Life In America's Poorest County

[Left Leanings]

Here is a story about the Appalachians:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2134196/Pictured-The-modern-day-poverty-Kentucky-people-live-running-water-electricity.html

Many live without elcectricity and running water, and 40 per cent fall below the 'poverty line'.

To say America is one of the richest countries in the world, it's some fucked-up shit.

[Ostrinski]

I've driven through there a few times, it's very surreal.

[Jimmie Higgins]

This comment, first on top, just fucking deadens my heart by 4 degrees:


I've always been puzzled and not a little ashamed by these Appalachian folk. People so stubborn and married to the "old ways" they deny future generations any kind of dreams or ambition. Also how does being poor demand someone not clean their home or take care of any material possessions? Some of these people may not have a lot, but keeping a place swept and in order - at least for the children - doesn't demand a lot of effort. We all need to do the very best we we can with what we have. Don't even get me started on the poor, chained animals. I see it a lot in those areas. Heartless.
- Marie, California, U.S., 24/4/2012 09:07
Oh the poor animals! The POOR animals! Oh god, the animality! Why did fate punish these animals be having them be born near POOR PEOPLE!

Oh the rampant dust bunnies! The dirt smudges around the door-knobs! These people are worse than the NAZIs and the Insane Clown Posse combined!

Heartless!? Fucking heartless!? My head's going to explode.

[Revolution starts with U]

Woop woop! :thumbup:


... :blushing: sry Knee jerk juggareaction

[Workers-Control-Over-Prod]

"A day to remember: Students enter the Owsley County High School Prom as family and community members watch from the bleachers

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2134196/Pictured-The-modern-day-poverty-Kentucky-people-live-running-water-electricity.html#ixzz1swl9yGsm"

Is this normal for the US, or is this something these 19th century proletarians get to enjoy?

[Workers-Control-Over-Prod]

Also, "Don't forget, government handouts. What boggles the mind is that even though they are living off welfare they still keep having children they can't feed on their own." Is there anything to say to this primitive scum? Fuck...

[Blanquist]

I don't see anything that screams poverty in these photos. Just some uncleaned and cluttered homes, nothing else out of the ordinary.

You guys must live some pampered lives if you think this is heart-breaking grinding poverty.

[Jimmie Higgins]

I don't see anything that screams poverty in these photos. Just some uncleaned and cluttered homes, nothing else out of the ordinary.

You guys must live some pampered lives if you think this is heart-breaking grinding poverty.

Where's that internet hard-man meme when you need it?:lol:

Man I live paycheck to paycheck in a working class neighborhood of Oakland and it's been a struggle to achieve doggie-paddle level financial stability: it's only been recently that I've been able to not have my electricity of phone shut off on a semi-regular basis. Yet I'd much rather have that level of poverty than this and I don't think that makes me "pampered". God forbid that people in a country that has seen rising productivity and profits for a generation have running water and electricity - la-ti-da, the snobbs!

No electricity, rampant unemployment, no services, no jobs - it's the same situation in US "ghettos" except better water and power and I don't think anyone should have to live under either conditions.

"Clutter" is pretty common for people living in poverty - particularly in rural areas where you take things to the dump yourself. But it's also just when people don't have much they don't want to get rid of things they might be able to use down the line.

[Regicollis]

The United States is one of the richest countries in the world and still some people there are forced to live like this. If they complain about it they will probably just be told that it is all their own fault.

Disgusting...

[Martin Blank]

Is this normal for the US, or is this something these 19th century proletarians get to enjoy?

I would call this relatively normal. The conditions in rural Kentucky can be found across the country, on any Native American reservation, in poor and working-class (especially African American and Latino) neighborhoods, and so on. It's not something out of the ordinary.


No electricity, rampant unemployment, no services, no jobs - it's the same situation in US "ghettos" except better water and power and I don't think anyone should have to live under either conditions.

