Justice, real justice, is needed in McKeesport. The ‘Punisher’ need not apply.

benfell

Pennsylvania and surrounding areas

Pittsburgh

Unauthorized violence


Fig. 1. “Ed Gainey poses with CeaseFirePA during the 2020 Women’s March in Downtown Pittsburgh.” Photograph by Megan Gloeckler, undated, via Pittsburgh City Paper,[1] fair use.

McKeesport is the site of that Healthy Village Learning Institute initiative in which “interrupters” seek to “change the narrative” from violence to nonviolence.[2] A few killings[3] shouldn’t be taken as a refutation, but I still think the program underestimates the breadth of the problem. Justice, real justice, which explores and remedies the root causes of so-called “deviant” behavior, up to and including the system of social organization itself[4] hasn’t become any less essential.

But of course, as a society, we very much prefer retribution and aren’t very much interested in justice, let alone real justice, at all.[5] Justice is the last thing we want.

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, “McKeesport sees another fatal shooting; four deaths in three days,” March 3, 2023, https://www.post-gazette.com/news/crime-courts/2023/03/03/mckeesport-fatal-shooting-park-steet/stories/202303030133

Infrastructure


Fig. 1. Post-collapse scene at the Fern Hollow Bridge, photograph by National Transportation Safety Board, January 29, 2022, via Wikimedia Commons, public domain.

Paul Guggenheimer, “Inbound Armstrong Tunnel closed as yearlong rehab project begins,” Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, March 4, 2023, https://triblive.com/local/inbound-armstrong-tunnel-closed-as-rehab-project-begins/

Marijuana

My problem with the medical marijuana program in Pennsylvania is that the state is a zero-tolerance state. If you are pulled over and found to have any quantity of tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) or other cannabinoids in your blood, you will be considered to have been driving under their influence. Detectable amounts remain in your system long after any intoxicating effect.[6] Being stuck as an Uber driver,[7] and though I see nearly no traffic enforcement,[8] I simply can’t take that risk. And nowadays, I really can’t afford it anyway because Uber has cut driver pay so drastically.

Ryan Deto, “Proposed bill would give Pa. doctors more leeway in prescribing medical marijuana,” Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, March 4, 2023, https://triblive.com/news/pennsylvania/proposed-bill-would-give-pa-doctors-more-leeway-in-prescribing-medical-marijuana/

Pittsburgh, the Ohio Valley, and surrounding areas

Pollution


Fig. 1. Photographer unknown, circa 1940-1950, from Smoke Control Lantern Slide Collection, ca. 1940-1950, AIS.1978.22, Archives Service Center, University of Pittsburgh., via Bloomberg,[9] fair use.

An asthma specialist and community advocates told the [Allegheny County Council’s Committee on Health and Human Services] that by the time an air inversion warning is issued, triggering efforts to cut emissions, the damage to lungs is already done. Inversions can persist for days as a mixture of warm air and emissions are trapped in the Mon Valley, often forcing residents with conditions like asthma to stay indoors.

During the nearly two-hour hearing, council members heard testimony criticizing the effectiveness of the rule [which aims to curb particulate pollution in the Monongahela River Valley during inversions]. Six speakers from a cross-section of medical, scientific and community organizing backgrounds pressed the committee for more stringent enforcement of air quality standards and for a more robust and enforceable approach to protecting public health.[10]

In essence, alerts are not going out quickly enough, delaying mitigation efforts by polluters, and are not triggered in all cases where they should: Even though hydrogen sulfide is covered by Pennsylvania regulations, it is not covered by federal regulations, hence high levels of this chemical do not trigger alerts.[11]

Meanwhile, dioxin that the Environmental Protection Agency initially said would have dispersed in the atmosphere could have attached to dust and settled to the ground, particularly in areas to the east of the derailment site in East Palestine.[12] Beaver County, we’re looking at you.

Scott Dance, “EPA orders testing for highly toxic dioxins at Ohio derailment site,” Washington Post, March 2, 2023, https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2023/03/02/east-palestine-ohio-derailment-dioxins/

Quinn Glabicki, “Rule to protect public health during Mon Valley inversions is not working, Allegheny County Council hears,” Public Source, March 3, 2023, https://www.publicsource.org/mon-valley-rule-pollution-emissions-inversion-allegheny-county-council-hearing/

Work


Fig. 1. Yeah, this is me. The sign says, “If you’re whining about a labor shortage, STOP ignoring my job applications!” And the QR-code leads here. Photograph by author, January 16, 2023.

