I was faced with a startling fact this week. It wasn’t a feeling I was used to when examining this fact. The feeling flew up and hit me straight in the face. It surprised and shocked me.

The feeling hit me after spending a weekend away taking a watercolor class in the cities and spending a girls weekend with a friend. We had a pretty non-media weekend along with a no news weekend. Maybe that is the reason I reacted to a piece of the news with shocking clarity about an emotion that is usually foreign to me. I was left mellow and soft by a weekend away from the gloom doom, grittiness of the happenings around the world and also the campaign news of the candidates.

I realized when I heard one piece of news that I am prejudiced. I usually try and see both sides of an issue. I usually don’t have prejudice against other races. I believe we are all God’s children, so perhaps that is why I didn’t identify my feelings.

I found I am prejudiced against very rich people and by that I mean millionaires and billionaires who are in the news and seem to be eroding the middle class of society. I’m not talking about the people who have more money than I do who live in my world. I am talking about those who seem to be our elite society in America today. I am prejudiced, and I didn’t realize it until I heard the statement Ivana Trump, ex-wife of Donald, made to support his campaign. She stated  immigrants are needed if they are legal because who’s going to vacuum and clean up after us? Americans don’t like to do this.

My jaw dropped, I felt anger in my body, and I wanted to shake something. Then I realized I am prejudiced against those who have so much money they totally have no idea what America is made of. They have no idea who actually makes this country run. I am talking about not just immigrants — my grandparents came to this country as immigrants and worked hard doing whatever jobs were needed to get by — but about working class America. Immigrants are part of working class America just like the rest of us. People who come to our country for a better life deserve more respect than to be relegated to the thought processes that they are here to clean up after us.

I fear there are many people with Ivana Trump’s attitude. They do not know America. Perhaps the problem isn’t with immigrants who come to our country to make their lives better and to work, but with those who think it is their right to be served by the working class of America today. The working class includes our health care workers, our police, our fireman, store clerks and yes, garbagemen and housekeepers. I am sure my list would be very long if I could name every service person job in the United States of America.

Where would we be without those who serve in our military? Serving our country is a low-paying job. Teaching our children is a low-paying job. And the people who work in these areas are all different races, colors and nationalities.

Here’s the thing. I am prejudiced because of one statement by one woman and maybe a few more in the same financial category. I don’t know any millionaires or billionaires so I am making a judgment on what I see and hear in the media. And I am not sure if I met one of these people I would  know how to act or give them a chance because I myself possibly would feel insignificant in their presence because I know their viewpoint.

I clean my own house. I vacuum my own floors. I clean my own cat litter boxes, I scour my bathroom and I am an American. And — you know what — I don’t mind doing it. I don’t mind helping someone out cleaning their house either. I will say it again: I am an American. I am a working class American. And I descend from immigrants.

My point is this. I am making a judgement because of something I read, and it made me prejudiced to those who are rich and famous. Because I do not know anyone like that, I make my presumptions on what I read and see in the news. Because of that, if I met someone like that in my life I wonder if I would give them a chance.

Perhaps we all do that. Perhaps it is part of the reason we have such division in our country right now. We make our decisions based on the news media rather then taking the time to get to know those in the group which we are judging.

You’ve heard the term “black sheep in the family.” Was the entire family judged by the black sheep? We have good and bad in each culture and race that makes up our country. We have good and bad in the rich and the poor in our country. We need to make our opinions based on facts and our experiences, and if we don’t have that experience to make a judgment call, we should maybe seek out truthful information before we choose to judge.

I need to get over my flash of prejudice. I can’t always stay in the feel-good bubble of a girls weekend away from the media. But the thought crosses my mind as I am trying to let the feeling go, that the political parties may be fighting for power and the Ivana Trumps of this world might think Americans don’t clean their own houses, but if we, the working class and the working poor, could get past our prejudices of race and color and unite as one, we would rock the world. It is the workers of America that run this country. If they all disappeared so would our country.

 

Wells resident Julie Seedorf’s column appears every Monday. Send email to her at hermionyvidaliabooks@gmail.com. Her Facebook page is http://www.facebook.com/julie.