Sitting safely in Norway, reading about the American election in various major global news outlets, it is hard to understand how Trump won the GOP primary, let alone is head to head with Clinton in the race for the Whitehouse. Clearly, there is something I have not understand and do not know! This TED talk, (and coupled with some opinion pieces JD Vance has written) gives perspective on a segment of America who see the world very differently than the privileged, and those on either coasts. There are takeaways for all, such as his vivid description of the consequences low social capital has for communities. A TED talks that made me think, and I can only recommend it to all!
J.D. Vance: America’s forgotten working class
J.D. Vance grew up in a small, poor city in the Rust Belt of southern Ohio, where he had a front-row seat to many of the social ills plaguing America: a heroin epidemic, failing schools, families torn apart by divorce and sometimes violence.
How Donald Trump seduced America’s white working class | JD Vance
America has never been entirely sure what to do with its white poor. For complicated historical and political reasons, we associate “poor” in our public consciousness with “black”. Terms such as “welfare queen” and “culture of poverty” became associated uniquely with the social maladies of African Americans in urban ghettos, despite the fact that poor whites outnumbered poor blacks.
Why Trump’s Antiwar Message Resonates with White America
MY grandma – we called her Mamaw – loved her country. Born in eastern Kentucky coal country at the beginning of the Great Depression, she credited so much of the good in her life to America’s bounty.