“A Good Man is Hard to Find”: A Marxist Critique
Through literary theory, art is given an opportunity to take on new meaning. Literary theory challenges the critic to shed personal biases and presuppositions—a deliberate and artistic practice of cultural relativism—while critically examining “‘the best that has been thought and said in the world” through lenses that encourage profound interpretation, impart meaning, inform context, and expand worldviews (Bertens 5). Viewing the same work through alternate forms of literary theory can shed light on the values, patterns, structures, beliefs, and assumptions of any given viewpoint (Bertens 1-2). Rather than taking a piece of art at face value, literary theory encourages the interpreter to ask meaningful questions which uncover historical, social, or cultural context; to search for underlying themes and elements which refer to intentions or motivations in creating the work, whether unconscious or deliberate; and examine structures and elements in the form of the work, lending deeper understanding to what makes a piece of writing “literary”.
Literary theory and literary criticism are two different beasts, though on the surface, they can sometimes be difficult to distinguish from one another. Literary criticism focuses on the study, evaluation, and interpretation of literary works, generally with a focus on thematic elements, narrative, and characterization. Literary theory urges the critic move beyond the basic building blocks of writing and instead consider and interpret the nature, definition, and parameters of literature; the sociopolitical, economical, and cultural influences that inform a work; and the concrete form and structure of literary texts (Bertens 2-3). Where criticism often places the most emphasis on discovering meaning, much of literary theory dismisses meaning as ultimately arbitrary, and instead focuses on context. The nature of this context varies depending on what discipline of literary theory is emphasized by the interpreter. It is also pertinent to note that, like meaning, much of literary theory can also be considered as subjective to the interpreter.
Flannery O’Connor remains a highly respected American writer, particularly within the short story genre. Her work, typically categorized in the “Southern Gothic” style, often features grotesque characters, graphic violence, and dark humor; her writing deals predominantly in themes regarding religious salvation and societal alienation. In this paper, I intend to explore one of O’Connor’s most famous works, “A Good Man is Hard to Find,” a short story concerning the violent death of a vacationing family by the hands of a motely crew of social outcasts. Through the lens of Marxist criticism, I intend to explore how both the protagonist (a middle-class grandmother) and the antagonist (an exiled hillbilly) of the narrative are both merely facets within the gem of O’Connor’s total worldview. The grandmother’s salvation at the time of her death is often regarded as the most significant point of the narrative; through the Marxist view, I will argue that O’Connor’s Misfit can be viewed as the most influential character of the story.
The school of thought known today as Marxism began in the mid-19th century, to the credit of German artist, writer, and philosopher Karl Marx and, to a lesser extent, his colleague, Frederic Engels. Marxism came about in reaction to the oppressive and autocratic social and economic standards that dominated Germany’s landscape during the Industrial Revolution (Bramann). Political activism was often regarded as a criminal endeavor; despite the risks, after receiving his doctorate, Marx “dedicated himself to the project of radically restructuring modern industrial society along socialist and communist lines” (Bramann). Both Marx and Engels—who first introduced Marx to the ideals of socialism and communism—became influential figures within a massive, international labor movement (Bramann). Marx played a significant role in the Revolution of 1848 as a newspaper editor; in the wake of the revolution’s defeat by the ruling monarchists, Marx fled Germany. He spent his remaining years in London, dedicating his life’s work to the study of economy, art, literature, nature, and science (Bramann).
In the simplest terms, the tenets of Marxist criticism rely on the premise that our social being influences our social consciousness. That is to say, the dominant hegemony—the economic structure and subsequent social hierarchy—of any given historical period aggressively shapes an individual’s personal worldviews (Eagleton 2). Additionally, residual and emergent hegemonies also play a role in social consciousness during periods of radical social change, which Marx argues are necessary for the evolution of society. The “economic base” of any given society consists of the means of production (tools in various forms), commodities, technological innovations, the ways we organize (such as the manager/subordinate relationship), and the proletariat/bourgeoisie dynamic (Eagleton 2). The “ideological superstructure” includes what Marxists would broadly refer to as our “consciousness,” meaning law, education, religion, art, literature, media—the elements which comprise culture (Eagleton 2). Marxism argues that the base largely informs the superstructure—our culture is defined by our market—though the relationship can certainly be regarded as reciprocal in some respects.
This explanation in no way exhausts the vast scope of Marxist philosophy. For the purpose of this critique, there is one particular tenant of Marxism that must be examined in further detail: Marx’s Theory of Alienation. In a precapitalistic society, the laboring class held some measure of autonomy: they made/forged/grew their own products, dictated their working conditions, set their own hours, bartered and sold directly, and so on (Bramann). Under capitalist rule, workers are alienated from their labor, with little or no influence over the means, process, product, and relations of production (Bramann). Ultimately, Marx argues, this separation from work fosters separation from our entire lives, as more and more of what the laboring class does is dictated by forces other than our own will. Put succinctly, the depersonalization of mass production works to estrange humans from their instinctively creative and productive nature. The Marxist view necessitates the abolishment of capitalism in order for society to actualize human autonomy.
In order to understand how Marx’s concept of alienation applies to O’Connor’s work, the historical context of O’Connor’s life must be examined. After all, it is the overarching economical constructs which, Marx argues, directly influence our culture, including literary work. O’Connor wrote “A Good Man is Hard to Find” in 1953, at a time of massive industrial change in America. Soldiers returned en masse to the labor force at the end of World War II; economic growth soared; mass production boomed; suburbs sprawled; populations grew; television became the dominant media force in American households (Beckman). Religious devotion, as well, saw an unprecedented rise in the post-war era. Amongst the burgeoning suburbs, highways, and shopping centers, couples were married, babies were christened, and religious—namely Christian—worship became an unquestioned standard of middle-class life (Beckman).
