# Ask the white, male, upper middle class, somewhat conservative, taxpayer **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [March 24, 2000, 12:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-white-male-upper-middle-class-somewhat-conservative-taxpayer/17889 "2000-03-24T00:09:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![tracer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tracer/32/20578_2.png) [@tracer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tracer)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2000, 10:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-white-male-upper-middle-class-somewhat-conservative-taxpayer/17889/21 "2000-03-24T22:49:00Z")
Easy. Read _Teach Yourself C++ In 24 Hours_, then move to the Silicon Valley. I swear, they’re throwing money at software engineers around here like it was going out of style. ---
**Author:** ![Sake\_Samurai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bc79bd/32.png) [@Sake\_Samurai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sake_Samurai)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2000, 4:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-white-male-upper-middle-class-somewhat-conservative-taxpayer/17889/22 "2000-03-25T04:45:00Z")
Then send some my way, you damn UMCer! If you ever feel the desire to _sponser_ a rock band just drop me a line. We can’t even afford any real good drugs anymore!! If you do, we’ll write a song about you. . . * * * Yet to be reconciled with the reality of the dark for a moment, I go on wandering from dream to dream. ---
**Author:** ![2sense](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/2/e47774/32.png) [@2sense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/2sense)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2000, 4:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-white-male-upper-middle-class-somewhat-conservative-taxpayer/17889/23 "2000-03-25T04:55:00Z")
WMUMCSCT, Since 100% of your income is earned within this society, why do you believe paying 40% is charity? I want to play too.Waaaaa. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2000, 5:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-white-male-upper-middle-class-somewhat-conservative-taxpayer/17889/24 "2000-03-25T05:13:00Z")
Athena: Yes, it is difficult to pull all three off at the same time. If you practice very hard it’s possible to look down on somebody while you are pretending to help them. If you live in a city you will need to perfect the casual backhand flip of change into the homeless man’s collection box. The look you are striving for is that of throwing away your money so that it just happens to land in the box, while ignoring the existence of the homeless person completely (if you give money you are absolved from actually caring.) Try the same attitude when somebody is collecting for charity at work. Being paternalistic is easy, just act like wherever you are would not exist without your beneficience. Sake: Tracer has the right idea. I wanted to take a moment to tell you how sorry you should feel for me. I was born the son of loving middle-class parents in Suburbia, and in spite of the fact that I was not ethnic, handicapped or minority in any way my parents somehow managed to overcome their disapointment and treat me just like anybody else. Dammit it just wasn’t fair! I wasn’t codependent, dyslexic, or anything else. Hell, I didn’t even have attention deficit disorder! I had nobody to blame for my failure or shortcomings, no way to avoid a long life of gainful employment and contribution to society. Society had backed me into a corner and pegged me to a role which I had no choice but to fulfill. Oh sure their were times when I felt despair. Some of my friends who happened to be fortunate enough to qualify as minorities were able to get into colleges that I couldn’t (Annapolis, and Notre Dame,) in spite of the fact that I had better grades, higher Sat scores and more extracurricular activities. For a while I it occured to me that this might be my ticket, my excuse to fail, but despite my best efforts I got into a good school and received a college education. Something was still missing. I was not being oppressed. I had nothing to complain about, no grudge to hold against society. I thought briefly about becoming Gay, but dismissed the idea because guys are just too hairy, smelly, and ugly. I found women mysterious, perfect, and irresistable. I was unable to mask my attraction to them even though it my last chance to be a minority. So I hunkered down determined to live the life that unyielding society had thrust upon me. I got good grades, worked throughout school and summmers, and worked 80 hour weeks for $18,000 a year in order to get the experience I needed. Eventually I moved up, got married, switched companies, moved to the country, and since then I have enjoyed a predictable life full of rewarding work, and fulfilling social life. I carried on in this vein for several years, (still full of bitterness and rage against society for not oppressing me.) Then I got lucky! Society had been changing (or maybe I never noticed it before.) I was being oppressed! I saw a good friend, who was an excellent father and loving husband, lose his children to his alcoholic, unfaithful wife in a bitter divorce because she found a woman’s legal aid society that convinced her to file allegations of physical abuse and molestation against her and the children. Several restraining orders have been placed against him, and he’s seen his children twice in the last six months under supervision. This in spite of the fact that he has not been charged with any crime, or had an opportunity to defend himself. Between lawyer bills (he has to pay hers too,) chiild support, and the need to maintain a seperate residence for himself, he is quickly losing his life savings. I am forced to spend my weekends in reeducation camps learning how evil I am, and how not offend minorities, or make my female coworkers uncormfortable (no I didn’t do anything, it’s mandatory for all MEN.) I am being taxed out the wazzoo. I can’t walk the streets of NYC or DC at night without being attacked for my race! Now that’s oppression! My “class” is stereotyped as the raper of women, oppressor