I cant say why others say this, but IMHO we can’t fix a social problem by deciding it is the sexiest most unrepentant fun to hate disorder and then talking about how bad those people are in our echo chamber, me I do love unmasking a true bloody fanged antisemite, satisfying in a super perverse way, but you really can’t fix that guy with education, perhaps antipsychotics.
It is the in between people who have never been told or media/peer pressured that no matter the race classism is also not OK, and it is not a way to disguise the racism they would already be embarrassed to express openly. If they learn that their hate for the less well off is universally unacceptable, then race stops being a classist identifier, we can fix both problems in one shot.
Nah, for me, it’s because classism is a Big Deal, and something that doesn’t get talked about nearly enough - and didn’t get talked about at all in the blog post, despite being very fucking relevant. It’s not like I’m diminishing the racism by pointing out that there’s more than just skin-color-based bigotry at work here. There’s racism. The post points it out and calls it and does a good job of it. That doesn’t mean that’s the exclusive narrative.
I am positive that there’s wealthy black people out there that would say the problem with poor black people is that they’re just not as smart/are inherently irresponsible/are lazier/are immoral/etc. I’ve heard wealthy black people say as much. Hell, I’ve heard poor black people say as much (about black people in their own neighborhoods, not themselves). Cosby’s got a whole horrible speech about how african-americans, in his view, cause many their own problems with people being “immoral,” and The Boondocks even puts similar admonishments into play in the person of MLK. Chris Rock’s whole bit about Niggas vs. Black People is steeped in classist stereotypes.
To pretend that the economic dimension is a simply distraction is to narrow your focus to an easy target. It’s racism. It’s not only racism.
Perhaps not classist in a power dynamic role but class prejudiced despite being near the bottom themselves. Like an african-american cop who loves to beat black kids, or a Jew who speaks at holocaust denier conferences.
Yeah, its that racist telekinesis jamming the debit machine again.
Well, it is because they feel something extremely important that needs addressing is being forcibly removed from the conversation, but no, it’s not them.
On the contrary, class discrimination is commonplace in such contexts. In my experience, poor people with jobs almost invariably look down on poor people who require public assistance, and can be quite openly contemptuous of them, just as in this example.
Ironically, EBT cards were implemented partly because of the stigma associated with traditional food stamps (in addition to being easier to manage and cheaper to reload) in order to encourage people to use their SNAP benefits more freely and avoid embarrassment.
Brought to you by the same rent seeking contractors who brought you student aid account debit Visa/student IDs.
Yeah, and I live in Maine and our crazy governor made it a requirement for the cards to have their pictures on them! Basically issuing ‘poor ids’
Not if you buy the idea that, if one is worried about class status, you are primarily interested in distinguishing yourself from the next lower rung of society.
So in the context of the OP, if the next person in line after the three black EBT card users had not been white “Ms. Johannsen with a credit card,” but instead another EBT card user who was white instead of black, a white cashier would have likely treated the white woman the same as she did the black women, and again not called the manager? Because classism? If so, I’m not buying it.
White cashiers and other service people (and of course the police) often treat black people differently, no matter how well dressed or otherwise apparently wealthy they are. I’ve seen it many times, and innumerable studies show it.
Yes, classism obviously exists, but as I was saying, the common insistence (white or otherwise) that it has to be brought up when racism is the focus is . . . interesting. I mean, where is the discussion supposed to go from there? "You know, that cashier wasn’t only racist, she was also classist, so . . . "
Poor white people get treated badly because of classism, but BOTH wealthy and poor black people get treated badly because of racism. When it comes to what deserves attention in the general mistreatment of black people, racism usually trumps classism. And while modes of oppression do of course occur simultaneously, calling for inclusion of classism (and sexism, and heterosexism, and religion, and regional differences, and on and on) when the current focus is racism only waters down or derails the discussion, yet again.
There are workarounds available
I want the Visa black card EBT skin; wait, this solves both problems.
