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[larryc]

Illuminata, if your can boil what teachers really need to know and is supported by research into a 180 page book, each point illustrated by a compelling anecdote, and include "teacher-hero" stories, and then develop a 50 minute lecture on it and 2, 3, and 4 hour workshops, you can be rich beyond your wildest dreams. I am completely serious.

[iomhaigh]

What's wrong with 19th century ideas?

They aren't necessarily wrong just because they are old, or because they have been discarded.

If they are wrong, then they should be shown wrong on their own merits.

Good, accurate stereotypes can be extraordinarily useful, particularly when dealing with groups of people (as opposed to individuals).  They can even be useful in individual contexts if one keeps in mind that they should only be easily rebuttable default presumptions.

I don't see what's so bad about saying that poor people are typically raised in a culture which is designed for short-term survival and which is not conducive to empire-building.  It may actually be the truth.  If different organisms can be better or worse suited to particular environments, why not cultures?

For starters, read some Payne before you try to summarize her and defend her.  Then, take some history classes.   

Here's a few of my favorite 19th century stereotypes & ideas which are the historical precedents of Payne's "theories."

Slavery. 

The happy slave.  (For a modern reworking of this concept and its ill-effects, see the house-elves in Harry Potter.)

From Elizabeth Robins's Votes for Women:
Miss Levering: '"A woman told me--one of the sort that knows--told me many of them "like it" so much that they are indifferent to the risk of being sent to prison. "It gives them a rest," she said."

(She refers to poor women who live on the fringes of society aka prostitutes here)

Poor people - they LIKE being poor and/or are too stupid to get out poverty.  Let's not bother to pay any attention to industry practices which prevent them from rising above their station.   

Hysteria diagnoses.

Outright shunning & disownment of people who married into the wrong class. 

Reactions to immigrants in this country -- much like current reactions, I might add.  It wasn't helpful or productive then, and it sure as shooting isn't now. 

Do I really need to go through all of this?  Really?  Comments like this make me think you really are a sophomore. 

[oldchair]

What's wrong with 19th century ideas?

They aren't necessarily wrong just because they are old, or because they have been discarded.

If they are wrong, then they should be shown wrong on their own merits.

Good, accurate stereotypes can be extraordinarily useful, particularly when dealing with groups of people (as opposed to individuals).  They can even be useful in individual contexts if one keeps in mind that they should only be easily rebuttable default presumptions.

I don't see what's so bad about saying that poor people are typically raised in a culture which is designed for short-term survival and which is not conducive to empire-building.  It may actually be the truth.  If different organisms can be better or worse suited to particular environments, why not cultures?

For starters, read some Payne before you try to summarize her and defend her.  Then, take some history classes.   

Here's a few of my favorite 19th century stereotypes & ideas which are the historical precedents of Payne's "theories."

Slavery. 

The happy slave.  (For a modern reworking of this concept and its ill-effects, see the house-elves in Harry Potter.)

From Elizabeth Robins's Votes for Women:
Miss Levering: '"A woman told me--one of the sort that knows--told me many of them "like it" so much that they are indifferent to the risk of being sent to prison. "It gives them a rest," she said."

(She refers to poor women who live on the fringes of society aka prostitutes here)

Poor people - they LIKE being poor and/or are too stupid to get out poverty.  Let's not bother to pay any attention to industry practices which prevent them from rising above their station.   

Hysteria diagnoses.

Outright shunning & disownment of people who married into the wrong class. 

Reactions to immigrants in this country -- much like current reactions, I might add.  It wasn't helpful or productive then, and it sure as shooting isn't now. 

Do I really need to go through all of this?  Really?  Comments like this make me think you really are a sophomore. 

Are any of these quotes from Payne?  I've read only one of her books, and don't recall anything of this nature. 

I'm not sure Larryc needs to take any more history courses.  Something tells me he's taken enough.

[iomhaigh]

What's wrong with 19th century ideas?

They aren't necessarily wrong just because they are old, or because they have been discarded.

If they are wrong, then they should be shown wrong on their own merits.