of minorities, basher of gays, destroyer of the rain forest and the environment in general. We are the serial killers, the sexual harrassers, the hider of UFOS and killers of the whales, and now that I’ve moved to the country I can even become a redneck if I try hard! We are the defenders of the status quo. In short: I am the Man. Since most people are not w.m.u.m.c.s.c.t ers I am a minority. Since everybody blames me (the generic me) for their problems I am clearly oppressed. But even here it’s not fair. As a minority aren’t I supposed to get special treatment? Isn’t somebody supposed to defend me? When do I get my fair share? Beware. I can only be oppressed so much before me and my kind are driven into extinction. Perhaps this is for the best. Once I’m gone the rest of society can just go ahead and form the perfect utopia that I (generic again) have been thwarting all these years. But then who can you blame if it doesn’t work right. As you go about your business this Saturday, I would urge you to spend a moment thinking of me. Lonely, forgotten, and oppressed. On golf courses, tennis courts, country clubs and trendy shopping malls across this great country of ours you will find me, a member of an outmoded and dying breed. I just want to be treated like everybody else. Do you feel sorry for me? Well if that doesn’t turn this thing into a debate I don’t know what will. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2000, 5:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-white-male-upper-middle-class-somewhat-conservative-taxpayer/17889/25 "2000-03-25T05:19:00Z")
2sense: Sorry I was whining while you asked your question and missed it. Since I have no choice but to pay the taxes perhaps it’s not really charity (dammit even the ability to be generous has been taken away from me) However, a good chunk of that money no matter how wastefully applied goes to public schools, medicare, various social programs and such. I consider those as charity. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2000, 5:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-white-male-upper-middle-class-somewhat-conservative-taxpayer/17889/26 "2000-03-25T05:21:00Z")
2sense: Am I to understand that you are implying that because I earn my living within society it is not mine, but rather societies, and that I have no right to it? ---
**Author:** ![WillGolfForFood](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/82dd89/32.png) [@WillGolfForFood](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WillGolfForFood)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2000, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-white-male-upper-middle-class-somewhat-conservative-taxpayer/17889/27 "2000-03-25T14:37:00Z")
Speaking as a fellow white male upper-middle-class conservative taxpayer who just happens to have a daughter who is dyslexic and has helped her fight that problem for the past eighteen years… > [@](#): > > Dammit it just wasn’t fair! I wasn’t codependent, dyslexic, or anything else. Hell, I didn’t even have attention deficit disorder! … When do I get my fair share? Son, that was an idiotic statement. You and I didn’t just get where we are because we’re talented, we also got where we are because we were lucky enough to be born in the right place at the right time. (The perfect place / time? No, of course not. My father was a night watchman and I grew up poor. But I was lucky enough to be bright, got a free ride through an Ivy League university, and managed to get myself into an excellent financial position without, as far as I can remember, working all that hard at it. Were I born into another society or several hundred years ago, I doubt very much that any of that would have happened.) ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2000, 2:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-white-male-upper-middle-class-somewhat-conservative-taxpayer/17889/28 "2000-03-25T14:49:00Z")
WillGolforfood: Is my post insulting dyslexics, or those that use it as a crutch, trivializing the disease? (Like Cher who “discovered” she was dyslexic about 4 years ago, and blames most of her problems on it) ---
**Author:** ![Greyson3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/258eb7/32.png) [@Greyson3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Greyson3)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2000, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-white-male-upper-middle-class-somewhat-conservative-taxpayer/17889/29 "2000-03-25T15:30:00Z")
Dear white, male, upper middle class, somewhat conservative, taxpayer, May I have some money? Sorry, I had to. * * * “I believe every word that man just said, because it’s exactly what I wanted to hear.” -Space Ghost ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2000, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-white-male-upper-middle-class-somewhat-conservative-taxpayer/17889/30 "2000-03-25T16:03:00Z")
Greyson3 said: “May I have some money?” Sure. All you want. Get a job. ---
**Author:** ![WillGolfForFood](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/82dd89/32.png) [@WillGolfForFood](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WillGolfForFood)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2000, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-white-male-upper-middle-class-somewhat-conservative-taxpayer/17889/31 "2000-03-25T17:06:00Z")
> [@](#): > > Is my post insulting dyslexics, or those that use it as a crutch, trivializing the disease? It sounded to me like the former. (In fact, rereading your original message, it still seems that way.) My apologies if you were in fact referring to the latter. BTW, my daughter _does_ get some special treatment as a result of her dyslexia. She gets to take standardized tests (such as the SATs) untimed, and some of her teachers do tend not to mark her down for spelling errors. Trust me, though - you do _not_ want to have this particular problem in order to get the above advantages. Crutches are nice things to have, but they’re usually not worth the broken leg that mandates them. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![WillGolfForFood](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/82dd89/32.png) [@WillGolfForFood](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WillGolfForFood)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2000, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-white-male-upper-middle-class-somewhat-conservative-taxpayer/17889/32 "2000-03-25T17:17:00Z")