"Better water and power" would be nice, actually. In Detroit, the water smells faintly like sulfur and is not really safe to drink, and a stiff wind will knock out your electricity (and gas heat, since furnaces are electrically controlled) ... if you have electricity, that is. At least one out of four households in Detroit is without electricity and gas heat at any given point of the year.


"Clutter" is pretty common for people living in poverty - particularly in rural areas where you take things to the dump yourself. But it's also just when people don't have much they don't want to get rid of things they might be able to use down the line.

That, or can't afford to replace.

[black magick hustla]

I don't see anything that screams poverty in these photos. Just some uncleaned and cluttered homes, nothing else out of the ordinary.

You guys must live some pampered lives if you think this is heart-breaking grinding poverty.
i don't know in what war torn cave in uganda you come from (that is hooked to the internet), but lacking water and electricity is pretty shitty, even when compared to some "third world" standards.

[black magick hustla]

i've driven through some of those areas. some folks keep fighting the civil war down there lol. its pretty surreal.

[roy]

I don't see anything that screams poverty in these photos. Just some uncleaned and cluttered homes, nothing else out of the ordinary.

You guys must live some pampered lives if you think this is heart-breaking grinding poverty.

Aren't you the guy who traverses the globe at will and has money to spend on a bust of Trotsky for his study?

[Left Leanings]

I don't see anything that screams poverty in these photos. Just some uncleaned and cluttered homes, nothing else out of the ordinary.

You guys must live some pampered lives if you think this is heart-breaking grinding poverty.

You're the one that lives the pampered live, with your 6 figure salary. And then in another thread, you had the audacity to post that you had no idea the British social security was "so generous", and all cos I posted that disabled peeps in a severe category, get something approaching minimum wage.

And plenty of peeps round my way go without gas and electric. They are on a 'card meter' system, where you go to a store and 'top-up' the card, then put it in the meter and it's credited.

The rates charged on these meters are often a lot higher than conventional meters, where peeps are billed quarterly. The utility companies claim they don't cut peeps off, and leave them without power. But when you aint got the money to top your card up and feed your meter, what's the fucking difference?

I been in plenty of gaffs where there's no power or gas, for days on end until it's fucking pay day.

[Jimmie Higgins]

Someone has a study? If Mrs. Scarlet is in there with the led pipe - run!

[Rooster]

Maybe the Blanquist considers this to be rustic.

[TheGodlessUtopian]

Well, the U.S is the richest country in the world, just not rich as in the Working Class is rich; rich as in the Ruling Class is rich.

[Anarcho-Brocialist]

The problem is not with only the Appalachian people, you can travel to any inner city and observe the poverty there as-well. It's mind boggling that we have millions of homeless people across the nation, but we spend 700 billion dollars a year to discover and finance new ways to kill people.

[Left Leanings]

The problem is not with only the Appalachian people, you can travel to any inner city and observe the poverty there as-well. It's mind boggling that we have millions of homeless people across the nation, but we spend 700 billion dollars a year to discover and finance new ways to kill people.

Also, there are some 40 million Americans who do not even have basic health cover? I think I have that right yeah?

In the UK, there are also areas of extreme poverty. And there are contrasts even within towns. Some people round here have jobs that pay well, others are sturggling to pay their rent and mortgage, or live on unemployment pay or similar benefits.

[NoOneIsIllegal]

I thought this was going to be about Pine Ridge, or Gary, or something.
America's inner-cities and dying rust-belt towns are terrible as well.

http://28.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_l3jit79K1W1qc9m0eo1_500.jpg

http://www.hoosiernation.us/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/gary-train-station.jpg

http://www.urbanghostsmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/gary-abandoned-apartment.jpg

http://www.urbanghostsmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/gary-indiana.jpg

http://www.urbanghostsmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/gary-abandoned-church.jpg

[El Oso Rojo]

"A day to remember: Students enter the Owsley County High School Prom as family and community members watch from the bleachers

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2134196/Pictured-The-modern-day-poverty-Kentucky-people-live-running-water-electricity.html#ixzz1swl9yGsm"

Is this normal for the US, or is this something these 19th century proletarians get to enjoy?