Good, accurate stereotypes can be extraordinarily useful, particularly when dealing with groups of people (as opposed to individuals).  They can even be useful in individual contexts if one keeps in mind that they should only be easily rebuttable default presumptions.

I don't see what's so bad about saying that poor people are typically raised in a culture which is designed for short-term survival and which is not conducive to empire-building.  It may actually be the truth.  If different organisms can be better or worse suited to particular environments, why not cultures?

For starters, read some Payne before you try to summarize her and defend her.  Then, take some history classes.   

Here's a few of my favorite 19th century stereotypes & ideas which are the historical precedents of Payne's "theories."

Slavery. 

The happy slave.  (For a modern reworking of this concept and its ill-effects, see the house-elves in Harry Potter.)

From Elizabeth Robins's Votes for Women:
Miss Levering: '"A woman told me--one of the sort that knows--told me many of them "like it" so much that they are indifferent to the risk of being sent to prison. "It gives them a rest," she said."

(She refers to poor women who live on the fringes of society aka prostitutes here)

Poor people - they LIKE being poor and/or are too stupid to get out poverty.  Let's not bother to pay any attention to industry practices which prevent them from rising above their station.   

Hysteria diagnoses.

Outright shunning & disownment of people who married into the wrong class. 

Reactions to immigrants in this country -- much like current reactions, I might add.  It wasn't helpful or productive then, and it sure as shooting isn't now. 

Do I really need to go through all of this?  Really?  Comments like this make me think you really are a sophomore. 

Are any of these quotes from Payne?  I've read only one of her books, and don't recall anything of this nature. 

I'm not sure Larryc needs to take any more history courses.  Something tells me he's taken enough.

Huh?

My comments were not directed at Larryc, and my intentional use of "historical precedents" would suggest that these are NOT Payne's ideas, but rather the ideological forebearers of them.   

[oldchair]

Sorry.  I thought you were referring to larryc's previous post.  My mistake.

I'm still confused, though.  How are the ideas you presented the historical forebearers of Payne's ideas?  Does she argue something similar?

[larryc]

Considering the hostility Payne arouses here (I haven't read her) I think there must be an academic critique of her work somewhere.  Anyone have a link?

[iomhaigh]

Sorry.  I thought you were referring to larryc's previous post.  My mistake.

I'm still confused, though.  How are the ideas you presented the historical forebearers of Payne's ideas?  Does she argue something similar?

She relies on a lot of outdated stereotypes about the poor which have not moved much beyond 19th century conceptions about why people are poor.  She also relies on a lot of current stereotypes which are simply modern recastings of 19th century (and earlier, frankly) stereotypes.  Poor people cannot raise themselves up by their bootstraps because they are too prone to being unmotivated, uneducated, etc -- but she does not really address WHY so many poor people end up in these situations.  Seriously, you can trace a nice straight line from "freed slaves need to act white to not be threatening to the whites" right along to her discussions of how the working class needs to change their manner of speaking so as to pass in the middle and upper class.  She teaches people how to teach their children to SPEAK like middle class white people.  This is but one example.  

As a poor person who did get out, I find it incredibly short-sighted and patronizing (ooh!  look at her!  She's a cute little poster child for a good work ethic and someone who learned the social skills of the upper-middle class and was able to escape her class) when in reality, I and a hell of a lot of poor people that I knew and know always had the skills, intelligence, drive and manners to succeed in the middle and upper classes without needing to become assimilated or share their value systems, etc., but we never had the financial opportunity to get out.  She completely (at least in the material I read, and this was a while ago when I was all excited by the prospect that someone understood what I had lived) misses the socioeconomic and institutional structures which keep people oppressed.  

A practical example that might explain what I feel she misses: Internships.

If Payne were to discuss them, based on my interpretation of the work of hers which I have read, she would discuss the social boundaries that working class kids might encounter when dealing with, say, law firm internships.  WC kids might have trouble fitting in because they didn't play golf as kids and would have trouble socializing at the golf outings that my lawyer buddies went on as interns.  They would not necessarily know how to speak or behave properly, and in her view, would likely get pitched off of the golf course for looking like hoodlums (okay, that's my frustration with her coming out.)  (This assumes you get the internship, which is a whole other ball of related wax.)    

