Politics and semantics: “working class”
Isn’t it about time that we stop getting angry at people for stating the obvious?
After “Bittergate,” I think I might have lost hope in our ability to ever recover from our tendency to make a big deal every time somebody says something rational that might just be politically incorrect. Recently, the popular political blog Crooks and Liars, whose views I usually agree with, decided to publish a post about a FOX News anchor’s statement that “working class” is a euphemism for “lower class,” which is a group of people with “lower income” and “lower education.” Crooks and Liars dubbed this “demeaning” and called it a case of “elitism”.
Honestly, I think they’re just arguing over semantics here. By no means am I typically a supporter of FOX news, but I don’t really see how he’s wrong. The phrase “working class” insinuates that you’re talking about a class of people who works… but doesn’t almost everybody work? He’s being pretty clear in saying that “working class” actually describes not “working people,” but rather “less educated people who tend to have lower incomes.” People on welfare are included in “working class,” but they don’t even work. Is his statement really false?
There’s nothing wrong with being less educated or less affluent; some of my best friends didn’t go to college. But I don’t see how it’s “demeaning” to simply point out the fact that this group of voters, by definition, has less money in the bank. Honestly, it seems to me that the comments on Crooks and Liars are more “insensitive and bone-headed” (to use their own words), since they seem to believe that it’s “demeaning” to have less money. I thought this was an equal society; are we going back to the days when it was lower-income individuals were considered to be inferior?
When I don’t have money, I don’t keep it a secret; neither do my “working class” friends. I’ll make it public knowledge right now that I just finished climbing out of debt; did I just demean myself? I think it’s about time that we start being honest and stop complaining about semantics.
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[…] mushin no shin wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerpt Isn’t it about time that we stop getting angry at people for stating the obvious? After “Bittergate,” I think I might have lost hope in our ability to ever recover from our tendency to make a big deal every time somebody says something rational that might just be politically incorrect. Recently, the popular political blog Crooks and Liars, whose views I usually agree with, decided to publish a post about a FOX News anchor’s statement that “working class” is a euphemism for “lower class,” whi […]
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