You are entitled to your feelings

[question everything]

On occasions I read the advice columns when the writer asks: am I wrong to feel that way?

The reply is that this is not right or wrong, If this is the way they feel then the partner (often) has to respect this.

I was thinking about this reading the condescending reactions to a rural Minnesota woman about why she switched from Obama to Trump. One reason, besides the deteriorating economic conditions, was the way Democrats have been looking down on Trump supporters.

DUers would not take this and responded with.. well, looking down.

On these pages I have often encountered similar attitudes. I would post about the need to approach rural voters and many reactions would be “f**k rural voters.”

Rural voters have contributed to our loss. Rural areas have suffered economically but, apparently we have not offered ways to help. Not even Whiny type platitudes of bringing the jobs back.

Some here continue to claim that we were cheated, that racism and misogyny were behind the loss, continue to find reasons. I am not going to argue about this. Clearly Democratic leaders think that changes are needed and are working on them.

And I appreciate the need to vent on these pages. But I hope that at some point we can be part of the next steps, to find the causes of the loss and to come with new approaches.

OK, start shooting (metaphorically)

[Elessar Zappa]

1. I agree with you.

Condescension has never been a good strategy. And if we don’t gain back some of the Trump voters, we’ll never win again.

[lame54]

31. They love Trump's condescension...

So much that they ignore his obvious lies and complete meanness

We're supposed to be nice-y nice to THEM?

I'm in constant fear of losing my house because of THEM

[bearsfootball516]

2. One of the biggest obstacles in winning back rural voters is news access.

Most rural areas are dominated by Fox News on TV and Fox radio. If you live in a rural area and you're looking for the news, it's often the only source.

I'm not sure how to combat that.

[Elessar Zappa]

3. Most towns and villages now have decent internet access.

Not out in the boonies, of course, but most rural voters live in towns.

[haele]

16. Internet access doesn't help because of troll farms.

Not when their towns are run by the only Company nearby, or local Used Car/Vehicle dealers along with the local Calvinist based Evangelical Church telling them the Government won't help them, only Gawwwd and hate of sin and sinners will.
The goal posts are always being moved in rural areas.

The only way to reach "these people" is to station a Democrat in some sort of outreach or help desk in red rural towns and go out and meet these people. Provide them with access to food pantries, health care information, filling out State and Federal forms, and information how to access government programs that can help them - consumer protection or SBA programs.
Build a more hopeful community on their level. Hold their hands and feed them hope.
That's the only way to get rural people back.

Roosevelt did it with the CCC and WPA and other programs. Getting college kids out to the small towns, farm and hollar gathering places just to talk and ask what their situation was.

But, it's a bit too late to do these things now.

Haele

[MiHale]

19. That's not entirely correct...

I’ve always lived rurally. I’ve always been able to get news other than Fox. I can still listen to Progressive radio as always. Granted you need internet access and that is a problem in some areas. Then letting people know where to go. It’s getting better.


How to combat? Dependable affordable high-speed internet access across all areas. Not only help with the news but give better tools for education.

[TheKentuckian]

61. What do their city dwelling and suburban cousins watch with highspeed access?

Access doesn't change the silos.

[TheKentuckian]

59. Yeah, we got to get them NewsMax, Joe Rogan, and brain rot from TikTok

to give them more options.

Internet doesn't change the information silo they love other than expanding the malinformation and lies.

[JustAnotherGen]

4. I can't trust the woman in Minnesota

And I don't care.

My facts say fuck her feelings and her upholding of white supremacy.

A LOT of those white ladies would love to see black women with high net worth white husbands (including mine) strung from a tree. Because we took what they believe they were entitled to.

I don't trust them.

And she could never be ME - and The Gio would never pick a loser cry baby for a wife.

[soandso]

71. I don't understand this post

Are you saying some rando white woman - in Minnesota - covets your husband because of his "high net worth" and, worse, desires to lynch you because they want his money?

[Prairie Gates]

5. ACA helps rural voters; education grants help rural voters; funding research helps farmers

Urban "elites" have been promoting small farms in their activities and politics for years - the much disdained "elitist" foodways of so-called urban elites (i.e., don't eat at the fucking Olive Garden in NYC) help farms. Who are some of the biggest supporters of small farmers in upstate New York? Urban "elite" chefs and restaurants. Tom Colicchio has done more for rural America than Donald Trump ever will. Rural wifi is a Democratic project. Infrastructure is a Democratic project. So we are skeptical of fracking? Yes, fracking provides rural jobs, but it is desperate short-termism. Burned on that one, I guess.

The fact of the matter is that Democratic policies are much better for rural people than Republican policies. They vote on values, not economic policy. If there's impatience among urban Democrats with rural voters, it is actually based on their (rural voters) own non-stop, vicious attacks on and resentment of urban voters who are, in fact, helping them. Who give and give and give only to be belittled and discriminated against. Yes. What you are peddling is ideology, which is defined as an imaginary understanding of the real economic and political conditions - literally the opposite of what's really happening. Urban voters have gone absolutely out of their way to help rural voters for decades, only to be shit on again and again, to be referred to as NOT REAL Americans, and other endless slanders.

