Hillbilly Elegy is a bullshit book that will be a bullshit movie

Recently, the 2017 book by JD Vance, Hillbilly Elegy was optioned into a movie. The author grew up in a small town in southeast Ohio then left to attend Ohio State University before going on to attend Yale Law School.

I myself grew up in an even smaller town and then left to attend Western Michigan University before going on Chicago Kent Law School am going to explain why his book fails to accurately prescribe solutions to small town poverty.

First off, Mr Vance and I have similar roads in that we both had to overcome hurdles to achieve success in a larger scope than our small town could offer. Middletown, Ohio, where he grew up is a community of over 40,000 that has a steel mill as it’s biggest employer.

My hometown of New Troy, Mi is an unincorporated farming community of roughly 700 according to the 2010 census.

However, it’s very clear that our viewpoints on how we got to where we are couldn’t be farther apart. I think when looking at his words, it’s important to contrast them with his actions.

JD has a lot of anger towards people making “poor decisions” so much while he was working hard. In reality though he took the choice that many of us in rural communities deal with; a choice of military service or staying in your hometown. He chose to serve in the marines which gave him a boost of opportunity to attend college.

In my own life I was able to move in with suburban family after high school that gave me better resources to move away from my hometown. Through my experiences, it’s not whether people necessarily work harder but rather close access to opportunity that determines whether or not someone stays in a poorer rural community vs moving out. Most people just simply don’t have the resources to pack up and move plus attend college or trade school. JD Vance didn’t seem to either, which is why the military heavily recruits small towns but colleges do not.

That that is even a realistic representation of the choices in rural communities is a huge disadvantage.

When we generalize that others don’t work as hard as we do, we put too much blame on the person who lacks access or knowledge of opportunities. Thusly when we blame the government for in his words “rewarding bad behavior” we make the assumption that the government has done nothing to help us. I find this ironic in Mr Vance’s case as his military service most likely opened the door to his further education. In fact, in rural communities the government is usually the biggest investor in people’s futures. Whether it is through farm subsidies or public schools and hospitals, military bases, etc. The public sector has heavily taken on the responsibility left behind by most private industry in providing jobs for rural communities.

The other issue I take with Hillbilly Elegy is it’s over reliance on a theory of learned helplessness. It is not that the poor white working class has learned to be helpless but that help and taking the necessary risks to leave your support network are usually too great.

In his book, Vance overates this attitude and underrates the role racism and a hatred of outsiders plays in the dynamics of white rural communities. It’s one thing to lose a factory, it’s something else entirely to vote for the business owners who have moved it.

Yet white rural voters continue to vote for policies that redistribute wealth upward because republican politicians use their hatred of non-whites as a wedge to keep class solidarity from forming.

This is a trick that has existed in US politics since the colonial days when indentured servants were given white special rights over slaves as a way of buying their loyalty. That Vance is a highly educated man who either is unaware of this or simply doesn’t care is disappointing. Growing up I heard the stories of job losses and factory closings as well as the blame towards everyone but the rich people who moved the factory. At some point the racial hatred that blinds a lot of rural voters is a big issue when they continue to vote for policies that perpetuate the poverty of rural communities.

I respect JD Vance and anyone who leaves a small town in search of a better job or any job. The amount of risk involved is usually the main barrier in whether or not someone can even leave. However, to listen to his story in Hillbilly Elegy is to come to the conclusion that he alone was better and smarter than a lot of “lazy” people when we know that that’s not necessarily the case.