Modern Old Order Amish communities, old Quaker and Puritan communities, 60's communes and alternative communities...

It sounds good, but in practice it requires an authoritarian regime to counter normal human impulses. It also can get pretty boring.

I thought maybe kibbutzes. I was always excited about the concept, but was told that it couldn't work on a large scale.

There was a time when I had the energy to work hard the way you do on a kibbutz. I don't have that kind of energy any more. I never heard how the kibbutz cared for the old or disabled.

Now, in an Amish environment, I have no doubt that the old and disabled are cared for, and I would also bet that, until they can't, there are tasks for them.

The human impulses part is where I see it breaking down. Sloth and greed are realities, unless you can somehow legislate them out.

But that's why I wanted to hear people's views on it... and how to make it happen, or if it's even possible.

Are they still around?

I remember reading how many early Puritan communes failed because nobody wanted to do the dirty jobs. And too many just didn't want to do any jobs.

Yeah, so far sloth and greed can't be eliminated, but they can be controlled.

I think the only way that can work is to identify them, put them on rotation and force everyone to do them.

What I *see* happening is bribery to get out of them.

The more I think about it, the more I think it can't work. I think that's why I'm trying to understand what the vision is, and then, how it is supposed to be achieved... and then how sloth and greed... and violence... will be handled.

Several times. I have yet to get an answer.

We'll see.

Imperfect but generally sane, livable societies where there is much less inequality.

because everyone would be equal economically. Minorities would no longer have to worry, it would be a win for all.

It's weird. It's VERY easy to envision racial justice.

But economic justice, well, it seems like communism. And I'm not sure if that's the intent.

True that focusing on economic justice will not solve all racial issues, but you can't have racial justice without economic justice. The inverse is also true.

No one is describing what economic justice looks like, so *I* can't picture it.

Please describe it.

a minority driving a nice car. It looks like my kid's not getting harassed constantly by the police for minding their own business. People not getting beaten & killed by the police in cold blood & then being told their actions were justified. It means walking through your own neighborhood without getting a shotgun pulled on you at 9 for walking on the curb so as to not getting hit by a car & then told by said homeowner, the next time I see your black ass touch my property I will kill you (even though all the white kids tromp straight through his yard to get to the neighborhood pool). It means not asking if I'm a citizen or how I got my citizenship simply because I'm latina & have a spanish accent.

There are countless examples but here's just a few.

crowd minorities into neighborhoods?

Is it okay to give minorities inferior schools?

Is it okay to not offer them the same civil municipal services that white neighborhoods take for granted?

Is it okay that minorities be paid less compared to their white counterparts?

Is it okay that companies like CVS only hire people outside of minority communities to work within minority communities?

white community into one that is a lot more black & hispanic because I know my kids are safer here. My kids attend a prodominiatly black school & their books & resources are garbage & I have no issue with trying to enhance the economic challanges that we face in our community. However, to pretend that by getting everyone jobs & schooling is somehow going to change the social injustices in this country is just false. A black male having a job doesn't decrease his chances of being shot by a cop or harassed by one. These a the social issues that can & need to be addressed.

By a cop because of their skin color has grown expedentially by living in a minority neighborhood.

If you want racial equality, then economic justice has to help drive that train. If you want a nicer neighborhood, then cities must step up and spend the same amount of money per citizen that it spends in its white counterparts.

If you want better schools, then there has to be the economic equality that lets minority parents to get the jobs that allow them to spend time on the PTA and create classes with fewer students.

Blended communities actually enrich everyone's lives.

Chicago ran a pilot program where they took several low income minority families with children who had been arrested on several occasions and moved them from the projects to middle-class neighborhoods. They went from a school with less than 50% graduation rate to a school with a 97% graduation rate. Every child graduated school and went on to college, none of them were ever arrested again.

Can't have one without the other.

in that white community. Our neighborhood here has no such issues & we've been here 2 yrs. There is no crime in my neighborhood & the families are a lot more tight knit.

You can say I'm wrong all day long but while you're looking over the fence making your assumptions, these are our lives & we know how the social justice system works against us.

minorities. 95% of those shootings happened in areas where the income base was below the national average and in predominantly minority neighborhoods.

