White Courtesy Telephone

Why I Return to New Orleans

This guest post was originally delivered as a sermon on November 14, 2010, by the  Reverend Dennis McCarty at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Columbus, Indiana.  We publish it here with his permission.  The reading for the sermon is from an Associated Press article published on March 3, 2010, by Remy de la Mauviniere and Elaine Ganley.

To anyone who doesn’t actually live there, I suppose it does look like a recipe for disaster, to live in a city that’s below sea level. But it’s not that simple. For one thing—below sea level or not—this city is a major seaport. It has a population of a half-million people. Because it sits just a few miles upstream from the mouth of the largest river on the continent, it guards a very important waterway.

Even long ago, when people first began to live here, the land was barely above sea level. Centuries of human habitation, land development, and land reclamation have caused it to settle even more. Now, the lowest points of this city are twenty feet or more below sea level. In the past, storms blowing in off the sea, have caused major damage and loss of life. If the sea walls, water gates, and levees were to fail again, the death toll could be enormous. For that reason, I suppose it is natural that someone from an inland state would suggest that the citizens just leave this place to the elements and build somewhere else, on higher ground.

But again, it’s not all that simple. For one thing, there is no ground that’s much higher, not till you get many miles away. For another, more than a million people earn their livelihoods from the commerce, tourism, and manufacturing located in and around the city right where it is. And that’s not even counting the music, museums, educational centers, and festivals. So the people stay. They do the best they can. Oddly enough, they don’t seem worried by a situation we inlanders might see as nerve-wracking.

I’m not talking about New Orleans, though. Welcome to the Dutch city of Rotterdam, which for centuries has been the busiest, most successful seaport in the world. Nor is Rotterdam the only city besides New Orleans that lies below sea level. Twenty percent of the whole Netherlands—and twenty-one percent of the country’s population—live below sea level. Another thirty percent lie three feet or less above sea level. Any mildly healthy North Sea wave, looks down on more than half the country.

Black Courtesy, White Courtesy: The Great ARNOVA Race Debate

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Editor’s note: Two weeks ago an ARNOVA member set off a campfire of controversy by warmly recommending the White Courtesy Telephone blog to his colleagues.  For those of you unfamiliar with the group, ARNOVA is an association of extremely intelligent people who study the nonprofit sector.  WCT investigative reporter Rachel Tension was able to obtain a transcript of the highly charged ARNOVA discussion, parts of which are reproduced below.  (We changed the participants’ names because we were too lazy to ask their permission to use their real names.)  In Washington, DC, it’s dog eat dog.  In academia, it’s the opposite, so we were frankly hesitant to approach the subject without some professional assistance.  We invited WCT semiotician-on-retainer, Monique Nescafé, to help interpret the transcript for us.  Dr. Nescafé’s work for the past several years has focused on neomaterialist narratives in the novels of Jennie Adams.  This is her first guest post with WCT …

I am so very happy to be invited to write for the White Telephone of Courtesy, and especially to comment on the post-capitalist discourse of ARNOVA members.  They say the American mind is closed.  No, my friends, he is wide open, like the pore of some gigantic sweat gland.

Consider this small exchange:

Alas, … I find the name [White Courtesy Telephone] unfortunate. It may indeed be useful but the title is off-putting.
—Betty

I am in the process of considering the title for my upcoming book, so I have titles on my mind.  Can you clarify what it is about the title of the White Courtesy Telephone blog that makes it off-putting? …
—Dorothy

I think the title of “white courtesy” gives the impression that there is something else possible like “black courtesy”—i.e. that there are disparate courtesies for different groups. Or even worse—that there is no other courtesy other than white courtesy.  I have been involved in discussions with other groups who would therefore find the title offensive. Unless of course you mean it ironically (like we don’t have white courtesy).  At the very least, I do not actually understand what “white courtesy” means.
—Betty

In her brilliant rejoinder,  Betty lays bare the racial insensitivity of the White Courtesy Telephone editors.  This is not in dispute: these editors often make light of subjects that would be better treated with reverential silence.  I applaud Betty.  Her act of problematization, of affirming a posttextual paradigm of reality—the impression of a racialized there-for-me—is, in my view, an intellectual tour de force.

How does she do it?  She describes herself as being in a superposition of affective eigenstates: while it’s true that she feels “put off,” she simultaneously postpones her feelings of offense as she considers an ironic reading of “white courtesy.”  She is put off, but she is not quite yet put off.  (A monk asks Dongshan Shouchu, “What is Buddha?” Dongshan answers, “Three pounds of flax.”)  And although Betty does not actually understand what “white courtesy” means, she complains about the phrase anyway.  If confusion is the first step to knowledge, then Betty is clearly very knowledgeable.

Betty also brilliantly presences the elided contextuality of the ARNOVA discourse by referring to “other groups” that would find the blog’s name offensive.  This kind of offense-by-proxy is the mark of a generous individual, willing to be offended not only for herself but on behalf of others as well.

