# Is there any correlation between white liberals and feeling rejected from society **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [January 9, 2019, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-correlation-between-white-liberals-and-feeling-rejected-from-society/827494 "2019-01-09T23:57:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![snoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@snoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/snoe)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2019, 1:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-correlation-between-white-liberals-and-feeling-rejected-from-society/827494/121 "2019-01-13T01:48:53Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > I’ll hazard a guess that many more LGBT people would be conservative if other conservatives weren’t so determined to reject them for being LGBT. There seems to be [strong social-scientific evidence](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2016/09/28/can-trump-win-black-votes-what-we-know-from-5-decades-of-black-voting-data/) that an analogue is true of African Americans. > [@](#): > > This suggests that most black voters view a Democratic vote as a heuristic for supporting strong federal civil rights protections and support for a Republican presidential candidate as a vote _against_ group well-being. And this also helps explain why political diversity within the black community remains below the surface, while their monolithic voting behavior is widely noted in every election cycle. ---
**Author:** ![snoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@snoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/snoe)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2019, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-correlation-between-white-liberals-and-feeling-rejected-from-society/827494/122 "2019-01-13T02:00:15Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > I’ll hazard a guess that many more LGBT people would be conservative if other conservatives weren’t so determined to reject them for being LGBT. > [@snoe](#): > > There seems to be [strong social-scientific evidence](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2016/09/28/can-trump-win-black-votes-what-we-know-from-5-decades-of-black-voting-data/) that an analogue is true of African Americans. I did conflate “be conservative” with “vote Republican.” I mean, one can argue that it’s actions which count, so you can’t really be conservative and vote for Democrats. :dubious: But the point is that members of these two groups show higher-than-average loyalty to the Democratic party while also exhibiting ideological diversity. And that’s because, back to the OP (ha!), of the actions (and words) of the other party. ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2019, 4:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-correlation-between-white-liberals-and-feeling-rejected-from-society/827494/123 "2019-01-13T04:27:47Z")
> [@Urbanredneck](#): > > Why are liberals and democrats so into censorship? Please define exactly what you mean by censorship. If it means suffering consequences for your speech or actions and/or being boycotted, that isn’t ‘censorship’. > [@](#): > > It was democrats who got the song “Baby It’s Cold Outside” banned. It was station managers responding to criticism of the song who banned it, and some of them are backing off due to listener polls. > [@](#): > > It was democrats who drove that christian baker out of business for refusing to make a cake for a gay wedding. See: Public Accommodation. > [@](#): > > Liberals and democrats want women and minorities in position of power. [PROVIDED they are not conservative.](https://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/08/opinion/sunday/a-confession-of-liberal-intolerance.html?_r=2) Liberals and Democrats want people who are not in power to be able to vote without hindrance or harassment and to have equal representation in government. It isn’t our fault that there are so few minority Republicans. Ever stop to think about how your politics and attitudes generally being harmful to them don’t tend to be condusive to their support? It’s either disingenuous or a complete lack of self-awareness that leads to blaming Democrats for women and minorities supporting a party that includes them and wants them to share power over one that doesn’t. ---
**Author:** ![HMS\_Irruncible](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hms_irruncible/32/7394_2.png) [@HMS\_Irruncible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HMS_Irruncible)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2019, 2:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-correlation-between-white-liberals-and-feeling-rejected-from-society/827494/124 "2019-01-13T14:49:58Z")
> [@LAZombie](#): > > I think a lot of you like one or two liberal songs but ended up buying the whole liberal album. More like we saw a cockroach run under a rug, lifted up the rug, and found a thousand more cockroaches. Time for an exterminator and a new rug. > [@](#): > > Just ideas to prime the pump. There’s no point in arguing specific issues just explanations of how you got there. Arguing through the issues is how we get there. We dig into conservative positions and find they lack any substantial relationship to facts, logic, or humanity. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2019, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-correlation-between-white-liberals-and-feeling-rejected-from-society/827494/125 "2019-01-13T16:40:36Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > I understand what the challenges are. What I’m skeptical about is whether the existence of these challenges result in a system that overall benefits the urban poor in comparison with the rural poor. To re-emphasize what I’m trying to dig up here in my conversation with Senoy: I don’t deny that live sucks for the rural poor. Rural poverty has been something that progressives and liberals have targeted at least as far back as the New Deal. Rural people should get the same benefits from the system that urban poor have. What I’m trying to get at here is the _resentment_ that rural people feel against urban people. I don’t see hard evidence that this is justified based on rational reasons. And this is to a large extent based on what I hear poor white people—both urban and rural—saying out of their own mouths. They are fixated on the fact that they perceive the urban poor to be _undeserving_. This is not a rational conclusion. This is based on tribalism and bigotry. And this is also one of the central elements of the whole American conservative movement—that some people are inherently deserving and some people are inherently undeserving. And when you look to see how these groups shuffle out, it always turns out to be correlated to race, ethnicity, and other tribalistic groupings. ---
**Author:** ![TryingMyBest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8797f3/32.png) [@TryingMyBest](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TryingMyBest)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2019, 6:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-correlation-between-white-liberals-and-feeling-rejected-from-society/827494/126 "2019-01-13T18:10:13Z")
Hi Wesley, I’m sure you didn’t mean it but you used erroneous math to reach your conclusion. When corrected, it renders your argument as, well… nonsense. You said: “According to this study, the tea party is 89% white and 59% male. That works out to 52% of the tea party as white men, when in the US in general I think only 30% of the public are white men.” You are comparing the composition of adult members of a political party to the proportion of white men in the US population. That makes no sense because the former contains no children while the latter includes 74 million children. What you SHOULD have compared is the proportion of white men in the Tea Party to the proportion of white men in the Democratic party. Had you done that, you would see that white men made up 39% of the voters in the 2018 national election (a proxy for party membership). That 52% vs. 39% gap is fully explained by the fact that women, blacks, Jews, Latinos, Asians, immigrants, and the better educated all skew strongly to the Democrat (Progressive) party. That’s the simple mathematical reason why white men make up a smaller proportion of Democrats. HOWEVER, there are **vastly** more white males who identify as Democrat than who identify as Tea Party – on the order of 50 million more. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2019, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-correlation-between-white-liberals-and-feeling-rejected-from-society/827494/127 "2019-01-13T18:26:49Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > To re-emphasize what I’m trying to dig up here in my conversation with Senoy: > > I don’t deny that live sucks for the rural poor. Rural poverty has been something that progressives and liberals have targeted at least as far back as the New Deal. Rural people should get the same benefits from the system that urban poor have. > > What I’m trying to get at here is the _resentment_ that rural people feel against urban people. I don’t see hard evidence that this is justified based on rational reasons. … First off, no, poor rural whites are not likely investigating and researching the exact amounts of Federal funds (or Federal plus state funds) going to benefit the poor in their communities, or even their regions overall, on a per capita basis and comparing it apples to apples to those to the poor in urban areas. But then I doubt you have. I’m not finding clearly understandable numbers all that easily myself. Do we count agribusiness subsidies as support in this analysis or not? The cost of military bases in the regions? Those are going to rural states but not to support of the poor or even for rural development. It’s by including those payments that articles like [this one](https://slate.com/business/2012/10/blue-state-red-face-guess-who-benefits-more-from-your-taxes.html) conclude that red states benefit more from federal largesse than do Blue ones. I would argue that is a specious analysis. Of course the sense of having their needs relatively ignored compared to urban needs isn’t the result of a researched and well-reasoned rational analysis. It is based on their knowing they are dropping down the ladder, a perception that others are climbing past them, and hearing the messages from the D side that helping these others is important (to overcome white privilege) without good marketing to them from the D side while the R side is heavily messaging that they are not getting their share because others are getting it instead. Oh sure the Ds used to message that their needs matter well but really not since Nixon’s Southern strategy flipped the political calculus. DO you have a good source for that resources spent per head below the poverty line in rural vs urban regions? A rural poor voter is not needing to believe that an urban poor resident is underserving to feel that they themselves are deserving but not getting theirs in comparison. Maybe a dive deep analysis would show that they are, I don’t know, but more importantly they are getting their share of the _rhetorical_ attention from the D side nationally and they are from the R one. The mainstream message that they are receiving is that _relatively_ they are undeserving because of the inherent advantages they have of skin color, and they while such may be true on a population-wide demographic basis, that is not something that they personally experience. They feel rejected by the mainstream. When the D side leaves that sense unaddressed they create the opportunity for that rejection and the resentment that comes with it to be exploited for gain by the other side. ---
