Blog 36

In my ninth grade English class, we were given the assignment to write a personal narrative from the perspective of a fictional character. For a long time, I couldn’t come up with a single idea. I thought it would be too easy to write it as a sports star or a successful business man, so instead I tried to go down a different road. My idea was to write as someone struggling to get out of a bad neighborhood but not succeeding. I thought that this would be a really insightful story where I shed light on the problems of the lower class in America to secure an easy A. The next problem I encountered was that I simply did not know where to start. There are no origin stories as to how people end up in the lower class; it is just what they were born into. I kept on working on my paper and I remember when I hit the two page mark I was satisfied. I went to read over my work before I submitted the assignment online, but then I realized something; I had written a terrible story. It was very easy to tell from reading the story that I had no idea what the lower class went through, and I imagined it would be even less convincing if someone who had actually experienced some sort of hardship read it. It dawned on me that however much I wanted to understand the perils of the lower class, I couldn’t. However much I claimed that I knew where they were coming from; I didn’t. However much I said I wasn’t like the rest of the upper class who can’t sympathize with the poor; I was. This goes for politicians too. They not only say, but they believe that they understand what people go through in the lowest classes. They are too detached from the poor to be capable of delivering them the sympathy they deserve.

                Picture a celebrity. This celebrity comes from a rich family, has tons of money, and hasn’t really worked for anything in their lives. They live in Beverly Hills and get paid millions of dollars to live their life in front of a video camera. One day this celebrity realizes that they aren’t in tune with the lower class, and they have a change of heart. They start to donate to charity, give speeches to the lower class; maybe even visit a third world country. After they have started this huge public campaign to help out the lower class, they start to proclaim that they get the lower class. In reality, all they really did was address the problem in ways that made their own image look better. They still don’t know what it’s like to not know the next time they will eat, live on minimum wage, or not make payments on a house. All they know is what it’s like to give money to the lower class and talk to them in impersonal venues. The only person who really benefits is the celebrity. People are more likely to adore them because they have shown a care for the lower class. This is applicable to politicians. It is a rarity to have a politician who honestly can say they understand the experiences of the lower class. Most of them are totally out of touch. They come from rich families and all they had to do was make it through luxurious private schools all their lives.