I am a Grenade

I am interested in this idea of "passing" as a different class.  Tammy mentions that her son "pretends" to be of a different class to impress his friends but he isn't actually of a different class.  I think it is important, though, to attempt to "pass" as a higher class in order to survive.  (Not that I'm saying that this system of class privilege isn't inherently fucked up, but I understand the necessity of passing).

This idea of needing to pass reminded me of this article. Often on my facebook feed I see people talking about how poor people shouldn't be spending money.  This is an article that I dug up when trying to rebut ridiculous arguments that people make to perpetuate this kind of thought.  So this article "Why Do Poor People 'Waste' Money on Luxury Goods" discusses the need to pass as a different class in order to dip into the privileges that being upper class entails.

Mainly, McMillan Cottom (author of article) discusses her personal experiences and relating this to the larger discussion on the necessity for poor people to pass as "respectable"--because, as we know and as Mantsios discusses in Media Magic, the poor are painted as anything BUT deserving respect.

I do not know how much my mother spent on her camel colored cape or knee-high boots but I know that whatever she paid it returned in hard-to-measure dividends. How do you put a price on the double-take of a clerk at the welfare office who decides you might not be like those other trifling women in the waiting room and provides an extra bit of information about completing a form that you would not have known to ask about? What is the retail value of a school principal who defers a bit more to your child because your mother's presentation of self signals that she might unleash the bureaucratic savvy of middle class parents to advocate for her child? I don't know the price of these critical engagements with organizations and gatekeepers relative to our poverty when I was growing up. But, I am living proof of its investment yield.

This quote sums up the general idea of the article.  McMillan Cottom centers her argument around the idea that it is important to make these kind of investments in order to pass as "not lower class" in a society where being poor is such a stigma on personal character.  Passing means more opportunities.

On another (similar but different) note, People Like Us places a great deal of emphasis on Individualism (at least in the clip that I viewed) by focusing on Tammy's son's desire to go to college and really emphasising the fact that Tammy has a job and isn't on welfare anymore like her friends are suggesting.  When really, Tammy could probably really use the extra help--but there is this stigma about being on welfare where welfare is somehow equated with being lazy when really this isn't the case. The biggest messages that I take away from this clip are "LOOK HE WANTS TO GO TO COLLEGE, NOT LIKE HIS LAZY COUCH POTATO BROTHER" and "LOOKIE HERE SHE ISN'T FOLLOWING HER FRIENDS ADVICE TO STAY AT HOME AND COLLECT WELFARE.  LOOK SHE HAS A JOB" which read more like ways to keep the idea of Individualism intact instead of critiquing the systems of privilege and oppression that exist when discussing class.  We get a hint of that when Tammy is talking about her father having twenty two children and that she "grew up poor"--this at least points to the fact that if you grew up in a poor family you are going to have a hell of a time trying to claw your way out of that social class because you probably couldn't go to college, you probably weren't exposed to the kinds of circles in which you could learn how to "pass" as a higher class and make connections with people in "high places."  But the majority of the emphasis of this documentary seemed to be on Individualism (at least based off of this short clip).