Points of Rebellion - William O. Douglas

Justice Douglas is my favorite Supreme Court justice.  Law school is extremely boring at times, but any class that features Supreme Court opinions from 1939-1975 holds the potential for excitement: Douglas is likely to dissent in many cases, and there is almost always a sentence or two of pure brilliance and disgust.  Points of Rebellion, then, is a 97 page dissent against America as she stood in 1969.  It is a fantastic book and I highly recommend it.

In college, I majored in Writing and Politics at the Gallatin School of Individualized Study at New York University.  We were required to state our concentration and present a colloquium on the topic.  I chose "Political Rebellion in Literature."  My presentation (delivered to my academic adviser, as well as two other faculty members) was mostly a mess.  We had to talk about 30 books.  Some of my books were Utopia (Sir Thomas More), Hamlet, The Rebel (Albert Camus), The Flowers of Evil (Charles Baudelaire), The Origins of Totalitarianism (Hannah Arendt), One-Dimensional Man (Herbert Marcuse), White Noise (Don DeLillo), Something Happened (Joseph Heller), Anti-Intellectualism in American Life (Richard Hofstadter), The Trial (Kafka), Discourse on Method (Descartes), Bend Sinister (Vladimir Nabokov), and others...

My basic argument was that the different forms of rebellion had been squashed by the majority in American society.  I could not make this argument anywhere nearly as well as I could today.

Points of Rebellion would have been THE PERFECT BOOK for this colloquium, and I am sorry that I did not know anything about the law, or the Court, when I was 21 and designing my project.

Were I to give this presentation today, the so-called "Occupy movement" would no doubt move heavily to the forefront of the conversation.  Last year when the police arrested protesters on the Brooklyn Bridge and raided Zuccotti Park, I wrote on Facebook that it had taken 7 years, but I had finally been proven wrong: the flowers of rebellion still bloom today.

But I would like you, one day, to look at Google Analytics (I find it from my finance page) and look at Domestic Trends and see the last ten years in various industries.  You will be able to see some remnants of the Great Recession, but more notable is the continued dominance of the credit card industry.

While the "Occupy movement" may have brought like-minded individuals together and fostered a stronger public consciousness of the ways in which the financial industry has siphoned off economic growth from 99% of the population, it is hard to say that they have made a serious impact.  Elizabeth Warren has made a much stronger impact in terms of formulating the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and she is but one person.  It is far too early to talk about 2016, but other people are already whispering that Hillary Clinton will be running on the Democratic ticket--but I am convinced that the only way we can enter into a "golden age" is with Warren as President.  Many people are saying that we will continue to live with high unemployment rates for the rest of our lives, but if more people read Points of Rebellion, one would realize that rapid and radical change is, in fact, possible.

To be sure, Douglas's vision of an American utopia is improbable.  It is quite easy to counter Douglas's statements or claim that he asks too much out of people.  Indeed, many of his statements ignore the psychological tendencies of people to organize themselves in "the Establishment" that Douglas faced in his lifetime, and that we still face today.

First, Points of Rebellion was written in 1970--but it might as well have been written yesterday because nothing has changed (excepting some of the statements about foreign affairs):

"The advances of technology present the problem of increasing disemployment in the private sector.  We brag about our present low unemployment.  But that is due to Vietnam.  Without Vietnam we would have 15 per cent or more unemployment.  Must we fight wars to have full employment?
Technology is in the saddle and displaces manpower.  The old problem of unemployment has become the new problem of disemployment.  How many of the present eighteen-year-old men and women will be permanently disemployed?  Thoughts such as these fill the hearts of the young with dismay." (66)

Douglas does, at one point, flex his literary experimentation to hilarious effect:

"A number of federal agencies also use personality tests.  One included the following choices:--my father was a good man, I am very seldom troubled by constipation, my sex life is satisfactory, evil spirits possess me at times, at times I feel like swearing, I have had very peculiar and strange experiences, I have never been in trouble because of my sex behavior, during one period when I was a youngster I engaged in petty thievery, my sleep is fitful and disturbed, I do not always tell the truth, as a youngster I was suspended from school one or more times for cutting up, everything is turning out just like the prophets of the Bible said it would.
The experts are at odds about these personality tests.  These tests commonly grade a person by eight, nine, or ten traits while twenty-five thousand traits might approximate an accurate personality portrayal.  Moreover, the creator of the test fashions his own neurotic world as, for example, to daydream is neurotic--the thesis that is present in one personality test." (25)

Most people know nothing of Justice Douglas.  Law students may hear the gossip that he was married four times and that he was an early advocate of environmental protection.  His passion for the environment is present throughout Points of Rebellion.  Sometimes his love for it is so innocent and genuine that one cannot help but be moved:

"I remember an alpine meadow in Wyoming where willows lined a clear, cold brook.  Moose browsed the willow.  Beaver came and made a dam which in time created a lovely pond which produced eastern brook trout up to five pounds.  A cattle baron said that sagebrush was killing the grass.  So the Forest Service sprayed the entire area.  It killed the sagebrush and the willow too.  The moose disappeared and so did the beaver.  In time the dam washed out and the pond was drained.  Ten years later some of the willow was still killed out; the beaver never returned; nor did the moose." (83)

Notably, Justice Douglas does not write as you would expect a Supreme Court justice to write--and it is refreshing as hell:

"In April, 1968, only 3.5 per cent of the general population was unemployed, while for those in the slum areas it was 7 per cent, with 5.7 per cent for whites and 8.7 per cent for Negroes.
The national white unemployment rate has been about 3.1 per cent and the national Negro unemployment rate 6.7 per cent.
Police practices are anti-Negro.
Employment practices are anti-Negro.
Housing allocation is anti-Negro.
Education is anti-Negro.
The federal government, with its hundreds of federally-financed public road contracts, and its thousands of procurement contracts negotiated each year by the Pentagon and other agencies to purchase munitions, towels, stationery, pens, automobiles and the like, is admonished by Congress to make sure that the contractors for these goods make jobs available without discrimination.  President Johnson gave hardly more than lip service to that mandate." (45-46)

When a Supreme Court justice can write the way Douglas does, one feels more secure in their love for their country.  However, there have not been many like him.  Points of Rebellion predates the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency, and one supposes that Douglas would think that agency a step in the right direction.  However it is more likely that he would find much to hate about it too.  His distaste for the administrative state is eloquently stated in another passage that could be written yesterday:

"Corporate interests, as well as poor people--unemployed people as well as the average member of affluent society--are affected by these broad generalized grants of authority to administrative agencies.  The corporate interests have been largely taken care of by highly qualified lawyers acting in individual cases and by Bar Associations proposing procedural reforms that define, for example, the 'aggrieved' persons who have standing to object to agency orders or decisions. [One wishes Douglas was on the Court when Lujan v. National Wildlife Federation came down...] But the voices of the mass of people are not heard; and the administrative agencies largely have their own way.
Moreover, the Establishment controls those agencies.  That control does not come from corrupt practices or from venality.  It results from close alliances made out of working relations, from memberships in the same or similar clubs, from the warp and woof of social relations, and from the prospects offered the administrator for work in the ranks of the Establishment, if he is the right and proper man.  The administrative office is indeed the staging ground where men are trained and culled and finally chosen to the high salaried posts in the Establishment that carry many desirable fringe benefits.  The New Dealers mostly ended up there.  Under Lyndon Johnson there was lively competition for administrative men who would in two years have made a million working for the Establishment.  That is a powerful influence among many agencies; and it results in those who have agency discretion exercising it for the benefit of those who run the corporation state.  And those people are by and large the exploiters." (79-80)

Like a law review article, this book ends with suggestions for reform.  President Obama should read this book (or at least indicate to me that he has read this book) and so should Elizabeth Warren.  They are the only ones out there right now that can make any of this change happen.  Of course, Congress will likely stand in their way, but if lawmakers are truly servants of the public, then they must listen to reason rather than self-interest.  Douglas nicely summarizes his vision at the end:

"There are only two choices: A police state in which all dissent is suppressed or rigidly controlled; or a society where law is responsive to human needs.
If society is to be responsive to human needs, a vast restructuring of our laws is essential.
Realization of this need means adults must awaken to the urgency of the young people's unrest--in other words there must be created an adult unrest against the inequities and injustices in the present system.  If the government is in jeopardy, it is not because we are unable to cope with revolutionary situations.  Jeopardy means that either the leaders or the people do not realize they have all the tools required to make the revolution come true.  The tools and the opportunity exist.  Only the moral imagination is missing.
If the budget of the Pentagon were reduced from 80 billion dollars to 20 billion it would still be over twice as large as that of any other agency of government.  Starting with vast reductions in its budget, we must make the Pentagon totally subordinate in our lives.
The poor and disadvantaged must have lawyers to represent them in normal civil problems that now haunt them.
Law must be revised so as to eliminate their present bias against the poor.  Neighborhood credit unions would be vastly superior to the finance companies with their record of anguished garnishments.
Hearings must be made available so that the important decisions of federal agencies may be exposed to public criticism before they are put into effect.
The food program must be drastically revised so that its primary purpose is to feed the hungry rather than to make the corporate farmer rich.
A public sector for employment must be created that extends to meaningful and valuable work.  It must include many arts and crafts, the theatre, industries; training of psychiatric and social workers, and specialists in the whole gamut of human interest." (92-94, emphasis mine)

Justice Douglas is most famous for introducing the word "penumbra" into the world of constitutional rights.  A lot of people criticize him for that.  People tend to forget that he was giving married couples the right to use contraceptives.

If Justice Douglas was mentioned in my U.S. History classes, I can't remember.  However, in my small and humble opinion, he was one of the greatest Americans to have lived.  Law school has been a long and painful process, but at the very least it allowed me to gain exposure to Douglas, and to find a view of the Constitution and American society at large with which I could agree and seek to propagate in my own life.

Points of Rebellion is an inspiration.  Some of the material may be dated, but those portions are at least entertaining.  It is a short little book.  If you care about radical politics, I highly recommend you check it out.  Then go out there, and try to build a more enlightened society.

Case No. 2433504, Knorps, 7/18/08, Los Angeles Board of Appeals

ALJ = Michael Abzug (Administrative Law Judge)

J = Christopher J. Knorps (Ex-Temp)

A = Alexandria Watson (Accountemps)

A: This is Alexandria Watson!

ALJ: Yeah Ms. Watson this is Judge Abzug, are you ready to proceed?

A: Yes I am.

ALJ:  Alright, the record is open, the case number 2433504, the claimant, Mr. Christopher Knorps, is present.  Also present on behalf of the former employer, Accountemps, is Alexandria Watson.  Ms. Watson what is your job title please?

A: I am a Metro Market Manager.

ALJ: The Administrative Law Judge is Michael Abzug, today’s date is July 18, 2008, the time is now 10:00 AM and the hearing is being conducted at the Los Angeles Board of Appeals.  The claimant has filed a timely appeal from a department (indistinct) determination, mailed to him on May 23, 2008, that held that he was disqualified for benefits under code section 1256.  The issue that we are going to be addressing today is how and why Mr. Knorps became separated from his most recent work.  If I find that he voluntarily abandoned work that was available to him, then the issue will be whether he did so with good cause.  “Good cause” is a legal term that is defined as a real and compelling reason to leave available work, the kind of reason that would have caused somebody in Mr. Knorps’s situation, who genuinely wanted to retain employment, to take similar action.  If he voluntarily left with good cause, he will not be disqualified for benefits, and the employer’s reserve account will be subject to charges.  Mr. Knorps, do you understand the issue that we are going to be addressing?

J: Yes, I do.

ALJ: Do you as well, Ms. Watson.

A: Yes.

ALJ: Ms. Watson, was a copy of the appeal file mailed out to you?

A: Yes.

ALJ: Did you review it?

A: Yes I have.

ALJ: Mr. Knorps, did you review….

J: Is this it? 

