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Reverse snobbery is a thing. Have you experienced it?


popmom
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That’s the first time I’ve seen that quiz, but I took it and got a 66. I’ve lived in both rural areas and cities. The diversity of people was very different. In the cities, I seemed to know more affluent immigrants and in the rural areas I knew more poor immigrants (and many were undocumented). There were pros and cons to both areas and I know I’m better for living in both, but I choose as an adult not to live in the rural areas anymore due to politics.

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4 hours ago, historically accurate said:

My dad was a die-hard Democrat, and he worked as an assembler in an auto factory for 40 years. He had a high school diploma, and he never lived in a city bigger than 20,000.  

I always kinda snicker at the "coastal elite Democrat" stereotype. In my family, it's the blue collar men & women who live in rural & suburban communities who lean Democrat. The Republican party was for the rich banker types according to them. 

It’s really just yet another way for some in power to keep the “us” vs “them” mentality going in the US and it helps them to stay in power. So they promote it and their followers pick up on it.

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12 hours ago, Not_a_Number said:

Lower income groups definitely ARE very heterogeneous. That I do know. 

I'm curious how diverse rural communities are, but not in the sense that I know. Like, my knee-jerk assumption was that they are less diverse than urban areas, because immigrants do mostly move to cities, but if I'm wrong, I wouldn't be surprised since I'm not knowledgeable about this at ALL. 

So, you're right. I was starting from an assumption that might very well be wrong 🙂 . That's why I'm curious what one could actually measure to figure out how homogeneous the communities are... 

I really think it varies quite a bit. I grew up in a rural part of the Midwest with virtually no immigrants and almost completely white. It’s still the same today. While there are parts of the state that have more immigrants now, working in agriculture and meat packing among other things, it does not. Where I live now, there are lots of immigrants living and working in both the rural parts of the state and in the cities.

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15 hours ago, Pawz4me said:

That quiz is kinda cute in a quaint way (it's several years old, so looking at it again--I'd done it before--through the lens of the past year is quite interesting). Like most quizzes, some of the questions, even the ones that aren't all messed up now because of the pandemic, are pretty weird and it's hard to figure out what they're getting at or how accurate it could possibly be. Like the one that asks if you or your spouse has ever owned a pickup truck. Umm . . yes, we have; it's sitting in our driveway right now. And exactly what is that supposed to prove? That we're anti-elitist rednecks? Or is it that pickups are very expensive vehicles, and being able to afford one means one is an out-of-touch elite? Does it matter if it's a super nice, new(ish) pickup that is used to haul landscaping supplies because one enjoys piddling in the suburban yard, or if it's a dusty, beat up/well used work or farm truck? The quiz didn't ask that, so I can't quite figure out the relevance.

(You can ignore my tangent. I'm mostly just amusing myself.)

I just took it and it was definitely... weird.
I didn’t know how to answer some of the questions. How is a “close” friend defined? How am I supposed to know about my 50 nearest neighbors? My kids have driven rusted out pick up trucks at their farm jobs, but our friends have sparkly $50k or more trucks as personal vehicles. We’re hoping to afford a good truck in the future.  The word management is used, but retail management is generally considered blue collar. I don’t remember my 1998 income. My rural area has a youth population of only 50% white, but lots of old white people.  We have a higher poverty rate than average, but also a higher median income than average.  I’ve lived in both the highest income county of a state (at the time) and one of the poorest cities in the same state. And I’m in a very politically divided area now, just barely pulling blue (though more this year than 2016.)

I know I have somewhat of a bubble, but I scoff at my 55, lol.

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6 hours ago, Carol in Cal. said:

So being diverse, in that case, does not necessarily mean actually interacting with other ethnicities very much.

In my experience, “segregated” winds up meaning something specific. So you may not know lots of poor people, or lots of Black people, but you will probably know MANY people from different countries and hear lots of different accents.

Like, my in-laws’ next door neighbors are from Iran, but they aren’t working class. DH’s high school girlfriend was Japanese, but again, not poor. 

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6 hours ago, popmom said:

okay so back to reverse snobbery lol

Here's my petty first experience.

My high school friends (I use that term loosely) all scored lower than me on ACT/SATs and went to a small school in state. I ended up at a large "name" school and joined a sorority (I was a total nerd in HS). My high school "friends" wouldn't have anything to do with me after that. I mean this has never bothered me. I just always thought it was interesting. I'm still not sure if it was the sorority or the big name school. Probably a combination. I just remember being so perplexed. I was naive.

That sounds disappointing 😞 .

