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J. D. Vance

Friday 26th of April 2024

Families American working-class families experience a level of instability unseen elsewhere in the world. Consider, for instance, mom's revolving door of father figures. No other country experiences anything like this. In France, the percentage of children exposed to three or more maternal partners is 0.5 percent—about one in two hundred. The second highest share is 2.6 percent, in Sweden, or about one in forty. In the United States, the figure is a shocking 8.2 percent — about one in twelve — and the figure is even higher in the working class. J.D. Vance, Hillbilly Elegy © 2016 Kwiple.com
Families Chaos begets chaos. Instability begets instability. Welcome to family life for the American hillbilly. J.D. Vance, Hillbilly Elegy © 2016 Kwiple.com
Income inequality At Yale Law school, I felt like my spaceship had crashed in Oz. People would say with a straight face that a surgeon mother and engineer father were middle-class. In Middletown [Ohio], $160,000 is an unfathomable salary; at Yale Law School, students expect to earn that amount in the first year after law school. Many of them are already worried that it won't be enough. J.D. Vance, Hillbilly Elegy © 2016 Kwiple.com
Knowledge He taught me that lack of knowledge and lack of intelligence were not the same. The first could be remedied with a little patience and a lot of hard work. And the latter? “Well, I guess you're up shit creek without a paddle.” J.D. Vance, Hillbilly Elegy, on his grandfather © 2016 Kwiple.com
Selfie I identify with the millions of working-class white Americans of Scots-Irish descent who have no college degree. To these folks, poverty is is the family tradition— their ancestors were day laborers in the Southern slave economy, sharecroppers after that, coal miners after that, and machinists and millworkers during more recent times. Americans call them hillbillies, rednecks, or white trash. I call them neighbors, friends and family. J.D. Vance, Hillbilly Elegy © 2016 Kwiple.com
Selfie We didn't live a peaceful life in a small nuclear family. We lived a chaotic life in big groups of aunts, uncles, grandparents, and cousins. This was the life I'd been given, and I was a pretty happy kid. J.D. Vance, Hillbilly Elegy © 2016 Kwiple.com
Snapshot What Trump is is just another opioid. Donald Trump portrayed by J.D. Vance © 2016 Kwiple.com
Trumpists say  If I had been vice president [on Jan. 6, 2021],  I would have told the states, like Pennsylvania,  Georgia, and so many others, that we needed to  have multiple slates of electors, and I think the  U.S. Congress should have fought over it from there. That is the legitimate way to deal with an election that a lot of folks, including me, think had a lot of problems in 2020. I think that’s what we should have done. J. D. Vance, auditioning to be Trump's running mate by confirming that he would have violated the Constitution and participated in Trump's attempt to overturn the 2020 election  [Over 60 courts denied Trump's claims of there being "a lot of problems" in the 2020 election] © 2024 Kwiple.com
Trumpists say It's not whether a woman should be forced to bring a child to term;  it’s whether a child should be allowed to live even though the circumstances of that child's birth are somehow inconvenient or a problem to the society. J. D. Vance, talking about abortion in cases of rape or incest © 2022 Kwiple.com
Trumpists say No more banana republic stuff from Joe Biden. So long as he goes after his political opponents, I will hold nominations to the Department of “Justice” J. D. Vance, 3:02 PM – Nov 1, 2023 ["hold" = prevent consideration of] [Courts in — so far — four jurisdictions are going after Trump, not Biden] © 2023 Kwiple.com
Trumpists say You have some people in this town saying we need to cut social security and throw our grandparents into poverty. Why? So that one of Zelenskyy’s ministers can buy a bigger yacht? Mike Pence, Mamaw's proud Putinista © 2023 Kwiple.com
 
Working-class whites Not all of the white working class struggles. I knew even as a child that there were two separate sets of mores and social pressures. My grandparents embodied one type: old-fashioned, quietly faithful, self-reliant, hardworking. My mother and, increasingly, the entire neighborhood embodied another: consumerist, isolated, angry, distrustful. J.D. Vance, Hillbilly Elegy © 2016 Kwiple.com