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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsThe Guardian nails it: White working class votes for white supremacists. Period.
Excellent Guardian essay. Here's the crux of the essay.
https://www.theguardian.com/inequality/ng-interactive/2026/jun/21/american-racial-anxiety-white-working-class-rights
Of course, LBJ said it in fewer words.
I was born (1944) and reared in a rural, crossroads, cotton-picking village in SW MS. I escaped at age 18 and never looked back. I have 14 cousins, all living in MS and LA, 4 of them are Democrats the rest are Republicans -- college-educated, financially successful but to hear them talk, it sounds like the words I heard in MS in the 1950's . . . their children and grandchildren attend lily-white " segregation academies." they do not refer to Black people as "Black," instead, it's "n####r" just as it was 60-70 or more years ago . . . and they are for Trump all the way.
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dalton99a
(96,147 posts)Mister Ed
(7,006 posts)
NoMoreRepugs
(12,303 posts)
Ocelot II
(131,752 posts)"No amount of persuasion will move those who have chosen to maintain control and violence over putting food on the table when the point of their trade-off is keeping others from putting food on theirs."
hlthe2b
(115,136 posts)I'd bet there are a lot of non-racist liberal/progressives that are getting lumped into that category nowadays. Stereotypes have some truth in them, no doubt, but they also tend to capture those not deserving. When you want to expand the independent (and Reagan-Democrat) vote away from R's, Conservatives, MAGA, I think that is worth taking into consideration.
yardwork
(69,900 posts)I think the author makes a strong case.
There's a schism in thinking about this among Democrats. At one extreme we have the opinion expressed by Bernie Sanders and others that the white (and white-adjacent) working class is worried about the economy and feels left behind.
The author of this column asks a good question: if it's about economic oppression, then why haven't Black working class voters abandoned the Democratic Party like their white counterparts did?
I think the author is correct. It's about racism. Southern Democrats left the party after the Civil Rights Acts were passed in the 1960s. Whites watch Fox News because the racist messages appeal to them. Whites support Trump despite all his failures because he's doing the one thing they really care about: he's attacking non-whites.
wnylib
(26,765 posts)White working class Americans tended to be Democrats prior to the Civil Rights movement. In the North, it was due to economics, especially among immigrants and first generation American-born citizens. In the South, it was due to hatred of Republicans during Reconstruction and a determination to keep former enslaved people on the lowest social rungs, or outside of the social system completely through segregation out of defiance against the winners of the Civil War.
When Blacks began to achieve progress in Civil Rights legislation, most White Americans did not know the severity of poverty and lack of educational opportunities for most Black Americans. There were some educated and middle class Blacks, but proportionately not as many as middle class Whites.
Northern Whites looked at the nation from their own perspective. They were segregated by tradition rather than by law as in the South and knew very little about Black experiences from the perspective of Black people. I remember hearing middle and working class Whites saying things like, "My immigrant grandparents didn't demand special treatment. They came here with no money and worked hard to succeed." But, their White grandparents could assimilate, get work, and build on that. They lived in enclaves by choice to be with people of similar cultural backgrounds, not by social segregation. They had upward mobility even if it took a lot of hard work to move up, even if they were looked down on by WASPS if they were Irish or Italian. They also had elected representation in government because they had enclaves of people who voted for one of their own. They were ALLOWED to vote.
Also, it is not true that they made no demands on their own behalf. Immigrants formed unions, similar to guilds that once existed in Europe to look after them from dues they paid. They fought bitter struggles to establish unions, often getting beat up or killed by thugs hired by management. FDR pushed for legal recognition of the right to bargain. But early unions usually excluded Blacks in the North as well as in the South.
Whites knew that Blacks were excluded from most rights of citizenship, but did not take into account that White immigrants could change their names, learn English, and assimilate BECAUSE they looked like other Whites. Blacks could not do that unless they were very light and and could pass themselves off as Italian or southern French or Greek.
Laws, bank policy, real estate policy all worked against Blacks, in addition to no hire policies and no union representation. How do you pull yourself up by your bootstraps if you have no boots?
So working class Whites saw Blacks as a threat when Blacks began to succeed in Civil Rights legislation, voting rights. education, job training and promotions, desegregation of schools and housing. They viewed Blacks as getting help that they didn't get.
When JFK and LBJ successfully pushed legislation for racial equality, Southern Democrats deserted the Dem party, which LBJ predicted would happen. Outside of the South, White working class people said that the Dems had deserted them because of the emphasis that Dems placed on standing solidly with Civil Rights. It was the right thing for Dems to do. But for a few reasons, many White working class people who did not think of themselves as racist, felt that THEY were being unfairly treated. Sensitivity training and experience working with Blacks did help some Whites see beyond their own perspectives. They learned about the effects of suppressing Black people that social prejudices had created.
