]

124. I don't pitty you.

I just feel bad that you don't see what NPR is doing because you have personal feelings about the people they used to do what they did.

Also, I think you have to ask yourself who has the narrow field of view. I think your interpretation of the show represents the knee jerk response. I think to see it the way I did, you actually have to think hard about what's going on and why it would happen, and you have to put it a context that isn't obvious on the surface.

Incidentally, I don't think I've argued that NPR viewers' problems are that they're rich and white. What I think I've said is that NPR knows the demographic of their audience and is trying to manipulate them into complacency and conservativism.

Also, you can fight against Fox, but I'm MORE worried about NPR. In many ways, the people who have the imprimatur of neutrality and credibility are way more dangerous than those who wear their politics on their sleeves. It's very important to hold NPR to a high standard. Have you heard their stories on Americans at work at low page jobs? They all make the jobs seem fun, except the one they did during defense of marriage week, which told us that women shouldn't get divorced if they don't want to be poor and miserable.

Furthermore, this woman does seem to have a work history that would suggest that she wasn't getting consistent health care. She had a lot of one year jobs and moved around a lot, and her new job wasn't supposed to start until fall.

In fact, this might be a case where she was in between health insurance programs and stopped taking medication for a couple months.

[Susang]

127. You mean you have to invent a context?

BTW, I work at a "low-pay" job and it is kind of fun. You just have no clue what you are talking about. Your assumptions are far more classist than NPR's ever could be.

And there you go again, making baseless assumptions about the woman in question. Do you know anything about the academic life? Of course her gigs were a year long, they were artist-in-residence programs. You are grasping at straws to try and prove that your assumption that she was poor and without healthcare had some merit. And by the way, medication does not always prevent suicides. You really need to know more about the subjects you argue about.

Goodnight,
Susang
A working class girl & low wage earner who does her research and knows when to pack it in

[AP]

130. I thought you gave up on this thread?

- do you understand why NPR wants people to think their crappy jobs are fun? Because if people start asking questions about the economy, Bush loses.

- One year positions with different lawyers = interim periods with no health insurance. I don't know what the truth is, however, it's often the case that people without health insurance will go off their expensive meds until the new plan kicks in (and sometimes preexisting conditions aren't covered -- don't know what Emory does). To me, this is the real story here. I'd be writing poems about that.

[Bat Boy]

101. Just a wee bit of clarification...

I am Susang's husband. The grandmother who committed suicide was mine. The mother who dealt with the aftermath was mine. The child who dealt with the mother was me.

My grandmother was an alcoholic. Spent most of her life in a bottle. When she learned she had contracted tuberculosis again, she couldn't take the thought of going into another hospital, so she made a choice. She put a shotgun in her mouth and pulled the trigger. That moment ends my grandmother's story.

When my mother got the phone call all they told her was that her mother was dead and she needed to go to California to take care of details. When she arrived they led her into the room where my grandmother had punctuated her life.

Blood was spattered all over the walls. Bits of skull and brain were embedded in dried pools. This was how my mother discovered the manner of her mother's death. Then, like the dutiful daughter, she got down on her hands and knees with a bucket and a brush, and cleaned up the aftermath.

Afterwards, my mother was an angry woman. Did she sympathize with her mother? Yes, that was there. But while suicide ends the story for one, the story continues for those left behind, drastically altered. Life will never be the same again. That’s where the anger comes from.

There is nothing socio-economic in this. It’s genuine emotion. I’ve known many suicides and their families. I’ve seen the patterns too many times, too many choices made destroying the lives of those left in the wake, for it to be anything else.

And there is always anger.

[AP]

106. Don't you think Norman and Shore should have saved some empathy for...

...the relatives like your mother who were hurt by the woman's deat. Say your grandmother committed suicide in someone else's house? What if your mother had to listen to theh homeowners talk about how much it interfered with the enjoyment of their house?

[Bat Boy]

108. You are talking in hypotheticals.

What if...?

The fact of the matter is that they were talking about their own feelings. How it affected them.

Who are you to tell them what they should feel?

[AP]

110. Certainly, what you'd feel is a hypothetical, the answer to which would

enlighten this discussion.