**Author:** ![you\_with\_the\_face](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/ecccb3/32.png) [@you\_with\_the\_face](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/you_with_the_face)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2019, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-correlation-between-white-liberals-and-feeling-rejected-from-society/827494/128 "2019-01-13T20:31:03Z")
> [@DSeid](#): > > It is based on their knowing they are dropping down the ladder, a perception that others are climbing past them, and hearing the messages from the D side that helping these others is important (to overcome white privilege) without good marketing to them from the D side \*\*while the R side is heavily messaging that they are not getting their share because others are getting it instead. \*\* The part in bold ain’t no small thing. Republicans don’t succeed in rural America because they canvass neighborhoods better and shake hands with more affection, and they don’t succeed because they sell a more inclusive messsge than Dems do. They succeed precisely because their message is exclusive. If rural whites are attracted to us vs them rhetoric, how are Dems supposed to counter this when the party has to cover under its umbrella a diverse coalition? Dems have to be inclusive in order to win, and all too often, their message of inclusiveness is spun by conservatives as being a threat to their “traditional way of life”, as **senoy** put it. > [@](#): > > A rural poor voter is not needing to believe that an urban poor resident is underserving to feel that they themselves are deserving but not getting theirs in comparison. Maybe a dive deep analysis would show that they are, I don’t know, but more importantly they are getting their share of the rhetorical attention from the D side nationally and they are from the R one. As you said up top, the Republicans have convinced a lot of rural voters that when they struggle, it’s because some other guy—urban blacks, urban “elite” whites, and job-stealing immigrants—are getting more than their fair share. I don’t see how you square that with the idea that they don’t believe “them” is less deserving. I’ve seen you criticize Dems before about how they aren’t reaching rural whites because they focus too much on minorities, but it takes zero effort to say they need to do better but not really propose practical marketing solutions. If you were a Dem and you wanted to convince swaths of rural whites that they should vote for you rather than your Republican opponent (who has mastered the art of making them feel like the _real_ Americans) what would you do? And does this differ from all the Dems that tried and failed? ---
**Author:** ![Some\_Call\_Me.Tim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@Some\_Call\_Me.Tim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Some_Call_Me.Tim)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2019, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-correlation-between-white-liberals-and-feeling-rejected-from-society/827494/129 "2019-01-13T21:02:33Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#): > > According to [this](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/tea-party-supporters-who-they-are-and-what-they-believe/)study, the tea party is 89% white and 59% male. That works out to 52% of the tea party as white men, when in the US in general I think only 30% of the public are white men. Among [solid liberals](http://www.people-press.org/2017/10/24/appendix-1-typology-group-profiles-2/), the gender roles are reversed. 59% female to 41% male. But at 73% white, that still means 30% of solid liberals are white men, which is about equal to the ratio among the general public (America as a whole is about 60% white, and about 50% male). (also sort of responding to points TryingMyBest made) So… if the Tea party were 59% white men, 30% white women, and 11% non-white women the evidenced statistics would be true. Also, if the Tea party were 48% white men, 41% white women, and 11% non-white men the evidenced statistics would be true. Similarly but more dramatically, 41% white men + 32% white women + 27% non-white women would generate the cited statistics about ‘solid liberals’. 