Those who could not see beyond themselves and their lives became Reagan Republicans and deserted the Dem party. They bought into the Republican spin that minorities and government supportiveness in achieving equality were unfair to Whites and were the cause of every and any problem that White Americans, especially those in the working class, experienced. They pushed stereotyped images that people who demanded equality were lazy and wanted things handed to them.
Working class Whites could feel social prestige by having select groups on a lower rung of society than themselves. They could also benefit financially by keeping "the other" down socially and economically.
They were so consumed by their social and racial views that they did not see what LBJ warned about, that the party who welcomed them was picking their pockets and lying to them.
questionseverything
(12,199 posts)The rappers like west or whoever he calls himself has hurt us
Wednesdays
(23,419 posts)History is repeating wnylib's history above about African Americans, except now it is with LGBTQ+ people. We have come full circle.
Again, the right thing to do, but Democrats are paying the price.
hlthe2b
(115,136 posts)to the same stereotype, yardwork? That group is ever enlarging now that Trump has destroyed the economy so the adage is going to be less applicable in the future as well.
sop
(19,801 posts)This was the primary concern of lower class whites decades ago, when non-white minorities (and women) were finally given access to jobs, education and other rights previously thought to belong exclusively to white males. Lower class whites rightly believed they would be economically disadvantaged by racial equality, probably because many of them realized they lacked the necessary tools to compete in an equal world.
malaise
(299,428 posts)Rec
ck4829
(38,162 posts)Doodley
(12,130 posts)sop
(19,801 posts)Some might argue "most" would be more appropriate.
Kid Berwyn
(25,441 posts)Whatever their skin tone or ethnicity, most all of my neighbors are good people.
Response to Doodley (Reply #9)
yardwork This message was self-deleted by its author.
yardwork
(69,900 posts)The fact is that a strong majority of white working class voters still support Trump even though he's done nothing to help them.
We all know that doesn't mean all white working class voters.
KPN
(17,580 posts)who voted for Trump were racist. There are many white working class who regret having voted for him in 2020 … and race based discriminatory federal governance has never been stronger. It’s either the economic insecurity, the hate based governance, the conspicuous corruption, the sheer idiocy of this Trump administration or all of the above that makes them regret their vote.
yardwork
(69,900 posts)I see them quoted sometimes but I don't know a single one in real life.
What I do encounter is a lot of mumbling along the lines of "I don't like Trump but I like his policies" and "Kamala would have been worse."
I don't think Trump's failures have changed many minds.
Keepthesoulalive
(2,456 posts)Racism is a cancer that is destroying our country. We need to talk about it honestly because Trump is the president because of it. It is not personal,I’m sure you are a good person but I see so many white people try to shut down any discussion because it makes them uncomfortable. Black people are under attack and 64 percent of white men who voted think that’s ok. Let’s not discuss all of those issues that don’t concern us let’s talk about economics which is another form of soft racism . Modifiers won’t fix what ails America but honesty and myth busting might.
yardwork
(69,900 posts)We see examples of whites being racist everywhere, yet some white people have a conniption when this is mentioned.
Instead of defending ourselves maybe we should start telling the racists in our lives to STFU.
Keepthesoulalive
(2,456 posts)We know people who have tried to teach white people the value of a diverse society. The pushback was so strong they got out of the business. The privilege of not discussing what is wrong in our society Trumps everything.
yardwork
(69,900 posts)Our national mythology is that God gave America to white Christian men to make a civilization out of the wilderness with the help of only their horses, dogs, and wives.
Despite the fact that this myth is almost entirely wrong, it persists in our national psyche. Check out the number of shows made by Taylor Sheridan, for instance.
This myth is the reason why so many Americans are fearful of socialism and communism, fearful of women's and gay rights, fearful of Black people and non-white immigrants, and fearful of any supposed "attack" on Christianity even when they don't attend church themselves. And they go bananas if anything else is taught in schools.
The myth of a strong, stoic white man building a life in the wilderness with only his hands is appealing as a fantasy and it's the reason we're so weak. We reject everything that makes modern nations strong.
Dr. T
(807 posts)Last edited Sun Jun 21, 2026, 12:55 PM - Edit history (1)
have no desire to have power over anyone. I am superior to no one and no one is superior to me 'cept maybe my girlfriend.
Cirsium
(4,213 posts)But so what? This is not about you. You are not in any danger. You are not being persecuted.
