The political bubble and how it affects your opinion

[BmorePat87]

(07-22-2019, 04:37 PM)bfine32 Wrote: Did you feel CJ's wording of the issues demonstrated any of the dynamics in the OP? 

CJ made an earnest attempt to contribute to the OP and discussed common ground. You've only posted attacks and haven't addressed the OP. 

Was there a bias towards his own point of view? Sure, but it didn't take away from his comments and harping on that detail that rather than the substance combined with an unwillingness to contribute to the OP can only be characterized as trolling. He was spot on in his response explaining that. 

People are catching on and will stop engaging you.

[*bfine32*]

(07-22-2019, 05:05 PM)BmorePat87 Wrote: CJ made an earnest attempt to contribute to the OP and discussed common ground. You've only posted attacks and haven't addressed the OP. 

Was there a bias towards his own point of view? Sure, but it didn't take away from his comments and harping on that detail that rather than the substance combined with an unwillingness to contribute to the OP can only be characterized as trolling. He was spot on in his response explaining that. 

People are catching on and will stop engaging you.

No one said his attempt was not earnest. I simply pointed out that he may be exhibiting a POV that is discussed in the OP and in my reply I referred to a technique (Johari's Window) that will help others understand their relationship between themselves and others.  My inference was he may want to recognize his "blind spot".

So far he has responded with a made up insult: "I cannot imagine a Liberal having a rational point" and been called a "troll"; yet in some logic I'm the one posting attacks. And his response get applause.

If by engaging, you mean stop insulting; then the sooner the better.

[BmorePat87]

(07-22-2019, 05:17 PM)bfine32 Wrote: No one said his attempt was not earnest. I simply pointed out that he may be exhibiting a POV that is discussed in the OP and in my reply I referred to a technique (Johari's Window) that will help others understand their relationship between themselves and others.  My inference was he may want to recognize his "blind spot".

So far he has responded with a made up insult: "I cannot imagine a Liberal having a rational point" and been called a "troll"; yet in some logic I'm the one posting attacks. And his response get applause.

If by engaging, you mean stop insulting; then the sooner the better.

It wasn't an insult, he just turned your comments around on you and then asked if you read the part of his post where he admits his own bias, the thing you were harping on. 

Your point was irrelevant as he addressed it in his post. When he asked if you saw it, you dismissed it with "I skimmed your post".

That's textbook trolling. I am 90% sure you're trolling right now and know this, but I will give you the benefit of the doubt and respond as if you're genuinely confused as to how your trolling could be trolling. I won't respond any more after this.

[CJD]

Notable statistic:
Bfine's thoughtful and helpful suggestion that I look inward (which I literally addressed in the original post as something that I may be guilty of not doing,as knowing what you don't know is a very difficult concept) has now lead to 13 (including this one) of the 24 posts in this thread.

But discussion derailment definitely is not an intention of his.

I hope, from this point forward, if someone posts in this thread, it is in regards to the original post, which was a genuinely interesting article that I believe is worth discussing.

[Dill]

(07-22-2019, 04:22 PM)Crazyjdawg Wrote: your points aren't trolling because they are contrary. Your points are troll because you don't address the content, you address either the semantics or ignore chunks of the statement with the intention of misrepresenting or exaggerating what was said. Your posts are not meant for discussion. They're meant to annoy. They're meant to frustrate and they're meant to dismantle any kind of positive or functional discourse.

LOL I think everyone is still reeling from "Trump didn't tell them to go anywhere. How many times do I have to repeat myself."

You are correct the poster has difficulty with content/semantics or, let's put it this way, close reading. However, this is not always trolling, and not always meant to dismantle any kind of positive or functional discourse.  We had a true Troll here a while back; even his handle was Russian. He would post right-wing provocations, then fail to respond when people took the bait, just moving on the next. No interest in real dialogue. This isn't that.