[Vinca]

7. Exactly. As far as I'm concerned, they deserve everything they get at this point. I don't plan to make nice with them.

This election they voted for "the show" and apparently nothing else. I hope they enjoy it.

[Lunabell]

28. Farmers, most of whom voted for the orange turd, are going to find out the hard way.

Last edited Tue Nov 26, 2024, 03:48 PM - Edit history (1)

Their labor is going to be rounded up and put in detention camps and then deported. Didn't they hear what I heard him say?

[Elessar Zappa]

10. Whatever the case, we can't keep bleeding voters.

If we do, we won’t win any more national elections. Just one example is around here where I am (southwest NM), white progressives started promoting the use of LatinX instead of Hispanic or Latino. Believe it or not, it created a big backlash among our local Hispanics because they hated the term and viewed it as condescending white people trying to regulate their community. I’m not saying that was a huge factor in us losing Hispanic votes but it is one small example.

[JustAnotherGen]

12. I don't blame the Latino Community

America is getting ready to get a backlash for lumping Black Americans in with 'people of color'.

I'm not 'person of color' - I'm a Black American women whose earliest record of an ancestor was 1832 - when he was sold to Alabama from Virgina.

America is in for a hell of a reckoning.

[PJMcK]

14. Spot on

We have a small apartment in Manhattan and a rustic house in the Catskills, about 2 hours NW of NYC. Your description of rural folks' disdain for so-called elites is exactly what we've encountered.

Although we've had the property for over 20 years, it's only since the pandemic that the locals have started to accept us into their community. Previously we were always treated as "weekenders" which is a nasty insult in these parts. In a recent conversation, a neighbor dismissed my comments by saying that I'm a LIBERAL and LIBERALS are always wrong. There really is no response to such a comment and it says far more about my neighbor than I think he realizes. Of course, such a realization would require a degree of self-awareness that I don't see in him.

By the way, the "weekenders" bring a substantial amount of economic activity to the area and the negative attitudes seem self-defeating to me.

[SWBTATTReg]

54. That is true, that 'weekenders' do bring a lot of positive economics to a rural area. If these areas didn't

have any visitors, then how are they supposed to create jobs, etc.? There's not enough of a base to really put in substantial businesses in a rural area, there aren't enough people to fill the job slots, so why would a business develop in a rural area? Now, if they come from these areas, I can understand that, but they can only do so much. Our family has always had deep, deep ties to our rural area (the Ozarks). Dad grew up there, a lot of family still there, and so forth.

You do have a lot of retirees moving into these areas (especially in the rural areas of the Ozarks. Housing and so forth for the most part are lower in price. But then of course, you don't have the corresponding jobs to attract the younger generation, and so they are still moving to the bigger cities, just to find decent jobs. Local businesses don't do much hiring, since they already have the family involved, so they don't hire much. And there aren't that many attractions or 'draws' for a lot of folks, no takeout meals, no pizza deliveries (usually you still have to drive a number of miles, meet somewhere in the middle so they can deliver the pizzas etc. to you. So you still have to drive to get pizzas, etc.

And this is going to be true no matter what tRUMP does, he won't build 100s of factories in these rural areas. No one in their right mind would. Too difficult to hire and getting resources there to build your widgets too expensive to ship in. It's a never-ending cycle, and my Mom and Dad know personally of the hardships and trials it takes to get a rural business off the ground and running. I've tried too, myself, but not enough traffic to really make a good go of it. Raising cattle or anything like that, impossible. Not enough land and what's there is too hilly and rocky (it's the Ozarks).

[Irish_Dem]

6. People who love viscous ruthless rapist traitor criminal psychopaths want our respect.

I can never respect or like these people.

[Blues Heron]

8. I think its condescending to indulge outright stupidity.

[WarGamer]

9. agreed... I'll just add, this isn't the Democratic Party of 20 years ago...

The current Party is far more wealthy and urban-centric

[mr715]

17. 30 years ago

West Virginia was sapphire blue and Virginia ruby red.

[mr715]

11. Question Everything

An important sentiment.

Thank you for this.

From my perspective it is extraordinarily difficult to accept political loss. I had a professor when I was an undergrad that was a soviet exile. He said our national sport is elections, and it holds from an emotional perspective. It differs from sports obviously, in that there are real world ramifications for political losses. We are typically going to be empathic and forward thinking, and so we are more sensitive to injustice and malicious actors.

Part of the issue is just how grotesque the Trump agenda is, and how he was able to wear it on his sleeve without consequence. What this tells me is that there is a very large part of the electorate (larger than I thought) that prefers confrontation to governance.

In many ways I think this loss corroborates what we learned when HRC lost (the electoral college) in 2016 -- the leading edge of the democratic left does not message to voters in a particularly effective way.

What is the solution? Do we find it at the neoliberal center? Was the Harris-Cheney coalition not enough?

Do we surrender our identity as the party that speaks to the marginalized and instead adopt a populist posture?