14% white men + 59% white women + 27% non-white men would also generate the cited statistics. So.. where exactly do the 52% and 30% numbers come from? Looks like some unstated assumptions to me… ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2019, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-correlation-between-white-liberals-and-feeling-rejected-from-society/827494/130 "2019-01-14T00:45:47Z")
> [@you\_with\_the\_face](#): > > … If rural whites are attracted to us vs them rhetoric, how are Dems supposed to counter this when the party has to cover under its umbrella a diverse coalition? Dems have to be inclusive in order to win … By offering an alternative message that explicitly includes them too. When the rhetoric of inclusion fails to explicitly mention them, when the messaging they hear from my side is dismissive of their very real problems and often condescending, if not outright insulting, that’s when us vs them sales pitches by the GOP are the easiest sell. It doubles back to the op. It is easy for me to have empathy for a variety of others for many reasons - I do not feel rejected from the mainstream even as I appreciate that I am also still “other” and of a demographic always at risk. To the degree I feel that risk I am not disrespected. I am economically secure. And my cultural rearing emphasized social justice. Someone who feels that their concerns are disrespected, who is economically insecure, and who does not feel their concerns are being heard, is less likely to feel empathy for others. Listen and offer a different approach that includes them is how. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2019, 1:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-correlation-between-white-liberals-and-feeling-rejected-from-society/827494/131 "2019-01-14T01:04:20Z")
To give a specific example - in her campaign Hillary Clinton had a nice rhetorical device of “let’s [rebuild ladders of opportunity](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xOMnypd6TRY)” She would in that bit often go on to explicitly how those ladders target those who have been left out and left behind and explicitly name the specific groups of African Americans, immigrants, women, as groups that need those ladders extended to them. And no question they do. But to a poor rural voter who has just become poor or who is getting poorer the absence of their group as _part of_ that list sent a message and not one that made them feel cared about. It was one that set the stage for us vs them to succeed. The simple suggestion is that in a sales pitch like that one includes rural whites and that identifies the very real problems they have as well and identifies the projects and plans for them. To be sure the Obama administration had rural projects and HRC could have built upon them as well. But no mention that they need ladders TOO. ---
**Author:** ![you\_with\_the\_face](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/ecccb3/32.png) [@you\_with\_the\_face](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/you_with_the_face)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2019, 1:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-correlation-between-white-liberals-and-feeling-rejected-from-society/827494/132 "2019-01-14T01:51:06Z")
> [@DSeid](#): > > To give a specific example - in her campaign Hillary Clinton had a nice rhetorical device of “let’s [rebuild ladders of opportunity](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xOMnypd6TRY)”. I read your posts, just so you know, and am disappointed that (once again…you did this in a previous thread) you use Hillary Clinton to support your stance. Not just because the extrinsic hurdles that she had to overcome far exceeded any other candidate you could think of, irrespective of her messaging, but because work has been done that shows reducing her electability to how much she talked about working class whites is an inaccurate conclusion. Take a [look](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/2378023117736486) at this paper. From the Conclusion: > [@](#): > > Why did working-class white men overwhelmingly support Trump over Clinton? First, I find that many men in the study had unfavorable views of both candidates, and about half of the likely voters in the study were conflicted about their election day choice. Yet most of these likely voters still chose Trump. Although many of these men described the choice as one between a brash outsider and an entrenched politician, **I find that most found Clinton more objectionable, largely because these men did not find her trustworthy, or in some cases, likable.** The overwhelming distaste for Clinton is consistent with polling showing that most Trump supporters were more against Clinton than in favor of Trump (Pew Research Center 2016). It also fits with a recent in-depth survey of Trump voters that found that the most unifying factor across all types of Trump voter was dislike of Clinton, a view held by 9 in 10 respondents (Ekins 2017). Ya think that Russian disinformation campaign and a unrelenting flow of hate mongering courtesy of Fox News might’ve had something to do with this distrust and dislike? I do. If their reasons for rejecting her had to do with perceiving she wouldn’t go to bat for them economically, it is strangely absent from their survey responses. That said, Dems do need to make sure they talk about the struggles of white rural Americans. Don’t disagree with you there, and yes that speech you linked to failed to show that kind of inclusiveness. I just don’t think that speech or any other one comes close to being critical to her loss. Here is another [article](https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/5/9/15592634/trump-clinton-racism-economy-prri-survey); see this bit: > [@](#): > > And economic hardship among white working-class Americans actually predicted more support for Hillary Clinton, not Trump: Although not highly statistically significant, the survey found that “[t]hose who reported being in fair or poor financial shape were 1.7 times more likely to support Clinton, compared to those who were in better financial shape.” This finding rebukes the common sentiment that poor white Americans came out in droves to put Trump over the top in 2016. The truth is ugly but it bears repeating from the mountain tops: middle and upper middle class whites—not hard scrapple whites—largely are responsible for voting Trump in office. I don’t know why SDMB seems stuck on talking about poor rural white voters, as if some of their own urban and suburban neighbors, coworkers, and family members ain’t in the MAGA, but for the love of all that is Meuller, I hope the Dems aren’t so blinded to the real big picture. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2019, 4:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-correlation-between-white-liberals-and-feeling-rejected-from-society/827494/133 "2019-01-14T04:16:53Z")