Even being a minority in a predominantly white neighborhood drastically increased your odds of not being shot by a cop when stopped.

Everyone is taken on face value. Your potential, number one, is the same as anyone elses, and should be nurtured by everyone. That should happen in school and at work, at the lowest to highest levels of power. No one is uncomfortable with the way you look, and no one makes assumptions about you. That you're dirty, or uneducated, or poor, or a criminal. People are happy to be in your company, as much so as anyone else. No one is surprised to see you or hear from you in any place, at any time, on any subject. People are as likely to mentor you as anyone else, as likely to promote you as anyone else, as likely to elect you as anyone else. No one tries to trick you or manipulate you or discount you because of your race. No one tries to shut you out or shut you down because of your race. No one flinches or gets angry when you look them eye to eye. Interracial dating, especially black women and white men, is common. Black women are cherished, valued, sought after, and our beauty is celebrated at every level. Black men are not expected to be faster, stronger, more capable in bed, but light on intellect. No one questions a black man (or woman) in a position of authority, no one questions how he got there, no one tries to undermine him, no one schemes to bring him down, just because of his race.

That scratches the surface. I'm sure others can add, or present different perspectives.

If those things are done to people as long as they not from the middle class, just as long as it's not based on race?

You asked me a question, I gave you an answer.

I started the thread to get an understanding of what economic justice looks like. Why are you going in another direction?

Questions to show how economic justice is intertwined with social equality.

There are overlaps. It sucks to be black AND poor. In fact, it sucks to be poor. What I hate is that society tries to make it suck to be black in America. Regardless of economics.

So, suffice to say, I don't think they are intertwined. Overlap yes, intertwined, no. And I really think that by coming in and bringing up racial justice, you not only don't address the reason for the thread, but you foist your own agenda, and then pound people who don't agree with you.

It's a free country, it's an open message board. But I can call you on it. You're being a troll.

Debate on this board. It's much easier to name call than to come up with honest answers or to ask honest questions.

You've failed to address how to have schools in minority neighborhoods that are equal to their white neighbors without having economic justice as a key component to social equality, or how to provide the same municipal services, or better job opportunities.

What does economic justice look like? It looks a lot like social equality.

It's a place where minorities have equal access to education. It's a place where the top 1% are highly taxed to help push the wages of the bottom 90% to a living wage. It's a place where more minorities are allowed into the 1% to help lift their fellow man from poverty. It's a place where once minorities enter the upper classes they can take part in their community and help fight social injustice by showing how wrong prejudices are.

But most of all, it's a place where when all of these things are done, minorities become an integral part of our economy where they are valued just as much as their white counterparts.

That's economic justice on a small scale.

I don't think economic justice addresses our issues. For example, putting minorities in the workforce as part of "economic justice" doesn't address racial profiling. It doesn't mean that Johnny will invite D'Shawn to play with him, or decide that T'Shandra is beautiful and he hopes to marry someone as pretty as her.

I am reading your vision of economic justice. It's kind of weird. There's all of this emphasis on minorities. That doesn't help white poor people AT ALL. The only thing that sounds like "economic justice" is the taxation of the 1%.

The bottom line - you see them as intertwined and I don't.

I think it's time for us to agree to disagree.

Justice?

that you're actually trying to understand me. But I will try again.

I do not see racial issues and economic issues with as much overlap as you do. I do not consider them "intertwined". I think you can have "economic justice" and black people will still be second class citizens, even if we have money. We have had this before. The black people with money created an entire society to interact in to shield themselves and their children from racism and bigotry. Having money takes some of the sting out of being hated, but not all of it.

Now, I am all for economic justice. And if someone somewhere tries to make sure that black people get a slice of it, that's quite kind of them.

I guess the bottom line is that I do not think that viewing minorities as a valuable part of the community has ANYTHING to do with economic justice. And that is what I was talking about.

You brought the race issue into this. I did not. The word "race" is not in the original post. That's why I called you a troll.

Racial "justice" starts when white people stop hating us. There is absolutely nothing "economic" about that. At all. And if you can't understand that, you probably aren't black.

