Working Class Elitists

In the initial stages of the primary, we heard a lot about blacks versus women. This simpleton's analysis withered away when the media realized that the Democratic Party contains other groups too, like Hispanics and young people and seniors. So, in the media's unceasing desire to live in black and white, to create Apollonian-Dionysian dichotomies, to cut America up like the baby before King Solomon, a new Manichean understanding has now arisen: the people that vote for Obama and something called "the working class."

The former, well, that's pretty straight-forward: these are the Democrats, Independents, and cross-over Republicans who choose Obama in the primaries.

It is the second group, "the working class," that is of interest to me. It seems that in the United States, being working class is code for being ignorant.

Anytime the media wants to cast aspersions upon Obama, to diminish his chances to be elected, to give voice to smears against him, to suggest that he is a Muslim, or a black-nationalist, or a socialist, or a Eunuch, or some Chameleonesque mixture of all of those things, suddenly these concerns are put in the mouth of "the working class."

Take only the most recent example of this at the New York Daily News. According to the paper, the "ugly truth" as to why Hillary won't quit is because she has the difficult job of giving voice to the racists and the ignorant that slither around among "the working class." This tripe is not just limited to newspapers, though. When ABC was lambasted for conducting one of the worst debates in the history of American politics, its simple response was that those vacuous questions were the questions the "average" (read: working class) Americans wanted to hear. Yes, average people are vacuous and stupid, so we, being populist, must pander to them, in essence.

This group, the working class, according to the media, is white, rural, crass, uncouth, impressed by theatrics such as downing whiskey, or preferring coffee to OJ, cares about flag-pins, and judges the merits of its presidential candidates by their bowling scores, their attire, and metaphysical things such as "elitism."

I find this entire narrative particularly insulting because I am a low income Muslim. I am not rich. My parents aren't rich. Hell, my grandparents are low income, not in the US, but in the third world. All of my life, I have grown up hearing that all the evil Muslims, the ones that commit acts of terrorism, are poor, have poor parents, and have even poorer grandparents. For a majority of my life, the media and the pundits have sold me the story that of all the Muslims that go fanatical, I am among the most likely to end up going in that direction because of my background. Yet I hardly became a loon; neither did my brother; nor do hundreds of millions of poor Muslim kids all across the world. The reason that this smear against the Muslim working class exists, though, is because it is easy, and because people have been conditioned to turn "the workers" into the worst representation of them-selves.

Same thing today, in the US. Having grown up and gone to school with good, working class Americans in the South and Northwest and Philly -- many of whom are not white -- its pretty easy to see that bullshit sits just as badly with working class people as it does with Ivy leaguers. Yet, the media doesn't see it that way. It only sees an Enlightened America (read: wealthy) that knows why they are voting and for whom, and it sees Working Class America (read: poor) who are duped and idiotic. For whatever reason, the Versailles version of America has been given to Obama and Crappy America to Hillary.

Of course, Hillary is part of the problem, because she embraces this dichotomy and tries to use it to her advantage (taking photo-ops of herself doing shots in a bar, dissing economists, and so forth all while she withholds disclosing her 100 million dollar piggy bank). In her increasing desperation to remain in a race that she lost when it became apparent she didn't have a strategy beyond Super Tuesday I, she has fed the media this narrative. It has gotten so bad that Bill had the audacity to make the following remarks in Indiana:

"The great divide in this country is not by race or even income, it's by those who think they are better than everyone else and think they should play by a different set of rules."

This is the typical stereotype that media and politicians peddle to the actual working class. Living in an Ivory Tower world, such people are somehow convinced that the average man is more affected by show-offs, than discrimination or lack of work. In fact, when one of the candidates stops and recognizes how dependent the current American system has made working class people on their jobs - to the extent that work is connected to dignity - he is the one that is smeared.

Ladies and gentlemen: welcome to an America where not only is being working class a code word for being the lowliest kind of human, but if you resist this smear, then you are an elitist.

www.alieteraz.com

Comments

[Scarabus]

So call me an elitist. I do indeed think that in mainstream public discourse "working class" = ignorant, clueless, bigoted, etc.

That aside, I would observe that the whole thing about filing our entire population into either two shoe boxes ("working class" and "elitist") or three shoe boxes (lower class, middle class, upper class) is bogus.
For example, last time I got new glasses, the dispensing optician gave me a choice: bifocals, trifocals, or graduated (i.e., smooth transitions, no clear demarcations). The last is way the real world functions. Or, another analogy, the real world is analogue and not digital. But it's more complicated still! The distinctions among us are not just graduated and analogue, they are mixed.

