The Angry White Man
 

I thought this was pretty good:

Gary Hubbell
February 9, 2008

There is a great amount of interest in this year’s presidential elections, as everybody seems to recognize that our next president has to be a lot better than George Bush. The Democrats are riding high with two groundbreaking candidates — a woman and an African-American — while the conservative Republicans are in a quandary about their party’s nod to a quasi-liberal maverick, John McCain.

Each candidate is carefully pandering to a smorgasbord of special-interest groups, ranging from gay, lesbian and transgender people to children of illegal immigrants to working mothers to evangelical Christians.

There is one group no one has recognized, and it is the group that will decide the election: the Angry White Man. The Angry White Man comes from all economic backgrounds, from dirt-poor to filthy rich. He represents all geographic areas in America, from urban sophisticate to rural redneck, deep South to mountain West, left Coast to Eastern Seaboard.

His common traits are that he isn’t looking for anything from anyone — just the promise to be able to make his own way on a level playing field. In many cases, he is an independent businessman and employs several people. He pays more than his share of taxes and works hard.

The victimhood syndrome buzzwords — “disenfranchised,” “marginalized” and “voiceless” — don’t resonate with him. “Press ‘one’ for English” is a curse-word to him. He’s used to picking up the tab, whether it’s the company Christmas party, three sets of braces, three college educations or a beautiful wedding.

He believes the Constitution is to be interpreted literally, not as a “living document” open to the whims and vagaries of a panel of judges who have never worked an honest day in their lives.

The Angry White Man owns firearms, and he’s willing to pick up a gun to defend his home and his country. He is willing to lay down his life to defend the freedom and safety of others, and the thought of killing someone who needs killing really doesn’t bother him.

The Angry White Man is not a metrosexual, a homosexual or a victim. Nobody like him drowned in Hurricane Katrina — he got his people together and got the hell out, then went back in to rescue those too helpless and stupid to help themselves, often as a police officer, a National Guard soldier or a volunteer firefighter.

His last name and religion don’t matter. His background might be Italian, English, Polish, German, Slavic, Irish, or Russian, and he might have Cherokee, Mexican, or Puerto Rican mixed in, but he considers himself a white American.

He’s a man’s man, the kind of guy who likes to play poker, watch football, hunt white-tailed deer, call turkeys, play golf, spend a few bucks at a strip club once in a blue moon, change his own oil and build things. He coaches baseball, soccer and football teams and doesn’t ask for a penny. He’s the kind of guy who can put an addition on his house with a couple of friends, drill an oil well, weld a new bumper for his truck, design a factory and publish books. He can fill a train with 100,000 tons of coal and get it to the power plant on time so that you keep the lights on and never know what it took to flip that light switch.

Women either love him or hate him, but they know he’s a man, not a dishrag. If they’re looking for someone to walk all over, they’ve got the wrong guy. He stands up straight, opens doors for women and says “Yes, sir” and “No, ma’am.”

He might be a Republican and he might be a Democrat; he might be a Libertarian or a Green. He knows that his wife is more emotional than rational, and he guides the family in a rational manner.

He’s not a racist, but he is annoyed and disappointed when people of certain backgrounds exhibit behavior that typifies the worst stereotypes of their race. He’s willing to give everybody a fair chance if they work hard, play by the rules and learn English.

Most important, the Angry White Man is pissed off. When his job site becomes flooded with illegal workers who don’t pay taxes and his wages drop like a stone, he gets righteously angry. When his job gets shipped overseas, and he has to speak to some incomprehensible idiot in India for tech support, he simmers. When Al Sharpton comes on TV, leading some rally for reparations for slavery or some such nonsense, he bites his tongue and he remembers. When a child gets charged with carrying a concealed weapon for mistakenly bringing a penknife to school, he takes note of who the local idiots are in e ducation and law enforcement.

He also votes, and the Angry White Man loathes Hillary Clinton. Her voice reminds him of a shovel scraping a rock. He recoils at the mere sight of her on television. Her very image disgusts him, and he cannot fathom why anyone would want her as their leader. It’s not that she is a woman. It’s that she is who she is. It’s the liberal victim groups she panders to, the “poor me” attitude that she represents, her inability to give a straight answer to an honest question, his tax dollars that she wants to give to people who refuse to do anything for themselves.