Let's Admit that the majority of police shootings is men of color. Let's admit that unemployment for people of color is more than double the national average. Let's admit that the majority of people being foreclosed up and pushed to homelessness are people of color. Let's admit that voting laws that keep people from making economic and social changes are aimed at keeping people of color from the ballot box. Let's admit that schools in poor neighborhoods are overcrowded and do a poor job at educating children, but let's also admit that most of these schools are in minority neighborhoods.

Can we admit that?

I was never talking about social justice. I was talking about economic justice.

You've brought in a new term, new issues. I'm not arguing with any of the information.

I'm saying that this is an ECONOMIC justice thread, not a SOCIAL justice thread.

I don't even know why it bothers you so much that I don't want to talk about race issues in this thread.

There is an amusing theory out there that addressing economic issues helps black people. It MIGHT help us economically (if white people let us get a piece of the action), but doesn't do jack shit for the other aspect - that some white people HATE us, and most white people don't care, and therefore, the ones who hate us win.

Dress a poor white person in a suit, fix his teeth, maybe, and take out the twang in his voice, and he will be loved.

Do you know that in the black community, there is still the fear that Obama will be killed? Do you realize that just about every black person in America wondered if he'd live through his first term? That does not have ANYTHING to do with economic justice. It's the fact that some white people hate us.

It's late, and I can't keep this up. You and I are not on the same page. I just want to know what economic justice is. Nothing else. No hidden agenda. Some people have tried to help me understand what it means here on DU, for them.

Maybe what you're saying is that in your mind, you have NO individual concept of economic justice, and if I asked the question, you could not give an answer without bringing race into it. I guess I just have to accept that.

I think it's funny that I can separate them and you can't.

CAN seperate them. It's not white people, by large margins, that this is effecting.

I'll put it both ways: you can't habe social justice without economic justice, nor can you have economic justice without social justice.

For economic justice to work, social injustices must be addressed at the same time. For social justice to be achieved, economic injustices must be addressed at the same time.

Neither will be achieved individually, nor will focusing on one solve the other.

If you believe otherwise, then please state your argument.

I found where we left off. You and I don't agree. I've tried to explain my perspective, you've tried to explain yours. We're never going to agree. It pains me to continue the conversation because I don't feel heard. But maybe you feel the same way, and that is why it continued. However, the more important thing that I have thought about, at 3am, is that you have a big heart and you care, and that's a wonderful thing.

In fact, in the grand scheme of things, outside of DU, in the real world, where our actions, not our words, make a difference, having a big heart and caring go a long way.

So I hope you always care.

-Lauren

& executions of minorities until the economic issues are fixed?

long as their is economic injustice, their will be racial injustice.

more job opportunities & educational opportunities this is somehow going to rectify the social justice issues minorities face in this country. While I think it's awesome & about time ppl started pushing the fact that our kid's schools get shafted (my son's go to a majority black school, they are one of the few black/Hispanic kids there). All of their books are falling apart & the graduation rate is about 65%. However, they are still getting the normal racial profiling from the teachers & if it wasn't for my youngest speaking out against one for her bias towards the white kids it would be worse.

Jobs & education will only do so much when the powers that be whether they are educators, employers, or law enforcement stop treating us like we are second class citizens. Economic justice will not fix this problem.

Low graduation rates, poor paying jobs, neighborhoods that look like third world cities unless you have economic justice.

graduation rates & giving people jobs won't fix the social justice piece. Someone's economic status doesn't stop the profilings, harassment, & deaths.

Minorities reach an economic status equal to their white counterparts.

But it's obviously pointless.

county.

How do you get social justice without economic justice?

People can not even begin to address self-awareness, empathy, and the like when the lowest rungs of Maslow's hierarchy of need are not being met.

If you do not have all physical needs met, then you are not really in a position to address racism or homophobia. If you do not have safety needs met (and this includes financial security), then you are not really psychologically able to focus on sexism or civil rights.

This is one of the reason I so dislike privilege theory. It is bandied about by those who have the time and money to look at those things. But it does not help the black teen who chooses to sell drugs cause it pays better than McDonald's. It does not help the hispanic single mother who works three jobs to support her children. It does not help the white family whose main breadwinner lost their IT job to an H1B Indian, has no health insurance, and one of their children has a chronic medical condition.

