The US conception of “race” is a direct outcome of the unique status of the United States as a slave holding republic. While slavery itself has long been abolished, its dynamics were replicated in Jim Crow segregation and later in the urban ghetto. The Jim Crow regime reworked the racial boundary between slaves and free into a segregated societies. Despite the he abolition of “statues segregation”, it seems that new ways have been thought in order to hold minorities from the mainstream society. Another ‘peculiar institution’, born of the adjoining of the hyperghetto with the cerebral system, is reorganizing the social meaning and significance of ‘race’ in agreement with the dictates of the deregulated economy and the post-Keynesian state.
White people fear and mistrust people of color .They think of black people’s lower-class members as the causes of social disorder, sexual dissolution, school dissolution, school deterioration, welfare profiteering, neighborhood decline, economic regression, and most significant violent crime. Americans are more afraid of being victimized by black strangers, rather than white ones. Meanwhile, some studies have shown that young black men are more positively associated with the belief that street crime is a serious problem. By the 1980’ there was the idea of” siege mentality” was integrated into the black districts and was suggesting to be aware of the unfamiliar black people in a given residency. This creates the strategy of avoiding younger African Americans. In past few years American courts have provoked the idea of stopping people and using race as “ a negative signal of increased risk of criminality”. For the past few weeks we were able to witness some of the vivid examples for this statement, such as Michael Brown’s and Erick Garner’s deaths. The equation in the article ”Race as Civic felony” ,”Young+Black+Male” brings some negative feeling and frustration, however; the bitter true is that people actually are being judged by this equation. The US Supreme Court permitted police officers to stop an individual based on solely upon “reasonable suspicion”. Unfortunately every officer sees those suspicious reasons differently due to the lack of manual that gives specific description of those “reasonable suspicions”.
Civiliter Mortuus: the Triple Exclusion of Convicts
Prisoners are denied the access to institutionalized cultural capital(130): It is thought that these will take away a lot of money from “honest and hard-working Americans” who do not have the chance of college educations too. This is also explained that some people might commit a crime just to get a free education. This statement particularly seemed to be a nonsense. Why would someone want to have a mark on their lives as felons just for free education. The actual fact that someone was charged of felony is pushing away the employees, so I don’t see why one would want to get higher education in prison.
Prisoners are systematically excluded from social redistribution and public aid(131). Everyone who has been in detention for more than 60 days is denied the help. Is this a correct thing to do? I don’t think so. If someone is charged for something that is not as dangerous as others, then I don’t think should be denied the help.Why are these people given the mark on their resumes as felonies and plus the they are denied any type of support. Don’t you think this automatically creates more criminals? What can one do to support his/her family if every door is closed for them?
Convicts are banned from political participation via “criminal disenfranchisement”(132). I support the idea that people who are imprisoned for murder or other types of violent crimes don’t have to vote. However; those people who committed far less dangerous crimes or at least they are freed should have the right to vote. I doubt this a little bit because I don’t think that everyone who is in prison is guilty. Some people were arrested based on wrong proves.
The word felony is derived from latin word fello meaning villain or wicked and designated as evil person.(135) The article suggests that the word felony was meant to be “ a symbolic act of political banishment, an assertion of the state’s power to exclude those who violated prevailing norms”, before it was explained as perpetrator on an infamous crime. Race or as article states the blackness is properly understood as America’s primeval civic felon. Not in a rhetorical or in metaphorical sense but more like in Durkheimian conception of the crime.(136) In this case America’s idealized .It is represented as a land of freedom, equality and self-determination. I constantly think about this idea of idealized America recently, especially after all these recent incidents. America seems such a friendly and racism country to me. I would see that people of different color and ethnic background appeared in movies and pop sphere. However, when I lived here for few years now, I realized that the race and ethnicity factor is highlighted very much. Everything is analyzed through the help of racism. For the first sight it is a little frustrating because obviously not every action is based on the ideas of racism. However, when deeper analysis are done I can clearly see why so much mistrust towards everything and every action. If someone can be imprisoned just to be kept away from the mainstream society its scary to think what else can be expected.