> [@you\_with\_the\_face](#): > > I read your posts, just so you know, and am disappointed … 😕 You made a request: > [@you with the face](#): > > … it takes zero effort to say they need to do better but not really propose practical marketing solutions. If you were a Dem and you wanted to convince swaths of rural whites that they should vote for you rather than your Republican opponent (who has mastered the art of making them feel like the real Americans) what would you do? And does this differ from all the Dems that tried and failed? I responded to that request. The most recent Dem to have failed at the national level was HRC. I accepted your challenge to offer a practical marketing solution to convince rural whites to vote for “me” as opposed to the GOP candidate who instead is offering an us versus them narrative and to demonstrate how it would be different than one that failed. It is not a big thing that change but it is a significant one. No, I made no commentary on whether or not that was the critical reason her campaign failed as that is not the subject of this thread. FWIW I do not think it was there was a single critical factor. There was a confluence of factors including a campaign that was poorly run in _many_ ways and lots more. It is however where she failed to provide a message that reached out to poor rural white voters (who are not equal to working class whites btw). I readily admit that it can be tricky to find the right balance. Sanders, IMHO, was messaging inclusively to rural white voters with his emphasis on the structural features that amplify and harden wealth inequality across all groups, but did that at the cost of his demonstrating a cluelessness regarding the synergistic impacts of the structural features that contribute independently to racial disparities. But I think the balance CAN be struck and as I was first listening to that HRC speech I was expecting her to hit it just right. It was a solid rhetorical device and a perfect chance. I expected her to _include_ hard hit rural communities in her list of places that need to have those ladders of opportunity rebuilt as she went into the meet of that bit. I was hopeful that she would signal concern for them too with a VP choice who had some expertise on rural issues. (And there were several to choose between, including Sherrod Brown who also has progressive cred while not sharing Sanders cluelessness regarding the impacts of systemic racism above and beyond economic factors.) It just didn’t happen. Maybe she was afraid that mentioning that white rural voters as worthy of ladders too would rub other needed members of her coalition the wrong way, that such would somehow mean less ladder for them? I dunno. But that is what I would have done differently to reach out to those voters if it was me, that is my practical marketing suggestion. For his part Obama hit it fairly well in 2008. As an incumbent for 2012’s election he did not adequately market the very real work his administration was doing in service of rural communities addressing the serious issues they faced. And the fact that the economic recovery was leaving many rural workers still behind with jobs that paid less than before and with them feeling less secure, for those who had jobs, made his sales pitch to them a bit tougher to make as successfully. ---
**Author:** ![you\_with\_the\_face](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/ecccb3/32.png) [@you\_with\_the\_face](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/you_with_the_face)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2019, 7:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-correlation-between-white-liberals-and-feeling-rejected-from-society/827494/134 "2019-01-14T07:23:01Z")
> [@DSeid](#): > > 😕 > > You made a request: I responded to that request. Yes, and you had the opportunity to put forth an evidenced-based proposal. But you failed at that, hence my disappointment. The most recent Dem to have failed at the national level was HRC. I accepted your challenge to offer a practical marketing solution to convince rural whites to vote for “me” as opposed to the GOP candidate who instead is offering an us versus them narrative and to demonstrate how it would be different than one that failed. It is not a big thing that change but it is a significant one. No, I made no commentary on whether or not that was the critical reason her campaign failed as that is not the subject of this thread. FWIW I do not think it was there was a single critical factor. There was a confluence of factors including a campaign that was poorly run in _many_ ways and lots more. It is however where she failed to provide a message that reached out to poor rural white voters (who are not equal to working class whites btw). I readily admit that it can be tricky to find the right balance. Sanders, IMHO, was messaging inclusively to rural white voters with his