Victim-Blaming: How does it affect those in our society who have lost jobs due

[LiberalLoner]

to this bad recession, or have had other calamities happen to them?

I wonder, how many people internalize this and then blame themselves for bad things that have happened to them? I wonder how much damage this has done to our society and is still doing as this recession goes on?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victim_blaming

Kind of an interesting article on victim-blaming.

It's interesting that victim blaming tends to happen along racist and sexist lines. Apparently it is easier to lay blame on people who already occupy a relatively low status in society.

Have any of you experienced victim-blaming in your lives, either being unfairly blamed yourselves, or blaming others? If you have experienced this, how did it affect you to be kicked while you were down, so to speak?

[lxlxlxl]

1. sort of natural in any situation to ask what your part in that situation was

its not really 'victim blaming' its epistemology.

[XanaDUer]

2. I think a part of it is a sort of magical thinking that all humans engage in

we like to feel we are in control of the major forces in our lives. If someone loses their home, job, whatever, it is comforting to self-talk and say things like, "Well, it was probably something that person did. That wound *never* happen to me because I am so smart, clever, hard worker, whatever..."

Also, Americans have this sort of self-mythos about self-reliance, etc. It grows out the Puritan work ethic, I think and the belief that, if bad things happen to you, you're not working enough.

Just my two cents.

[LiberalLoner]

4. Yes, that's exactly what the article said, too, it was about feeling more in control...I have

also seen that happen to people who have come down with cancer, etc. They have people who say to them, well, you must have been eating the wrong things or you must have smoked or something...they kind of blame people for being sick, I guess it makes them feel that illness could not possibly happen to them.

It's still a rough thing to hear when you are suffering and on the receiving end of more kicks though.

[marions ghost]

15. I learned this early in life--

ie. that you really find out who your friends are when misfortune strikes.

The wagon train just goes on without you.

[ipaint]

3. Sure, on this board a couple weeks back.

How did it affect me, I just thought "what an ignorant asshole" and moved on.

Anyone who wants to blame me for the criminal activities of the wealthy elite in this country can go fuck themselves.

[LiberalLoner]

5. Love your attitude and your strength of spirit! :) I agree with you, anyone

who kicks you when you are down can go suck on an egg!

I wish for better times and better things for you, soon. :)

[The Straight Story]

6. It has affected me greatly

I just don't want to go into the details but did want to answer your question.

[LiberalLoner]

9. I'm so sorry. I know I can't help much but I said a prayer for you for healing. n/t

[jtuck004]

7. Book "When Work Disappears" and other good information

in this article.

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/print/2010/03/how-a-new-jobless-era-will-transform-america/7919/

There are some paragraphs that should shake people up a little. I see people getting excited about 100K jobs being created in a month. At that rate we will have about 12-15% unemployment in 3 years. Underemployment will be worse, and it is already 30% among those with less than $15,000 in income.

[LiberalLoner]

8. Oh, how depressing. We will have to reach out and help others, we have to

hang together or I just don't see us making it as a society. I guess there will be some of us who survive no matter what but there will be way too much suffering if we don't learn to help each other instead of blaming each other.

[jtuck004]

10. Don't let it depress you. Let it motivate you to help find solutions.

I think a lot of people don't really understand how tenuous things are right now. The way forward is a much higher plane of education in ways that we are not used to, lots of hoop-jumping needs to be tossed aside, and people need to be willing to work for much less than they are used to. Or it all comes apart.

Gonna be interesting times ;)

[provis99]

11. the farmers getting big government subsidies around here always blame welfare recipients.

Every one of these damned Indiana corn farmers gets massive amounts of federal money, yet complain constantly that poor people are lazy welfare sponges.

[rudy23]

12. Ask someone affected by Katrina about this. Blame the victim was the national talking point.

The saddest thing about it was how 50% of Dems, and even many of the affected accepted the Rovian talking points.

Do people remember that Karl Rove was put in charge of Gulf Coast Recovery? And no one questioned it? Man, fuck people.

[Jkid]

13. Victim-blaming is a form of Social Darwinism.

Victim-blaming assumes that the person is able to change his situation irregardless of anything outside his or her control. But there are some situations that it's impossible to change anything.

[kenichol]

14. It's at least as old as Job

In the Old Testament story of Job, some just 'know' that Job must have done something wrong for so much bad to have happened to him.
Sometimes we do wrong and bad consequences occur, but sometimes bad shit happens to good people. Period. But it's not always easy to tell which is which.

[county worker]

16. Two large banks were merging in the 90's in San Diego.

All the employees of one of the banks were going to be let go. The employees of the other bank said it was because the other bank's employees did not do a good job and did not work hard enough. I think it was Wells Fargo and some other bank that is no longer in existence.

[Berry Cool]

17. The concept of "karma" as most people speak of it is also victim-blaming.

The assumption is that bad things people do will inevitably come back and punish them, while people who do good things will have only good things happen to them. Of course, this is bullshit. Bad things happen to good people all the time, and good things happen to bad people all the time.