I think that to understand why people defend Trump (while saying they are not), one has (among other things) to look very closely at what seems trolling. Hypothesis: a lot of Trump defenders have difficulty forming evidence into precise claims and deducing logically consistent conclusions from them; conversely, they have genuine difficulty recognizing when others are doing exactly that.  Evidence-based charges against Trump's behavior don't seem any different to them than rumor-based charges against Hillary or Obama. No surprise that bias-hunting so frequently substitutes for analysis in their posts. Further, in this frame, the distinction between evidence-based argument and personal attack is almost nil.  Thus criticism of Trump, for example, is not motivated primarily by evidence of what Trump does, but by his critics own "bias" and "hatred." And if it will equalize the playing field without accountability, Trump supporters are happy to grant "both sides" are biased. 

All this is to say that while our conservative friend's posts do sometimes devolve into trolling, he rarely starts with that intent. When it does occur, it is more evidence of frustration in building an effective argument and representing a minority position in this forum than incorrigible evil.  He has been a serious poster for years and ought to get the benefit of the doubt on every new thread. In my view, he is sincere when he says he sees bias in your post (despite all the care you put into balance), and sincere when he says he doesn't think Trump's recent tweets were racist.  Given that sincerity, the question for me is more about the poster's frame of reference than the poster as individual.  Where does that frame come from?  What are the features of the "bubble"--shared by millions--in which it emerges? In my view, understanding that is the key to understanding current divisions in US politics. 

But there is a liberal bubble too; second hypothesis: there are features of liberalism which make researching that key difficult. Looking for "common ground," assuming there always is such, may obscure more than it reveals. We should be just looking for grounds first, whatever they are.

[*bfine32*]

(07-22-2019, 05:40 PM)BmorePat87 Wrote: It wasn't an insult

Of course it was. But no issues with ceasing further discussion about the matter

(07-22-2019, 05:41 PM)Crazyjdawg Wrote: I hope, from this point forward, if someone posts in this thread, it is in regards to the original post, which was a genuinely interesting article that I believe is worth discussing.

Unless it's to illustrate how someone in this very forum might be caught up in the same dynamic addressed in the OP. Of course the article is interesting and first hand examples of the dynamic can be equally as interesting. 

[CJD]

(07-22-2019, 05:52 PM)Dill Wrote: LOL I think everyone is still reeling from "Trump didn't tell them to go anywhere. How many times do I have to repeat myself."

You are correct the poster has difficulty with content/semantics or, let's put it this way, close reading. However, this is not always trolling, and not always meant to dismantle any kind of positive or functional discourse.  We had a true Troll here a while back; even his handle was Russian. He would post right-wing provocations, then fail to respond when people took the bait, just moving on the next. No interest in real dialogue. This isn't that.

I think that to understand why people defend Trump (while saying they are not), one has (among other things) to look very closely at what seems trolling. Hypothesis: a lot of Trump defenders have difficulty forming evidence into precise claims and deducing logically consistent conclusions from them; conversely, they have genuine difficulty recognizing when others are doing exactly that.  Evidence-based charges against Trump's behavior don't seem any different to them than rumor-based charges against Hillary or Obama. No surprise that bias-hunting so frequently substitutes for analysis in their posts. Further, in this frame, the distinction between evidence-based argument and personal attack is almost nil.  Thus criticism of Trump, for example, is not motivated primarily by evidence of what Trump does, but by his critics own "bias" and "hatred." And if it will equalize the playing field without accountability, Trump supporters are happy to grant "both sides" are biased. 

All this is to say that while our conservative friend's posts do sometimes devolve into trolling, he rarely starts with that intent. When it does occur, it is more evidence of frustration in building an effective argument and representing a minority position in this forum than incorrigible evil.  He has been a serious poster for years and ought to get the benefit of the doubt on every new thread. In my view, he is sincere when he says he sees bias in your post (despite all the care you put into balance), and sincere when he says he doesn't think Trump's recent tweets were racist.  Given that sincerity, the question for me is more about the poster's frame of reference than the poster as individual.  Where does that frame come from?  What are the features of the "bubble"--shared by millions--in which it emerges? In my view, understanding that is the key to understanding current divisions in US politics. 

