The black vote is already pretty much maxed out Democratic, so it makes relatively little difference. Going from 96% to 98% Democratic won’t sway things much.
But if certain white groups have swayed by double digits, that’s something, especially since there are five times as many white people in America as black people.
Never heard that term, and not sure what it means.
You overreached with that line, man. Own goal.
I don’t know what you mean by that. Are you talking about affirmative action?
Yes, it’s along those lines. So is “an Affirmative Action hire” usually used as a reasonable comment?
This analysis is so shallow it’s ridiculous.
There are a lot of white straight men in this country, as well as “two of the three.” There are voices who laud white straightness and support white straightness as a matter of course. Those voices have electoral appeal. And they’re not on your side.
I strongly dislike** SlackerInc**. I am suspicious of this thread simply because it’s his. But there is a problem if both the left and moderates consistently play into the trope that we take white/straights/men for granted. We won’t just lose a dangerous number of young men from the left, but from the center as well.
We need a lot more positive reinforcement of non-toxic, non-gay masculinity. We need some kind of positive answer for the plight of the American white. Even “Go back to Europe” would be better than “Fuck you, white boy, it’s our time.”
Just guessing, but “equity” as a negative means “in service to some vague ideal about equality”. “Hire”, in that sense, means that probably the employee was not actually the best qualified, but see above.
How about “NO one is entitled by the mere demographic accident of birth to better opportunities than others get” …?
(Note that this formulation uses ‘opportunities,’ not outcomes.)
From what I’ve seen it’s meant as a dismissive insult, but what’s your point?
Uh, yes. That is all exactly what phrase is generally meant to imply.
Is the “American white” suffering more than Americans in general?
I know that a lot of working class people of all races have had tough times, and it would be great if we could address that with more than meaningless slogans (MAGA) and counter productive policies (recent tax cut). I don’t hear a lot of “Fuck you, white boy” from any serious Democrat or progressive. To the extent anyone has that attitude, it shouldn’t be seen as a reason to vote Republican (which, I think, is what this thread is about).
Gosh, I don’t know how to feel about all these hard luck white guys who just can’t catch a break now that women and minorities are taking all the good jobs.
I’m supposed to feel sympathy for them, listen to their concerns and join their demands to rip back all the progress we’ve made so that they won’t feel so bad about themselves? Well that won’t happen.
Again, I’m a 55 year old white guy, solid middle class, worked in IT most of my adult life. There is no part of this country, our local world, that is biased against me by fact of me being a white male. There is significant bias against black men, women and other minorities. Giving them the same rights, the same opportunities as me does nothing to harm me excepting in the general manner of enlarging the labor pool and increasing my competition for good jobs.
But that’s the ticket, right? Those qualified women and black people taking the job I as a white man should feel entitled to? That’s the entire thing, the entire complaint. “They don’t deserve it, I do”.
Me. My misses. Two. In this thread alone.
Still the relevance of that data is worth highlighting a third time in the context of not only elevating one internet poll to Truth but presuming some causations that both do not fit the data and that fly in the face of real world special election results.
As far as being perceived as the “anti” … given the GOP party of no that is pretty rich but we live in a world that artificially colored artificially flavored salted sugar water is successfully sold as a healthy drink for athletes, so marketing is capable of lots.
No argument from me that the Dem side needs to market better what *positive *visions they are for and to help those less educated white men who are being left behind in the current and the future economy that the positive vision includes them.
Velocity share of vote is one thing. Turnout is another. Going from your 96 to 98% (or 80 to 93% which was HRC '16 to Obama '12) is one thing. Going from 66 to 59% turnout in that demographic is another. Trump’s victory did NOT hinge most on greater turnout among whites, voting for him; it hinged most on the drop in Black turnout, back to the level before Obama. White turnout was up, but only 1%.
Forbes put it well. The nonvoters decided the last election.
