Victimized but got away from it. It is exceedingly difficult to "escape" poverty and the culture that goes with it when there isnt another place accepting you. Immigrants here typically have a very different support network than some poor kid in the bad part of town, who is born here into the systems (or legacies of the systems) that have kept them down. Even if that kid has a great mindset and works hard, the cards are stacked against them succeeding. I had a good friend I went to community college with, who had been arrested for breaking up a fight at school. His school had more cops than college councilors. He talked about this stuff a lot, because he was one of the only people from his class who went on to college and it upset him, obviously.

And what does success look like for someone like that? Leaving their family and neighborhood behind? Essentially becoming an immigrant in their own country? It's complicated. That's what a lot of successful people end up doing, because otherwise, they can't be very successful, because of the lack of investment into these communities means there's not much opportunity. These pioneers leaving continues to keep the investment out and the poverty concentrated. Its a cycle.

The mindset, if that's the issue, isn't going to easily change without serious investment into poor communities. The culture didn't develop out of nowhere.