The Stereotypes Of Poverty In The Documentary By Linda Midgett

812 Words2 Pages

One of the most prevalent social problems in America, which also carries the most social stigma, is poverty. The documentary “The Line”, which was produced by Linda Midgett, discusses this issue and reveals that many people who live in poverty work incredibly hard to escape the vicious cycle. The fact of the matter is that no one chooses to live in poverty. Some people work two or three jobs to try and support their family, but still struggle paycheck to paycheck. Approximately “46 million Americans live in poverty” (The Line). This is a staggering statistic which should force people to open their eyes, and realize that people in poverty are not all addicts. They are not all people who have made bad choices. Many of them are hardworking people, who want …show more content…

The documentary states that “some of the most prevalent and damaging stereotypes about poor people are that they are lazy, that they are stupid, they don’t have any skills, [and that they] prefer poverty” (The Line). In reality, more than 7 million Americans work two or more jobs in order to provide for their families. This social stigma is a roadblock that stands directly in the way of solving this social problem. If people realized how hard those that live below the poverty line work in order to survive, poverty itself could be eradicated. There is no way a human being could see how difficult these people’s lives are, and not want to help them. If everyone rallied around this one idea of eliminating this problem, then it could easily be done. There is no reason that we, as the nation known for spending the most money, should also have the “third highest poverty rates among developed nations”. As a nation who often feels the need to police the rest of the world, we need to put more resources into helping people in our own country, rather than interfering in the affairs of other nations. That is the purpose of the United

Show More
Related

  • Analysis Of Dianne's Essay Framing Class, Vicarious Living

    1002 Words  | 3 Pages

    More often than not, the homeless are viewed as weak and helpless. They are seen in movies as street beggars, and are vehicles of pity and remorse to touch the hearts of the viewers. Moreover, the media trains its audiences to believe that homelessness comes from the fault of the person. They are “bums, alcoholics, and drug addicts, caught in a hopeless downward spiral because of their individual pathological behavior” (427). In reality, it is the perpetuating cycle of wealth that keeps them in at a standstill in their struggles. The media only condones this very same cycle because it trains the masses to believe that people are poor due to their bad decisions. This overall census that the poor are addicts and alcoholics only makes it easier to drag their image further through the mud, going as far as calling them “crazy.” This is highlighted in shows such as Cops, or Law & Order. With the idea that these people are bad news it is easy to “buy into the dominant ideology construction that views poverty as a problem of individuals” (428). Although some of the issues of the poor are highlighted through episodic framing, for the most part the lower class is a faceless group who bring no real value to the

    Read More

  • Working Poor By Barbara Ehrenreich Summary

    2835 Words  | 6 Pages

    According to a 1997 report of the National Coalition for the Homeless, “nearly one-fifth of all homeless people are employed in full or part-time jobs”. In the book Nickel and Dimed, On Not Getting by in America, by Barbara Ehrenreich, the author goes undercover in order to investigate and experience first-hand how life is for America’s “working poor”. The “working poor” are defined as individuals who have a full-time job, sometimes more than one, but still cannot afford the basics of shelter, food and adequate healthcare. As one can imagine, this led to many public health concerns. In each of the three locations visited, Ehrenreich realizes that for many, “getting by” in America can sometimes be a daunting task.

    Read More

  • The Glass Castle Stereotypes

    1391 Words  | 3 Pages

    Poverty in America is a very complex issue that can be looked at from many directions. There are a plethora of statistics and theories about poverty in America that can be confusing and at times contradicting. It is important to objectively view statistics to gain a better understanding of poverty and to wade through the stereotypes and the haze of cultural views that can misrepresent the situation.The official poverty line in America begins with a person making at or below $12,060. To calculate the poverty line for a family, an additional $4,180 is added to the base of $12,060 for each additional member(“Federal Poverty Level Guidelines”). According to the last U.S. census, over 45 million or 14.5% of Americans are at or below the poverty line(Worstall). At this level, the U.S. poverty level has not changed much from the 1970s when the government began a “War on Poverty.” However,