I don’t have personal experiences like that, but then I’ve always hung out with nerds, lol. So everyone has good jobs nowadays (although I’m not in touch with my high school friends, either.)

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Y'al know that i don't like contentious threads, but I've lived in 9 states, 2 in southwest, some in the south, and some in Appalachia so I thought i"d add a few observations about diversity in different areas.  

The southwest is interesting because in some areas whites would likely be in the minority - there are large Hispanic and Native American populations, while the cities are a mix that has more whites.  In the south, some areas are mostly white, some mostly black, and some have both.  Depending on where you go, there may be a large Native American population.  Appalachia is often mostly white outside of cities, although there are black communities that built up around particular industries (more on that later).  

I've rarely been in a small town that didn't have a Chinese restaurant run by first-generation immigrants.  I live in an area that borders on a small city but was rural/small town 10-20 years ago and there are 5 such long-standing restaurants within 4 miles of my house.  The stereotypes about immigrant-run gas stations and the seemingly odd phenomenon of there being other 'ethnic' restaurants randomly scattered about in unexpected places is also due to both being fairly common.  It is also common to find immigrant doctors in small practices or regional hospitals. 

In agricultural areas the migrant workers are often Hispanic, and many construction crews are also Hispanic.  There are areas - either parts of small cities or...well, I"m not sure if they are small towns because in rural areas there are just random clusters of buildings (grocery stores, a few shops, and a restaurant) - but, at any rate there are places where all of the signs are in Spanish.  When we moved here from the southwest we were surprised to learn that tamales on Christmas Eve were also a tradition for many in Appalachia - it turns out that it's a tradition that got borrowed from migrant workers in the deep south.

The south also has a lot of small college towns with small colleges.  You don't see this as much in the southwest - I think it has to do with how much population there was when Vanderbilt-era philanthropy was happening.  But, these are also sometimes pockets of people from a variety of backgrounds-  students and grad students in addition to faculty.

And, finally, there is the weird situation where certain industries specifically go to low-population areas.  The early national atomic labs (which sometimes later evolved into tech areas with other companies nearby), chemical plants, and paper mills all exist in what is or once was the middle of nowhere.  The everyday workers are often local, although sometimes a company seemed to recruit, or maybe new workers got family to move to the area.  In WV, where there were many chemical plants and the population is largely white, the small company towns around a couple of the plants were almost entirely black.  But, independent of who the workers are, the engineers that manage the facilities are educated and often from elsewhere.  At the small high school I attended in WV, everybody knew that one of the Singh kids was not following the academic path expected by his parents and that the Qazi kids fasted during Ramadan.  

I know that a handful of immigrants doesn't have the same 'diverstiy' feel of a city with a thriving immigrant community, but in a small town everybody knows each other combined with a handful of immigrant families, with their kids in school, it would mean that a lot of people are interacting daily with a different group. Obviously it's not happening everywhere, but it's not uncommon, either. 

As a related anecdote, recently we talked to my in-laws, who live in a tiny town.  They said that their neighbors had moved and sold their house and 20 acres to a highly educated (I don't remember if they were medical or engineers) immigrant family.  My in-laws dropped off some welcome muffins.  A few weeks later the family dropped off some Vietnamese egg rolls (that were apparently delicious) and said that they planned to build 2 new houses on the property and some other family members were moving to the area.  

Edited by Clemsondana
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5 minutes ago, Clemsondana said:

I know that a handful of immigrants doesn't have the same 'diverstiy' feel of a city with a thriving immigrant community, but in a small town everybody knows each other combined with a handful of immigrant families, with their kids in school, it would mean that a lot of people are interacting daily with a different group.

I would guess that it’s still a very different experience. For one thing, being one of very few families of a particular ethnicity means that there isn’t a community, so there isn’t a center for the culture. So, realistically, you probably get exposed to fewer cultural approaches to how people live their lives.

Half my high school class was Chinese 😛 . There were complicated feelings between earlier Cantonese and later mainland Chinese people. It’s just a different level of exposure. 

I mean, it’s like having one Black friend or one Jewish friend, or for that matter, one working class friend. Is it valuable to get exposed to those perspectives, even if in small chunks? Absolutely. Is it remotely like actually being immersed? Definitely not. 

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11 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

I would guess that it’s still a very different experience. For one thing, being one of very few families of a particular ethnicity means that there isn’t a community, so there isn’t a center for the culture. So, realistically, you probably get exposed to fewer cultural approaches to how people live their lives.

Half my high school class was Chinese 😛 . There were complicated feelings between earlier Cantonese and later mainland Chinese people. It’s just a different level of exposure. 