I don't know what the Democratic party's identity is in the wake of Trumpism. Typically, it is easier to be in the resistance. However this election cycle informs us that that isn't sufficient to win elections. And if we can't win, we're irrelevant.

Who leads our party, do you think? Not who runs. Who is the intellectual and philosophical leader.


MR

[mr715]

15. Thanks

I'm not sure I agree with your solutions re: flat taxes. I'm more Keynesian about it.

As I said before, I am a true Hillary Clinton loyalist. She has a little bit of a Cassandra curse - she speaks truth/prophecy, but everyone hears lies.

I am reminded when she was caught on a hot mic with BLM protestors and she said "Bring me a movement," and it was disparaged in the media.

The fact is change requires a mandate and a mandate requires, apparently for our side, distasteful compromise. Not legislative compromise, but a compromising of our principles to achieve a strategic goal.

HRC "didn't campaign" because she and her team were busy writing an equivalent of Project 2016. Vice President Harris campaigned vigorously and was criticized for not having outlined enough of her plans.

I don't know where to go from here, but I don't think Senator Sanders is the leader of the party. I think he served to inject progressivism into the Biden administration. But the Biden admin, and any progressive achievements, are going to be swept aside by a much more real authoritarian executive and whatever progress was made will either be reversed or reduced to insignificance.

Thank you for engaging with me on this. I think it is an important and therapeutic discussion to have.


MR

[JustAnotherGen]

21. Your welcome

I can't see Black Americans being forced to pay a full tax on par with white, asian, latino, etc. etc. Americans if we are going to be left out of those big Big Government money give aways.

That's simply not fair to us. We were here first.

[mr715]

25. Strictly strategic

Can we win on that? because if we cannot, it is moot.

I think we can win on "fairness" but when you get into taxes based on identity, we're in dangerous territory.

Do not mistake my skepticism for lack of sympathy. I agree with the sentiment.

Simply put I don't know what the answer is. We are a little bit adrift without a leader. Perhaps Obama should step up. History calls.

Like, if Trump could dictate the GOP terms while in exile in Mar a Lago, why can't the last coalition leader coordinate 'resistance' efforts. Obama is still a generation younger than Trump.

I don't know - I appreciate you and your insight.


MR

[JustAnotherGen]

32. But the Party shouldn't lie to black folks

I'm serious - including black women.

IF it is only for the whites, asians, latinos -

You guys would be putting us back to the 1950s.

I'm seriously in the corner - of let it all burn. Deadly serious.

I have enough connections in the black community where we can take care of our own. Get rid of ALL the social welfare programs, cut everyone's taxes and no one gets ANYTHING.

I am not my grandparents - born at the turn of the last century. If they thieve (the white American Aristocracy including those in poverty)

Black Americans need to retaliate.

I'm not handing my stuff over to some nobody from nowhere.

[mr715]

34. Opinion on Biden?

Yes yes we all know the political pieties of this site.

But as a black person who feels the "need to retaliate," what is your characterization of Biden in 2020? Or holistically over his career. He is allegedly beloved amongst the base, but he has never been particularly sympathetic to radical action.


MR

[JustAnotherGen]

42. I absolutely love him!

Was privileged to work with his team on the VAW when I worked for a Congresswoman - that year as an intern. He's spectacular.

The radicals would be the folks saying its time erase black women from the Democratic Party.

That is EXTREMELY radical.

Using language that only appeals to young white men and racist whites who are just out for themselves - will ALIENATE the base.

We saw during the Raw Deal that a 'rising tide did not lift all boats'.

The reality is that the Dominant Culture in America is white folks.

They voted for this fucking guy - they wanted a Radical Revolution.

If the Democratic Party is going to be a bunch of feckless wimps -

Then tell your base the truth. Tell US the truth.

Is that Radical? Because this 'wishy washy lets fetch and step for bigots' is REALLY Alienating a lot of black folks.

We aren't the radicals who voted to burn America down.

But I will most definitely sit back, drink and old fashioned, and watch it burn. And I will do it with a smile on my face.

[mr715]

45. I bet you won't

I suspect you are not one to watch things burn with a smile.

It is clear who the radicals are (and who they always have been).

Cheers. To truth.




MR

[ShazzieB]

58. Wait, what?

"The radicals would be the folks saying its time erase black women from the Democratic Party."

Sorry if this is a stupid question, but who is saying that? Please fill me in, because that is just plain wrong and stupid.

[Keepthesoulalive]

60. It is in code

Only the class and economic struggle matters. Not those pesky social issues.

[mr715]

63. No

Social issues are enmeshed with economic justice.

You can't tease them apart. They exist within each other.


I think the overall point is that we need to understand the nature of the Democratic party in order to win elections.

Are you being a little sardonic when you call social issues "pesky"? If so, could you clarify your interpretation of this convo?

I wonder about those social issues and want to hear from you first...



MR

[mr715]

35. To put a fine point on it

I think it was very clear from the start that this cycle, black voters were assumed to "come home".

I do not believe the Democratic party spoke to their issues and I think that is problematic.

