In Defense of The Wire: Respond
Atlas, John & Dreier, Peter
WE, TOO, were big fans of The Wire and are sorry that it is off the air. It touched a nerve among Americans who are hungry for a society that brings out the best in people—a society that...
...People need to feel not only that things should be better but that they can be better...
...But incorporating their stories in the series would have shown a different aspect of Baltimore, one in which the poor and their allies seek change, not charity, and learn how to marshal their collective power...
...The Wire brilliantly portrayed these realities, putting a human face on the "urban crisis...
...and address the shortage of decent jobs that is ultimately at the root of Baltimore's crisis, from the docks to the ghetto to the inner suburbs...
...There is an exchange between Howard "Bunny" Colvin (Robert Wisdom), an ex-cop working in the program, and Parenti that parallels our differences with the three sociologists...
...However, The Wire's mayor, Tommy Carcetti (Aiden Gillen), rejects this experimental program...
...providing adequate funding for housing, public schools, health care, child care, and environmental cleanup...
...Most of the cops, teachers, clergy, journalists, and even politicians on the series ultimately became cynical or corrupt...
...America today has the biggest concentration of income and wealth since 1928...
...But the sociologists' examples of community action portrayed—such as Narcotics Anonymous—hardly qualify as challenges to the powers-that-be...
...As an example of community-led efforts in The Wire, they point to the fictional pilot project devised by University of Maryland researchers and implemented in the Baltimore schools to separate stoop kids from kids who disrupt classes and to intervene educationally...
...Stoop" kids hang out near home and obey their parents, while "corner" kids, who have less parental discipline, are more likely to get involved with drugs...
...A growing number of working families are in debt, while the number facing foreclosure has spiraled...
...In other words, they need some sense of hope...
...By exploring the dysfunction of many key urban institutions, The Wire revealed, although not explicitly, how urban politics is often a struggle over crumbs, whether the issue is funding for schools, police, housing subsidies, or drugrehab programs...
...Since welfare reform was enacted in 1996, Americans have viewed poverty primarily through the prism of working conditions...
...In the past few years, we've witnessed a growing concern about poverty and inequality bubbling up from the grassroots, and just now surfacing in our national political life...
...After it is clear that the city is rejecting the program, Colvin is despondent...
...For that to occur, they need to believe (1) that the plight of the poor is the result of political and social forces, not selfinflicted by the poor themselves...
...They try to help individuals, one at a time...
...Academics...
...Simon said, -The Wire spoke to a world in which human beings—individuals— matter less, a world in which every day, the triumph of capital results in the diminution of human labor and human value...
...Only the federal government can address the issue of regulating business...
...First, to the extent that The Wire helped raise awareness of these problems—and the systemic nature of the urban crisis—it deserves all the praise it has received...
...It touched a nerve among Americans who are hungry for a society that brings out the best in people—a society that encourages hope rather than fear...
...Senators Obama and Clinton picked up on Edwards's themes and some of his policy ideas...
...Polls also show that sup8 6 n DISSENT / Summer 2008 port for labor unions has reached its highest level in more than three decades...
...and (3) that the problems of the urban poor can be solved...
...What, they gonna study your study...
...In the show, David Parenti (Dan DeLuca), the University of Maryland researcher, is concerned about "tracking" some students into classes with low expectations, but he believes that the program will truly help the corner kids rather than merely warehousing them in a separate class...
...American workers face declining job security...
...We accept as "normal" levels of poverty, hunger, crime, and homelessness that would cause national alarm in Canada, Western Europe, or Australia...
...No other major industrial nation has allowed the level of sheer destitution that we have in the United States...
...WE AGREE THAT the message of the show and the work of grassroots activists go hand in hand...
...Three things...
...In January, under pressure from community activists, the city of Baltimore sued Wells Fargo Bank for targeting minority neighborhoods for predatory loans leading to high foreclosure rates, costing the city millions of dollars in lost tax revenues, added fire and police costs, court administrative costs, and social programs to maintain healthy neighborhoods...
