{"id":11678,"date":"2012-07-27T07:00:13","date_gmt":"2012-07-27T06:00:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.badreputation.org.uk\/?p=11678"},"modified":"2012-07-27T07:27:53","modified_gmt":"2012-07-27T06:27:53","slug":"guest-post-the-seven-traits-of-highly-unsuccessful-people-or-troubled-families-a-moral-maze","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/badreputation.org.uk\/2012\/07\/27\/guest-post-the-seven-traits-of-highly-unsuccessful-people-or-troubled-families-a-moral-maze\/","title":{"rendered":"[Guest Post] Troubled Families: A Moral Maze, or The Seven Traits of Highly Unsuccessful People"},"content":{"rendered":"
Today on the guest soapbox, it’s artist and comics creator Howard Hardiman<\/strong><\/a>. The eagle-eyed among you will remember us
previously
mentioning<\/a> his comics The Lengths<\/strong><\/a> and (with Julia Scheele and Sarah Gordon) The Peckham Invalids<\/strong><\/a> <\/a> in these pages. <\/p>\n
If you’ve got a guest post brewing in your brain, pitch us at
badrepeditors@gmail.com<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n
A Moral Maze<\/strong><\/a> came on the radio, aiming to address
the moral challenges around the government’s Troubled
Families<\/a> initiative, in the wake of the government’s
‘Broken Britain Tsar’, Louise Casey, suggesting that
women in these families should be financially discouraged from
having more children if they are struggling to cope at present.
This comes off the back of Eric Pickles saying we’re too
politically correct to lay blame where it belongs, which is with
the troubled families where recidivistic criminality and truancy
endures across several generations.<\/p>\n
It is, they suggest, a moral failure of the families who
languish on benefits that they do not lift themselves out of
antisocial behaviour and state dependency.<\/p>\n
In this
Moral Maze<\/strong><\/a>, it was said more than once
“we all know who these families are” when panel
members asked for clarification on whether they were
discussing troubled or troublesome families.<\/p>\n
The criteria for being regarded as a Troubled Family are
that a family has five or more of the following seven
traits:<\/p>\n
Source: they’re outlined
in this
Independent<\/strong> piece<\/a>. <\/p>\n
However, the
Moral Maze<\/strong>‘s panel also discussed
some very loaded terms like “serial
fatherlessness” which seemed to point quite
firmly to where they apportion the blame for this
supposed crisis.<\/p>\n
Of course, like most government statistics, the
figure of 120,000 families in the UK meeting
this definition is disputed, with most attempts
to replicate the research finding far, far fewer
families than in the initial research.<\/p>\n
To me, the most pernicious aspect of the
definition is the bias against disabled people,
particularly against disabled women. Since
it’s far harder for disabled people to
find decent education or well-paid employment,
and since depression and other mental health
challenges are incredibly common among disabled
people (perhaps because we’re being told
that our problems are our own moral
inadequacies?), it seems like a given that most
families where one or both parents are disabled
are automatically well on the way to being
labelled as problematic.<\/p>\n
In fact, if you examine a family where neither
parent is ill, disabled or has mental health
problems, they must meet all five of the
remaining criteria, but a disabled family where
the mother has mental health issues need only
meet three of the five non-health-related
factors to be labelled as problematic.<\/p>\n
If you then add in the idea that the mothers in
troubled families should be discouraged, perhaps
financially, from having more children than they
can afford or cope with, we’re worryingly
close to a programme of eugenics that
disproportionately targets disabled and mentally
ill women.<\/p>\n
The discussion on
Moral Maze<\/strong> didn’t pick up on
this point, seemingly assuming that it should
be taken as read that ill-health and
impairment, whether physical or mental,
constitutes a problem for society.<\/p>\n
It’s a disturbingly regressive idea
that in order to end poverty, you end the
poor, and one that should be challenged with
passion at every turn.<\/p>\n
Reading through earlier government documents
relating to this, however, paints a
different picture to the one now being
presented by ministers. The definition there
ran:<\/p>\n
These local considerations can
include:<\/p>\n
Emotional and mental health
problems
Now, this list of issues seems
problematic, but less so when you
take into account the idea that
these should only be considered once
it’s established that there
are problems with criminality or
where the child is not attending
school often enough. Worklessness is
given less priority than these and
health problems such as alchoholism
are even less relevant.<\/p>\n
Source:<\/strong> this
Troubled Families Programme PDF
from March 2012.<\/a><\/p>\n
I think that the shift from what
this document describes to the
seven traits of unsuccessful
people defined above and
communicated by ministers more
recently is incredibly telling
in determining the underlying
ideology at play here. Rather
than say that criminality and
absence from school or the
structure of employment,
education or training are the
main challenges facing families
and requiring intervention,
we’re left with the
impression that there are
wickedly immoral, lazy people,
primarily the poor, disabled
people and single mothers, who
are tearing apart the fabric of
the country.<\/p>\n
The original notion – that
families who are troubled and
troubling through antisocial or
criminal behaviour, where
children are being denied the
life chances that education
provides, could do with
additional support and
intervention to assist them in
re-introducing structure to what
can often be a chaotic and
fraught existence – seems
sound. To turn this into yet
another attack on poor people,
disabled people and women just
seems like a moral failure of
government, and that, I think,
is far more likely to tear the
country apart.<\/p>\n
www.howardhardiman.com<\/a>
\n
\n
\n
\n Drug and alcohol
misuse
\n Long term health
conditions
\n Health problems
caused by domestic abuse
\n
Under 18 conceptions<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
\n
\nwww.thelengths.com<\/a>
\nwww.thepeckhaminvalids.com<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n