It always been the Normal in this country.

[Left Leanings]

I don't see anything that screams poverty in these photos. Just some uncleaned and cluttered homes, nothing else out of the ordinary.

You guys must live some pampered lives if you think this is heart-breaking grinding poverty.


Aren't you the guy who traverses the globe at will and has money to spend on a bust of Trotsky for his study?


Someone has a study? If Mrs. Scarlet is in there with the led pipe - run!


Maybe the Blanquist considers this to be rustic.

Nice one, rooster.

Yep. He probably does see it as rustic. And perhaps quaint as well.

Maybe he should set up a business venture, and make even more money - Blanquist and Company: Luxury Tours For The Better Off - just for peeps on 6 figure salaries. See the rustic and quaint environment of how the other half live, all from the window of your luxury coach.

[El Oso Rojo]

North St.Louis folks

[Mr. Natural]

I'm somewhat surprised that some comrades are surprised there is material poverty in the US. Capitalist production creates great wealth that is not returned to its producers.

I live in rural northwestern California, and am daily depressed by the parade of the homeless and otherwise poverty-stricken people I encounter. So many "live" in broken-down trailers in the woods and dunes. I watched a middle-aged woman push a shopping cart across the street in front of me yesterday. She was accompanied by a dog, and inside the cart was another dog that had just given birth and was licking her puppies.

Living in the US with awareness is very painful, especially in that there is nothing currently happening in opposition to capitalism's capture of the human species. The material capture of humanity is a BIG problem that then generates an even greater problem: The System's mental capture of humanity.

Capitalism's systemic mental envelopment of humanity is manifest on these left sites where there is a constant rummaging through century-old "classics" desperately in need of updating. There is a kneejerk rejection of any new ideas and revolutionary theorizing.

Do any comrades really believe that Marx and Engels, were they living, wouldn't have made serious revisions of their Marxism as capitalism advanced?

I'm especially upset with the profoundly un-Marxian abandonment of the materialist dialectic as understood by Marx and Engels, and by the rejection of the new sciences of organization by a left that cannot organize.

Damn! Can't we do better than this? Where are the open but critical, radical minds? Where are there some revolutionary comrades who are looking at The System and not within its institutions and values?

Just thought I'd ask. My red-green (sigh) best.

[Left Leanings]

I don't think anyone is particularly surprised by it. But where examples can be cited, they are worth citing. I have long understood that American welfare, for example, is a good deal less effective in ameliorating the worse conditions of the poor, than the UK. Me and my mates say a lot how we would hate to have to claim benefits in America.

And in the UK, right in my home town, and the nearby city. It's a regular occurence to see people begging for subsistence, and literally destitute.

One of my mates has been homeless several times (before I knew him), and has lived in homeless shelters and on the streets.

Another of my mates cos of his problems, was going from place to place, and was without his own place for FIFTEEN years. He did two stints at mine. Fortunately, he is finally settled in his own place now, in another town.

I might add, that this is a community of people without any running water and electricity. Now in present day America, that's pretty appalling, and indeed, maybe even surprisng. The townships of Soweto used to go without these basic utilities ffs.

[Althusser]

Well, I think that's about enough mountain dew for me...

[tachosomoza]

The problem is not with only the Appalachian people, you can travel to any inner city and observe the poverty there as-well. It's mind boggling that we have millions of homeless people across the nation, but we spend 700 billion dollars a year to discover and finance new ways to kill people.

And our restaurants destroy mountains of food every day, and we have abandoned, huge buildings going to smash. The restaurants should be mandated to give away surplus, and those abandoned buildings should be seized and converted to housing. Bam, instant standard of living increase.

[Pretty Flaco]

there's a very large difference between rural and urban poor in america however in that the rural poor doesn't have the excessive violence and crime that you can find in urban areas. the social problems are worse in the city.

[tachosomoza]

there's a very large difference between rural and urban poor in america however in that the rural poor doesn't have the excessive violence and crime that you can find in urban areas. the social problems are worse in the city.