O’Connor was an only child, born into a prominent and devoutly Roman Catholic family in Savannah, Georgia. Writing was still considered an unorthodox profession for a woman in that time; O’Connor’s university scholarship and post-graduation acceptance into the University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop was a testament to her talent in this regard (Encyclopaedia Britannica). O’Connor’s father died from complications of lupus when O’Connor was thirteen, and after being awarded an MFA from University of Iowa, O’Connor’s inheritance of the same disease saw her life relocated to a small farm in Milledgeville, Georgia (Encyclopaedia Britannica). O’Connor lived modestly, continuing to write as she raised peafowl with her mother—and occasionally travelling to lecture or speak at seminars—until her untimely death in 1964, at the age of 39 (Encyclopaedia Britannica). O’Connor never married, nor had children, which were particularly stark social deviations for a young woman in the throes of the post-war baby boom.
Small farming was one of the few industries that saw massive decline in the post-war economic boom. As the middle-class grew and demand for food production exponentially increased, corporations began aggressively shaping agricultural consolidation throughout the United States, leaving family farmers to either be bought out or try their best to compete against the overwhelming forces of cheap, mass-produced livestock and crops (University of Groningen, 2012). This consolidation left many farmers displaced from an industry which traditionally was passed down through generations; perhaps O’Connor perceived herself as alienated to some extent from her true “creative” self because of the economic demands of her “laboring” self, brought about by the loss of the typically-breadwinning patriarchal family figure. This is one of many possible demonstrations of Marx’ alienation at work, similar to the social and economic alienation so often featured in O’Connor’s writing, including “A Good Man is Hard to Find”. An alternate viewpoint might be that O’Connor’s return to the farmstead was instead a fulfillment of human autonomy; through separation from the ruling class, O’Connor had gained complete freedom to dictate the means, conditions, relations, and products of her labor, both in her writing and in her farming.
O’Connor’s educational success and literary accolades could not counteract the economic depression she and her mother were pigeonholed into after her father’s death; it is likely their small peafowl farm struggled to some extent, like most others, under the corporation monopolization of farming practices. It does not seem out of the realm of possibility that O’Connor expressed some measure of her social displacement through her writing: a prestigious, devout, and yet socially rebellious woman, riddled with talent and illness alike; a woman who came from a once-prominent family and who had achieved a high level of education, eventually reduced to a bed-ridden, working-class farm life (Encyclopaedia Britannica). In a Marxist examination of “A Good Man is Hard to Find,” the characterization of both the grandmother and the Misfit would suggest two conflicting and alternating worldviews that O’Connor attempted to reconcile through her craft.
O’Connor remained pious throughout the entirety of her life, her personal journals often concerning themselves obsessively with channeling her Catholic religion through her writing (O’Connor). Marx famously argued that religion was merely another man-made ideology—“ideology” specifically in the Marxist sense, encompassing all the various elements which inform our culture—dictated by the hegemonic forces of any given society, meant only to impart a false sense of purpose and moral sanction in an increasingly purposeless regime: “Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people” (Marx). It is obvious from O’Connor’s journals that she felt endlessly compelled to bring her faith to the forefront of her life’s work, which suggests, at some level, there existed an internal struggle against her religion. I believe this struggle is documented in the character of the Misfit, as well as in the other violent, grotesque, cynical, and faithless characters featured in her body of work.
The character of the grandmother deals predominantly with issues of social affirmation, wealth, and status; these would suggest concerns of the bourgeoisie, or the ruling class. For example, the grandmother disparages the casual dress of her son’s wife, opting to clad herself in stately attire for a long road trip to Florida: “In case of an accident, anyone seeing her dead on the highway would know at once that she was a lady” (O’Connor). Even at the thought of her own fragile mortality, the grandmother is entirely concerned with keeping up appearances of social hierarchy. Though putting forth all the surface appeal of a “good Christian woman,” the grandmother is generally selfish, vapid, and petulant in her actions and dialogue; she lies, panders, and has little regard for anyone but herself (Leonard 52). Even as her entire family is systemically murdered before her, the grandmother continues to plea with the Misfit only for her own life: “You wouldn’t shoot a lady, would you?” (O’Connor). O’Connor’s subversive criticism of American religious culture through the grandmother character suggests a certain level of dissatisfaction with the generally shallow religious discipline of the middle-class; perhaps, particularly when viewed in conjunction with the content of her personal journals, it also suggests a dissatisfaction in the depth of her own faith: “Oh God please make my mind clear. Please make it clean. I ask You for a greater love for my holy Mother and I ask her for a greater love for You. Please help me to get down under things and find where You are” (O’Connor).
The grandmother’s supposed salvation comes moments before she is shot dead by the Misfit; after a moment of religious doubt (“Maybe He didn’t raise the dead”) the grandmother is possessed by the spirit of Christ (O’Connor). In a stereotypically Catholic “moment of grace,” she recognizes the Misfit as simply another child of her god, and thus by her possession, a child of her own: “Why you’re one of my babies. You’re one of my own children!” (O’Connor). The grandmother attempts to usher the fervor of her faith—perhaps literally, perhaps figuratively—upon the Misfit, who “sprang back as if a snake had bitten him and shot her three times through the chest” (O’Connor). O’Connor spent much of her time defending this violent end to critics and readers alike, arguing that the murder of the grandmother was necessary to her spiritual realization: “The devil accomplishes a great deal of groundwork that seems to be necessary before grace is effective” (Leonard 52). The grandmother’s last pious exclamations and her contented post-mortem expression both offer religious affirmation and reinforcement of hegemonically-dictated roles: she finds joy in death in the recognition of her “child,” affirming her matriarchal status; she achieves deliverance from the mortal realm by the hands of a male (the Misfit) into the hands of a male (God), affirming patriarchal positions of power.