This is all fine and dandy to a point.  I accept that only certain classes are likely to play polo as kids and that wc kids might have some issues adjusting.   But, she'd leave the discussion there and focus on the how the working class kids need to change to fit in.  

She never quite gets to the larger and much more important underlying problem that working class kids cannot afford to spend their summers interning unless someone steps in and gives them funding because they have to work at paid jobs in the summer in order to afford college in the first place.  And, historically, they are not going to be attending the kinds of colleges which fund all summer internships.  Hence, they cannot take those full-time summer internships because they cannot afford to do so.  

This is not the best example, but I pitched my Payne materials when I moved because she annoyed the pants off of me, and my foray onto her website while writing this just made my blood pressure go up.  I'm particularly fond of her comment in a linked newspaper article that the college professors who criticize her do so because they've never worked with poor students.  Patronizing pretentious and presumptuous.      

She would look at me and think that I got out because I had assimilated properly and learned to pass (which, if you know me, you'll know is a joke), instead of recognzing that I got out because I'm damned smart, was at the top of my class and I ignored my high school guidance counselors and applied to elite schools, and I got into some of them with full aid packages because I was fantastic for their demographic profile and could not afford to go without their need-blind admissions policies. I went where I went because they gave me a load of cash, and I did not go to the other schools where I got in because they did not give me enough aid.  My college pedigree and my brain got me into my grad school... etc.    

Now, my high school guidance counselors might have read her works and decided that I was better off going to a state school because I was not wealthy, refused to "act above my class" and would not fit in at the super-elite school I attended.  Guess what?  I didn't fit in with a lot of the people at my super-elite college when we talked about class & money because many of them had never met people who were not as privileged as they were, but I did fit in on many of the other levels.  (I'm lucky that I chose a college where people don't tend to care as much about the kind of car you drive as a status marker.)

She teaches people how to teach their impoverished students how to pass, and her approach at worst reflects and at best implies an unfortunate assumption that all poor people are so utterly lacking in their social skills that they cannot pass in a different class without someone telling them how to do so.  

I had hope for her work -- because there are codes and because her intentions reflect, as acrimone noted early in the thread, a desire to address some serious issues in this country.  But, her manner of doing so is just misguided and reinforces too many long-standing stereotypes.    

[oldchair]

Thank you.  Your reply is very thoughtful and helpful.  I had not noticed these dimensions in Payne's work, but I've only read a bit of what she has written.  I wouldn't be very sympathetic to arguments that poor people are poor because they lack motivation, either.

I really do appreciate your response.

[iomhaigh]

Thank you.  Your reply is very thoughtful and helpful.  I had not noticed these dimensions in Payne's work, but I've only read a bit of what she has written.  I wouldn't be very sympathetic to arguments that poor people are poor because they lack motivation, either.

I really do appreciate your response.

Sure thing -- my apologies for getting steamy -- it all just torques me because she has the mouthpiece and power to do so much good and yet it is so unfortunately misguided. 

Something's better than nothing, I suppose. 

[acrimone]

She relies on a lot of outdated stereotypes about the poor which have not moved much beyond 19th century conceptions about why people are poor.  She also relies on a lot of current stereotypes which are simply modern recastings of 19th century (and earlier, frankly) stereotypes.  Poor people cannot raise themselves up by their bootstraps because they are too prone to being unmotivated, uneducated, etc -- but she does not really address WHY so many poor people end up in these situations.  Seriously, you can trace a nice straight line from "freed slaves need to act white to not be threatening to the whites" right along to her discussions of how the working class needs to change their manner of speaking so as to pass in the middle and upper class.  She teaches people how to teach their children to SPEAK like middle class white people.  This is but one example.  

