Just the other day, Newt Gingich accused Mitt Romney of saying anything that will get him votes. He could have just as easily been referring to himself, and his recent comments regarding poverty amongst children. Even though those comments were stereotypical and classist, they certainly have “played well” amongst many voters during the Republican Presidential primary.
While looking for votes in Iowa last month, Gingrich told a crowd that children in impoverished neighborhoods “have no habits of working and nobody around them works.” He went on to say, “They have no habits of showing up on Monday and staying all day or the concept of ‘I do this and you give me cash,’ unless it’s illegal.” He then suggested various jobs they could do, like working in a library, working as a janitor, or repainting a school. “If they had their own money,” he said, they would not have to “become a pimp or a prostitute or a drug dealer.” Lastly, he makes it clear that these ideas are not spur of the moment; rather, he has thought about them long and hard.
On the surface, Gingrich’s assertion is a classic form of sophisticated stereotyping. Take the question, “Who do you blame for poverty?” Social scientists have long studied the public’s response to this question. According to research, most people put the blame on the individual. Why? Because we live in a society that is individualistic. We also subscribe to the idea that the U.S. is a meritocracy; in other words, talent and hard work are rewarded.
Newt’s thinking? If children were not lazy, they would not be poor. And why are these children poor? Well, it has to be because of their immediate environment, their “subculture” if you will. Because of their values and their lack of positive role models, these children have no direction, no motivation, no understanding of cause and effect. Change this “culture of poverty” and you change children’s work habits.
As “successful people” know, according to Gingrich, if you want money you need to learn the value of work early in life and pull yourself up “by your bootstraps.” What could be simpler?
To be continued…
Mr. Gingrich is slowly hanging himself in this Presidential election. The statement on proverty amongst children was very disturbing. I can name quite a few people that grew up in poverty and now are some of the riches people around. Everyone is not born with a “silver spoon” in there mouth. There are some that get out there and earn their place amongst “your” kind,the rich and famous. When you lose this election go to time out and think of what you did.
Newt Gingrich’s comments are very alarming on numerous levels. It would take up too much time and space to respond to each of his comments. Since I don’t feel his comments hold much merit, I will limit my comments to Mr. Gingrich’s comments on people living in poor neighborhoods.
He is stereotyping all people living in poor neighborhoods and is just one comment short of racism. It is pretty obvious he is referring to the people with diverse ethnic cultures because demographics tell us that the majority of people living in poor neighborhoods come from diverse cultures.
I am shocked at the many comments Newt made regarding, children, parents, work habits, jobs, drugs and behavior. His comments were not fair to the numerous families living in poor neighborhoods that he stereotyped in this manner. There are many parents living in poor neighborhoods working several jobs just to keep their families afloat on a daily basis.
He is trying to place blame on these families for our country’s economic crisis, which is clearly misleading. He is singling out people in poor neighborhoods as if they do not contribute to the economy, thus creating their own socio-economic problems. We are all fully aware our economic crisis is due to the war in Iraq and shady dealings between the government, bank corporations and large independent corporations.
Mr. Gingrich is not a newcomer to politics and he should know about diversity in our country, states and neighborhoods. Yet, he still clumps all people living in poor neighborhoods together into his comments.
I don’t know what is more disheartening and concerning, the fact that he is vying for the Presidency of our “Great Nation”, or the fact that numerous people jumped on his bandwagon and agreed with his comments.
With all of the evidence based information out there on determinants of socio economic status and a multitude of examples of individuals who do not fit his stereotype, I find it hard to believe that people can actually believe his words are the truth. Does anyone have a hypothesis as to why there is such a large number of people who think his depiction is accurate?