In stark contrast to the character of the grandmother, the Misfit is not in any way concerned with appearances or adherence to social norms, starting with deviations as minor as appearing to the family without a shirt on, ending with the mass-murder of the group under little to no pretense (O’Connor). Where the grandmother has wholly conceded herself to the dominant hegemony of 1950s America, the Misfit lives beyond it: working when, where, and how he pleases; living as a nomad; rejecting religion for his own moral code; learning independently; collaborating only with those he chooses; and yes, even murdering, the starkest of social deviations. The grandmother, in comparison, adheres to appearances; places upmost value on wealth and status; clings to superficial religious ideals without explicitly practicing them; and is hopelessly self-centered (Leonard 52-3). The Misfit recognizes the grandmother’s supposed spiritual awakening for what it is: “only the illusory Sun which revolves around man as long as he does not revolve around himself” (Marx). The Misfit vehemently rejects the grandmother’s imposed salvation upon him, recognizing that her personal ideals only materialized in the ultimately selfish moment of her demise: “’She would of been a good woman,’ The Misfit said, ‘if it had been somebody there to shoot her every minute of her life’” (O’Connor).
The alienation of the Misfit in the
narrative is different than alienation in the Marxist sense; however, I argue
that O’Connor’s own (Marxist) alienation from her true “creative” self—through
labor, through patriarchal rule, through illness—spurs the need to endlessly
negotiate these barriers in the body of her work. I also argue that, through a
Marxist lens, it is the Misfit who serves as the grotesque antihero of the
narrative; a man who has achieved as much human autonomy as can be afforded
under a ruling capitalist regime. The grandmother and her family have bowed
under the weight of the dominant hegemony, and the end result is death; the
protagonist is ultimately afforded nothing more than her precious “opium,”
while the Misfit continues on with life as he sees fit. In a microscopic
example of the societal cycle Marx predicts, the governing class is overthrown
by the revolutionists. The Misfit holds no false preconceptions about the man
he is, and makes little in the way of moral judgments for what he does; he
allows himself simply to exist, and to exist in ultimate freedom, living closer
to Marx’s ideal of “true self” than any other character of the narrative. O’Connor’s
endless flirtation with the binaries of faithlessness/salvation,
inclusion/alienation, and domination/subordination could all be considered as
reflections of an internal struggle against her “true” self and the imposed
societal standards and structures of post-war, capitalist America.
Works Cited
Beckman, Joanne. “Religion in Post-World War II America”. Duke University, 2000, retrieved from nationalhumanitiescenter.org/tserve/twenty/tkeyinfo/trelww2.htm
Bramann, Jorn K. Educating Rita and Other Philosophical Movies. Nightsun Books, 2009, retrieved from faculty.frostburg.edu/phil/forum/Marx.htm
Eagleton, Terry. Marxism and Literary Criticism. Taylor & Francis Group, 2014, ProQuest Ebook Central, retrieved from ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/snhu-ebooks/detail.action?docID=180126
Encyclopaedia Britannica. “Flannery O’Connor”. Encyclopaedia Britannica Online, 2019, retrieved from britannica.com/biography/Flannery-OConnor
Leonard, Douglas N. “Experiencing Flannery O’Connor’s ‘A Good Man is Hard to Find’”. Interpretations, 1983, retrieved from https://www-jstor-org.ezproxy.snhu.edu/stable/23241513?seq=5#metadata_info_tab_contents
O’Connor, Flannery. “A Good Man is Hard to Find”. 1953, retrieved from http://xroads.virginia.edu/~drbr/goodman.html
O’Connor, Flannery. “My Dear God”. New Yorker, 2013, retrieved from newyorker.com/magazine/2013/09/16/my-dear-god
Marx, Karl. “A Contribution to the Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right”. Deutsch-Französische Jahrbücher, 1844, retrieved from marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1843/critique-hpr/intro.htm, accessed 11 February 2019. University of Groningen. “The Post-War Economy: 1945-1960”. GMW, 2012, retrieved from let.rug.nl/usa/outlines/history-1994/postwar-america/the-postwar-economy-1945-1960.php
Copyright E.J.R. Webster, 2019, all rights reserved.
A Philosophical Examination of Native American and Maori Cultures
The indigenous Polynesian and North American cultures are both comprised of unique and largely independent tribes; yet there exist broad, archetypal threads uniting the philosophies of each distinct subculture. Prevalent in both cultures is a strict code of “environmental ethics,” along with a custodial attitude toward the ecology’s continued sustainment (Callicott and Overholt 46, Patterson 33). Both cultures demonstrate animism—the idea at all elements of the physical world, both animate and inanimate, possess some type of life-force, awareness, and purpose (Callicott and Overholt 51-2, Patterson 36). Coinciding with shared animistic beliefs, both cultures stress an entirely non-individualistic worldview, with emphasis on the good of the whole over the benefit (or detriment) of the individual. I intend to explore Maori and Native American perceptions of time and epistemology through the examination of each culture’s shared ideals of non-individualism and ecological interdependence.
