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Even without the race element - there’s definitely a class thing.

I noticed it when I moved to the Bay Area after growing up in western New York. The types of foods people ate or didn’t eat, the restaurants people would or would not go to.

The shows people would or would not watch, even the way people talked. I think I hadn’t really seen the difference in class behavior before in America. Now it’s easy to see it.

A lot of it is tightly correlated to wealth and a lot of it reminds me of things the author describes (fear of not being able to find a job, fear of just “taking a year off” because it sounds financially crazy), but it’s not only about wealth really.

You can be poor and still act more “upper class” and you can be rich and still act “working class”. It’s a lot of little things people do in preferences and how they talk/behave.

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Much racism in America is actually classism. That's why something like Henry Louis Gates being profiled by a neighbor and a policeman as he was trying to get back to his Harvard home makes the news: Gates is an educated upper-class black man, and in this case he was treated as the latter rather than the former.

I think you could argue that the opposite is true. Much classism in America is actually racism. For example, opposition to welfare programs have often been motivated by racist tropes like welfare queens. The truth is that racism and classism in America are deeply intertwined.

Explain how opposition to welfare programs is racism. Also, please explain why impoverished minority communities have not vastly improved regardless of the constantly increasing money tossed into welfare programs.

The comment wasn't that opposition to welfare programs was solely caused by racism, just that it was one motivation. It's easier to defend a racist policy if racism is never explicitly brought up, the policy just has a disparate impact along racial lines. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lee_Atwater#%22Southern_strate...

>The comment wasn't that opposition to welfare programs was solely caused by racism, just that it was one motivation

Ok so how would one oppose welfare programs and not be labeled racist? Do you believe there are no individuals taking advantage of the welfare system and that pointing out anyone who is would be racist?

I think that the above was comment abour welfare queen discussion that actually happened in USA around 1980 in presidential campaign.

My point was to try and get the poster to tell us how we can be critical of welfare programs without being racist. Since they never answered I'm going to assume, like most people with this stance, they think ANY criticism against it is racism and no discussion should happen. Assuming that every black single woman is a 'welfare queen' would be racist but the idea that there are individuals who take advantage of the system is not, especially since it's true. Focusing on a term that some find offensive seems like a waste of time and a distraction from real discussion on the issue.

Opposition to welfare programs happens in countries without race related problems as well. How do you distinguish between such opposition if you're going along with "that affects particular race more that's why they oppose it" argument. You can paint everyone to be racist this way.

Opposition to welfare is not racist per se. But it has been used by politicians and pundits in the US as a dog whistle to drive a racial wedge between white and Black Americans. It's not explicit, and that's the point [0].

0. https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/exclusive-lee-atwa...

Yeah, it has been used but the way the argument goes it's impossible to form an argument against a welfare program without being painted a racist.

What I mean is that a line of reasoning so often used these days: "this affects race X more therefore it's racist/racially motivated" is just incorrect thinking.

Have you heard of intergenerational wealth, which is one of the issues described in the OP article? Then, have you further heard of redlining, Jim Crow, slavery, sharecropping, lynchings, hiring discrimination, justice system discrimination, police discrimination, urban ghettoization, locally-funded school districts based on local property taxes, code switching speech, cultural discrimination on styles of dress and hair, and the digital divide?

Would you like to take any guesses of any of those issues not being involved in poor members of minority groups remaining poor?

What does that have to do with welfare being a good idea? You're straw-manning.

There are no straw men here and it's insulting that you'd accuse a stranger acting in good faith of that.

It's a direct answer to "Also, please explain why impoverished minority communities have not vastly improved regardless of the constantly increasing money tossed into welfare programs."

Food assistance, subsidized housing, and monthly cash payments are only really short-term stabilizing tools. For that they can be useful, but those systems are not designed or equipped to vastly improve the wealth and self-reliance of impoverished communities.

The key word in "impoverished minority communities" is "communities". Good schools, grocery stores, street maintenance, good transit, good jobs within driving distance, fair lending (and honestly lending practices designed to fix the damage of generations of unfair lending), vocational training, job placement assistance, enforcement of building codes on landlord-owned buildings, stable utility infrastructure including broadband Internet, and other things stable, wealthier communities take for granted are necessary to have a stable, flourishing community population.

Welfare may be a bad example because I think there are more white people on welfare in general? Would potentially be evidence of class divide.

I think there’s truth in what you’re saying though - single family zoning is an easy example. Also when they talk about welfare on the news and only show black people (even though more white people are on welfare iirc) - or how the sister reply to your comment gets indignant demanding you “explain how opposition to welfare is racism” and in the next sentence complains about minority communities. So there’s definitely a racial component.

I guess I mostly agree, we just see race more easily than class because of arbitrary skin color categorization. I hope in the future both are irrelevant.

We have the same discourse around welfare in the UK, where the stereotypical poor person is white. I'll bet you a bag of Hot Cheetos they have it in Hungary, Japan, and other ethnically homogeneous countries.