I appreciate your insight and perspective. I hope I am not annoying you with my inquiries.


MR

[JustAnotherGen]

43. You are not annoying

I think you are hitting the nail on the head.

[mr715]

46. Thanks n/t

[Keepthesoulalive]

62. They want black folks to be invisible again.

[mr715]

65. Who is they?

?

[Keepthesoulalive]

68. The folks that think we should not talk about social issues

That if talk about the class divide to disaffected white and rural voters they will vote for Democrats.
It’s the republicans who have gone back to Lee Atwater and it works.

[mr715]

69. Understood.

I just feel so uncomfortable not knowing a clear path forward.

The easy solution is some sort of transformational figure, but I can't think of one.

[TheKentuckian]

40. If you are going to strategically chuck us under the bus

then you better be damn sure about your numbers because we'd have little choice but to strategically oppose and bring the strategy down in flames.

We did our time on the plantations to build white multi generational wealth under disgusting hardship, depravity, and still no compensation leaving most of our families literally centuries behind the game while everyone else is given higher status from the Irish to the Arabs.

You surely get how that is a game we cannot play.

[mr715]

41. I surely do

And we nip and cut at our coalition at our peril.

And perhaps to call it "our coalition" is a misnomer because Black Americans have been the beating heart of the Democratic party for longer than I've been alive. I am a member of your coalition, and we'd/i'd do well to remember that.

[LisaM]

23. There are people from my home town who are Trump supporters.

I try to pay attention to them (I am from a small town in Michigan). One of the things they most hated about the Biden agenda was forgiveness of student loans. They posted about it constantly. So I don't think they were ready for a Sanders agenda.

Now, you and I know many things about this forgiveness. Student loans aren't handled the way they were 40 years ago, tuition is higher, and the debt that's being forgiven is most penalties and interest. But this wasn't how it was framed at all, and there was a lot of resentment towards the program. I think they literally thought it was coming from their own pockets. Worse, they disdain any college degree that can't be monetized.

There is a messaging divide and I don't know the best way to combat it.

[mr715]

30. Student Loans

Are killing me. NYU from a working class family in 2000s. Grad school after. I'm finishing up my PhD now partially because now my loans get deferred!

I did 15 years of title 1 public school work in a high need field (science). I think I deserve a little forgiveness given that I was 17 when I signed up for $150,000 in debt.

I talk to my former fellow NYC teachers. One Trump supporting one is non-stop trans stuff. Every-single-day. Lots of "rank and file" are tired of nonstop trainings and professional seminars about the changing world. And I empathize. But I am of the opinion that we shouldn't punch down. If a kid (or adult) is hurting we shouldn't make a spectacle out of it. I can't imagine how difficult it must be to have the wrong genitals. I personally am very attached to my genitals. We've been together since I was born and I'd like us to remain associated until I die.

Another teacher buddy is from Michigan and he plays the both-siderism card. But he is a Bernie Sanders supporter. There is an element of antiestablishment posturing within the liberal left that makes us difficult to corral.


Warm regards. Thanks for talking to me.


MR

[LisaM]

38. I think they should be forgiven too.

In fact, I think most of the people I know who were so against it would actually feel differently if they realize most people had paid way more than the principal already and were drowning in the penalties and interest. They were ironically also griping simultaneously about high credit card interest rates.

The problem is, they are fed misinformation and don't have the attention span to dig into the nuances and I don't know how to change their perceptions.

[mr715]

39. It is surprising to me

that it didn't seem to strongly motivate young voters. College or near college voters.

The rub is you can't combat misinformation without an educated populace, and an educated populace now requires K-16 education.

I am amazed at how mismanaged education has become, and I say that as a proud public school teacher.


I love how the progressive caucus and Sen. Warren are pushing Trump to cap interest from credit cards at 10% as a part of his populist agenda. I think that is a very clever use of power and adroit politics besides.

Let him have the credit, but it'll do a world of good for people with debt.

[thebigidea]

64. why would it have? Haven't we chased the mirage of young voters enough for the past 50 years for it to sink in?

[mr715]

67. God I'm getting old

I think I first joined this forum before the Kerry election of 2004. I was a young voter then. I still choose to identify as a young voter. I am sadly no longer a young voter by any objective measure.


I don't know why they don't vote. It seemed like Kamala Harris ran a mostly pitch perfect campaign, and the "vibes" are that Trump brought in young males. But Harris made it crystal clear, and I am amazed more people weren't mobilized. Sad.

[Meowmee]

18. It is not a matter of looking down even

If you vote for a fascist who murdered people etc. you will get flack from me at the least. I don't care what your "reasons" are.

[usonian]

20. Ever since the Kennedy-Nixon debate, politics has been called a beauty contest, at least in the entertainment sense.

When issues give way to "personality politics" it's bad news, and speaking of bad news, the media are all over personalities because they are good for clicks/readership etc. Facts are boring.

What we have seen lately is (speaking of the elephant in the room) the result of decades or hate speech and brainwashing of the cult variety.