ABC123Easy
(440 posts)Great post, thank you!
FakeNoose
(42,928 posts)The so-called "white working class" were just starting to abandon the Democratic Party back in the mid-90s. I believe Clinton could have stopped it if he had done a few things differently. He should have supported the labor unions when he had the chance. Increasing the minimum wage, installing universal healthcare, supporting public education and other pro-labor and pro-working-class initiatives would have gone a long way to retain those Dem voters.
Instead he killed welfare, gave in to the banks at every chance and he allowed CEOs to have special access because they were campaign donors. Clinton did things that we criticize Chump for now, but this was over 30 years ago!
Bill did good things too, but the white working class voters started leaving the Party on his watch.
NBachers
(19,659 posts)Health Care. It was one of the cornerstone proposals of his first administration, and he ran on it in the run-up to the 1992 election. The Maggots-of-the-day dubbed it Hillarycare, and it was ultimately defeated in Congress.
You'll find plenty of information here:
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=Bill+Clinton+and+Al+Gore+promote+Universal+Health+Care+card&atb=v466-1&ia=web
comradebillyboy
(10,975 posts)was the cause of all the Democratic Party's problems. /s
MorbidButterflyTat
(4,941 posts)then some other Democrat. 
FakeNoose
(42,928 posts) Keepthesoulalive
(2,456 posts)The republicans offer nothing to make Americans lives better but working class whites still vote for them. Affirmative action, DEI, Trans, immigrants and you know the rest. Oklahoma had a chance to increase the minimum wage and they said nope. The reason we are screwed as a country is because hate sells better than progress.
DFW
(60,733 posts)When LBJ was president, and pushed through the Civil Rights Act of 1965, he said that he has lost the South for the Democrats, thinking it was for a generation. It turns out it was longer than that, but he was right. Nixon exploited it ruthlessly, and the Republicans never looked back. It took guts to do what LBJ did. That and Vietnam practically snatched the white house away from Hubert Humphrey. But the Civil Rights Act was still the right thing to do.
FakeNoose
(42,928 posts)As I recall, he said something like, "Let them go..."
I grew up in the Midwest and my Grandpa was a Republican voter. But he passed away in 1980 just as Reagan was planning to move into the White House. I believe my Grandpa would have been appalled at what has happened to the GOP since Reagan. If Grandpa had hung on into the 1990's I believe he would have voted for Bill Clinton.
So I guess my point is that I'm not equating the "white male working class" with "Southern racists" - they are two distinct groups. Or they could have been, if we had handled things differently.
yardwork
(69,900 posts)
betsuni
(29,417 posts)They began leaving in the '60s when inequality was low, good paying manufacturing jobs still plentiful, union membership high. It was not economic. Bill Clinton was popular with white working class.
In 2007 there were about the same number of white Democrats and Republicans. In 2009 68% of whites were Democrats, by 2016 down to 55%. Politics was increasingly racialized by the right-wing and resulted in Trump.
yardwork
(69,900 posts)It started in the 1980s with Rush Limbaugh and really took off in the 90s.
justsomeguy01
(57 posts)Fox "news" on big TV on the wall 30' in front of me.
Big brouhaha about some baseball players being sanctioned for putting bible verse on their caps.
I only saw the video (and cryons) - no sound.
Even without audio it was clear this was being treated as "how DARE MLB persecute Christians".
I guarantee the "what if they put "86-47" or pro-Muslim or anti-war messages or "Jesus was a liberal" on their caps - would that be OK ? That's why NO messages are allowed on players caps" perspective was not presented. And few FOX viewers were not successfully moved to outrage and hatred of "woke" "godless" Democrats/elites.
Propaganda WORKS.
betsuni
(29,417 posts)Last edited Sun Jun 21, 2026, 02:11 PM - Edit history (1)
because identity politics."
"For many years, whites with less formal education had not mapped their views about race onto their broader political views. Because they tended to follow politics less closely, they had not fully learned or internalized the long-standing divisions between the Democratic and Republican parties on civil rights and other issues related to race. But once Obama was in office, whites with less formal education became better able to connect racial issues to political politics. There was a large increase in the proportion of non-college educated whites who knew that the Democratic Party was more supportive of liberal racial policies than was the Republican Party. Then racial attitudes became more connected to whether whites identified as Democratic or Republican.