Rural poor have extremely high rates of alcohol and drug (methamphetamine abuse), runaway/transient youth, broken homes, and domestic violence. Not to mention the health problems. Mississippi, for example, is a state with a significant rural poor population, and it has a maddeningly high obesity rate.

[gorillafuck]

there's a very large difference between rural and urban poor in america however in that the rural poor doesn't have the excessive violence and crime that you can find in urban areas. the social problems are worse in the city.criminal activity is not the only indicator of social problems.

[Pretty Flaco]

criminal activity is not the only indicator of social problems.

I know, but that was the first thing that came to mind. One of the most blatant problem related to urban areas is violence.


Rural poor have extremely high rates of alcohol and drug (methamphetamine abuse), runaway/transient youth, broken homes, and domestic violence. Not to mention the health problems. Mississippi, for example, is a state with a significant rural poor population, and it has a maddeningly high obesity rate.

And urban areas don't have these problems either? what i'm saying is that the urban areas have similar problems except on a far larger scale.

[tachosomoza]

Sure they do, because there are more people in urban areas. That doesn't make rural poverty and the ills associated with it less bad than urban stuff.

[Os Cangaceiros]

related to the violent crime discussion: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/06/01/fbi-crime-falls-but-small_n_209893.html

[Os Cangaceiros]

Anyway, of course small towns will never replicate, say, crack war-level urban violence, but places like this county in Kentucky and Pine Ridge and other places have basically all the problems that plague urban areas, just on a smaller scale.

[X5N]

And to think, in any other country these people would be rabid socialists, but in America, with a hundred years of redphobic brainwashing, they're some of the most ridiculously conservative people in America.


This comment, first on top, just fucking deadens my heart by 4 degrees:

Oh the poor animals! The POOR animals! Oh god, the animality! Why did fate punish these animals be having them be born near POOR PEOPLE!

Oh the rampant dust bunnies! The dirt smudges around the door-knobs! These people are worse than the NAZIs and the Insane Clown Posse combined!

Heartless!? Fucking heartless!? My head's going to explode.

Airhead latte liberals for ya.

[Danielle Ni Dhighe]

I have long understood that American welfare, for example, is a good deal less effective in ameliorating the worse conditions of the poor, than the UK. Me and my mates say a lot how we would hate to have to claim benefits in America.
The state has certified me as unable to work, but yet they only provide $197 per month in cash and $200 per month in food benefits while my federal disability claim works its way through the system.

[Anarcho-Brocialist]

I need to mention too that homelessness is in every community. Where I live we have 6 golf courses and 3 country clubs. You know how many homes could fit on all that land?

[Danielle Ni Dhighe]

As others have stated, this kind of poverty isn't unusual in the US. It can be found in urban areas, suburban areas, and rural areas.

[Drosophila]

I've seen it before as well. People are starving to death, in America (best country in the world!), yet companies and farms burn their excess harvests out of fear that the price of wheat will drop too much. Appalachia also shows how ignorant the common American is of poverty and debunks the notion that this stuff only happens in the "third world."

Disgusting.

[Jimmie Higgins]

As for which is worse urban or rural poverty - well does it matter, it's relative and I'm sure you can have just as soul-crushing a life in urban poverty as in rural poverty.

My personal preference: urban poverty - but maybe that's just because I'm used to it.

I'm somewhat surprised that some comrades are surprised there is material poverty in the US. Capitalist production creates great wealth that is not returned to its producers.

I live in rural northwestern California, and am daily depressed by the parade of the homeless and otherwise poverty-stricken people I encounter. So many "live" in broken-down trailers in the woods and dunes. I watched a middle-aged woman push a shopping cart across the street in front of me yesterday. She was accompanied by a dog, and inside the cart was another dog that had just given birth and was licking her puppies.Right, and all throughout the California Vally poverty in huge in one of the richest agricultural areas of the world... then the entire pacific northwest almost has been depressed for decades. Being used to urban poverty as I stated above - I went to Oregon for the first time a decade ago and I was so impressed with the natural beauty and then we'd go into towns and I'll look down the main street and see: liquor store, gun store, pawn shop, liquor store, pawn shop. I was like, "Oh shit, this is a like a more beautiful West Oakland"!