But there is a liberal bubble too; second hypothesis: there are features of liberalism which make researching that key difficult. Looking for "common ground," assuming there always is such, may obscure more than it reveals. We should be just looking for grounds first, whatever they are.

I appreciate the sentiment behind the benefit of the doubt. I would be amenable to that. Maybe he's just having a bad week. I too remember him as a serious poster prior to the Trump Racism tweets. I could see trying to find a way to defend Trump making you go a little crazy.

I'll keep an eye on his posts and keep an open mind.

But make no mistake. Responding to my attempt at a thoughtful and constructive post about the cognitive dissonance that is separating the two major parties by relaying common ground I believe the vast majority of people share with "maybe you're suffering from the problem this article is talking about" is definitely trolling. 

So, noted. We'll see if he can make a recovery to his former self once the TDS drains out of his system a little bit. 

[Dill]

(07-22-2019, 08:44 PM)Crazyjdawg Wrote: But make no mistake. Responding to my attempt at a thoughtful and constructive post about the cognitive dissonance that is separating the two major parties by relaying common ground I believe the vast majority of people share with "maybe you're suffering from the problem this article is talking about" is definitely trolling.

LOL  A Bfine pro-tip: the longer your post, the shorter his response.  Once you understand the rules, you'll be less surprised and irritated when extended argument gets short shrift.

[Dill]

(07-22-2019, 11:23 AM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: Spoiler alert, living in a bubble is bad.

Not possible to live wholly outside any and every bubble.

They cannot be separated from language, culture, history and education.

Recognizing bubbles, how they are constituted, and what sort of understanding they enable or limit is good.

[Dill]

(07-22-2019, 04:48 PM)Crazyjdawg Wrote: . . . do you think this tendency of politicians to "demonize and caricaturize the opposing party" is of equal magnitude on both sides?

Well, recency bias would lead me to think that the Republicans are much heavier offenders of the first question. But, of course, that's about 99.9% due to Donald Trump, who I think is the manifestation of this entire article.

But think back to the Presidency of George W Bush. The left's readiness to call him and his followers racist, in hindsight, seems pretty demonizing, doesn't it? (See: Kanye West saying W doesn't care about black people). Like, comparing him to Donald sure makes me feel like I was too hard on W and the people who voted for him. So if that's the case now, then I find it incredibly likely that at least a degree of that is occurring now, even if Donald is kind of making Democrats feel like it's 100% warranted right now.

I don't think that is just "recency bias." Think back to fights-make-news Gingrich and his 1994 GOPAC memo on the control of media through control of language, emphasizing the importance of words like "traitor" and "hypocrisy" in describing political opponents. https://fair.org/home/language-a-key-mechanism-of-control/.

Not sure West was wrong about Bush; though I have more respect for Bush's judgment than West's.  Trump has not yet sent 4,500 Americans to their death in an unnecessary war, but he is doing more "infrastructural" damage to government than Bush did.

"They do it more" is not the point of my response though. I am concerned with how the OP/Common Ground has framed the issue using poll results. We are told in the Common Ground poll that 79% of Republicans think racism is still a problem in the US.  But 57% agree with Trump's tweets against the squad, according to a USA Today poll.https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2019/07/17/trump-tweets-poll-unamerican-offensive-partisan-divide/1748737001/. Only 45% found the tweets "racist."

And a Marist poll showed that Trump's popularity increased after the tweets. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2019/07/22/trump-approval-rating-new-high-npr-pbs-poll-after-racist-tweets/1796556001/.

These are not fringe numbers. So if one asks people "Is racism still a problem today?" there need be some further qualifying questions to ascertain what they mean by this. E.g., Dems could mean that racism, as in discrimination against minorities (especially black), is still with us. Others could mean that whites are now more discriminated against (like Christians! lol).  So if Dems guess that only 50% of Republicans think racism is a problem, as Dems understand racism, they might not be so far off as 79% suggests.

Also, when formulating poll questions, it is good to remember that Americans as a group sound "progressive" when asked about principles. E.g., is equality good, racism bad etc. But when you ask about specific policies or cases, results are often flipped, as we have seen with the Trump tweets.

