When I was 24 I wanted to be a union organizer. I was a graduate student whose academic work focused on the working class and the nature of class power and class struggle. Although my upbringing was middle class, I was keenly aware that my parents had grown up working class during the Great Depression. I was always a curious kid, so I asked them and my working class grandparents about their lives, and heard a lot of firsthand accounts of the hardships endured by the working class during those years.
When I started college I was drawn to working class studies and related topics, though I lacked any awareness that my personal background played any role in this. Looking back, I can see that I was betwixt and between in my relationship to the working class—and to the middle class as well. My situation with respect to the working class was analogous to that of a second generation immigrant: I felt a connection to the working class because I knew that’s where my family comes from, but I also knew that I personally was not living a working class life.
So there I was, a 24-year-old graduate student and wannabe labor organizer canvassing a working class neighborhood in a Carolina mill town—tiny frame houses and all—trying to convince folks to support a union organizing drive at one of the nation’s largest textile mills. I assumed that my knowledge of labor studies would help me to persuade the mill villagers to the union cause, but then an elderly working class woman taught me something about the class divide—both external and internal—that I would never forget.
I was talking to her on her small front porch, making the union pitch as I had learned it from the professional organizers, when she stopped me dead with this: “That all sounds good, but I remember the General Strike, and I don’t ever want to see the babies eating out of garbage cans again.” The national textile general strike of 1934—the largest mass strike in US history up to that time, with 400,000 textile workers on strike for 22 days—was a massive defeat for the working class in the South, which never really recovered from it. I had read about it, but she had lived it.
In that moment, I realized that my middle class, education-based knowledge was no match for this woman’s personal life experience of 50 years before. Because of my respect for her, I could not bring myself to refute her with prepared responses. My position on the union had not changed, but I felt uncomfortable, as a middle class organizer, insisting on that view. Unconsciously, I knew that to do so would be to disrespect her and her life experience from a position of class privilege.
The professional organizers were not impressed, and I was chided for my reticence. And though I never became a union organizer, I have been a reliable pro-labor ally and activist, including as a participant on this site for several years.
I. Stereotypes, Power Asymmetries, and Classism
Lately, however, I have become very concerned about a troubling and unacknowledged problem at DKos: the proliferation of anti-working bias, also known as classism. For example, during a recent discussion of a viral video showing some truly vile racist & anti-Muslim behavior by an inebriated white man toward a Muslim family, two posters traded in these stereotypes upon learning that the perpetrator worked in a restaurant kitchen (the names are made up):
Abe: [He’s a] Cook at a BBQ joint? Sonny’s BBQ in Tampa or Plant City Fla? Or did he lose that job and flee to Connecticut?
Ben: How did I *know* that this dude works in a kitchen?
Abe: Yeah.
Cal: You want Freedom Fries with that?
Abe: Nah. Tater allergy. But merci beaucoup.
Dave: What does his working in a kitchen, if that’s where he works, have to do with anything?
Ben: Because I work with these guys, and they’re either screaming in apoplectic rage, or near tears, with little middle ground.
I am “Dave”. I was disturbed at how comfortable Aaron & Ben were with over-generalization and stereotyping of working class people. Ben actually believes that because he works with “these guys”—working class kitchen workers—and therefore knows some of them at work, he is qualified to generalize about how “they” behave. Although I wanted to raise the issue of classism during that discussion, I am not a naturally confrontational person, and I chose to reflect on the incident, and ultimately, to write this post.
As we all know or should know, the DKos website has strict rules against the expression of prejudice, discrimination, and other forms of oppression. In fact, classist hate speech is specifically and explicitly banned at this site, yet it occurs nearly every day and and is consistently ignored.
From the “Rules of the Road” entry on hate speech:
DO NOT:
…
4. Use racist, sexist, classist, homophobic, ageist, able-ist language -- or hate speech, generally. It is not acceptable at this site. We respect everyone.
Classism is just one form of bigotry, and though some readers may be unfamiliar with the term classism, the core processes and structures of classism are the same as they are for other forms of prejudice and systems of oppression. Consider this standard definition of “Racism and Discrimination”:
Racism can be defined as a system of oppression based on racial/ethnic group designations in which a pervasive ideology of racial superiority and inferiority provides the foundation for structural inequalities, intergroup conflict, discrimination, and prejudice. Racism, like all systems of oppression (e.g., sexism, classism, heterosexism/homophobia, ageism), is based on power asymmetries such that the dominant group is granted unearned privileges, such as respect and esteem, social validation and affirmation, opportunities and rewards, freedoms and safety, and greater access to valued societal resources.
