— Matt Taibbi and Molly CrabappleThe other thing here is an idea that being that poor means you should naturally give up any ideas you might have about privacy or dignity. The welfare applicant is less of a person for being financially dependent (and a generally unwelcome immigrant from a poor country to boot), so she naturally has fewer rights. No matter how offensive the image is, it has a weird logic that’s irresistible to many if not most Americans. Even if we don’t agree with it, we all get it.
Replicated under Fair Use from The Divide: American Injustice in the Age of the Wealth Gap by Matt Taibbi and Molly Crabapple.