I mean, it’s like having one Black friend or one Jewish friend, or for that matter, one working class friend. Is it valuable to get exposed to those perspectives, even if in small chunks? Absolutely. Is it remotely like actually being immersed? Definitely not. 

I wouldn't argue that it was the same.  Your initial statement was that rural areas were homogenous in ways that cities aren't.  In a way, it's very true, but in a way, it's not because people different cultural groups don't have the option of only hanging out with people from their own group so they have to make cross-group friends.  In elementary school, my brother's best friend was a Chinese student who didn't speak English when he first started school.  Even with only one kid, it was fairly immersive in a way that I didn't experience in academia where I knew many Chinese scientists.  But, my lab had 2 students from India and 1 from Pakistan.  Due to the closeness of our relationships, my immersion in that culture was much more than what it would be if 200 families moved to our town.  My Indian friends used to borrow my Christmas lights to decorate for Diwali, we ate many meals at each other's houses, and we celebrated each other's holidays and traditions.  My in-laws have a friend, an older white woman, who has been married to a migrant worker for years.  Relationship closeness and number of people both affect what people know and how they interact with different cultures.  And, it's something of a mistake to think that rural people act the same and have the same traditions in different places.  If the accents are different, the culture probably is, too - in my experience traveling the same is true of cities - the culture of DC isn't the same as the culture of NYC and the culture of TN isn't the same as the culture of GA even though the states touch (actually, TN has several distinct cultures influenced by the original settlers and how regional economics affected who came later).  

But, it's not like it's a contest - it's just that I wouldn't argue that a class that is 1/2 Chinese and 1/2 white (or a mix of other groups) is particularly more diverse than a class that is 1/3 black and 2/3 white with a handful of 2nd generation kids from somewhere else (this would be typical in many places I've lived in the south).  In many small towns there is 1 high school, so everybody, rich, poor, all races, goes there.  It is in no way the same as living in an area with the distinct communities that a large city has, but it's not particularly homogenous, either.  

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3 minutes ago, Clemsondana said:

Even with only one kid, it was fairly immersive in a way that I didn't experience in academia where I knew many Chinese scientists.

That’s probably time of life as much as anything, right? If you go to school with lots of cultures, it’s immersive.

One year in school, my friend group was a black guy, a Chinese guy, and a Korean girl. Later on, my good friends were mostly Chinese, as was my first serious boyfriend.

5 minutes ago, Clemsondana said:

Relationship closeness and number of people both affect what people know and how they interact with different cultures. 

Oh, definitely. You’re just much likelier to have close relationships with people of different cultures if there are more of them nearby, like at school or at work. 

 

7 minutes ago, Clemsondana said:

But, it's not like it's a contest - it's just that I wouldn't argue that a class that is 1/2 Chinese and 1/2 white (or a mix of other groups) is particularly more diverse than a class that is 1/3 black and 2/3 white with a handful of 2nd generation kids from somewhere else (this would be typical in many places I've lived in the south). 

It’s not a contest, but it’s a different kind of cultural exposure. Yes, I would assume that if a certain culture is better represented in circles you travel, then you probably learn more about that culture. Hence I know a lot about Chinese and Indian cultures, and of course I’m immersed in Russian culture, but I know much less about various Latino cultures and I’m really not super in touch with the working class culture that the quiz is getting at.

I’m not arguing either is better or worse. But we can’t start by saying that you have to have a close friend who is evangelical to have thorough exposure to working class culture and end by saying that having one immigrant Chinese family in the small town is lots of exposure. 

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33 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

 

I’m not arguing either is better or worse. But we can’t start by saying that you have to have a close friend who is evangelical to have thorough exposure to working class culture and end by saying that having one immigrant Chinese family in the small town is lots of exposure. 

I'm not planning to comment more - as I've said elsewhere, I enjoy reading about what people see in their lives that I don't and I enjoy sharing the same, but I dont' enjoy arguing with people online, and I've shared my observations and don't really have more to add. I never said that your average small town person has lots of exposure to different cultures.  I said that it's not a homogenous group, that at least some people were likely to be close friends with families that are different from theirs, and that the doctor's kids go to school with the migrant worker's because there is only one school.  They may not be best friends (although they could be) but they aren't unaware of other cultures. 