Racial discrimination, prejudice, and stereotypes are the building blocks as well as the products of racism. Stereotypes are cognitive overgeneralizations, the labels associated with different groups. Prejudice is an attitude formed about a group of people without adequate evidence. When prejudgment is added to stereotypes, racial prejudice exists. Racial discrimination is differential treatment and behavior based on race. When action is added to racial prejudice, discriminatory behaviors are manifested. Racism is a systemic process. When power asymmetry is added to racial discrimination, the system of racism is operating.
Encyclopedia of Multicultural Psychology, at 408 (2006). (emphasis added).
This definition of racism is based on the influential work of Prof. J. M. Jones of the University of Delaware, whose book, Prejudice and Racism, is a standard text in colleges and universities. This definition is paired with a pattern, what I would call a “social equation,” of racism, that runs like this:
race-based stereotypes + prejudgment = racial prejudice.
racial prejudice + differential treatment = racial discrimination.
racial discrimination + power asymmetry = systemic racism.
And can be expressed for all systems of oppression as follows:
group-based stereotypes + prejudgment = group-based prejudice.
group-based prejudice + differential treatment = group-based discrimination.
group-based discrimination + power asymmetry = systemic group-based oppression.
It is very important to understand that this social equation of oppression is not meant as an attempt to explain historically how various kinds of oppression have arisen. Instead, it is a way of understanding how the social psychology of oppression works at any particular time, and it applies equally well regardless of the targeted social group:
gender/sex-based stereotypes + prejudgment = gender/sex prejudice.
gender/sex prejudice + differential treatment = gender/sex discrimination.
gender/sex discrimination + power asymmetry = systemic sexism.
Or,
class-based stereotypes + prejudgment = classist prejudice.
classist prejudice + differential treatment = classist discrimination.
classist discrimination + power asymmetry = systemic classism.
II. Classism: What It Is and How to Fight It
A. What It Is
Although Rule 4 explicitly forbids “classist” language, classism in fact runs rampant on this site. Applying the definition above to issues of class power yields the following working definition of classism:
Classism can be defined as a system of oppression based on class designations in which a pervasive ideology of class superiority and inferiority provides the foundation for structural inequalities, intergroup conflict, discrimination, and prejudice.
Betsy Leondar-Wright, author of the book Class Matters: Cross-Class Alliance Building for Middle Class Activists, is a leading activist and educator on how class bias endangers progressive coalition building. As she points out, progressive middle class activists are often utterly blind to their classism—they are as unaware of their class privilege, and its effect on others, as many whites are of their race privilege.
We've all learned classist prejudices, and none of us has completely eradicated them from our minds, or from our speech.
Few middle-class people would say we have prejudices against working class or low-income people, of course. Our classism is often disguised in the form of disdain for southerners or midwesterners, religious people, patriotic people, employees of big corporations, fat or non-athletic people, straight people with conventional gender presentation (feminine women wearing make-up, tough burly guys), country music fans, or gun users.
When non-working class people make generalized statements that rely on these sorts of stereotypes of working class people—that they are ignorant, fat, stupid, gun nutty, hyper-religious, hyper-patriotic, rednecks, hicks, country bumpkins, unambitious, lazy, etc.—it necessarily pushes away potential working class allies and weakens the overall Left.
As we talk, working-class people notice how oblivious or how aware of class issues we seem, and make decisions about how much to collaborate with us based on those evaluations, among other factors. The goal of reducing the classism in our speech is not to keep ourselves out of trouble by avoiding angering working-class people, and it's not to reach some kind of perfect non-classist purity. The goal is to make ourselves more trustworthy and to alienate working-class people less, so that we can work together for economic justice and other common goals.
That sounds like a pretty reasonable goal, eh? And yet, fighting bourgeois class chauvinism is and will continue to be a difficult struggle, for classist bias is part of what helps keep corporate capitalism in power.
1. Examples of Classism
Over-generalizations and stereotypes are effective because so many people unconsciously agree with them. Thus the first step is learning how to consciously recognize stereotypes in order to weaken their power to influence our thinking. Based on her research and experience, Leondar-Wright has concluded that most classist thinking, speech, and behavior “could be summed up in these two phrases: ‘overlooking intelligence, and overlooking necessity’" while trading in negative stereotypes of working class people.