It happened when "fairness" went out the door and money marched in with "Citizens United".

Seriously, you don't have to be a philosopher. If "entities" have a "free speech" right (as in money, boatloads of money) then why don't they have a vote. Not a one. Citizens have a right to vote. Period.

There is nothing to compare the current situation with because the world changed.

Section 230 of the CDA has already been shattered by a judge who ruled that TIkTok's algorithm was making editorial decisions and not "merely passing through" user generated content. Well, that's a work just begun, but MAYBE hate speech may see limits someday.

Hate, racism, misogyny, anti-semitism and so on are powerful forces that every wannabe Hitler uses. Fascist playbook. They read it, and the next step is control of the armed forces. I am not about to see a repeat, and I always believed in the Democratic Party as a populist party in the sense of standing up for the average person's interests rather than the wealthy. The fact that the party has NOT engaged in hate and racism (though the haters and racists say that it does, in their perverted logic) is to its credit, but must "Speak more like Bernie" in speaking more like it acts. [flame wars begin]

I am no psychologist, but do see the old Democratic "we're fighting for the average working person" message as a powerful one, and one that Joe Biden has acted upon powerfully. I heard it from the Harris-Walz team, but they had little time to get it across.

I have an ongoing study of activist sites and tools and will share my preliminary findings very shortly. It will be "incomplete" in many ways, but the journey starts now.

You can't counter brainwashing and perverted logic by speaking its language. Get a message across that is in a different language altogether.

One of equality, the dignity of all people and of fairness as opposed to a few getting all the benefits and being immune to the laws that we are supposed to uphold. F--- their culture wars. Like all fascists, they put up smokescreens and divide and conquer. The "oppressed white person" myth is sick and twisted.

To borrow a phrase from the 60's, GO BACK TO AFRICA ---- Fans of apartheid, that is.
The shadow of apartheid South Africa in America.
https://www.democraticunderground.com/100219696928



YOUR APARTHEID TECH-BROS

[Sympthsical]

22. There are two rules of human behavior that are oddly elusive for some

1. You cannot tell people they are not experiencing what they are experiencing and expect positive feedback.

We see this with the economy. Costs of living have been rising making people living paycheck to paycheck struggle that much harder. And the response was, "The economy is great. It's misinformation. You're doing amazing, sweetie!" And somehow people thought was a good message to have. Telling people who worry about feeding their families and keeping a roof over the heads that they're hallucinating the problems in front of their eyes.

The choice was empathy or fuck you, and people went with fuck you. And then have the audacity to be surprised when it doesn't go well.

2. You cannot reason people out of what they were never reasoned into.

This is just a universal human thing. Neither Right nor Left, religious nor atheist. People just believe things, and no matter how hard you bang your head against that wall, it's not going to penetrate. Look at the election numbers discussed in recent weeks. Even with hard data - hard, indisputable facts - people just . . . have a feeling. Because it's not a feeling reasoned into. It's purely emotional reaction and instinct.

That's a harder thing to get around. You hope that logic and reason reign, but social media and the MSM are largely geared to trigger emotions, because emotions lead to engagement. The Right doesn't succeed because they have amazing arguments. They soak through because they have sites like Libs of TikTok where it's nonstop "Look and react to this!" Have people ever really looked at social media? 99% of it isn't particularly interesting in the "providing useful information" sense. But the wackiness of human behavior is entertaining as shit. I love watching the crazy, the zealotry, the certitude in ideology, religion, and tribalism. It's fun in a "I cannot believe adults behave like this" sort of way, but it's not necessarily useful. It's purely manipulative.

I think the solution isn't that obvious. We always hear, "We need to teach critical thinking!" Which, yes, that is vital and would be nice. But given technology, culture, and societal tribal organization right now, I think we need a different priority to tackle the issues we face.

We need to teach emotional regulation. You can't begin to bring critical thinking into the picture until we engage the problem that social media are an emotionally dysregulative mess. It's all feelings and reaction overriding logic, reason, and thinking things out rationally.

And good luck with that one. Because it circles around to your main point. We're a "Every feeling I have is valid and I'm entitled to behave as antisocially as I want in response!" Which, woo. You go, I guess. And then we wonder why most people just tap right the fuck out from anything being said.

[onecaliberal]

24. You can lead a horse to water, you can't make it drink.

The decisions these people are making are KILLING people. It’s not a game. They wear shirts saying fuck your feelings. I’m sorry; but it’s time for people to suffer tj consequences of their actions. Sometimes the school of hard knocks is the only way. Sadly they will murder countless in their educational endeavor.

[Mustellus]

26. Farming is gonna be depressing...

The era when your teenage sons could clear another 140 acres and homestead.. is long gone.

You cannot divide up the farmland into ever smaller plots.

There is no new farmland to speak of.

This means.. .you have to export your kids. They can't stay.

Indiana.. a farm state if there ever was one, maintains Purdue University... to ready its children for shipment to other states.

But living in a farming community has gotta be depressing.