There are many millions of Angry White Men. Four million Angry White Men are members of the National Rifle Association, and all of them will vote against Hillary Clinton, just as the great majority of them voted for George Bush.

He hopes that she will be the Democratic nominee for president in 2008, and he will make sure that she gets beaten like a drum.

Where'd you find that Merc? :thumb2:

An email circulation.

http://www.aspentimes.com/article/2008198091324

~snip~

:headshake Sometimes I think you're not far from a cave and a club.

Good God woman, I didn't write it!


But I do agree with most of it.

It's from the Aspen Times.

Hey Cous - you do realize that the article used artistic license with its oversimplification and generalization to describe a segment of our population right? I don't think Merc was saying women are weak and stupid and should be treated as such.

Because, God forbid we should mention that millions of years of evolution has produced two distinct sexual genders; physically, mentally, and emotionally best-suited to the tasks that they were designed for. We are not created equal, we simply live in a society that rightfully provides equal oppurtunity to all people. Two very different things, often confused.

{correct}

A lot of people can empathize with some of these feelings.

wait a minute, that can't be true. are you suggesting that even if I work out really hard I might not end up looking like The Rock? I've got a paper here that says were all created equal. I'm calling my attorney.

Sort of like the right to pursue happiness. Not the right to have it provided for you.

Is it ok if I just pursue it?

Yea, that too. :D

So the angry white man...is he the ideal or something :eyebrow: ? It was written from an Aspen newspaper...Aspen.

Is the point of the article to just underly the angry white man's disgust of Hilary? Or is there another point behind it? I fail to see one.

Aspen. Aspen. I don't get it. What is Aspen supposed to mean to me?

I understand that. From what I have seen here I think he treats his wife with respect. However, if he posts drivel, tongue in cheek or not, I will say something. (I know Merc didn't write it!) My oversimplification could easily be: Native Americans were screwed in every sense of the word. Women are still lesser in a far too great number of areas.

I would be told that I was oversimplifying and would be called on it. I would be told that people can do whatever they want regardless of race, or gender, or other factors. The White Man can do that same thing, so don't expect me to feel sorry for the Angry White Man.

I can, if you take out White Man and insert any number of other sections of society. :D

No hard feelings guys. Just something that rankled me.

Now, get your ass over here and open my ketchup.

Aspen sometimes referred to as the whitest city in America.
That's why I was like "Oh an Aspen newspaper wrote that, oh really..."

But not whiter than Livonia, Michigan..

OK, I don't know Merc's thought process but I can tell you mine when I read it. It is oversimplified and too general to be anything other than a farcical comment on life today. BUT the point of the article is that nobody is looking to impress or attract the white man's vote. Specifically the white man's vote. Why? It is acceptable to openly seek the black, hispanic, female, gay, lesbian, transgendered, _________ vote. Now stop and think about it. Anyone who went publicly looking for the "White Man's Vote" would be assumed a racist sexist pig. Why?

The article doesn't give an answer, but it just might get a someone to at least ask the question.


I'll just wait quietly holding my breath for the first person to respond with Everything is already stacked in the white man's favor.

:p Just a little shit stirring in response to your invisible ink:

Man, the white man thinks
he's losing the country.
You watch the news: ''We're losing
everything. We're fucking losing.
Affirmative action, and illegal aliens...
and we're fucking losing the country."
Losing? Shut the fuck up.
White people ain't losing shit.
lf y'all losing, who's winning?
lt ain't us.
lt ain't us.
Have you driven around this motherfucker?
lt ain't us.
Shit, there ain't a white man in this room
that would change places with me.
None of you would change places with me.
And l'm rich!
That's how good it is to be white.
There's a white, one-legged busboy
in here right now...
that won't change places with my black ass.
He's going, ''No, man, l don't wanna switch.
l wanna ride this white thing out.
See where it takes me."

--Chris Rock

But I do see your point about openly seeking the white man's vote and being thought a racist.

Yeah Chris Rock, I feel ya. Good post Shawnee.

