Sneering progressives are driving young white men into the arms of the GOP

Thank you for, finally, actually doing what I asked and showing me what you think I’m wrong about.

EE never disavowed those numbers. He disavowed his misunderstanding/mischaracterization of your argument. Those numbers, which were the basis of my assertions, are correct.

Roughly, I suppose. My assertion is that any random black people has more legitimate reason to be afraid a white person might kill him than a white person does to be afraid a black person might kill him. Which is the general kind of fear in our society at large quite common, unfortunately, in white people – I’ve talked to many, many white folks who actually express fear that they will be harmed or threatened by a black stranger, some day. And my point is that this fear is based on mythology, and a stereotype that was born of data-free white supremacism, and in fact, black people through our history have had far more legitimate reason to be afraid of white people than the reverse. And these numbers show that this is still true, at least from the perspective of the kind of general fear of cross-racial murders that an individual person might have.

BLM is about society in general, with a focus on law enforcement. Statistics as well as reports of individual black people tell a pretty consistent story – that our society doesn’t place as high a value on black lives as white lives. Murders of black people are cleared less often, police shoot black people at a far higher rate than difference in crime rates would justify, white people are far more likely to get away with shooting a black person than the reverse, etc.

Yet another hypothetical that substitutes weird categories in for the real-world statistics in an attempt to invalidate them… But even in your hypothetical, if I’m reading it right, I’d have a lot more legitimate reason to fear Emmas than Dedricks; and if anyone is spreading a story, after centuries of anti-Dedrick brutality along with myths about Dedrick’s inferiority, that we should be more afraid of Dedricks than Emmas, then they’re spreading bullshit based on myth.

All of the numbers and circumstances and history that go into these statistics are indeed part of the explanation, but that doesn’t render the assertion invalid. A lone duck in a flock of geese might have pretty good reason to fear those geese – they outnumber him greatly – especially if they’ve mistreated him before. If you need a hypothetical to explain my point, here goes – imagine that big flock of geese, with only a few ducks. The geese mistreated the ducks for many years, in addition to spreading false rumors that the ducks were dangerous. The ducks always had a big fear of the geese, since they mistreated them for so long, and occasionally sometimes one or two of the ducks lashed out, even at higher rate of lashing-out than the geese have. But that doesn’t mean that the rumors the geese spread were legitimate – they were always baseless, and still are. If any geese have a generalized fear of ducks, that fear is based on a bullshit myth cooked up by long-dead ancestors, and kept alive by ignorant anti-duck bigots. Especially since the statistics show that a duck is a lot more likely to be killed by a goose than a goose is to be killed by a duck. In other words, the ducks’ fear of geese has a real basis to it… a history of mistreatment, being outnumbered, having bullshit rumors spread about them… while any fear the geese have for ducks is based on bullshit.

Aaand we’re back to the Scotsman. When some smart white teenaged boy starts sorting out the world of politics, and he sees these swarms of “woke” tweeters getting massive likes, and he sees movie critics for MAJOR media outlets saying the same shit, and no one on the left is denouncing any of it, how on earth should he be expected to know it’s not a “real” liberal/Democratic position? Give me a break.

As pointed out above, you may not feel a hundred likes a liberal position makes, but if someone else does, that could affect his/her vote.

They might well be true Scotsmen (or true liberals/lefties), but a few hundred likes, or even a thousand or two, is not “massive”, not in this day and age of Russian bots, hackers, like/retweet-for-pay, etc. I’m unaware of any mainstream/influential Democrat or liberal who disparages people for nothing more than being white man.

Funny how you can use ducks and geese, but I can’t use space stations etc. Anyway, that portion of your post is deeply flawed, but I’ve tried every which way to frame it and I’m worn out.

However, I do want to note this part:

Absolutely true. Best argument you’ve made today, and probably ever.

100 people is “massive likes”? Give ME a break.

When some smart white teenaged boy starts sorting out the world of politics and he sees actual members of the US government stating inane, racist, sexist, and god-knows what else -ist statements, and no one on the right is denouncing any of it, how on earth should he be expected to know it’s not a “real” conservative/Republican position? Give me a break.

You say nothing when actual members of our government say and do actual harmful things, and you want me to come in here and denounce one moron in bumfuck California somewhere because 100 people like that fact that he said “White people are to blame for sickle cell anemia” or some other dumb shit? You must be crazy.

There’s nothing we can do about random idiots who get a handful of likes and retweets on Twitter.

But we’re talking about teenagers here, or at least I am (and I have been trying to all along). Which do you think a teenager is more impressed by: a post or tweet that gets more likes than they’ve ever gotten, or the talking points of a stuffy middle-aged politician on cable news?

This is the absolutely key heart of this entire issue.

