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"Basic fairness and equality is much more important to me than my paycheck size." That may be because your paycheque affords you a comfortable enough life on t

by NamTaf 10y ago

"Basic fairness and equality is much more important to me than my paycheck size." That may be because your paycheque affords you a comfortable enough life on that front that you don't have to stress over it. As you said, it cuts both ways. Where you worry about the social issues that could rob you of your marriage, some of the working class worry about the economic issues that appear to be imminently robbing them of their income that feeds their family. Yes, the straight white male tends to not care about social issues because he isn't affected by that inequality. Similarly, the upper-middle class tends not to care so much about job creation because they're afforded enough education and job security that they don't have to stress over the prospect of not having an income.

byuu 10y ago
> That may be because your paycheque affords you a comfortable enough life on that front that you don't have to stress over it. I won't deny I currently make a fairly decent amount of money. I'm not rich, but am somewhere around the top 20% or so of income earners at $70,000 a year or so. And I know I have that job due to both luck and privilege. Not white privilege, but being born with a brain that was well-suited to learning and enjoying computer programming. Which just happened to be the in-demand thing. But I have been extremely poor before. I've worked full-time at Wal-Mart and near full-time at McDonalds simultaneously to afford the apartment I had to share with three roommates. I've lived for years on ramen noodles and bologna sandwiches. Believe me, I know what it's like to pay credit card interest with other credit cards, to have to finance food purchases, to dodge constant collector calls (even at work, yes even though that's illegal) and worry about a court case leading to wage garnishments. To have to drive without car insurance to afford food and have your heart rate skyrocket to 170/110 whenever you see a police cruiser on your side of the road. If it meant we could treat all people as equals with dignity and respect unde the law, I would accept going back that far. I very much don't want to, but to me, social issues are more important. One thing I will say is that I've never had to provide food for my children (I don't have any.) I can certainly understand how having children leads many people to be more conservative. I've seen it happen to some of my best friends I've known over half my life now.
ZeroGravitas 10y ago
Some straight white males seem to care a great deal about these social issues. That's why they're fighting a culture war over them to distract from their anti-working class economic policies (I am of course referring to the Republican party). Peter Theil gave a speech at the RNC and said "who cares what bathroom people use" and got cheered. To this day I have no idea if he, or the people cheering meant: "Silly Democrats talking about bathrooms when we could be fixing the economy, we should check peoples birth certificates before they use the bathroom" or "Silly Republicans talking about bathrooms when we could be fixing the economy, just let people use whatever they want". Either works, either side could just decide to go along with the others decision if the other topics are more important. But they don't, so it's weird to act like only one side is caring about stupid stuff unless you have strong ideas about what the 'default' correct answer is and anyone who deviates is automatically the one who should stop wasting time on it.

by NamTaf 10y ago

byuu 10y ago

> That may be because your paycheque affords you a comfortable enough life on that front that you don't have to stress over it. I won't deny I currently make a fairly decent amount of money. I'm not rich, but am somewhere around the top 20% or so of income earners at $70,000 a year or so. And I know I have that job due to both luck and privilege. Not white privilege, but being born with a brain that was well-suited to learning and enjoying computer programming. Which just happened to be the in-demand thing. But I have been extremely poor before. I've worked full-time at Wal-Mart and near full-time at McDonalds simultaneously to afford the apartment I had to share with three roommates. I've lived for years on ramen noodles and bologna sandwiches. Believe me, I know what it's like to pay credit card interest with other credit cards, to have to finance food purchases, to dodge constant collector calls (even at work, yes even though that's illegal) and worry about a court case leading to wage garnishments. To have to drive without car insurance to afford food and have your heart rate skyrocket to 170/110 whenever you see a police cruiser on your side of the road. If it meant we could treat all people as equals with dignity and respect unde the law, I would accept going back that far. I very much don't want to, but to me, social issues are more important. One thing I will say is that I've never had to provide food for my children (I don't have any.) I can certainly understand how having children leads many people to be more conservative. I've seen it happen to some of my best friends I've known over half my life now.

ZeroGravitas 10y ago

Some straight white males seem to care a great deal about these social issues. That's why they're fighting a culture war over them to distract from their anti-working class economic policies (I am of course referring to the Republican party). Peter Theil gave a speech at the RNC and said "who cares what bathroom people use" and got cheered. To this day I have no idea if he, or the people cheering meant: "Silly Democrats talking about bathrooms when we could be fixing the economy, we should check peoples birth certificates before they use the bathroom" or "Silly Republicans talking about bathrooms when we could be fixing the economy, just let people use whatever they want". Either works, either side could just decide to go along with the others decision if the other topics are more important. But they don't, so it's weird to act like only one side is caring about stupid stuff unless you have strong ideas about what the 'default' correct answer is and anyone who deviates is automatically the one who should stop wasting time on it.