pandabear wrote:
Vigilans wrote:
Wasn't that term originally used by the immigrant Irish to describe their own plight?
Possibly. I remember reading that Irish labourers in New Orleans would be given harder and more dangerous work than the slaves, because if an Irishman was killed or became disabled, it wasn't a big deal--there were always many more where he came from. But, if a slave were hurt, it would result in a direct economic hardship to the owner who would no longer be able to get a good price for the slave at auction.
As someone who grew up in the south, I can assure you that white trash/n****r is a term used by the same people who still use the word n****r. It describes a lower class white person deemed to be as worthless as a regular (black) n****r.
...and as a previous poster observed, the term is also used by middle/upper class liberal whites who think the poor whites somehow deserve their disadvantaged economic status.
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No man is free who is not master of himself.~Epictetus