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Show Poor Little Rich irl By Dr. Alfred P. Haake (EDITOR'S NOTE: Alfred P. Haake, Ph. D., Mayor of Park Ridge, Illinois, is a noted Economist, Econ-omist, Business Consultant, Lecturer Lec-turer and Author.) Elaine was a pretty little thing quiet, friendly and modest. mod-est. Did her work well, too, and the girls in the big down-town office all liked her. When a department head made her his secretary they gave a party for hcr. "That gal is goin' places," said the switch-board operator, sagely. , And then the heavens fell. It was only a clipping from the society columns of the Sunday paper, read by thousands of women, many of them finding .vicarious outlet for their innate snobbishness in the stories they i read there. It as the addresso- graph operator who carried the clipping around the office, telling tell-ing the story of a fond mother in a north shore suburb who had given a coming-out-party for her debutante daughter. "Whaddy y' know!" exclaimed the girls. "Our own little Elaine a 'debbytant.' -So that's why she never talks about her home. Holdin' out on us. Thinks she's better'n. the rest of us." ; Protests friendly to Elaine grew fewer and fewer as the office of-fice became an under-cover bedlam bed-lam of hostility to the girl who, until then, had been winning the respect and even affection of her fellow-workers. Her bewildered be-wildered efforts to change the situation only made it worse, and a few months later she left the office. Poor little Elaine! She believed in democracy and wanted so much to share the fellowship of girls who had to work for a living. But they shut her out with their own intolerance and petty envy. But the people I really pity are not the poor little rich girls. Rather, my heart goes out for the poor little snobs who envy the rich because they cannot be the snobs they think the rich must be. A labor leader, sitting in a meeting of civic leaders, looked around defiantly at the people representing other elements of the city an remarked: "What's wrong with this town is that some of the people think they are too good to associate with us common folks." Yet it was several of those "people" who were responsible for the labor man being recognized in that meeting at all. They wanted to know him better and work with him. , That man and others like him have deliberately set up barriers of class distinction between themselves and what thev sneer at as the "better people" in town. He and his ilk unceasingly propagate the stupid theory that labor must unite against the bosses as enemies, and they discourage any worker who is so foolish as to have personal ambitions and strive to win promotion in the factory. There ARE people among the more able, successful and fortunate for-tunate who are so foolish as to look down on the masses of Americans as inferior beings. But they arc the exception rather rath-er than the rule and, in many cases, arc the sane people who, in their own earlier days of lesser fortune, gave vent to the! same envious snobbery which is now directed against them. We have too much in common, our needs are too great and the dangers we face are too serious, to spend our precious time and energy in envy and hate. Understanding Under-standing and fellowship denied the Elaines of the world by those who fall victims to their own intolerance, and denied to men in management who have I won the right to cooperation Ifrom their fellow-workers by the troublemakers who spread, the irWdious poison ofclyass hatred that understanding and fellowship are needed desperately desperate-ly by all of us. Only the very petty can afford the meanness of snobbery. When I find myself feeling a little superior, or resenting what seems to me the snobbery of some one else more fortunate than myself, I remind myself of what the Master once said:' "And why beholdest thou the mole that is in thy brother's eve. but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?" |