It’d sure be nice if I saw the world that Annie Lowrey sees. She writes cheerily that some low-wage workers are achieving middle class wages at places like Target.[13] I see rather something different as my phone continues not to ring[14] and Uber and Lyft continue to pay drivers effectively nearly nothing[15] and continue to treat them as disposable.[16] Oh, and when I checked Target jobs around Pittsburgh, they were paying $15.00 per hour to start,[17] not the $24.00 that Lowrey hallucinated.[18] (And like other Uber and Lyft drivers, I’ve taken on expenses and debt[19] that mean I need to see a cash flow closer to $25.00 per hour.)

So, imagine you are a good capitalist. Thy gods, your investors, have etched on a stone tablet that they have handed to you, the Moses of your employees, that thou shalt lay people off, whether business conditions actually warrant you doing so or not. Because workers must know that they are disposable.[20]

But you don’t want the publicity that attaches to layoffs. You know, like that tech chief executive officer who invoked Martin Luther King, Jr.—Jennifer Tejada of PagerDuty actually wrote, “I am reminded in moments like this, of something Martin Luther King said, that ‘the ultimate measure of a [leader] is not where [they] stand in the moments of comfort and convenience, but where [they] stand in times of challenge and controversy”[21]—in announcing layoffs.[22] Blaming the layoffs on automation and artificial idiocy or pretending that you were over-exuberant in hiring people in the first place[23] similarly won’t do. So what to do?

The trick, which has a name, “backdoor layoffs,” is to make workers miserable so they’ll quit on their own.[24] Which, by the way, also means you won’t have to fight their unemployment insurance claims.

“The moves, though not labeled as layoffs, can at times have a similar effect in thinning a company’s ranks,” according to the Wall Street Journal. “It is also a sign that bosses at white-collar firms are back in charge after struggling to retain workers in recent years amid a tight labor market.”

Some corporate demands include asking employees to return to the office or retracting location flexibility—cue the anticipated outrage. Employees at companies like Disney and Amazon have sounded the alarm on these strict policies, taking to the web to share their distaste and sign petitions.[25]

Now we know what’s really behind all those “back to the office” orders.

Amber Burton and Paolo Confino, “Employers are taking the easy way out and cutting employees through ‘backdoor layoffs,’” Fortune, February 28, 2023, https://fortune.com/2023/02/28/job-cuts-backdoor-layoffs-quitting/

Jacob Bogage, “Starbucks committed ‘egregious’ violations in battling union, judge rules,” Washington Post, March 1, 2023, https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2023/03/01/starbucks-union-ruling-buffalo/

Gerrit De Vynck, Caroline O’Donovan, and Naomi Nix, “The age of the Silicon Valley ‘moonshot’ is over,” Washington Post, March 2, 2023, https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2023/03/02/big-tech-moonshots-google-meta-amazon/

Annie Lowrey, “Low-Wage Jobs Are Becoming Middle-Class Jobs,” Atlantic, March 4, 2023, https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/03/wage-growth-income-inequality-labor-market/673277/

So-called ‘ridesharing’

Drivers


Fig. 1. Yeah, this is me. The sign says, “If you’re whining about a labor shortage, STOP ignoring my job applications!” And the QR-code leads here. Photograph by author, January 16, 2023.

Oh gee, Uber and Lyft deny that they treat drivers as disposable.[26]

According to the survey, drivers of color were deactivated significantly more often than white drivers. Nearly 70% of drivers of color experienced either a temporary or permanent deactivation, compared with 57% of white drivers. Some of the drivers who responded to the survey said they feared racist passengers could end their job on a whim with a false complaint.

“Customer input can have such an impact on whether the drivers can continue to use these apps or keep working and have their pay or benefits,” [Asian Law Caucus attorney Winnie] Kao said. “There’s so many discriminatory and biased interactions that are happening and, and that they’re completely unchecked.”

Rideshare apps using these complaints to determine whether drivers can do their jobs can be problematic, Kao said. The stories she heard exemplified how necessary elementary safeguards were in any workplace, including a rideshare car, she said.[27]

My experience of this hung on a single phone call. Because I’d let it go to voicemail and because I detest dealing with people on the phone, I tried every other way of responding. I went and checked my mail (my mail drop is about 25 minutes away) and discovered I was still suspended. I drove back home and discovered I was still suspended. It had been well over an hour, probably more like two or three, and I gritted my teeth when I called back, but I’d had plenty of time to think about what I would say and so I was ready when I did.

Drivers who aren’t as well prepared as I was for any of a number of reasons might not do as well as I did.

Sakshi Venkatraman, “Uber and Lyft drivers in California say they’ve been spontaneously fired by apps, report finds,” NBC News, March 3, 2023, https://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/uber-lyft-drivers-california-say-ve-spontaneously-fired-apps-report-fi-rcna73262

Gilead

Right-wing militias

Police White supremacist gangs


Fig. 1. Photograph by Lorie Shaull, April 1, 2021, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0.