ALJ: The documents in the file?  The reason I ask that is because in a few moments I am going to mark certain of those documents as exhibits so that I can consider what they say as part of the basis on which I am going to make my decision eventually.  My decision is also going to be based on what other evidence is introduced at this morning’s proceedings, which, at a minimum I expect will include the sworn testimony of Mr. Knorps as well as Ms. Watson.  After I mark these documents as exhibits, I will ask each party if they have any objection to their admission into evidence.  You’re not required to make objections of course, but if you do I will consider them.  After I have considered those documents (indistinct) I will then take testimony.  It at least preliminarily appears that Mr. Knorps is the moving party of the separation, and we will begin by taking testimony from him.  I will ask him to swear to tell the truth which I am required to do by law, I will ask him a few questions about the issues that I have outlined a few minutes ago, and when finished, he can add to his proof either by supplementing his own testimony, introducing documents, calling witnesses, in case he thinks there is something I have inadvertently overlooked that I need to know in order to make a good decision.  I will also give Ms. Watson the opportunity to question Mr. Knorps if she likes.  Ms. Watson you are not required to ask the claimant any questions – I am going to give the employer a separate opportunity to tell me its side of the story – but if you want to ask any questions, I’ll give you that reasonable opportunity to do so.

A: Okay great, thank you.

ALJ: When we’re finished taking testimony from the claimant, we’ll take the testimony from Ms. Watson that will follow the same order of proof, that is I’ll swear her, I’ll ask her some questions, I’ll give Ms. Watson the opportunity to add to her proof the same way I gave Mr. Knorps the opportunity to add to his proof, and then we’ll conclude by giving Mr. Knorps the same right that I gave to Ms. Watson, that is if he wants to ask her questions he can do so, but he is not required to.  When we’re finished I’ll thank everybody for their appearances, I’m not going to make my decision today, I’ve got to make it later in writing and a copy will be mailed to each party, clearly (?) EDD, probably in about 20 business days.  Mr. Knorps do you think you understand the procedures?

J: Yes I do.

ALJ: Do you have any questions about them?

J:  No.

ALJ: Ms. Watson, do you understand the procedures?

A: Yes I do.

ALJ: Do you have any questions about the procedure?

A: No I do not.

(ALJ reads the various exhibits he is marking into evidence, exhibits 1-7, asks if there are any objections, to which Mr. Knorps replies no.)

ALJ: Ms. Watson, have you reviewed 1-7?

A: I have – I do have to say that the record of claim status interview is not legible to me – I can’t read the writing on the document….(A short discussion about this follows)

ALJ: Claimant states that he voluntarily quit because the company did not offer him permanent full-time work at the company.

J: That’s not, really….

ALJ:  Well just a second, I’m just reading it.  I’ll give you a chance to comment in a moment.  Claimant states he is looking for full-time work, not willing to do temporary assignment work.  Claimant states he did not want to be working there anymore.  He wanted to do something different.  He wants to write a book or novel.  Or technical writing, screenwriting.  If he does not have the experience

J: (scoffs)

ALJ: He wants to work in the writing industry.  Um.

A: Now just….

ALJ: One second, please.  I’m just reading it, and then everyone will be given a chance to comment, I’m not going to cut anybody off.  The employer said that the claimant is no longer working with the company and cannot provide any additional information.  The EDD basically concludes that claimant’s decision to voluntarily quit to look for work was personal, a personal decision, therefore, in their opinion, he is disqualified.  So that is the substance of the interview that occurred on May 22, 2008.  Now that I have read that to you, Ms. Watson, any objection to the admission of exhibits 1-7.

A: No, just so I completely understand, so this is the information that was gathered from my company, by the EDD is that correct?

ALJ: No, that’s not correct.  What happens when somebody separates from work for any reason and applies for benefits, there is what’s called a “claim status interview” which is a telephone interview conducted by the EDD to figure out whether the circumstances of the separation merit benefits under the law.  What I just read you were the notes of the department representative who spoke to the claimant and who spoke to the employer representative. 

A:  Okay, so the claimant let the EDD know that he was interested in writing screenplays, because that’s what I’m trying to confirm.

