What is is with the "It's great to be poor" meme?

[spinbaby]

I'm listening to conversation drifting over the cubical walls, hearing about how great it is to be on welfare because they get free cell phones, free Internet, free laptops, free housing, free day care, free medical,and free food stamps, so all they have to do is to lie around the house watching their free TV. I hear this stuff all the time--working people who are barely getting by thinking that poor people are living high on the hog on their tax dollars. The thing is, THEY ALL KNOW POOR PEOPLE WHO ARE NOT GETTING BY. But somehow the poor people they know are different from the poor people collecting all that free stuff. I guess it just shows the power of 30 years of welfare-queen propaganda.

[GreenPartyVoter]

1. Talk about a disconnect. "They" are robbing me blind, but my neighbor is

in a really bad way."

[theophilus]

2. It is the "lucky ducky" myth. Pathetic and driven by greed...pure and

simple. They should all have to trade places for a year.

[sinkingfeeling]

3. Ask them to prove what they say. There are no programs that provide all of the things you listed.

[OHdem10]

4. This is how the GOP has won elections and continues to win

elections.

[Lorien]

5. It's been a Limbaugh meme for decades now. They also believe that 50%

of our taxes go to welfare for the poor. :eyes:

[Pacifist Patriot]

6. I don't get it either.

[Orrex]

7. This is why millionaires in record numbers are forfeiting their wealth

Aren't they?

[treestar]

8. Probably racism underlying that

Why they are so eager to believe all of that.

What really burns me is when they claim jail is just fine. "Three hots and a cot." Like it's OK to be there.

[MedicalAdmin]

20. I used to work in maximum security.

3 hots and a cot plus gang violence, deviant cell mates, communal showers, cons, bad hygiene, crappy food and clothes, no rights, and did I mention it smells?

Prison isn't a day in the park. Next asshole who mentions 3 hots and a cot, hand them a brick, point them at a window and invite them to get some of the that gravy train. When they decline your generous offer, tell them to shut their stupid pie holes.

[rfranklin]

9. It is a psychological failing of the human mind...

Unwanted thoughts and feelings can be unconsciously projected onto another who becomes a scapegoat for one's own problems. This concept can be extended to projection by groups. In this case the chosen individual, or group, becomes the scapegoat for the group's problems. 'Political agitation in all countries is full of such projections, just as much as the backyard gossip of little groups and individuals'.<12> Jung considered indeed that 'there must be some people who behave in the wrong way; they act as scapegoats and objects of interest for the normal ones'.<13>

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scapegoating

[Gormy Cuss]

18. Agreed.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

10. I always ask them, "If being poor is such a great deal, why don't you quit and cash in?"

[kestrel91316]

11. Divide and conquer. The propaganda is designed to divide the poor and middle class

from themselves, to fracture us, to weaken us and destroy our political power.

It's working very well so far. It is why so many poor and less well off folks vote Repig.

[Bluerthanblue]

12. the only people who could honestly say that are those who've

never been there.

I have- and it isn't anything like people would have you think. Sure there are a few (very few) people who play the system, but for every one of them there are thousands of people who cannot get the help they need to provide for themselves- who are anything but lazy and want nothing more than to provide for themselves and their family.

People hate the poor- and need to make it seem as though poverty is a choice, a lack of personal character, or an individual falure- because facing the reality, the fact that poverty can happen to anyone, no matter how hard you work, or how careful you are is just too damn terrifying. So we marginalize and blame those who are facing something which we don't feel we could survive. In my opinion, and experience.

[Demit]

13. I always ask the person, "Would you want to be them? So you could get that stuff too?"

It's a variation on what Tierra_y_Libertad said: "If what 'they' get is so great, why don't you quit your job so you could be poor and get all that stuff too?"

[Javaman]

14. I have your answer right here...

people are stupid. :)

[obxhead]

15. If it were so great to be poor they would be aiming to get there.

If the rich people they are ignoring (or voting in favor of) paid their fair share, there would be fewer poor people to "sponge" off their tax dollars.

[Mariana]

16. They probably believe that all those freebies

are only available to minorities, and that poor white people can't get them. I think that's a pretty common belief among teabagger types.

[JoeyT]

19. +1

I hear that all the time. Actually going and asking a minority or at whatever place handles the benefits simply never occurs to them.
Mostly because it would strip fuel from their racist rants. It's more important to have a reason to hate minorities than it is to be right.

[dtexdem]

17. Hey, I'm all for its being tried out ...

particularly by teabaggers and other Repukes. ;-)

[kctim]

21. Such thinking

is the product of our Constitution and the individualism it promotes and protects.
Right or wrong, something for something has always been looked up more favorably than something for nothing.

[phantom power]

22. Suggest that they quit their job if it's so goddamned great.