emphasis on the structural features that amplify and harden wealth inequality across all groups, but did that at the cost of his demonstrating a cluelessness regarding the synergistic impacts of the structural features that contribute independently to racial disparities. But I think the balance CAN be struck and as I was first listening to that HRC speech I was expecting her to hit it just right. It was a solid rhetorical device and a perfect chance. I expected her to _include_ hard hit rural communities in her list of places that need to have those ladders of opportunity rebuilt as she went into the meet of that bit. I was hopeful that she would signal concern for them too with a VP choice who had some expertise on rural issues. (And there were several to choose between, including Sherrod Brown who also has progressive cred while not sharing Sanders cluelessness regarding the impacts of systemic racism above and beyond economic factors.) It just didn’t happen. Maybe she was afraid that mentioning that white rural voters as worthy of ladders too would rub other needed members of her coalition the wrong way, that such would somehow mean less ladder for them? I dunno. But that is what I would have done differently to reach out to those voters if it was me, that is my practical marketing suggestion. For his part Obama hit it fairly well in 2008. As an incumbent for 2012’s election he did not adequately market the very real work his administration was doing in service of rural communities addressing the serious issues they faced. And the fact that the economic recovery was leaving many rural workers still behind with jobs that paid less than before and with them feeling less secure, for those who had jobs, made his sales pitch to them a bit tougher to make as successfully. [/QUOTE] ---
**Author:** ![you\_with\_the\_face](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/ecccb3/32.png) [@you\_with\_the\_face](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/you_with_the_face)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2019, 7:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-correlation-between-white-liberals-and-feeling-rejected-from-society/827494/135 "2019-01-14T07:31:11Z")
Forget that botched attempt at a response. This is what I get for posting in the middle of the night with a newborn in my lap. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2019, 9:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-correlation-between-white-liberals-and-feeling-rejected-from-society/827494/136 "2019-01-14T09:52:46Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#): > > So from a psychological perspective, what motivates hetero white men who are liberals? Are they people who feel rejected from society for some other reason and identify with out-groups? Are they people who value fairness and justice more than the privileges of identity politics? I suppose the short answer is “not being a racist, bigoted, uneducated, jerk, who believes everything he sees on Fox News.”? From the discussion in this thread, it’s pretty obvious that there are a lot of poor conservatives for who the system does not benefit. Particularly in rural areas. Why do these people cling to conservative politics when it clearly doesn’t work for them? For that matter, why do any conservatives who are not in the top 0.1% feel Republican policies benefit them? > [@Wesley\_Clark](#): > > For the purposes of this argument, I’m assuming many, if not most, people’s politics are motivated by self interest at root. People who feel rejected from society want change and equality. People who benefit from inequality want to keep the unequal system. A hetero white male from an above average socioeconomic level benefits from the system as is. Your assumption may be unfounded. Many people’s politics are motivated by an inherent sense of justice and what’s right. Or at the very least, they believe their self interest is served by policies that benefit everyone. It’s nice that at least you recognize that it is an “unequal system”. Most conservatives sort of spout a lot of bullshit about how the system is equal and poor people just need to work harder. ---
**Author:** ![ekedolphin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ekedolphin/32/10003_2.png) [@ekedolphin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ekedolphin)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2019, 11:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-correlation-between-white-liberals-and-feeling-rejected-from-society/827494/137 "2019-01-14T11:19:30Z")
> [@Lightnin](#): > > The only time I, as a white heterosexual male liberal, feel rejected from society is when conservatives tell me that I’m somehow not a real American because I’m an evil liberal. Lord, yes. My landlord, though I love him to death, is rather a die-hard Trumpist who _knows_ I’m a liberal, and he hurt me one time when he postulated about a war between Democrats “and Americans”, as if Democrats aren’t real Americans. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2019, 12:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-correlation-between-white-liberals-and-feeling-rejected-from-society/827494/138 "2019-01-14T12:46:11Z")