As a poor person who did get out, I find it incredibly short-sighted and patronizing (ooh!  look at her!  She's a cute little poster child for a good work ethic and someone who learned the social skills of the upper-middle class and was able to escape her class) when in reality, I and a hell of a lot of poor people that I knew and know always had the skills, intelligence, drive and manners to succeed in the middle and upper classes without needing to become assimilated or share their value systems, etc., but we never had the financial opportunity to get out.  She completely (at least in the material I read, and this was a while ago when I was all excited by the prospect that someone understood what I had lived) misses the socioeconomic and institutional structures which keep people oppressed.  

A practical example that might explain what I feel she misses: Internships.

If Payne were to discuss them, based on my interpretation of the work of hers which I have read, she would discuss the social boundaries that working class kids might encounter when dealing with, say, law firm internships.  WC kids might have trouble fitting in because they didn't play golf as kids and would have trouble socializing at the golf outings that my lawyer buddies went on as interns.  They would not necessarily know how to speak or behave properly, and in her view, would likely get pitched off of the golf course for looking like hoodlums (okay, that's my frustration with her coming out.)  (This assumes you get the internship, which is a whole other ball of related wax.)    

This is all fine and dandy to a point.  I accept that only certain classes are likely to play polo as kids and that wc kids might have some issues adjusting.   But, she'd leave the discussion there and focus on the how the working class kids need to change to fit in.  

She never quite gets to the larger and much more important underlying problem that working class kids cannot afford to spend their summers interning unless someone steps in and gives them funding because they have to work at paid jobs in the summer in order to afford college in the first place.  And, historically, they are not going to be attending the kinds of colleges which fund all summer internships.  Hence, they cannot take those full-time summer internships because they cannot afford to do so.  

This is not the best example, but I pitched my Payne materials when I moved because she annoyed the pants off of me, and my foray onto her website while writing this just made my blood pressure go up.  I'm particularly fond of her comment in a linked newspaper article that the college professors who criticize her do so because they've never worked with poor students.  Patronizing pretentious and presumptuous.      

She would look at me and think that I got out because I had assimilated properly and learned to pass (which, if you know me, you'll know is a joke), instead of recognzing that I got out because I'm damned smart, was at the top of my class and I ignored my high school guidance counselors and applied to elite schools, and I got into some of them with full aid packages because I was fantastic for their demographic profile and could not afford to go without their need-blind admissions policies. I went where I went because they gave me a load of cash, and I did not go to the other schools where I got in because they did not give me enough aid.  My college pedigree and my brain got me into my grad school... etc.    

Now, my high school guidance counselors might have read her works and decided that I was better off going to a state school because I was not wealthy, refused to "act above my class" and would not fit in at the super-elite school I attended.  Guess what?  I didn't fit in with a lot of the people at my super-elite college when we talked about class & money because many of them had never met people who were not as privileged as they were, but I did fit in on many of the other levels.  (I'm lucky that I chose a college where people don't tend to care as much about the kind of car you drive as a status marker.)

She teaches people how to teach their impoverished students how to pass, and her approach at worst reflects and at best implies an unfortunate assumption that all poor people are so utterly lacking in their social skills that they cannot pass in a different class without someone telling them how to do so.  

I had hope for her work -- because there are codes and because her intentions reflect, as acrimone noted early in the thread, a desire to address some serious issues in this country.  But, her manner of doing so is just misguided and reinforces too many long-standing stereotypes.    

So let me get this straight... because her description of things has exceptions -- of which you are one -- it's obviously wrong and misguided?

Let's talk about internships for a minute.  Yes, there's an economic aspect to it.  (It's funny you picked interships because I specifically mentioned my own experiences with them before -- when I was in college I couldn't figure out why my friends were taking jobs where they didn't get paid; it made no sense.)  But there's also a cultural aspect.  And it's not fair to say that one shouldn't discuss the cultural aspects without getting down on one knee and paying holy homage to the Gods of Economic Barriers.  The fact that I was raised in a culture where unpaid internships made no sense whatsoever was a cultural barrier.

I was smart enough that if I had known to value such things, I could have made things work out despite the financial difficulties.  But I didn't value such things, because that wasn't part of my world outlook.