Cities can do the same thing with more cultures, or not...I had a coworker who grew up in New York's Chinatown and she said that until she started school she though all Americans were Chinese and couldn't figure out why people on TV looked different.  She was 2nd generation but, due to growing up in an area where so much Chinese is spoken, still spoke with an accent while the children of of the local restaurant owners I mentioned earlier speak with a mountain drawl and interpret for their parents.  Neither is better or worse, just different.  And, my experiences may be unusual - I love to cook so I often end up feeding people who want to try southern food and they wind up bringing me Indian desserts or Chinese dumplings, and I tend to have the kind of relationships where I can ask 'Why do y'all do that?' and people will tell me and ask an equivalent question.  For that matter, I've sometimes answered the same sorts of questions for academics of all enthnicities, including white American-born people, who don't now any southerners or Christians...which I am happy to do.

But, I don't understand the statement above and am not sure where it came from - maybe the quiz that people were posting about earlier?  I don't associate evangelical with working class, necessarily.  I associate it with a few different groups in different parts of the country, but many working-class people in places I've lived are Catholic, others are culturally Christian but not particularly religious, and some are mainline Protestant (I don't think that Methodists and Presbyterians are usually considered evangelical). 

I would think that both close friends and also long-term exposure can give cultural understanding.  I didn't have any close Navajo friends when I lived in the southwest, but over the course of a decade I acquired a lot more insight than I had before I moved there.  An immersive summer volunteering in the 4 Corners region would certainly teach more, but the training I got (biology instructors were trained because the Navajo have specific practices around death and we had cadaver labs), student interactions, and sister-church programs gave me an awareness and appreciation of Navajo culture and thinking that most outside the southwest don't have.  

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16 minutes ago, Clemsondana said:

I said that it's not a homogenous group, that at least some people were likely to be close friends with families that are different from theirs, and that the doctor's kids go to school with the migrant worker's because there is only one school.  They may not be best friends (although they could be) but they aren't unaware of other cultures. 

Yeah, I didn’t say “homogenous,” just “more homogenous,” and I meant on average. Obviously, it varies 🙂 . 

I do wonder what a good measure of homogeneity would be... probably you’d want to think about groups of people close to one emotionally, not just people in the same zip code.

 

18 minutes ago, Clemsondana said:

I had a coworker who grew up in New York's Chinatown and she said that until she started school she though all Americans were Chinese and couldn't figure out why people on TV looked different.  She was 2nd generation but, due to growing up in an area where so much Chinese is spoken, still spoke with an accent while the children of of the local restaurant owners I mentioned earlier speak with a mountain drawl and interpret for their parents. 

Yeah, growing up in an ethnic enclave will do that! That’s also a very homogeneous experience, obviously. I knew Russian people like that, too. It always seems kind of sad when people don’t wind up learning the local culture at all. I was pretty grateful that no one in my middle school spoke Russian and I was forced to quickly learn English.

 

20 minutes ago, Clemsondana said:

But, I don't understand the statement above and am not sure where it came from - maybe the quiz that people were posting about earlier? 

Yeah, it was that silly quiz 🙂 

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That quiz is just weird.   

Except brief college, I've always lived in NJ.   

-the entire state is basically in a major metropolitan area but is far from homogenous with income levels from way below poverty level to extremely wealthy, big city to rural farmland, and basically all major religions represented in decent amounts. 

-I've walked on a factory floor as part of a job, but it was a pharmaceutical factory and I was in a white collar job.

-I've done heavy stock work hauling heavy boxes, retail work on my feet all day, administrative/computer work.   But the physical work wasn't because I had no other options and I left easily when it no longer served its purpose.

-I mean, Avon?  I don't get that one at all.   Pick-up trucks?   Mass market beer?

-Fishing?  Dh loves fishing.  Does it matter that he used to own his own boat? 

-I've attended exactly one union meeting, at one job when I was 20.  

-I did parades with 4-H and when I was a docent at a zoo.  

My score was 74.    Honestly, I don't think it's accurate.  I have no experience with living in truly rural areas where big stores are over an hour away, or down South, or factory towns.   I see people talk about experiences on these boards and they are completely foreign to me.   

 

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1 minute ago, kand said:

And the TV show questions. I’m not a big TV watcher.

Yeah, same. I don’t own a TV and we haven’t been watching movies, either. Back when I did watch things, I did indulge in the occasional soap opera and I really liked Buffy. Oh, I loved The Simpsons. No idea what that says about me, but I couldn’t click any shows on the quiz because I watch nothing.

 

2 minutes ago, kand said:

It definitely seemed that it was getting not at whether people were in a bubble, but whether they were in what the author considered the “right” bubble.

Exactly.

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On 12/30/2020 at 6:19 AM, Pawz4me said:

 

I was going to simply post that the trend of anti-intellectualism (or anti-"elites") in the US is absolutely a type of reverse snobbery. You explained it in good detail.