This message thread is taking an unfortunate turn, veering away from the important things in life. In an effort to steer it back… What do you think of the golf world’s obsession with titanium? I can see where titanium’s excellent strength-to-weight ratio makes it a good thing for metal driver heads, but what the heck is it doing in golf balls? Golf balls are _supposed_ to deform on the clubhead briefly when hit - that’s how they pick up their spin! ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2000, 6:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-white-male-upper-middle-class-somewhat-conservative-taxpayer/17889/33 "2000-03-26T06:59:00Z")
WillGolfForFood: Thank you for your gracious accceptance of my explanation. The people I intend to insult are those that use their minority or handicapped status as an excuse for their own personal failures. Besides Cher just makes me sick. Since from what you are saying, your daughter is achieving, I imagine it must particularly infuriate her when celebrities or others make what is certainly an invalid claim to the illness as an excuse for their own personal laziness or lack of achievement. I do not understand titanium golf balls either. I use d.t.90s ---
**Author:** ![2sense](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/2/e47774/32.png) [@2sense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/2sense)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2000, 6:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-white-male-upper-middle-class-somewhat-conservative-taxpayer/17889/34 "2000-03-27T06:46:00Z")
WMUMCSCT, Sorry I ran off. I was busy elsewhere. > [@](#): > > Originally posted by Scylla: > **2sense: > Am I to understand that you are implying that because I earn my living within society it is not mine, but rather societies, and that I have no right to it?** Hell no. I’m just wondering what you think your fair share of the governmental tab should be. ## You must get some benefit for the money you pay. What percentage of your income would you be willing to pay? And which benefits are worth it to you? Thanks for answering my post. You may be the heavyweight champion of the world. You may be a socialite with a long string of pearls, But, yeah, you’re gonna have to serve somebody! Bob Dylan ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2000, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-white-male-upper-middle-class-somewhat-conservative-taxpayer/17889/35 "2000-03-27T16:04:00Z")
2sense: I don’t know what a air percentage is. I do know that the Government is basically a full partner in every dollar I make. I receive very little in terms of consideration for this. You would think that society would reward behavior that benefits it. It’s quite the opposite. When the amount of taxes an individual pays become disproportional, the tax rates are actually raised. This is like going to your local Costco buying an industrial pack of 1000 rolls of toilet paper, and actually paying more than if you just purchased a single roll! For being a good taxpayer, and paying lots of taxes, shouldn’t I get a discount? ---
**Author:** ![Esprix](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/esprix/32/7899_2.png) [@Esprix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Esprix)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2000, 4:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-white-male-upper-middle-class-somewhat-conservative-taxpayer/17889/36 "2000-03-27T16:35:00Z")
As a white, male, upper middle class, liberal taxpayer, I empathize brother! Oh, wait - I’m gay. Hrm. Well, I can blend in when I need to, right? 😃 Esprix * * * [Ask the Gay Guy!](http://boards.straightdope.com/ubb/Forum7/HTML/001376.html) ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2000, 4:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-white-male-upper-middle-class-somewhat-conservative-taxpayer/17889/37 "2000-03-27T16:50:00Z")
Espix: Yes, I guess that means you get the best of both worlds. Don’t be to full of yourself though, if you were a bi-sexual w.m.u.m.c.s.c.t. then you would really have it made. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2000, 4:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-white-male-upper-middle-class-somewhat-conservative-taxpayer/17889/38 "2000-03-27T16:52:00Z")
I spoke to fast, you’re really screwed because you can’t get that marital exemption can you? That stinks. ---
**Author:** ![Hamlet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hamlet/32/2818_2.png) [@Hamlet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hamlet)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2000, 6:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-white-male-upper-middle-class-somewhat-conservative-taxpayer/17889/39 "2000-03-28T06:42:00Z")
Maybe I don’t get it, but what are you so upset about? Your earlier tirade seems to indicate you’re upset about your station in life, but I don’t see why. You have to pay taxes? That’s it? Or is it that nobody comes up to you and tells you how great you are for your successes? * * * “…a man of infinite jest.” ---
**Author:** ![andros](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e480ec/32.png) [@andros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/andros)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2000, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-white-male-upper-middle-class-somewhat-conservative-taxpayer/17889/40 "2000-03-27T19:47:00Z")
> [@](#): > > For being a good taxpayer, and paying lots of taxes, shouldn’t I get a discount? You do, pally. You get to live in a country which affords you the right to whine with impunity about being a member of the _single most affluent SES in the **entire world** _. :rolleyes: [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-white-male-upper-middle-class-somewhat-conservative-taxpayer/17889.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-white-male-upper-middle-class-somewhat-conservative-taxpayer/17889.md?page=3)