It's interesting the racial segregation of extreeme povery in the US: rural white and latino towns, urban black/latino/asian/immigrant neighborhoods, native american reservations... it's a very effective fetter keeping people from making certain connections about realities of life in the US.


Living in the US with awareness is very painful, especially in that there is nothing currently happening in opposition to capitalism's capture of the human species. The material capture of humanity is a BIG problem that then generates an even greater problem: The System's mental capture of humanity.

Capitalism's systemic mental envelopment of humanity is manifest on these left sites where there is a constant rummaging through century-old "classics" desperately in need of updating. There is a kneejerk rejection of any new ideas and revolutionary theorizing.

Do any comrades really believe that Marx and Engels, were they living, wouldn't have made serious revisions of their Marxism as capitalism advanced?

I'm especially upset with the profoundly un-Marxian abandonment of the materialist dialectic as understood by Marx and Engels, and by the rejection of the new sciences of organization by a left that cannot organize.

Damn! Can't we do better than this? Where are the open but critical, radical minds? Where are there some revolutionary comrades who are looking at The System and not within its institutions and values?

Just thought I'd ask. My red-green (sigh) best.I think there is a contradiction in your argument here. In the first paragraph here you note that there are no class movements currently, but then in the rest of the argument you say the left hasn't come up with new ideas or methods for organizing - don't you think this answers your question? How can the left develop new methods of organizing when there haven't been movements? How can new ideas be developed if there is no practice to test these ideas against?

In fact I think there has been a plethora of new ideas about both society, the economy and organizing but the problem is that there haven't been the movements. I think it's idealistic to argue that new ideas lead to new practice rather than than new ideas coming from material practice. Marx and Engels didn't write what they wrote simply by observing capitalism, that's only part of it, they developed their ideas in dialogue with material reality and the upheavals of 1848 and the Paris Commune.

Without actual movements, I think the left has been flooded with the old new-Left trying to use their academic positions and brains to think our way out of a lack of struggle and class organization. So we've had tons of theories, tons of post and neo Marxist and globalization and identity theory and critical theory and so on - and I think most of it misses the mark because there's no praxis and it not only misses the mark, but it often just useless to actually doing anything for the working class. On the left every few years it seems like people get all excited about some new concept or idea - now it's the precariate - that will suddenly allow the left to leapfrog over the historical position we find ourselves in. I think this is looking to shortcuts, I think real movements will lead to new methods and new ideas, not the other way around.

[Mr. Natural]

Jimmie Higgins, Thanks for your comments. The "contradiction" I see in my observations is a dialectical, not a logical contradiction. I see no new radical ideas and no radical movements anywhere, and that this is the situation is dialectically related to the triumph of capitalism as a system.

We have to "begin" somewhere, whether it comes from an "idealistic" or "vulgar materialist" start. Revolutionary-beyond-belief developments in the natural sciences have resulted in "Capra's triangle": a model of life's universal pattern of organization. We revolutionaries must now merge this "idea" of life's organization into the material production of revolutionary communities and processes. The "idea" of life having a universal pattern of organization dialectically arises from life's material relations, though. Ideas emerge from matter, matter emerges from ideas, and the material "things" of life have an "idealistic" organization.

I believe I might have just dialectically confused myself. I hope you fared better.

My red-green, dialectical best.

[jourclark]

A study released by the United States Census Bureau shows that progressively Americans are giving up their battle to stay afloat in an economic climate that refuses to recuperate. The number of Americans residing beneath the poverty line has increased to its highest number since the bureau started keeping such reports in 1959.

[MarxSchmarx]

jourclark. Please don't necro threads, in the future, posts like yours should be new threads. Thread closed.