By Jim Heffernan
It’s easy to understand why the nuns were so testy. They always had a class with 50 students. That’s just the way it was in Catholic schools in “baby boom” times. I spent my first 9 years of school in Catholic schools and in every classroom, I shared it with at least 49 other kids.
I think 50 is the maximum number of people that one person can control, provided they’re adept in the use of verbal and physical threats.
“You’ll end up in a factory,” was a strange thing to say in my school. I grew up in a working-class neighborhood and I suspect half the kids in the room had parents that worked in a factory. My father delivered mail. I don’t think there were any children of doctors or lawyers in my school.
The funny thing is she was right. I did end up in a factory. After I left the military, I spent 41 of my 42 working years in a factory. I loved it and wouldn’t change it if I could. I do regret the year I spent trying to be a businessman.
It’s only in the last few years that I learned a name for her attitude. These days we call it “elitism.” It’s real and it’s divided our nation. Implicit in Sister’s attitude was the idea that without a degree, my life would be wasted.
She was wrong. Too many of us share her attitude.
When I ran for Transportation Board a couple of years ago, I went to all the candidate forums. It shocked me that it was at the Republican forums where I saw familiar faces from my years at the Cheese Factory.
The people I worked with were not really drawn to the Republican party by anything special that the Republican party was going to give them. They were driven from the Democrats, my party, by our “elitism.” Somehow the historic party of the “common man” now looks like the party of the professional class. It wouldn’t pain me so much if they had migrated to the historic “Party of Lincoln” but that party doesn’t exist anymore. It has become the party of Trump.
Trump narrowly won the election, I am sure, because too many of us working class voters felt disrespected by the elitist attitude that infected the Democrats.
Maybe this time around, when the smoke clears, we will see things as they truly are and we can begin re-building this sundered nation. Maybe we Democrats will shed our elitism. Maybe working-class voters will finally realize who is really on their side.
As always, discussion welcome at codger817@gmail.com
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