white trash

Catherine Driscoll catherine.driscoll at arts.usyd.edu.au
Wed Feb 26 05:15:17 PST 2003


Quoting Wojtek Sokolowski <sokol at jhu.edu>:


> Perhaps "white trash" was not the best choice of words. But what
> alternative term would you use to describe the group of self-righteous,
> arrogant whites, predominantly males, who feel that they are entitled to
> the life style and consumption level they have, holding disparaging
> views of any other ethinic group (including other "whites" such as
> Europeans or Jews) and women, ethnocentric (or "patriotic"),
> deferential toward authority figures, ignorant, displaying philistine
> attitueds toward culture and learning, favorably responding to the most
> debased calls and causes, and deriving thinly veiled pleasure form
> suffering inflicted on others? We are talking about half or so of the
> US population here - so it would be helpful to agree on the proper term.

i'd call them self-righteous, arrogant, ignorant, bigotted white men

but... are they arrogant? that kind of seems odd to me

also, some of this is easily translated to other cultures -- including Australia, where we don't really use the phrase "white trash" (thankfully), but "bogan" does some of the same thing -- and other parts are not so much

i just mean, i think you're over-emphasising this as an american thing i know for a far there are self-righteous, arrogant, ignorant, bigotted white men in europe

catherine

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