Familial and tribal hierarchy reflect the ideology of interdependence prevalent in both the Maori and Native American peoples. Callicott and Overholt note that “the concept of the Great Spirit and of the Earth Mother and the family-like relatedness of all creatures seems… to have been a very common, not to say universal, American Indian idea… likewise, the concept of a spiritual dimension or aspect to all things” (53). These indigenous societies lack the patriarchal tendencies of Judeo-Christian Europe, and entire tribes—comprised of dozens of families—are regarded as cohesive, familial structures. Shared contribution and adherence to duty are the most basal expectations of each individual, while the greater purpose of the collective is geared toward honoring the governing spirits and sustaining the physical land. One practice of the Australian aboriginals reflects this attitude concisely: “Each child’s umbilical cord is placed in a special tree, one for each child. What happens to the tree happens to the child—therefore the child has a responsibility to take care of the land” (Goode 23-4). Mono tribe member and archaeologist Ron Goode also writes:
“Our knowledge is based on a philosophy that says we are at one with Mother Earth and Creator. Our philosophy dictates our practice. Our gathering philosophy is our ecological policy. Gather what you need, leave some for the next gatherer, leave some for the animals, leave some for seed, leave some for the bush itself—no one wants to be left naked.” (26)
These beliefs are reflected in daily practices, with rules and rituals that govern hunting, gathering, farming, and social conduct within the tribe’s environment. Most pervasively, the sustainment of human life is not prioritized over the sustainment of the conceived universe (Perrett 258 and Patterson 35). Each tribe’s unique set of practices serve as demonstrations of their reverential and sacred regard for their world; they are also physical reflections of the theology and storytelling practices alive in both the Maori and Native American cultures.
The interdependent worldview shared by these societies does not end at the physical realm. The mythology and oral traditions of both cultures have had significant influence on the beliefs, rituals, and codes of conduct that regulate everyday life. Storytelling serves not only to connect people to the physical realm, but also the physical realm to the spiritual (Callicott and Overholt 53). Gods and spirits are believed to interact regularly and intimately with all inhabitants of the physical world. The Maori concept of wairuo (“two waters”) represents this idea—that the spiritual and the physical are “understood as analogous to two streams merging as a flowing river, with associated ebbs, eddies and currents” (Rameka 388). In many Native American tribes, the dreaming state is considered a higher or “truer” reality than the perceptions of the waking world; it is believed that, while asleep, one is able to temporarily shed their physical body and freely roam the spiritual planes (Callicott and Overholt 55). This indistinction between corporeal and incorporeal existence not only encourages each culture’s beliefs of animism—spiritual life imbued upon all things—but also influences perceptions of time and epistemology.
The Western view of time typically dictates the past as an inert collection of experiences; the present as the active, living moment in time; and the future as a nebulous cloud of unrealized possibilities and aspirations. The views within the Maori and Native American cultures represent non-linear perceptions of time and particularly contrast the Western view. The Maori have a common idiom: “Kia whakatōmuri te haere whakamua; I walk with backwards into the future, with my eyes fixed on my past” (Rameka 387). Rather than “facing” the future and leaving the past “behind,” the Maori see their past as the only truly knowable experiences from which they can direct their present choices. Experience and knowledge of the past is believed to continually shape and influence the present moment. Thus, the Maori carry their past and present at the forefront of their mind as they travel blindly—rearward—into the future. This is another example of the intuitive epistemology of these indigenous people. It is true that one cannot know the future with any certainty, and most, if not all, of an individual’s decisions are in fact guided by either previous experience or shared wisdom. It could logically follow that one would continuously reflect upon the past for guidance as they move into the uncharted waters of the future.
Alternately, the Native American perception of time is generally viewed as cyclical and regenerative. Again, this experienced-based knowledge feels quite intuitive when placed in the context of the “universal ethos” and animistic beliefs which are common of the Native American peoples (Callicott and Overholt47). Life in nature isundeniably cyclical: the rising and setting of the sun; the phases of the moon; the sprouting and wilting of crops; the shifting of the seasons; the shortening and lengthening of days; changing of the tides; the migration of animals; even the culling and regrowth of forests by fire—a sustainability practice common among many indigenous North American tribes (Goode 23-4). The continued observance of these naturally-occurring cycles in the physical world, combined with the theology of a single, unifying Great Spirit, instinctively leads to the cyclical perceptions of life and death which are quite common in the Native American culture.
Non-linear views of time also serve to bolster the non-individualistic worldview and universal ethos common within both cultures. A cyclical view of time, in conjunction with an animistic worldview, all but demands non-individualistic perceptions: if every understanding of the universe is based in unity with the Great Spirit or other cosmological power, then all elements of the universe must be treated with the same respect that the Great Spirit would be afforded (Callicott and Overholt47). This includes both past and future generations. Spirits of the Native American peoples are believed to act intimately within the land, touching all of existence, regardless of time (Perrett 255-8). Similar beliefs are held within the Maori culture: “Ancestors who have passed on, while existing within the spiritual realm, still remain in the physical, alongside the living… life is seen as a transitory process moving from body-to-body and generation-to-generation” (Rameka 388). This active and participatory acknowledgment of generations gone, along with those yet to come, encourages the individual to look beyond themselves, adhere to tradition and ritual, maintain social norms, avoid taboos, preserve the ecology, and ensure sustainment of the tribe.
