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the term "trailer trash verses apartment dweller?

i was thinking about this.. and when i drive by trailer parks,, i see trailers that are for sale.. some are nice. and some are expensive and look like houses.. and i see there vehicals and even them are nice.. then i drive by apartments and i know most of them are rentals.. the trailer in the parks ar mostly owned .so i dont get it.. an apartment is just a box.. stacked up on top of another one.. that anyone can rent for 30 days of space. not even a yard. so should not the term be apartment trash? not to be rude to anyone.. i live in an aparment once

Public Comments

1. sounds like you worry too much about what people think. who cares what they think? Life is too short to worry about that.
2. Just live in your car instead. That way, you will save money, *and* avoid being called names. Of course, you might get your throat cut. But that's a whole nother question, innit? But seriously, I live in a trailer on an acre in a rural area. Here, a nice, brand new 3 bedroom 2 bath 1400 square foot trailer with an air conditioning unit and a hot water heater thrown in costs a whopping total of 25-30k. That's the total cost, plus setup. They are nice, and will last at least 30 years, even if they aren't properly maintained. That's a much better deal than renting. I never understood why folks feel compelled to refer to others who happen to live in trailers as 'Trailer Trash'. It is mostly a term I hear used by classist jerks and black folks who hate white folks, and seem to think that no black folks live in trailers. (Ha!) But, I guess the answer to your question would be yes, it would make as much sense to refer to apartment dwellers as 'Apartment Trash'. God bless.
3. Well, when you analyze it, calling human beings trash is fairly offensive, no matter where they live. Trailers are not as safe as apartments, and climate control is not a minor issue (and I say that as someone who has spent many a summer night in trailers). There are some localities where trailers are just plain illegal. But you do tend to have a different mindset in the two demographic profiles, as well as a whole different set of economic considerations. A trailer is something you could conceivably save up for or pay off in a few years. If you're renting an apartment, you'll be handing your money to somebody else for the rest of your life, perhaps. You might be renting a slot in a trailer park, but if you decide you don't like that neighborhood, you could theoretically move your whole house. My hunch is that people who live in trailers are not quite ready for city life or the suburbs. They'd be on the farm if they could, and sometimes they are. As a country girl who lived in cities of half a million or more for more than ten years, I can certainly understand. There's a field called "geodemographics", and a firm called Claritas, that breaks down American society into categories with labels that are a little less loaded than the terms you used. As someone with background in population geography (very different) I interviewed with a firm that was using this categorization to help companies know where to market their products or locate their factories and customer service centers. You might find their zip code lookup interesting. You type in your zip code and a security code, and they tell you what market segments live in your neighborhood. How accurate are they? That's the first link. The second link is from the website of an excellent documentary series that was shown on PBS a few years back, on social class in America. The DVD is exhorbitant (since it is assumed it will only be shown to classrooms full of people, not watched for fun like I want to), but the entire transcript is online. That's the second link, and "Tammy's Story" starts on page 25.
4. Trailer trash is someone who cheats on her husband while he's deployed.
5. I don't think the term really has much to do with the actual trailer... There are many nice gated community trailer parks and then there are many run down, dirty, cockroach infested trailer parks. The term "Trailer Trash" is more in reference to the poverty stricken, uneducated, criminal element, addicted, lack of morals, character of a person. Not necessarily living in a trailer park. Like the term "Bar Fly".