And so, what is it ultimately that puts the “white” in White Courtesy Telephone?  Another ARNOVA commentator chimes in:

… we know words make a difference, so what I’m interested in is: why did the creators of white courtesy telephone pick that name, rather than, say, ‘black courtesy telephone,’ or just plain old ‘courtesy telephone’?

Was it in order to prompt this very discussion?

Or do white courtesy telephones have a special connotation not shared with courtesy telephones of other colours?

I may be exposing my ignorance here—but that’s because I’m ignorant.
—Nigel

Did Monsieur Ruesga, when he chose the name White Courtesy Telephone, choose it in order to “prompt this very discussion”?  It is possible, n’est-ce pas?  He might very well have anticipated the ARNOVA exchange as a sommelier anticipates a Montrachet 1978 from Domaine de la Romanée-Conti.  How delicious, to inquire after coloured telephones through the fog of a fine wine.  While these coloured telephones may have a special significance, we will henceforth, in deference to our subject, refer to them as telephones of colour.

Guest Blogger “Mouse” on Rural Philanthropy

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We welcome this post from guest blogger Mouse on the vicissitudes of rural philanthropy.  Mouse is an animal lover who lives in rural Northern California.  Check out her new blog, Northern California Muse.  If you’re interested in being a guest contributor to White Courtesy Telephone, contact us by writing to courtesy_telephone (at) yahoo.com.

I just read an interesting article on the difficulties facing rural nonprofits when it comes to securing grant money.  I think they read my mind and felt my frustration.

There are no large corporations funding nonprofits in our rural location. We don’t have any large corporations. Our largest companies are the local non-chain grocery store and hardware store.

There are no large foundations in our rural location. There are no foundations either.  We are so rural most foundations can not find us on a map.  During a discussion with a potential foundation about a site visit there was a long pause when I mentioned the three-hour-plus drive down a windy two-lane road.  That road makes it difficult to develop a “meaningful” relationship. We are a great vacation spot and I have even offered a room in a local bed & breakfast; no one has accepted yet.

Those with the money in the urban environment do not grasp our world or some of our problems. I mentioned to one foundation that we had a problem in a location far from our center, and gas money for volunteers was crucial.  She apparently had a vision of ten miles or less round-trip; I was thinking fifty miles one way.  My grocery store is ten miles away.

I want to laugh when someone asks about excessive employee benefits or high salaries. What are benefits?  Do employees get benefits?  Not here!  A benefit is that they have a job. As for those high salaries: some of the foundation heads make more than our entire payroll.

One of the suggestions in the article I read was to establish a local nonprofit group. That won’t happen. The 50 local charities are trying very hard to grab every $1 donation; we could never sit in a room together and share information. We are jealous if another nonprofit gets to put its donation can beside the busiest cash register at the grocery store.  Competition is rough here.

One foundation requires a professional site video.  I did not know how to explain that I could borrow a camera or hire the local television station; but we did not have anything in-between. The professional videographer moved out of town.

Now that I know the problem, I do not know what to do with the information.

Joe Breiteneicher on Compensating Trustees

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Joseph C. K. Breiteneicher, one the Great Souls of philanthropy, died on June 22nd after a long battle with cancer.  He was a mentor to many in the field—myself included—and one of the pioneers of promoting philanthropy.  He brought incredible intellect, passion, and moral authority to his work, serving most recently as president and CEO of The Philanthropic Initiative.  I republish below a guest post that Joe wrote two years ago for the blog Hail, Sons and Daughters of Carnegie, the predecessor to White Courtesy Telephone.

Restoring the Trust in Trusteeship

Trusteeship is a sacred calling—as should be all work in the philanthropic sector.  Compensating trustees diminishes the stewardship values and moral force of the sector.

Below, I offer several perhaps not-so-obvious arguments why all foundation trustees ought to serve pro bono.

First, I find it a moral disconnect that foundations pay trustees for service while they allow salaries in many grantee nonprofits to hover near subsistence levels.  Because most folks who work in nonprofits (real ones, not tax-exempt businesses like most hospitals and large private colleges) are underpaid, and because foundations have contributed to this “underpayment” by not fighting for better conditions of employment for the nonprofit workforce, foundation trustees should feel obliged to forswear all compensation.  It is the moral thing to do since foundations have helped keep most nonprofit workers economically barefoot and pregnant. And, thanks to Senator Grassley, it may also be the politically wise thing to do.

If the sector cannot get its act together, then Congress ought to adopt Canada’s laws regarding trustee compensation.  Perhaps that could help build momentum toward other things Canadian—universal health care, gay marriage, diversity, police in great uniforms.

The rules of Revenue Canada (IRS nord) proscribe trustee compensation for all types of NGOs/foundations.  The penalty is simple: foundations lose their nonprofit philanthropic charter.  Last I looked, Canada had some very effective, progressive philanthropies with quite active trusteeship.  No U.S. community foundation that I know pays its trustees.  In both cases I can cite great foundations that have participation from less affluent folks who are passionate about their communities and who see philanthropy as real service.  All this without the need to compensate.