These poverty tourists treat communities as primitive cultures. But people need help to take control of their future
Rapper Loki’s alter ego says problems in deprived areas won’t be solved through outside intervention or rage alone
IN HIS new book Poverty Safari, rapper and writer Darren McGarvey criticises the burgeoning industry that profits from deprivation. He says there are too many careerists “helping the poor” and pushing out grass roots organisations who can really make a difference. And he claims “regeneration” has become a by-word for “opportunism, mismanagement and exploitation”, which has left communities ignored, angry and resentful. Darren said: “The massive multi-agency structures that have emerged to address the social problems created by industrial decline have become a problematic industry in themselves. “I am not taking a moral position, but there are people who make a career out of poverty. “It’s a steady procession of well-meaning students, academics and professionals descending into the bowels of poverty, taking what they need before retreating to their enclaves to examine the artefacts they retrieved on the safari. “They extract data, narratives and statistics. They are ultimately tourists and people in the communities don’t have a say in what is done with it. If they criticise, they are accused of being negative.” Darren, 33, has written his book, which is part autobiographical, to give a voice to the people of communities like the one he grew up in – Pollok, Glasgow. It is nuanced, considered and complex in its take on poverty. Irvine Welsh praised it as “Nothing less than an intellectual and spiritual rehab manual for the progressive left.”
Darren admits he has exploited his experience of hardship professionally, both as Loki the rapper and as a respected social commentator.
He said: “I acknowledge the paradox of poverty. I have written a book about it and I recognise the irony in that. But I do think it is important to have an honest, open discussion and to listen to people we may not agree with.”
He cites local groups run by local people, like youth projects the Barn in the Gorbals and PEEK in Glasgow’s Calton, as popular and positive. But they struggle to compete for funding against big organisations. Large organisations, dedicated to the business of “aiding the poor”, have professional fundraisers and policy staff who can tick the right boxes to secure public funding.
This, in turn, makes them subordinate to Government rather than the needs of communities.
Darren said: “This sector, which comprises arts, the media, charities and NGOs, behaves like an imperial power.
“Poorer communities are viewed as primitive cultures that need to be modernised, retooled and upskilled.
“This approach is often predicated on the assumption that people in these communities don’t have ideas of their own, that they exist in a cultural and political vacuum, with no past or future.
“For locals who wish to engage, it leads to a sense that privileged people with little insight into their concerns are being parachuted in to superimpose their values on everyone.”
Darren suggests although we have benefited from the activism of the left, there is a tendency to oversimplify issues, suggesting anger and a change of government is the panacea for poverty.
He added: “You can’t blame poverty on any one political party. We must resist the temptation to project all blame for our personal and political circumstances on to bogeymen and pantomime villains.
“I no longer believe poverty is an issue our politicians can solve, because an honest conversation about what it will require is too politically difficult to have.
“If those in power were straight about what addressing this problem would require, it would shock us to our core. And not merely because of the ma gnitude of the task facing society, which is unconscionable in scale, but also because there is a certain level of personal responsibility involved that’s become taboo to acknowledge on the left.”
He is the first to recognise the destructive impact of our punitive welfare system and lack of understanding of the realities of poverty.
But he added: “We demand simple answers, but if we want to change our culture, our system, we have to look at ourselves, too, and the impact our individual decisions have.”
Darren refers to the stress which comes with poverty as the engine house of problems including dependence on alcohol, drugs, cigarettes and unhealthy eating.
He knows this from his own experience. Now three years sober, settled and a father, he believes that some earlier mental health problems and self-destructive behaviour stemmed from his dependency on drugs, alcohol and over-eating.
But he is proof that the cycle can be broken sometimes.
We told yesterday how Darren was traumatised as a child by a violent and addicted mother, who herself had been raised a victim of deprivation and abuse.
Much of his problems with drink and drugs came from a need to numb the neglect and violence he experienced, but, he argues, not all.
His solace was in having a father who cared and tried to protect him. But in his book, he acknowledges he must also take responsibility for once steering his life the wrong way. Some of the support he got from the system, such as access to a psychologist, helped steer it back.
Darren said: “In the absence of real leadership, it’s time we demanded more of ourselves.
“Much of the reason this system endures is directly related to how we think, feel and behave as individuals, families and communities.
“Just as we are products of our environment, our environments are also a product of us, from the foods we consume, to the products we buy, the newspapers we read and the politicians we vote for.
“So many of the problems we face, that we often attribute to ‘the system’ are, to some extent, self-generated.
“Many of these problems, although certainly not all, are within our individual and collective competence to positively affect.
“The question for people on the left is no longer simply, ‘How do we radically transform the system’, but also, ‘How do we radically transform ourselves?’” ● Poverty Safari is published by Luath Press priced £7.99
You can’t blame poverty on any political party. I don’t believe politicians can solve it
DARREN McGARVEY