> You can be poor and still act more “upper class” and you can be rich and still act “working class”.

You are stunningly naive if you think that a poor person acting more "upper class" isn't reminded that they're "out of their lane" more than someone rich acting "working class".

Spot on. Every time I wear "fancy" clothes I'm constantly worrying that everyone is pointing at me thinking "we know who you really are, you're poor and don't deserve to be acting this way". This is despite me moving away from my poor town years ago and establishing a solid job for myself. Nobody in my new town knows me at all yet I assume they know I came from a "less than" background. A poor person must undo decades of the effects poverty inflicts to truly appear "rich" where a rich person must simply "lower their standards" to act working class.

> must simply "lower their standards" to act working class.

You make that sound easy, but I see the situation as symmetric. For example, my wife grew up wealthier than I did - and when it came time for us to buy a car, her first question was "how big a car would we need to comfortably move our family around" while mine was "what's the most affordable?"

it's a completely different mindset - she is frustrated that I default to a poor mindset and I am frustrated that she defaults to a rich one. Neither one is easy to switch.

I'm talking about the case where a person doesn't get to "choose" to act poor. The poor person doesn't get to choose to think other than what is affordable, where someone with more money gets the choice to thinking of things other than affordability, like comfortably. The mindset that develops from a lack of agency in one's life is more traumatizing than one that does have that agency but must learn to change their mindset. Different people might not be as effected by poverty however.

You don't need anything even close to overly "fancy"; if you're the average poor person, you can vastly improve your image simply by wearing any sort of formal clothes, as in a suit and tie. Even if others "know who you really are" they'll still appreciate that you're making the effort to relate to them, and that's what matters. We tend to forget stuff like this as we lose sight of the value of enduring traditions, but if you look at visual records of how older generations behaved you'll see plenty of poorer folks looking quite comfortable in formal wear.

But poor people hate feeling like they have to change their appearance to get the approval of the privileged classes. Feeling like you have to visually and verbally code switch to get "better" people to respect you just feels bad. Spending precious money on the cheapest formal wear you can find just so people will take you seriously further cements the divide poor people feel.

> But poor people hate feeling like they have to change their appearance to get the approval of the privileged classes.

You say that like everyone else isn't doing the exact same thing. Being privileged is all about playing the "get everyone else's approval" game. But coming from a different social context it's even more basically a way of showing others respect and earning their trust, so it's not without consequence.

It loops back around at the top. It’s why there’s an eccentric rich person trope and why it’s called “fuck you” money.

If you’re totally financially independent you’re more free to do what you want, independent of class behavior expectations (or even in contradiction of them). They no longer matter that much (unless you’re doing something that requires politics or people).

You're right, everyone is doing that to some degree at some point through out their life. But consider that there exists people who feel they need to dress better just to get the basic respect they deserve. In the case where someone cannot afford the appropriate clothing, it ostensibly seems they are unable to show the respect you speak of and are deemed "less than" because of that, but really their minds and character is the same regardless of clothing. Being privileged is having the agency to pay for the kinds of clothes that impress people and causes them to respect you, and in some cases, without having much other than a nice suit to justify such respect.

You're still not going to look right, though. You will have the "wrong" shoes, or you'll keep them so long from thrift that they'll go out of fashion. Your one set of nice clothes is precious to you in a way that the one-out-of-ten is not to someone in the upper class, and that will make you wear it differently.

No need to go for the throat there. And especially not when you're not totally correct.

Paul Fussell's Class documents the exact phenomenon OP describes. Wealth is not class [1]; class is much more complex. For example, poor academics are higher class than rich blue-collar workers. Donald Trump is crazy rich but affects many of the working-class behaviours described in said book (technically "high prole"). Barack Obama has much less money but most would view him as upper-middle class. Nobody would accuse the above of being "out of their lane".

My very rough approximation: class is something like the integral of wealth over very long periods of time. Being rich and well-connected for long periods gives you a chance to accumulate high-status behaviours and preferences, which can persist even when the wealth doesn't, and continue to confer benefits. Preferring golf or tennis to say, bowling, doesn't necessarily come with a major difference in affordability. But being good at golf might help your career more than bowling. Reading more helps in tons of ways, and most people only pick up this habit if they grow up with access to good education and parental cognitive surplus.

[1] https://resourcegeneration.org/breakdown-of-class-characteri...

Yeah - I agree with all of this.

On a related note, I think the US approach to dismissing class is preferable to the UK where it’s very explicit.

While both approaches have issues, when it’s explicit in the culture people seem to discriminate on it more (or even self-sort themselves based on identity).

I think ideally it’s better for a culture to try to not do that, but pragmatically it’s good to be aware of its existence in order to be successful. I mostly chalk it up to social skills.