"Of course, these Obama-era trends also coincided with the onset of the Great Recession. But it is unlikely that economics was driving defections from the Democratic Party among whites with less formal education or less favorable views of racial and ethnic minorities. For one, the recession began under a Republican president, George W. Bush, and both he and his party received most of the blame -- which is exactly why Obama won so handily in 2008. Moreover, rising unemployment has historically favored the Democratic Party ... perhaps because Democrats are perceived as caring more about the issue of jobs and employment than do Republicans. If anything, then, the Great Recession should have driven the voters experiencing economic hardship to Obama and the Democratic Party. And even if voters did blame Obama, one would then expect defections from the Democratic Party to reverse themselves as the economic recovery took hold, but instead the defections accelerated over the course of Obama's presidency. This is why racial attitudes appear to be the more likely culprit."
From "Identity Crisis"
Make people angry about race and culture wars and tell them it's about economics, conspiracies by liberals or oligarchs or establishment or centrists or AIPAC or elites or revisionist propaganda that Bill Clinton and Barack Obama were bad terrible neoliberal sea monsters.
That and 100% Republican obstruction with the goal of making government dysfunctional, even voting against their own bills if there's the slightest possibility it might make Democrats look good (bipartisanship); then blaming Democrats. Media and pundits blame both sides, people think their vote doesn't count, anger from other directions that Democrats don't want to do anything, spineless, corporatists, elites, status quo, don't fight, etc. Everyone whining about Democrats.
Cirsium
(4,213 posts)Clinton's attempts to reach across the aisle and achieve bipartisan consensus - which is just a euphemistic way of saying pander to white racists - did not work. That's the lesson of the Clinton era. Trying to win over "white working class voters" - white racists - is a losing proposition and always has been.
From the article:
Across both parties, terms like “economic opportunity”, “upward mobility”, “housing” and “job creation” are effectively dog whistles for the last 100 years of government rhetoric that champions working-class whites over working-class everyone else while the outcomes of their policies enrich the wealthiest Americans at everyone else’s expense.
Fiendish Thingy
(24,415 posts)Especially this year, when Trump induced, widespread suffering has crossed all regional, racial and partisan boundaries, we will likely see a not-insignificant number of working class white voters voting for Dems in the midterms.
Keepthesoulalive
(2,456 posts)Nope as soon as another racist pied piper comes along they will go right back. People in red states vote red no matter who. West Virginia has been circling the drain for years and it gets worse with each new governor. They will not vote for a democrat. Go figure.
Fiendish Thingy
(24,415 posts)In elections , not polls, Over the past year, 2024 Trump +20 districts have shifted 15-30 points towards Dem candidates in places like TX, GA and FL.
This is why gerrymandering won’t save the republicans in the midterms.
Dems are likely to pickup senate seats in ME and OH, and Senate races in places like IA, AK, TX and even MT are competitive for Dems.
If Dems regain the trifecta in 2028, expand the court and govern fearlessly and unhesitatingly, they will retain that trifecta for a generation or more (see FDR and the New Deal).
Keepthesoulalive
(2,456 posts)But I am an old lady and I have never seen such effective propaganda, so many people are brainwashed it’s like all the fifties horror movies have come to life. We don’t know all the players but the billionaires are behind it and their reach is worldwide.
Fiendish Thingy
(24,415 posts)At least electionwise.
Musk sank millions into the WI Supreme Court race and lost big time.
mr715
(4,787 posts)The Senate will flit about between parties based on candidates.
Given the conditions you describe (Democratic trifecta in 2028, with an expanded court)
If they permit DC and PR statehood, Democrats would probably control the Senate too...
mr715
(4,787 posts)Was, prior to 2000, a solidly, solidly Democratic state.
It is a very interesting case study in rapid political realignment.
Keepthesoulalive
(2,456 posts)Senator Byrd was transforming West Virginia and then they decided to become republican zombies.
mr715
(4,787 posts)Labor was the heart of WV politics.
As the unions withered, and as Democrats became less strongly associated with "white, working class" voters West Virginia shifted to one of the reddest states of the country.
There is also issues with centrist, neoliberalism and triangulation, deregulation of energy, and other stuff. West Virginia is a beautiful state that has been systematically and totally destroyed by coal/mining and as those industries die, so too is their economic potential.
Al Gore probably lost West Virginia due to his anti-coal messaging before its time.
Keepthesoulalive
(2,456 posts)But no one can blame democrats for them turning a blind eye to the self destructive practices of voting for republicans. They have poisoned their water, blown the tops off their mountains and left the Appalachians in poverty. For hundreds of years millionaires have taken their resources and won’t even give them peanuts. They must own this and vote for the betterment of their children and their state. Hillary tried to show them a new way with different solutions to energy production, they wouldn’t hear it.
