People don't "find themselves" in a social position. It isn't like they wandered into the wrong part of town. People suffering poverty are angry about wealth because it represents something withheld from them by an opaque and unfair system (how opaque and how unfair is the only thing under debate). Rich people who think poverty is a moral failing are afraid of losing what they have and in need of a feeling of intrinsic superiority because their greatest anxiety is that they don't deserve what they have.
The phrase was used to stay out of the debate about the cause, not to imply there was no cause.
The trophy is a symbol for something more, and so is having hundreds of millions of dollars.
The parent poster is specifically referring to a specific type of unfounded animus. Namely: having no argument other than "they have more money than me" to justify said animus.
Here's a way to think about it - what is the corresponding thing for the rich to hate on the poor for? Are the rich jealous of not having money? Are they envious of those who cannot pay more for housing simply because a building of questionable merit faces it (one of the examples given in the article)? How is that founded? The rich can easily get themselves into that position, should they be desirous of it.
There is an arguable parallel in the rich who see the poor as being a moral failure for merely not having money and the poor who see the rich as being a moral failure for merely having money, but a) I think the poor have a better claim to well-foundedness there, even if it is slight, in that the rich quite clearly have the ability to stop having money with a snap of their fingers where the poor do not obviously have the ability to start having money, and b) the article does not seem to say that merely having money is a moral failure - at best it says that misusing money is a moral failure.
Let me make sure I understand, because I fear we may be talking past each other.
Are you suggesting that the simple fact that one has more money than you is sufficient to justify animus?
(I'm happy to discuss the rest of your post once we clear up this particular point; it seems fundamental.)
(I'm not totally sure where my own worldview lies, for what it's worth. Almost certainly the strongest form, and almost certainly not the one you stated. But I think it is defensible that some worldviews believe all of these and they are not the worldviews of people too irrational to be worth understanding.)
Not if the difference is trivial, but absolutely when it is as enormous and as unmotivated as it often is. Why would it be strange that obviously unfair inequality would be a source of animus?
"Of all the preposterous assumptions of humanity over humanity, nothing exceeds most of the criticisms made on the habits of the poor by the well-housed, well-warmed, and well-fed." — Herman Melville
EDIT: Phrasing.
The difference with wealth is that you can choose to become unwealthy on a moment's notice. So each day you remain wealthy is, itself, a choice. And the process of becoming unwealthy itself has direct benefits for the poor.
A white person cannot choose to become black and thereby remove oppression. A straight person who does not marry does not thereby yield the ability to marry to a gay couple. Even someone assigned male at birth who decides to present as female does not get to transfer her former male privilege to anyone in the process.
But someone who can afford a $10M condo that is as functional as (being generous) a $1M condo could directly transfer that $9M to people who don't have a place to live at all. So their choice not to do that—their choice to merely have money—is a decision we can justly evaluate morally, in a way we cannot evaluate merely having white skin or male presentation morally.
In my religious tradition, in our ritual confession of our faults, we apologize "for what I have done and for what I have failed to do." There is a story of a rich man who dutifully kept the ancient laws but refused to sell his possessions to the poor, and chose his possessions over the way of the religion. To remain rich (at least beyond one's needs and beyond the needs of one's credible plans to help the world) is an active choice, and can be criticized as any other choice.
It is right for oppressed groups to want to not be oppressed, it is not right for them to hate other groups because they are not oppressed.
"I hate you for having ∞x more than me and actively preventing me from having a decent life, just to milk a little bit more from me. I want my stuff"
This is just a denial of the reality that no one is really given a choice about the circumstances of their lives. That goes for abilities and outcomes. It should be self-evident, that all men are created equal - not in ability or outcome, but in the fact that no one has a choice in the hand they are dealt.
The less-fortunate you are, the more grievances you have - legitimate grievances. My original post wasn't meant to de-legitimize anyone's founded grievances. I'm just starting to see this in these types of discussions, both online and irl, that the more we rail against members of difference classes, the more rigid those class structures become. Of course this is a slippery slope to telling people to pull themselves up by the bootstraps. That's not what I mean either.
edit: I got a little (ok, a lot) carried away with the language, and it definitely detracted from my point, and added nothing to the conversation.
Seriously, what does that add here? It was already perfectly unambiguous you find her and her perspective abhorrent. Such hateful vulgarity actually detracts from your argument, IMO; you come across as rageful, not rational.
EDIT: Parent comment was edited to remove the quoted bit, and also significantly for tone, before being flagged to death.
So this gets complicated. Plenty of underprivileged people would kill for the change to have a decent and fair shot at life with a reliable roof over their heads, and certainly I wouldn't begrudge them that. But there are also plenty of people who are stably renting a small apartment or own a small one-family house in the suburbs who would also kill for a McMansion, and I think the unfortunate but fair judgment of those people is that, were they rich, they'd behave in the ways we stereotypically dislike the rich for. The fact that they do not because they cannot is not, I think, itself a reason to avoid making that judgment.
I'm trying to think of actual instances...
Beggars should be abolished: it is irritating to give to them and it is irritating not to. --Nietzsche.
an old person without money is pathetic --Anon. from "Bookends" album, Simon and Garfunkel.
Maybe you travel in different circles? I sure don't love the poor, but I used to be really poor, so I feel I have the right.
By the way, I also grew up poor - as in, growing up in the US with an outhouse poor. And, now I’m rich. And, yes, I hear that all the time.
Have also seen people who played too many video games and ten years into their adult lives have absolutely nothing to show for it other than some min wage job say 'fuck the rich'. Equally shitty.
In both cases, a healthy does of get-the-fuck-over-yourself is due.
That's not the case here, she is criticizing them for more than just having money.
The author is not poor.