It's quite common in the American South which is odd because there are plenty of college educated, even Ivy League educated people here. But I've often heard variations of "I'm just a ol' country boy and don't need no college education to have sense". While I agree that common sense doesn't come from education and that some intellectuals seem to not have common sense, it really goes both ways. If that was said as an acknowledgement of the latter it wouldn't be reverse snobbery but that's not how it was meant. It has definitely been reverse snobbery when I heard it.

On 12/30/2020 at 8:20 AM, PeterPan said:

Have you seen Mike Rowe talking about this? I think there's balance. Sometimes people who haven't been to college (or who have!) think that getting the dc through college secures their future. For some kids it does and for some kids it really wasn't the ideal path. So it's kind of foolhardy either way. 

What you might do is instead emphasize WORK and then see what helps him on the path to do the work he wants to do. Make sense? I mean, we can go into this whole gig about how college is really about development, blah blah, but that's sorta poppycock. Most people don't have $50-200k to blow not to have it result in a better job. But in my small experience, it's not necessarily wise to push college as religion on people for whom it's not the right fit. It's more helpful to embrace the value of WORK and let the dc sort out what doors he needs to have open.

 

I completely agree, even as one who once got a job for which I was unqualified simply because I had a college degree. I was later told it came down to me and one other person but since I had a degree he felt I was more likely to be able to learn the skills. I don't think that's true but the person who hired me apparently did.

I think college should be for those careers that require it. Want to be a teacher? RN? Lawyer? Doctor? You need higher education. Is auto mechanics calling you as it seems to be calling ds 23? You need the vocational training (or sometimes on the job training) to get you there but not  necessarily a bachelor's degree, and certainly not higher. 

21 hours ago, gardenmom5 said:

 

eta: speaking of . . . . The guy (Geoffrey Owens) who played cosby's son-in-law on the cosby show was working in a grocery store.  Some not-nice-person took his picture and posted it all over social media to 'shame' him.  He should thank her, people were so outraged, it helped him get another gig. (which led to another gig . . . )

IIRC, the shamer was shamed and people repeatedly told Owens that there was no shame in how he was earning his living. I'm glad that happened. (Not glad the shaming happened but that people came to his defense)

17 hours ago, historically accurate said:

My dad was a die-hard Democrat, and he worked as an assembler in an auto factory for 40 years. He had a high school diploma, and he never lived in a city bigger than 20,000.  

I always kinda snicker at the "coastal elite Democrat" stereotype. In my family, it's the blue collar men & women who live in rural & suburban communities who lean Democrat. The Republican party was for the rich banker types according to them. 

I'm from a blue collar family of Democrats who always felt Republicans were for the rich. Dh's family sadly, from Tennessee, were once Democrats who became Republicans after the Democrats realized the error of their ways and began to oppose segregation. That's how many in the South turned Republican, not necessarily because of conservative values. Read up on the Dixiecrats if you weren't aware of this.

15 hours ago, Thatboyofmine said:

I think that quiz could have been more accurate if it had said in certain questions, “as an adult, have you xyz?”  And then in another question, “since childhood, have you xyz?”  I struggled with some questions just from an age standpoint. 

There was only one question like that - the one about poverty. I agree there should have been more.

13 hours ago, Corraleno said:

Murray argues that poor people are poor because they are genetically inferior,

Geez. So I guess that makes me genetically superior to the two parents who gave me their genes. 🙄 I grew up poor but have thankfully not been poor as an adult. I've been broke, but not truly poor. 

4 hours ago, Clemsondana said:

 

Cities can do the same thing with more cultures, or not...I had a coworker who grew up in New York's Chinatown and she said that until she started school she though all Americans were Chinese and couldn't figure out why people on TV looked different.  She was 2nd generation but, due to growing up in an area where so much Chinese is spoken, still spoke with an accent while the children of of the local restaurant owners I mentioned earlier speak with a mountain drawl and interpret for their parents.  Neither is better or worse, just different. 

Though it's not the same as your example I have a similar personal anecdote. I grew up in an ethnically European immigrant area. The neighborhoods I lived in had Irish, Italian, and Russian (mostly Jewish) immigrants or children of immigrants. Everyone we knew was either Catholic or Jewish. My school in Northern New Jersey was not racially segregated and the African Americans I knew at school were all Baptist. They were the only Protestants I knew and I didn't know people of any other Protestant faith besides Baptist.  I grew up thinking all Baptists are Black (though not vice versa as we had some Black families at our Catholic Parish). When we moved to Florida some of my new (white) friends were Baptists and that was a culture shock to me.