TygrBright
(21,408 posts)Keeping us powerless, feeling impotent and 'less than' in cultural terms, is key to triggering the emotional response that prioritizes a sense of entitlement and power over the reality of actual economic and social well-being.
While plenty of working class white voters know this, recognize it, and counter it at the ballot box, "plenty" is still not a majority in our demographic. Stoking the culture wars is cheap and effective for the oligarchs.
sadly,
Bright
kimbutgar
(27,694 posts)
mopinko
(74,203 posts)yeah, they hated affirmative action, even when it mostly benefited their wives, at a time when families started needing 2 incomes to survive.
KS Toronado
(24,133 posts)lot of white people used the "n" word, I associated with people who didn't. What really surprised me about
the blacks in MS is how so many of them used the "n" word also. Didn't see that back in Wichita KS. 
Keepthesoulalive
(2,456 posts)And people in that group can use certain words and phrases other people can’t.
For instance the b word, when a woman uses it among consensual friends it doesn’t sting but if a strange man says it to a woman danger and misogyny. How about white folks don’t use the n word when speaking to black folks and also when they say it to each other it’s meant to demean. The 2 are not equivalent.
rogue emissary
(3,451 posts)We keep seeing post about Democrats not reaching the white working class. This is the reason they're not responding. Democrats aren't offering them the prize that they truly seek from their vote. They want racial power and they don't mind if they have to suffer as long as the black, other, gay, and immigrants suffers more.
haele
(15,697 posts)Americans have a more narrow class identity than most other nations, based on our work (or lack of) rather than actual culture. An American sees their personal value in their job and in their ability to own something, rather than in their personal nature or talents.
Most Americans, especially White "as almost middle class" are pretty comfortable - even when they complain - with their local class hierarchy and find "fairness" in that hierarchy when they measure their self worth and assess themselves against other groups in their general class.
Americans in general don't tend to care about "those others" that live "over yonder", Americans tend to be uncurious and selfish, they know very little about the culture or lives of "the others" other than what the media shows them,, and they resent having to change their personal activities and preferences to level a playing field and share opportunities with strangers who might have a better way of doing a job they consider theirs by right.
Especially sharing with those they self-justify looking down on.
There's always a provincial prejudice. The difference between the outright bigot and a person who prefers certain cultures over others is in the strength they cling to their comfortable, childish hierarchies and the almost paralyzing fear of stepping outside of expectations and being required to either compete (without shortcuts or cheating) or cooperate for resources.
And yes, I'm American.
But I have few problems metaphorically looking in my ethical mirror and seeing what my actions say about me. I
'm still broadly curious in my old age and don't shy away from problems that don't immediately affect me even as I watch many of my fellow Americans turn away from a variety of options and hunker down/double down on "This is the way it's supposed to be" results based attitudes whenever their lives start becoming difficult or complex.
And in my experience, if someone doesn't want to admit they have to grow up and stop expecting people to smooth out the road in front of them, they are going to cling to their personal childish and selfish attitudes even harder.
betsuni
(29,417 posts)Belief that Republican voters haven't voted for Democrats because Democrats are not progressive enough, have no economic policies and stand for nothing, Republicans are waiting for true progressives who will fight the establishment to rescue The People.
No. Big difference in Right and Left populism, and economic anxiety isn't why they vote the way they do.
Redleg
(7,054 posts)Tell me again, main stream media, how Democrats need to be able to speak to these people.
Squaredeal
(752 posts)As his son related years later, upon he and his father seeing his neighbor farming by hand and realizing that his son knew his dad had poisoned the mule said, “Son, I just couldn’t have have people seeing a black man better off than me.”
Joinfortmill
(21,886 posts)
MerryBlooms
(12,553 posts)My father's parents met sharecropping in Oklahoma. Side by side, white and black, and whoever else showed up. They depended on each other and loved each other. I Never heard my grandparents utter a racist word, nor anyone on that southern side of my family. The racist words I heard were from Oregon born brothers.
My family was all working poor, but yes, there was class, morals and respect.
I didn't know what middle class was until I married into it. And man, what an eye opener. I realized half my Oregon born family had appeared in front of my new Circuit court Judge father-in-law. You talk about heavy pressure lol. He never brought it it up. Probably because his roots were also from Oklahoma sharecropping and tents.
SamuelAdams
(327 posts)Look at their campaign ads and rhetoric going back decades. Welfare queens and Willie Horton were only the most infamous ones. They are always showing dark-skinned people benefiting from welfare programs and using them to scare white people.
Joinfortmill
(21,886 posts)
zanana1
(6,599 posts)Minorities and us.
