reparations & exploitation

Doug Henwood dhenwood at panix.com
Fri Mar 9 11:20:57 PST 2001


kelley wrote:


>i don't think anyone here doesn't believe that! what is at issue
>isn't that! what is at issue is whether you can say that white
>workers benefit from racism by calling that exploitation. does the
>woman who hires a housekeeper exploit that housekeeper? does the
>couple who buys all the meals preprepared and eat off disposable
>dishes exploit the people who make the disposable tableware and the
>food they eat? does the dot.com worker or lawyer exploit the
>physician's assistant who checks out his strep throat and prescribes
>antibiotics?

I thought you said we were talking about groups, not individuals. The woman who hires a housekeeper is highly likely to be white and professional/managerial; the housekeeper is highly likely to be a recent immigrant, and quite possibly an illegal one. The former group enjoys certain social benefits at the partial expense of the latter group. I don't know how that would fit into a SV model, but it sure smells like exploitation to me.

Doug



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