"Human waste", the War on Drugs and the judicator State

[The Johnny]

This is pretty much a riff on Zygmunt Bauman's "Wasted lives..." and Loic Wacquant's "The prisons of misery"...


Capitalism creates "human waste" as a byproduct of its "progress"; human waste is -following a metaphor of how industrial waste is created in order to generate profit- that which will not be used, for "recycling" (integrating elements to the productive cycle) is costly and is overlooked.

Human waste is the reserve army of cheap labor, but now there is no way to get rid of them as it was done in past times, such as marginalizing them towards unpopulated regions, or some desert island, now they are left to fare off in political situations of wars and massacres of ethnic cleansing (see Africa); theres also the bio-segregation in "refugee camps" in which they will never be acknowledged as "exilees" for that would imply that they cannot go back to where they came from, but thus remaining in political limbo, not having rights and access to society nor being able to return to their homeland. There is also prisons, where after "paying its debt to society" and tries to return to work and reintegration, runs into how almost nobody wants to hire an ex-inmate, exacerbates its previous condition of exclusion and forces the person to participate in illegal activities to make a living and ends up in prison again.

The neoliberal project and politics fragilize salaried work and worker protection, which creates situations of misery for a great segment of the population... this situation is controlled by measures such as "Tolerance Zero" and "The War on Drugs"(^tm) but how?

Prisons are a way to segregate the "dangerous population" and to put them in a position whereby their labour can be exploited thru the prison work system... there is statistical correlation between the mass unemployment and the raising of the time of court penalties... for example, in France, the inmate population is basicly composed of inmigrants and street drug dealers...

So on Wacquants (translated) own words "the invisible hand of capitalism now wears an iron glove"

[Telarus]

Well constructed. I haven't run into either author yet, but I could follow you. Some of it may need some polishing or expansion to make readers more aware of these trends. Nice job.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I think you've got a pretty good handle on most of North America's social situation.

[hirley0]

despite the new tall tower of hope?
My guess is the iron age has had its day.
The future is one of biological warfare,
& the cost's of it?

"waste human"  \
"dangerous population" "the invisible hand of capitalism now wears an iron glove"

[The Johnny]

Well constructed. I haven't run into either author yet, but I could follow you. Some of it may need some polishing or expansion to make readers more aware of these trends. Nice job.

thanks i barely know them either, both are sociologists, one is french and the other polish, i learnt about them on an exclusion course

and yeah, its a bit short cz im going from my notes and typing on a mobile device is awful   

[The Johnny]

I think you've got a pretty good handle on most of North America's social situation.

well the situations alluded to supposedly are firstworld trends not just Usa. Australians ran off some people to an island, theres "refugee camps" in differnt parts in europe that have people escaping african guerrillas or arabian dictatorships. the "unrecycled" people that are not integrated to the system manifest themselves, for example in mexico as the large percentage of persons living off of informal economy style jobs (were talking 60% or more) or in the USA how there doesnt seem to exist enough jobs for everyone because high tech takes their place or are moved overseas. its a general trend in capitalistic societies that simply dont give their populace a proper place or situation to survive.

[The Johnny]

despite the new tall tower of hope?
My guess is the iron age has had its day.
The future is one of biological warfare,
& the cost's of it?

"waste human"  \
"dangerous population" "the invisible hand of capitalism now wears an iron glove"

im sure a lot of people can tell that hope is just how a donkey sees a carrot on a stick, always just barely out of reach; totalitarism seems to be the order of the day or century

and surely biological warfare to cut down on population isnt out of the imagination of the states, but there seems to be more benefits from having "excess population", like a willing force of cheap labour, or having scapegoats for the built in failures of the system. just say, shifting the blame from economic policies to immigrants.

[Doktor Howl]

despite the new tall tower of hope?
My guess is the iron age has had its day.
The future is one of biological warfare,
& the cost's of it?

"waste human"  \
"dangerous population" "the invisible hand of capitalism now wears an iron glove"

There will always be time for bullets, Hirley0.