THE NAME’S SIXPACK. JOE SIXPACK.
Oct. 5th, 2008 06:08 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
defrogre Sarah Palin’s constant invocation of the term “Joe Six-Pack”:
I’m still waiting for someone to call her on this, since – in my mind – the term seems to imply an interpretation of the Working Class Guy as a beer-guzzling alcoholic. Which seems like an odd way to endear yrself to the blue-collar voting bloc, even if it's true.
Meanwhile, the AP’s Sharon Themier raises an even better question: who is this Joe Six-Pack anyway? Answer: he doesn’t exist.
Tagging voters with cliches simplifies them to the point of caricature — and is far removed from reality. People are more complicated than that, whether their employment status is classified as blue-collar, white-collar, retired, self-employed or unemployed. However pollsters might slice and dice the public, there is no Everyman.
DISCLAIMER: Technically, of course, Themier is incorrect in saying Joe Six-Pack doesn’t exist. He does. But he’s a beer correspondent for the Philadelphia Daily News, and I’m pretty sure that’s not who Sarah Palin means in her speeches. Unless he's secretly a lobbyist for the beer industry. Then it makes a little more sense – in as much as Sarah Palin makes sense about anything, that is.
More beer,
This is dF
I’m still waiting for someone to call her on this, since – in my mind – the term seems to imply an interpretation of the Working Class Guy as a beer-guzzling alcoholic. Which seems like an odd way to endear yrself to the blue-collar voting bloc, even if it's true.
Meanwhile, the AP’s Sharon Themier raises an even better question: who is this Joe Six-Pack anyway? Answer: he doesn’t exist.
Tagging voters with cliches simplifies them to the point of caricature — and is far removed from reality. People are more complicated than that, whether their employment status is classified as blue-collar, white-collar, retired, self-employed or unemployed. However pollsters might slice and dice the public, there is no Everyman.
Recommended reading.
DISCLAIMER: Technically, of course, Themier is incorrect in saying Joe Six-Pack doesn’t exist. He does. But he’s a beer correspondent for the Philadelphia Daily News, and I’m pretty sure that’s not who Sarah Palin means in her speeches. Unless he's secretly a lobbyist for the beer industry. Then it makes a little more sense – in as much as Sarah Palin makes sense about anything, that is.
More beer,
This is dF