As for SlackerInc’s exhortation for us all to police the speech of others who somehow dis straight white men. The voices that saying those things to those turned off by them? Most often likely Millennials’ … speaking to Millennials in fora that us old Boomers don’t frequent much. And odds are different fora than where the undereducated white male Millennials are hanging too. We cannot police it. And my adult voting kids, all straight white males … they I think are more likely to agree with the disses than to police it.
To whatever degree it occurs in those places I don’t frequent, it is dumb and counterproductive. And it has nothing to do with anything that gets labelled as “PC” or “progressive.” The lack of marketing a message, a vision, that is inclusive of the real issues that the less educated white male demographic experiences is a fail, yes, but trying to compete with the GOP in pandering to resentment would be a bigger fail.
Really good point. I hadn’t thought about it quite that way, but you’re right.
Note too that “mediocre” is implicitly the ceiling for the quality of white men, as this term is generally reserved for men high up in business, politics, or entertainment—not for shoe salesmen or small town accountants. It strikes me that this word was chosen because it was understood that a certain minimal level of competence has to be acknowledged when someone has, for instance, created a successful and critically-acclaimed TV show.
Was this meant for a different thread? What does this have to do with my opposition to calling out people for the gender and ethnicity they were born with, regardless of how ignorant/assholish they may or may not be?
Again, what the actual fuck does this have to do with the topic of this thread? “Republicans do stuff that is worse” is not an argument. I mean, of course they do—but that hasn’t prevented them from winning a lot of elections up and especially down the ballot. I’m concerned about managing our own house. I have four kids, and “Jayden does worse stuff at her house” is not an argument that will get my kids out of trouble.
I don’t know. I used to be a pretty good political prognosticator, but then I was so wrong about 2016. So I’m not sure what to expect. Those special election results are very promising, but the dwindling of the generic ballot is worrisome. I don’t know which to trust.
What I do know is that white men are a very large cohort of voters, and millennial white men are the ones who have the greatest number of elections ahead of them over the next few decades. So getting them on the right track while their political orientation is still fluid is very important.
And what I don’t know, but strongly suspect, is that they would be much more like their female millennial peers in their voting preferences if they were made to feel more welcome. (Because, again per Pew, it’s not just about black and white but male and female: that millennial gender gap is ginormous.)
No.
Completely wrong.
The complaint is that the rural communities that many of these people live in are in an ongoing crisis. The complaint is that they are not just doing less well than their parents did but are in a downward spiral, falling out of middle class and into an entrenched lower class. They are the ones being hollowed out from the middle downwards. The issues are real.
Give them a vision that includes some understanding of the real problems they are facing, a vision that *includes *a path for them to also be part of a secure middle class, not fearful that the next technologic or trade shift will have them unable to pay the bills, and they might sign on. Message that they are not a concern, only “others” are, well that’s what makes the product of resentment an easy sale.
Yes. A possible Democratic message–that has the advantage of being true–is that no straight white Christian male with self-respect wants to succeed based on the accident of his birth: he wants to succeed based on his own merits.
As you say, the numbers tell the story: Trump didn’t win by bringing out the disaffected, resentful white males. He didn’t bring them out in any numbers greater than they’d come out for previous GOP candidates. Trump won because the non-white and other traditionally Democratic voters decided not to show up.
So pandering to insecure people by saying ‘we will ensure that no one will ever criticize you and you will receive the deference to which your birth entitles you’ would be utterly useless. Those voters did not decide the 2016 election.
(And, yeah: there’s no point in mocking or ridiculing anyone. Of course if the more entitled types choose to interpret non-mockery as mockery, there’s nothing anyone can do about that.)
Rural communities have been on a slow decline since farm machinery greatly reduced the need for farm labor. There is no plan to save rural small towns because to do so would require putting industries back in those areas. Sorry, the farms don’t need that much labor and Toyota isn’t building a plant in Podunk, Wisconsin. If they build one, it will be closer to a larger population center where they can find the labor and skills.
Don’t want rural America to be passed by? Then support higher minimum wages so that your entire county isn’t living on $9 an hour jobs at the SuperAmerica station and the Dollar Store. Don’t NIMBY every damned offer of a new mine or factory.