ALJ: That’s the allegation, yes.

A: Okay, then I understand.  Thank you.

ALJ: Any objections to the admission of 1-7?

A: No.

ALJ: Mr. Knorps, now that I’ve read that exhibit, would you like to raise any objections to the admission of 1-7?

J:  Well when I did that interview, I really don’t think the proper scrutiny was paid attention to.  I just feel as if the separation from the company was not as clear cut as being a “quit” or a “fire” or a “laid off,” okay?

ALJ:  Alright, well excuse me for interrupting you, I’ll try not to do it again, I’ll construe your remarks as an objection to the exhibits and respectfully overrule them, as I mentioned to you before the fact that I admit them into evidence doesn’t necessarily mean that I believe every word they say, or that they’re accurate, and it certainly doesn’t mean I am going to rule against you, it just means that I think the documents may be relevant – how relevant I won’t make up my mind until I’ve heard everything that you and Ms. Watson have to say so, 1-7 are received.  Mr. Knorps, please raise your right hand.  Do you solemnly swear, or affirm, that you will tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?

J: I do.

ALJ: State your name please.

J: Christopher John Knorps.

ALJ: Alright Mr. Knorps I’m going to ask you a few questions.  How long were you registered to work with Accountemps?

J: Roughly six months – between October 28 to May 2, October 28, 2007 to May 2, 2008.   

ALJ: Alright, on May 2, 2008, where were you assigned, who was the employer at the time?

J:  Jefferies & Co.

ALJ:  What was your job title with Jefferies & Co.?

J: I was accounts payable clerk.

ALJ:  Full time work?

J:  Yes.

ALJ: And what was the wage at the time of separation?

J: $13 an hour.

ALJ:  And how long had you been working for Jefferies & Co.?

J:  Six months.

ALJ:  Alright well what caused the separation on May 2^nd?

J:  Well previously, about a month previous, my supervisor Maria Magpantay kind of talked to me about leaving.  It was kind of a mutual agreement to leave.  I did not tell her that I wanted to quit.  She didn’t tell me, that you know, she didn’t think my performance was up to standards.  I asked for a full-time position because there was one person who had recently left, and she said she wasn’t able to hire me full-time….

ALJ:  You mean a permanent position?

J:  Yes, with Jefferies & Co.

ALJ: I understand, okay.

J:  She told me that wasn’t going to be possible.  And when I started working there, Accountemps had told me it was going to be a 6 month temp-to-perm position, so my understanding was that at the end of the six months I would be offered a permanent position with the assignment company.  So when they told me, you know, we just kind of have to leave May 2, I didn’t really have any objection to that, because I had already started looking for new work – I had had a friend who tried to get me a job with UCLA and I was looking for something else, and it’s true I was trying to change careers from accounting, so there is some truth to that, but there is also just, the way it ended was ambiguous I guess, and it wasn’t properly communicated in the interview I guess.

ALJ:  Alright let’s back up a little bit, who at Accountemps assigned you the job?

J:  Shezzad Allaudin.  But Jessica has been my representative.

ALJ:  The person you spoke to about the offer was Shezzad?

J:  Yes.

ALJ:  And what did she tell you about how long the job would last?

J:  He said it would be six months.

ALJ:  Six months?

J:  Yes, but it was temp-to-perm.  And I guess maybe that wasn’t properly explained to me what temp-to-perm meant, but I was under the impression that it meant that, after you were there for six months, they would hire you full time.

ALJ:  The person you spoke to about a month before the separation, what was her or his name?

J:  Maria Magpantay, she was my supervisor at Jefferies & Co.

ALJ:  When you spoke to her and she told you that they weren’t going to hire you permanently, did she tell you that May 2 would be your last day?

J:  Well we agreed.  She said do you want to make it for a month, just say a month from now, and I said yes, I think it’s best if I leave in a month, I want to try to find something else.

ALJ:  Alright, I’m going to ask you a hypothetical, what do you think would have happened if you had said, no, I want to stay on past May 2^nd?

J:  She probably would have said that was okay.  If I had wanted to do I could have stayed.

