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sciatrixSo I asked Metafilter about class and socioeconomic status yesterday. Not theoretically, either: I was pretty direct about where I was coming from and openly curious about other people and their thoughts.
(I'm honestly kind of surprised the thread went up immediately without workshopping from mods; I'm not bothered by it either, just startled.)
And... predictably, people are really uncomfortable! I totally understand that--I'm uncomfortable having written it out, frankly--but I'm kind of impressed at the number of people who jump to "this thread is a doxxing honeypot" or "this thread is an exercise in making us all feel bad!" Not really surprised, but impressed.
I mean. I didn't bring that here. That's you, buddy. I'm trying to be careful to signal both "I come from an incredibly privileged class background that just got more so after I left" and "I am currently struggling in SES but I have a way forward not everyone does." I'm actually more vulnerable feeling about the first one, which is why I took care to bring it. Economic inequality and class privilege exist. It's not a personal insult to talk about where I stand and invite others to do the same.
(At the same time I totally understand why that makes people feel vulnerable and why people might feel uncomfortable both that they feel like they're being pressured to contribute--I tried not to do that but you know how that goes--and like the conversation itself is something of a threat.)
In some ways I think internalized classism is harder to deal with because it is so complicated, and you get the same privilege fragility as you get on any axis except it's coupled with more defensive "I'm not REALLY privileged because--" thought because it's complex and there aren't discrete categories that any given person obviously belongs to. And also everyone quietly hides their advantages.
I'm not really bothered by the defensiveness, but I'm thinking about it. I spend a fair bit of time sitting with my own class based discomfort, often because T has heard something fall out of my mouth and explained why it was a real real "wow your class background is obvious" moment; our backgrounds are really different and mine is a lot more divorced from many of our friends' realities.
So. I don't know. I'm sitting thoughtfully right now and putting my thoughts here rather than there. I'm not feeling much in the way of personal emotion, just intellectual interest. But I had thoughts, and I figured this was probably the place to have them without distorting the entire conversation around me.
(I'm honestly kind of surprised the thread went up immediately without workshopping from mods; I'm not bothered by it either, just startled.)
And... predictably, people are really uncomfortable! I totally understand that--I'm uncomfortable having written it out, frankly--but I'm kind of impressed at the number of people who jump to "this thread is a doxxing honeypot" or "this thread is an exercise in making us all feel bad!" Not really surprised, but impressed.
I mean. I didn't bring that here. That's you, buddy. I'm trying to be careful to signal both "I come from an incredibly privileged class background that just got more so after I left" and "I am currently struggling in SES but I have a way forward not everyone does." I'm actually more vulnerable feeling about the first one, which is why I took care to bring it. Economic inequality and class privilege exist. It's not a personal insult to talk about where I stand and invite others to do the same.
(At the same time I totally understand why that makes people feel vulnerable and why people might feel uncomfortable both that they feel like they're being pressured to contribute--I tried not to do that but you know how that goes--and like the conversation itself is something of a threat.)
In some ways I think internalized classism is harder to deal with because it is so complicated, and you get the same privilege fragility as you get on any axis except it's coupled with more defensive "I'm not REALLY privileged because--" thought because it's complex and there aren't discrete categories that any given person obviously belongs to. And also everyone quietly hides their advantages.
I'm not really bothered by the defensiveness, but I'm thinking about it. I spend a fair bit of time sitting with my own class based discomfort, often because T has heard something fall out of my mouth and explained why it was a real real "wow your class background is obvious" moment; our backgrounds are really different and mine is a lot more divorced from many of our friends' realities.
So. I don't know. I'm sitting thoughtfully right now and putting my thoughts here rather than there. I'm not feeling much in the way of personal emotion, just intellectual interest. But I had thoughts, and I figured this was probably the place to have them without distorting the entire conversation around me.
no subject
Date: 2019-03-09 04:33 pm (UTC)and yeah, the whole protestations about how average they are can possibly tie to how the american narrative is that everyone's middle class. like, i feel in more class-conscious societies, there is usually a custom that you're meant to be more outwardly humble the wealthier you are, but that's not the same thing with what's happening here.
i don't know if i'll join in the convo there, but my experience is a bit more different, as i'm from one of those thirdworld post-colonial countries that literally committed itself to an economic social engineering programme, and the scholarships and programmes we had/have is more than just getting bursary support. like, my mum remembered in her time, the dorm is to serve rice for dinner a couple of times a week only, because the scholars were meant to get used to eating bread (and thus equipping themselves for overseas study). there are obviously colonial-era elite classes that still survive but that programming really did vault tens of thousands of people into at least a class above their starting point.