Continuation of Kozol

In my first post I left out Delpit's fifth aspect of the culture of power which is how people with little power are more aware of its existence than people with a lot of power. The people in Mott Haven are well aware that they do not have much power. In Mott Haven they built an incinerator that was suppose to be built on the East side of Manhattan, but since the people in Manhattan have more power than the people in Mott Haven they were able to say no we do not want it. The parents in Mott Haven were very against this because it is harmful to the kids, but they put it there anyway. Cliffie's mother says that they put a lot of things in the neighborhood that nobody wanted and she realizes that they have no power to protest against these things. Also, people that do not live in Mott Haven dump there junk on the streets and nobody does anything about it. Towards the end of the article Cliffie says "that an evil exists and what the rich had done to the poor people in this city is something that a preacher could call evil." Cliffie a young kid even understands that the rich have all the power and that they do not do anything to help the people in Mott Haven. After class discussion I seen more similarities between Kozol's and Delpit's writings.

The last thing I want to talk about is the quote that Lawrence Mead mentioned in this article. Lawrence Mead a professor said that "if poor people behaved rationally they would seldom be poor in the first place." I totally disagree with this statement and this article gives a great example of how this statement is incorrect. Mrs. Washington acted rationally and she could not catch a break. She tried very hard to renew her welfare, but they gave her a such hassle and eventually she gave up. She was on SSI because she had cancer, but they said she was not sick enough. This does not make any sense to me and I believe that sometimes you can do everything right and still not be rewarded for it. I believe that a lot of people in Mott Haven act rationally, but can not catch a break like poor Mrs. Washington. The class discussion on "Amazing Grace" helped me greatly and I know understand much more that I did before our discussion.