Moore than i expected

so in my class tonight we watched the michael moore film Roger & Me which is a documentary about Flint, Michigan. The story centers around General Motors closing most of their plants in Flint, which is where the company began. the economy of Flint had been built around GM for so long that when the plants closed, the entire city spiraled downward.

now, this is a michael moore film, and he does tend to be a bit biased with his opinions, but regardless of his opinions, the truth is still pretty apparent on the screen.

more or less, the entire working class is devastated by the closings of the plant. the factories employed so many people, and then smaller industries that were dependent on the GM factories struggled. the town essentially becomes a ghost town very quickly.

moore juxtaposes scenes of a family getting evicted on christmas ever with a scene of the GM president giving a speech on how great christmas time is. There's also several other scenes where the wealthy people of Flint dismiss the jobless and unemployed as people who are being lazy or just not trying hard enough to get jobs. it was pretty convicting, because i know i've made that judgment in my head before. thinking that people who are unemployed must not be trying hard enough.

and in addition to having some ridiculous stuff in the movie; a woman who raises and sells rabbits [for pets or for meat], a sheriff's deputy that reminds me of Stanley from The Office, and a plant employee who literally goes crazy because of the stress of his job at the plant, the movie really makes me think about the way corporate america exists. does it care at all about the working class, or does it care only about making money? It also really makes me sad about the state of those who are well off, we've so isolated ourselves from the poor, put layers of insulation between us and those who are on the streets, that we can just dismiss them and say that they just need to work harder. when will we start recognizing the brokenness in our societies? when will we stop insulating ourselves from the poor and actually get to know those people rather than just feeling good about ourselves because we give to the salvation army?