“’…poor people today have it easy because they can get government benefits without doing anything in return’” This quote comes from Nicholas Kristof’s article “ Where’s the Empathy”, where it is used to describe how, according to a poll, wealthy Americans feel about poor people. These comments did not shock me when I initially read them because of the community that I live in, however I have known individuals who have required assistance from the government, and I have found them to be hard working people who strive to return to the work force so they do not have to live on money from the government. I am from a middle class area of Long Island, New York and have been fortunate enough to not need assistance from the government, as have most
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The person who had made the comment did not know my family well and did not know much about my uncle, other than the fact that my uncle did not have a job at the time and was receiving money from the government. The individual who made the comment said that my uncle was “lazy” and should “just get a job”. This individual did not know that my uncle had been trying to get a job and was unable to. I was surprised to hear someone that I knew judge someone who was in a worse situation than he was in, especially since that individual had never been in the situation that my uncle was in; jobless with a family looking to him for support, however he had decided that my uncle was just lazy. Unfortunately this was not the only time I had heard people in my community discuss people were receiving assistance from the government negatively. I have heard people describe them as: lazy, useless, and expecting …show more content…
From what I have witnessed, the comments I have heard about my uncle, and from the information described in Kristof’s article it seems that affluent Americans are the in-group and poorer Americans are the out-groups. Affluent Americans are willing to describe poorer Americans as lazy, unmotivated and lucky. If something were to happen to an affluent American then the situation that the affluent American was in would most likely be considered when looking at what happened to that
The person who had made the comment did not know my family well and did not know much about my uncle, other than the fact that my uncle did not have a job at the time and was receiving money from the government. The individual who made the comment said that my uncle was “lazy” and should “just get a job”. This individual did not know that my uncle had been trying to get a job and was unable to. I was surprised to hear someone that I knew judge someone who was in a worse situation than he was in, especially since that individual had never been in the situation that my uncle was in; jobless with a family looking to him for support, however he had decided that my uncle was just lazy. Unfortunately this was not the only time I had heard people in my community discuss people were receiving assistance from the government negatively. I have heard people describe them as: lazy, useless, and expecting …show more content…
From what I have witnessed, the comments I have heard about my uncle, and from the information described in Kristof’s article it seems that affluent Americans are the in-group and poorer Americans are the out-groups. Affluent Americans are willing to describe poorer Americans as lazy, unmotivated and lucky. If something were to happen to an affluent American then the situation that the affluent American was in would most likely be considered when looking at what happened to that