ALJ:  Alright, so why did you decide to leave on May 2^nd rather than stay?

J:  Well, this is going to be…Well, I switched apartments from the West Side to Silverlake, and the offices were about a 5 minute drive from my place on the west side and now it was going to be like a 45 minute drive, so…

ALJ:  One way?

J:  Yes, I had commuted for a few days doing it, and it was just kind of assumed that once I moved to a new apartment I would move to a new job….In hindsight it was a mistake.  (laughs)

ALJ:  Well I’m not trying to confront you or make you uncomfortable.  I’m just trying to get information.  So you were living in Westwood and you were moving where?

J:  Silverlake.

ALJ:  Oh you were moving to Silverlake.

J:  I live there now.  But I was living in Palms before.

ALJ:   Where the new jobsite is.

J:  Yes.  The new job site is in Beverly Hills.  I just started working there this week.

ALJ: No, no.  I meant, they moved you from the west side to Silverlake at Jefferies & Co.  Is that right?

J: Oh no, no, their offices are on the west side.  I am talking about my personal apartment.

ALJ:  So you moved to Silverlake before May 2^nd?

J:  Yes, I moved there, like, April 28, that’s when my lease began.

ALJ:  Okay, anything else, did you have any other job to go to at the time you abandoned work on May 2^nd?

J:  No.

ALJ: Anything else you want to tell me?

J:  I believe that’s all the relevant information.

ALJ:  Okay, thank you.  Ms. Watson are you still with us?

A:  Yeah, I’m still here.  I only heard bits and pieces of Christopher’s testimony, I don’t know if it was my phone or if he’s on a cell phone that’s cutting out.

ALJ:  Well I wish you would have told me that before this time, we could have tried to make the testimony more audible to you, what is it you want me to do now that you haven’t heard it?

A:  Well I think I got the gist of it, I just want to tell you that I don’t think I heard everything, I just didn’t think I was allowed to interrupt.  I apologize. 

ALJ:  That’s fine.  Let me do this, what I will do, is attempt to accurately summarize what Mr. Knorps has said, and Mr. Knorps why don’t you listen carefully and if I’ve left out anything material at the end you can add it so that Ms. Watson is fully informed.  Okay.  Here’s what he said.  He said that he had been registered to work for Accountemps for six months.  He had one job only – apparently – and that was with Jefferies & Co., which was located on the west side.  He was accounts payable clerk, full-time, and his wage was $13 an hour.  He was given the assignment by a man named Shezzad who told him that it was a six month temp-to-perm assignment, so that, for about five months, he went along and worked, and then had a conversation with his supervisor at Jefferies & Co., Maria Maganya, about whether he was going to be given a permanent position.  Ms. Maganya informed him that he would not and asked him basically what he wanted to do, and whether he wanted to make May 2 his last day, and he said – he agreed.  He agreed.  I asked him whether he believed that continuing work was available to him if he had told Ms. Maganya if he had told her that he wanted to continue working as a temp, and he said that he believed continuing work was available to him, if he wanted to work as a temp, but he decided to leave work on May 2, 2008, because he moved from the west side to Silverlake on April 28, 2008, and he found that the switch from a 5-minute commute to a 45-minute commute one way was burdensome, and that he just generally felt that since he had switched apartments, he should probably switch jobs too, which in retrospect he believes may have been a mistake.  At the time he left available work on May 2^nd, he did not have another job, although he was hoping to switch industries.  Mr. Knorps have I summarized your testimony accurately?

J:  Very accurately.

ALJ:  Anything else you want to add to the record?

J:  Just Maria Magpantay, was her name.

ALJ:  Anything else I material I missed?

J:  No.

ALJ:  Ms. Watson, did you hear me?

A:  I did absolutely, thank you so much.

ALJ:  Any questions you want to ask Mr. Knorps?

A: No, I think it’s pretty clear cut to me.

ALJ:   Then raise your right hand.

A: Right hand raised.

ALJ: Do you solemnly swear the testimony you are about to give will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth so help you God?

A: Yes I do.

ALJ:  State your name.

A:  Alexandria Watson.

