Trump is a despicable dumpster fire of a person, but I am related to people who voted for him and still support him. I don’t really interact much with them, but I’ve been to their houses and I see them on Facebook. Painting with a broad brush, here are some of the categories of Trump supporters:
- Garbage In/Garbage Out: This accounts for our recent posters; people who are smart enough to apply logic to an argument, and who are wise enough to know how to read and listen to the news. But, their information sources are for shit. That’s why they believe things like immigrants are criminals, that pre-ACA healthcare worked fine, that Obama was bad for the economy, or any other number of objectively wrong things. It’s not that they can’t handle sophisticated nuance, it’s just that they aren’t exposed to it, and instead told incorrect things that lead them to believe that Democrats are traitors, or weak or ineffectual.
You can try to correct these people (in theory, they can be reasoned with), but your patient corrections will get subsumed by the waves of bad data they regularly intake. My dad (who was a regular fan of Glenn Beck’s radio program) probably qualifies.
- Republican by tradition: My Uncle votes Republican. Trump was the Republican, so he voted for him. Why? Because my Uncle was raised by a Republican father, so he learned at a young age that “Republicans are good for business, and Democrats favor poor people”. And since he owns his own business, he’s a Republican. It’s simple, really: Your political party is part of your identity, and once identified it’s simply who you are. My Uncle can no more imagine becoming a woman than becoming a Democrat.
Similarly, my cousin’s step-father once got in a Facebook spat with me because I made disparaging remarks about the Republican administration…of Herbet Hoover! For real; I was disparaging the team. He couldn’t cotton to that (his utter ignorance of the dates of WWI and the Depression notwithstanding)
- Reasons. My Aunt hates Hillary with the fire of a thousand suns. Why? “She’s a crook”. Why? “I don’t want to talk about it!” My cousin’s wife, when I lamented Trump winning, said on Facebook “Well with Hillary you’d have to deal with her emails!” What about them? They are bad! Bad emails! (It should be noted that my cousin’s wife is functionally illiterate - seriously, as a mother of 4 in her 30s, she doesn’t know how to use any punctuation. I doubt my Aunt could manage to read a book. She’s very sweet, but also quite dumb)
Lots of people “know” things that they don’t really know. They just think it, because it’s an impression they get. Man, Colbert was genius with that whole “truthiness” thing. Usually, I find that these are the people who only think something because a smart person told them. Cousins who spend a lot of time in church are included.
- Bigotry. One of my cousins thinks that Black people wouldn’t get shot if they stopped robbing places. It’s not that he thinks that Black people are all criminals. But, seriously, they should really stop robbing stores if they don’t want to be shot. When his wife posted some beautiful and opulent picture from Dubai that she saw online, he was beside himself: “Babe, it says United ARAB emirates. Arab!”
He doesn’t believe minorities have anything to complain about, but he hates that he goes to places where he feels “like a minority in my own country”. When he was 18, he had to look on his driver’s license to spell his middle name on an application.
Yes, people really are that dumb. Trump made those people feel important.
…………….
So, why support Trump.
Well, a lot of ignorance. Note that ignorance is not a function of whether you make a lot of money, whether you are nice, or even whether you are happy. But it does reflect a lack of understanding - either because the person lacks the capacity for critical thought or are being misled by biased sources that profit off of fear and confusion. I daresay that a person with access to, and an understanding of, reputable and comprehensive information would not, could not, be a Trump supporter.