[Hassler]

27. Do some look down on rural voters. Sure

But some rural voters look down on urban/suburban dwellers as well. You know, those people who disparage cities as crime ridden hell-holes. And what cities do they usually name? My native hometown, Detroit, is at the top of the list. Why would Detroit get singled out? Hmm. Because it's not pale enough. So do I just ignore the obvious racism rural voters buy into with their votes, or do I call it out and make the rural voters who allow for it feel inferior? I know what my choice is.

[Scrivener7]

53. This point is always conveniently ignored. And here's a question: would those peoples' opinions about

you EVER make you vote for someone just to spite those people? My guess is no. Because somewhere along the line, you grew the fuck up.

And you are absolutely correct about the racism inherent in singling out Detroit and other cities. "Democrats look down on us!1!" has always seemed to me to be the ultimate projection. They say this because they look down on Democrats. And you have put your finger on exactly why.

[TheKentuckian]

55. For many the only even halfway tolerable city in the nation is Salt Lakes City.

If it ain't all white then it cannot be alright but knowing nothing about the dynamics in Utah, I'd place a moderate bet that their rural folks aren't much on Salt Lakes either.

You ought to see and hear how the bumpkins talk about Louisville here in Kentucky, it may as well be the pit of Hell as far as they are concerned.

Part of me would love to see the fallout if they got their snarling wish for it to no longer be a part of the state and they have to figure out how to eat and see the education rank goes to dead ass last.

Even from a place of loving patience I'm afraid what they want is magic. They want well paying local jobs that require little to no education or specialized training not "hand outs" or re-training programs.

They want amenities that villages and tiny burgs cannot support while somehow retaining their small town vibe and don't want much if any population growth or any disruption of changing demographics.

Internet access is still a factor in some locations but there is no way for providers to run lines to most of the access deserts and not lose money or bill thousands of dollars so huge subsidies and tax incentives are required to move the needle much more without new technology.

They want their kids and grandchildren to happily stay in BFE.

[ShazzieB]

73. Those rural Kentuckians hatingbon Louisville sound familiar to me.

We have the same kind of people in rural parts of Illinois who think Chicago is Satan and the Antichrist and any other terrible thing you can think of × 1000!

It gets more intense the farther south you go. Several counties in southern Illinois had a referendum on their ballots in the past election about giving their county boards permission to talk to each other about getting together to ask Cook County (which consists of Chicago plus a whole bunch of its suburbs) to secede from Illinois.* (I don't know what the results were and haven't bothered to find out, because Chicsgo leaving Illinois is about as likely to happen as pigs flying. In fact, if I had to choose which was more likely, my money would be on the pigs! )

I'm laughing at the sheer absurdity of it all, but those people were dead serious, as I'm sure the ones in Kentucky are. A lot of people in rural areas really do have a hate boner for big cities, and I have no idea what the solution is.

*This is only a rough approximation of what they were trying to do; more information can be found here: https://www.democraticunderground.com/10497757

[Passages]

29. Post mortems are essential and not always comfortable for some.

The reasons we lost are important to know..if we don't self-correct we'll repeat them over and over again.
Never give up fighting at the grassroots level and never stop making demands against the status quo.

[jalan48]

33. Class based issues win over identity group issues. Class based issues appeal to a larger audience.

It's not rocket science.

[Keepthesoulalive]

57. I live with these rural folks.

Democrats have busted their ass trying to help them, their only response is the fear someone is getting more than them . We have had candidates address their issues, schools, health, addiction, decent housing and internet access. Nothing works . They consistently vote for republicans who have not done one damn thing for them. They don’t want to be in your class they want to feel like victims and hate on others.

[relayerbob]

36. If Fox told the actual truth

They would realize that we've been trying to help only to have been spat upon repeatedly. When they accept some sort of responsibility for their OWN actions, then the next steps can be taken. Meanwhile, like any cult member of addict, they will have to hit rock bottom before they wake up. Sadly, it will drag the rest of us don with them.

[Paladin]

37. I've had a belly-full of Democrat-bashing over the election results.

A less-than 100% perfect campaign effort doesn't excuse all the brain-dead votes cast for trump.

[KT2000]

44. What do rural voters want?

I live in a rural area that voted for Harris. Farmers are being decimated by corporations - republicans serve corporations. Allowances in Medicare are made to serve rural counties to assure some level of healthcare. Many farmers and corporations are subsidized by the government. Etc.

I honestly feel that the so-called rural voter is blaming the government for the actions of the corporations and financial markets. Their political choices are worsening their conditions. They do not get that everything in this country is now a commodity and their losses are shared by many in this country.

What exactly do they want? After the election there is a long list of those who the Democrats supposedly did not serve: rural voters, white women, black women, black men, Hispanics, etc.

They chose to vote for a creature that brags about assaulting women, ridicules the disabled, ridicules injured, killed military members, dehumanizes people of color, and frankly never offered solutions to the country's problems other than seeking revenge.

Can't fix that.

[lees1975]

47. The country is extremely polarized, this was done by extremist media, beginning with Rush Limbaugh

who found a niche out of which to earn money by pitting Americans against each other and then pointing to ways to beat a system that was originally built on trust, to destroy it and keep enough anger brewing to cash his big paycheck.