*Throughout the summery I have few questions that I answered in my own way.Please, feel free to comment about your ideas.
Here are also some problems linked with marijuana use:
Addiction—that is an obvious one. In addition, it can cause uncomfortable withdrawal symptoms in people who discontinue use.
Anxiety and Paranoia—In high doses or in sensitive individuals, marijuana can cause anxiety and paranoia.
Memory Impairment—As anyone who’s ever talked to someone who is high knows, memory impairment is common.
Mind-Altering Effects—This is particularly evident among people who haven’t used it before as well as many young people.
Heart Attack—One study found an increased risk of heart attack within the first hour of smoking marijuana.
10 Health Benefits of Marijuana
Alzheimer’s—Marijuana may be able to slow the progression of Alzheimer’s disease, according to research by the Scripps Research Institute and published in Molecular Pharmaceutics.
Anxiety—Harvard Medical School found that marijuana may have anti-anxiety effects. Of course, keep in mind that high doses may increase anxiety and paranoia.
Arthritis—Marijuana can alleviate pain and inflammation linked to arthritis.
Cancer—Research in the journal Molecular Cancer Therapeutics found that cannabidiol found in marijuana, turns off a gene called “Id-1,” which cancer cells use to spread.
Epilepsy—Marijuana has been shown in studies by Virginia Commonwealth University, to stop seizures in the school’s animal studies.
Glaucoma—Researchers are working on developing new drugs based on cannabis to treat glaucoma pain after learning its effectiveness for treating the condition. Glaucoma is a condition that increases pressure inside the eyeball and can lead to vision loss.
Improves Lung Health—Research in the Journal of the American Medical Association found that marijuana can increase lung capacity, not decrease it as many people have long believed.
Multiple Sclerosis—A study published in the Canadian Medical Association Journal found that cannabinoids found in marijuana significantly reduced multiple sclerosis pain.
Nausea—Marijuana contains a minimum of 60 chemicals known as cannabinoids, of which THC is the primary one associated with its mind-altering effects. THC has been used in the treatment of nausea, including drug- or chemotherapy-induced nausea.
Parkinson’s Disease—Research published in MedPage Today found that marijuana use eased tremors and improved fine motor skills in patients with Parkinson’s disease.
However, marijuana is far less dangerous than alcohol or tobacco, which are legal. Around 50,000 people die each year from alcohol poisoning. Similarly, more than 400,000 deaths each year are attributed to tobacco smoking. By comparison, marijuana is nontoxic and cannot cause death by overdose. Most people who overdose are under the influence of more than one drug. In 2003, the Drug Abuse Warning Network reported an average of 2.7 drugs in fatal overdose cases. Importantly, in these cases, no single drug is usually present at a lethal dose. Rather it is the synergistic effects of combining the drugs that are lethal. For example, a combination of heroin and alcohol can be especially dangerous. Heroin and alcohol both suppress breathing, but by different mechanisms. Heroin is the cause for more deaths by overdose than any other single drug. The majority of these deaths ultimately result from respiratory failure. A toxic dose of heroin increases the inhibitory effect of GABA, which causes breathing to slow and eventually stop. Alcohol overdoses occur predominantly in two ways. First, by decreasing the excitatory effect of glutamate, alcohol causes unconsciousness. At high levels, it can also cause breathing to slow or cease. Second, the body tries to rid itself of unabsorbed alcohol by emptying the stomach. If a person vomits while they are unconscious, they may inhale the vomit and compromise their breathing or even drown.
When you Google cook at least 12 are women.(Selected Area)
Chef
When you Google Chef only 3 are women.(Selected Area)
Teacher
When you Google Teacher 21 are women.(Selected Area)
Professor
When you Google Professor only two are women.(Selected Area)
Comment: I have chosen the same area for the example. This means I have copied the beginning of Google searched pictures.Does this tell you anything about the roles of women and men in our our society? One of my professors mentioned this in our class and I thought I must share it with you, especially this relates to our group case,Lilly Ledbetter Fair Act. Please, let us know what you think about this.I myself, see gender discrimination. What do we think when we say a chef? What do we think when we say professor? Obviously these titles show more power and respect.
