“On the rich ‘understanding’ the poor’”,
In schools with predominantly rich people the teachers/administration/whoever often have students learn about the poor, do community outreaches, group projects. This does one of two things for the students:
It makes them see the poor as something to be managed, like dirty laundry; or
it makes them develop a sort of saviour complex, where the poor are incomplete without their support/presence specifically.
In both situations the poor are seen as something other-than-human, and their situation seen as an extraordinary exception that they caused rather than something that could happen to anyone regardless of their “hard work” or “character”. Overtime this mindset calcifies into a “don't-talk-don’t-discuss” kind of situation, where they perform concern for whoever brings up the poor and discard it whenever the topic changes. They congratulate foundation donors but would never become one. And much more I haven’t said. Or written, actually. ♦