It's all well and good that you were smart enough and good enough to make things work despite growing up poor.  It's all well and good that I was able to, too.  But we shouldn't kid ourselves that we weren't hobbled by the attitudes we inherited -- and while I know exactly where I got some of my good influences from, I'm willing to bet there's a few educated, accomplished people in your background, too, who gave just the right pushings in just the right directions in just the right amounts to allow you to pull yourself up by the bootstraps.

You did learn to "pass" and "assimilate."  Clearly.  Don't kid yourself that you didn't.  You never completely take the streets outta the kid -- I had my hand on a knife in my pocket the other day when this guy who asked for directions set off my warning bells -- but you're not exactly a hoodlum.  My evidence:

"I worship the god 'Dieneyesuds' with my lighter and my squeaky new pens while on a 'Search for Gudo.'"

In fact, what you probably don't know (and which I didn't until I was like 28) is that a lot of very well-off middle class people will think you are from a fabulously wealthy family precisely because you are articulate and quirky -- and make silly monty python references while playing Nethack.  I can't tell you the number of people who have told me they thought I was some trust-fund baby, because regular people don't go around acting like I do.  (I can't tell you because I don't really know, but it's more than two.)  They see me in a particular environment, instantly recognize me as not middle class, and assume I must have been raised rich.

I'd be willing to bet a lot of people who don't already know better probably think the same about you.  Passing is a lot easier than you think.  Just because you don't feel comfortable in a situation, doesn't mean that's transmitting.

[iomhaigh]

So let me get this straight... because her description of things has exceptions -- of which you are one -- it's obviously wrong and misguided?

Good lord no, that is not at all what I said.  Her description of things relies far too heavily on stereotypes -- and for that, it is misguided because it, in part, perpetuates centuries-old stereotypes.   The poor are people to whom the middle class needs to show the light, needs to bring culture to, needs to make better because there is nothing inherently valuable in their ways of approaching life.

I'm not saying that exceptions are a problem -- I'm saying that she's overly reductive and using the same basic approach to life that led people to visit the asylums in the 19th century.     

  The fact that I was raised in a culture where unpaid internships made no sense whatsoever was a cultural barrier.

I was smart enough that if I had known to value such things, I could have made things work out despite the financial difficulties.  But I didn't value such things, because that wasn't part of my world outlook.

It's all well and good that you were smart enough and good enough to make things work despite growing up poor.  It's all well and good that I was able to, too.  But we shouldn't kid ourselves that we weren't hobbled by the attitudes we inherited -- and while I know exactly where I got some of my good influences from, I'm willing to bet there's a few educated, accomplished people in your background, too, who gave just the right pushings in just the right directions in just the right amounts to allow you to pull yourself up by the bootstraps.

You did learn to "pass" and "assimilate."  Clearly.  Don't kid yourself that you didn't.  You never completely take the streets outta the kid -- I had my hand on a knife in my pocket the other day when this guy who asked for directions set off my warning bells -- but you're not exactly a hoodlum.  My evidence:

"I worship the god 'Dieneyesuds' with my lighter and my squeaky new pens while on a 'Search for Gudo.'"

In fact, what you probably don't know (and which I didn't until I was like 28) is that a lot of very well-off middle class people will think you are from a fabulously wealthy family precisely because you are articulate and quirky -- and make silly monty python references while playing Nethack.  I can't tell you the number of people who have told me they thought I was some trust-fund baby, because regular people don't go around acting like I do.  (I can't tell you because I don't really know, but it's more than two.)  They see me in a particular environment, instantly recognize me as not middle class, and assume I must have been raised rich.

I'd be willing to bet a lot of people who don't already know better probably think the same about you.  Passing is a lot easier than you think.  Just because you don't feel comfortable in a situation, doesn't mean that's transmitting.

Oh please... the only way anyone would think I'm from a fabulously wealthy family is if they were stoned or they assumed that I'm slumming it.     

One would think that you, of all people on these boards, might be aware of the fact that people can appear differently in text and on board than they do in real life. 

I had a big long reply here, but I'm not bothering getting into an inane argument about my self-awareness with you.  I don't particularly care to subject the rest of the fora to an explanation of exactly how off-track and misguided you are. 