*groan* see, this isn't about losing something or someone else taking something, it's about the division. The longer we let politicians and their sort tell us why one group is different and another is more privileged, one is held down and another needs a hand up the longer things get worse. Nothing positive comes from people feeling different or separated from each other. Only one group is helped by drawing a line in the sand between black/white/brown, rich/poor, college educated/not. We call that group politicians. They get ahead by keeping us apart. They pander to that niggling little feeling that someone has it better than you. They tell the poor that the middle class is disappearing to take away their hope. They tell the middle class that the gap is getting bigger between them and the rich to remove so they'll keep working harder and spending more so they won't fall into the "poor" category. They tell the rich that the poor welfare recipients want to tax them at 50% while they stay home and smoke crack and have babies, so they'll contribute more to the campaigns.

Who is getting something out of dividing us?
What ground has ever been gained by separating people?
What motivation would a politician ever have to make you feel safe, secure, and content?

And while Chris Rock may be funny, he's just a comedian. I, and a lot of other white people would trade places with him in an instant.

Oh for pete's sake, cuz...I know he's just a comedian.

Levity toggle: off.

wait, i thought you were trying to stir the shit. i didn't want you to be disappointed. ;)

Well I for one feel deeply sorry for middle class white males. They're clearly having a very difficult time these days, what with the immense power and influence invested in ethnic minority communities and women.......

I know that you intended that to be sarcastic, but thoes groups carry far more power than you apparently believe. Hell, I have to ask permission before I smack a woman's ass or grab her boob... and you don't even want to know the hoops I have to jump through before I can buy or sell my neighbor's kids now. And forget about whipping them, apparently we're all touchy feely now.

And the middleclass white man still carries far more power than any of them overall. Look at the percentages of women and ethnic minorities at the higher management levels in business and look at how many of your senators and congressmen are white men.

We get the same arguments over here about the apparent power of ethnic minorities and women. Yet the paygap between men and women in this country is still 17.5% across a lifetime. The economic gap between black and white even bigger and the gap between Pakistani and white even greater than that.

There is a massive economic gap between black Americans and white. There is an economic gap between American men and American women. Economic power counts for a lot in a capitalist society. When the political power is also held most firmly by the same group it's difficult to make a case for power residing anywhere but in a white man's hand.

Far more women and ethnic minorities are in positions of power today than they were 10,15,20 years ago. Shitty customs and policies kept them out for far too long. See unfortunately there isn't a switch to flip and magically split top management positions neatly along demographic lines. It takes years for individuals to be groomed for leadership. I'd wager that the University class of 2008 will grow into leadership positions pretty well in line with general demographics over the next 10-20 years.

If a man and a woman have the same job, same seniority, same qualifications, will they be paid roughly the same?

Again, comparing people who've made similar choices over similar timeframes?

That still doesn't answer the paygap problem. I agree strides have been made. Strides have been made, in part because America chose to actively tackle the problem. In actively tackling the problem you have engendered a feeling amongst some that the white man is not valued and powerless. This isn't the case. White males are still statistically most likely to be in positions of power than any other demographic group. They are likely to earn far more across their lifetime than any other demographic group. Because the situation is starting to balance out does not mean that they are rendered powerless or that the other groups are becoming more powerful than them, merely that they are closing the gap ( a little).

In terms of paygap between men and women in America:

from http://www.aauw.org/education/cap/paygap.cfm

Lifespan cumulative pay comparisons are pointless. Show me two people who are in salaried jobs with the same time, experience, and success and they should be paid about the same. Point in time direct comparison would be the only accurate way to judge the situation. Men rarely take time off for childbirth, raising the family, etc. Not that all women choose to do that, but Lifespan pay has no way to account for that.

I will tell you one thing I've seen firsthand though. Right around the time a man turns 30, if he is in any sort of production/incentive career, his pay tends to spike up. Strangely that is about the time that he has a wife at home who will cut his marbles off if he doesn't successfully provide well for her and the kids.

In answer to your question: partly it is because firms get around the equal pay laws by giving their male employees different titles. Partly it is due to a lack of eforcement where firms are blatantly paying different scales for the same job (where workers negotiate individual remuneration packages rather than having a firmwide payscale) and partly it is due to the continued gender assumptions which direct girls towards certain fields and direct boys towards others. The trouble is that areas which are historically considered 'female' attract lower payrates than areas which are historically gendered 'male'. The historical basis of this goes back to the medieval period when the concept of a separate rate of pay for 'women's work' was enshrined in law under the Labourers act. It continued through to the industrial revolution where women's pay was less even if doing the same job as a man because she was not considered the main breadwinner.