ALJ: And your job title?

A: Metro Market Manager.

ALJ: Alright Ms. Watson is there anything that the employer wants to add to the record that you think I need to know before I close it?

A:  The only thing I would add is that Jefferies & Co. is a consistent client with us, and they pretty much never convert candidates to permanent.  So the documentation in my system for this particular assignment states that it was long term, comma, possible temp-to-hire, and we always let candidates know that there is a possibility that things will go temp-to-hire, but this particular candidate…we’ve had candidates work out there for three years on a temporary engagement and not convert.  So I just wanted to make sure that was stated clearly, that I know that we did not assure that this was going to be a temp-to-hire.

ALJ:  Well, okay, that’s fine you have stated it, and I don’t have the impression from Mr. Knorps’s testimony that he was in any way guaranteed a permanent position.

A: Okay.

ALJ:  Alright, anything else?

A:  No.

ALJ:  Alright Mr. Knorps any questions for Ms. Watson?

J: No.

ALJ:  Anything else you want to add to the record that you think I need to know?

J: No.

ALJ:  Alright, okay, well Mr. Knorps good luck out in Silverlake.  I hope things turn around for you, and that your switch to a new industry is successful.  Take care of yourself.  This record is closed. 

Unemployment

May 2, 2008 was my mother's birthday and my final day at Jefferies & Co. I called her to wish her a happy one, and my co-workers held a potluck lunch for me as a send-off. The circumstances that led up to this event all seemed the logical, reasonable sort. I was being paid $13/hour to do rather menial work. I wanted something more significant. My boss and I agreed it was in both of our best interests if I sought work elsewhere. Let me make one thing clear: I would have worked at Jefferies & Co. on a permanent basis if they had been able to hire me. Unfortunately, they prefer to manage their payroll through temporary staffing agencies, which actually makes them pay twice as much for my time, but which may give them some sort of tax-break, or may be an indication of their corporate climate (I only saw four or five co-workers leave/be fired in the six months I was there--but accounts payable can be dull if you do not have interesting people to talk to). While it was dull, I enjoyed the company of my co-workers, and my life seemed to be going in some direction, even if it was as small as writing poems and songs in my little orange journal during my cigarette breaks, I felt like I was living a life not wholly unhappy.

I stopped sharing a two-bedroom apartment at the end of April and moved into my own place in Silverlake. This was also a decision of the logical, reasonable sort. I wanted to live on my own. I wanted to be able to play music at a volume appropriate for singing along. I wanted to get all my books and my stereo and my LCD TV and get my own place with digital cable and get all the channels and get an XBOX 360 for HD capabilities and I wanted to live where it was slightly cheaper, in Hollywood. So I found an apartment that was the same rent as my share--$750--of course this is before they raised it to $795 a month, and before my extra $150-200/month in cell phone, cable, electric, and gas bills. I figured, it was okay, I could still make ends meet with those numbers. I would be living in Silverlake! Where Morrissey lives! Maybe I could meet him and befriend him and write his authorized biography! Or maybe I could be a bohemian poet, reading prose works at one of the cafes along Sunset Blvd, collecting $10 from a tip jar every night and building connections to get my work published. Or I could work Downtown, or in Hollywood, or even in the Valley, in Pasadena or Glendale--even Burbank is not such an unreasonable commute. Sure, I wasn't two miles from the beach anymore (my bi-weekly runs to Venice Beach were no longer possible) but I was a lot closer to Hollywood, and the industry I moved here to try to gain a foothold in.

Now, one tip for anyone considering moving to L.A. If you are concerned about finding work here (and you should be)--it is probably the best option to live on the west-side. Now, the west-side is expensive--Westwood, Santa Monica, Venice Beach--none are cheap. Palms/Culver City is the best bet for cheap, convenient, safe housing. Now, living in Silverlake, I find many, many jobs are located on the west-side, and not so many downtown. Century City is perhaps the most popular employment center in Los Angeles. Any of the areas between Westwood and Santa Monica are also popular for employers. There are practically no businesses in Silverlake beyond boutiques and restaurants. Hollywood does offer employer locations, but they tend to veer closer to Beverly Hills, which is about midway from where I live to Santa Monica. Santa Monica is like twenty miles from where I live, just so you know. 20 miles is a really hard commute to do in L.A. Most of the time I don't apply to jobs in Santa Monica. Most of the time, I am spending my time with staffing agencies again. They at least offer me some sort of hope. They are someone to talk to. They do not ignore the resumes you send them. Or rather, they do ignore, but once they know you, they will at least make you feel better about yourself by talking to you and giving you realistic impressions of who will hire you.

