Category — BudgetCuts

As experiences come into your life, you begin to recognize how one situation compares and relates to another. For example, my recent bout with the side effects of a treatment meant to improve and protect my bones from the ravages of bone cancer and osteoporosis triggered the thought of how the side effects of integration have affected the lives and lifestyle of socioeconomically disadvantaged blacks in America.

The once a month infusion treatment, or intravenous injection, was supposed to alleviate the pain and prevent further disintegration or breaking of my bones. I suffered great side effects of chills and aching the first time the drug was administered, but when the injection time was increased, those particular side effects decreased. The treatment continued month after month, but I began to notice I was having difficulty breathing.

It began with the feeling of excess fluid and a rattling breath sound. The problem impeded my ability to perform any physical activity, walking, cleaning, showering, having sex, etc. All effort was labored and distressful. My doctors ordered x-rays, scans, and echo-grams to try to find out what was causing the “pleural effusion” I was suffering; but to no avail. The situation kept getting worse.

Along with complaining, I began to do research into the side effects of the many drugs and supplements I am taking for my various ailments which include Type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, anemia, breast cancer, bone cancer, osteoporosis, and kidney disease. Some of the medications mentioned difficulty in breathing, but the doctors seemed to ignore that as a cause. Since the infusion was the latest treatment, to me it became the most suspicious.

As a required precaution, prior to receiving the treatment, a blood test to see if the creatinine level in my kidneys is low is taken as the medication negatively affects the kidneys. For the past three months, my tests have come back with the level too high because the tumor in my cancerous breast erupted and caused bleeding. The loss of blood caused the kidneys to be drier, causing the creatinine level to go higher, which negated my infusion treatment. So while my body has been healing from the tumor eruption, it has also been withdrawing from the side effects of the infusion, which has allowed my breathing to return to normal. I am regaining my strength and ability to function as before. Thank God!

When I awoke this morning the correlation of experiencing side effects from a medical treatment fit into the framework of the black Underclass in America experiencing the side effects of integration.

For many blacks, successful assimilation became a reality. However, according to Bill Cosby, beloved TV father and celebrity, the “lower economic people” or black Underclass, are “knuckleheads walking around…not holding up their end.” To Mr. Cosby, the Underclass has not gotten with the program of living in an American, integrated society and their inability to appropriately function has become very obvious.

In recent statements, Mr. Cosby, has spoken on their lack of language skills, their poor parenting, their spending habits, their dress, their lifestyle, their reflection of ethnicity, even the naming of their children. We all recognize him as a very funny comedian, but what has and is happening to our people is no joke.

Integration was a wonderful concept from a basic human standpoint. All people should be allowed the freedom of their “inalienable rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness,” and the U.S. prides itself in that ideal. But along with the powerlessness to pursue the better things in life, there were many blacks who were unable to escape their environment even after the opportunity was presented due to a lack of money and education, or simply because they wished to remain in the comfort zone of their surroundings.

The side effects of such great change in their surroundings became most severe when nearly all of the educated, prominent, role models moved from the black neighborhoods to white suburbs and left the less fortunate behind. The ones left were forced to continue surviving as best they could without direction and the leadership and guidance that had always been available. The motivators and mentors disappeared, leaving only folks of basically the same status. So the vulnerable ethnic group developed their own ways of life and became a culture (Underclass) within a culture (black) within a culture (white or American). The culture of the black Underclass includes a language and moral code which often seems harsh and even barbaric to those from the outside.

But the resourceful group has now increased in such numbers and have gained the attention of outsiders through the widespread popularity of rap and hip hop music, clothing and hair styles, piercing and tattoos, etc. Those who are thriving with conventional lifestyles are taking notice. Particularly as another side effect of integration has been the adoption by mainstream youth of many of the Underclass habits and social standards; including the use of the “N” word.

The further side effects of the full acceptance and incorporation of the black Underclass language, dress, and customs, has made some middle- and upper-class blacks, like Mr. Cosby, criticize and denigrate them in order to try to set them apart. But it can’t be done. Just as I can’t separate my breathing from what is happening to my bones, all descendants of slaves are segments of the whole, parts of the body. It is our legacy. All we can hope for is to find ways to alleviate the side effects which are affecting us.

If Mr. Cosby really wants to help, rather than rant to his peers; he should go to people who would benefit the most from hearing what he has to say. Speak to them and I believe they will listen. He should tell them about his own side effects and challenges. As a matter of fact, the black Underclass has been waiting for someone who made it out and overcame the struggle to come back and give them some honest relief. After all, isn’t that what all those suffering from side effects really want and need?

When Arnold Schwarzenegger, Governor of California, threatens to reduce state workers’ salaries to minimum wage, there is a great cry of alarm from many sectors. According to an article written by Jon Ortiz, reporter for the Sacramento Bee, “doctors and lawyers would get no pay…and (the workers who) don’t get overtime would receive a flat $455 per week.” The order to reduce pay would be voided once the state budget is approved, with back pay rewarded and pay levels returned to normal.

Considering this situation by having been a state and federal civil servant during my working years, I can relate as there was a time or two when I was a victim of the same budget-related procedure. Now, as a retiree who is living on the fixed income of Social Security and Supplemental Security Income or SSI, I can again relate to a reduction in income because for the last two years we in my current financial position have felt the pinch of reduced income and no cost of living increases. But I say to the California state workers and all those up in arms about a reduction to $455 a week, try living on less than $900 a month, which is what most of us receive.

I believe that nothing happens by accident and there are no coincidences. Everything is life is being played out as it should, and in every special situation there is a lesson involved. The lesson for state workers may be to feel for a brief period, brought on by political in-determination, what those whose welfare they be in charge of is feeling all the time, due primarily to no fault of their own.

The Bee article spoke of workers having exhausted their savings or not having a nest egg to fall back on and how having to stretch their $455 for a week will be hard for some. But existing on $900 for a month leaves nothing for savings or a nest egg and is hard for everyone on SSI. Our incomes force us to live only in specific areas because of the need for low-income or subsidized housing, and some cut corners or take advantage of whatever extra funds are available, even if that means doing something immoral or other than legal.

Our low-income diets are less than healthy because we usually shop in self-service warehouse-type markets; variety stores where everything is a dollar or less; or the corner grocer that sells mainly junk and liquor. The other option is cheap fast food with all its sodium, fat and unhealthy ingredients. The majority of us have preexisting conditions which are make worse by a poor diet leading to additional health issues.

Because we are usually dependent on the state’s health provisions or MediCal in California, the quality of care is less than adequate even when compared to prison inmates, especially the dental, mental and vision needs.

For state workers, the budget will be signed soon and salaries will return to normal, and workers will be able to continue their comfortable lifestyles. This will not occur for us on the lowest level of state or federal funding. Many of us receiving SSI have worked, paid taxes and lived productive lives prior to our serious physical and mental challenges forced us to seek the only financial solution available. But there will be no restoration of the reduction in our income which has been taken due to budget cuts.

The lives of low-income people who work for minimum wage and SSI recipients will continue as a struggle from day-to-day. I hope that those whose help we depend on to finalize the processes they are in charge of will remember how it was during the time of wage reduction and speed things along. Our well-being and lives depend on it.