[Bat Boy]

113. Hypotheticals have a million answers.

The entire range of possbilities is present in a hypothetical question. If my grandmother had ended her life in someone else's house and my mother had heard them talking about how much it interfered with the enjoyment of their house then she would've...oh I don't know...gone on a seven state killing spree. Turned the radio off and made lunch. Sang all 100 verses of "99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall."

The fact is that this couple, when asked how the terrible event that had occured in their home had affected their view of their home, answered the question honestly. The show was part of a series on homes after all. Not on how suicide affects the family.

But to answer your question...my mother would have realized that the event was not hers alone. That it sent ripples out through whomever it touched, and that these people were affected too. In a way it would have given her some comfort, knowing that she wasn't alone in the anger, hurt and bewilderment.

Hypothetically.

[Cheswick2.0]

54. thank you

My ex-sister in law was involved with a drug addict/dealer. She also is a heavy user and was dealing even to my teen age son and his friends. I would like to strangle the woman (I have no relationship with the whole family anymore, long story, but most of the problem was about her lying behavior towards my son)and yet I feel sorry for her. That guy shot himself in the head right in front of her. He did it because they were fighting. It was a very hostile and childish act.
So now she is married to his best friend who is also a drug dealer and they have a little girl.

[Selwynn]

69. I agree whole heartedly with that analysis.

But then again, I'm just a evil self-centered upper middle class man... :rollseyes:

[AP]

88. ...who is very defensive about the sacred cow, NPR.

Why aren't you willing to be critical of NPR. And I'm not even arguing that I'm right about this. I just think the opposite argument is one that is more text-based. The one I get from you is more like I've attacked a sacred cow.

[Selwynn]

125. Not from me -

You're beef must be with the poster I responded to. But you can see post #67 and that should be it. I don't care if NPR is left, right, center, sidways or whatever else. It has programming I really like. If you don't, don't listen to it and leave it at that.

[AP]

126. I like NPR too -- Car Talk, Tavis Smiley, This American Life, and some

locally programmed stuff. I donate money to my local affiliate.

I don't like ME and WATC, and ATC when they're blatantly BS. I don't like TOTN. I think the second hour of Diane Rehm is terrible. I think Terri Gross should think about talking about something that doesn't already sell millions of copies.

[Selwynn]

129. We all get it AP - its just that some of us don't care that much.

I like listening to NPR - that's really the long and short of it. :)

[REP]

45. I Didn't Hear The Interview, But

if they did let the woman use their house, they did indeed do something to help her. I can't help but feel that if I had given someone the use of my house and it is was used to commit a murder/suicide in, I would be pretty upset as well that my house and my help had been trashed like that.

I'm sure these poet-people were insufferable, but just because it's "not nice" to be upset that someone comtaminated your living space with murder/suicide doesn't mean that having these feelings makes someone a bad person. Let me stress that if I had heard the interview, I'd probably loathe these people as well, but for different reasons.

[AP]

61. Then I encourage you to listen to the story (the link is above)

then you can reread the arguments about it here, and then you can revisit your theory.

[REP]

95. I Stand By My Original Thoughts

They give the use of their house to a friend and her child; she repays their kindness with suicide and murder. They were offered an opportunity to express how that made them feel about their home. I not only think they are allowed to feel anger; I think it would be unnatural if they didn't.

[indigo32]

50. To each his/her own I guess

I didn't hear the particular interview you are referring too. But I WILL continue to support NPR. Sorry it doesn't meet your standards.

[AP]

62. I donate to my local affiliate. But I don't check my critical faculties at

the door.

I wish more people here would too.

But I see that a lot of middle class people here are falling for exactly the BS that stories like this one sell to NPR listeners.

[indigo32]

103. I don't check mine either...

I'm perfectly capable of coming to my own conclusions thx, and also able to like some parts of something and not others.

[AP]

107. And we're discussing exactly that thought process here.

[Selwynn]

67. I love NPR, it is five thousand times more valuable than other media

available locally to me.