TheProle
(4,188 posts)
BeneteauBum
(929 posts)Fortunately, my kids do not support this administration. They are wonderfully intelligent and support equality. They also expect our politicians to address America’s issues without bias, not enrich themselves.
Peace ☮️
agingdem
(9,041 posts)and white working class vote for white supremacists because they are desperately trying to hold on to a whites-only/daddy knows best/christian/restricted United States that no longer exists.
Redleg
(7,054 posts)I will give the Guardian credit for this.
agingdem
(9,041 posts)retribution they paint white hate-fueled racist voters voting for white hate-fueled racist candidates as something we should understand and tolerate…
Solly Mack
(97,416 posts)no shit
multigraincracker
(38,289 posts)It was like working at the United Nations. We were all paid pretty much the same. Most folks got along pretty well, not all but most.
I see the day when many of those bigots will have tan grandchildren with nice wavy hair. Gonna be one big happy family. Someday.
gulliver
(14,148 posts)Seeing what has happened with race in this country makes me understand better what happens with anorexics. They look in the mirror, and they see an overweight person. They see a thin person, and they think it's an overweight person. They see an overweight person, and they think it's an overweight person.
You tell then they look thin, and it's not good for them. They hear someone lying to them...
Blasphemer
(3,633 posts)
duckworth969
(1,445 posts)Hackman in “Mississippi Burning” gives a short soliloquy that lays that out about his own daddy.
I highly recommend that movie. Great writing and acting.
Redleg
(7,054 posts)Hackman and Dafoe made it look so easy. A masterclass.
Fil1957
(961 posts)biocube
(288 posts)are picking up white working class voters (especially young men).
I'm not sure what implication is here. Are Dems going to win with finger wagging?
Response to biocube (Reply #42)
Post removed
biocube
(288 posts)The idea of defeating Republicans with DC statehood and abolishing the electoral college is fantasy. How about we for once nominate a president who has built their brand around class issues (someone like Bernie?).
yardwork
(69,900 posts)The minds of many lower income white people are biased against Black people. They may not feel that bias against other minorities.
And the minds of many white adjacent voters (like my BIL, who is a lifelong Latino Republican) are similarly biased against Black people.
The assumption that all non whites are unbiased is wrong.
I see this every day.
MorbidButterflyTat
(4,941 posts)
Celerity
(55,276 posts)the Democratic US Senate nominee against the POS Collins. You (and others) are still, post primary, engaging in sniping at him. This really needs to stop IMHO.
Cirsium
(4,213 posts)What do you believe that tells us?
Cosmocat
(15,515 posts)The media relentlessly trying to assign "economic anxiety" to it.
Bullshit, they doggedly vote against their own interests in favor of the scumbags who whistle (increasingly more directly speak to) at their biases prejudices.
yobrault1
(210 posts)that the construct that is racism and subsequently white supremacy is very expensive for white people who support it. and it’s not just the poorly educated it’s anyone that wants to believe that they are better than someone that doesn’t look like them and they’re willing to pay to have the chance for proximity to power.
paleotn
(23,039 posts)The article is way too simplistic in its thinking. There are many factors, including geography, culture, size of municipalities, and history to name a few, that play a part in how prevalent such attitudes are among various groups of people.
It's not a matter of whether or not racism exists and less well off white people screw themselves because of it. That exists everywhere. It's a matter of how many in various places exhibit those attitudes. Is it ingrained and cultural? In some places it is. In much of the south it's the default attitude, thus the majority in various regions.
I've been told that racism exists in New England. Yeah, it does. But these people have no idea what blatant, ingrained, default racism looks like. People seem to expect my chosen region to be some panacea in that regard (the author teaches at Boston U.) It's not. But compared to the most innately racist place I've ever lived in my entire life, South Carolina, there's no comparison. More of that in the Midwest. But still, no comparison to what I saw growing up and in our stops in the Southeast.
We'd been in South Carolina about 2 months and I was puttering in the garage with the garage door open. Next door neighbor came by and we chatted for a few minutes. Then, out of the blue, he said the most racist thing I'd ever heard in my life. Quite a feat given I grew up in Tennessee. It must have been the expression on my face (I'm terrible at poker) because for the next 2.5 years living there, he never went there again.
Places are different. They have different feels and cultures. Broad brushing isn't useful in a country as large and diverse as ours. And the author does a disservice to think it's as simple as she makes out. It's not. Lazy thinking in my mind. And simplistic, lazy thinking isn't going to help us get out of this mess.
Bluetus
(3,258 posts)being vague and mushy about what we would actually do differently. I don't deny that there are very clear differences in philosophy between Republicans and Democrats. But the less educated, less intelligent, less engaged are not moved by philisophies. This need clear, tangible things.