I've said for years that our problem is messaging, and it was once again. The Biden administration did everything right when it came to handling COVID, and dealing with supply chain issues and battling inflation, and most of our own party can't tell you what it was they actually did. A group of neighbors were chatting in our building lobby one evening and someone said something about Biden draining the national oil reserves. I interjected and said yes, he did sell off some of it, when oil was over $90 a barrel, and they turned around and replenished it at about a 30% discount on the price, making billions in the process. And that helped stabilize the price of a barrel of oil, and is one of the reasons we see gas prices dropping off now. Most of these people are Democrats, and reasonably well informed. But no one else had heard of it. Nor did anyone ever know the details of the inflation legislation, or the management of interest rates that brought inflation down, and didn't kick off a recession.

The entire area around our building is experiencing some kind of construction, and the contractor signs point to the money having come from the infrastructure bill. We've had storm sewer lines upgraded and replaced, the electric lines in the front elevated and the towers strengthened, and virtually every bad street in town is getting repaved. I heard someone say that must have created a lot of jobs. In our municipality, population 12,000, it has created over 800 jobs.

So we lost an election after the most successful presidency since LBJ.

[BurnDoubt]

48. Septic Tank Vote

My reaction to Hillary's loss the morning after and seeing the map: We lost the septic tank vote!!!!! We are caught in the age-old snare. Folks who live in close proximity to other people are, in my view, more socially conscious by virtue of having to be part of a community, and share space and resources. Rural values are different. Independent minds eschew the compromise needed to share space and resources. It takes very special conditions for us to come together and "circle the wagons", and our continual factionalizing is a brake on our progress as a species.

[Aviation Pro]

49. A lot to unpack here

First off, it seems that rural voters love to be lied to whether it emanates from the anus-like mouth of Motherfucker or some holier-than-thou religious huckster, they seemingly fall for different flavors of the same bullshit: “I can make you rich!,” “The Almighty has a grand plan for you!,” and “You will receive your reward for your faith!”

Meanwhile, pass the plate or the screaming all cap text and dig deep, brothers and sisters, and give until it hurts.

I’m not sorry that I don’t pity or have any kind of empathy for them because the only use they have from my perspective is to keep a lot of red states red, which is exactly what the obscenely rich want.

The poorly educated is what Ben Franklin warned us about when he said, “If you can keep it.”

[Cirsium]

50. There is no farm voting bloc

I see people here equating rural voters with farmers with MAGA with "red states." That is all way off the mark.

States don't vote, don't have personalities, don't do anything. It is the archaic and anti-democratic electoral college that has us thinking in terms on states. Don't blame the results of that on people who happen to live on this or that side of some imaginary line. It is the people in those states that matter. There are more Democrats in Texas than there are in Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota , New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, or Virginia.

Then there is the debate about should we reach out to them or should we shun them? Both have some truth in them. Absolutely we should no longer take any abuse from MAGA friends and relatives and that often means cutting them off entirely. At the same time we can acknowledge the undeniable truth that the Democratic party leadership has utterly failed and that a big cause of that has been their betrayal of blue collar workers and thwarting of working class aspirations.

The most important misconception so commonly heard from Democrats involves agriculture. There is no farm voting bloc. That is a myth. All food related occupations comprise only 10.4 percent of U.S. employment, or 22 million people. Of those, 12.7 million work in food services, 3.3 million in food and beverage stores, 2.1 million in food, beverage and tobacco manufacturing, one million in forestry and fishing.

What are we left with? How many are actually on farms? 2.6 million, or 1.2% of the total umber of people in food related occupations. Of those how many are actually owners? Most of the people working on the farms here in the Midwest are not owners, overwhelmingly so. The owners are the farmers, not the farm workers. By the way, here it is mostly small farms and about 40% of the growers vote Democratic.

Ergo, the number of farmers voting for Trump is an exceedingly tiny percentage of the voting population.

Then, we have misconceptions about the demographics. "Rural" today is more like suburbia was 30+ years ago. Metropolitan areas have sprawled farther and farther into formerly rural areas, and most small towns have been dying. Remaining areas that resemble the old rural America have been steadily losing population while monstrous metroplexes grow and grow. Mayberry R.F.D. is dead and gone.

[Scrivener7]

51. A certain freedom results from the fact that those people have fucked up our country so royally.

There's nothing we can do about it now. There's no reason whatsoever to "try to reach them," or to "try to see where they're coming from." Because we're fucked. It doesn't matter if we reach them. It doesn't matter if we understand them. We'll still be fucked.

So let me say I'm not trying to be snarky. I have no animosity towards those who feel as you do.

But here are my feelings:

If someone has voted for trump because they think Democrats look down on trump supporters, then ABSOLUTELY, YES. UNEQUIVOCALLY. I LOOK DOWN ON THAT PERSON. Can't help it. They're morons. You know it, I know it, I'm not going to pretend it isn't true simply because they whine a lot.