A recurring theme or question this class brushes up against, often at the end of a class discussion, is the idea of the intended beneficiary versus the actual beneficiary of a law. And similar to many other cases (of law or legality) discussed, the Supreme Court case of Ledbetter v. Goodyear poses the question of who is left disadvantaged, long after a law has been enacted. The case poses other questions as well, of whether laws do bring about social or socioeconomic change, of how fair compensation is determined and how institutional forms of discrimination can be glossed over. You yourself may recognize the name Ledbetter from the first act that President Obama signed in office. We decided to look at the case historically, and start with a brief overview of how some acts concerning gender discrimination came about. In addition to our explanation of the case, we felt it would be helpful to tie in some notes on American feminism, and connect the issues presented with problems workers face today.
The ERA, a most famous un-ratified act.
A few years after the inclusion of the 19th Amendment allowing women the right to vote, women (and men) gathered at the Seneca Falls convention to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the first Women’s Rights Convention. It was here that the activist Alice Paul presented what she called the “Lucretia Mott Amendment,” named after the late 19th century women’s rights activist. Paul, a triple law degree earner, wanted to put into words a strong resolution of the idea of equality. To put in terms familiar from The Common Place of Law, she put legality into law. Paul would go on to travel to Europe, acting as leader of the World Woman’s Party that she created, and work closely with the League of Nations, the precursor to the United Nations. She would continue to organize, lead coalitions, and protest until her death in 1977.
The story of the ERA is a bit more frustrating. While it was introduced in 1923, it would go on to be presented to Congress every year until 1972. Alice Paul edited the act in 1943 and renamed it the “Alice Paul Amendment.” The sections now read:
Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.
The Congress shall have the power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.
This amendment shall take effect two years after the date of ratification.
But since the premier issue of the era was labor and workplace law, the act was put on the backburner. Instead, the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s brought on a new surge of women organizers demanding equality. And by the early 1970s, mobilization for the act effectively introduced the second wave of feminism in the United States, particularly in the Midwest. As scholar Erin Kemper writes, the ERA “profoundly affected the nature and trajectory of the second-wave feminist movement in Indiana” (Kemper). It created a divide among radical feminists and general reformists, but the movement was a huge step in unifying women’s discontent with the inequality they faced in the workplace and beyond. Feminism became that much more mainstream.
Unfortunately, even as the act was introduced year in and year out, it was never fully ratified. Though 35 states ratified it, another five repealed their ratifications. As U.S. presidential elections turned more conservative in the 1980s, support for the ERA dwindled even further. Despite hunger strikes and civil disobedience, the 1979 deadline of the ratification proposed by Congress came and went without full ratification, and the act was not reintroduced to Congress until 1982. It has been introduced every year since, but the rhetoric of the act is often claimed to be redundant, with other acts argued to have similar motives. But ERA supporters are still out there.
Equal Pay Act
From the early 20th century, women made up 24% of the workforce while making on average 59 cents to every dollar earned by men. With the rise of women in the labor force during World War II, due to labor shortages, it became inevitable to impose laws that would protect women from unequal pay. The first equal pay act was introduced to Congress in 1945: Women’s Equal Pay Act, which failed to pass due to disputes on the specific phrase “comparable work” used in the bill. The disagreement with the phrase stemmed from the implication that equal pay should be given for different positions in the same work environment. Throughout the 1950s, numerous bills for equal pay were brought to Congress, but all of them failed to move forward until 1961, during John F. Kennedy’s New Frontier campaign for the election. Esther Peterson, a women’s advocate who was appointed to Kennedy’s Women’s Bureau in the Department of Labor, submitted a draft bill on behalf of the Kennedy administration. Legal terms, such as “comparable work” were replaced with “equal work”, to signify that “jobs requiring equal skill, effort and responsibility, and which are performed under similar working conditions” made it possible to move the bill along. The Equal Pay Act intended to eliminate wage differences resulting from sex discrimination. This Act enforced employers to pay women and men the same wages for performing “equal work” in the same workplace. Equal work is defined here as “jobs requiring equal skill, effort, and responsibility, and which are performed under similar working conditions.” Although this bill was designed to protect discrimination against women even today, there is a significant pay gap in the workforce. Equal Pay Day represents how far into the year a woman work to earn the same amount of money a man earned the year prior. “Celebrated” in April, the day is a disheartening reminder to us all of the fact that many women must work 16 months to earn what men do in 12, for the same work. President Barack Obama signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009 into law on January 29.
Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co.
Lilly Ledbetter was born in Jacksonville, Alabama in 1938. She graduated Jackson High School, after which she passed H&R block tax preparation courses and started to work for them as an associate. She later on became an office manager at an accountant firm in Gadsden and in a gynecologists’ office. In 1979, Goodyear hired her in a supervisor position. According to one of her interviews, that job was exiting for her. The job as area manager was mostly occupied with male workers and she was among few female workers to be in that same position. They were nearly being paid the same rate for similar workload. In 1992, Ledbetter received an anonymous mail stating that she was under paid and all her male coworkers get more money than she did. She would get $3,727 per month; meanwhile, male area managers would get $4,286 per month. When she found out, she decided to file a lawsuit against the company. She filed a complaint with the EEOC, her case went to trial, and the jury gave her back approximately $3.8 million in compensatory and retributive damages for the pay discrimination to which she had been subjected. However, in 2007, the U.S. Supreme Court later overturned the lower court’s ruling. She lost only by one voice (5 out of 4). According to the Supreme Court, the Title VII only allowed victims to file a claim for pay discrimination within 180 days of the original pay-setting decision. The employee must claim her or his rights within 180 days of the discriminatory action. Thus, Ledbetter lost her case because she worked in a company for 19 years and filed a complaint only after retiring.
Despite her defeat, Ledbetter continued her fight for workplace fairness. She indicated in one of her interviews “I’ll be happy if the last thing they say about me after I die is that I made a difference. She does not want women and minorities to come across these types of discriminations. In January 2009, The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act was the first law passed by President Obama. It reestablishes an anti-discrimination law that existed earlier to the Supreme
Court decision in Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire and Rubber Co.. This Act takes over the court decision by making clear that each discriminatory paycheck is a new act of discrimination, which resets the 180-day limit to file a claim. At the same time, the Act states that claimants still can recover back pay for a period of no more than 2 years before they encounter the discrimination.
Lilly Ledbetter has been traveling around the country for the last 10 years. She shares her experience and story with people and encourages women and minorities to claim their civil rights. She wrote a book, Grace and Grit: My Fight for Equal Pay and Fairness at Goodyear and Beyond, in 2012. This book was co-written with Lanier Scott Isom and talks about her life, her work experience with the Goodyear and everything that followed.
Ledbetter case gives hope to thousands of woman who want to be equally paid for the same job. President Obama seems to be integrated in the problem of wage gap very much and has been seriously involved in the prevention of pay discriminations at work after signing the Ledbetter Act. In his State of Union Speech he said” Today women make up about half of our workforce. But they still make 77 cents for every dollar a man earns. That is wrong, and in 2014, it’s an embarrassment”. Obama gave out two executive orders in support to the Equal Pay act. First, everyone now can request and find out information regarding his/her coworker’s pay rate. This will help everyone to find out if there is a discrimination of his or her paycheck. There are so many people who are treated unequally but due to the lack of information, they never find out about it. Secondly, the President signed Presidential Memorandum ordering the Secretary of Labor to create new guidelines requiring federal constructions to submit data containing compensations paid to their employees, including data by race and gender.