> [@you\_with\_the\_face](#): > > Yes, and you had the opportunity to put forth an evidenced-based proposal. But you failed at that, hence my disappointment. First congrats on the new baby! Pretty high bar you are setting for me I must say. Best I’ve got is anecdotal and humble opinion. As I noted above [in 2008](https://www.dailyyonder.com/one-time-rural-voters-didnt-desert-dems-2008/2018/05/31/25857/) Obama did that outreach very well, much much better than Clinton did. How did that work compared to other recent Dems? > [@](#): > > In 2008, Barack Obama won 43 percent of the vote in rural America. That was 3 points higher than the share of rural votes Democrat (and white) John Kerry won in 2004. And support for Democratic House candidates was higher in 2008 than in 2006. > > If anything, rural voters were attracted to Obama’s candidacy in 2008. > > All that changed in later elections. By 2016, Democrat Hillary Clinton took a tad over 30 percent of the rural vote. Mind you I think the linked article, which goes on to disparage Obama’s in office performance attending to rural concerns, is off the mark. His administration actually worked pretty hard on rural concerns. But again, they failed to market that and make it very visible. In 2012 not as well, and then Clinton did as above. So not much solid evidence but it is the evidence we have. The common sense piece: if the other side is selling an us versus them narrative and you do not even offer a different one, one that includes the them as part of us, an important part of us, then you cannot be shocked that the us versus them narrative sells well. ---
**Author:** ![TruCelt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/trucelt/32/523_2.png) [@TruCelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TruCelt)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2019, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-correlation-between-white-liberals-and-feeling-rejected-from-society/827494/139 "2019-01-14T15:18:15Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#): > > Is it? > > Women are more liberal than men, LGBT are more liberal than heterosexuals. Both groups are marginalized and see their civil and human rights threatened by conservatives in mainstream society. > > non-whites are more leftist than whites, but I don’t know if they are more liberal. blacks aren’t necessarily more liberal than society at large, while LGBT are 2x as liberal as the public at large. Right. Everybody who would be hurt by “conservatives” policy of “rights for white males” is declaring themselves to be liberal. There is also a very strong cohort of white males who would probably be helped by those policies and yet their consciences drive them to support liberal policies anyway. Then there is the minority of those who don’t care who would be hurt by the Conservatives policies, but who don’t want to live in a hellscape with sick people dying unnecessarily and children starving in the streets. Your question is inherently dismissive of the very real harms the GOP policies create. It’s not a matter of feeling rejected and banding together, it’s a matter of wanting to live. ---
**Author:** ![you\_with\_the\_face](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/ecccb3/32.png) [@you\_with\_the\_face](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/you_with_the_face)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2019, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-correlation-between-white-liberals-and-feeling-rejected-from-society/827494/140 "2019-01-14T16:16:50Z")
> [@DSeid](#): > > First congrats on the new baby! > > Pretty high bar you are setting for me I must say. Best I’ve got is anecdotal and humble opinion. Thanks for the congrats! I don’t think it’s a high bar at all. I mean, it took all of 5 min for me to find those articles. You may disagree, but available scientific evidence doesn’t support your opinion about HRC’s messaging mattering a whole lot to her appeal (or lack thereof) to rural whites. So yeah, it’s frustrating to see you put so much weight on such an unsupported opinion. > [@](#): > > The common sense piece: if the other side is selling an us versus them narrative and you do not even offer a different one, one that includes the them as part of us, an important part of us, then you cannot be shocked that the us versus them narrative sells well. Common sense tells me that if Republicans have convinced conservative-leaning whites (not just poor rural ones but those in the middle and upper echelons too) to fear, resent, and hate minorities, feminists, LGBTQ, and anyone who calls themselves a liberal, the smartest tack (based on what I’ve read) is to do more to dispel the belief that these groups are the real enemy. History shows time and time again that those with power win by pitting groups against each other; it gets the heat off them and puts it on a convenient scapegoat. Case in point, illegal immigrants. Notice that the employers (like Trump) who hire them rarely get called out or condemned; rather all the spittle is hurtled at hardworking people who are simply desperate for opportunities and a better life for their children. It is easier for conservatives to vilify Mexicans than the companies exploiting their labor. This incongruity needs to be hammered over and over again. We need to help people see how they are being manipulated. Successfully eroding these layers of racial and cultural anxiety will take a lot more strategic thoughtfulness than affecting a southern accent and paying lip service to coal. Because it’s so hard to do, it’s why we’re even having this conversation. This is a problem that is old as civilization, seriously. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-correlation-between-white-liberals-and-feeling-rejected-from-society/827494.md?page=6) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-correlation-between-white-liberals-and-feeling-rejected-from-society/827494.md?page=8)