Hard times have forced me to live without the sweet pleasures of "on demand" cable programming. In fact, I’ve been forced to give up cable all together. For over a month now I’ve been going through a kind of withdrawal. Learning to live without programmed entertainment is like learning to live without tobacco. With no remote control to hold onto, I wonder what to do with my hands. With no images flashing across the screen, I wonder what to think. There were times when I was so desperate for a fix that I’d watch whatever I could find in garbled antennae images. This is how I came to watch an episode of ABC’s "Wife Swap".
In this reality show couples trade wives for two weeks. They don’t trade in the Mad Men swinging lifestyle sense of the word. They switch in the dirty dishes, what’s for dinner kind. The couples are always from the extremes of the social and political spectrum. In that way, they have much in common with the candidates on the ballot this year. On the episode I watched, a wealthy family of entrepreneurs switch with a family that was trailer park poor.
Wife Swap
When the show started, it was obvious which family I identified with. Although the poor family had a sympathetic story line, they were not attractive. They wore clothes that were stained and torn, they looked like they needed a haircut and a visit to the dentist and they were overweight. Both parents had rolls of belly fat and their sons did too. On top of all that they didn’t seem to care about their appearance. They said they cared more about each other than about having things.
The other family of wealthy self-employed entrepreneurs were always well groomed and exquisitely dressed. They had gym memberships, ate well balanced meals, their children had beautiful teeth, were well behaved and they all lived in a beautiful home. Their story was the American Dream story. These attractive people had succeeded in attaining financial security. The other family had failed. It was easy to make a snap judgment that the poor family just wasn’t trying hard enough.
It was later, when I looked a bit deeper that I began to realize just how these entrepreneurs had made that good living and purchased that beautiful home. They got rich by selling hope to desperate people. They sell books that claim you can accomplish your dreams by simply "manifesting" it. Not a book on how to find a job. Not how to develop the skills to find work in a city where the only business just moved to China. Not how to survive on food stamps and unemployment benefits. But they sell a book on how to imagine yourself into being wealthy.
In the first week of the swap, the wives live by the host families’ rules. In that week, the poor family takes the wealthy mom to the Soup Kitchen where they go when the food runs out before the month does. Week two they switch and the guest mom makes the rules. That’s when they went back to the Soup Kitchen so that the wealthy mom could sell her books. Never willing to pass up an opportunity to make a buck she actually gave a presentation to the people who came looking for a meal and expected them to pay 35 bucks for her book. The unemployed father tried to tell her how cruel and insensitive she was being but she heard nothing. It was to quote them "like talking to an infomercial."
The wealthy family has all the warmth and authenticity of a Stepford Wife and their beautiful home is like Skinner’s box. Their children may have better clothes and more nourishing foods, but their souls are emaciated. The wealthy parents answer every situation by reciting the doctrine of manifesting. They wake their children with chants of "be your best you" and seem to be tone deaf to anything real. Their children are not loved but indoctrinated and subjected to non-stop behavior modification.
These entrepreneurs are faith healers, snake oil salesmen. They are no different than the traveling salvation shows that my mother warned me about. Mom would always get angry when she told stories of the traveling preachers who preyed on the small towns hidden in the Appalachian Mountains. That’s where I was born and where she grew up. She said that every summer the Faith Healers would come around and set up their tent just outside town. All the hill people would pack up the family on those hot summer nights and go listen to the preacher. Some came out of curiosity. Some came for the fellowship. Some came looking for salvation. But many came looking for healing.
At the tent revival meetings, the crowd would gather and then the preacher would take his place up on a makeshift stage. He’d swagger about for awhile warning of hellfire and damnation. He’d read scripture from the Bible that sounded official but were often not actually in the Bible. He made up the parts he needed. If anyone caught him, he’d say that God had given him a vision. Then the preacher would perform some "miracle" and a crippled girl would walk again. Or a man on the floor having a fit would have the demons lifted from his soul. He would arise smiling and praising Jesus. Sometimes folks would notice that those who were healed returned year after year to be healed.
Mom would tell how desperate poor families would take the money scrimped and saved for winter food and spring seeds out of the coffee can. They wrap it in a hanky. They’d make the long walk to the Faith Healers tents. They’d give their last few pennies to the preacher to buy health for a broken body. In a place far from towns and doctors, sometimes this was the only medicine they had. If the healing failed, the Preacher would say it was because they didn’t have enough faith. He’d say God required faith and if you believed then God would heal you. But you had to believe. The same way the entrepreneurs said you had to "manifest" wealth. According to the entrepreneurs, it wasn’t that there were no jobs in this town; it was that the poor family didn’t have enough faith. That’ll be 35 bucks please.
As for the poor family, the RV factory closed down and their town is considered the most economically depressed in the whole country. Now that’s saying something. That’s pretty damn poor. When the only factory leaves town, the supermarkets are close behind. Each business failure leaves fewer and fewer choices, fewer places to buy healthy food, school clothes, and fewer places to find work. All the manifesting in the world won’t change this global race to the bottom. And if it did, how come those manifesters don’t work on something besides lining their own pockets?
The situation for the poor family is not a temporary setback. A shave and a haircut won’t change things. A good attitude and a new shirt won’t do anything but leave less money for their kids’ dinner. Over time they have adjusted. The parents have gone without in order to make sure the kids had what they needed. You look at all of them and the kids clothes are in good shape. But the parents wear rags. They stopped getting haircuts, stopped buying new clothes, going to the dentist and the doctor. They gave up everything that wasn’t vital to make sure their boys had decent jeans and some good shoes. But what’s most amazing is that the poor parents have made these sacrifices for their kids with an open heart and a smile.
If there’s no money and no grocery stores, they survive on a high fat diet. They cook food that will fill the bellies of growing boys. As one who survived a teenage boy’s bottomless pit, it’s not easy even when food is plentiful. The family has the side effects of the corn syrup diet. The body doesn’t seem to metabolize high fructose corn syrup the way it does sugar. The result is belly flab. The corn syrup will stop the hunger pangs for awhile but it won’t nourish you.
When you really look at what these parents have done, you have to admire their grit, determination and how deeply they love their boys. And they have done it with integrity and honesty. Unlike this new breed of vulture capitalists, they would never take advantage of someone who was down on his luck. They are more likely to share their own meal than to sell a hungry man a book.
In the end, the entrepreneurs will never have enough to be happy. In their constant striving to "be the best me" and are destined to fail. The poor family has learned to want what they have instead of having what they want. There was a time when that kind of sacrifice was considered admirable. There was a time when greed was not synonymous with god.
The story of these new ghost towns repeats all over the country but most acutely in what was once the manufacturing Midwest. For decades our corporations have been draining the lifeblood out of those cities and towns. Absentee landlords move in with the assistance of the local Chamber and systematically disassemble a community. They fight the Unions and the environmental regulations. They start sending the jobs overseas, to places without environmental regulations, worker safety regulations and without Union representation. Generations of hard working men who at one time could proudly support a family are left behind and growing desperate.
Weeks later, this program is in my head (even though my cable is back) and I see parallels everywhere. I see the business news honey who is outraged that she should pay more taxes than poor people do. I see progressives who take one look at these families and start preaching about healthy food. And I see the families walk away shaking their heads. Another lecture and another self help book. They are losing hope.
I see the way the tea party is seducing these families. You don’t need no books they say. You’re better than those fancy people. And they are better than those fancy people. We need to remember that. We need them. Not because we need their votes, but because they are the best part of being American.
And now just for fun - out of the memory vault - a bit of Frank and Ernest circa 1985