General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: We Live In The Emotional And Economic Wreckage Of This Broken Home.... [View all]The Magistrate
(96,043 posts)Always inherent to the Civil Rights struggle was improvement of the economic condition of black people, black poverty being in large part enforced by the regime of white supremacy established in law at the south, and on the wink and nod elsewhere. That is one of the elements in the situation which turned working class whites from the left; to the degree the left was perceived as working for black improvement, it was seen by many white working class people as working against them.
I would not argue against a sub-division setting a 'white left' category at the time. Certainly there were numerous schisms, and certainly a good many white leftists were put off by the Black Power faction. And at bottom, a great proportion of young white leftists never felt much identity with working class whites. 'Hippies' and 'Greasers' did not mix, to put it mildly, and most young people who were brought up in reasonably prosperous circumstances were raised to consider themselves not working class but middle class, and to aspire to professional or managerial or entrepreneurial careers.