Conclusion
Does this mean that society is gradually getting rid of the gender discriminations? Does this mean that soon there will not be any barriers for females to success and move forward in their careers? These questions will never have completely positive answers. It is obvious that there will be many positive pay changes for women. However, this will not end the discrimination or gender inequalities at workplace completely. This is something like racism, which fades away but never disappears completely. These acts will be followed but the new ways will be created to discriminate women a work. Lilly Ledbetter was not the first or the last female who met pay rate discrimination. The vivid example of upper said is the Wal- Mart v Dukes act, which was actually denied. Betty Dukes was a 54-year-old Wal-Mart worker in California. In 2000, she filed a sex discrimination case against Wal- Mart with few other female workers. Regardless of her six years’ experience of work and progressive performance reviews, she was denied the training she needed to improve for a higher salaried position. The women were paid in low pay rates compared to men in similar positions. They also had to wait longer for the management positions compared to men. In June 2001, the lawsuit began in U.S. District Court in San Francisco. The accusers sought to represent 1.6 million women who were currently working or who had previously worked in a Wal-Mart store since December 26, 1998. In June 2004, the federal district judge, Martin Jenkins, ruled in favor of class certification. However, Wal-Mart appealed the decision. The Supreme Court agreed to hear Wal-Mart’s appeal in 2006. In 2011, the Supreme Court ruled in Wal-Mart’s favor, saying the accusers did not have enough in common to constitute a class. Gender fairness will be achieved when people will be able to access and enjoy the same rewards, incomes and occasions regardless of whether they are women or men.
Class Connection
There is a connection between Lilly Lebetter v Goodyear and “The Common Place of Law” by Patricia Ewick & Susan S. Silbey. The case is a part of the third law type, “against the law”. Injustice has been committed against that individual and action is required for their benefit. Against the law requires resistance. This is what happened to Lilly Ledbetter. She was treated unequally and the law seemed not to be on her side. She was not able to work with the law, because the law excludes her from its legal protection. It is interesting how both cases were first approved by district judges and later on were rejected by the Supreme Court. This looks like a bias in Supreme Court decisions that are related to women.
Bibliography
1. Cose, Ellis. “The Supremes’ Technical Failure.” Newsweek 11 June 2007: 34. Criminal Justice Collection. Web. 19 Oct. 2014
2. Eidmann, Kathryn A. “Ledbetter in Congress: The Limits of a Narrow Legislative Override.” The Yale Law Journal 117.5 (2008): 971-79. JSTOR. Web. 18 Oct. 2014.
3. Ewick, P., & Silbey, S. (1198). The Common Place of Law: Stories from Everyday Life . Chicago and London : The University of Chicago Press
4. KEMPKER, ERIN M. “Coalition And Control.” Frontiers: A Journal Of Women Studies 34.2 (2013): 52-82. SocINDEX with Full Text. Web. 1 Nov. 2014
5. Ledbetter, Lilly M., and Lanier Scott Isom. Grace and Grit: My Fight for Equal Pay and Fairness at Goodyear and beyond. New York: Crown Archetype, 2012. Print
6. Lovell, Vicky. “Evaluating Policy Solutions To Sex-Based Pay Discrimination: Women Workers, Lawmakers, And Cultural Change.” University Of Maryland Law Journal Of Race, Religion, Gender & Class 9.1 (2009): 45-61. SocINDEX with Full Text. Web. 19 Oct. 2014
7. Lyons, Sarah. “Why The Law Should Intervene To Disrupt Pay-Secrecy Norms: Analyzing The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act Through The Lens Of Social Norms.” Columbia Journal Of Law & Social Problems 46.3 (2013): 361-392
8. School, C. U. (2007, May 29). LILLY M. LEDBETTER, PETITIONER v. THE GOOD-. Legal Information Institute. Retrieved from LILLY M. LEDBETTER, PETITIONER v. THE GOOD-
Hi everyone. I read the chapter so I have an idea what it was about .I was just wondering if you had discussed something interesting today in the class that was not in the assigned chapter?Did professor discuss anything new?(Case project, syllabus, final paper and etc)
It was a very interesting lecture on Wednesday. There were examples brought by some of you that welfare money could be misused. I agree that we can meet few people that are taking advantage of government help. However, I don’t think it’s a common action in our society. I have done a research paper on Single Mothers, Poverty and Welfare last semester.(I had chosen the topic myself). I think it is a very important issue in our society nowadays. I will suggest to look deeper in order to see what is the cause of the poverty and welfare requirements for all these people in need.There sure will be people that argue about whether low income families should get welfare or not. According to these people it is unfair that the tax money from their hard work goes to those who “don’t work”. Is being poor a crime? What causes these people to not move froward to wealth and welfare life, especially mother and most importantly single mothers. Here are some research that I had done for this particular topic.( Single Mothers, Poverty and Welfare)
