Abstract
Punk Politics
Last February, police escorted Russian punk band Pussy Riot out of a Moscow church after they performed a “punk prayer” that included the line “Mother of God, Virgin Mary, drive Putin away.”
Three members of the band, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, Maria Alvokhina, and Yekaterina Samutsevich, were subsequently arrested, charged with hooliganism motivated by religious hatred, and held in custody until they were sentenced to two years in prison. In October, the court released Samutsevich. “We won’t stay silent,” vowed Tolokonnikova and Alvokhina.
By sparking international outrage and eliciting support from human rights groups and heads of state, Pussy Riot did exactly what many punk bands have done—sparked protest.
Sociologists Ryan Moore and Michael Roberts, in a 2009 article in Mobilization, “Do-It-Yourself Mobilization: Punk and Social Movements,” described punk music as a potent medium of protest. In 1976, punk bands participated in “Rock Against Racism,” a campaign that steered British youth away from white nationalist groups. The 1980s saw hardcore bands like Minor Threat and Fire Party organize protests against the Reagan administration’s foreign policy agenda and apartheid. Since the 1990s, bands such as Los Crudos and Limp Wrist have bridged punk and activist communities.
Pussy Riot models themselves after 1990s feminist punk movement Riot Grrrl, finding inspiration in its impudence, politically charged lyrics, and outspoken feminism. Writer Sara Marcus, in a 2010 book, Girls to the Front, sees Riot Grrrl as a prophetic feminist movement that urged young women to confront sexism when they saw it. But Marcus laments that since the demise of Riot Grrrl, no movement has confronted sexism as powerfully.
Maïté Abram
That’s why Kathleen Hanna, formerly of the band Bikini Kill, is encouraged by the work of Pussy Riot. “It would be really cool,” says Hanna, “if it reinvigorated feminists from all over the world.”
Letters
Dear Editors
I greatly appreciated Contexts’ multi-faceted coverage of complex and concerning transformations in higher education (Fall 2012), but was troubled by the use of the language of the assembly line. Call me fussy, but comparing for-profit, “corporatized” modes of higher education to an assembly line is not only an imperfect metaphor, it also demeans the work of actual assembly line workers. Chaplin’s “Modern Times“ (which provided much of the art for the Contexts issue) was critical of capitalism and industrial society, but Chaplin’s working class Tramp was also a bit of a bumbling fool. As sociologists, we must use images and language that help communicate our ideas to the public, but we also need to carefully consider all the possible implications.
Occupy Hong Kong
photos by Daniel Garrett
Occupy Hong Kong was China’s contribution to the global Occupy movement. Launched in mid-October 2011, the activists planted their anticapitalist message in the center of Hong Kong’s Central Business District. They took up residence in a large public open space beneath the iconic Hong Kong Shanghai Bank of China (HSBC), situated at the crossroads of major financial, shopping and tourist areas.
Signs protested neoliberalism, the banking system, and state suppression. A tank signified the 1989 crackdown on student protesters in Tiananmen Square. Inside the camp were tables and message boards for activists, and meeting, living and meditation areas.
Following the trend of other world cities evicting occupy settlements, Occupy Hong Kong ended one day last September, as more than 100 guards and bailiffs descended upon the plaza, expunging all vestiges of the protest. It reflected China’s and the local power elites’ belief that Hong Kong should be an economic rather than a political hub which, given Hong Kong’s nickname, the “City of Protests,” was ironic indeed.
Foreclosing on Black Communities
While the economy is showing signs of slow recovery, foreclosures continue to decimate American cities. Six million families have already lost their homes, and the Center for Responsible Lending estimates that six million more will do so before the housing crisis is over. Black communities have been impacted the most, experiencing a foreclosure rate twice as high as their white counterparts.
Right-wing pundits blame greedy borrowers, arguing that they took out loans on homes they couldn’t afford, and federal policy, which “required” banks to give loans to unqualified inner city residents in order to counteract years of redlining. But research by the Federal Reserve, and others, shows that the such loans were typically home equity loans, given to homeowners in which their home acts as collateral.
Predatory lenders used aggressive marketing tactics to entrap unwary buyers with high fees and interest rates, variable rates, prepayment penalties, and other costly provisions. Lenders also often falsified information to get families to borrow more money than they needed, or could afford to pay back. The Department of Justice recently found that Wells Fargo Bank, for example, targeted black communities with these kinds of “ghetto loans.”
Missing from debates about the roots of the crisis is the role played by housing investors. Sociologist Gregory Squires and urban affairs scholar John Gilderbloom, researching foreclosure activity in Louisville, Kentucky, found that among people who live in the houses they own, race had little to do with foreclosures. Race was, however, a significant predictor of foreclosures of investor-owned properties that were rented out to others—particularly among suburban whites renting out properties in predominantly black inner-city areas.
The foreclosure crisis, in other words, has little to do with the risky behavior of homeowners—or their race.
Rage Against the Refs
When people watch football, they tend to focus on their favorite team. But this season the NFL referees’ lockout has shifted attention to the men in stripes.
Fans complained that replacement referees took too long to announce basic penalties, that they didn’t know which way to face to address the crowd, and that they couldn’t keep up with the pace of the game. But fans rarely complain about the home-team advantage that regular referees give teams, according to economist Tobias Moskowitz and sports journalist L. Jon Wertheim in their 2011 book, Scorecasting.