I've applied to be practically everything here--a legal assistant (on a phone interview last night that was so exciting and nerveracking and ultimately disappointing and bittersweet), a music sales representative (for a company that is basically a glorified myspace for "industry attention"), an accounting clerk and administrative assistant at God-knows how many places, generally only interviewing at staffing agencies for those roles, a traffic data collector (on an hour long interview last Friday that I thought went really well...), an assistant to a talent agent (on a very short interview this Monday that I thought went really well--but the guy said he was meeting "a million" people that day)--which was only going to pay $500 a week--sadly a wage I may have to deal with in other industries as well, an SAT English teacher in Arcadia, CA, another 20-mile commute, but one that would pay $15/hour and would have been good for getting me back into English, but I wasn't experienced enough, an administrative ("sales," but not so much) assistant for Biolock, a company introducing key-free, fingerprint-technology security, where the French lady who would be my boss wondered whether or not I would really like doing it for $13/hour. I wish I had tried to speak French with her, but I am afraid of looking like a fool who can't keep up his end of the conversation.

This post is to demonstrate the nature of despair in times of unemployment. And also, to give others an idea of the specific experience I have had over the last two months. Warning to all college graduates: a B.A. in liberal arts is not necessarily going to make you that much more qualified than an applicant with a HS Diploma, because they generally have four more years of experience on their resume. It's a trade off, and I wish I hadn't studied "Writing and Politics" at NYU because I don't think anybody respects the fact that I designed my own curriculum--they'd rather believe it is a BS major (no pun intended). So I sent out my revised rationale for my colloquium as an attachment to that Legal Assistant position and that was enough for that man to call and say he was impressed with my writing skills.

Nice, but there are no literature-based businesses that pay you to interpret old texts. There is only new, present-day text that must be analyzed. And it is not very difficult to analyze business copy. The aims of business are far more ordinary than the aims of literature. It is easy to predict a successful model for business, but few people realize how difficult it is to find a successful model for a novel. Yes, I would copy the structure of This Side of Paradise or Buddenbrooks (my current reading), but that would be a cop-out. One has to understand how Fitzgerald and Mann came to cultivate their own prose habits, and one must behave appropriately to complete the task. That is, writing every day. Other writers will often sneer at amateurs, asking, "Do you write every day?" in order to classify their seriousness. Yes, writing every day is pretty much a necessity, but unfortunately, it's very hard to make yourself do that when you're working 40 hours a week or more. When you are unemployed, it is much easier to write every day, but it also comes with the guilt and fear that you are not (nor will be) a useful presence in anyone else's business model.

The state of the artist in 2008 is quite frustrating. It appears that music, (punk rock, more specifically) is the only medium which continues to profess the same values, though that may be because money is never really the primary aim--it is building an audience. Film may have always been an "insiders" medium, but it appears now that the studios are interested in more and more copycat projects guaranteed to make profits rather than weird, experimental art films. In order to be taken seriously by literary agents, I have to be published in a prestigious journal. In order to be published in a prestigous journal, I have to pass a screening process that is probably as intense as admission into any MFA program. It would be prudent for me to work on an economical short story in the 3,000-4,000 word range, but I am too anxious to finish my second novel. And I am too anxious to find a job.

It appears that connections are the greatest asset any single person can have when entering any job market. As much as I used to scoff at the idea of networking (and while most networking events find me networking with people just as, or more desperate than myself) having as many friends as you can is usually the most intelligent path towards success in business. That, and completing a major with real business applicability, but that's something I wouldn't know about.