Suffice it to say: I don't kid myself.  I don't think I've transcended my class.  I see no point in trying to do so at this point in my life; I never knew how to back when I might have been insecure enough to care, and I was too vividly aware of the issues and contrary for much of the intervening years to want to do much more than f*** with people's brains by confusing them by playing with their assumptions. 

People don't think I'm fabulously wealthy, in large part because I never did much of what Payne suggests: changing the way I talk, dress, and behave to match someone else's external conceptions of what I should sound, look and act like. 

Indeed, I had a conversation with a campus security guard for a good 1/2 hour earlier this evening before I "remembered my manners" and introduced myself.  He asked where I worked on campus, and when I told him where he was visibly shocked and told me he thought I worked in a building where no one but support staff works.  My neighbors think I work 3rd shift nearby.  Let's not even get into the lack of accoutrements, shall we? 

I don't try to fit any particular value system other than my own peculiar, singular andever-morphing one.  I find life is a lot easier that way, even if it does confuse some people who like everything to fit in neat boxes....

....what a nice segue back to Payne. 

[acrimone]

Good lord no, that is not at all what I said.  Her description of things relies far too heavily on stereotypes -- and for that, it is misguided because it, in part, perpetuates centuries-old stereotypes.   The poor are people to whom the middle class needs to show the light, needs to bring culture to, needs to make better because there is nothing inherently valuable in their ways of approaching life.

Which, as I've been trying to say, isn't a problem if the stereotypes are accurate.  I haven't made any secret of the fact that I haven't read her stuff -- but all I'm hearing from anyone on this board is how her stuff is like/premissed on a bunch of 19th century stereotypes.  The few concrete examples you've given that actually could be proved inaccurate weren't Payne's anyway.

I just don't see how someone who grew up poor and has half an education could possibly deny that the overwhelming force in the perpetuation of poverty through families is the transmission of a values set that doesn't prioritize the sort of things that go towards economic security and success.

You can go ahead and say that the value set that poor people have is a noble one, that there are more important things than formal education and the acquisition of wealth.  I'd agree with you.  But attitude and values are among the chief contributors to the inescapable poverty, and I don't see the harm in pointing that out. Indeed, if you think that economic poverty is something to be escaped from, it's useful to realize what's holding you back.

[illuminata]

The essential problem here is the oversimplification of complex issues. i.e. stereotyping. Not even *most* people really 'fit' these supposed categories. My own class group's description in Payne's books is very wrong on many counts. Hence, the problem with this book being used as training material. People who believe Payne are lead to think that ALL students from class group x behave xly. And treat them accordingly. This flies in the face of legitmate human behavioral research in multiple fields. Students are individuals (and members of families) first. Forgetting that leads to poor pedagogical practice, regardless of the class or color or location of the student.

Which is all why, sadly enough, I can't make this into a dog n pony show and make dollars. Lowest common denominators work in math, not in people.

[iomhaigh]

Good lord no, that is not at all what I said.  Her description of things relies far too heavily on stereotypes -- and for that, it is misguided because it, in part, perpetuates centuries-old stereotypes.   The poor are people to whom the middle class needs to show the light, needs to bring culture to, needs to make better because there is nothing inherently valuable in their ways of approaching life.

Which, as I've been trying to say, isn't a problem if the stereotypes are accurate.  I haven't made any secret of the fact that I haven't read her stuff -- but all I'm hearing from anyone on this board is how her stuff is like/premissed on a bunch of 19th century stereotypes.  The few concrete examples you've given that actually could be proved inaccurate weren't Payne's anyway.

I just don't see how someone who grew up poor and has half an education could possibly deny that the overwhelming force in the perpetuation of poverty through families is the transmission of a values set that doesn't prioritize the sort of things that go towards economic security and success.

You can go ahead and say that the value set that poor people have is a noble one, that there are more important things than formal education and the acquisition of wealth.  I'd agree with you.  But attitude and values are among the chief contributors to the inescapable poverty, and I don't see the harm in pointing that out. Indeed, if you think that economic poverty is something to be escaped from, it's useful to realize what's holding you back.

