Nation of Stereotypes

When President Obama proposed last week that the pay of federal employees be frozen for two years, the DC Urban Moms and Dads discussion forums were inundated with posts on the topic. A common theme among posters who supported the proposal was that government employees were lazy recipients of overly-generous benefits packages who were impossible to fire. "Welcome to the real world" was the frequent refrain.

I was immediately reminded of the debates surrounding former DC Public Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee and DCPS teachers. Rhee was praised for her willingness to challenge the Washington Teachers Union. Teachers were criticized as lazy whiners who were more interested in protecting their cushy jobs than teaching children. Rhee received nearly universal praise for firing them in great numbers.

There were also parallels with common attitudes towards the United Auto Workers during the government bailout of General Motors and Chrysler. "Auto workers are overpaid, lazy, and deserve to lose their jobs", we were told. Depressingly little concern was shown for the fate of these blue collar workers.

The common theme here is that many of us have come to see others not as friends, neighbors, or fellow citizens, but as stereotypes. As is frequently the case, it is easy enough to find examples that exemplify the stereotypes. But, as is also true of stereotypes, they are mostly wrong in the broader sense. Another thing these groups have in common -- according to the stereotypes -- is that they are lazy and inordinately well compensated. The stereotypes encourage us to welcome them being taken down a notch or two.

The irony is that nobody becomes a federal employee, teacher, or auto worker to get rich. Moreover, these professions used to be sort of like motherhood and apple pie -- they made America great. Now they have become scapegoats. They are people we love to hate.

I think this is a dangerous trend. It is popular now to look to the earliest days of American history for guidance for today's politics. In that vein, John Dickinson, George Washington, and Patrick Henry all famously used the phrase "United we stand, divided we fall." When federal employees express glee in the firing of teachers, teachers offer approval for auto industry layoffs, and auto workers chuckle at federal employees getting their pay frozen, it benefits none of the groups. And when everyone else applauds the financial hits suffered by those workers, it weakens us all. We become like the proverbial crabs that individually could escape from a bucket, but pull each other down so that none can escape. We've become the engine of our own failure.