That was a weird quiz yet it nailed me. It had me as first generation middle class who grew up with working class parents. My great grandparents came here from Italy with nothing as a result of Italian unification. I don't know when my Irish ancestors came here but they likely arrived due to the famine, so also poor. I grew up poor and my generation is the first in the family to achieve middle class status. I'm also the first on my mother's side of the family to go to college, which thankfully was something to aspire to and not looked down on. 

 

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17 minutes ago, Lady Florida. said:

Though it's not the same as your example I have a similar personal anecdote. I grew up in an ethnically European immigrant area. The neighborhoods I lived in had Irish, Italian, and Russian (mostly Jewish) immigrants or children of immigrants. Everyone we knew was either Catholic or Jewish. My school in Northern New Jersey was not racially segregated and the African Americans I knew at school were all Baptist. They were the only Protestants I knew and I didn't know people of any other Protestant faith besides Baptist.  I grew up thinking all Baptists are Black (though not vice versa as we had some Black families at our Catholic Parish). When we moved to Florida some of my new (white) friends were Baptists and that was a culture shock to me.

Demographics are fascinating to me. My town in North Jersey was more 3rd+ generation with a sprinkling of 2nd, with very few Black families, but I also grew up thinking all Baptists were Black.

The area was also very Catholic and some Jewish, but still had all different types of Protestants... mostly Methodist and Lutheran (we were Lutheran.)

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3 hours ago, Carrie12345 said:

Demographics are fascinating to me. My town in North Jersey was more 3rd+ generation with a sprinkling of 2nd, with very few Black families, but I also grew up thinking all Baptists were Black.

The area was also very Catholic and some Jewish, but still had all different types of Protestants... mostly Methodist and Lutheran (we were Lutheran.)

That's interesting. It must have been a geographical thing. I'm sure there must have been white Protestant families in our area, I just didn't know of any. 

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4 hours ago, Lady Florida. said:

That was a weird quiz yet it nailed me. It had me as first generation middle class who grew up with working class parents.

Interesting. It was way off on me -- it put me down as second generation, for one thing, which is definitely not true. (I guess I'm 1.5th generation, if you go by some people's definitions, but I wasn't even all that little when we moved -- I was 11, not a toddler.) 

As for "class," it's hard to know how to place us. We were poor when we moved, then we weren't because my mom married a rich guy. But the rich guy didn't like me and I took pride in taking very little of his money (I got a big scholarship to a Canadian university, and paid almost everything it didn't cover by doing research in the summer.) 

But anyway, none of this adds up to "comfortable second generation middle class or upper middle class." 

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On 12/30/2020 at 7:05 AM, MEmama said:

Also, and this is a total aside from the larger conversation, diamonds can now be grown in labs. They are chemically equivalent to mined diamonds but without all the obvious humanitarian and environmental problems.

My 25th anniversary band is made of diamonds lab grown in Minnesota. 

  DeBeers hates the lab grown diamonds - cuts in on their market. They want them (or theirs) stamped so they know what's real and whats "lab-grown".   Diamonds would be a dime a dozen if it wasn't for them - they drive the prices artificially high.

When a rich deposit was discovered in ?siberia? - they went nuts trying to keep them off the market.

Rhodes Scholarship was founded to assuage Cecil Rhodes feelings of guilt about his connections to the diamond industry.

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On 12/30/2020 at 2:42 PM, TravelingChris said:

Well I am not anti-intellectual but am, in some regards, anti-elites.  I guess it depends on what you mean as elites.  I am anti coastal NYC/Boston types and to a lesser degree some of the big cities on the other coast who A) think that reality in nameyourbigcity is your reality in the rest of US/Canada?wherever since I have actually seen and heard this in other countries too B) think that based on their lives, they can tell you what is right for you, your community, etc.   And you can see this on TV or read in books and media.  I got an interesting cookbook from dh for Christmas with a lot of recipes I want to try- but the author, who lives in a very large city in Canada, seems to think all the rest of us reading the book have equal access to ingredients like she does.  That is a bland example because it is just kind of a dumb suggestion- go to a certain type of Asian store-not the kind we have here nor the kind available in large proportions of cities and of course, no rural areas.  But elites who constantly harp on stuff like living your life themes that have zero to do with people not in the biggest cities, or people who offer political or other solutions that totally ignore the realities of most lives- like anyone whose life doesn't have a lot of leisure time or anyone who isn't in perfect health or anyone who isn't wealthy  or (I could name so many examples as to write a book)>  

White elites who deem to speak for blacks or Native Americans or who have you.  Deciding that a so-called activist of whatever group actually speaks for all that group,.  Elites who think that any group of people is all the same and thinks all the same be it disabled, blacks, rural, whoever.  

