The Logic of Stupid Poor People: Identity, and Societal Perceptions

The Essence of Tressie McMillan Cottom’s Perspective

Growing up in a low-income home, a home where want is surpassed by bare necessity, prosperity can often only be achieved by mirroring those you most admire to be. Tressie McMillian Cottom’s article reviews the stupid decisions poor people tend to make. Cottom depicts her perspective as an old outsider looking at the world from within. Initially growing up in a poor black American family, Cottom often fell silent because of the genteel bureaucratical way.

Now, as an award-winning Harvard affiliate, she expresses so much more. In the Logic of Stupid Poor People, Tressie McMillan Cottom successfully sets a logical point of view, builds personal creditability, and appeals to emotion to convince her audience that stupid poor people view status symbols as a necessity rather than a desire.

Acquisition of Social Representation through Materialism

The purpose of this article is to convince its readers that poor people acquire social representation through materialistic things. Cottom implies that as stupid as something like a handbag or a silk top might be. They make the difference in the most absolutely ridiculous ways. She covers the difference between presentability and acceptability for a poor individual through the eyes of one that used to be one. She states presentability is a social privilege with unfair attributes, while acceptability is viewed more as approval within such wished social class. Cottom makes a valid point by indicating that as absurd as a status symbol might be, many “cannot afford to not have it “. The author states, “You have no idea what you would do if you were poor until you are poor” to primarily target those who haven’t experienced being poor, essentially those in the higher social classes. Throughout the article, Cottom repeatedly refers to her audience as gatekeepers to demonstrate what great amount power they hold and how commonly it is held through a bias standpoint.

Challenging Preconceived Notions: Logic vs. Survival

To build her case, Cottom begins her article by appealing to logic. She displays a social media post where it builds the biased generalization many hold against poor people. Her incorporation of such a tweet tries to embed the idea that it is all their own fault. Poor people are poor because they place themselves in that position. However, Cottom goes against this biased reasoning when she states, “One thing I’ve learned is that one person’s illogical belief is another person’s survival skill”. The author incorporates this point of view to shift the audience’s reasoning. Survival is an individual’s most obvious intuition. From birth, that is a human’s primary goal. Although spending money on overpriced items might not seem like the logical thing to do, the means of survival ultimately is. Cottom sheds light on this rational concept to give others some insight into why poor people do what they do. Furthermore, she moves on to present a more personal approach.

The Emotional Weight of Acceptance and Presentability

Cottom significantly builds the majority of her article upon a mountain of ethical persuasion. She begins the reading by talking about her past. She expresses how her family was a part of “the good poor,” a group of people who were smart with their money and helped others when means made it possible. Cottom makes herself out to be trustworthy when she states, “But perhaps the greatest resource we had was a bit more education. We could, as my grandfather would say, talk like white folks’. With this comparison, she implies that she holds the knowledge and skill many struggle to acquire. Cottom is most appealing when she talks about a childhood memory she remembers to have been extremely annoyed. She states that her mother once had to dress in her “English queen Mahony outfit just to appear worthy of any recondition”. This gives the audience insight that Cottom has been in a position similar to others. She shows to be notable because she holds many firsthand experiences where the judgment was born from superficial looks. Cottom’s use of plural wording and honest position all add up to demonstrate that she knows what she is talking about.

dditionally, the author also uses emotion to convince her audience. Cottom first draws in her audience through a set of rhetorical questions she asks. The questions are included to add a more personal tone to the reading. Cottom indicates that the dominant reason many tend to buy these luxurious items is that “they want to belong”. She effectively approaches her audience through the feeling of empathy. She points out that no one ever wants to be left out or feel like an outsider. She takes this line of attitude to give the audience something they can relate to by implying that the desire to belong is not only a poor person’s dream but all’s. Cottom then strengthens her approach by indicating how polar opposites presentability and acceptance are. She states, “It’s the aging white hippie who can cut the ponytail of his youthful rebellion and walk into senior management while aging black panthers can never completely outrun the effects of stigmatization against which they were courting a revolution”. The use of this bias stereotype is used to cause a feeling of compassion. Cottom tries to imply that being presentable doesn’t matter if you lack to be acknowledged or even approached. She exploits the fact of how frequently people are misinterpreted at first glance and just their looks.

Overall, Cottom makes a good argument on why the decisions of poor people aren’t necessarily stupid. She heavily embeds the idea that poor people take irrational actions for just simple validation and approval by setting a reasonable position, making herself creditable, and targeting her audience’s emotions. Cottom makes it quite clear that the genteel bureaucratical way is what is diminishing our society. That the society we live in prefers to only acknowledge those who seem appealing. Cottom ultimately broadens the concept of sacrifice to a whole different perspective. She sets in stone the idea that what kind of shoes a person wears can be the worst or best decision for their state of well-being.

Works Cited

1. Cottom, Tressie McMillan. “The Logic of Stupid Poor People.” Tressiemc, 29 Oct. 2013,
2. https://tressiemc.com/uncategorized/the-logic-of-stupid-poor-people/. Accessed 18 Feb. 2020

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