Keri Blakinger, “Special counsel urges sheriff to ban the ‘cancer’ of deputy gangs,” Los Angeles Times, March 2, 2023, https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2023-03-02/la-me-deputy-gangs-report

Anna Orso, Chris Palmer, and Kasturi Pananjady, “Philadelphia’s driving equality law reduced traffic stops but not racial disparities in its first year,” Philadelphia Inquirer, March 3, 2023, https://www.inquirer.com/news/philadelphia-driving-equality-legislation-one-year-results-20230303.html

Mark Belko, “A short stay? Allegheny County Police patrols Downtown could be wrapping up,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, March 4, 2023, https://www.post-gazette.com/business/development/2023/03/04/county-police-downtown-pittsburgh-fitzgerald-gainey-swartzwelder/stories/202303030131

  1. [1]Charlie Wolfson, “Neighborhood groups try to curb shootings as Pittsburgh’s mayoral campaign puts political focus on gun violence,” Pittsburgh City Paper, October 20, 2021, https://www.pghcitypaper.com/pittsburgh/neighborhood-groups-try-to-curb-shootings-as-pittsburghs-mayoral-campaign-puts-political-focus-on-gun-violence/Content?oid=20401296↩
  2. [2]Quinn Glabicki and Amelia Winger, “‘Change the narrative’: A new crew of ‘interrupters’ aims to curb the violence in McKeesport,” Public Source, August 15, 2022, https://www.publicsource.org/gun-violence-prevention-pennsylvania/↩
  3. [3]Justin Vellucci, “Third man dies, 2 injured in separate McKeesport shootings, authorities say,” Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, March 1, 2023, https://triblive.com/local/at-least-1-dead-3-injured-in-mckeesport-shootings-authorities-say/; Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, “McKeesport sees another fatal shooting; four deaths in three days,” March 3, 2023, https://www.post-gazette.com/news/crime-courts/2023/03/03/mckeesport-fatal-shooting-park-steet/stories/202303030133↩
  4. [4]Wanda D. McCaslin and Denise C. Breton, “Justice as Healing: Going Outside the Colonizers’ Cage,” in Handbook of Critical and Indigenous Methodologies, Norman K. Denzin, Yvonna S. Lincoln, and Linda Tuhiwai Smith, eds. (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2008), 511-529.↩
  5. [5]Dana Forsythe, “Punisher creator Gerry Conway: Cops using the skull logo are like people using the Confederate flag,” SyFy Wire, January 8, 2019, copy in possession of author; David Masciotra, “The Punisher skull: Unofficial logo of the white American death cult,” Salon, April 28, 2019, https://www.salon.com/2019/04/28/the-punisher-skull-unofficial-logo-of-the-white-american-death-cult/↩
  6. [6]Ed Mahon, “5 ways Pa.’s marijuana laws could change in 2023,” Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, February 13, 2023, https://triblive.com/news/pennsylvania/5-ways-pa-s-marijuana-laws-could-change-in-2023/↩
  7. [7]David Benfell, “About my job hunt,” Not Housebroken, n.d., https://disunitedstates.org/about-my-job-hunt/↩
  8. [8]David Benfell, “Reckless driving as routine,” Not Housebroken, January 28, 2023, https://disunitedstates.org/2023/01/25/reckless-driving-as-routine/↩
  9. [9]Mark Byrnes, “What Pittsburgh Looked Like When It Decided It Had a Pollution Problem,” Bloomberg, June 5, 2012, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2012-06-05/what-pittsburgh-looked-like-when-it-decided-it-had-a-pollution-problem↩
  10. [10]Quinn Glabicki, “Rule to protect public health during Mon Valley inversions is not working, Allegheny County Council hears,” Public Source, March 3, 2023, https://www.publicsource.org/mon-valley-rule-pollution-emissions-inversion-allegheny-county-council-hearing/↩
  11. [11]Quinn Glabicki, “Rule to protect public health during Mon Valley inversions is not working, Allegheny County Council hears,” Public Source, March 3, 2023, https://www.publicsource.org/mon-valley-rule-pollution-emissions-inversion-allegheny-county-council-hearing/↩
  12. [12]Scott Dance, “EPA orders testing for highly toxic dioxins at Ohio derailment site,” Washington Post, March 2, 2023, https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2023/03/02/east-palestine-ohio-derailment-dioxins/↩