They understand "I'll build a wall and Mexico will pay. They understand "I will deport 2 million brown people." Is it racist? Yes, I suppose it is, but mainly it is SPECIFIC. The Dem candidates that are doing well are talking about specific solutions. We saw what Mamdani did. Talarico is talking about "the first 10 bills" and he is not shying away from taking on the Supreme Court and Citizens United. Platner is talking very clearly about why is really screwing this country and what we can do about it.
Courage is contagious. Ossoff is coming on strong. Booker has had good rhetoric, but it is 99% hollow, ultimately saying nothing. But even that is changing. He is starting to talk specifics. Every Dem needs to be following this pattern. Some are never going to come along and we'll just have to do tohe work to replace them with candidates with stronger backbone. But many are starting to get this religion.
For most of the past decade, I have been advocating for aggressive campaigning with very specific progressive ideas that actually will improve lives in ways that pwople will see and understand. And I know I have rubbed a lot of people the wrong way and it was a very lonely place to be. But today I am seeing essays and hearing interviews every single day where people are talking about the necessity of talking about REAL SOLUTIONS -- real changes in direction that can offer a meaningfull choice for Americans.
ColoringFool
(1,371 posts)LISTEN and HEAR them!
Develop policies that RETAIN COAL MINES and get rid of OSHA and OVERTURN BROWN v. BOARD of EDUCATION and return to the ORIGINAL US CONSTITUTION, GODDAMMIT, to count NEE-GROES as 3/5 of a PERSON and ban WOMEN'S VOTING!
MAGA! MAGA! MAGA!
Alice B.
(760 posts)They just lack the nerve to come out and say in public what their vote is *really* about.
yardwork
(69,900 posts)The amount of racist freaking out about the Obama Library is a good example.
MorbidButterflyTat
(4,941 posts)instead of calling it by its real title, The Barack Obama Presidential Center.
Like the Affordable Care Act became "Obamacare" so people would know they were supposed to hate it.
"Conspiracy" becomes "collusion," which undefined doesn't sound so bad.
It happens all the time.
Wednesdays
(23,419 posts)Nor Jewish. Even Marco Rubio would be a stretch.
Nor female, unless she's a Sarah Palin clone.
Every GOP nominee in history has been male straight White Anglo-Saxon Protestant, and of considerable wealth in the last fifty years. There's little to lead me to believe they'll ever change that pattern.
Cirsium
(4,213 posts)Let's recognize and acknowledge the author: Saida Grundy. The Guardian has published a number of excellent articles she wrote.
https://www.theguardian.com/profile/saida-grundy
Saida Grundy is a feminist sociologist of race & ethnicity and Associate Professor of Sociology, African American & Black Diaspora Studies, and Women’s and Gender Studies at Boston University. Her research to date has focused upon formations and ideologies of gender and racialization within the Black middle class–specifically men. Using in-depth interviews, her current work examines graduates of Morehouse College, the nation’s only historically Black college for men. Quite simply, this work asks how, in light of an ongoing national climate and discourse about young Black men “in crisis,” the men of Morehouse experience racialization and the process of “making” manhood at an institution that frames Black male elites as the solution to the crisis and the rightful representatives of the racial agendas. Her most recent book, Respectable: Politics and Paradox in Making the Morehouse Man (University of California Press, 2022), expands upon this work.
Saida’s research interests currently span examinations of masculinity and “social justice capitalism,” racialized rape culture, and bridging hegemonic masculinity theories to our understandings of campus sexual assault. Her work has been supported by the Boston University Center for the Humanities, the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation, the Social Science research Council, and the Andrew Mellon Foundation.
https://www.bu.edu/afam/profile/saida-grundy/
orthoclad
(5,021 posts)as a wedge tool. It's been doing that for centuries.
"Economic anxiety" makes it seem like all people need is a great big group hug. I knew lots of white working class who lost their homes in the Recession. Quite an anxiety! Instead of recruiting them against the ruling class which took their homes, we call them racist and further divide the people. We do the work of the ruling class for them.
A lot of those people who lost their homes turned to Trump because the oligarch media told them the "other people" were their problem, and we reinforced the message by sneering at these racists with dirty hands and turning our clean noses in the air. The rich who caused the misery skated away. We could just as easily have made allies of them, but we did the ruling class's work by feeling superior.