The prevalence of single mothers is much more in the USA than in most other industrialized countries. In general US has the highest rate of single parenthood in the world. (Casey, 2012) The economic conditions of single mother household are often strained because single mothers experience many challenges, especially if they have reached profession stability and economic comfort. Much of the contemporary literature describes that single mother homes often have low income, difficulty attending higher educational institutions and accounts, number of other problems that are characteristics of this demographics. As a result it is important to contribute to challenges and hardships of single mother who are raising children and don’t have a sufficient level of education.
Families that are supported only by single mothers have been increased radically during last three decades. Half of children born nowadays are more likely to grow up in a single mother headed family before reaching the age of 18. (McLanahan, 1989) Feminism perspective has sought to improve the social status of women, who have been treated as inferior to men and have been controlled by them. Women were always neglected by society as soon as they tried to do something more than just being a housekeeper. The feminist movement effected change in Western society, including the right to initiate divorce proceedings and “no fault” divorce, the right of women to make individual decisions regarding pregnancy, they received the access to abortion and the birth controls, the right to own property. It has also led to broad employment for women at more reasonable wages, and access to university education. (Wood, n.d.)On one side it is welcoming but sometimes it holds single mothers in poverty. Even though women are freer now to make any decision they want, it can be very challenging to be a single mother without the support of the partner.
Due to the fact that women are the carriers of babies, they ought to give up their dreams as soon as the child is born. This is not a must, but it is common mostly among teenagers who drop out of the school due to their early pregnancy. The number of high school dropouts increases each year significantly. More and more women tend to drop out of schools due to the early pregnancy factor. This isn’t a welcoming finding because the study shows that women who don’t have high school diploma tend to get more support than those who have high school education. (Peter, p. 26)It is very hard for a single mother to get a good job even with high school degree. As we know the more educated the person is the higher paid job can an individual find. Women who are educated are less likely to be in a poverty and have a non-marital children compared to those who do not have the required education level. (Shattuck, 2011). This creates trouble for single mothers. In fact the rate of premarital pregnancy among young women has increased. The younger person is the less experience they have and the chances to get better job is less and less among young people (Lawler Dye, 2008).
There are other expenses that college education requires. It is not just the tuition bill but also factors such as books, supplies, travel and miscellaneous expenses. (Federal Student Aid , n.d.)Not to forget that single mothers have to take care of their children and children also require a lot of expenses. It is very hard to be a single mother and take care of children. According to National Commission on Children estimated that expenses with raising a child is around $6000 per year.(Stoesz, 2010) (Why would someone want to have more babies fro welfare if the cost of a child is so much compared to the welfare money they would get?) Based on the information retrieved from the US Department of Labor the minimum salary is $8 per hour (Division of Communications, Wage and Hour Division, 2014) . Even though the minimum wage has been increased recently, it caused a lot of other problems for single mothers. It is going to raise the price of low-skilled labor to employers. This increase in the wage may cause a decrease in employment and hours, which in its turn could cut single mothers’ income and keep them in poverty. (Joseph, 2008) A single mother is not able to work 40 hours per week. The need for different support programs grows. “For children living with a single parent and no stepparent, income is the single most important factor in accounting for their lower well-being as compared with children living with both parents. It accounts for as much as half of their disadvantage. Low parental involvement, supervision, and aspirations and greater residential mobility account for the rest.” (Cohen, 2012)To avoid all these, single mothers ought to use government help. Most common used help is the welfare.