Government can only do so much with regards to social justice. The rest occurs through education, psychological self-awareness, and the development of empathy. Government can, by enabling more economic justice, create an environment where we are all safer and more secure so that we can do the kind of psychological work necessary in order to bring about less bigotry and racism.

Sweden is often touted as a Feminist paradise. Hell they actually have a Feminist political party. Why is this country in many ways better for women than the US? I would argue that they have the psychological maturity to do so because everyone has health care, everyone has a guaranteed education, everyone has assurances of a safe retirement, etc. etc.

Economic and social justice go hand in hand. Period.

That we both agreed what solutions are needed to create a more equal society.

I would just add that anyone would be naieve to believe that any society on this scale could completely eradicate both. There's always going to be a racist bigot or some form of economic equality. What we can do is drastically reduce the numbers to a much more manageable, but never acceptable, number.

Economic justice?

out of poverty, but it's not going to change the way we are treated in this country by law enforcement or the criminal justice system. Starting when our kid's are in grade school.

Or at least was last time I checked.

I'd hardly call that 'working for him', unless you're being sarcastic.

Have been in jail for murder (regardless of innocence or guilt) a long time ago.

The facts as presented? The truth of the intertwining of social and economic justice?

What exactly?

deals with economic justice as well as social. I used the example of gender as that one is incredibly strong. There is a different minority make-up in Sweden than there is in the US.

And yes, they are extremely proactive ---

http://www.minorityrights.org/1501/sweden/sweden-overview.html

Are they perfect? No. As has been mentioned in this thread, I agree that I doubt that every instance of bigotry and racism will ever be permanently eliminated from the human psyche. We as a species have always been this way. But progress can be more easily made when the two types of justice go hand in hand.

Do you yourself really not have an idea of what economic justice looks like, for you?

I want all people to be financially comfortable, and if that means that the government assists with this, then let the government assist. And if this means that the upper 1% get higher taxes, then that's fine with me. And if it means that corporations can't dodge paying taxes, that would make me happy. And a hike in the minimum wage would be good.

I would like everyone to have food, clothing, housing and health care. And educational opportunities at the high school level that prepare them for the working world. Free college for those who want to go, but not a necessity to get a good-paying job.

Is that economic justice? I don't think it's what is meant. I'm only trying to shore up the bottom. I'm not trying to work a miracle with the middle. It seems as though there's a desire to do something about the "shrinking middle class" and I have no idea what that looks like.

and I'd be fine with that.

I get the feeling that economic justice is democratic socialism. But I'm not sure that that is what everyone means. Sometimes I think it's a leveling of the playing field in which the rich and corporations are stripped of their money and everyone is "middle class".

That's why I started the thread. Everyone keeps talking about economic justice, as though everyone knows what it is. I do NOT, so I'm trying to understand.

But a foundation to build on could be the Second Bill of Rights, outlined by FDR. But there are still points in there you could drive a truck through that would not fix racism. It would need to be matched with an equally robust and keen set of laws that wouldn't allow the economic freedoms to only benefit white males.

other than anti-discrimination laws. Racism didn't disappear just because LBJ got the Voting and Civil Rights acts passed, that much is obvious. Those problems are largely the result of the attitudes of individual people and large numbers who share those beliefs. You cannot regulate people's thoughts, you can only try to educate them, regulate their behavior and nudge them towards more humane belief systems.

Structural racism is much larger than individual attitudes about people.

It all stems from thoughts and attitudes, though; norms, including bad ones, do not simply appear. They come from somewhere.

Even people who don't have racist thoughts benefit from societal racist inequities. That's why it is called structural racism.

A chicken in every pot. Lots of solar panels.

Or I should say science fiction, since it won't ever happen...and really even if it does follow the Gene Roddenberry mold' I think we all remember how The Federation turned out.

HINT - not a utopia for those constantly getting invaded or going off to a strange part of the galaxy and dying in the void of space.

There is NO SUCH animal as a nation with complete economic justice, without solid social justice which is just another way of saying basic civil rights.