  13. [13]Annie Lowrey, “Low-Wage Jobs Are Becoming Middle-Class Jobs,” Atlantic, March 4, 2023, https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/03/wage-growth-income-inequality-labor-market/673277/↩
  14. [14]David Benfell, “About my job hunt,” Not Housebroken, n.d., https://disunitedstates.org/about-my-job-hunt/↩
  15. [15]Rebecca Bellan, “Lyft is charging riders wait time fees — but drivers aren’t reaping the rewards,” TechCrunch, February 17, 2023, https://techcrunch.com/2023/02/17/lyft-is-charging-riders-wait-time-fees-but-drivers-arent-reaping-the-rewards/; Jon Fingas, “Uber and Lyft driver pay isn’t keeping up with soaring fares, study says,” Engadget, February 14, 2023, https://www.engadget.com/uber-and-lyft-driver-pay-isnt-keeping-up-with-soaring-fares-study-says-173807130.html; Winnie Hu and Ana Ley, “Uber Drivers Say They Are Struggling: ‘This Is Not Sustainable,’” New York Times, January 12, 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/12/nyregion/cab-uber-lyft-drivers.html; Liz Kilmer, “Uber, Lyft drivers announce strike across Pittsburgh region,” WPXI, February 10, 2023, https://www.wpxi.com/news/local/uber-lyft-drivers-announce-strike-across-pittsburgh-region/T7SE5T7GHJB7VOD4LG3J4VF34A/↩
  16. [16]Sakshi Venkatraman, “Uber and Lyft drivers in California say they’ve been spontaneously fired by apps, report finds,” NBC News, March 3, 2023, https://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/uber-lyft-drivers-california-say-ve-spontaneously-fired-apps-report-fi-rcna73262↩
  17. [17]Indeed, “Target Jobs in Pittsburgh,” 2023, https://www.indeed.com/q-Target-l-Pittsburgh,-PA-jobs.html?vjk=705637bbe9c8f953↩
  18. [18]Annie Lowrey, “Low-Wage Jobs Are Becoming Middle-Class Jobs,” Atlantic, March 4, 2023, https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/03/wage-growth-income-inequality-labor-market/673277/↩
  19. [19]Winnie Hu and Ana Ley, “Uber Drivers Say They Are Struggling: ‘This Is Not Sustainable,’” New York Times, January 12, 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/12/nyregion/cab-uber-lyft-drivers.html↩
  20. [20]Brian Merchant, “The real aim of big tech’s layoffs: bringing workers to heel,” Los Angeles Times, January 30, 2023, https://www.latimes.com/business/technology/story/2023-01-30/column-how-big-tech-is-using-mass-layoffs-to-bring-workers-to-heel↩
  21. [21]Jennifer Tejada, quoted in Grace Dean, “A tech CEO apologized for quoting Martin Luther King Jr. when announcing layoffs, calling it ‘inappropriate and insensitive,’” Business Insider, February 1, 2023, https://www.businessinsider.com/tech-layoffs-pagerduty-ceo-apologizes-martin-luther-king-jr-quote-2023-2↩
  22. [22]Grace Dean, “A tech CEO apologized for quoting Martin Luther King Jr. when announcing layoffs, calling it ‘inappropriate and insensitive,’” Business Insider, February 1, 2023, https://www.businessinsider.com/tech-layoffs-pagerduty-ceo-apologizes-martin-luther-king-jr-quote-2023-2↩
  23. [23]Bernard Marr, “The Real Reasons For Big Tech Layoffs At Google, Microsoft, Meta, And Amazon,” Forbes, January 30, 2023, https://www.forbes.com/sites/bernardmarr/2023/01/30/the-real-reasons-for-big-tech-layoffs-at-google-microsoft-meta-and-amazon/↩
  24. [24]Amber Burton and Paolo Confino, “Employers are taking the easy way out and cutting employees through ‘backdoor layoffs,’” Fortune, February 28, 2023, https://fortune.com/2023/02/28/job-cuts-backdoor-layoffs-quitting/↩
  25. [25]Amber Burton and Paolo Confino, “Employers are taking the easy way out and cutting employees through ‘backdoor layoffs,’” Fortune, February 28, 2023, https://fortune.com/2023/02/28/job-cuts-backdoor-layoffs-quitting/↩
  26. [26]Sakshi Venkatraman, “Uber and Lyft drivers in California say they’ve been spontaneously fired by apps, report finds,” NBC News, March 3, 2023, https://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/uber-lyft-drivers-california-say-ve-spontaneously-fired-apps-report-fi-rcna73262↩
  27. [27]Sakshi Venkatraman, “Uber and Lyft drivers in California say they’ve been spontaneously fired by apps, report finds,” NBC News, March 3, 2023, https://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/uber-lyft-drivers-california-say-ve-spontaneously-fired-apps-report-fi-rcna73262↩

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.