There are only two ways that a mother could give up the welfare, either they have to find a high paid job or work and receive welfare until required level of experience for promotions. (Mullan Harris, 1993). The single mom is more likely to earn gross income of $29,000 with $57,327 in remaining income and benefits than to earn gross income of $69,000 with net income and benefits of $57,045. (Pethokoukis, 2012)It is better for a single mother to have a part time job and a welfare support rather than full time job with high pay rate.Some people are scared of going on any types of risks. They rather stay on low paid jobs but know that their family have some support rather than trying to move forward and get better jobs. What do you think about my view point?
References
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Bates, T. (143-156). Self-employment entry across industry groups. ScienceDirect, 1995.
Burke, V. (2003, July 1). CRS. Retrieved from The 1996 Welfare Reform Law : http://royce.house.gov/uploadedfiles/the%201996%20welfare%20reform%20law.pdf
Casey, M. (2012). Worst Off – Single-Parent Families In The United States . Legal Momentum , 3.
(2014). Division of Communications, Wage and Hour Division. United States Department of Labor.
Cohen, P. (2012). Poverty,Single Mothers ,and Class Mobility. Sociological Images .
Federal Student Aid . (n.d.). Retrieved from An Office of US Department of Education : http://studentaid.ed.gov/prepare-for-college/choosing-schools/consider
Haskins, R. (2006). The Outcomes of 1996 Welfare Reform. Brookings .
Hewett, N. D. (2008). Readings in american History. In Women,Families and Communities (pp. 58-78). Pearson Education .
Joseph, S. (2008). Minimum Wages and the Economic Well-Being of Single Mothers. Wiley, 848-866.
Lawler Dye, J. (2008). Participation of Mothers in Government Assistance Programs:2004. US Census Bureau , 70-116.
Mary, R. F. (2001). Outrageous Women of Colonial America. Canada: John Wilay & Sons.
McLanahan, G. (1989). Single Mothers, the Underclass, and Social Policy. Ossage , 92-104.
Mullan Harris, K. (1993). Work and Welfare Among Single Mothers in Poverty. Chicago Journals , 317-352.
Oams, O. S. (1983). AID and the Single Welfare Mother. The Hasting Center , 22-23.
Peter, B. (n.d.). Trends over time in the educational attainments. IRP, 26.
Pethokoukis, J. (2012, July 10). American Enterprise Institute . Retrieved from http://www.aei-ideas.org/2012/07/julias-mother-why-a-single-mom-is-better-off-on-welfare-than-taking-a-69000-a-year-job/
Shattuck, K. (2011). Social and Economic Characteristics of Currently nmarried Women with a Recent Birth:2011. U.S. Census Bureau.
Stoesz. (2010). American Society Social Welfare Policy . Boston: Pearson Education Int.
Wood, M. (n.d.). The Women’s Movement . Retrieved from Learn NC: http://www.learnnc.org/lp/editions/nchist-postwar/6055
The article “Law, Property, and the Geography of Violence”, by N. Blomley, notes that various intellectuals have found connection between state law and violence. For example, Max Webber identifies that state law is controlling violence by transforming it to a legitimate force within territory. Derrida has argued that “Law is always an authorized force”. It is hard for N. Blomley and his students to answer the question regarding the law and violence, because they are contrasting one another. Liberalism tries to find violence outside the law and posts state regulations because it contains and prevents anomic anarchy. This article is concentrated on violence relationship to private property. It states that there are intrinsic and consequential geography to law’s violence regarding to private property. The author bring out three specializations ;the frontier, the survey and the grid.
