Social Class

My initial response to watching the video "People Like Us" was frustration at how narrow minded the people were, but when I thought about it, their beliefs come from how they were socialized. I'm still frustrated, but I guess I have to be more upset with the socialization and more understanding of the fact that some people don't realize that they are being prejudice. If a person is born into a higher class, they are socialized into thinking that certain behaviors are proper and polite, but that doesn't excuse disrespect. The "WASP" in the video had a really narrow mind about people in other classes, and I think the biggest problem is that people will use their social class or culture's criteria for judgment without realizing that the person they are criticizing has grew up and was socialized completely differently. And even if they are in a certain class, a person shouldn't be limited to behaving only as a person in that class is supposed to. The stereotype the the African Americans in the video were running into was that if they were using "proper english" or going to "ivy league" schools or were simply upper class, was that they must be "bourgeoisie" or "acting like a white person." It's frustrating that they have to be placed in a category, when none of the criteria that mark any category or social class can actually describe each member accurately. It just seems pretty ironic that all social classes do is divide a country whose founding principals are equality and unity.