Cooling the Marks, Part 1

For the benefit of non-Pittsburghers: Pittsburgh's mass transit system is circling the drain. It faces a $64 million deficit in fiscal year 2012-2013, primarily as a result of cuts in state appropriations. The current plan is to lay off 500 employees, to raise fares either 25 or 50 cents depending on location, and to cut service by 35%, eliminating 46 of 102 bus routes. There will also be deep cuts in ACCESS, a service which provides transportation for the disabled. This comes on top of a 15% service reduction and comparable fare increases in March 2011. The concern is that Pittsburgh's transit system will be sent into a death spiral: fare increases and service cuts, leading to decreases in ridership, leading to decreases in revenue, leading to further fare increases and service cuts, etc.

Photo by PCTATLANTEANHUNTER

Those concerns are apparently not felt by the Elephants who are in charge of every branch of the state government in Harrisburg. A spokesman for Governor Tom Corbett stated that Pittsburgh's transit woes were “strictly a local problem,” meaning that they have no intention of helping. Our newspapers regularly publish letters demanding that bus passengers be required to pay the full cost of their rides. These citizens appear to be unaware of how much the government subsidizes driving passenger cars and trucks. These hidden subsidies include the costs of roads and highways not covered by fees and tolls, the health consequences of air pollution, and massive tax breaks and other handouts to the oil companies. One source estimated the true cost of a gallon of gasoline to be about $15, and this doesn't include the most expensive subsidy of all, the U. S. military's conduct of wars in the Middle East intended to protect our access to cheap oil. Since most of that $15 comes out of public funds, people who don't drive are subsizing those who do, people who drive fuel-efficient cars subsidize those who drive SUVs, and we all subsidize the trucking industry.

On Tuesday, February 29, over 300 people came to the David L. Lawrence Convention Center to testify at a public hearing before senior staff members of the Pittsburgh Port Authority. The hearings were conducted in two rooms simultaneously and lasted from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. The majority pleaded for more funding for public transit, although it is not clear that anyone present had the power to deliver any financial support. Meanwhile demonstrators marched outside the building, chanting and carrying signs. But almost everyone—speakers, listeners, and demonstrators—agrees that the hearings were an exercise in futility. They are unlikely to have any effect on the fare increases and cuts in bus service to Allegheny County that will most likely take place in September.

By the way, I am not predicting with absolute certainty that there will be no financial relief for the Pittsburgh Port Authority. However, if the necessary funds are provided, it will happen only if corporate campaign contributors to the Elephant-in-chief and his party decide that the economic damage to the city caused by the loss of bus service is so great that it cannot be tolerated. If this happens, it will have nothing whatsoever to do with any of the actions of the citizens who testified at or attended this hearing.

I want to raise two questions. Why were these hearings held? And why do people bother to testify or attend?

In 1952, sociologist Erving Goffman wrote a paper entitled “On Cooling the Mark Out.” The mark, in con-man parlance, is the victim or intended victim of exploitation. Goffman notes that after the sting is completed, a member of the team, the cooler, usually stays behind to try to diffuse some of the mark's anger and persuade him or her to go home quietly. “The mark is given instruction in the philosophy of taking a loss,” he says. Goffman was not primarily interested in the behavior of grifters. His purpose in writing the paper was to point out that almost all social institutions have similar mechanisms for dealing with people who are to be unjustly treated.

For example, the anonymous author of the Global Sociology Blog recently applied Goffman's analysis to those who voted for Barack Obama in 2008 in the hope that there would be important changes in American foreign and domestic policies. They are marks, the author says, because the members of the Jackass Party, including the president, had no intention of delivering on their promises. Once this became apparent, Jackass Party spokespersons and media pundits adopted the role of cooler and began to offer rationalizations: “the President can't really do much,” “it's the fault of the Republicans,” “he got the best deal he could under the circumstances,” etc. Of course, the next step is to assert that “things will improve if he gets a second term,” since they hope to persuade these same suckers to take another kick at Lucy's football this next November.

Applying Goffman's model to the transit situation, the citizens of Pittsburgh whose lives will be disrupted by the loss of mass transit are the marks. Over the last several decades, public hearings have become one of the habitual mechanisms by which politicians attempt to create the illusion of public participation in the democratic process. I will elaborate on this tomorrow in Part 2 of this post.