Why the Left Isn’t Talking About Rural American Poverty

[Ptarmigan]

The poverty is in Fly Over Country. Right? Coming from a group that looks down on rural people.

Why the Left Isn’t Talking About Rural American Poverty
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=7284008

KamaAina (67,322 posts)

Why the Left Isn’t Talking About Rural American Poverty [View all]
http://inthesetimes.com/rural-america/entry/18526/why-the-left-isnt-talking-about-rural-american-poverty

Within the popular American conscience—arguably a close reflection of the mainstream media—there are two favored focal points for discussing the problem of poverty. The first is within the urban, inner city context—often conflated with black poverty—which has held a critical role in American political and cultural discourse throughout most of the past century. The second is the poverty of the Global South: Sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America, South Asia, and the rest of the developing world.

What seldom gets talked about—and when it is, often with irreverent humor and contempt—is the poverty of rural America, particularly rural white America: Appalachia, the Ozarks, the Mississippi Delta, the Dakotas, the Rio Grande Valley, the Cotton Belt.

If you spend time among coastal liberals, it’s not unusual to hear denigrating remarks made about poor “middle Americans” slip out of mouths that are otherwise forthcoming about the injustices of poverty and inequality....

American disinterest in the poverty of its own pastoral lands can be traced across the Atlantic Ocean and back several hundred years to the origins of social sciences in academia. The rise of these disciplines coincided with the Industrial Revolution and the mass migration of peasants from the country into cities. As an effect of these circumstances, the leading theorists of the era—Karl Marx, Emile Durkheim and Max Weber—were primarily concerned with living conditions in cities and industrializing societies, setting the foundation for the metro-centrism that continues to characterize the social sciences.

SharonAnn (10,175 posts)
51. Around here (Appalachia), the rural poor are right-wing Republicans. Odd, but true.

Now, I see why you do not care for them. 

Erich Bloodaxe BSN (12,025 posts)
2. You barely hear politicians on the left talk about poverty at all.

Especially since it's been on the rise during the current administration.

Let's see. They are redistributing and yet poverty continues to rise.

msongs (37,465 posts)
11. keep voting for republicans nad nothing much will change nt

Nothing has changed under the Democrats.

Comrade Grumpy (12,949 posts)
19. Poverty, schmoverty. They have white privilege.

Right?

Huh????????????? 

jwirr (34,424 posts)
26. Right! The only white privilege a poor white family has is that

they cannot be seen as easily as the poc.

In sheer numbers, Whites make up the most in poverty.

loyalsister (8,702 posts)
28. Owning houses via generational transfer is a privilege that has been largely reserved

for white people who live, poor as they may be, in areas where people of color most often wisely avoid in MO. A surprising number of disabled and poor people I know live in such houses.

What is the problem with that?

JI7 (53,323 posts)
66. Why are they more likely to support Hillary Clinton than Bernie Sanders

So says the BernieBot. 

[jtyangel]

Nothing like this idiots proving the point of the disdain of particularly the left for rural white america. Dumbasses one and all.

[Carl]

Response to KamaAina (Original post)

Fri Oct 23, 2015, 10:04 PM

AZ Progressive (1,920 posts)
17. The rural poor are one of America's cursed groups

Especially the rednecks. They are too stupid to vote for their own interests, they back the Republicans at their own peril. Then again, the Republicans seem to be the only ones that care to appeal to them. I would have to say that liberals have done a poor job to reach out to rural people.

I would say LBJ was the last president that actually cared about helping them.

No shit.

Listen you useless piece of puddle slime,you helpless fools can`t even breathe or feed yourselves without demanding government assistance.
I would happily watch you starve trying to fend for yourself.

[98ZJUSMC]

Quote
msongs (37,465 posts)
11. keep voting for republicans nad nothing much will change nt
Erich Bloodaxe BSN (12,025 posts)
2. You barely hear politicians on the left talk about poverty at all.

Especially since it's been on the rise during the current administration.

Keep voting against my best interests, dipshit.

Quote
msongs (37,465 posts)
11. keep voting for republicans nad nothing much will change nt

'scuse me?  How are those decreased health insurance premiums working out for ya?  Did you like your $2500 dollar savings, asswipe?

No shit.

Listen you useless piece of puddle slime,you helpless fools can`t even breathe or feed yourselves without demanding government assistance.
I would happily watch you starve trying to fend for yourself.

I'd pay to watch.   

[USA4ME]

AZ Progressive

The rural poor are one of America's cursed groups

Especially the rednecks. They are too stupid to vote for their own interests, they back the Republicans at their own peril.

Black people vote 90% for Dems but yet they're still poor and living in poverty and high crime areas. Talk about "peril." So if you're looking to make the claim that rednecks voting Dem would be better off, your track record says otherwise.

.

[Chris_]

Erich Bloodaxe BSN (12,025 posts)
2. You barely hear politicians on the left talk about poverty at all.

