#4 - Cell Phones

A cell phone is, perhaps, the white trash person's most important accessory. The style, color, and features of one's cell phone define personhood much the way the right t-shirt defines a white person.

A white trash person's cell phone should be shiny, small and noticeably tricked out. Metallic pink is the color of choice for the well-accessorized white trash woman, and a matching cell phone holder with press on plastic crystals spelling out the woman's initials will complete the look.



The ring tone is also a very important element of the white trash cell phone. Rather than the traditional "ring-ring", the white trash person prefers to hear a loud hip hop du jour song (preferably one with a lot of profanity) when someone is calling; this is also their preference for what the caller hears when they are waiting for the white trash person to answer the phone. For instance, when you call a white trash cell phone, you don't hear "ring-ring", instead you hear "fuck this, fuck that, etc." While this would normally prove problematic for one awaiting something such as a call-back from a job interview, this is a small price for the white trash person to pay to know that his/her friends and relatives will be sufficiently entertained while waiting for Mr. or Mrs. White Trash to answer.

As a result of delinquent rent-to-own big-screen TV payments (See post #6 - "Rent to Own") white trash people are unable to qualify for an actual cell phone plan through a traditional cell phone provider, so they use one of the pay-as-you-go plans, such as Boost Mobile, Virgin Wireless, TracPhone or Cricket. These phones automatically shut off when the white trash person's pre-paid minutes have been used. As a result, "minutes" are the unofficial currency of the white trash nation - much as cigarettes are in prison. Accordingly, white trash people can often be seen bargaining, squabbling or taking on a fiance (See post #1 - "Fiances") over minutes.

#3 - Pain Medication

White trash people really enjoy taking prescription pain medication, especially hydrocodone and vicodin.

Vicodin and hydrocodone are widely available via pharmacy robberies and prescription fraud, but an easier route for many white trash people is to "develop" a chronic pain condition such as lower back spasms, "the arthritis" or migraine headaches. Once the chronic pain condition is established, white trash people frequently move from walk-in clinic to walk-in clinic throughout their geographic area, moaning and writhing in pain. In fact, the ability to spontaneously shout out in pain is a white trash skill with widespread application (see also, post #5 - "Disability").

As more doctors have caught on to the fact that many Americans are now actively seeking pain pills for recreational purposes, these meds have become harder to get. For this reason, some white trash people are now willing to literally inflict physical harm upon themselves (a la "Jackass") in order to score a vicodin or hydrocodone prescription. Self-inflicted white trash injuries may include shooting one's hand with a nail gun, dropping an anvil on a toe, severing a non-essential finger or getting into a drunken bar fight resulting in tooth loss (if applicable).

#2 - Pit Bulls

The pit bull is to white trash people as the chocolate lab is to white people. In fact, pit bulls can be viewed as the official mascot of the White Trash Nation.



The adoption of one's first pit bull puppy is a rite of passage for the young white trash man or woman. For the white trash woman, it means she has established a home of her own; however, in the case of the white trash man, it means he has taken up with - perhaps even become engaged to* - a woman who likes him well enough that she will allow him to move himself and his pit bull puppy into her home.

*See Item #1

#1 - Having a fiance(e)

When non-trashy white people fall in love, they get married. When white trash couples fall in love - or become pregnant - they take a fiance (rhymes with Beyonce - coincidence??). Today, when one is introduced to the significant other of any white trash individual, that person will inevitably be referred to as the fiance. For evidence, we refer you to any recent episode of "Judge Judy."

The fiance phenomenon within white trash culture is relatively new; not too many years ago, white trash couples - no matter how long they had been together, or whether or not they had children together -merely referred to one another as "boyfriend" or "girlfriend." At some point, however, the white trash woman decided that the word "fiance" sounded both more serious and more exotically foreign. She came to believe it bestowed a certain desirable cachet - gravitas, if you will - upon her relationships.

For the white trash man, however, becoming a woman's fiance is more practical than descriptive. It means he can obtain many of the same benefits of marriage (cell phone minutes, cable upgrade, acccess to another man's child support payments, etc ) without the expense or hassle of actually getting married. It means he can move from fiance to fiance - often within the space of only a few months - without legal or social impediment.

A white trash fiance is much like a traditional fiance - the primary difference being that the white trash man has absolutely no intention of marrying his white trash fiance. You see, in white trash parlance, "fiance" does not mean, "woman I intend to marry." Instead, the term means "woman that I am sleeping with and who buys my beer and pays my rent."

Another data point is that within white trash culture, becoming affianced does not involve the man giving the woman a ring; instead, the white trash couple seals the deal by jointly adopting a pit bull puppy*

*See Item #2