November 14, 2007

Speaking About An Unspoken Issue

A documentary about poverty in America is important because it was made, Seth Arenstein writes.

Tube Stake | Programming Reviews by Seth Arenstein

Wednesday, November 14, 2007
Martin Luther King III’s Poverty in America, Pt I, 8pm, AmericanLife TV
(Part II runs Thursday, November 15, at 8pm.)

You must applaud Martin Luther King III for taking on the subject of poverty and AmericanLife TV for asking viewers to focus on it.

Lord knows poverty in this country is not a popular issue; it’s not likely to get much time in the presidential campaigns and doesn’t make headlines in our newspapers. It won’t grab big ratings for this cable network, carried in 10.5 million households.

It’s difficult to know how effective this 2-part piece about Martin Luther King III’s travels around the country to see the new face of poverty will be. AmericanLife TV released only a 25-minute highlight reel of the 2-hour documentary.

Judging by that reel, however, the documentary seems extensive as it covers some well-traveled ground. It notes that poverty in this country isn’t limited to the inner cities, or rural areas; it smears indiscriminately, young and old, white, black,  brown and yellow. It’s a cancer that permeates the entire social system of the country, leading to crime and violence. Its causes are many: new patterns of industrialization, a reduction in agriculture and factory jobs.

One of the more interesting points that the piece makes comes from Washington, D.C.,  a metropolis that mixes immense wealth and power with abject poverty. It’s not that D.C. isn’t creating jobs, its new mayor, Adrian Fenty, says. The problem is that part of the District’s population isn’t well trained or educated enough to take the jobs being created, he says.

Perhaps the most important part of the documentary is that it is being shown at all. Americans are like most other people—we relate to our immediate environment. Most of us have no idea that nearly 37mln Americans live in poverty, which is below $20,614 for a family of four, according to the 2006 Census. We need to be told that almost 1 in 5 American children grows up in poverty and that some 90 mln Americans are low income.

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