To vastly VASTLY oversimplify things, democrats could take two approaches:
(1) Spend a lot of time talking about social justice issues, white privilege, etc. This will (the theory goes) turn off some number of fence-straddling white voters, but increase turnout among the progressive wing of the party (who would never vote GOP, but might stay home or vote green)
(2) Spend a lot of time talking about jobs, never mention social justice issues. This will lure fence-straddling white voters, but decrease the engagement level among progressives

Now, obviously the issue is a zillion times more complicated than that. And obviously there are middle grounds that can be taken. And obviously not all social justice issues are always in sync (for instance, black Christians resistance to gay/trans issues). But it’s at least worth thinking about this type of calculus. But we can’t solve it here on this board (even if we were somehow important Dem policy-makers). What is really needed is polling data, focus groups, and so forth. I’d definitely prefer to be in a party that addresses progressive issues head on than one that doesn’t. But I’d even more rather be in a party that wins, at least when the other choice is Trump. And I don’t assume that the winning strategy is the one that makes me feel warm and fuzzy.

Just trying to speak your language.

I think I’ve narrowed it down – you think my framing is misleading because of course the larger population is a greater danger to the smaller population. I’m saying YES there is a population difference, and that population difference is ABSOLUTELY part of the legitimate reason for fear many minorities have. When you’re massively outnumbered, as well as having a history of bullshit myths being spread about your inefiority, along with brutal polices and practices against you… all of that will go into how people feel in terms of fear and opinion about other races. And thus any broad white fear of black people is illegitimate and based on bullshit (my characterization, but a reasonable one, taking all this into account), while any broad black fear of white people is less illegitimate and less based on bullshit. The numbers from EE just give a numerical demonstration, of a sort, of that fear.

Thank you. So you now agree with BLM and think it’s both a reasonable movement name and a reasonable movement?

There are millions of twitter users. There will always be idiots who get a few hundred likes or retweets for something idiotic. There’s nothing I can do about this, and my efforts would be much better served explaining to the reachable teenagers the validity and reasonableness of terms like privilege, systemic racism, etc., than finding these fringey weirdoes who some skilled right-wing manipulator finds and then holds up falsely as representative of all liberals/lefties.

I think this claim is fairly disingenuous, at least as far as statistics are concerned. If members of group A are more likely to be murderers than members of group B, per capita, then they are. Trying to hide that behind the the fact that there are far more members of group B than members of group A in the overall population and that therefore group B commits more total murders (of both group A and group B) seems deliberately deceptive.

That said, I’ve lost track of what larger point either of you is trying to make. You may well be right on the macro claim you are making, even if you are supporting it in a shaky fashion. But I have no idea what that claim is.

It’s not hiding anything. I’ve talked about the population differences and how that’s a part of that, including a part of fears and feelings people have. Especially when an overwhelmingly outnumbered population has also been historically brutalized, slandered, oppressed, etc.

The white demographic will become a minority in approximately 2045. White voters are increasingly leaning GOP, with self-identified white democrats decreasing approximately .5% per year over the last decade (currently 26%, from 31% in 2008). I suspect this trend will continue, and if it does, we’re looking at approximately 12 point additional loss by 2045, putting democrats at approximately 14% among whites, and 7% across the whole country. That will probably happen no matter what. The year might not be right, but I believe that will happen sooner rather than later. They may go republican, they may go independent, but they will go bye-bye from the democratic party, unless something truly remarkable happens.

Looking at this in the long-term, as I think some are, democrats have far less to lose pissing off whites than they do pissing off minorities. If democrats lose the minority vote, they’re dead, period. They know this, and are banking on minorities by pushing identity politics and intersectionality hardcore. Not saying that’s a purely pragmatic move, but there’s definitely some political motivation to. They pretty much have to. The question is, until whites are an inevitable minority, short term it is risky to piss them off. D’s may have to face some losses before they can win.

Max, very thoughtful posts (748 & 751).

How so? Would those minorities vote Republican? They wouldn’t. Would they vote for some party that’s more liberal/leftish than the Democrats? If so, then why *shouldn’t *that party prevail over the Democrats?

Because if we spend 20 years having a green/dem realignment, we’ll have 20 years of GOP rule and GOP supreme court appointments. And with the current GOP that’s an absolutely unacceptable catastrophe.

The main struggle, I think, that democrats have and will have with minorities, will be getting them to vote, period. Trump did not win because whites love Trump so much, they won because a lot of people that voted for Obama didn’t vote.

This is my main point about strategy. Democrats will win if they can motivate young and minority voters to vote. Like they did in 08.

Well, hopefully the democrats can find another “articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking” black guy to run. That’ll make it a lot easier. Pesky term limits.