But how does this universal ethos—a stark contrast to the typically Western view of ecology—come to fruition? Both Maori and Native American creation myths typically assign some sort of human-esque personification to the elements of the natural world (Perrett 258, Alexander 385-6). The sky, earth, moon, sun, storms, waters, mountains, animals, grasses and trees; they are spiritually imbued, personified, familial relations of a greater, unifying cosmological entity (Patterson 34-5). These entities are alternately male, female, or instilled with the qualities of both sexes. This is another logical and intuitive assumption, as the majority of the elements in nature require the joining of two binary sexes in order to reproduce. Alexander notes that “the creation is the joint effort of a community, not often the work of one deity alone,” which further supports a worldview of interdependence and non-individualism (385). This “familial relation” to the gods then encourages views of interconnectedness, animism, and non-individualism within the people and their environment (Perrett 258). The gods and spirits are not distant, alien, untouchable beings; they are active, intimate, and unavoidable entities which live inside every element of the earth and are closely related to human beings.
This is an interesting contrast against the Judeo-Christian “sky god”; a singular, omnipotent male figure, utterly separated from the physical world, and believed to only interact—and interact quite abstractly—with those holy and worthy enough to be afforded his attention. Whereas the Maori and Native American cultures see the physical world as a holy realm, distinct but not in any way separate from the spiritual world, the Judeo-European attitude requires deliberate severance from the physical world. To “be of the world,” is a sin, and unity with the Father-God is only achieved after an ascension from our natural environment. Alexander argues: “The fundamental religious attitude is up, and focuses upon the idea of leaving the earth at death… Down is a metaphor for ‘bad’: the Fall, Hell, the ‘lower desires’ and the ‘lower animals’ are schematized in our moral vocabulary by this image” (384). This attitude supports the Western view of environmental dominance over dependence and entirely disassociates the physical world with any of the reverence and holiness so prominent within the Maori and Native American cultures.
Though the Western cultural view still typically perpetuates a classically Greek attitude toward nature—mechanical, unconscious, and wholly distinct from human existence—the modern, scientific view of the world falls more closely in line with the attitudes of the indigenous cultures explored throughout this paper. We now understand that the ecosystem of our world is vastly interdependent; we have witnessed and recorded the consequences of rampant colonialism, deforestation, poaching, extinction, over-farming, pollution, and the depletion of much of the earth’s natural resources (Goode 23-8, Callicott and Overholt 50). And though the Western attitude generally touts itself as utterly logical and scientific, our cultural attitude has yet to catch up to the mountains of empirical evidence available to the world. We continue to regard our environment as disposable, unchanged, and persistent in the wake of our rampant destruction.
In sum, there is a wealth of knowledge to be gleaned
from cultures once debased as “savage” or “inhuman”; cultures which we now
understand to have held a more scientifically sound and appropriate attitude
towards our Earth than our “civilized” European ancestors. Mysticism aside,
there is no denying the role that each species–plant, animal, mineral—plays
within their ecosystem; there is also no denying the detriment that our
individualistic and dominant Western attitude has had in reshaping the planet.
Goode writes: “What are global warming, climate change, drought, dustbowls?
These are terminology for a humankind out of sync” (27). These indigenous
people, nearly erased in the insatiable Western appetite for dominance, likely
hold the keys to restoration of our once-wild lands.
Annotated Bibliography
Alexander, Thomas. “The Fourth World of American Philosophy: The Philosophical Significance of Native American Culture”. Transactions of the Charles S. Pierce Society, vol XXXII, no 3, EBSCO Publishing, Summer 1996, pp 375-402.
Thomas examines the mythology of various tribes of native people across all of North America, tying the storytelling and oral traditions of the peoples into the emergence of their philosophical standpoints. He contrasts beliefs of indigenous Americans with the imported European Judeo-Christian ideals, and the various branches of philosophy that have emerged from that theology.
Callicott, J. Baird and Thomas W. Overholt. “Traditional American Indian Attitudes toward Nature”. From Africa to Zen: An Invitation to World Philosophy, 2nd ed, edited by Robert C. Solomon and Kathleen M. Higgins, Rowman & Littlefield, 2003, pp 45-66.
Callicott and Overholt draw stark contrasts between philosophies of indigenous Americans and European colonizers, focusing particularly on ethics and environmental responsibility. The lore, cosmology, and theology of Native Americans is used to trace the lineage of traditionally Native American worldviews.
Goode, Ron W. “Tribal-Traditional Ecological Knowledge”. News from Native California, California State University at Chico, Spring 2015, pp 23-28.
Goode, a Native American of the Mono tribe, explores the impact of colonization on the management and sustainability of indigenous lands, and explores the modern philosophical and cultural significances of an interconnected worldview.
Patterson, John. “Respecting Nature: The Maori Way”. The Ecologist, vol 29, no 1, ProQuest, Jan/Feb 1999, pp 33-8.
Patterson looks at the natural world philosophies of the Maori people and the potential impact adopting such protective and harmonious standards could have on modern culture. He closely ties his arguments into the Maori idea of all things containing mauri, or life force.
Perrett, Roy W. “Ngā Whakaaro Māori: Māori Philosophy”. From Africa to Zen: An Invitation to World Philosophy. 2nd ed, edited by Robert C. Solomon and Kathleen M. Higgins, Rowman & Littlefield, 2003, pp 255-68.
Perrett examines numerous facets of both past and modern Maori philosophy, tracing its origins to the myths and traditions of Maori ancestors. Additionally, Perrett points to the influence those ideals have had on the social and political landscape of New Zealand.