    Read More

  • People Like Us: Social Class In Americ Tammy's Story

    997 Words  | 2 Pages

    Poverty is a worldwide social problem that effects billions of people and in the video clip People Like us: Social Class in America: Tammy’s Story we are able to get a deeper look into just one of the many heart wrenching cases. Tammy’s story is a documentation of the life of the Crabtree family in Waverly, Ohio, a family that lives in rural poverty. The Crabtree family consist of the mother Tammy and her four children in which only two are featured, Beau and Matt. Tammy is the only money-earning member of the family with a minimum wage job at Burger King. This amount of income leaves them below the poverty line in the United States, which classified them as an impoverished family. In the video clip the Crabtree family discusses various negative effects of being below the poverty line including not having enough money

    Read More

  • The Working Poor: Invisible in America by David K. Shipler

    741 Words  | 2 Pages

    In The Working Poor: Invisible in America, David K. Shipler tells the story of a handful of people he has interviewed and followed through their struggles with poverty over the course of six years. David Shipler is an accomplished writer and consultant on social issues. His knowledge, experience, and extensive field work is authoritative and trustworthy. Shipler describes a vicious cycle of low paying jobs, health issues, abuse, addiction, and other factors that all combine to create a mountain of adversity that is virtually impossible to overcome. The American dream and promise of prosperity through hard work fails to deliver to the 35 million people in America who make up the working poor. Since there is neither one problem nor one solution to poverty, Shipler connects all of the issues together to show how they escalate each other. Poor children are abused, drugs and gangs run rampant in the poor neighborhoods, low wage dead end jobs, immigrants are exploited, high interest loans and credit cards entice people in times of crisis and unhealthy diets and lack of health care cause a multitude of problems. The only way that we can begin to see positive change is through a community approach joining the poverty stricken individuals, community, businesses, and government to band together to make a commitment to improve all areas that need help.

    Read More

  • Analysis Of As American As Apple Pie

    901 Words  | 2 Pages

    The article “As American As Apple Pie” is about, poverty and welfare and how they are looked down upon and treated with suspicion or outright antagonism, and how many associate those in poverty with negative stereotypes often seen as deviant such as homeless, lazy, and criminals. Mark R. Rank points out how poverty across the world is a lot more normal than we think it might be. Some people are at greater risk than others, depending on age, race, gender, family structure, community of residence, education, work skills, and physical disabilities. This article provides the readers with data and analysis of American poverty and welfare over the course of the past 25 years. Rank also talks about how we have framed the poverty issue, and how we should frame it.

    Read More

  • Poor Kids Movie Analysis

    1527 Words  | 4 Pages

    As the Film Poor Kids continued on it became more and more apparent that the main issue was poverty among children in the United States. It needs to be first recognized

    Read More

  • A dollar a Day: Made in China

    684 Words  | 2 Pages

    ...des of the world we can still see similarites with the strugggle of living in poverty. They both are trying to support thier family and complete thier own personal goal. But Li and Wayne aren't the only ones struggling Li and Wayne represent a whole mass of people who are living in poverty and are seeking job opportunities and want to have a decent life. A dollar a Day gives us the behind the scenes look on how people who live in poverty persevere to make thier life better. This documentary shows how the trade of goods can lead to job loss in America but job opportuinties in China. I think we can all agree that people who live in poverty and are seeking jobs want the government to reform the job market because the government right now in China and America aren't creating more job opportunities and the government is not doingenought to help people come out of poverty.

    Read More

  • The Myth Of Poverty In America

    1125 Words  | 3 Pages

    As stated by Franklin D. Roosevelt, “the test of our progression is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little.” Many people may agree with this statement considering that the United States is such a wealthy country and in 2012, 46.5 million people were living in poverty in the United States and 15% of all Americans and 21.8% of children under age eighteen were in poverty.The honest truth is that many people do not know the conditions this group of people must live in on a daily basis because of the small number of people who realize the struggle there is not a great amount of service. In the article Too stressed for Success, the author Kevin Clarke asks the question “What is the cost of being poor in America?” and follows the question by explaining the great deals of problems the community of poverty goes through daily by saying, “Researchers have long known that because of a broad reduction in retail and other consumer choices experienced by America's poor, it is often simply more expensive to be poor in the United States.