Dylan wrote about Medgar Evers' killer: "lyrics attribute blame for the killing and other racial violence to the rich white politicians and authorities who manipulated poor whites into directing their anger and hatred at black people." The killer was "only a pawn in their game".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Only_a_Pawn_in_Their_Game
This strategy of the ruling class (identity divisions) is powerful because racism, sexism, and all the other isms are very real and hurt people immensely. There are lethal effects. They MUST be opposed.
What we should focus on is the greatest of all identities: the rich and the rest of us. The LBJ quote shows us the truth.
At the Obama library, the rapper name-dropped the Black Panther Fred Hampton. Hampton was executed in his sleep by police, targeted by the FBI because he was so successful in building alliances. Imagine, bonds between the socialist Black Panthers and an Appalachian youth group. He focused on class. THIS is powerful! And it threatened the bosses so much they murdered him. That reaction showed us our most effective strategy.
Picture a school of little fish chasing a great big fish.
Martin68
(28,250 posts)
JustAnotherGen
(38,184 posts)Rec this a million times
pat_k
(14,476 posts)In response to the obscene injustices of the gilded age, seeds of reform were planted by the rise of progressive alliances of the 1890's (e.g., People's Party, Colored Farmers Alliance, Knights Labor, and women's suffrage). These alliances were ultimately subsumed within the two party system, but did ultimately lead to progressive reforms. However, they also provoked reactionary violence and the rise of Jim Crow as southern elites and corporate monopolies hellbent on keeping their "rightful place" systematically decimated the power of black organizations and empowered white supremacists to destroy alliances between white and black organizations.
Despite some reforms, rapid industrialization and obscene concentration of wealth continued into the 20's. It was not until it all fell apart with the great depression that we got the new deal. But that did nothing to counter Jim Crow and violent racism in the South. Compromise with southern Democrats codified it by explicitly excluding blacks from new deal programs.
Union organizing and progressive and civil rights activism continued throughout the 1940's, with some victories. This period laid the groundwork for the events of the 50's and 60's most of us are more familiar with. A little summary from Gemini (view with the skepticism you apply to all AI):
Before taking his famous role in 1963, labor leader A. Philip Randolph threatened a massive march on Washington in 1941 to protest racial discrimination in the defense industry and armed forces.
The Progressive Result:
President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued Executive Order 8802, which barred discrimination in defense employment and created the Fair Employment Practices Committee (FEPC).
The Double V Campaign (1942–1945)
Spearheaded by the Pittsburgh Courier, one of the nation's leading Black newspapers, this campaign called for two victories for African Americans: victory against fascism abroad and victory against racism and segregation at home. It laid the ideological framework for wartime progressive and civil rights activism.
Smith v. Allwright Supreme Court Decision (1944)
The NAACP's legal defense fund won a landmark case in Smith v. Allwright, which struck down the "white primaries" that excluded Black voters from participating in Texas's Democratic primary elections.
The Progressive Result:
This opened the door for increased African American voter registration across the South, serving as a critical stepping stone toward the broader Voting Rights Act of 1965.
Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) Founded (1942)
Founded in Chicago, CORE pioneered the use of nonviolent direct action—such as early sit-ins and "Freedom Rides" (testing the 1947 Supreme Court Morgan v. Virginia decision banning segregated interstate buses)—to integrate public facilities.
Truman’s Desegregation of the Military (1948)
Following up on civil rights recommendations from his newly established President's Committee on Civil Rights, President Harry S. Truman signed Executive Order 9981, officially mandating the desegregation of the United States Armed Forces.
Highlander Folk School's Shift (Late 1930s–1950s)
Originally focused on labor organizing and union education for both Black and white workers, the Highlander Folk School in Monteagle, Tennessee, evolved into a vital training center for early civil rights organizers. It provided workshops where future leaders like Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King Jr. were trained in nonviolent organizing.
The road to the civil rights act in 1964 was long and the forces of racism aided by vast sums from the private sector has never been, and perhaps never will be defeated.
However, I think the 40 year Republican project that has kept racism alive and spreading in each successive generation while transferring about 70 trillion from the many to the top 1%, will ultimately be a victim of its own success. Obscene concentration of wealth has fueled backlash in the past. This time that backlash could result in truly transformative reform. And their racism has become so naked and ugly it is provoking the kind of moral outrage that led to the civil rights act.
But even if transformative reform follows, we must be vigilant and recognize that the forces of racism and elitism will remain a force to be reckoned with.
There are two sides to the American story. I think with progress, too many Americans lost track of that. We cannot just label that "other" story of racism and economic injustice as Un-American or immoral. We must figure out how to cut the power of money out of our politics and make a truly effective case against that "other story" that recognizes how deeply rooted it is in the American story.
usonian
(27,050 posts)