The examples below are taken from the website Class Matters , which Leondar-Wright founded. If at first these examples don’t seem to you to violate Rule 4 against classist hate speech, try substituting gender or race for class. So in Example 1, what if narrator told us that the waitress—whose race is unmentioned—was black? Wouldn’t the statement then be racist? Why is it easier, for some, to recognize racism and not classism?
Example 1
I ate out with a friend — someone proud to call herself a Massachusetts liberal — and the waitress got her order wrong. My friend said, "Well, if she was smart, she wouldn't be a waitress."
Classist because: Overlooks intelligence by assuming a stereotype that people in working class jobs are stupid. Overlooks necessity by assuming that the waitress had other, better options. The Mass. liberal friend had no idea of the waitress’ life circumstances, yet her class privilege allowed her to believe that she was in a position to judge her.
Example 2
I was once part of organizing a radical book fair. It was held in a hall at a local university. At the end of the day several folks started leave, despite the fact that the hall was a complete mess. When challenged to help clean up, one of them replied "Isn't that for the janitors to do?"
Classist because: Assumes a stereotype long associated with class privilege: that physical labor is for “them” (working class people), not for “us,” (middle class or higher) who are above such things.
Example 3
I have heard two different feminist governing boards, when deciding how to set fees for an event, say, "Everyone can afford five dollars. If they are not willing to spend five dollars, then they don't care enough about the event."
Classist because: Overlooks necessity, displays ignorance of working class finances, and assumes that if someone cannot “pay to play politics” they just don’t care—and don’t deserve to participate.
Example 4
Here's one that was said directly to me, about me. The people who said it are two long-time peace activists whom I greatly respect and have fondness for. That's part of the reason I was so surprised to hear it from them.
As a progressive non-profit director frequently surrounded by other directors who come from more affluent means, I talk often about my background as a person who grew up in a single parent family, living in a mobile home or tiny cottage when I was a kid, and sometimes on welfare and food stamps.
When I shared this on one occasion the first response from the peace activists — I really do like them a lot still — was that they didn't know that about me and were surprised because "I speak so well".
As an anti-racist activist I challenge statements like that when they are said by fellow white people about people of color. When it was said to me, about me, I had nothing to say, I was just surprised.
Classist because: Overlooks intelligence by assuming a stereotype that working class people are poorly educated and ignorant. This is a close analogy to those white people who compliment black people for being so “articulate.” Also assumes a connection between educational attainments and intelligence, i.e., confuses intelligence with education.
Example 5
Several times I've heard social welfare professionals say about poor mothers, "We have to speak for them because they can't speak for themselves."
Classist because: Overlooks intelligence by assuming a negative stereotype that working class people are too ignorant and inarticulate (see above!) to express themselves, and by assuming a positive stereotype of themselves, i.e., that as “professionals” they understand these women (whom they are treating as objects rather than self-active subjects) and could accurately “speak for” them, rather than encouraging them to speak for themselves and helping them do so.
Example 6
I was wearing an old pair of shorts and T-shirt while shopping at the local hardware store. A clerk asked me what I needed for my trailer. My custom built home on a half acre with views currently has a market value of 240K. The clerk assumed I was poor by my clothing.
P.S. After posting my experience I became aware that my statement has a classist element. I mentioned the fact that I'm a property owner to distinguish myself from a person who owns a trailer, as if there is a type of person who owns a trailer. The stereotypes of "trailer trash" in our society are widespread. I think I made a fool of myself when I mentioned my home ownership. I've looked in the mirror and don't like what I see. Thank you for starting a dialogue on class consciousness. I am now painfully aware of my own bigotry.
Classist because: Overlooking intelligence, as the writer’s own reflections indicate, by both he and the sales clerk were assuming certain negative stereotypes of working class people.
2. Examples of Classism at daily kos
Set forth below are several examples of classist statements made by DKos postgers, but please note that I have deliberately excluded the authors’ names because the point here is not personal shaming but community education.
Example 7
In trying to deflect attention from the urban, middle class, progressive bubble that many, including SNL, have so effectively skewered for its own forms of narrow mindedness, notice how this poster, in a discussion about white working class voters, assumes a natural dichotomy of “rural and small town whites (especially white men)” versus “progressives” who are “painfully aware” of others’ thinking because of their superior education, etc.
As far as bubbles go, I do think that much in this country colludes to allow rural and small town whites (especially white men) to stay in their bubbles more than the rest of us do.
While progressives also live in bubbles we remain painfully aware of how “the other side thinks.” It probably has to do with mobility, education, exposure to different ways of thinking, a whole lot of things.