...Although the United States has many serious problems that are disproportionately located in cities, these are national problems...
...But we live in interesting times, and perhaps the only thing that is left to us as individuals is the power to hope, and to commit that hope to action...
...Those who lead union- and communityorganizing fights have the same foibles and human weaknesses we witnessed in the characters in The Wire...
...Third, The Wire offered viewers little understanding that the problems facing cities and the urban poor are solvable, and that a small but growing movement has emerged to mobilize urban residents and their allies to address these problems at both the local and national level...
...In their remarks, Simon and Burns reflected a new spirit of possibility that is a precondition to transforming the country...
...2) that lifting up the poor will not come at the expense of middle-income Americans...
...Hope springs from a combination of political leadership and grassroots activism...
...That attitude was not evident in The Wire, but we can hope that their next television series will embody that feeling of hope and change...
...ARGUMENTS Second, The Wire showed us how overwhelming obstacles create desperation, even in people with good intentions and some idealism...
...The Wire offered viewers little reason for hope that the lives of the people depicted in it could be improved not only by individual initiative but also (and primarily) by collective action and changes in public policy...
...In May, The Wire creator David Simon and co-writer Ed Burns received an award from the Liberty Hill Foundation, a Los Angeles nonprofit that provides funding for cutting-edge grassroots community, environmental, and labor organizing...
...It was the first lawsuit filed by a municipality seeking to recover costs of foreclosure caused by racially discriminatory lending practices But Baltimore can't fix these problems on its own...
...Even the most well-managed local governments, on their own, don't have the resources to significantly address them...
...These trends don't guarantee that middleclass Americans, faced with their own economic insecurities, will identify with and make common cause with the poor...
...When do the shit change...
...But the few heroes depicted in The Wire and mentioned DISSENT / Summer 2008 n 87 ARGUMENTS by our critics are individualist renegades and gadflies, not those who sought to change institutions and public policy...
...It is here that we differ with Chaddha, Wilson, and Vankatesh...
...A longer version of this response is available at the Web site of the National Housing Institute/Shelterforce Magazine: www.rooflines.org . 88 n DISSENT / Summer 2008...
...In accepting the award, they offered kudos to the activist groups whose leaders were represented in the audience...
...Unlike the activists involved with the programs we cite, they don't seek to empower people as a collective force...
...After they won a majority in Congress in 2006, the Democrats hiked the federal minimum wage to $7.25, still below the poverty line, but an improvement...
...So do you...
...The popularity of Barbara Ehrenreich's Nickel and Dimed, the challenges to Wal-Mart, and the remarkable growth of the "living wage" movement we described all reflect an upsurge of concern about poverty...
...Colvin asks in disbelief...
...The cost of housing, food, health care, and other necessities is rising faster than incomes...
...In his presidential campaign, former Senator John Edwards lifted the issue of poverty into the national debate...
...Each of these three conditions has taken root in recent years...
...We agree with Chaddha, Wilson, and Venkatesh that The Wire revealed how the lives of inner city residents are significantly determined by the spirit-demoralizing, soul-crushing institutions and bureaucracies...
...I hope not...
...Parenti, though, is optimistic about the great research they did and all the attention it will get from academics...
...Polls revealed that a vast majority of Americans wanted to raise the federal minimum wage, which had been stuck at $5.15 an hour since 1997...
...Since George W. Bush took office, an additional five million Americans are living in poverty...
...One person alone can't save a school system, create jobs, or make a neighborhood safer...
...Is that world an accurate depiction of America...
...But the show left it to the viewers to put the problems of Baltimore in a wider context...
...A good example is the current mortgage meltdown—caused by the greedy and racist practices of banks and mortgage companies and the failure of the federal government to regulate the financial services industry...
...Local governmental policies are not their cause...
...What does this have to do with The Wire...
Vol. 55 • July 2008 • No. 3