    Read More

  • The Logic Of Stupid Poor People

    796 Words  | 2 Pages

    Poverty is a complex and growing problem in the United States. As of right now there is no solution. There are proposals and acts, such as Obama Care, that were enacted in an attempt to help people in poverty, and there are so many organizations, such as Habitat for Humanity and The Hunger Project, that try to aid people when they start to lack the necessities, like food and shelter. College students are graduating college with a large amount of student loans and no way of paying them off, people are being evicted from their homes, and employees are being laid off. The unemployment rate in the United States in 2015 was five percent, that’s about fifteen million people. It’s becoming difficult for people to find jobs, therefore making it hard for people to get back on their feet and start living a comfortable lifestyle. Poverty in the

    Read More

  • The Black Community: The Uses Of Poverty In The Community

    1873 Words  | 4 Pages

    Gans wrote an essay on the uses of poverty (Gans, 1971). He came to the conclusion that our society needs the poor to function. Gans gave thirteen different reasons as to why we need the poor, and what their functions are. The first is that we need poverty to make sure that the “dirty work” gets done. By dirty work, he means jobs that are dangerous, underpaid, menial, temporary, undignified, and physically dirty. Both the Neumann family and the Stanley family had to take up jobs that fit in with Gans’ first point. They took up jobs that barely gave them any money and they were physically dirty, such as basement waterproofing by Claude Stanley. The second function is that the poor subsidize economic activities to benefit the affluent by working at low wages. It apparently makes life for their employers easier because they have to pay them less. The two families in the documentary were paid very low wages. They knew exactly how it felt. The third function is that the poor create jobs for the rest of society to serve or protect those in poverty. Welfare, food stamps, and homeless shelters are examples of services that help to protect the poor. Without the poor, those jobs would not be necessary. Both families could have used help from those services to get them through their rough patch of poverty. The fourth function is that the poor prolong the economic usefulness of items like day old bread and old fruit and vegetable. They buy the stuff that others do not want to buy. Secondhand clothes and deteriorating building are also included. The Stanley family went to thrift shops to buy their clothes. They couldn’t afford to buy the clothes from regular stores. The fifth function is that the poor are a deviant subculture that help uphold the legitimacy of societal norms. Gans says that the rest of the society can use the poor to be punished for being lazy, promiscuous, and dishonest. They are most likely to be caught for it. Some

    Read More

  • Homelessness And Poverty Analysis

    226 Words  | 1 Pages

    In this story, poverty and homelessness is the underlying problem. However another problem discussed is whether or not the potential loss of funding sources to help the homeless justify not standing up against policy that negatively affects the homeless population by causing unjust criminalization (Pg. 100). In my heart, and in a perfect world, I would never want to sacrifice my beliefs of fighting for the greater good of all people, but I understand that it is more complicated than this in real life. There is no doubt that we are all born with different opportunities. Our text explains some of the personal factors that determines who is homeless. Some of the contributing causes of homelessness include addiction, disability, mental illness,

    Read More

  • The End Of Poverty: Movie Analysis

    895 Words  | 2 Pages

    The 2008 documentary The End of Poverty? is a film that focuses around global poverty and how it became the tragedy that it is today. Poverty was created by acts of military conquest, slavery and colonization that led to the confiscation of individual’s property and forced labor. However, today the problem remains because wealthy countries who take advantage of developing third world countries. The film interviews several activists who discuss how the issues became and several ways in which they could be eliminated, as well as interviews from individuals who are experiencing it firsthand.

    Read More

  • Poverty Sociology Essay

    1163 Words  | 3 Pages

    Poverty has affected the lives of many people around the world and with the definition being covered it proves that the government has to change for the different situations that people can get themselves plus the different inequality that is displayed throughout the social classes and social norms. Also the myths that were covered proves how the world views people that are in poverty which is not true and lastly what was covered was the significance of how poverty is affecting society and what implications are taking place. Poverty may never be solved but the way the world looks at it could be

    Read More

  • The Negative Effects Of Poverty

    1313 Words  | 3 Pages

    Poverty is an undeniable problem in America. In 2014, 14.8 percent of the United States was in poverty (“Hunger and Poverty Fact Sheet”). There are more people in the United States than it seems that do not have their basic necessities. In an

    Read More

More about The Stereotypes Of Poverty In The Documentary By Linda Midgett

Open Document