William Penzer - Blog Post 4

William Penzer Blog Post 4

I want to start by saying that micro-aggressions will inevitably persist in our society. The things that we say and do that are unintentionally hurtful to others are just that: unintentional. Even for those of us who try to remain vigilant about maintaining political correctness find that every once in a while something we say could offend someone. The idea of a middle class culture of power, however, confuses me. Arguably, over the last 25-35 years, the balance of power has shifted from the middle class to the super rich. In today's United States, our culture tends to glorify the lives of the super rich. The media, through TV shows and movies that glorify big spending, fast cars, and giant mansions, has taken the American dream and skewed it so that the end goal is becoming super rich. Becoming a member of the super rich is a nearly impossible task, yet the media pushes members of the middle class to want to achieve this new American dream. Those who have an unlimited amount of money tend to look on the rest of society with contempt. These members of the super rich think that their economic status makes them better than everyone else, and the middle class that emulates them tends to pick up on this elitist worldview. When we talk about the middle class culture of power, it's important to recognize from where that culture originates. In my mind, it isn't its own culture at all, but rather an imitation of the culture of the super rich.  In order to make any progress in reducing micro-aggressions, we need to work from the top down.