This critique supplements my
January 13, 2023, letter on the Circle City Clubhouse, which was posted in
April 2023 on this very “Politically Incorrect Leftist” blog, and builds on the
information brought forth in that letter.
What is different is, I researched the criteria for Clubhouse
affiliation given by Clubhouse International, as well as noting that while
Clubhouses have been extensively covered in the academic social science
literature, the studies done to date have numerous flaws: among them, no randomized samples or
randomized control groups, use of mental health recovery measures that are
limited to self-assessment, and I would add, only looking at certain select
Clubhouses, and improperly generalizing from that sample. Which has led, in my informed statistical
opinion (I have a college degree in economics), to the Clubhouse model being
vastly overrated, and wrongly credited for achievements it has not made. That is certainly true for Circle City
Clubhouse.
Clubhouses, although extensive
geographically, vary widely in quality and availability of programs, with
Circle City Clubhouse, the main Clubhouse in Indianapolis, having a major
paucity of programs, thus being really limited in the mental health consumer
services it provides. Carriage House, the
Clubhouse in Ft. Wayne, as one example, has a savings bank available for use by
its members, but no such exists for Circle City. Clubhouses are supposed to offer three tiers
of employment programs, 1.) transitional employment, 2.) supported employment,
and 3.) independent employment; but Circle City only offers transitional
employment, and that is spotty. Circle
City Clubhouse has only one transitional employer now that I’m aware of, and
has lost several transitional employment sites in just the last few years. As for supported employment (i.e., employment
with staff support assistance for maintaining employment) and independent
employment (i.e., Clubhouse members finding, with help and encouragement,
employment on their own), neither exists at Circle City. Nor are Clubhouse members encouraged or
cajoled to seek employment, even when they’re capable of doing such, so that
many Circle City Clubhouse members who could benefit from employment do not, in
fact, do so. Though Clubhouse International
maintains it seeks employment for its members at “prevailing wages,” here in
Indianapolis the “prevailing wage” varies considerably depending on the nature
and size of the business. I would
imagine Circle City Clubhouse’s transitional employers in Indianapolis and
environs pay only minimum wage or maybe a little above, which is still at a
truly dismal $7.25 an hour; but also here in Indianapolis, my employer, Kroger
pays a starting wage of $14.25 an hour, nearly double! Crew Car Wash and Target here pay starting
wages of $15 an hour, so as is easily seen here, what the “prevailing wage” for
the type of work Clubhouse members get to engage in can mean either an income
that is indeed very low-wage, or an income nearly double that. As a trade unionist supportive of the union
in my workplace, I naturally find that appalling! Yet, I don’t see Circle City Clubhouse or any
of its staffers trying to address that.
Another major gripe I have with
Circle City, and one that may extend to many other Clubhouses as well, is that
in its “work-oriented program” of having Clubhouse members do simple
maintenance, food prep and other labor to occupy themselves and contribute,
these members work for free, are given absolutely no wages or incentives. Such labor for others (and the Clubhouse is
an “other,” it stands as an institution with rules and structures that members
must subject themselves to) is the very dictionary definition of—slave labor! As a person influenced by Marxism, I
definitely agree with Marxism’s premise that humans are fulfilled by productive
labor. But the only labor available at
the Clubhouse is all unskilled mindless menial labor such as cleaning toilets,
emptying wastebaskets, pushing mops or brooms, or simple food prep. Labor that gives no chance to grow in
productivity and competence, or learn new work and employment skills. It’s all dead-end labor for free, and saves
Circle City Clubhouse much money it would otherwise have to spend on outside
maintenance or food prep contractors.
All this fits the direct dictionary definition of labor
exploitation: Clubhouse members add value
through their labor to the Clubhouse, but get nothing back in return. In fact, not even a staffer saying to one
worker (but not to all), “Job well done,” for that would violate the Clubhouse meaning of equality:
high quality and low quality of performance are on an equal footing alike!
