State of Emergency
...no use for food at all if it weren’t for the fact that every afternoon at about 2:30 she starts up a food-fantasy conversation in the car.” p96. These are the words of a women who holds a minimum wage job, yet still cannot afford to eat. According to Maslows theory since this basic physiological need cannot be met, it is constantly on her mind. It disables her to desire any other stage of life. It should make people think. A hard-working woman in America, one of the richest countries in the nation, cannot meet the most basic of five needs to achieve the label of “a fully functioning person” The second need that is strived for once all the physiological needs are met, is the need for safety. This need is more active in children, as a fear of being harmed or alone, but also appears in adults as well. In adults it is on a more subconscious level, and usually comes into play when it is jeopardized. It is crucial to feel safe, because a person living in fear can become consumed by it there for hindering any chance to move forward towards the next stage. A person who cannot afford proper shelter will usually feel unsafe and threatened by there surroundings. In the book Nickel and Dimed, Barbara learns that her need for safety has always been taken for granted and it was not until she felt unsafe, that she realized her desire to be safe. “Poor women-perhaps especially single ones and even those who are just temporarily living among the poor for whatever reason-really do have more to fear than women who have houses with double locks and alarm systems and husbands or dogs.”P153. Barbara is put into a situation, like most poor people, that jeopardizes her safety, the fear consumes her and she is left to dwell on ways she can feel safer. This proves that Maslows theory of obtaining each stage individually and in consecutive order is very necessary. In the center of the hierarchy of needs lies the need of love, affection and belongingness. Once one is physiologically satisfied and feels safe and secure, a desire of love and affection creep in. loneliness sets in and the desire to belong can consume you. Always seeking approval and acceptance is suddenly very important. Since the need for esteem does not come until after, its hard to love yourself until you feel love from someone else. It doesn’t necessarily have to be a significant other, but a coworker or friend. In Nickel and Dimed, a lot of the women would seek acceptance and belongingness within there job. Since this is where they spend a relatively large part of their day. Even Barbara herself, being stripped of her outside connections looks for belongingness within her workplace. “But the truth is I’m not ready to leave Wal-Mart yet; it is my connection to the world, my source of identity, my place.” When you are constantly striving to meet the basic needs, your need to be loved sometimes comes later in life. This makes it harder for one to find love so easily, therefore people take great solace in the connection to the people they meet. In Nickel and Dimed, and for most others in the situation of poverty it is hard to go through life without that support system. People will often cling to their families, and this gives them the extra motivation they need to move forward. The need for esteem plays into the need for love. I feel these two are the most directly related because when one starts to feel loved, there needs for esteem began to feel satisfied as well. Towards the end of the book a man chooses to have the courage to stand up for his rights. When asked, he is not doing it for himself, but for the love of a child, his son. Therefore we can conclude that the love from his family meets his need for love and gives him the self-esteem he needed to move forward towards better things. Playing off of the last stage, are the needs for esteem. It’s very difficult to reach self-actualization and the yearning for happiness if you don’t have esteem in yourself. Most of the people exposed in Nickel and Dimed, have never had the chance to build there esteem. They are often unskilled and uneducated and thus forced into jobs that don’t allow them to show there abilities. It is very important to have an understanding of yourself and a high level of self worth to achieve things in life. Its hard to build your esteem when your constantly being shot down. This should be started young with the parents. The sad part is most people coming from poverty either don’t know their parents or come from broken or struggling homes that don’t put their child’s esteem as a priority because they are often at a lower level in the hierarchy themselves. One will often strive for compliments or feed off positive remarks for days, even weeks. This can also have the opposite effect, a negative remark or put-down can injure the self-esteem immensely. “The other, less tangible factor is the lure of Ted’s approval. This, perhaps as much as m...