Scuttlebutt: Statistics and More
Here are some statistics you may have not expected: A larger percentage of every racial minority voted for Trump this year than in 2016. Among Blacks and Hispanics, this percentage grew among both men and women, although men were more likely to vote for Trump than women. Black women voters doubled their support for Trump (still only 8%). 5 percent of Black men voted for John McCain; in 2012, 11 percent voted for Mitt Romney; in 2016, 13 percent voted for Trump; and, this year 18 percent voted for Trump.
The percentage of L.G.B.T. people voting for Trump doubled from 2016, moving from 14 percent to 28 percent. In Georgia the number was 33 percent. In September, the gay social network Hornet published the result of a survey of 10,000 of its users that found that 45 percent of the gay men on it planned to vote for Trump. 10 percent of the American gay men who took Hornet’s survey say they ‘do not support [Donald Trump] at all’ but will vote for him nonetheless.
Nearly three out of every five white voters in America are Trump voters.
Columnists David Brooks points out that Trump won the largest share of the nonwhite vote of any Republican candidate in 60 years.
Political strategist David Shor said in an interview, “the joke is that the G.O.P. is really assembling the multiracial working-class coalition that the left has always dreamed of.”
Why these unexpected changes? David Brooks suggests that “the core Biden policies are astoundingly popular. It’s that they’ve built a cultural blue wall that keeps the other half of the country out, no matter the circumstance.”
Commentator Jasper Kang suggests,”...as long as they (the Democratic Party) believe Latinos, the second-largest voting demographic in this election, and Asian-Americans, the fastest-growing group in the country, will continue to vote down the Democratic Party line because they care deeply about racism and bigotry as defined by the left, they will continue to misdiagnose the complexities within these populations, neither of which primarily think of themselves as “Latino” or “Asian-American” at all. He goes on to state, “Too much of the messaging toward these groups is aimed at the upwardly ascendant second- and third-generation immigrants who worry about questions of representation within elite institutions. They (democrats) must stop believing that an immigrant shows up in America and immediately begins worrying, say, about how many Asian or Latino actors have been cast in the latest comic book movie.”
I believe one of the things driving these changes is the national media and our obsession with it. I don't believe it is because they are pushing a particular agenda (though many unabashedly are), but because of the way that most media functions. Whether it is politics, sports, or entertainment, attention is reduced to focus on individuals. Religions have always personified “god” to exemplify their teachings and royalty, as we have been informed by "The Crown" series, exists to embody the values and traditions of a nation.
Politics has become little more than a popularity contest. Complex issues are rarely discussed. Not enough clicks. Sports events are invariably advertised by mentioning the stars of opposing teams (“Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls meet Pat Ewing and the New York Knicks”). Entertainment celebrities are increasingly known more for their personal behavior off screen, for better or worse, than for their artistic achievements.
As a result political protest movements are generally reported through the words of a few select individuals whose statements become the hallmark of a movement. The most startling protest signs are the ones photographed for broadcast. Whether far-right or fringe-left these slogans become assumed to be the opinions of thousands or millions.
For example, the phrase “defund the police” was repeated innumerable times in the media, but was never close to becoming supported by a majority of Americans. Not even democrats or Black people in general ever gave it over 50% approval and republicans opposed it by 84%. How reasonable is it that democrats should expect republicans to “cross over” and vote for democrats when phrases like this are attached to the democratic party, despite it never being popular with a majority of democrats? Surely there were potential democratic voters who voted for Trump simply because of their revulsion to that phrase.
So what should democrats do? New York Times op-ed writers Jennifer Medina and Aston Hemdon believe that a better approach would be akin to “what Bernie Sanders campaign developed with the uncompromising message that working-class Americans affected by injustice can unite across ethnic identity. This has shown traction in both predominantly white Iowa and New Hampshire and the more black and brown Nevada.”
I recall Bernie always mentioning minority groups, but he was not pointing out their uniqueness, but rather what economic issues they all share.
Jay Kang proposes that the democratic party should “disaggregate and then reorganize into an even broader movement . . . that puts less weight on questions of belonging and citizenship for these nebulously and conditionally defined groups — and more on the experiences, as working-class . . . .”
Identity politics overwhelmed political discussion in the past few years for a number of reasons. Strident, and largely justifiable complaints arose from every conceivable affinity group, from the MeToo movement, to Black Lives Matter to LGBT movement, yet it didn’t seem to move these groups in a rush to support democrats. Sure, Donald Trump is a sexist pig, but that didn’t stop white women from voting for him. For many women, his sexism is not the most important issue in their lives. It comes as no surprise to these women that some men are sexist. LGBT folks apparently were more concerned with the stock market and their IRAs than with how many gays are depicted kissing in movies.
It seems voters have more personal reasons for casting their votes than being part of some minority group. The real affinity group, and it is not a minority, is the group of people who are at the wrong end of the economic inequality in this country.
Image adapted from a photograph by
Hulki Okan Tabak from Pixabay