These attitudes informed your own culture as well. The idea of paying women less has only very recently been regarded as unfair, even by women. Consequently jobs traditionally associated with women (communications, caring and cleaning: the Three C's) have always been paid at a lower rate than those associated with men. The market has no need to increase those payrates to take account of newer attitudes and women are still predominantly employed in these industries because that's the way the education system sends them, or because those are the jobs that play to women's strengths (the caring roles and communications). As long as jobs which predominantly attract women are undervalued compared to 'male' jobs there will be a pay disparity.

Added to that are the differences in female and male lifecycles. Women are the ones who tend to take extended time out from their careers to have children. Though this is changing and women are more likely to return to work soon after the birth of their child, there is still enormous societal and biological pressure for women to take time out for the first year or two of their baby's life. The workplace does not take great account of this, seeing it as an inconvenience rather than a societal necessity and women are therefore penalised within their career for being active carers of their children. Women are more likely than men to become carers of elderly parents. Again the workplace deems this an inconvenience rather than a societal necessity and women are again punished in their careers.

That's an important point. It's about time society started valuing women for doing that rather than penalising them. Though in fairness the paygap carries through even for women who never have children. As that article states, the disparity begins within a year of graduating and continues to increase even where women are working in the same field as men.

It's a complex issue wth many factors, but the end result is that men are economically more powerful than women as a sex.

Although all of that makes sense, none of it points to anything unfair. A woman going coming out of school today can choose, with very few exceptions, to follow any career path she chooses. If she chooses to be an attorney she will be paid in line with her choice. If she chooses to be a secretary she will also be paid in line with her choice. How is this unfair? Should a secretary really be paid as much as the executive she serves? This isn't about the value of a human life, it is an issue of pay required to keep a competent individual in a job slot.

I guarantee you that me 2 female VP level clients make far more than I do. I also guarantee that most of their male (and female) employees make less than I do. How is that unfair or evidence of some injustice?

If you mean in terms of dollars earned by all men this year vs total of all dollars earned by women this year, then I concede the point. If you want to talk about who actually directs the usage of the dollars in the US economy, I'll point you in the direction of the Profit and Loss charts for Lowe's and Home Depot. One company mistakenly thought men made home improvement and maintenance decisions. The other researched the issue and came to a different conclusion.

How about the disparity between communication based work (call centres and receptionists, shopwork), caring work (nursing, primary school teaching) and cleaning, and the traditionally male areas of engineers, electricians, mechanics, management, labouring and construction etc. Areas that are traditionally female command lower wages than areas that are traditionally male.

An engineer doesn't train for longer than a primary school teacher. They both require a degree and are both in demand. One is traditonally male and one is traditionally female. Yet the engineer will most likely be paid more than the primary school teacher.

The problem is centuries in the making and the market is not going to resolve the issue. Society will need to tackle this one. Either girls need to be educated differently or...society needs to start valuing female skills more highly than it has historically done. What the answer to the problem is I honestly do not know. However, it is fruitless to deny that men are more economically powerful than women. Just as it is fruitless to deny that white men are more politically powerful than any other group in England or America. The fact that women have managed to close the gap somewhat in terms of economic clout and the fact that different ethnic groups have managed to close the gap somewhat in political terms, does not change the fact that most political and economic power rests in the hands of white men.

That doesn't mean all white men are powerful, in either economic or political terms. But it does mean that if you are born white and male you are statistically more likely to be able to access routes of power and influence than if you were born female or of another ethnic background. You are also statistically more likely to earn more money across your lifetime than any other group.

Dana - are male teachers paid more than female engineers? Is a female manager paid less than her male call center employee?

Most nurses make more than most mechanics, regardless of the gender. Why?

Wages are attached to jobs because of supply and demand. More people are qualified to teach than to design a building. The people that teach work in a non-profit environment whereas a company can realize huge profits from an engineer's designs. Do you really not understand why one of those fields pays more?

Call center employees are easy to replace and easy to train they should pay less than an electrician receives.

Maybe England is more different from the US than I realized because I look around the US and I see lots of male teachers, nurses, and call center employees. I also see lots of female doctors, engineers, lawyers, and managers.

No one shows up to their first day of school and gets a slip of paper that says You have a penis, you shall be a manager of men or You! Vagina holder, go clean my toilet. People are free to make their own choices and they reap the pros and cons of their choices.