It has nothing to do with rural or urban. It has only to do with who they voted for.

They voted for someone who is going to fuck up their lives, and mine along with them, possibly forever, because they believe people they have never met are looking down on them.

They think this because other people they never met told them it was true. And they chose to believe it. And then - because somehow they forgot to grow the fuck up - they chose to care about it.

How mind-numbingly stupid would one need to be to do such a thing?

Pretty damn stupid. So do I look down on them? Yes. Absolutely. Because they're idiots.

But guess what? None of this matters. Your feelings, my feelings, their feelings. None of it. Because we're fucked. They saw to that.

And PS: It WAS about racism and sexism.

[wryter2000]

52. Are we allowed to respond to the way they talk about us?

Look down on hardly describes claiming we drink the blood of babies and have no desire to help after natural disasters. Those are just for a start.

[maxsolomon]

56. Liberals have never had the Rural Voter

Dems did, when they upheld Jim Crow in the South.

[thebigidea]

66. it's almost as if there's a huge propaganda operation against cities and coasts

let me know when the Democrats run a comparable propaganda operation against rural voters, or when even ONE of our elected reps slams them to cheers from huge crowds.

My god, imagine the shrieks of concern from the media if we scapegoated rural voters and blamed them for all our economic problems, crime, drugs, etc. In, oh, exactly the same way the Republicans do.

For decades.

[Blue_Tires]

70. There's no other changes to make

Except for being as cravenly criminal and sociopathic as the opposition

[msfiddlestix]

72. I have never seen anyone say "fuck rural voters: perhaps it;s a feeling of similar weight, but saying that is weird

I hope no one actually said that, and it wouldn't have been necessary to add to the story, if it wasn't actually said.

personally, I don't understand any woman supporting TSF.
Someone supporting Obama turn around and support that freak, well I don't know.
there's no understanding of that psychology.

[question everything]

75. This was a comment posted here responding to a post of mine

But really, just read some of the comments on this thread and you can see the sentiment.

I think that we, Democrats, often try to use reason and logic to describe our messages. Someone has recently posted that Fox, I think, is using grade level language while MSNBC used graduate ones.

I remember ever since the Kerry campaign in 2004 that I wished he would get down to simple ideas to, yes, the good old kitchen table ideas.

Gore, Kerry, Obama, Hillary - all highly educated individuals who just could not help it. I think that Bill Clinton was the only one who managed to close the gap.

And as my OP suggests - it has nothing to do with reason: how can you vote for Obama and now for Whiny. It is a feeling. A feeling that the Democrats, as a party, do not know how to approach the non urban, non college educated, workers.

I wish that Sherrod Brown and John Tester could offer us some points. Two long term senators who served their rural communities but now fell in the changing tide. Even Klobuchar got fewer votes this cycle.

And.... discard the identity politics. I can see a rural white person thinking that the Democrats care about women, and gays, and people of color and wonder whether they belong.

I think that we have enough rural members who can visit these places, who would know how to approach them, to listen and, by the way, to add that, hey, this is what we are working on.

[Keepthesoulalive]

77. I live with them ,

They don’t get the big picture or any picture at all. The local Democratic Party has rural outreach.
They are listening to and addressing their concerns. They have not listened or changed since the civil war and they are proud of that. when people’s minds are closed , you can’t force them to think.
The democrats advocate for schools, hospitals, decent forms of transportation, drug rehabilitation,
More and cheaper daycare. What do the republicans advocate to help these people. One more thing
When we have a discussion I tell them to help their adult children leave the area because there is nothing but trouble here.

[EndlessWire]

74. I believe people are entitled to their feelings.

But, you know, bottom line is that, people who voted for this demented, old felon who wants to tear apart our country, hurt people deliberately, and basically crush our ability to feed our families, are not favored. I don't feel sorry for them. If they wanted to get even with us by voting for Trump, because we called them incredibly stupid, then that just shows how incredibly stupid they are.

[Raven123]

76. Personally I would love to hear what will improve rural economies

Probably not accurate, but I associate rural communities with agriculture, and the increase in industrial farms has devastated them. How do you fix that?

Rural hospitals closing. How do you fix that?

[Skittles]

78. once again

please tell us exactly what Trump will do to help rural folk, thank you

[Tesha]

79. I have to disagree, strongly

Rush Limbaugh was given free airtime and since his hate spread freely where nothing else was available - the Midwest - this was absorbed.

FOX became the patriotic place to watch 9-11, glued to their coverage, elder Americans became their base and Murdock used it to spread lies 24/7.

ALEX and the Kochs and the deep pocket business folks threw money to every state to win on a redistricting year, gaining seats and taking state governments. Those elected this way made it harder for people to vote blue, impossible in many cases.

Think tanks produced plausible lies based on misinformation with billions and billions of dollars, and lobbying with the funds to buy politicians.

Dems did not lose this election, we were beaten by decades of careful planning and a shit load of money and power.


It’s nice to think we can find a way out just by being better at politics, but I think unless we have a powerful media, trillions of money to spend, and decades to take it all back - we are sunk.