 

There is an excellent book that discussed the divide and had a quiz in the back to see how elitist you were.  Coming Apart by Charles Murray.  And the quiz is available on PBS at https://www.pbs.org/newshour/economy/do-you-live-in-a-bubble-a-quiz-2

 

I hope the book is better than the quiz.  I got a 78 on the quiz.  It was nutty.  It doesn't even consider that a person might know that Branson is both a person and a place.  You have to pick one.  I get more "credit" for having grown up in a small, homogenous bubble than I do for traveling and becoming an educated adult.  True diversity is not something I experienced growing up in a rural bubble.  Most of my neighbors who are supposedly the bubbled, liberal elite based on zip code alone, are transplants from all over the country and the world.  Allegedly, I learned all I needed to know to become a well-rounded person BEFORE my adult life began and I was exposed to ideas not reflected in rural America?  It was one loaded bogus question after another. 

They asked if you ever had a job where something hurt at the end of the day.  I honestly put Yes.  I'm pretty sure they weren't thinking of aged suburban dance teachers when they wrote that one. More than one question rewards you for having been in the military.  It was goofy.  Now I've gotta go look up Jimmy Johnson?!?!?

Edited by KungFuPanda
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15 hours ago, KungFuPanda said:

I hope the book is better than the quiz.  I got a 78 on the quiz.  It was nutty.  It doesn't even consider that a person might know that Branson is both a person and a place.  You have to pick one.  I get more "credit" for having grown up in a small, homogenous bubble than I do for traveling and becoming an educated adult.  True diversity is not something I experienced growing up in a rural bubble.  Most of my neighbors who are supposedly the bubbled, liberal elite based on zip code alone, are transplants from all over the country and the world.  Allegedly, I learned all I needed to know to become a well-rounded person BEFORE my adult life began and I was exposed to ideas not reflected in rural America?  It was one loaded bogus question after another. 

They asked if you ever had a job where something hurt at the end of the day.  I honestly put Yes.  I'm pretty sure they weren't thinking of aged suburban dance teachers when they wrote that one. More than one question rewards you for having been in the military.  It was goofy.  Now I've gotta go look up Jimmy Johnson?!?!?

He's a NASCAR driver — apparently if you're a working class American you must be a pickup-driving, bass-fishing, Bud-drinking NASCAR fan whose idea of fine dining is Denny's and IHOP, who watches lots of Dr Phil, and saves up his paltry salary for a big vacation in Branson, MO. It's such a caricature — I'm surprised they didn't ask if there's confederate flag on that pickup. 🙄

I also thought it was "interesting" that you got points for having friends who are Evangelical Christians, but there were no questions about friends who are Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, atheist, or even other Christian denominations. 

Edited by Corraleno
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I took the quiz and it did nail me well (second generation upper middle class), but the premise and explanations really bugged me. It seemed to be saying that certain things associated with being white and working to middle class are non-bubble, and anything else is bubble. It reminds me of the push to see that same stereotype as "real Americans" and anyone else as suspect. It's true that I grew up not knowing as much about white working class people, but I was exposed to many other cultures besides that one. So yeah, not buying the bubble thing. It really was a quiz about how closely do you follow a white, working to middle class stereotype.

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15 minutes ago, Corraleno said:

He's a NASCAR driver — apparently if you're a working class American you must be a pickup-driving, bass-fishing NASCAR fan whose idea of fine dining is Denny's and IHOP, who watches lots of Dr Phil, and saves up his paltry salary for a big vacation in Branson, MO. It's such caricature — I'm surprised they didn't ask if there's confederate flag on that pickup. 🙄

I also thought it was "interesting" that you got points for having friends who are Evangelical Christians, but there were no questions about friends who are Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, atheist, or even other Christian denominations. 

Wait.  I looked it up and it said he was a football coach.  Did I remember/type/look up the wrong name?

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3 hours ago, Corraleno said:

 It's such caricature — I'm surprised they didn't ask if there's confederate flag on that pickup. 🙄

I also thought it was "interesting" that you got points for having friends who are Evangelical Christians, but there were no questions about friends who are Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, atheist, or even other Christian denominations. 

I think it says a lot about the quiz writers and that evangelicas was so important to them.