I will grant you that very few men are house cleaners though. I think that makes sense though. Who would pay a man to clean a house when you know you'd have to go behind us and fix everything?

Statistics don't tell the whole truth, they're just easy to use when presentng a case. My whiteness and my maleness didn't open any doors for me. My low middleclass birth meant more than my penis or pigment.

No. It's a little more subtle than that. This is centuries of conditioning. We aren't born in a silo.

Likewise here. But...more women than men tend to work in those areas that are either tradionally female, or which play to 'female' strengths. Males are more likely to go for areas which are not tradionally female or which play to .male. strengths. The wage differential between those areas has always been the case. And no an individual woman engineer will not be paid less than an individual male nurse. But most engineers are male and most nurses are female.

Statistics can be skewed to make arguments, but they are also a useful indicator of societal trends. They show that employment and wage trends which have been the case for over a hundred years have not yet fully balanced out and continue to economically favour males over females.

As I said, being white and male doesn't necessairly mean you will be wealthy or powerful. It just makes it more likely. Being middle-class will have its effect also. As I said earlier, middle-class white males are the most powerful group in America and England. Being white and male doesn't save you from being poor or powerless. However, being middle class and female means you will likely earn less and be less politically powerful than males of your class.

The study I referenced earlier was specifically looking at graduates. The differntial began to show within a year of graduation. Statistics aren't everything, but if you examine a large group of women and a large group of men of comparable starting points in life the gap will show.

True dat :P

Call center employees are equally men and women, in my experience, and are paid in rupees according to how well they mask their accent.

lol the world is changing fast :P

You've said that a couple times now. So if a woman who loves children and the joy of learning goes into teaching she is somehow following a discriminatory path of being underpaid?

I don't understand how you separate a person's decision of what they want to do with their life from the consequence - they get paid in line with what they chose to do.

I am a financial advisor and when I don't spend the whole day debating with my friends in the cellar I'm paid pretty well. If I decide to leave this and go back to the high school teaching thing should I be paid more than other teachers because of my current standing as an advisor, or should I be paid the going rate for a teacher with my experience? Now suppose I was a female, should I be paid more, less, or the same as other teachers with the same credentials?

I guess what I'm getting at is why do you think it is some sort of disparity when a woman is paid the going rate for a field that she freely chose to enter? It doesn't matter if her parents handed her a doll or a GI Joe when she was 4, she was still an adult when she chose her career and she is free to change that career if she decides she wants something else. She will be paid according to her experience and skills in any field she pursues - just like a man. How can you get any more fair than that?

You have to separate the dollar value of a career choice from the real value of a person on an individual level. Each person is paid for the work that they do. Those that are paid more are not worth more as people but they are worth more as employees.

yes sir. damn dirty foreigners, takin' all our women folks' jobs... howkin our womenz compete wit those men?

Because the going rate for those fields is partially informed by historical factors. Historical factors which have tended to value areas where females worked less highly than areas where men worked. We have moved on and progress has been made. No longer is it legal to openly pay a woman less for doing the exact same job with the exact same jobtitle, but that was a long time coming and a relatively recent development. Historical factors are still at play in how the market values certain types of work. Historical factors are still at play in how society values the role of women within it (women are on the whole more likely to be unpaid carers, thus removing a burden of care from the state for the elderly and infirm).

Please don't think I am suggesting a conspiracy to keep women down. Though at certain points during the indutrialising era there were concerted efforts by both employers and male employees to maintain women's low wage rates and male unions generally tried to exclude women from their trades as their entry a) ndrove down wages and b) made male workers less attractive because they were more costly. The issue is both smaller and bigger than that. It is simply how our society is...and our society is the way it is because this how it has developed. There are historical factors which inform current trends and current factors. There are also biological and sociological factors.

The point I am making Lookout is that whilst at an individual level people make choices, at a societal level a basic inequality exists between males and females in terms of their economic power. The same is true for people of different ethnic origins. At an individual level people make choices, but at a societal level there is a huge disparity in terms of economic and political power.

