No End in Sight

Tribute to Virginia Tech

Although I didn't know the victims, I was moved to create this for them. Many (actually, all) of the tributes on YouTube seemed to focus more on the killer and violence instead of the lives of the victims, so I wanted to create this as a simple tribute that's just about the victims, with minimal commentary. So, here it is.

the killer's parents

Like everyone else, I have utterly shocked by the events that happened at Virginia Tech. It was strange how it impacted me. I didn't know anyone there, but the tragedy hung over me like a dark cloud, and as more of the story unfolded, it became worse.

To date, though, the media has covered a lot on the victims, the survivors, and the killer, but I was surprised how little has been told about the parents. Who are they? What do they feel? I cannot imagine how incredibly guilty and wretched they must feel, for their own son (whom they love, I'm assuming) to be part of this heinous crime; to see his photos uploaded on the media; to see his mad video rants reported on television and across the Internet.

Understandably, they would want privacy, and perhaps the media is respecting that. The little I've read about, is that they were poor in South Korea before moving to the United States. I heard he had a sister but I'm not sure.

Still, one can't help but feel that their lives are over. It has been devastated. And this killer, in all his self-righteous declarations, even if he hated the "rich kids", perhaps he ought to have considered how he also destroyed his own parents' lives.

book review: nickel and dimed

"When someone works for less pay than she can live on - when, for example, she goes hungry so that you can eat more cheaply and conveniently - then she has made a great sacrifice for you, she has made you a gift of some part of her abilities, her health, and her life. The "working poor," as they are appropriately termed, are in fact the major philanthropists of our society. The neglect their own children so that the children of others will be cared for; they live in substandard housing so that other homes will be shiny and perfect; they endure privation so that inflation will be low and stock prices high. To be a member of the working poor is to be an anonymous donor, a nameless benefactor, to everyone else."

Barbara Ehrenreich, Nickel and Dimed

I've heard about this book ever since it came out but never had the chance to read it. Nickel and Dimed is a pseudo-investigative report and sociological study of the working poor. In it, Ehrenrich, who in "real life" is a writer for magazines like Harper's, immerses herself as much as she could into three working class communities: in Florida, Maine, and Minnesota, where she worked as a waitress, house-cleaner, nursing home attendant, and Walmart salesperson. She describes the process of looking for the cheapest housing (within reasonable constraints, such as safety), jobs, the interviews, and the work experience.

She reveals the stunning reality that many people in the upper class (and perhaps even the middle) may not have known - that even as a healthy, single woman without any dependents, it was often times near impossible to survive. Moreover, that often times, these working class jobs require that the people sacrifice their own health, state of mind, families, dignities just so the rich could live in a little comfort.

This might not be "news" to many, but I think people don't realize the difficulty that many working class people have to go through. The fact that the poor aren't dying in mass numbers might make people think that they're doing okay, or that they're surviving somehow. Sure, they're surviving, but they're also going through a great deal of suffering that is easily discounted. Just as Fast Food Nation had shown, many of these sufferings are invisible. These aren't only the backaches, sores and bruises that these jobs entail, but the human indiginities, the lost of individual freedom and voice.

Ehrenreich also shows that there are many ways corporations can hold down their workers, such as forbidding them to talk to one another, or share salary information, and hanging over the constant threat of humiliation through random drug tests. Sometimes the naive notion that they can just "get a new job" is impossible when you have to take care of your children or a dependent.

And I'm sure, there are many things that Ehrenreich didn't encounter, things that are far worse. At least the people she ran into were legal workers, many of which were Caucasians. The world of the illegal immigrants or minorities are possibly even darker, and more painful to consider.

In the end, she asks us not to feel guilt, but shame. And as part of the elite who has be privileged to be served, I do feel utter shame at the reality that the working poor have to suffer through. I only pray that I can help correct the problems, or at the very least, not add to it.

activism update: what's been going on

As I wandered the hallways of my school I noticed that there were actually more Pepsi machines than Coke machines. I don't know if that means they're phasing out the Coke machines or what, but I never noticed the ratio and placement of these various vending machines. I did manage to get the student rep for my school to bring up the Coke banning issue in the next hearing.

On the more global "international day against Coke", there's been more disappointing news. Actually, no news, which is perhaps why it's disappointing. To date (April 4th), the Students Against Sweatshops haven't updated their website regarding the boycott so I'm not really sure what went down. Perhaps they're still gathering their own information. I was contacted once by a member from that group who tried to put me in touch with a student from Columbia, but she didn't contact me.

So, lessons learned? Well, that students are busy people and it's difficult, but not impossible, to get any kind of action going. Most social changes wouldn't have occurred if people (students or not) inconvenienced themselves to speak out against some issue. Sometimes I wonder whether our relatively easy access to information makes us lazy to take action.

I'm still trying to decide which company to boycott for April. That announcement would be coming up in the days ahead. Stay tuned.

join folding@home

I just used my PS3 to sign up for Stanford University's Folding@Home project. The project basically uses millions of idle computers (and I guess game consoles now) to do "protein folding". I'm not fully sure what it is, but whatever it is, it's using your processor's power to help do medical research. How can it get better than that?

I created a team called "end Iraq war". The team number is 61764. Now you can fight disease while being anti-war as well. How great is that?

If any of you have PCs or PS3 turned on all day and sitting idle, why not help out the medical community?

For more information, following the link: http://folding.stanford.edu/

turning on the water works

It has recently been recently been reported that Coca-Cola is investing in water initiatives in Africa to expand supply. It's easy to be cynical about these altruistic moves. After all, they make billions of dollars, they can certainly afford to throw out a few million here and there if it makes them look good. A 15-nation study in Europe has shown that many people feel the same cynicism against corporations who don't seem genuine when they make these performances.

In general, I like to give corporations the benefit of the doubt as much as possible. I never believed that corporations were people, even though they reap all the benefits of being treated as an individual without any of the drawbacks. (See the excellent documentary The Corporation for this argument.) Whether a board of managers sit together in a room and say "We don't really care about people but let's pretend we do by making all these gestures" is not something I want to speculate. Mainly, I don't want to give the impression that corporations can't do anything good.

Of course, this doesn't excuse Coca-Cola or any other corporation for the ills they have committed. Certainly if all corporations made these gestures and others followed, our society would be a better place regardless of their sincerity.