Property: It is the right to use some land or share its benefits. N. Blomley writes,” Regulation among the people by distributing power to control valued resources “. The property gives its owner the right of excluding, using or transforming the others. These actions are enforced by custom or the law. The access to a property is an indicator of one’s position is social hierarchy by affecting class, race, and gender relations. There are social differences in access to real estate. According to statistics 90 % of the property belong to 10 % of U.S. household. The affects wealth health and well-being. The rich get richer and the poor get poorer. These factors also relate to racial minorities and women. They don’t benefit. The property also includes in itself social symbols, meanings and stories. It plays a big role in formation of national identity. Property owners are not just technical users of land but also they engage in some moral questions of social order. N. Blomley sites Carol Rose, in order to think about the intersection of property and social relations. According to C. Rose property depends on continual active ‘doing’ and it’s not static pre-given entity. C. Rose states that can be ‘persuasive’ , that is linked to shared understanding. Blomley isolates three geographic concepts: the frontier, the survey and the grid ,in order to understand legitimation, origins and property.
The Frontier: The illustration of the frontier may include figurative, temporal or spatial, is essential to this process. Inside the frontier is the secure tenure, fee simple ownership state guaranteed rights to property. However, outside of the frontier it is uncertain and undeveloped entitlements. According to the Locke, America was all. It was here that violent frontiers of property were more deeply involving. Jeremy Bentham gives a clearer example of the frontier that divides property and violence. J. Bentham stated that property and law are bonded together, and can’t survive without each other. Geography plays a huge role in mapping of savagery. N. Blomley, sites Ellen Churchill Semple, who carved out a conceptual frontier between, “advanced” and “lower” societies. According to her “lower” societies also have internal violence, such as abortion, cannibalism , murder of elder and weak, suicide and etc.. As of N. Blomley, the poor are identified as treat to property, not only because of the crimes but also because they disturb the property value, both economically and culturally.
The Survey: “Traditionally the surveys were created by manorial officers or overseers who, at the court of survey, was charged with receiving tenants for the performance of ritualized ceremonies of homage and featly and reviewing the customary rights that made up a manor, based on the testimony of “true and sworn men”.”( N. Blomley, p. 126 ). However, by the end of the 16th century the surveyor became the person who would measure the land . The maps were used in everyday life, however , they were not mastered very much. It was used to show the boundaries of ownership and property itself. The survey and its maps very essential in establishing different political ideals. What about violence? The boundaries were violently opposed. The hedges and borders were put down, officials were harassed. There was the State violence also. “Violence is not only a product of law but also its vector”.( N. Blomley, p. 130)
The Grid: The author sites Harris(1997), as of whom, the grid is a persuasive form of disciplinary rule, with the help of upper power. They create rules by creating boundaries that are so important for the liberal regime.( N. Blomley, p 131). The property of grid is very easily negotiated by many of us. However, the act of violence towards the property depends on our social location. For example, there are rules that prohibit sleeping in the parks, trains or streets. Who does suffer from this rule. Definitely not the wealthy neighbor next door or even us. The people who violet this rules are homeless people. They are the ones who don’t have place to sleep. In relations to the grid gender violence is also explained legally. People who can be fit in the grid are easily targeted for the legal violence, often in form of very direct ways.
The author wants us to highlight the importance of the association between property, violence and space. Even though the article was written by Nicholas Blomley, my attention was caught by Jeremy Bentham’s idea that, property and law are born together ,and will die together. Let’s go back, when people would transfer from one place to another for locating food and shelter. However, they as soon as they started to settle down, the idea of boundaries and property came out. Later on we get the tribe leaders, kings, pharaohs , presidents .The property owners will dictate the laws that would be created for the “protection” of their belongings. Is this fair? Doesn’t this mean that there are going to be laws that violent “lower” class people?
Hi everyone, I found this discussion question in New York Times, under the Room for Debate. I thought it might be interesting to post , while I am training myself to use the blog. I remember some one said that sex work should be legalized in order to have safer environment both for sex workers and anyone else in the society.(At least, this was what I understood from the discussion of few students). Following the discussion question there are few articles that agree or disagree with this idea. http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2012/04/19/is-legalized-prostitution-safer
SOC320: Law, Society and Civil Rights 
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