The solution to rural poverty is as old as mankind. You move to the city to find work. Mesopotamians were doing that over 6,000 years ago.
You can’t sit in rural bumfuck West Virginia, where the mines have closed, and whine about how the entire world owes you a new job in the same town because you refuse to move. No one owes you that job, just the same as your party has been saying for decades. Besides the fact that every single one of you came from immigrant stock, and your own ancestors moved there for the jobs, from somewhere they didn’t have a job. Do the same.
The generic ballot has been within noise range and not dwindling at all. Today D+7, a month ago D+8, three months ago D+5, five months ago D+8 … Yes some spikes and valleys. Spiked up to D+13 end of December and down to D+5.5 end of March. But overall pretty flat and no “dwindling” apparent.
Now the switch to LV polls will shake it up some, who knows what way, but that is yet to come.
Again though … you think the millennial white male is the most likely midterm voter?
Chimera, it was poorly marketed but actually Obama’s administration had some decent rural initiatives that given some time and support could help some, starting out with improved connectivity, small business loans, and better education.
In any case if I was a rural white millennial male, or even a blue collar one, not highly educated, no IT skills for example, now dropping lower and lower from safe middle, the vision you are selling? Sign me up for them GOP phone banks! At least they pretend to care about my problems. They may be selling me a bill of goods but they at least aren’t calling where I live bumfuck and telling me that my community doesn’t matter and isn’t worth making an effort to save. Yeah, I, with my High School diploma and no skills, should move to the great city where I know no one and have no family and no supports and no job. Everything solved! Great plan.
Okay, this will be my last post before going offline for my regularly scheduled weekend “Internet fast”. I’ll check back Monday afternoon or evening.
Probably so for you and many others reading. If that describes you, then my exhortation is not for you.
I’m tempted to question how saying that progressives shouldn’t be faulting someone for characteristics they are born with is “pandering to resentment”. But more importantly, I see we’re getting into the whole “downtrodden/disaffected rural blue collar whites” discussion, which was not my aim at all. Not that I can stop you, but I’ll try to at least give a better idea of who I have in mind—and that’s the white boys from the other side of the tracks. The ones who grew up in affluent suburbia, who are heading to good colleges and then presumably on to good jobs in large, dynamic, growing urban areas.
We have gotten so used to paying attention to the new type of Republican, who is a “poorly educated” rural white person, that we forget that the educated, affluent white man was traditionally the rock-ribbed cornerstone of the GOP. And there’s no guarantee they won’t go back there if we don’t tend to them a little better. It may make you ill to even contemplate being concerned with the egos of young white men with good jobs, but there are a lot of votes there that we need to keep.
That doesn’t mean changing important policy positions or throwing people of color under the bus. The kind of men I’m talking about aren’t thirsting for that anyway. Just put out the welcome mat for them if they are willing to be progressive or at least center-left.
The non-college educated rural white guys, OTOH, are a much tougher “get” at this point—and I’m not convinced we should even expend much effort on them.
Exactly right. Andy misses an important point: those right wingers are saying nasty things about a group of people who make up hardly any of the votes Republicans rely on to win elections. There is little penalty to be paid for alienating them en masse. The same is not true for Democrats and white men!
And then of course there’s the basic idea “two wrongs don’t make a right”.
I’m as nonplussed as you are to find us in agreement on this. And I love your phrasing: “Fuck you, white boy, it’s our time” nails it. And I’m sympathetic to why this might be tempting to think this way! But it is an impulse that has to be resisted.
Here we go, another comment that has exactly fuck-all to do with this thread. You sound like a primitive progressive chatbot that only knows how to say a few stock phrases, regardless of context.
Shit, missed the edit window.
ETA: If the generic ballot is not in fact “dwindling”, my mistake. (I only really started following politics again in December, so I took that as the starting point.) Then you can substitute “anemic” for “dwindling”. We need a double digit lead to be in solid position to retake the House, per 538.