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philtor 's review for:
Dignity: Seeking Respect in Back Row America
by Chris Arnade
Took me a bit to warm up to this book. But by the end I thought it was a pretty important record of our time.
Arnade is sending us postcards from the other America: The large swath of America that's been left out of our economic system because they don't have the education or even share the same values. He refers to this as "back row" America. The people who have been left behind and mostly forgotten by both the Left and the Right. I think what stood out to me was how much drugs have taken over many parts of the country. Arnade says that so many in these communities take them to cope with the pain of everyday existence in a country where they feel rejected for not having the education or credentials to really participate in our current economy.
He doesn't offer a lot in the way of solutions, but lots of food for thought in this book. I came away from it thinking that things are a lot worse here in the US than most of us in the "front row" living in coastal metropolitan areas can imagine. It's a pretty depressing read, but we need to grapple with this.
Arnade is sending us postcards from the other America: The large swath of America that's been left out of our economic system because they don't have the education or even share the same values. He refers to this as "back row" America. The people who have been left behind and mostly forgotten by both the Left and the Right. I think what stood out to me was how much drugs have taken over many parts of the country. Arnade says that so many in these communities take them to cope with the pain of everyday existence in a country where they feel rejected for not having the education or credentials to really participate in our current economy.
He doesn't offer a lot in the way of solutions, but lots of food for thought in this book. I came away from it thinking that things are a lot worse here in the US than most of us in the "front row" living in coastal metropolitan areas can imagine. It's a pretty depressing read, but we need to grapple with this.