The Handicap of Victimhood

Intellectuals give people who have the handicap of poverty the further handicap of a sense of victimhood.  They have encouraged the poor to believe that their poverty is caused by the rich — a message which may be a passing annoyance to the rich but a lasting handicap to the poor, who may see less need to make fundamental changes in their own lives that could lift themselves up, instead of focusing their efforts on dragging others down.

Thomas Sowell, Intellectuals and Society, p.544