NPR is not about getting the hard left wing news for me, in fact that's not even what I want out of it. I enjoy it in the same way I enjoy PBS, because I enjoy its programming. I'm sorry that not every report gets your special seal of approval, but I don't really care that much. Shows like All Things Considered, Morning Edition and This American Life are wonderful, touching and entertaining. Add to that Car Talk and Science Friday and I'm in heaven. On top of all that we get Michael Feldmans Whaddaya Known on Saturdays which is a wonderful program.

I don't share your opinion about the story, I know what it feels like to be a person who is hurting because of someone else's tragedy, and what it feels like to try and deal with those feelings when you know everyone else just expects you to focus on "the other person." And its really offensive to me for you to ridicule them as self-centered because it affected their lives too.

The bottom line is this - I listen to NPR daily, and for ever one story or incident someone mentions here followed by their sweeping overgeneralizations about the station, I can think of ten times more stories in my mine that have been powerful, insightful or touching, or which have enriched my life in some way.

[MarkTwain]

75. Deserves Repetition!

"for ever(y) one story or incident someone mentions here followed by their sweeping overgeneralizations about the station, I can think of ten times more stories in my min(d) that have been powerful, insightful or touching, or which have enriched my life in some way."


Beautifully stated on right on the "mark," so to speak - about NPR and about this thread.

:)

[Logansquare]

77. I just listened to this--another story about Susan and/or her friends

The original mission of public radio was to provide broadcasting which would attempt to be representative of the entire population, not the entire population of friends of NPR correspondents.
I missed it when it aired because I will automatically hurtle toward the radio and shut it off when I hear either her or Cokie come on. Lately, I just listen to some music and read the NYT in the morning.

[Plaid Adder]

78. Yeah, Cokie turned to the dark side long ago

As for Susan Standberg, I think she just turned to the trivial side. Basically for the past few years she's been doing Sunday-magazine type stories (sailing on the QE II, visiting art exhibits, working that @#$! cranberry sauce recipe into some unrelated story every Thanksgiving). MarkTwain's assessment of Standberg as one of NPR's finest is, based on the years I've been listening, pretty overblown IMHO.

As for the tone of a lot of this thread, I have to say I don't get why people have to take this "you're with NPR or you're against us" attitude. We still listen to NPR a lot; we have supported it financially in the past. We stopped giving last year because their coverage of the Iraq war nauseated us, and because they started including far more material from conservative commentators. THe last straw for me was a piece by that POS Kmiec at Pepperdyne about why the war in Iraq was just. Not only were the politics foul, but it was just a crappy piece--a bunch of unsupported assertions that added up to a feeble reformulation of Republican talking points. That was when I wrote in to tell them they weren't getting another dime from me. Why should I pay them to deliver bankrupt right wing claptrap when I can turn on any network news show and get it for free?

Now that they've got $20 million from Ms. Kroc I hope to see them strike out on their own again. I still have a lot of affection for them and would rather listen to NPR than anything else on the radio; but that does not mean that they are still doing the job they did ten, five, or even three years ago.

Like the Democratic Party under the DLC, they are the only game in town; and like them, they are also just not good enough. I'll vote Democratic in 2004 for the same reason I listen to NPR: because I have to. What the hell else am I gonna do, vote REpublican? or turn on Rush? But being the lesser of two evils does not make you good.

Alas,

The Plaid Adder

[BiggJawn]

89. It's the Litmus Test thing again.

Rub it on you and see if it shows that you are a true Liberal...
I'm with you, I listen because other than the BBC, they're the only game in town that I'm not afraid will try to turn me into a Rush-bot.And maybe I AM "too coarse"(that "mythic white Trash" thing again) but I find most of the "entertainment" on NPR tedious and the jokes stale. Michael Feldman is boring. Yuppie humour is NOT funny. Zorba Pasteur is interesting, though.

Never mind the RNC crappola that gets uttered as objective reporting, how about a report on GMO food? In a segment "underwritten" by "ADM, Supermarket to the World"...In light of the revelation that "The Toy Guy" gets paid big bucks to shill for various toymakers, how can you believe a report on a major sponsor's line of work? the days when the media would bite the hand that fed them are LONG gone.