Especially since it's been on the rise during the current administration.

Do these people even pay attention to what they type?

[SVPete]

loyalsister (8,702 posts)
28. Owning houses via generational transfer is a privilege that has been largely reserved

for white people ...

In what paranoid fantasy world does ls live? No law forbids "generational transfer" (more commonly known as inheritance) by "poc", and no law has forbidden home ownership by "poc" (race clauses among some properties' CC & Rs became unenforceable 50 or 60 or more years ago). And inheritance is not a "privilege" it's a right called ownership, shared by all people in the US.

But to answer the thread title question, too many among the rural poor are "white", and they (all "colors") are too dispersed to make up a large geography-based voting bloc.

[franksolich]

Black people vote 90% for Dems but yet they're still poor and living in poverty and high crime areas. Talk about "peril." So if you're looking to make the claim that rednecks voting Dem would be better off, your track record says otherwise.

[Boudicca]

Black people vote 90% for Dems but yet they're still poor and living in poverty and high crime areas. Talk about "peril." So if you're looking to make the claim that rednecks voting Dem would be better off, your track record says otherwise.

.

Funny, but I don't hear much about those stupid rednecks offing each other the way their fellow impoverished counterparts in the inner city ghettos keep killing their bruthas and sistas.
WHO are the stupid people again?
Besides the DUmmies like Commie Anna.

[jukin]

Yet somehow the murder, violent crime, rape, and theft is one tenth what it is in the black"community."  Kind of tells me that the problem is not one of economics but is a black problem.

[Fourwinds]

The SharonAnn comment about Appalachian people being right wingers made me laugh. They are in such deep denial. The Democrat Part is the true party of the rich. I can't count how many corporations have liberal CEOs directing them. Add to that the fact Hollywood is almost overwhelmingly leftist. The insane amount of funding we see every presidential election on the side of the left isn't from the nickels and dimes these knuckleheads say they donate. It comes from people like Gates, Zuckerberg, Soros and the like.

[Boudicca]

Yet somehow the murder, violent crime, rape, and theft is one tenth what it is in the black"community."  Kind of tells me that the problem is not one of economics but is a black problem.

Rednecks get raised right.  My dad was always proud to be one of the Appalachian folk, and yeah, he grew up dirt poor.  Somehow managed to not burn down the neighborhood or get arrested for any drugs, violence or theft.
But what did daddy know?  He was just a stupid redneck who wouldn't have known how to deal with those intellectual types on DU.

Except, he would have beaten the shit out of any one of them one of his daughters brought home.  We were raised with something the Left lacks:  STANDARDS and ETHICS.

[Patriot Guard Rider]

Because, Liberals believe the United States consists of Washington DC (Extended out to the Ohio/Indiana line and down to the Tennessee/Georgia line), New York consisting of everything left east of the Mississippi and California comprising everything else west of the Mississippi.

Flyover country doesn't exist to them, why should they worry about poverty there?

[miskie]

DUmmies make me laugh.

The article referenced clearly states that the left look down their noses at the rural poor at their own peril, yet half the responses in that thread are doing just that. A few seem to realize the problem is genuine, yet still jump to the wrong conclusion.   

[txradioguy]

Nothing like this idiots proving the point of the disdain of particularly the left for rural white america. Dumbasses one and all.

Rural America is that bunch of "bitter clingers" Obama referred to when he first ran in 2008.  The left despises them.

[SVPete]

Rural America is that bunch of "bitter clingers" Obama referred to when he first ran in 2008.  The left despises them.

Rural America feeds and clothes these contemptible @#$%^@#$%@#$%. I wish Progs like these had the ideological consistency to refuse to eat food and refuse to wear clothing made of fibers raised by the "rednecks" they contemn!

[Patriot Guard Rider]

Rural America feeds and clothes these contemptible @#$%^@#$%@#$%. I wish Progs like these had the ideological consistency to refuse to eat food and refuse to wear clothing made of fibers raised by the "rednecks" they contemn!

Is contemn a synonym for condemn?

[hillneck]

SharonAnn (10,175 posts)
51. Around here (Appalachia), the rural poor are right-wing Republicans.

SharonAnn, you stupid b**ch, maybe if PrezBO and his EPA wasn't so deadly to the timber & coal industry, maybe some of those poor Appalachia people would have more spending money or jobs.  People back home just want to work and support their families and be left alone from the government.   

[freedumb2003b]

SharonAnn, you stupid b**ch, maybe if PrezBO and his EPA wasn't so deadly to the timber & coal industry, maybe some of those poor Appalachia people would have more spending money or jobs.  People back home just want to work and support their families and be left alone from the government.    :banghead:

SharonAnn, you ignorant slut!

[SVPete]

Is contemn a synonym for condemn?

To view or treat with contempt

[Patriot Guard Rider]

To view or treat with contempt

I try to learn one new word a day. I done learned one.