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Awaiting Trump's coal comeback, miners reject retraining
- Thread starter Dalek
- Start date
They can't conceive their presidential candidate would lie to them, but I wonder; if asked about Hillary's emails or Benghazi or whatever, did they also think she wouldn't lie or did they call her a liar? I think partisanship plays into how much faith they have in Trump.
It should be known that this retraining stuff has been there for a while these coal miners and they ask for very little from said miners. But we'll be having the same conversation next election about how these folks have been "ignored" and no one is offering any kind of retraining or support for them.
Sitting and hoping and pointing fingers is easier than moving in a new direction. These people would rather stick their heads in the sand and pray than get with the program. They'll find a scapegoat though, so it's all good. Right? Why wouldn't their jobs come back? Climate change isn't real, is it?
All kidding aside, I have no sympathy for these people. They're not looking a gift horse in the mouth, they're punching it in the teeth.
All kidding aside, I have no sympathy for these people. They're not looking a gift horse in the mouth, they're punching it in the teeth.
This is a good point. I can't quote everyone who said similar, lol.
When you sit back and actually observe politics, it's a sad state of affairs.
I've only ever seen it used in my life as a way to criticize people for patronizingly telling someone to 'pull themselves up by their boostraps.' Guess we took ownership of it and flipped it like they flipped "Fake News."
That is pretty much every (or going to be) Trump voter.
Speaks for itself
no matter how uncomfortable it makes Americans, the truth is that history is not over and reality is not stagnant. Neither coal, nor anything else, is forever.
uh, we have a few
it's like a cultural thing
uh, we have a few
it's like a cultural thing
It's sad. I guess there is schadenfreude involved but hearing the same lines used against blacks in New Orleans and other impoverished minorities irks me. There is incredible difficulty and costs involved with moving, and we are talking about long generational lines. For me the argument that "they did it first," shouldn't apply here.
I would also like to add that if they can't fill these courses they can apply the saved money to my student loans. I just don't understand why anyone would turn down free education and training. I understand they don't get paid but for those that aren't currently working what do they have to lose? The line about not wanting to travel for work was just insane to me because people have ridiculous commutes everywhere to end up somewhere that there is work.
Because these people are lazy as shit. They also don't view education as a good thing.
for a lot of these guys, all their dads and grandads needed was two hands and a willingness to work, and they could provide for their families. That is, in itself, a kind of American dream/bubble. But that's all they know, they didn't have plans for anything else.
EDIT: for the record, i know sympathy for coal miners is lame atm.
Am I supposed to feel sorry for them?
Though I suppose I do, actually, feel bad for them in some ways. That level of ignorance/stupidity isn't formed on its own, it's a product of a lifetime surrounded by angry entitlement. It's hard to break away from the pack, and if you don't know your pack is sick and dying, it makes sense you'd fight to preserve it.
I foresee a lot of opioid addiction and broken towns coming from these areas.
Though I suppose I do, actually, feel bad for them in some ways. That level of ignorance/stupidity isn't formed on its own, it's a product of a lifetime surrounded by angry entitlement. It's hard to break away from the pack, and if you don't know your pack is sick and dying, it makes sense you'd fight to preserve it.
I foresee a lot of opioid addiction and broken towns coming from these areas.
Which, sadly, is a problem. The world does not stand still. Life moves forward, culture and civilization progresses with time. There is no sure thing in this world. Those who cannot find ways to adapt to change become irrelevant. It's all well to feel sorry of those left behind (being humans, we can feel for others), but time doesn't feel sorry, and nature doesn't feel sorry. That is the way of the world. That is the way of life.
Yyyup. Trump is one evil motherfucker.
"We're gonna bring coal jobs back and cure the opioid epidemic!"
And then he doesn't bring coal jobs back and more people take opioids to forget how shitty their lives are.
It's amazing. The term "selling your soul to the company store" comes directly from this industry, it showcases the contempt that this industry has for these people. As the business is dying, they hold steadfastly on to the idea that people who, at best, cared nothing for them in the first place, and more realistically hate them, will suddenly hop to and give them means to live through jobs.
That's an idealistic view of the current state of America. If they don't wake up then they deserve their fate of being left behind.
It's already there. They don't call opioid pills hillbilly heroin for nothing.
How dare you! These are "real Americans" and if you insult them, they'll never join "our" side.
You must treat these "real Americans" with kid gloves, no matter how stupid or self destructive they are.
~The moderate
I think the entire situation is sad. I don't fault these people entirely - they've been taken advantage of by forces larger than themselves for decades, and come from communities where things like education or being politically informed aren't valued. And the entire opioid and heroin epidemic is just terrible and tragic.
I will call out their hypocrisy though. These are the "bootstraps" voters, the ones who constantly call out people of color for "taking handouts" - and despite being provided free retraining to pull up their bootstraps, they decline to use it. I realize many have, but clearly not a majority, so it's difficult to have sympathy for those who didn't.
I will call out their hypocrisy though. These are the "bootstraps" voters, the ones who constantly call out people of color for "taking handouts" - and despite being provided free retraining to pull up their bootstraps, they decline to use it. I realize many have, but clearly not a majority, so it's difficult to have sympathy for those who didn't.
