This is a phenomenon for white American men because the American middle class happens to be majority white. Behind every “DEI hire” stands a mass of others who never made it as far as you expected to.
There is nothing to be gained from bitterness at being the last to rudely awaken from the American Dream.
> Mental illness and homelessness and career troubles are plaguing people like me,
The people who hoard all the money that's actually depriving you of stability have trained you with identity politics to think of these as issues that affect people "like you" rather than affecting everyone outside their top 1% in-group, regardless of identity.
I want to believe the old tale of the moral decline of black and brown America will lose its persuasive power once the rest realize they were never secure from the forces that effected it. I fear that they will not.
From what I see, power/wealth in the US is still disproportionately held by white men. The balance may be shifting, but a slight reduction in privilege towards the average is not the same as becoming outgroup.
The shift parent is concerned with is perceived at the lower-middle, not at the top. People like Barbara Ehrenreich have noted the “fear of falling” in America for generations. Attitudes like this are what is seen when the fall actually happens.