I’m not really asking you to accept hypotheticals. I’m just saying that the cashier’s statement - “people like that just don’t keep track of their money. They think they have all of it on their cards, but they just don’t budget well.” - is likely including in the group of “people like that” people with EBT cards, regardless of that person’s race. Not budgeting well and not keeping track of your money could, in the cashier’s mind, be things poor people do, which may very well overlap with what they think of as things black people do.
You’re right. They also treat poor people differently. There are fewer studies on that - there’s less awareness that it happens.
For me, it goes to how those two things intersect, interact, and play out with each other in the social sphere - for instance, how Prosperity Gospel hucksters like Crefflo Dollar get an unusual amount of traction within African-American communities, or how racists will excuse their racism by saying things like “If black people weren’t lazy, why are more of them on food stamps?!”, or how a random cashier’s bigotry is shaped by the community of people she sells food to. Or how an African-American performer can get accolades and acceptance among white jagoffs for pointing out that the problem isn’t black people, it’s poor black people.
There is a LOT to tease out at that intersection.
You’re right. And poor black people get treated the worst by that social system, because they’re firing on at least TWO cultural biases that we have, but only one of which is part of our cultural dialogue (stilted and insufficient and awkward as it is).
I’ve gotta reject the “trump” framing. It’s not like we’re in some human suffering pissing contest and we can pick only one awful thing to pay attention to and must leave everything else by the wayside. When people are being awful, we can talk about ALL the ways they’re being awful. It’s not a zero-sum game.
I’m sympathetic to the problems of derailing, and I appreciate your watchfulness for it, but one of the problems with classism is that people will push it aside and pretend it isn’t an issue when it clearly is part of the conversation. It’s clearly part of the conversation in this article, though Ms. Johanssen remains rather curiously silent on it. That’s an omission that is hard to let stand without comment. And I don’t want to talk about classism instead of racism, I’m not at all interested in shutting down the convo about how this served as an example of “everyday racism,” but I would be interested in talking also about how everyday classism plays into everyday racism, and how that dynamic can make racism harder to accept or easier to excuse, and that seems well within the scope of Ms. Johanssen’s concluding paragraph.
Well, you’ve certainly left me with nothing to say. Thank you for saying it better.
Does everyone leaving comments here know the race of the checkout lady? Or do we all see fit to assume that she’s cheap white trash and so we’re all good-to-go on the stereotypical politically SAFE middle of the road responses? I mean chances are she’s not a Boing Boing reader right?
Also, shame Ms white hands remained as voiceless onlooker only. You get more glory here than if you’d’ve commented at the time right!? Wet let’s all share a pat on the back.
In my experience “people like that” actually do budget well and keep close track of the money they have. The people I know in those circumstances know to within $1 how much they are spending before they hit the checkout line.
It’s nice (sarcasm) that a faulty card reader can disrupt your current food purchase AND prevent you from buying food for a full day. What if what you are buying is dinner for tonight plus breakfast, lunch and dinner for tomorrow?
Dream on.
It’s funny (in a sad way) that you said that right before acknowledging my point that “talking about ALL the ways” that people are being awful counterproductively diffuses examination of one of the ways that they’re being awfuul.
Fine, you’re free of course to have that detached intellectual conversation with anyone willing to engage in it. Just don’t be surprised if, when you do it during a conversation focused on racism, a lot of people don’t respond as if you’re saying something new or significant. Nor if they respond accordingly.
If I was in line…
It can. But the truth resists simplicity, so I think we can get an improved understanding of a situation from letting these topics build each other up, not tear each other down. It’s about understanding racism as a psychological and cultural shortcut rather than just mocking one racist cashier for being nakedly racist.
It’s not detatched - if you don’t bring to the conversation the context of why these three black women had EBT cards but the (presumably) white cashier and article-writer didn’t, you’re going to ignore the way the people in the situation are thinking about themselves and others as human beings and in their societies, which I am lead to believe is pretty fundamental point when it comes to understanding and counteracting racism.
And I don’t think what I’m saying is especially new or significant, but I do think that it was a point the article-writer conspicuously overlooked, and because I think it contributes to a greater understanding, it is an assertion I supported.
And I hope you continue to question that.