On specifically being told to “stay in your lane” my point was more that if you’re behaving a certain way you won’t be told that, because the other people will assume you’re like them. It’s not only about wealth (though as in the article, the behavior is often related).

> On a related note, I think the US approach to dismissing class is preferable to the UK where it’s very explicit.

Huh. My perception has always been that America is far more obsessed with class and “keeping up with the Joneses” than Britain.

That said, I have in the past been called “rich” in a derogatory manner just for owning an iPad. But that’s more an amusing anecdote than social commentary. I find this type of thing to be the exception rather than the norm.

For context I’m a Brit with a decent job but my family is certainly not upper middle class or even middle class and all my friends are working class because those are the people I naturally get along with. For the most part the fact I make more money doesn’t cause any friction in those social circles. One of my mates even said to me if he didn’t know better he’d assume I lived on a council estate.

I guess the point I’m trying to make is the class lines are very blurred in modern day British society except for at the extremes. As such it’s not something people tend to obsess over.

On the other hand I’ve found that, in general, middle class Yanks tend to care more about being perceived a certain way so people know they’re middle class or upper middle class or whatever else. I’ve even seen them argue over exactly what constitutes “real” upper middle class compared to regular middle class. Not something I’ve ever seen Brits do.

Cross-Atlantic class discourse is always somewhat tricky since a car factory assembly line worker would be considered middle class in the US (based on income) but working class in the UK (based on status.) As a Brit in the US I find it kinda fascinating.

> My perception has always been that America is far more obsessed with class and “keeping up with the Joneses” than Britain.

The US is obsessed with material consumption. As such it probably plays a bigger part in status here than in the UK.

> I guess the point I’m trying to make is the class lines are very blurred in modern day British society except for at the extremes.

Perhaps this is a reflection of increasing university education and the changing nature of work away from factory jobs. In a way it's a move to a more American view of class, where most people are considered 'middle class'.

> As such it’s not something people tend to obsess over. > I’ve even seen them argue over exactly what constitutes “real” upper middle class compared to regular middle class. Not something I’ve ever seen Brits do.

Brits regularly obsess over whether someone or some hob qualifies as working class or not though!

Donald Trump is as high class as it gets. From upbringing to the way his career developed. To the people he socializes with.

> Being rich and well-connected for long periods ... which can persist even when the wealth doesn't, and continue to confer benefits. Preferring golf or tennis to say, bowling, doesn't necessarily come with a major difference in affordability. But being good at golf might help your career more than bowling

He was literally rich from the day he was born to old age. He was getting those benefits whole his life. He plays golf.

What he is not, is not being good person.

I think this is wrong and misses the point.

A lot of his political popularity is because while he’s rich, the way he speaks is “working class”.

He’s a good example of the difference we’re talking about.

My point is, he speaks exactly how he learned to speak in environment of rich people.

He is not all that much how actual working class behaves. Instead, he is his how middle class imagines working class. And people who vote him are economically not the poorest either. And he is also what poor people imagine super rich to be.

Eh - I don’t agree, his rhetoric and the macho over confidence is similar to a lot of people I grew up with that support him (that are working class).

Since when has a reality-tv career been considered high class.

It’s high status in some circles that equate celebrity with prestige

That’s kind of case-in-point - it’s high status in low class circles.

Is this confusing wealth and class?

Your statement, worded differently, seems to read "it's high class in low class circles". Are you implying class is only appropriately defined only by those in high-class? I guess I was looking at it as social prestige regardless of who in the social strata assigns it. In other words, if enough 'low-class' people think you're high-class, you're by definition high-class.

Class is defined by the members of each group. Non-members are by definition mostly ignorant of the groups' culture that they are not a part of. So they can recognize people are different from them, but not which group they belong to.

"low-class" people would not determine who is "high-class" any more than the "high-class" people determine who is "low-class".

And also surprising the author did not experience it at Uni where even well off middle class people, suddenly are mixing with much wealthier people.

I remeber my cousin who went to UMIST saying this and that side of the family was well off.

Its even more noticeable if you went to oxbridge and bumped into some one like Borris Johnson and his Bullingdon mates.

This is highly dependent on university - I didn’t notice it much where I went (RPI), but it’s a lot more obvious at Stanford.

I think this is school dependent. In my experience, many wealthy kids will hide behaviors they know are associated with being wealthy / hide their backgrounds in order to better fit in. The awkwardness goes both ways.

Middle class kids might, not upper class wealthy ones not so much.

Not all of us went to schools that have "much wealthier people" attending, of course.

I find that hard to believe unless your country has a very stratified higher education system - which is a bad thing.

Well, my country is the US, and I am speaking from experience. I'm definitely not saying it's a good thing. It's just important to acknowledge that "the college experience" of elites and the elite-adjacent doesn't represent the common post-secondary case here.

Class[0] by Paul Fussell is a great book on this topic. The back of the book has a test to identify your class.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Class:_A_Guide_Through_the_Ame...

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