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Comment by cup | Hacker News Reader

One can always find exceptions to the rule.

Is it an exception or do we mix racism with classicism? No I don't believe that racism is dead but do believe classicism is worse. Studies show that minorities have a harder time getting jobs, apartments, and are stopped more often by the police.

But studies have also shown that income mobility regardless of race is statistically rare.

I've heard a lot of classist comments from both White people (calling people "red necks" and "trailer trash") and upper income black people ("I don't want to live in a majority Black neighborhood around "them people")

In my experience as an American, it’s basically impossible for most Americans to talk about race and class problems at the same time. It seems as if for most people they exist in a zero-sum relationship; either everything wrong is because race(ism) or everything wrong is because class(ism). It’s not only exasperating, but seems to have stalemated progress on a societal level for generations.

This may be because Americans believe that class mobility is high (even though it isn't as high as it once was). But if class mobility is high, then if you're lower class, well, that's kind of your own fault. Go fix it. Move up.

But if you're of the wrong race, that clearly can't be your fault, and you can't "fix" it.

That split in how we think about class and race may be the underlying mechanism as to why we can't talk about both class and race at the same time.

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