I hear people argue about the advantages that rich people get all the time. The affluent are always quick to brush off poor people. “If they’d just worked harder, they’d have been more successful.” Anyone who’s ever worked in fast food knows that largely bullshit, but I don’t think people realize that huge divide between the way the rich people and the poor people experience the world.

Molly Crabapple wrote an awesome column debunking the myth that successful artists are sell-outs, but it also focuses on the bizarre disconnect between the two worlds.

Some months ago, I got to fly first-class from London. Until then, I’d never realized it wasn’t just a recliner in the plane and some cheap bubbly, but rather a separate sphere of being. In first-class, you weren’t groped or barked at or treated like a combination of a terrorist and a cow. Instead, paid servants pretended your presence was a gift. 

After years of work trips crammed in coach, being forced to show my underwear to the TSA, I felt like a guttersnipe in a palace. I loved it, but it was also deeply strange. “These people don’t really like me,” I thought, no matter how skillfully they acted like they did.

“Filthy Lucre” by Molly Crabapple | Vice.com

It’s interesting.  If you ever want to see the difference between the way the rich and the poor live–besides the cliched and stereotypical country clubs and what not–try to take a trip through first class.

Also, can we have a conversation about how poor people are accosted by the TSA for “safety”–because you never know, they might be a terrorist–but the rich are ushered through with as little fuss as possible.  As if terrorists couldn’t get the money to afford first class tickets as well?  That’s some classist bullshit, right there.