Classist because: Assumes negative stereotypes about white, rural people, as a mask for bias against working class people, especially rural ones. Also make unfounded, positive stereotypes about urban progressives, who are depicted nearly as martyrs due to their “painful awareness” of how others’ think. It is very difficult not be sarcastic about this comment, but I persist.
Example 8
Here’s one that openly states that to be a white member of the working class is necessarily to be uneducated, and presumably ignorant.
the WWC, by definition, doesn’t have a college degree.
Classist because: Overlooks intelligence and necessity by relying on a demonstrably false negative stereotype, when in fact 23% of workers in low pay sectors have a bachelor’s degree or higher. The fact that some pollsters and analysts use educational attainment—graduation from High School versus college—as a proxy for classifying voters into working class or middle class is no defense. Instead, the fact that nearly a quarter of low paid workers have a college degree demonstrates that those pollsters and analysts are using a very poor proxy for class—but one that serves to bolster negative stereotypes about working class people. Funny how that works, huh?
Example 9
Here’s an exchange that assumes that any economic concerns of Trump voters are really just a mask for racism.
Abe: what’s amazing is that despite his approvals being garbage right now, Tr*mp is doubling, if not tripling down on being a dick.
Betty: My guess is that’s for his base, the racist morons, um I mean “victims of economic anxiety”, who LIKE it when he’s being a dick!
Classist because: Overlooks necessity by vastly overgeneralizing the attitudes of some Trump voters as being those of all such voters. Implicitly attacks working class people, as “economic anxiety” is typically associated with the working class.
Example 10
This poster was having a fine time attacking Alex Jones as “toxic human garbage,” and then characterized his fan base in similar terms. But then he decided to attack them on class grounds.
Besides punching themselves out in a drunken rage, cuz they missed the trailer park payment they could not fight their way out of a wet paper bag. Racist women hating gutless trash.
Classist because: Overgeneralizes wildly, assuming without even a shred of evidence or argument that Alex Jones’s followers are “trailer park” residents, i.e., working class people. Using the words “trailer park” and “trash” to describe people clearly rests on the classist trope of “trailer park trash,” about which Wikipedia says the following:
a derogatory North American English term for a small percentage of poor people living in a trailer or a mobile home. It is particularly used to denigrate white people living in such circumstances and can be considered to fall within the category of racial slurs. The term has increasingly replaced “white trash” in public and television usage as the latter expression became more politically incorrect.
B. How To Fight It
I want to believe that many of the people who make classist statements at DKos do not fully understand the classist nature of the statements they make, nor the oppressive character of their underlying thinking. If they do not comprehend how negative stereotypes are distorting their thinking (perhaps because they believe them), that would be a case of ignorance. Of course ignorance is no more an excuse for classism than it is for racism or sexism, but the cure for ignorance is education, not hostile confrontation.
In fighting classism I believe we should proceed with an initial assumption that many members of the DKos community will respond to this issue in good faith, with open minds and a willingness to listen, learn, and change. Thus, the first step in fighting classism at DKos must be raising consciousness about the issue. Hence this post.
Going forward, I hope other community members who are concerned about classism will raise their voices as a way of educating this community. I would love to see comments below, or even separate diaries, about classism here at DKos, as well as about classist experiences folks have suffered anytime or anywhere. Perhaps a group on Anti-Classism?
One thing should be crystal clear: There is and should be zero tolerance for classism at DKos. As Rule 4 indicates, there is no hierarchy of oppression: racism (or sexism, homophobia, etc.) is not worse (whatever that even means) than classism, nor is the opposite true. Comparison, which is the thief of joy, is also a thief of unity in coalitions.
Classist comments are subject to flagging and removal, though I personally intend, as an initial matter, to engage in dialog about the issue, which I think is a much better way to start when one finds classism here.
Resources are available on the web for fighting classism. Below are several links that should be helpful.
Class Matters
What About Classism?
5 Common Assumptions You Never Realized Were Classist (by James St. James, Everyday Feminism)
Classism (by Kate Carraway, Vice)
Classism: The last socially acceptable prejudice in America (by gjohnsit, Caucus 99%)
Finally, classist prejudice is baked in to mainstream, neoclassical economics, which teaches that workers’ wages are an accurate reflection of their “market worth,” despite the fact that class power plays at least as large a role in setting compensation. Studying progressive, heterodox economics is a way to free our minds from neoclassical ideology, and should be an essential task for any progressive. Here are a couple of sites to get started:
Economic Policy Institute
Association for Heterodox Economics