In a 2000 article in the European Journal of Social Psychology, social psychologists Michael Lupfer, Kelly Weeks and colleagues showed that most people judge fairness on the basis of consistency and predictability. Even though fans prefer good decisions, they may see bad or incorrect decisions as fair if referees are consistent. Fans get less upset when referees favor the home team because that’s something every home team counts on.
When fans saw replacement referees’ decision-making as inconsistent, unreliable, and biased, it made them feel cheated. For the duration of the lockout, their anger resonated throughout Twitter and Facebook. A controversial, last-second touchdown call that gave Seattle a win over Green Bay led to particularly scathing comments about the referees. One meme, for example, pictured Stevie Wonder next to the caption “Roses are Black, Violets are Black, Everything is Black, Touchdown Seahawks.”
Once the lockout ended last September, fans finally went back to the time-honored tradition of calling the referees blind—every other game.
Amanda Lanzone
Rocking the Vote
Jennifer Johnson
When a Gallup poll showed a sharp drop in the number of 18- to 29-year-olds who said they would “defi nitely vote” in the 2012 Presidential election, new media initiatives came to the rescue.
Social science researchers have noted the advantages of using digital and entertainment media in soliciting youth civil involvement. “Youth generally find spontaneous, uninstitutionalized, creative forms of collective expression online more appealing than the online civic engagement initiatives sponsored by government and NGOs,” argued media scholars Henry Mainsah and Andrew Morrison in the Proceedings of the 12th Participatory Design Conference held in Denmark last year. “Young citizens [also] fi nd more authentic experiences in edgier political sites and in entertainment media and games.”
In a photo caption challenge on Comedy Central, participants voted on and shared their political caption favorites via Facebook, Google+, and Twitter. Virgin America and PromoJam united behind nonprofi t group Rock the Vote, allowing new voters to register by scanning a code found on in-fl ight entertainment consoles and t-shirts.
Communication researcher Kathryn Montgomery, in the 2008 book Civic Life Online: Learning How Digital Media Can Engage Youth, says these corporate collaborations are “emblematic of the growing practice of ’cause marketing,’ in which companies link their products to causes and issues in order to build customer appreciation and loyalty.”
While some decry these efforts, suggesting that they’re leading to the commercialization of the democratic process, when it comes to increased youth turnout, Democrats tend to benefit. In last November’s election, President Obama enjoyed a 24-point edge over Romney among 18- to 29-year-olds, even if preliminary data suggests that turnout among youth may have declined slightly since the 2008 election.
Like a Hurricane—But Worse
The storm known as Sandy was called a “superstorm,” a “Frankenstorm,” “the perfect storm.” It was indeed impressive, with a wind span of about 1,000 miles, a 13-foot storm surge in lower Manhattan, 126 homes burned in Queens, the obliteration of parts of the New Jersey coast and Staten Island, massive power outages, and at least 30 billion dollars in damages.
Sandy showed that the elderly were particularly vulnerable, modern society is highly interdependent, and living near the water can be very dangerous. But one thing Sandy was not was a worst case.
Sandy’s total body count was about 200. By comparison, Katrina claimed over 1,800 souls. And much like Katrina, the damage Sandy caused wasn’t unanticipated. Experts have long known of the vulnerabilities of the tunnels and subways. Lower Manhattan is very close to sea level. Climate scientists have been modeling the implications of sea-level rise for years, so they knew what storm surge could do. And while it’s not typical for a hurricane to strike New York, 11 major storms have affected the city since 1938. The vulnerabilities on New Jersey’s coast were similarly well known.
So, Sandy was not even close to the worst that could have happened. That would be a moderately sized earthquake under Manhattan.
Experts estimate that in a magnitude seven earthquake, half or more of Manhattan’s buildings would suffer moderate damage or worse, and 1,700 would completely collapse. They predict a total loss of 50 billion dollars or more. If it occurred at two o’clock on a work day, about 540 Manhattanites would either die instantly or suffer life-threatening injuries, and about 3,000 would require hospitalization—figures that are probably low estimates.
In Manhattan, a great many—if not most—of the tall buildings were built around the turn of the last century. New seismic codes didn’t start until 1996. And 80 percent of all buildings are made of unreinforced masonry, which often crumbles in earthquakes.
It would be fires that would be most lethal. That’s what killed so many in San Francisco’s 1906 earthquake. In Manhattan, water mains would break and firefighters would not be able to get through the debris to rescue people. Many fire houses and medical facilities would crumble. Nearly all police facilities would be unusable, along with three-quarters of all medical facilities. As fires raged out of control, the loss of lives and property would exceed anything we’ve ever seen.
Of course all of this is highly unlikely. Manhattan isn’t located above the boundary of tectonic plates, where the vast majority of earthquakes happen. It sits, relatively speaking, safely on its bedrock. But it’s not always wise to make personal and policy choices on the basis of likelihood. When we buy life insurance, inspect all airplane accidents, and hold fire drills in schools we’re making choices on the basis of possibilities—not probabilities.
So while worst case thinking shouldn’t supplant probabilistic thinking, sometimes it’s the smartest thing to do.