"White Trash" -- A Spurious Category (was Re: Populism as Masquerade)

[Yoshie Furuhashi]

Mike Yates wrote:
>On the other question raised in connection with the exchange among Doug,
>Cockburn, et. al. concerning militias, populism, etc. let me say a few
>words from experience.  My youngest brother is what some might call a
>raving lunatic:  sees conspiracies everywhere, lives in the woods, owns
>guns, thinks Y2K may lead to chaos in the streets, etc.  But he is most
>definitely not a racist or an anti-semite (two of our nieces are black,
>for which fact his own health and life have been threatened more than
>once).  He is well-read though not too systematic in his thinking.  He
>was once unemployed for several years and had to get by with odd jobs.
>He was fired for refusing to take a lie detector test, and this whole
>awful affair hurt his confidence and self-esteem a lot. My parents
>helped out a lot, but this did not do much for his ego either.  He feels
>a lot of rage and directs this as best he can against the powers that
>be: hatred of local police, diatribes against Clinton, etc.  I am sure
>there are tens of thousands of persons just like him.  Are they
>unorganizable? white trash? future militia bombers? future religious
>zealots?  Maybe.  But then maybe if we had a decent left movement,
>inclusive and democratic, maybe not.  I do know that I'd trust my
>brother to hide me if the Nazis came to town.  And I'd be glad he had a
>gun and knew how to use it.

There's obviously nothing wrong with knowing how to use a gun.  I
personally don't, but probably I should.  As for populism, judging by what
you say about your brother, it doesn't seem to me that he subscribes to any
"ism," in the sense of a coherent political ideology, such as populism.

Now, allow me to say a word about the term "white trash."  I think this is
a spurious term that no leftist should use, except when you are trying to
expose it as a false category that divides workers.  I think that those
cultural studies folks who sort of invented what may be called hip "white
trash studies" (e.g. _White Trash: Race and Class in America_, eds. Matt
Wray and Annalee Newitz) have done a disservice to the Left.  The same must
be said about the term "underclass."  These two terms have only ideological
functions, and they have no explanatory power.

Yoshie