That is a key reason why. when I
would show up at the Clubhouse, I would always refuse to do any work. I wasn’t about to allow myself to be used as
a source of slave labor for free, and certainly was not, as a university
graduate, going to allow the Clubhouse to confine my labor, skills, and education
to uses that were menial and mindless. I
note that at my present job at Kroger I do mindless menial physical labor, but
it is far more therapeutic, for I gain a decent hourly wage out of it. (Currently $16.60 an hour, or about $35,000 a
year.) I put up with its mindlessness
and physical strain because I am rewarded, am given incentive,
for doing so. Totally unlike the
Clubhouse, where the workers don’t even receive a simple “Thank you” and are
just taken for granted, denied all opportunity to advance in work skills that
would be useful in a real job situation.
They are consigned, thus, to being mere myrmidons used unconscionably by
Circle City Clubhouse to save money through what can only be called a form of “wage
theft.” They don’t even get minimum
wage, but just how much money do they save the Circle City Clubhouse
each year?!
To add insult to injury, Clubhouse
members are also pressured and dragooned to help the Circle City Clubhouse in
its incessant fund-raising campaigns—again, for free!
That does much to explain why the
Circle City Clubhouse can’t retain its college grad or even high school grad
members, but, as I surmise, is but a resting lounge for what are, in so many
cases, only high school dropouts. Circle
City Clubhouse grotesquely maintains it has helped 310 mental health consumers
recover, but that 310 is only the total number of people who have passed
through its doors, and only a few remain for any length of time. (Many come one
time, and never come back.) From my experience,
the core membership of Circle City is only about 20 people. But once a Clubhouse member, always a
Clubhouse member, at least on paper, even when one has no interest whatsoever
in the Clubhouse. I once looked forward
to participating in the Clubhouse, having finally found a home for myself as a
mental health consumer, a hope also shared by my friends and my
psychotherapist. Alas, it was not to
be! I ran early on into a wall of
cliquishness and clannishness, a wall so extensive other Clubhouse members didn’t
even say “Hi” to me, and was soon stymied by my inability to use my educational
and other skills productively in any kind of Clubhouse setting (though I did
manage to publish articles in the Circle City Clubhouse Newsletter,
which was fulfilling, even though no one seemed to read them). Yet, it was so apparent things could be so
much better! Yes, a Culture of Mediocrity
prevails, both among members and staffers alike. Staffers are, in social work jargon, regarded
as “generalists,” but really they are mere baby-sitters who play a very passive
role in the Clubhouse, even though they’re required to have college
degrees. Of course, from what I’ve been
able to determine, they’re only paid like baby-sitters, an unconscionably low
hourly wage. Marissa, a Circle City
Clubhouse staffer, admitted I earn more than she does at her job, at $16.60 an
hour, which will go up to $17.10 an hour in July; 2023 yet my job only requires
a high school diploma, and hers a college degree!
Clubhouse International is aware of
these and other deficiencies at Circle City Clubhouse when it does its periodic
accreditation review, but to date has only given Circle City a “Tut, tut, do
better” admonition. In my opinion,
Circle City shouldn’t be accredited at all, given its overall lousy performance
that does little, if anything, for real mental health recovery (my recovery,
for example, owes nothing to the Clubhouse, despite my formal membership in it
since January 2016). Nor should it be
given charitable donations—that’s just throwing money down a rathole, in my
opinion. However, to be honest, I will
grant that Circle City has recently made some positive changes, but they are, in
my opinion again, not only long overdue, but too little, too late. They’ve only marginally improved the
functioning of Circle City Clubhouse, but which still stands at mediocre or
worse. And probably will continue to do
so.
Supporting details for my arguments
above can be found in my January 13, 2023, letter to the Clubhouse, which
should be read in tandem with this essay. Perhaps the effect of these two highly critical Clubhouse posts will be salutary--waking up the Circle City Clubhouse to do much more, be much more, be more effective at it! That, thus, would be the "constructive" role I could play as a Clubhouse member: by being one of its most scathing critics, I'd be giving it a very much needed wake-up call.