You have to be recognized as a human being with needs; food and shelter. Those might be needs, but they are basic rights afforded to all of us. In accordance that we really believe in a true egalitarian society and not something that turns into Animal Farm.

would it help, yes.

Not sure why.

I thought economic justice was the thing most people in DU wanted.

Instead, I see this getting derailed, people have started talking about social justice, racial justice, WHY? It's such a simple question.

1. Children not living in cars.
2. No more food insecurity.
3. Free health care so people don't die from easily treated illness.
4. Younger retirement especially for people very physically intense jobs.
5. No unemployment gap between POC and white people or Asians.
6. Homeless shelters if they still exist would be for a couple of days in case of fires and extreme economic disasters, just until they can get in public housing if they need it.
7. Debt free higher education, this can include trade schools.
8. No more soup kitchens because people would get adequate SNAP benefits and/or living wage jobs.
9. No Red Nose days for any homeless people.
10. Reversing urban blight.
11. No crumbling schools without basic things like air conditioning.
12. Free lunches for all students.
13. Speaking of school, restructuring the way schools are funded so they are funded equally.
14. Which would mean a lot less emphasis on people looking to move to an area because of the excellent schools, they would all be excellent.
15. Neighborhoods would become a lot more diverse. Which means a lot more people would have a lot more diverse group of people they call friends.
16. People in Appalachia would be able to buy their children shoes.
17. A whole lot less people running around without teeth, glasses, and hearing aids.
18. Doctors without Boarders would not be working in Kentucky.
19. Fewer people would be in jail over petty economic crimes.
20. The 1% would become the 20% or perhaps a bit more.

Almost everything you have said is about providing safety nets. Also improved schools and access to higher education.

And then there's number 20. It seems totally unrelated to the others. What would you do to enable 20% of our nation's citizens to become multi-millionaires?

And is it necessary?

And what difference would it make to the remaining 80%? Should it?

you are really something. Do you have a problem with safety nets? Are safety nets not economic justice? Who would Jesus Starve? Safety nets would be used a whole lot less if their was economic justice, but I believe if we are going to go with that, then we have to start with the most vulnerable people. It would be ridiculous to start with people who are already making enough money to provide their own net, however I would help them too if they needed it. 20% is speculation based on how many people would seek higher education if it was free or they could do it without being saddled with crippling debt. Because yes if we help people who are on the bottom or close to it then more people are going to rise up on the economic ladder. Monopolies will start eroding and businesses will become more competitive and the number of people in the ranks of the very wealthy will rise. It will most likely mean that the billionaires have a few less billion to hoard and that is a good thing. It isn't necessary that more people become millionaires, but it's likely and it's nearly certain more people would become middle class and that is probably necessary if we want our nation to not keep slipping into that undeveloped nation status.

I believe in safety nets. I like everything you came up with. I could probably come up with more, and we would agree.

I was just pointing out that number 20 seemed totally unrelated to 1-19.

people in Appalachia can afford shoes and most of us have all of our teeth

or are part of the moneyed elite because the Appalachia region has some of the worst white poverty in the nation.

http://www.app-pov-proj.org/igive.html

my county has 15-23 percent poverty rate but that doesn't mean people can't afford to buy shoes

Because yes, there are families where they can't afford shoes so the kids don't wear them in the warm months saving them for use in the cold.

Obviously you are not paying attention.

That's weird, I haven't heard anyone say that.

The only "decoupling" of the two that I have seen have been from the Ancestors of this stupid meme who came up with the stupid fucking idea that because Bernie Sanders seems, upon cursory examination, to talk "more" about economic inequality than it must follow logically that he doesn't care as much about "social equality".

It is the product of the stupid, fucking binary thinking that has infected Americans.

I'd point to the Scandinavian countries as examples where economic (and social) justice issues are the most successfully exemplified.

The 85 Richest People In The World Have As Much Wealth As The 3.5 Billion Poorest

http://www.forbes.com/sites/laurashin/2014/01/23/the-85-richest-people-in-the-world-have-as-much-wealth-as-the-3-5-billion-poorest/

is an example of what can happen when economic justice gets up and leaves.

I have no idea what social justice is like there.

It's never a coincidence that when you lack in you lack in both.