Ain't that the truth.

the societal level is made up of individuals making individual choices.

and no matter how much you want to believe that secretaries are paid less than managers simply because more women do the job, you are ignoring the obvious - secretaries are easier to find and train than the manager is so they will (and should) always earn a lower wage. regardless of the presence of peni, pay is determined by the supply and demand for qualified imployees in a job.

anyway, it's time for me to skedaddle onto my last little todo item, then i'm outta here. been fun discussing this with you, ya pinko commie.;)

If we look at the representation of ethnic minorities in our Congress they are over represented.

Your pay gap statistics don't mean squat. Women and minorities have come a long way in removing those barriers to pay. A long way.

It ain't about secretaries versus managers. Those are not on a par with each other. It's about jobs which are on a par in terms of training and demand, but which are gendered male or female traditionally.

I also have to skedaddle ( a word that isn't used nearly enough in my opinion :P) Ciao for now you capitalist pig:P

Merc I don't argue that there's been no progress. Just that we haven't reached parity yet.

The one example pair you've given so far is schoolteacher versus engineer, citing the fact that they require the same amount of schooling. Just because the standard for a college bachelor's degree is four years does not mean that they are learning the same things in those four years, or that any person could equally decide to earn either degree. Engineers are generally more intelligent and more skilled than schoolteachers. (Quite a few of my teachers were downright stupid, in fact.)

Do you have any other examples of jobs which are truly on par with each other?

OK, I'd refute the fact that engineers are generally more intelligent than school teachers. lol

I've met quite a few and many of them are very stupid. Not to mention afflicted with tunnel vision. Oh, and did I say stupid?

There is pay parity in health care jobs. There is complete parity in all government jobs, at both the state and federal level. There is complete parity in the military. That is a whole lot of folks. There is complete parity in most entry level jobs in both the public and private sectors. The biggest bitches and moans are for the top jobs that are few and far between.

Science and technology associate professionals versus health and social welfare associate professionals. The former are predominately male the latter female. Skilled agricultural fields versus skilled textiles. Both primarily male, but with a much higher percentage of females in textiles.

Looking at graduates, most female graduates will earn between 20 and 25% less than their male counterpartds even if they go into the same industry. In the UK female graduates can expect to earn approx. 17.5% less than their male counterparts. Why this is is difficult to answer and combines a number of factors both economic, societal and biological. The fact remains that males on average earn more than females. Count it how you like, that makes men the economically more powerful sex.

Most girls don't want to be farmers. Some do, but there's a far greater number or men who actually want to be farmers than women.

As I say a number of factors are involved including the choices which are made at an individual level regarding careers. Whatever causes it, it remains the case that whilst progress has been made, parity has not been reached at a societal level.


[eta] and on that note I really am going to bed where I intend that I and sleep will reach parity :P

I don't think men alone can be blamed for that. Women on an individual basis can either be happy with their lot or they can fight against what they have.

If you don't like what you're being paid, then do something about it. Don't sit around and moan that society isn't fair.

I've never done a job where men who were equal to me were being paid more. In fact, in most cases, I've been paid more because I was prepared to argue my case and prove that I was worth more.

Some things need to be changed on an individual basis.

Insightful.

Feck....I really was going to bed, why did I automatically click the New Posts button?

This isn't about blaming men. I do not hold men resonsible for this situation. Our society (and the market) has evolved into what it is because of a complex set of factors. There is no conspiracy by men to keep women barefoot, pregnant and underpaid. Even when male union workers were fighting to keep women out of their trades in the late-eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, women were also arguing that case. This isn't about men doing something to women, this about society having evolved in a particular way and leading to a situation where one sex is more economically powerful than the other. Both sexes have played their part (and continue to play their parts) in that evolution. Both sexes will play their part in how society continues to evolve.

I understand that Dana, but in the case of this argument in general, men are viewed as the root cause of the problem. Men hold the power so men get to decide who gets paid how much.

I don't necessarily agree that women should be paid equally for jobs that are different but take the same amount of time to learn how to do. In some cases this is true but not in all. I happen to think teachers in general are definitely underpaid for the services they provide to our society, however, I don't agree that all teachers should be paid the same. Some teachers are better than others and should be rewarded for that whether they're male or female.

To me, it's about paying people what they're worth. Not paying people because they happen to do a particular job, or because they happen to have a dick or not. I happen to think society in general is well on the way to achieving this parity. At least, that's how it appears to be in Australia.

Now wait one minute there missy! :D

What should I be waiting for? :)