From the Stuff White People Like website, "Knowing What's Best For Poor People":
It is a poorly guarded secret that, deep down, white people believe if given money and education that all poor people would be EXACTLY like them. In fact, the only reason that poor people make the choices they do is because they have not been given the means to make the right choices and care about the right things.A great way to make white people feel good is to tell them about situations where poor people changed how they were doing things because they were given the ‘whiter’ option. “Back in my old town, people used to shop at Wal*Mart and then this non-profit organization came in and set up a special farmers co-op so that we could buy more local produce, and within two weeks the Wal*Mart shut down and we elected our first Democratic representative in 40 years.” White people will first ask which non-profit and are they hiring? After that, they will be filled with euphoria and will invite you to more parties to tell this story to their friends, so that they can feel great.
But it is ESSENTIAL that you reassert that poor people do not make decisions based on free will. That news could crush white people and their hope for the future.
I don't know why the Stuff White People Like people have to limit this "false consciousness" insight to white people. I know of a prominent black person who said more or less the same thing.
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True, Jeff, but then again, in every corporate "diversity" program I've ever had the misfortune to encounter the assumption is that "White Person" and "Affluent White Liberal Person of Privilege" are synonymous--which is probably another example of "Stuff Affluent Liberals Like."
Oooh, oooh Erin, you are dead on! I was reading the "Stuff White People Like" website -- which is hilarious -- and thought, "This is stuff affluent white liberals who go to elite schools like." Still, it's pretty funny.
I'm sorry Rod, but Obama was the only one talking sense on that gas tax thing - he has"been there, done that" in the Illinois State legislature. They already found out (in 2004/5) I believe that the oil companies kept the difference. The grand total of $28 for the whole summer wouldn't buy a family of "poor people" a Kentucky Fried Chicken Dinner even if they walked all the way to the drive-in....
... and I think that the "poor people" are beginning to recognize that Mrs Clinton was pandering in a grossly egregious way (kinda wishful thinking on her part that they'd have a few cents left over to donate to her campaign, since they're in such fiscally dire straights) and IMHO insulting their intelligence BIG TIME.
Of course Obama was right about the gas tax, and bless his heart for it. Shame on McCain and Hillary.
Jeff Sullivan: I think that's the whole joke behind the "Stuff White People Like" blog - a sort of satirical payback for the way many white pundits use "black people" and "drug-taking, panhandling ghetto trash" more or less interchangeably.
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