This weekly roundup thread is intended for all culture war posts. 'Culture war' is vaguely defined, but it basically means controversial issues that fall along set tribal lines. Arguments over culture war issues generate a lot of heat and little light, and few deeply entrenched people ever change their minds. This thread is for voicing opinions and analyzing the state of the discussion while trying to optimize for light over heat.
Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time, and so is being nice! Pessimistically, there are many dynamics that can lead discussions on Culture War topics to become unproductive. There's a human tendency to divide along tribal lines, praising your ingroup and vilifying your outgroup - and if you think you find it easy to criticize your ingroup, then it may be that your outgroup is not who you think it is. Extremists with opposing positions can feed off each other, highlighting each other's worst points to justify their own angry rhetoric, which becomes in turn a new example of bad behavior for the other side to highlight.
We would like to avoid these negative dynamics. Accordingly, we ask that you do not use this thread for waging the Culture War. Examples of waging the Culture War:
-
Shaming.
-
Attempting to 'build consensus' or enforce ideological conformity.
-
Making sweeping generalizations to vilify a group you dislike.
-
Recruiting for a cause.
-
Posting links that could be summarized as 'Boo outgroup!' Basically, if your content is 'Can you believe what Those People did this week?' then you should either refrain from posting, or do some very patient work to contextualize and/or steel-man the relevant viewpoint.
In general, you should argue to understand, not to win. This thread is not territory to be claimed by one group or another; indeed, the aim is to have many different viewpoints represented here. Thus, we also ask that you follow some guidelines:
-
Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.
-
Be as precise and charitable as you can. Don't paraphrase unflatteringly.
-
Don't imply that someone said something they did not say, even if you think it follows from what they said.
-
Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.
On an ad hoc basis, the mods will try to compile a list of the best posts/comments from the previous week, posted in Quality Contribution threads and archived at /r/TheThread. You may nominate a comment for this list by clicking on 'report' at the bottom of the post and typing 'Actually a quality contribution' as the report reason.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
That seems doubtful. Trump won the >$100k/yr vote in 2020* and his electoral coalition was significantly whiter and older than Biden's.
*not by a huge margin, admittedly, but the divides aren't huge in any income group; either major party trying to position themselves as the party of the poor/working class is typical American posturing where everyone wants to be rich but no one wants to be Rich.
California’s housing problem and people’s political views on it is completely orthogonal to national party differences. It’s caused by local zoning restrictions which is basically older incumbent homeowners versus younger new entrant renters. Through demographics it’s probably accidentally related to national party affiliation but that’s likely weak and completely incidental. Whether the locals like Trump or not has nothing to do with whether they’re in favor of multi family apartment building construction. The state (Democrat) has implemented pro-building policies that short-circuit local power to restrict it but again you should think of this as largely orthogonal to D vs R. Viewing this as a Trump-related culture war issue totally misses the mark IMO. (I’m responding to your comment but this goes for everyone in this thread).
I don't disagree - as I said in another subthread, the anti-housing consensus is bipartisan. Rationale is sometimes different (although sometimes that just a gloss on the same underlying motivations). At least in California, voting for the GOP isn't going to indicate a significantly different housing policy and the CA GOP has the usual array of conservative beliefs that make it a less than credible option for defection.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
I believe you are incorrect. [This Nate Silver article] specifically says it went the other way. More importantly, and to @jeroboam 's point ... the realignment is still happening.
@jeroboam - Re: your fact about major corp's donations; It was the NYPD and ... The United States Marine Corps. God Bless the Alcoholic Gun Cult.
I can't really evaluate this because the reference link is absent, but every source I've been able to find shows Trump beating Biden with high income voters by ~10 points. e.g.
Whoops.
Link: https://www.natesilver.net/p/how-culture-trumps-economic-class
From the article:
NYT exit polls indicate the opposite. Also, a 2022 House Exit Poll for another example of the GOP winning high earners.
I'm far too lazy to run around aggregating a bunch of exit polls, but it doesn't really matter that much because whatever the exact tilt they're all pointing the same way. Namely, that the spread on voting by income level may be electorally significant (not hard when margins are so low), but it is not demographically substantial (i.e. if you were to get a random sample of any of the strata, roughly half would be voting for each major party). Thus, my initial point remains the same:
Saying one party is the party of the working class because slightly more than half of voters go for the other party while slightly less than half go for the same seems like it's drawing too strong a conclusion from too little evidence. Whichever poll you reference, characterizing the conflict as one of pure class comes across as slightly farcial. It is, however, consistent with my theory that the liberal-conservative conflict is sectoral (in particular, merchants and gentry versus professionals) and normative.
less charitably: the "realignment" is conservative wishcasting that more reflects how suburban conservatives would like to see themselves. It's part of the broader populist-conservative 'just a little guy' routine where Trumpists pretend that they have no power or influence. Admitting that they're actually well-off and influential would puncture the fantasy that they're rebels against the empire instead of engaged in a peer conflict.
There's some parts of this that I might try to nitpick or reframe, but, broadly, I think this is well argued and an astute analysis.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
It's crazy how total the left's demand for control is. They will not rest until they control literally every institution.
They already have the universities, nearly all major corporations, the media, the bureaucracy, the non-profit sector, the rich, the technology sector, and the legal system (minus the Supreme Court). But we are assured that just a single election could usher in a right-wing fascist dictatorship. It's delusional.
Please tone down the outgroup-booing. This is waging the culture war, not discussing it.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
The party realignment is still in mid-swing. I have faith this narrow Republican majority is largely an artifact. Previous party alignments took decades to play out. For example, Texas elected Democratic governors as late as 1990!
The trend is clear. Democrats are for rich white people and the underclass. Republicans are for the others.
100k is very middle class today. Amongst the posh, Democrats are so utterly dominant its comical. I can't find it on Google (because of course I can't) but someone looked at political donations from every large employer. The majority of donations went to Democrats for every employer except for the NYPD and maybe one other. That's right, even supposedly "right wing" corporations like Exxon had more Democratic donors than Republican ones. Amongst tech companies and universities, Democrats held an edge of something like 10-1.
The elite is all in on the Democratic party. And that is truly new. Back in the day, there were a substantial subset of WASP-y Republicans in the northeast and California. They are utterly gone. I know these people. They vote blue now, no matter who.
Until said reversal actually manifests, calling its absence an artifact seems premature. Predicting the Democrats are going to become the party of rich white people is one thing (which I still find doubtful, but nevertheless). Saying the Democrats are already the party of old rich white people is factually inaccurate when the GOP has a distinct advantage with high income voters (approx. 10 points), white voters (approx. 10-15 points), and older voters (approx. 5 points, higher when talking about really old voters).
This seems to hinge on gerrymandering 'elite' (and related terms) in ways that include a lot of middle income people from major cities while excluding high income people from the suburbs and major cities (and fits into a broader pattern of conservatives denying their own political power). The regional gentry that dominate the Republican Party don't like to think of themselves as 'elite', even though they often make more money (in many cases, significantly more money) than the urban professional class that mirrors them in the Democratic Party.
Like, I'm not really sure what you mean by posh here, since that's a British term without clear American analogy (maybe some New England Old Money, but they're frankly not very relevant). I'm guessing you mean affluent metropolitan professionals, but that's just a guess. Or maybe Ivy League students, but then you're not really comparing SES, you're comparing children to parents.
Assuming this is true (and I will grant that it is facially plausible), it is evidence for the merchant/gentry class vs professional class divide. It's not evidence for Republicans being poorer or more working class.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link