3 hours ago, livetoread said:

I took the quiz and it did nail me well (second generation upper middle class), but the premise and explanations really bugged me. It seemed to be saying that certain things associated with being white and working to middle class are non-bubble, and anything else is bubble. It reminds me of the push to see that same stereotype as "real Americans" and anyone else as suspect. It's true that I grew up not knowing as much about white working class people, but I was exposed to many other cultures besides that one. So yeah, not buying the bubble thing. It really was a quiz about how closely do you follow a white, working to middle class stereotype.

It said I was second generation upper middle class  . . . . What do they define as "upper middle class?"  what are the other types of "middle class" they are considering?   How do they define them?   

They put value on living in poverty - both as a child and as an adult! they make no distinction between poverty in cities, and poverty in rural areas.  (the seem to think poverty only exists in rural areas.)

it was interesting to see how they classified military - where class structure is alive and well.  (dh has a family joke concerning being an officer's wife in Panama (in the 1950s.- mil really liked that life.))  

I was left with the impression the writers have some very strong prejudices. (but think they're "open minded".)

 

Edited by gardenmom5
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20 hours ago, kand said:

Really weird quiz. I wish I could see how each question gets scored at the end. Do you get more or less points if you answer the same way for are you an evangelical and do you have evangelical friends? And why does a parade count except if it’s a gay rights parade? And the TV show questions. I’m not a big TV watcher. And the truck. And Avon (I used to buy Mary Kay, but never Avon, why does one count and not the other?) It’s a very weird quiz. It definitely seemed that it was getting not at whether people were in a bubble, but whether they were in what the author considered the “right” bubble. Because there are definitely bubbles at both sides of the spectrum he seemed to be (unsuccessfully) trying to tease out. 

I do think society ends up benefitting from many (not all) of the ultra rich. There are so many things that get funded by people with millions to spare that I think it would be a definite loss to society if we didn’t have some of those people. Besides charitable contributions to medical research and international aid organizations and things like that, it sometimes takes someone having money for them to be able to start a company doing something that benefits all of us  That’s different from the run of the mill wealthy, who don’t have millions to spare, but I expect many of them are contributing to things as well. They should certainly pay more in taxes, commensurate with their wealth.

 

No one is paying taxes based on their wealth- except property taxes if owning a house, etc.  Which is why I am so p*ssed about Bezos claiming 70K in income and Larry Page (Google) claiming $1,   And the Hedge Funds people, etc.  They often pay much less in taxes than people who make 250k but have very little wealth (as in house equity, bank accounts, etc).

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21 hours ago, kand said:

Really weird quiz. I wish I could see how each question gets scored at the end.  And the TV show questions. I’m not a big TV watcher. And the truck. And Avon (I used to buy Mary Kay, but never Avon, why does one count and not the other?) It’s a very weird quiz. It definitely seemed that it was getting not at whether people were in a bubble, but whether they were in what the author considered the “right” bubble. Because there are definitely bubbles at both sides of the spectrum he seemed to be (unsuccessfully) trying to tease out. 

 

 

Yes - the TV shows. . . . I have not watched any other those - because i watch almost no broadcast tv!  (vs my mother, who grew up in a blue-collar home - my grandfather worked in a factory, and my grandmother was a store clerk. - spent saturdays in the movie theater to escape her mother. TV and movies were how she escaped life. so, growing up, TV was an escape.  I didn't do it with my kids.)  why didn't they ask if you go to plays? or concerts? or other performing arts?  It's almost assumed if you don't go to movies (like there are any worth seeing./) - you "must" be able to afford tickets for performing arts.

And chain restaurants!  why didn't they ask how often you go out to eat vs eating at home?  or do you go to another type of restaurant?

why not how many states have you been too?  or traveled outside the US? or another continent?

This was very much looking at one thing, and one thing only - their own very narrow minded expectations.

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10 hours ago, livetoread said:

I took the quiz and it did nail me well (second generation upper middle class), but the premise and explanations really bugged me. It seemed to be saying that certain things associated with being white and working to middle class are non-bubble, and anything else is bubble. It reminds me of the push to see that same stereotype as "real Americans" and anyone else as suspect. It's true that I grew up not knowing as much about white working class people, but I was exposed to many other cultures besides that one. So yeah, not buying the bubble thing. It really was a quiz about how closely do you follow a white, working to middle class stereotype.

I think it's far far more narrow than that.   It's a niche segment of working-class/blue-collar.  anything else is "upper class".  as for being white . . it depends what part of the country you're in.

I used to joke WASP (white, anglo-saxon protestant) was an overly broad definition of who was acceptable to my grandmother. - the one who grew up on a rural farm, and was married to a union factory worker. - I also think it's an overly broad category to the writers of this so-called quiz.

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