Separate Realities: The Dream and the Iceberg - Scarecrow Press

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48 Chapter 2 The existence of mixed forms of evidence where interest in class inequalities is concerned suggests that Americans generally lack a consistent focus on, or clear understanding of, the submerged dimensions of the class iceberg, including conflicting class interests, the structures and processes that legitimate the class system, and the possibilities for changing it. 12 We think the paradoxical trends of interest/concern and confusion/distraction stem, at least in part, from the taboo nature of social class in America. SOCIAL CLASS: THE LAST TABOO Class is the last great taboo. These days it’s more socially acceptable to talk about sex than it is about . . . class. —Felice Yeskel, “Class Action in the News,” April 1, 2006 Mainstream American social institutions today openly address a wide range of issues that until recently have been considered taboo as topics for public discussion. Despite the expanding inventory of previously censored cultural and lifestyle issues (e.g., sexual orientation, abortion, rape, family violence, race and gender inequalities), social-class analysis remains the last taboo. This is especially the case for analyses involving the nature and consequences of socialclass structures, interests, and power inequalities. Examples of topics excluded from consideration by conventional social institutions under the taboo include inquiries into the one-sided class war waged by the superclass against the working class, interpretations of working-class economic and political interests as legitimate, the merits of a labor party, and the need for new redistribution policies developed by and for the new working class that would shift substantial privileged-class economic and political resources to workers. Where these and other features of class analysis are concerned, a virtual blackout exists among mainstream social institutions. Few public forums exist for wideranging discussions of these topics, and they have been consistently marginalized and ignored by the schools, the mass media, and most political leaders. Despite occasional media attention to some class-related lifestyle issues and economic inequalities—as discussed later in this section, in the box at the end of this chapter (“Class Issues in the Media: The American Dream”), and in chapter 5—the taboo against social-class analysis remains firmly in place. Class analyses involving the issues noted above are not curricular themes covered in schools at the primary or secondary level and are seldom included in university-level courses. 13 In the mainstream media, we find attention to working-class interests to be virtually nonexistent. In the print media, newspaper editors have little interest in, or sympathy for, working-class interests or issues. Majorities ranging from 54 percent to 60 percent of editors report that they side with business in labor disputes and also in business-worker conflicts involving issues such as minimum-wage increases and plant-closing legisla-
Separate Realities 49 tion. 14 Every major U.S. daily newspaper includes a separate business section, but none includes a separate “class” or even “labor” section, and none of the 1,457 daily U.S. newspapers includes a regular commentary column written by a socialist or social democrat. 15 A similar situation exists in the electronic media, as illustrated by a study of the three network television evening news programs, which found the networks devote only 2 percent of total airtime to workers’ issues. 16 Television news interview programs mirror this pattern. A study of the major TV networks’ Sunday morning talk shows covering nineteen months identified only 2 representatives of organized labor out of 364 guests. More recent studies found “no labor guests” have ever appeared on NBC’s Sunday morning Chris Matthews Show since its debut in 2002, while Matthews’ cable show, Hardball (MSNBC), interviewed labor leaders only six times in a fifteen month period spanning 2004 and 2005. 17 Politicians typically avoid class-based rhetoric, especially the use of language and policy labels that might openly emphasize or reveal the conflicting economic and political interests of working-class versus privileged-class members. This is the case because political candidates, especially presidential candidates, who violate what amounts to an unwritten rule against framing class inequalities as legitimate public policy issues risk being accused of promoting divisive and disruptive “class warfare” by privileged-class-based mainstream media pundits and their class cousins, “responsible” public officials, politicians, and business leaders. 18 Candidates who violate this rule are likely to be pressured by mainstream pundits to conform; if that fails and candidates persist, they are likely to be marginalized, ignored, or ridiculed by mainstream media pundits and political leaders. The end result may be political stigma and a failed campaign. But not always. For example, in 2006 a number of congressional candidates advocating pro-working-class policies won their elections. 19 This topic is considered in more detail at the end of chapter 4 in the box, “Class Issues in the Media: U.S. Elections and the Class Taboo.” Only two exceptions exist to the taboo on public discussions of class issues. First, it is acceptable to discuss the “middle class” and problems faced by this class. 20 Because large numbers of Americans identify themselves as middle class, references to this group actually serve to disguise and mute class differences because the term is so inclusive—it includes nearly everyone. When the mainstream media profile middle-class concerns, as was the case in the mid- 2000s (as noted earlier), such reports increase public interest in, and the market for, such reporting. The 2005 New York Times “Class Matters” series (later published as a book) illustrates the mainstream media approach to class inequalities. The Times series, like a few other high-profile mid-2000s media reports on growing economic inequalities and middle-class concerns (discussed at the end of chapter 5), did not address conflicting class interests or class power inequalities. Instead, the Times series focused mainly on class-based lifestyle differences, social experiences, and income inequalities. On the latter issue, the Times acknowledged that in recent years U.S. income inequality has
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