This article is composed of highlighted quotes from an interview with an anonymous Bowdoin student. It is a detailed look into one Bowdoin student’s thoughts on wealth and its impact on their lives. It is color-coded by theme. Blue represents the development of the wealth stigma based on one’s previous and current friend groups and environments. Red represents the perception of material goods and actions as symbols of wealth and the conclusions drawn from that information. Purple represents the notion that wealth is a challenging and uncomfortable topic that people avoid, due to its stigmatization.
“If [I’m talking to] someone within my socioeconomic status, it’s definitely a lot easier [to talk about wealth]. My family is middle class, but we weren’t always middle class, so talking to someone who’s very upper class or comes from a prep school is… Like, I don’t really say anything in that conversation. It’s usually just them talking.”
“I definitely talk about [wealth] more within my socioeconomic class rather than with people outside of it, because when I am talking about it within my class, it’s usually about how it’s uncomfortable to talk about it with the upper class.”
“I can relate and empathize with the people who I am talking to [when they’re in] the lower class or the working poor. Whereas the upper class, I can’t really relate to them. So even if we do talk about it, there’s always a sense of awkwardness or tension, because they get defensive, or I get defensive.”
“With one on one conversations, you can just be open and vulnerable and have an understanding with the person that you’re just being honest. Like, ‘don’t take it personally,’ or ‘don’t judge me’ or whatever. Whereas with a big group of people, I feel like making that understanding or making that connection with everyone is hard; it’s harder to be open and vulnerable with larger groups of people.”
“It wouldn’t be their fault, being born in the upper class because, honestly, you can’t control if you were born into it, but I think it would definitely be a harder time empathizing and understanding the struggles even if you really tried because you haven’t experienced it, or you haven’t even seen it in reality.”
“A lot of people classify as middle class when they really aren’t. I feel like that has to do with if you’re from the lower class and you want to identify with the middle classes, to keep up a front that you’re just as good as everyone else. Or if you’re upper class, you don’t want to be judged for the wealth that you have.”
“[I come from] a small white affluent town. And even though my town is white, I didn’t know Canada Goose was such a big thing until I got [to Bowdoin]. And I’m from New Hampshire, so it gets cold over here too. But Canada Goose has been a big thing for me and I didn’t know that it was such a big deal. My friends and I would notice the cars that our friends drove into school.”
“I feel like on campus, you have the resources you need to be able to succeed. For the most part, everyone’s on a level playing field.”
“On campus, I think [identifying wealth] has to do with how good of a writer you are. I think that’s the biggest thing that we all noticed. I personally don’t think I gained anything from my first-year seminar and I really needed a lot of work on my writing skills. Whereas some people knew how to write papers and were really good at it and came out of it stronger, whereas I still felt really weak because of the specific class I was in.”
“I wouldn’t notice disparities aside from just the material clothes you’re wearing and the phone you have because I feel on campus, you have the resources you need to be able to succeed.”
“My friends and I talked a lot about how people who wanted to stay on campus or the fact that just with income and the state of your family, if your family’s not the wealthiest, they can’t afford having constant reliable WiFi.”
“I knew that [Bowdoin] would be definitely a white space and a rich white space.”
“There’s a stigma around rich people being snobby or entitled or egoistic or not knowing that there are struggles in the world. I think people who have money don’t want to experience those stereotypes and that stigma, so that may be a reason why they hide their wealth. And then on the flip side, if you’re coming in from a working poor background where you don’t have a lot of money, people could think it’s embarrassing. When I was little and grew up without having a lot of money, I really didn’t talk about it. I tried to keep myself in the middle class; when I would go to school, I would try to dress the same, even though we couldn’t afford it, just because I didn’t want people to pity me.”
“I think just having more dialogue about [wealth would help destigmatize it]; we don’t talk about it quite as much as we should.”
“At Bowdoin, first-years and sophomores don’t really know each other that well. I moved to my hometown when I was in sixth grade, but everyone that I knew grew up here, we’re born and raised, like one big family. So there isn’t that much stigma because everyone came from the same socioeconomic class.”
“Since Bowdoin is bigger than my high school and we’re all very diverse people in terms of what we’ve experienced, the wealth stigma is more prevalent.”
“I’m gonna be honest, it was kind of uncomfortable just because I didn’t know if I was saying the right thing, I guess. And I don’t want to offend anyone. Even conversations where [wealth is] the designated topic are very hard.”