From: mccolm@darwin.math.usf.edu. (Gregory McColm)
Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.meta
Subject: Re: MINDWALK - An exercise in Passionate Thought
Date: 18 Jan 93 19:38:48 GMT
Organization: Univ. of South Florida, Math Department

In article <1993Jan10.080252.46273@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu> miner@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu writes:
>In article <1993Jan4.193559.27818@ariel.ec.usf.edu>, mccolm@darwin.math.usf.edu. (Gregory McColm) writes:
>
>Generally a fine post that I agree with.  But I have had it up to here
>with the following kind of thing:
>
>> Now, imagine that it is nearly a thousand years later, and you work 
>> 45 hrs weekly in a dead-end job with 2 weeks vacation, a half-hr 
>> commute, declining benefits, and hazardous working conditions.  You 
>> never had a chance to go to College, and your kids probably won't 
>> either.  "Good" does not consist of Great Art, it consists of decent 
>> dental care for the kids and some recognition of one' humanity from 
>> one's employer 
>
>Well-meant, of course, as it usually is.  But
>this glib and sweeping nonsense about how the working classes (barely
>sentient as they are) are incapable of any concern or interest beyond
>food, sex and their unemployment check is deeply offensive.  I grew up
>in poverty and I didn't have decent dental care or anything else, and
>astonishingly, I developed an interest in Great Art.  Thousands of
>others have done the same.  One of the things I resent most about the
>"limousine liberals" is their utter incapacity for the variety and
>fluidity of human experience.  You would think they had never read a
>book, or pondered about how civilization got along before there was a
>middle class...
>
>[...]
>
>> -----Greg McColm
>> --
>> SHAMELESS AD:  Math PhDs in Analysis, Discrete Math./Th. of Comp., Num. Anal., 
>> Prob., are invited to apply to the Math. Dept. of Univ. of S. Florida for 
>> research/teaching positions that may be available: contact K. L. Pothoven at 
>> mathdept@math.usf.edu. Deadline 2/1/93. USF is a politically correct employer.
>
>-Ken


Limousine liberal, me?  Well, maybe so, but anyway ...

I was responding to what I see as the seven gadzillionth denunciation 
of The Mob whom elitists see as uninterested in the finer things of 
life---this is, as history buffs will recall, a frequent rationale for 
denying said better things to The Mob.

I don't really know how interest in art and science (and other finer 
things) correlate with class.  Superficially, it seems that "Ken" is 
wrong:  while the Upper Classes have a long history of funding art 
and science (among other things), the Lower Class has a long history 
have not having their interest in art and science recorded by historians.

Of course, we must have our doubts about the Upper Classes (how many 
patrons actually read the books that they made possible?  when Trudeau 
portrayed Donald Trump as a philistine demanding hooters for his nymphs, 
he was showing a very common kind of Patron of the Arts) and the 
Lower Classes, given the chance, often showed much interest in art 
and science (witness the attendance among workers among public lectures 
by Thomas Huxley and other 19th century science popularizers).  A 
typical American household, circa 1820, had a copy of King James and 
another of Shakepeare.  Acting troupes wandered the American West, 
producing bowdlerized versions of old classics.  And out of the West's 
wilderness came people like Mark Twain and Abraham Lincoln.  So perhaps 
the chroniclers, knowing which side their bread was buttered on, are 
wrong:  there is great interest in art & science among the Lower Classes.
Evidence for this can be seeing in "crafts" like quilting and pottery 
(a "craft" is often an art form of Lower Class derivation).

But the truth is that everything takes time, and the more time one 
has top devote to survival, the less time one has for anything else.
One is not patronizing turn-of-the-century workers by observing that 
the 80-hour week drained their lives.  Today, the situation seems more 
complex.  In my job (a university professor), I encounter many "lower 
middle class" people who are working over 60 hours a week, and are 
doing this for years.  Many do not keep up with the news, or read 
books outside of those assigned.  I lead a rather sheltered life, but 
I get the feeling that in some ways, this problem is not restricted 
to those 30- and 40-year-olds I find trying to finish college.  I 
suspect that there is so little time for anything, and I wonder what 
consumes it (job?  TV?).  This is not a class phenonenon (you can 
hear the upper middle class whining about it incessantly), and it 
doesn't have much to do with people who are "... incapable of any 
concern or interest beyond food, sex and their unemployment check ...".
If I was paranoid, I might wonder if it was deliberate.  George Orwell, 
in 1984, hinted that overwork & red tape might be useful devices for social 
control.  Certainly, that is how Brezhnev kept his people in line.  It 
works:  you entangle people with red tape, put them in frustrating 
jobs, and they don't think, don't dream, and don't cause trouble:  all 
they do is tell pathetic jokes about the situation, and become bitter.

Perhaps this is just my ignorance, but in this country, isn't there 
a difference between the Lower and Middle Classes?  The Middle Class 
regards art as a waste of money---I find I have no idea what the 
Lower Class thinks.  "Culture" is distributed in such strange ways, 
and most "market research" ignores people who have little money.  At 
times, the Lower Class despises it all (eg, "Luddism" and McCarthyism), 
but those movements are entangled in class hatreds.  Are public libraries 
used much by the Lower Class?  Is PBS watched by a large audience with 
no ability to pay?  Does anyone know?

Final comment:  the Middle Class is ancient.  In fact, most mathematicians 
came from what we would call Middle Class backgrounds.  The traders, 
civil servants, scholars, inventors, etc were what made advances in 
our civilization.  These are also people whom we call Middle Class.  
People from the Lower Classes who made such innovations often found 
themselves in the Middle Class.  The Middle Class, of course, always 
aspired to be Upper Class, which is why they aped the Upper Class, and 
even cooked up ideologies (eg, Libertarianism, to return to a common 
enemy) celebrating the Upper Class.

-----Greg McColm
--
SHAMELESS AD:  Math PhDs in Analysis, Discrete Math./Th. of Comp., Num. Anal., 
Prob., are invited to apply to the Math. Dept. of Univ. of S. Florida for 
research/teaching positions that may be available: contact K. L. Pothoven at 
mathdept@math.usf.edu. Deadline 2/1/93. USF is a politically correct employer.
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