"I Know Why Poor Whites Chant Trump, Trump, Trump"

[Nevilledog]

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I Know Why Poor Whites Chant Trump, Trump, Trump
From the era of slavery to the rise of Donald Trump, wealthy elites have relied on the loyalty of poor whites.
stirjournal.com
10:10 PM · Dec 21, 2020

http://www.stirjournal.com/2016/04/01/i-know-why-poor-whites-chant-trump-trump-trump/

From the era of slavery to the rise of Donald Trump, wealthy elites have relied on the loyalty of poor whites. All Americans deserve better.


I’m just a poor white trash motherfucker. No one cares about me.


I met the man who said those words while working as a bartender in the Ozark Mountains of northwest Arkansas. It was a one-street town in Benton County. It had a beauty parlor, a gas station, and a bar where locals came on Friday nights to shoot the shit over cheap drinks and country music. I arrived in Arkansas by way of another little town in Louisiana, where all but a few local businesses had boarded up when Walmart moved in. In Arkansas, I was struggling to survive. I served drinks in the middle of the afternoon to people described as America’s “white underclass” — in other words, people just like me.

Across the highway from the bar was the trailer park where I lived. I bought my trailer for $1000, and it looked just like you would imagine a trailer that cost $1000 would look. There was a big hole in the ceiling, and parts of the floor were starting to crumble under my feet. It leaned to one side, and the faint odor of death hung around the bathroom. No doubt a squirrel or a rat had died in the walls. I told myself that once the flesh was gone, dissolved into the nothingness, the smell would go away, but it never did. Maybe that’s what vermin ghosts smell like.

I loved that trailer. Sitting in a ratty brown La-Z-Boy, I would look around my tin can and imagine all the ways I could paint the walls in shades of possibility. I loved it for the simple reason that it was the first and only home I have ever owned.

My trailer was parked in the middle of Walmart country, which is also home to J.B. Hunt Transportation, Glad Manufacturing, and Tyson Chicken. There is a whole lot of money in that pocket of Arkansas, but the grand wealth casts an oppressive shadow over a region entrenched in poverty. Executive mansions line the lakefronts and golf courses. On the other side of Country Club Road, trailer parks are tucked back in the woods. The haves and have-nots rarely share the same view, with one exception: politics. Benton County has been among the most historically conservative counties in Arkansas. The last Democratic president Benton County voted for was Harry S. Truman, in 1948.

*snip*

[moondust]

2. LBJ knew.

“If you can convince the lowest white man he’s better than the best colored man, he won’t notice you’re picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he’ll empty his pockets for you.”

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/lbj-convince-the-lowest-white-man/

[Skittles]

3. yup

as much as they try to claim it is something else, it really comes down to this:

racist, sexist, homophobic gun nuts who believe Christianity should be the national religion.

[LeftInTX]

4. Because it rhymes with "pump"

[Fyrefox]

5. Trump plays such people like a fiddle...

He convinces them that they've been treated badly and he has, too, but if they support him they'll have their revenge on the "elites" and "liberals" who supposedly oppress them. The "elites" include professional people with training and experience such as teachers, doctors, anyone with beyond a high school education, and people who believe in science and facts rather than what is convenient and comforting. Such people are not to be trusted, they are not like you, but Trump is. He'll beat down your enemies for you, and govern by common sense.. Anything else is fake news spread by the liberal media...

[lostnfound]

6. Readable and worth reading nt

[JHB]

7. The linked article is from April 2016, so it's a little dated...

...in that it doesn't factor in continued support for Trump after years of him doing what he usually does, stiff people on what he promised.

Also missing, and still applicable when it was written, was that "media" is only referred to with respect to mainstream major media. Completely absent is any mention the prevalence of conservative media in appealing to and fostering racism and grievance nonstop.

There are real problems, but it's very easy to mutter to bartenders "I’m just a poor white trash motherfucker. No one cares about me." when guys on the radio spend hours upon hours telling you that that's what "coastal elites" think of you.

And then any time the "coastal elites" try to do anything that would help fix those problems, the guys on the radio scream "socialism!" "communism!" "Saul Alinsky!" "George Soros" and you stampede right in the direction conservative media wants you to.

[Hortensis]

8. Ignorance, lowish intelligence and regional culture correlate with conservatism

far more than poverty alone does. And conservative personalitydispostion blows them all away.

Many people of liberal nature are impoverished for various reasons, ranging from the biggie of being born into it to being rendered destitute by illness and medical bills. Many are above average in intelligence and curiosity also. Which means it's very wrong, also mean and stupid, to smear them as trumpists, as if they don't have enough problems.

Those areas of trumpist majorities do correlate with conservative culture, higher percentages of conservatives in the population (surprise!), lack of intellectual vigor and enterprise leading to brain drain, corrupt news sources, lower educational levels -- and then of course larger numbers living in long-term poverty because of decades or centuries of conservative culture and government.

[pansypoo53219]

9. poor blacks the red herrings. the tea baggers should have been anti corporations.

welfare kings get way more.

[skip fox]

10. Well written.

[Grasswire2]

11. Yes, who is this writer?

Very talented or accomplished at telling the story. Kudos.

[Grasswire2]

12. I donated a little bit to this writer's paypal.

Reward talent.

[coti]

13. Pretty much. They just don't believe in the social contract.

They don't believe they've ever benefitted from it so they've defected.

[Delarage]

14. Great article!!!

And that's why MLK and the Kennedys were killed. Try to remove the artificial wall between poor whites and black & brown people and you threaten the big money ruling class. Keep the poor whites feeling superior to *anyone* and, as LBJ said, they'll empty their pockets for (people like Trump).

It's why Sanders appeals to people (he was my choice over Hillary) and why he would never have a chance. I'm counting on Joe fighting the fight...and it's why I suggested in another post that Joe ramp up face-to-face (him, administration reps, etc) meetings in Appalachia along with real-life examples of what the government can and should do. I thought health care would be a great start, but highlighting any of the ways the 1% game the system against all poor folk would possibly cut through the radio noise.

[JI7]

15. Same reason as non poor whites do .

[Duppers]

16. K & R