[AP]

91. We debated NPR's presentation of the GMO issue recently

and in my research I discovered that NPR has been having the same person give his expert opinion on this issue for the last seven or so years. In the last three or four years, his expert status is supported by citing a book he has written on GMOs. His reporting basically soft pedals the issue, and I suspect this same attitude in refelcted in his book, which I haven't read. The interesting thing, however, is if you go back a little farther, you discover the guy is a former NPR reporter who left NPR to write the book.

You just have to wonder who underwrote his time-off from NPR to write the book. You have to wonder if it's the same people who underwrite NPR.

[AP]

90. I hope Mr Stamberg, I mean, MarkTwain responds to this.

And it's worth noting your point that NPR should be about giving voice to people who don't have a voice in the media. There's nothing plugged on Fresh Air that isn't sold by a huge media conglomerate and which doesn't get plugged on every FOR-PROFIT media outlet. Same with Diane Rehm -- the people who give opinions on her show are the same people whose opinions appear in all the media outlets regularly turning up on the list of whores over at MediaWhoresOnline.

As for the story that is the subject of this thread, who gets their perspective voiced more often, the mentally ill who are driven to do horrendous things by misery, or the privileged and wealthy who have enough pull with people at NPR that they can get their self-centered selfish ideas about the world and their poems recited for the world?

[skippysmom]

98. Thank you for this thread

I heard this story the other morning, and found it rather stunning. I generally like NPR -- and yes, I did have an upper middle class upbringing. And I generally like Susan Stamberg. But the focus on "reclaiming their home" just seemed so cold. The couple didn't say anything about the poor woman or her son (at least on the air -- could it have been edited out?) and I couldn't help but think how cold they sounded.

As for criticism of NPR -- no, they're not perfect. They do cater to an upper class audience -- much like many media outlets, like the NYT or the Boston Globe. They are certainly better than all the rest, but does that mean we can't call them on bad stories?

The "either you're with NPR or you're against NPR" sounds vaguely Bushlike to me.

[tigereye]

99. What an interesting discussion,

dealing with class issues is a touchy business. It is fascinating to see the divisions that appear when various forms of "middle-classness" (I'm sure that there is a better word for it, but can't think of one)are discussed.

I am willing to bet that many here on this board have "working-class" origins, depending on where their ancestors emigrated from. I know that my ancestors moved from Irish mercenaries to railroad workers to government functionaries to lawyers, priests, bankers and even an academic or two. I'm not sure if it has to do with family pressure, desire for different social status or the desire to " move up" financially, although in my experience having more education does not necessarily mean having more money!

I don't think that people have much to say about being born middle class - or any class for that matter; what family you are born into is obviously beyond anyone's control. It is a matter of the choices that you make in terms of being content with your current "social status," or attempting to move to another social structure.

I missed the "middle class" discussion thread and will have to seek that out. I also want to check out the books noted by you folks that deal with working class academics and their perspectives.

What is the most interesting, IMHO, is that people's discomfort with certain aspects of NPR and the subtext of some of their pieces, morphed into a discussion of class "discomfort." BTW, I listen to NPR a lot, but do periodically feel that many of the pieces they air do have a tone of detachment from some aspects of "real-life." The NPR piece noted above had some of that tone, which bothered me. On the other hand, many of NPR's pieces deal with gut-wrenching aspects of war, poverty, mental illness and drug abuse, in a way that few media are willing to entertain.

[Logansquare]

122. Reetika Vazirani's story

Here's what I find truly reprehensible about the way Stamberg presented this story. She covered it entirely from one point of view, without the balance and nuance that distinguishes stenography from journalism. We could have actually empathized with the horror of the Shores if we had also heard the tale of the dead woman and her son. Instead they are voiceless, because Susan just wanted to plop her lazy ass down and do a ten minute phone-it-in interview with some of her buddies. Stamberg is not only a disgrace to NPR, but equally to her entire profession.


In Final Hours, Despair Defeated Poet http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A8730-2003Jul17?language=printer


A Web Chapbook from The Literary Review
Reetika Vazirani
http://theliteraryreview.org/Featured_P&W/Reetika_Vazirani/