Rameka, Leslie. “Kia Whakatōmuri te Haere Whakamua: ‘I walk backwards into the future with my eyes fixed on my past’”. Contemporary Issues in Early Childhood, vol 17, no 4,Sage Publishing, 2016, pp 387-98.
Through Maori myth and cosmology, Rameka explains Maori philosophies of time and epistemology. She also examines the impact that non-linear time perception has on other areas of Maori life, such as personal responsibility and the familial structure.
Copyright E.J.R. Webster, 2016, all rights reserved.
Sociological Impact of the Decriminalization of Marijuana
I. Introduction and Historical Background
Participants of perceived social deviance throughout the 1950s and 60s—the emergence of hippie culture, “free love,” the Civil Rights movement, and protest of the Vietnam war—were often directly (though not always fairly) associated with drug use; the most common and widespread association being the recreational use of marijuana. That association likely helped to facilitate marijuana’s inclusion into the Controlled Substances Act of 1970 by the Nixon administration. However, negative connotations with the substance began in the early 1900s, after the Mexican Revolution of 1910 saw a massive influx of Mexican immigrants into the United States (Hay, 2015).
Recreational use of marijuana was an established and integral part of the Hispanic culture, and the drug quickly began to take root in the United States, particularly in the south. Prohibition of alcohol had almost immediately made marijuana an attractive, easily accessible, and largely unregulated choice for recreational pleasure (Schlosser, 1994). However, growing racism and prejudice against the influx of immigrants was further inflamed by narratives of the “Marijuana Menace,” a drug which was suddenly and intentionally purported to corrupt morality and incite violent crime (Frontline, 2014). Even the common name we now use for the drug—“marijuana”—was an intentional push to associate what had previously been referred to as “cannabis” with Mexican culture, and thus further inflame the growing anti-immigrant sentiments of the Depression era (Thompson, 2013).
Examples of anti-marijuana propaganda (Sullum, 2018)
Much of this misinformation and anti-marijuana propaganda was deliberately fueled by Harry Anslinger, the U.S. Narcotics Commissioner and leader of the federal Prohibition agency—the originating government agency which would later evolve into the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA). Anslinger recognized that he was facing potential unemployment when alcohol prohibition ended in 1933, and he swiftly turned his efforts instead to the criminalization of marijuana. Cultural stresses due to the massive financial recession had already created an atmosphere in which much of the white population feared a further shortage of resources and employment from the Hispanic population seeking asylum in the United States. Anslinger recognized and capitalized on the fears and prejudices of the time. In a 1937 testimony before Congress urging federal restriction on marijuana, Anslinger stated: “I wish I could show you what a small marihuana cigaret [sic] can do to one of our degenerate Spanish-speaking residents. That’s why our problem is so great; the greatest percentage of our population is composed of Spanish-speaking persons, most of who are low mentally, because of social and racial conditions” (Thompson, 2013). These sweeping, stereotypical, and factually untrue assumptions point toward the deeply problematic and unsound correlations between race and criminality which still permeate every level of the American justice system today.
At the outset of marijuana prohibition, the federal government encouraged any concerned state governments to regulate marijuana independently. By 1931, twenty-nine states had outlawed the substance, and the 1937 Marijuana Stamp Act—again, largely facilitated by Harry Anslinger—effectively criminalized the drug for recreational use (Frontline, 2015). Later reports commissioned by the Kennedy administration supported decriminalization of marijuana due to the perceived low risks of its use. Substantial evidence contradicted previous claims of the dangers of marijuana, but the plant was ultimately classified as an illegal Schedule I Narcotic by the Nixon administration in 1970. This inclusion was made against a report made by the Shafer Commission, a bipartisan committee appointed by Congress to provide recommendations on the regulation of marijuana (Frontline, 2014). The Shafer Commission determined personal use of marijuana should be decriminalized; Nixon vehemently opposed this recommendation (Hay, 2015). Despite the effective prohibition of the substance, eleven states still made the decision to decriminalize marijuana throughout the 1970s and many more lessened their penalties for possession. Today, twenty-nine states have legalized medical marijuana, eight states have legalized recreational use for adults over twenty-one years of age, and almost all states have deprioritized marijuana-related offenses, but the substance remains illegal at the federal level.
II. Cultural Beliefs and Biases
In researching recent efforts in marijuana legalization, it’s become apparent that only a small handful of the total population in the U.S. still holds to the antiquated belief that marijuana is a dangerous or risky substance in need of stringent regulation. Most states now consider the substance legal in some capacity, and two-thirds of Americans support federal legalization (NORML, 2017). The cultural belief that marijuana is dangerous never actually stemmed from scientific evidence, but rather from lingering associations with negative stereotypes deeply rooted in racism and prejudice.
Staggering unemployment rates during the Great Depression fueled resentment and distrust of incoming Mexican immigrants, and their cultural association with marijuana was ample fuel for Anslinger’s newest crusade after the end of alcohol prohibition (Frontline, 2014). Likewise, marijuana also had a long history of being used as a sedation drug for slaves throughout Jamaica and the Caribbean; forced use of the substance eventually evolved into an accepted, recreational habit in these cultures as slavery slowly came to an end (Hay, 2015). Since hundreds of thousands of these slaves were eventually imported to the United States, recreational marijuana usage had also become a normalized part of the African-American culture. So, an existing association of marijuana with perceived “second-class citizens” or those who were “racially inferior” was further exploited and inflamed by political agenda.