Man, seriously, learn to read:  I'm NOT denying that there are cultural forces that perpetuate poverty.  But, for Payne, that's all there is -- it is all culture, it is universally defined and applied, and it is all reductive, as illuminata notes.

We cannot overlook the economic factors, and we cannot overlook systematic and institutionalized impoverishment of people in this country which undervalues them based on socio-economic, racial and gender-based   

Here are your concrete examples (some repeated, I might add): poor people need to be saved from themselves, so us upper & middle class folks need to show them how to do it, in a good, patronizing, positivist philosophical approach.  Poor people are not skilled enough, socially or otherwise, to get ahead in this world without the help of us richer folk who know what we're doing.  Poor people are too simplistic to value education or value anything other than family and survivial.  They sit around all day and crack jokes about their situation as a coping mechanism rather than doing something to get out of poverty.  Us upper-middle-class folk need to come in and save them from themselves.  This is a perpetuation of stereotypes of slaves & immigrants. 

Seriously, go read some Payne, then read some Comte, Darwin and social histories, and then come back to us and tell me if you do not think that her work is problematic.  Her work is based on stereotypes.  I am arguing that it is based in part on 19th century holdovers. 
     

And, I cannot believe that I forgot my favorite 19th century stereotype about poor women:
they are all sexually promiscuous anyway, and they are never going to be worth anything, so who cares if they get raped or sexually ruined?  We still live with that one. 

[acrimone]

Poor people need to be saved from themselves, so us upper & middle class folks need to show them how to do it, in a good, patronizing, positivist philosophical approach.  Poor people are not skilled enough, socially or otherwise, to get ahead in this world without the help of us richer folk who know what we're doing.  Poor people are too simplistic to value education or value anything other than family and survivial.  They sit around all day and crack jokes about their situation as a coping mechanism rather than doing something to get out of poverty.  Us upper-middle-class folk need to come in and save them from themselves.  This is a perpetuation of stereotypes of slaves & immigrants. 

Seriously, go read some Payne, then read some Comte, Darwin and social histories, and then come back to us and tell me if you do not think that her work is problematic. 

I'll give her a look, but what you've said so far sounds more or less accurate. 

Poor people do value survival and family more than leaving poverty, which leads people to do things like assemble criminal records in order to accomplish short-term goals, without heeding the long term consequences of such a record.  Poor people drop out of school to care for family members -- I don't mean for a semseter; I mean for years.  Poor people decide not to go to school or to finish a degree because it's going to require more debt, and they've got a really great job offer from a friend.  These are things that happen all the time.  They happened to my cousins, my sister, and they damn near well happened to me.  ANd yes, poor people need someone with a more future-oriented outlook on life to slap them upside the head and say, "What the heck are you doing?"

It was only some condescending, philosophical upper class crusader who saved me from myself, who made me see the mistakes I was about to make.  (Actually is was three of them.)

And yes, poor people do lack a lot of very basic "life skills" (as one of the crusaders called them) that are necessary to succeed economically.  And yes, they need to be taught those skills because by and large they do not get those skills from their parents and they sure as hell don't get them from your typical public school.

Now, if what Illuminata says is true, and the sorts of things she described aren't even true of most people, then the stereotype isn't that useful and should be discarded.  (Which, since I'm inclined to take Illuminata at her word, is why I'm going to read and see for myself.)  And even if her material is balanced, maybe we can say that the risk that it will be misused by those who wish to apply those steortypes universally and without discretion is so great that her work is more harmful than good... but that's not what you're arguing, and you only seem to be making Payne's case more forcefully by explicating it.

Frankly, the things you're saying make you sound like the worst stereotypes of academics: "Oh no, we can't possibly do anything to help people understand how to deal with the cultural issues unless we also deal with the economic and infrastructural issues which are detailed in Chapters 11, 12, and 15 of the work by the noted social theorist...."

Like I said, I'll give Payne a look and see if she's as bad as you say; but from what you've said I've no reason to think so, and I'm not a big fan of letting the perfect be the enemy of the good, as the say.