The Spirit Level – Obesity, Education, Teen Births and Violence – Church as Equality

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Chapters 7-10 of The Spirit Level: Why Greater Equality Makes Societies Stronger considers issues of obesity, educational acheivement, teenage pregancy and violence.  In all the cases the authors cite equality as a factor that informs previous and partial explanations.   Below is a snapshot of each chapter.

1. Obesity: Addressing the epidemic of obesity, the authors invite the readers to consider the matrix of issues involved and to include inequality in the mix.   The World Health Organization performed a study in the 1980s that found obesity has increased as the disparity in the social gradient as increased.  Obesity, as cited in previous chapters of this book is more prevalent among the poor than among the wealthy.  Further they concluded that it “seemed that people in more unequal societies are eating more and exercising less.” (95).   All the the states within the United States have an adult obesity of at least 20 per cent.  Studies in this chapter reveal that despite knowing what produces a healthy body, many people do the contrary.    Knowing that behavioral changes are more possible when we feel positive about our life and have the sense that we can control the changes, Pickett and Wilkinson speculate that lessening inequality could affect the epidemic of obesity.
2. Education  The drop out rate of children cannot be measured by poverty alone.  “No state has a poverty rate of higher than 17 per cent but drop-out rates are above 20 per cent in sixteen states and dropping out is not confined to the poor.  When unequal situations are revealed in the classrooms, the performance of those in the lower social gradient is affected negatively.  This has been tested internationally in at least the UK, India, and the United States.   Particularly, parental attention and bonding to the children and investment in their education is an indicator of future success.  The more the parents are involved in the first three years of their children’s life and education the more successful the child is likely to be.  Countries that are more equal provide more extended maternity leave (Sweden – 3 months paid and 3 months unpaid).   More unequal countries like the United States provide less (no more than 12 weeks).
3. Teenage Births  This chapter can be well summarized with the following excerpt from page 121 of the book.  “Teenage birth rates are higher in communities that also have high divorce rates, low levels of trust and low social cohesion, high unemployment, poverty, and high crime rates.  It has been suggested by others that teeange motherhood is a choice that women make when they feel they have no other propsects for achieving the social credentials of adulthood, such as a stable intimate relationship or rewarding employment.  Sociologist, Kristin Luker claims that it is ‘the discouraged disadvantaged’ who become teenage mothers.”   While this is not always the case, this explanation may contribute to a more comprehensive response to the trends.
4.   Violence  Immediately within this chapter, the authors cite a problem with studies in violence.  Most studies will emphasize an experience with shame or humiliation as a precursor or root to violent behavior.   However, all of us identify with these experiences of shame and humiliation.  “…why is it predominantly among young men that those feelings escalate to violent acts?” (123)   It is as if the authors play connect the dots between significant studies that show violence is not just about poverty but about inequality.  As inequality increases so does violent crime.  When there is less hope that education, material wealth, good employment, esteem from peers will be realized, violence is perceived as an immediate way to maintain respect and honor.

Issues of inequality are at the heart of the Gospel message of the church.  Evidence of inequality could likely be the new mission field of the church in North America.  We know as the church is related to relevant mission, so it is able to experience revitalization.   The history of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A) is an intellectual and pragmatic one.  Considering pragmatic responses to the findings recorded in The Spirit Level may be among the most important responses we could make.  Educating pastors which such information and then encouraging pastors to consider calls in areas that are challenged by inequality is one possibility.   Surely financial support and congregational support will be required to transition churches who have not been as active in the social ministry as they would like to have been. 

In my own ministry, some of the greatest rewards have been the times that the church has allowed people of unequal status in the larger culture to co-mingle in the pews.   It is always interesting to me how folks who are unequal in all other places are fast friends, colleagues and mutual cheerleaders in the church.    As contrasting individuals build relationship, there is the experience of what process theology calls harmony.  Harmony is the reconciliation of constrasting events or circumstances.  The degree of the contrast is congruent to the degree of the harmony experienced.   Jesus is remembered for being most interested in reconciliation of contrasts and discovering anew that we are all children equal in the site of Goid.    The church of today still has the potential to live into the Jesus movement of the ancient days.

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Chapter Three of The Spirit Level – Narcissism, Social Sensitivity and Anxiety

The focus of chapter three is that there are individual sensitivities to inequality and those sensitivites offer an explanation for why  living in unequal societies can have such profound effects.  They assert that “Individual psychology and societal inequality relate to each other like lock and key” (33).  They make this argument by citing the effects of inequality and the relationship between them.  The effects of inequality can be found in our psychological state.   

1.  There is a rise in the anxiety levels of populations such as college students and children in the United States according to studies out of San Diego State University.

2.  There is, simultaneously, a rise in self esteem.  “So that despite increasing anxiety, people were taking an increasingly positive view of themselves” (36).  The key here is in the distinguishing of healthy and unhealthy self esteem.  “The healthier kind seemed to centre on a fairly well-founded sense of confidence and a resonably accurate view of one’s strengths in different situations and an ability to recognize one’s weaknesses.  The other seemed to be primarily defensive and involved a denial of weaknesses… People will insecure high self-esteem tend to be insensitive to others and to show an excessive preoccupation with themselves, with success, and with their image and appearance in the eyes of others.”(37).   Thus, there is really a rise in narcissism.

3. Both narcissism and anxiety find their source in social evaluative threat or those threats that created the possiblity for a loss of self esteem (38).

4.  How other people see us matters ultimately.  How others see us determine if we experience shame or pride.  Other people’s view of us determines our social status and if our social status is high we can become anxiety ridden in an effort to preserve the high status.  consumerism plays on this social status reality and consumption is part of the way that we set ourselves apart from others.  “Surveys have found that when choosing prospective marriage partners, people in more unequal countries put less emphasis on romantic considerations and more on criteria such as financial prospects, status and ambition, than do people in less unequal societies.”(44)

Some say that the church is struggling to be purposeful in our culture and society.   Relevance to our tradition and God’s people in society is at a premium in the life of  the church.  In the previous blog, I offered my opinion that churches can get caught up in striving to be “better than” another church or congregation.  If we take what the authors say at face value, it seems that the church has a continued opportunity for relevance. Some say that the nature of all cultures is inequality.  The church’s attempt to provide an environment in which communities can practice equality is a crucial response to the biblical and gospel message. 

But what do we mean when we say  equality?  The authors remind us that concerns about equality are at least as old as the French Revolution.  They cite the slogan of that revolution “liberty, equality, and fraternity” and note that ” ‘Liberty’ meant not being subservient or beholden to the feudal nobility and landed aristocracy.  ….Similarly, ‘fraternity’ reflects a desire for greater mutuality and reiprocity in social relations.  …’Equality’ comes into the picture as a precondition for getting ‘liberty’ and ‘fraternity’ right.”(45).  Said another way and using the language of persuasion and relationship from process theology, liberty requires persuasion and cannot survive coercion.  Fraternity emerges within a society that values mature relationality.  Equality as the prerequiste of both has yet to be defined by the author.  But process theology might invite us to understand equality more fully in an experience of wholeness and unity with the environments and creatures in whose midst we live.

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