The persisting cultural belief that minorities compromise the majority of drug users has led to institutionalized and systemic racism within the justice system. Historically, minorities have been arrested, convicted, and served time for minor drug offenses at ten times the rate of whites faced with similar charges (Drug Policy Alliance, 2018). This demonstrates how an issue that begins as an individual belief or bias can become deeply engrained in societal norms: a relatively minor cultural association between minorities and drug use is propagated and enflamed by political agenda; government propaganda causes this belief to become entrenched in our society; societal belief leads to targeting by law enforcement for these crimes; established bias also creates the more likely outcome of conviction by a jury after arrest. Perceived deviant behavior is most often regulated by law in our society, and we are only now beginning to see a shift in the legislation to reflect our culture’s changing perceptions on marijuana use. One major player with vehement resistance against legalization is the American pharmaceutical industry.
Though in the past, Americans often inherently believed and trusted the advising of government agencies such as the Federal Drug Administration, growing turmoil amid the opioid crisis and other public health threats has created an overwhelming sense of mistrust with many aspects of government regulation (Norman, 2016). The current quasi-legal status of marijuana is no exception. Despite threats to enforce federal laws, numerous representatives and state governors are standing their ground against the current administration’s threats against legalization (Tumulty and Sullivan, 2018). There has been a significant cultural shift against the idea that government agencies are diligently working with the peoples’ best interests at heart. The state-by-state legalization of marijuana is another example of how individualism can have a massive impact on societal institutions. Over time, both anecdotal and scientific evidence demonstrated that marijuana is in fact a beneficial drug, with a low rate of risk and dependency. As a result, our societal view on the supposed deviancy associated with marijuana use slowly began to change. A movement that started with a handful of grassroots activists has now swept the majority of states and the regulation of marijuana is being challenged at the federal level.
III. Social Roles
Despite the overall shift in cultural acceptance of marijuana, the acceptance of medical usage has been more widespread than recreational use. Stereotypes of “stoners” or associations with laziness and social deviance have persisted against those who choose to use marijuana recreationally, which has manifested in the slow progression of legality of recreational marijuana. Recreational users in legal states are also subject to more stringent purchasing limits than those who are medically licensed, and still cannot legally grow their own plants (Wells, 2017). All users are still subject to stringent local laws regarding where and when they can consume and under what circumstances.
Many recreational users still feel the need to hide use from employers, family, and friends due to lingering discriminatory attitudes against marijuana versus other recreational substances, such as alcohol, though that stigma appears to be waning nationwide (Brooks, 2016). A significant milestone in that shifting attitude was the 2017 introduction of legal “pot clubs,” in Colorado. Pot clubs are private venues where recreational users can smoke and socialize, much like your average bar (Markus, 2017). This filled a growing need in the marijuana tourism industry, as most tourists coming to Colorado risked fines from hotels for smoking privately or encounters with police for smoking publicly, effectively giving tourists the opportunity to buy but denying them the opportunity to smoke.
There are still issues of social inequality for medical and recreational users alike. It is important to note that in the process of obtaining a medical license, a doctor provides a recommendation for medical marijuana use, not a prescription. Due to marijuana’s persisting illegality at the federal level, there are no HIPPA protections for those that medically use. Many people have found themselves unemployed or unable to obtain employment due to corporate drug screenings – unlike prescribed medications, marijuana use can still be discriminated against by employers, even for those who are medically licensed (Flock and Taylor, 2012). Our culture creates a dysfunctional view of marijuana use because of the separation of these two roles. On the one hand, we are willing to give the sickest and most vulnerable of our citizens complete access to this drug, which was initially only available legally to those with terminal or life-threatening illnesses such as cancer or HIV (Thompson, 2018). On the other hand, despite zero associated deaths, a relatively low dependency rate, and a wealth of benefits (such as lowered opioid dependency, lowered crime rates, and benefit for those with anxiety, depression and other mental illnesses, epilepsy, and other non-life-threatening disorders), our society has stalled against access to marijuana as a recreational substance available for use to the public. Our major societal institutions—the law, the government, and most religions—still brand the drug as dangerous, addictive, and ultimately harmful to the quality of life. The unrelenting bias of the federal government, instigated by political agenda and fueled by corporate investment, creates a conflict of scientific evidence against law; our cultural conflict of allowing access to a relatively innocuous substance for those who are ill but restricting it for those who are not is ultimately divisive and perpetuates the myths surrounding marijuana use.
IV. Social Issues
There persists an issue of discrimination against those who have criminal records relating to marijuana use in now-legal states. Drug convictions can disqualify citizens from educational loans, housing, job opportunities, and most importantly, the ability to vote. California is leading the way in this aspect, with numerous counties now allowing prior marijuana convictions to be sealed or expunged from criminal records after a petition process (Quinton, 2017). Still, this process is slow and expensive; many of those with criminal records lack the means to be able to begin petition. The issue remains rampant in many other states, particularly those without recreational legalization. These convictions have largely plagued minority communities (Drug Policy Alliance, 2018). Though marijuana arrests have sharply declined due to deprioritization and legalization, this issue continues to feed the faulty belief that marijuana is largely used by minorities; they are simply more likely to be punished for it.
Gerrymandering via drug conviction is an example of how racism continues to influence our societal institutions. Societal bias causes minorities to be disproportionately targeted for drug offenses by police, which means minorities overwhelmingly carry criminal convictions throughout their lives (Thompson, 2018). As a result, large groups of people—primarily African-Americans—have lost their ability to vote for representatives in their communities and their government. It’s estimated that one out of thirteen African-Americans (seven percent of the national population) is currently disenfranchised (Green, 2016). The voices of these communities then go unrepresented year after year, which means issues such as the sealing of drug convictions are left unaddressed unless those without drug convictions choose to get involved in the matter. The constituents most in need of representation are effectively silenced; governing societal institutions are then slow to change; in reflection of our laws, negative cultural biases persist.