I absolutely agree. I don't think anybody is making that argument, but I could see a situation where someone might find themselves so wrapped up in binary partisan politics and tribalism that they might get a warped view like that. In both situations, it's people choosing to resent someone rather than feel less about their own status.
To say "These ignorant assholes don't want to give up their precious coal!" is such a childish and inhumane way to look at what's going on. New industries aren't coming in and they got their whole lives and families there. Doesn't make their political alignment with transparent charlatans like Trump right, but having such vitriol for people whom you've never met in communities you've never visited is not going to lead anywhere constructive for anybody. It's not what a progressive, compassionate, and educated person would do. For many, such an identity as a progressive is naught but pretense, as demonstrated here in this thread time and time again.
As I said before, we shouldn't let ourselves be tricked into hating the small man who turned to a liar in desperation. Hate the liars who have been preying on Appalachian communities for 150 years.
And why not take the time and get to know them? Learn about their communities. Maybe visit their communities. Volunteer. Work together with them to build a new vision for Appalachia that actually promises a future for their families.
If reaching out to these communities is beneath your time and dignity, but smugly going on about how ignorant they are and deserving they are of their families' misery isn't? Then that should disabuse you of the notion you were ever a progressive. Just another version of the people you resent residing on the opposite side of the same smug, privileged coin.
I admit that I didn't vote for Bernie in the primaries. But, everyone should listen to how he speaks to the people in coal country. He listens with an open mind and heart and by the end, he often uncovers that they are people just like anybody else who really only care about taking care of the people that depend on them and they are scared that one day they might not be able to do it. A little dignity goes a long, long way. That man is a good example of a true progressive.
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LOL, imagine that. A 55 year old coal miner choosing to enrich himself in the field he's worked for his entire life instead of becoming a computer programmer. What a dumbass!
K. How am I as a black woman supposed to reach across the aisle to the angry white coal miners who love bitching at me about bootstraps. You fail to understand that are rage towards these people is because they keep biting us.
Give them tax breaks.
They lie about us.
Offer them retraining programs.
They disregard them and call us a bunch of entitled babies.
You can only get kicked in the face so many goddamned times before you start swinging back.
When it means cosigning his family to poverty while also blaming everyone else but themselves then yeah, I'm going to clown on them.
You don't get to blame me without hearing my mouth.
I was wondering this today. Would they take straight-up handouts or something like UBI? Do they only want coal? I get that that's part of their identity and that they might think that coal is necessarily going to remain a decently-paying gig for someone without a technical background. But I have to wonder what, besides running out of coal to mine, would induce this population to let go of the coal dream.
You're a really aggressive poster. Try not to get caught up in the same thing you did yesterday.
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I understand why you feel this way. So many Trump voters and rural white people have a twisted vision about the black community. They've never been to these communities, they never talk to the people in these communities, and they never take the time to learn about why these communities have been historically exploited, abused, and kept impoverished before they call them ingrates, ignorant, and blame their culture for why things are they way they are and why they keep voting for people who only manipulate their desperation and suffering for their own political gains.
Now, I'm going to ask the same of you. How many coal communities have you been to? How many Appalachian people do you know? I think you would find that working class people from America share so much more in common than they don't. If they hate you, and you hate them, but you've never even mat each other or visited each other's neighborhoods, then somebody had to teach you to hate.
I just ask that before you dismiss them as lazy ingrates, try walking a mile in their shoes. If a man gets offered retraining as a computer programmer but there are no programming jobs in Logan, WV for everybody, what good is the training if he has kids and a disabled elderly father who needs his support? He turns to coal not because he hates the environment, but because he loves his family and is scared that he can't provide for them. That's all. Doesn't make his politics right, but it's a lot more complicated than some are making it seem in here.
I want to look toward a path where working class people unite for one another, regardless of any other identity we might have, at the end of the day we are all Americans, neighbors, and friends.
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Quick question, the white working class folks problems are mainly self inflicted. They have been bitching at the black community about bootstraps yet somehow it's the black community who must stand in their shoes?
if by "self-inflicted" you mean "caused by decades of miseducation and propaganda created by the coal industry, which has spent decades essentially overtaking entire towns and communities and turning them into 'coal towns' until these communities' entire identity is centered around their servitude for corporate interests, and entire local economies depend on the continued existence of coal mines to exist and sustain themselves, thus inevitably causing an existential terror as it becomes more and more apparent that the coal industry is not long for this world which locals are not prepared to deal with"
stop getting mad at individual coal miners who are just scared for their jobs and family and want security, and get mad at the corporations and politicians who have led people to that point.
Why would I be mad at them ? They are offered help and refuse it. Sorry if you feel my lack of sympathy for them is me being angry. My question was they had help refused help and attacked the others for being entitled and all that jazz and yet somehow the others are the ones who needs to try to understand from their point of view?
"Take this free retraining for a job in a field that simply doesn't exist in Gilbert, WV".
O-ok.
Oh I didn't know they only offered One type of course and enlighten me how does that make me understand why should other community who were attacked by them are the ones who are supposed to try to understand them?