For example, lots of wealthy, privileged politicians sitting in Congress are as dumb and as clueless as dirt. (For starters, think Inhofe and Stevens.) At the same time lots of working class (sic) persons are bright, educated, clued-in, etc. Example? Mr. Eteraz!

As a card-carrying elitist, I would add another perspective: Thomas Hardy's novel "Jude the Obscure." Jude is a working class guy (sic), very smart, well qualified for college. But, because of England's class structure and social biases in the late 19th century, Jude can become part of the "Christminster" (read "Oxford") community only as a stonecutter, not a scholar.

That was more than a century ago. Shouldn't we have learned something in the interim? Yeah. Rhetorical question. We should have, but manifestly we haven't.

[Mack20]

I'm glad you have such a lofty opinion of yourself. You only get one vote, though.

[Javani]

Hi Ali,

It's not Hillary, it's the outcome of identity politics which have usurped Democratic Party discourse. Hispanics must think this way, Black that way, etc. It is how the Northeastern White elites make sense of their country. They think they want unity, far from it. That''s why Obama's race speech in March where he departed from post-racialism brought them squeals of joy.

Labeling is not only part of their limited thinking patterns, but part of the way they praise themselves. The "white working class" is the problematic other for the Democratic party elites. Decades ago it was not, but now Democratic leaders come from the upper financial industry/education classes. This is reflected in the way national media shape the news. The Democratic elite is as alienated from the monetary concerns of "regular people" as much as the Republicans now. Exhibit #1 - comprehensive immigration reform. Exhibit #2 - NPR reporting obsession with the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960's. It allows them to keep thinking how they used to care about the common man, but no more. ;-)

[Marrigan]

Rule #1 - Don't take anything that those in the political echo chamber say so personally. Most of them think that if you're not a "journalist", a lawyer or incredibly wealthy, you're "working class".

Rule #2 - When Bill or Hillary Clinton accuse someone of having a character flaw or having said or done something wrong, remember that it comes straight from their heart, LOL. They've been there, they've done it, they got away with it and they're arrogant enough to think we've forgotten.

Rule #3 - If you go through life letting other people define and categorize you, you'll go crazy. Remember how Barack used his hand to 'dust off' his shoulder after PA? Try it. You'll live longer.

[Blutus]

Election hype. Americans are used to it. Words. Working class Americans are very proud
of who they are and don't mind the label.
Don't sweat what other people think of you unless they are armed.

Americans are not into "face" and do not get suicidal when someone expresses dislike of them.

Remember: it's an election. Words have lost their meaning. For now.

And Obama?


It has nothing to do with his race, although that matters to some Americans.

His problem is the Chicago Political Machine. Of which he is part.

Americans are very familiar with the Chicago Political Machine.

THAT is Obama's problem.

[Susanfrom29]

Well said, and thank you for saying it. Somebody had to, and it wasn't going to come from the mainstream media who truly believe that Americans have a 30 second attention span. So they present the news in soundbites that are at best insulting and at worst create unforgivable stereotypes. If an item doesn't fit into a planned narrative it is ignored.

But some of the responsibility has to be placed on the White House doorstep. I don't remember a time when this nation has been led by a more irresponsibly racist administration. And even though not a Muslim, I am insulted that this administration, or anyone else, would think that as an American, I would condemn a religion because there are Muslim terrorists. I don't remember this anger at Roman Catholics when the IRA was active in Northern Ireland.

As for the "working class" argument, it seems to me that this is just a code word for white. Hillary Clinton does well by appealing to the fear that she believes exists about race. She wins in states where there has been a history of white racism by appealing to that side of people. She should be ashamed, since people of color have long given support to the Clintons. I'm sure that her argument to the superdelegates will be based, in large part, on the fact that she thinks a black man cannot be elected, that the racists would prefer a woman to a black man.

[RJII]

Ali E. I am speechless. You have articulated exactly what I believe to be so-so true and disparing. I am newly surprised by the Dem Party and have switched to independent.

AMEN!

[erykah]

Well said sir. Well said.

[Desiderata]

"welcome to an America where not only is being working class a code word for being the lowliest kind of human, but if you resist this smear, then you are an elitist"

Exactly.

And this will be why Obama becomes the next President of the United States, because he refuses to accept this politically distorted view of us. He talks to us adult to adult. She talks at us as though we are kids in daycare.

[bentenrai]

Good point Ali.
I wonder what's wrong with wanting to be part of the elite, unless we want to dumb down america. If people did not aspire to elitism, they wouldn't send their kids to the best schools their money can pay for.