Additionally, prior drug convictions have barred tens of thousands of minorities from the ability to enter the legal marijuana industry: Almost all twenty-nine states have varying laws barring or restricting previous drug offenders from seeking employment in both the recreational and medical marijuana industries (Thompson, 2017). A massive report issued by the American Civil Liberties Union, based on nine years of data compiled by U.S. Census and the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Uniform Crime Reporting Program from 2001-2010, concluded that the African-American population across the entirety of the U.S. is “3.73 times more likely to be arrested for marijuana possession than a white person, even though Blacks and whites use marijuana at similar rates”; thus, people of color disproportionately hold criminal records related to drug possession despite a negligible difference in the reported rate of use between the minority and white populations (ACLU, 2013). The majority of legalized states include “Good Moral Character” clauses which entirely prevent individuals with any prior drug-related convictions to participate in the legalized marijuana industry (Thompson, 2017). Only Oregon and California allow those with prior drug convictions to hold a position within the legalized industry, and only after an arduous and expensive process of sealing or overturning former convictions (Thompson, 2017). For most, hiring a lawyer and participating in the lengthy legal process is simply not a viable option.
Essentially, minorities have been unfairly targeted for illegal possession and distribution of marijuana for decades; now that the substance is legal, they have been widely excluded from participation in the legal market. Because of the quasi-legality, the black market for marijuana has now dwindled, leaving the lucrative financial benefits of the industry overwhelmingly in the hands of the white population: the population which first demanded criminalization the substance; purported and encouraged associations between marijuana, minority races, and criminal behavior; and then demanded and shaped the substance’s legality for our own personal benefit and monetary gain. Those who distribute illegally are still subject to penalty under the law, which continues to perpetuate the harmful societal associations with minorities and criminal behavior. The gentrification of the marijuana industry is a reflection of the larger issue of racism that still permeates nearly every aspect of our society.
V. Challenging Social Conditions
Marijuana is challenging the current state of politics in its pseudo-legal status: while legal in some form in the majority of states, the drug remains illegal at the federal level. Despite bipartisan support of ending prohibition, current Attorney General Jeff Sessions has made numerous threats to begin enforcing federal laws regarding marijuana, something which was publicly “unprioritized” under the Obama administration (Angell, 2018). Legislation was introduced March of 2018 by 62 bipartisan representatives, requesting that the federal government not pursue prosecution of individuals and businesses complying with local state laws concerning medical and recreational marijuana (Angell, 2018). The provision was approved by the House floor and was adopted by the Senate Appropriations Committee, but the Sessions is still able to direct the efforts of the Drug Enforcement Administration as he sees fit. This creates a dysfunction in our society because even those operating legally under state law have a looming threat of federal enforcement of their trade.
In the past, arguments against marijuana legalization often centered around two issues: increased adolescent drug use and increased crime rates (including DUIs). The newest data—still limited information, due to the brevity of the period of legality—has shown no negative correlation to these issues. In fact, legalization has decreased gang violence, illegal trafficking, and violent crime rates in border states; decreased crime rates overall in legalized states; and despite steadily rising teen drug use over the past two decades, has not been shown to further facilitate or encourage drug use in youth residing in legalized states (Messamore, 2017; Sarich, 2014; Ingraham, 2017). This preliminary data was surprising to opponents and even some supporters of legalization. However, it is still too early to definitively see the long-term impact that legalization will ultimately have on states and their communities; federal legalization would likely have a significant impact on accessibility and regulation.
Decriminalization of marijuana has also challenged social perceptions. As mentioned before, in the throes of a nationwide opioid epidemic, attitudes are shifting not only positively toward marijuana usage, but negatively toward the pharmaceutical industry as a whole (NORML, 2017; Norman, 2016). The pharmaceutical industry has spent the past decade under intense public scrutiny for unethical practices such as price fixing, artificial inflation, and offering extravagant kickbacks or incentives for doctors to unnecessarily or over-prescribe medications (Norman, 2016). One of the end results of these profit-driven practices has been a nationwide opioid epidemic; it recently became enough of a problem to be declared a “Public Health Emergency” by the current Trump administration (Allen and Kelly, 2017). Many states have turned to marijuana legalization not just as a source of tax revenue, but also as a means to combat exponentially rising opioid dependence and its related fatalities. The pharmaceutical industry has thus lobbied adamantly against legalization, funneling money to anti-legalization groups nationwide and keeping the pockets of powerful political figures – such as Attorney General Jeff Sessions – generously lined (Ingraham, 2016). The industry continues to purport the idea that marijuana is dangerous while simultaneously working to synthesize the drug artificially, the ultimate goal there being to have control over the trade of THC.
VI. Conclusion
While many who used marijuana were previously subjected to negative stereotypes concerning “stoners,” “hippies,” or “drug users,” two-thirds of the American population now supports ending marijuana prohibition. As the declining opioid use in legal states shows, many people realize that the numerous benefits of marijuana are a viable alternative to often risky and highly addictive prescription medication. As with the ending of alcohol prohibition, the cessation of marijuana prohibition at the federal level will be a battleground slowly won, state by state.
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Copyright E.J.R. Webster, 2018, all rights reserved.
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