The question of "demonization and caricature," in my view, is made more difficult by media bubbles, and in turn makes describing/defining media bubbles more difficult. E.g., is it "demonizing" Obama and Susan Rice to claim they used government power to spy on the Trump campaign? Not if one believes they did, and certainly not if they actually did.

In my view, people striving for "common ground" or to repair division would do much better to address the issue of how "alternative facts" and the like come to circulate so little contested in the current mediascape. Part of this has to do with the discrediting of institutions like the MSM and the FBI, which enables new "bubbles" to arise protecting disinformation, in part by making people resistant to counterfactuals and counterarguments from the get go as "far left" liberal media propaganda.

[Sociopathicsteelerfan]

(07-23-2019, 09:03 AM)Dill Wrote: Not possible to live wholly outside any and every bubble.

Who said wholly? 

Quote:They cannot be separated from language, culture, history and education.

This was more true prior to the advent of the internet.  Those who currently live in bubbles are doing so by choice.  it's the easier, safer, choice, but it's still a choice.

Quote:Recognizing bubbles, how they are constituted, and what sort of understanding they enable or limit is good.

Which was the whole point of the article in OP.  Currently the "left" has further retreated into it without, apparently, recognizing the limitations of doing so.

[Belsnickel]

(07-22-2019, 04:22 PM)Dill Wrote: How will resigning from the Dems increase the likelihood of laws that support equity, conserve natural resources, advanced evidence-based policy solutions, etc. ?

By freeing up my resources, such as time and money, to work with other organizations that promote these policies and also do the actual work. By working with youth in the BSA to teach them about conservation and planning service projects for them to do that will help them gain an appreciation for these efforts.

I don't want centrism, but the ideologues and the centrists are currently battling in the party in such a way that prevents any realistic benefits. I can have a greater impact devoting myself to other organizations.

[Dill]

(07-22-2019, 04:48 PM)Crazyjdawg Wrote: And if this sort of thing "comes between" the parties, do you think politicians are the primary "cause" of it?

As far as whether this is primarily caused by politicians...yea. I think so. Politicians kind of need you to feel like voting matters. If you think both candidates are basically the same (Hillary was pretty fiscally conservative and her socially liberal policies were pretty recent and not that all encompassing, especially compared to where the party is now), then you wouldn't really feel compelled to vote unless you have a specific issue that you vote on. So I think it's natural that politicians would try to make the other side seem worse than they are. 

Again, Donald is a perfect example of this. He is literally telling people the media lies to them regularly. He is attempting to divide the country by virtue of demonizing and de-legitimizing one of the main systems meant to check him. And he's no kinder to Democratic politicians either. Remember, before Donald, it used to be basically taboo to criticize the President before you. Donald insults Obama so much, it's not even newsworthy anymore.

AOC has been described as the liberal Donald Trump because she uses similar tactics. I think the squad in general does stoke the anti-Republican vibe, not just anti-Trump.

It's in politicians' best interest for their voting base to hate their opponents. It's how they get re-elected. Now, that's not to say that all demonization is a cynical attempt to falsify their opponent. I'm sure both sides believe part or most of what they say about the other side. But the reason decorum used to be important in politics was because outwardly calling other politicians bad people for what they believe is a great way to get them shot at on a baseball field or have bombs sent to their home addresses. And this hatred creates conspiracy theories, like the pizzagate thing.

It's just not good for anyone. And I hope it stops after 2020.

No doubt there are politicians who demonize and always have been.You might agree it is far worse than at any time since 1954, and that Trump is the worst all time offender, shattering norms of decorum almost daily (E.g., your mention of his criticizing previous presidents would be a mild example.) Not sure how AOC uses similar tactics. Does she degrade and humiliate the other gender or racial groups? I have not read all her tweets.

I can no longer see politicians as the primary cause, though clearly one side is the greater offender.

Dems need to feel voting matters, but don't respond all that well to demonization as a tactic, or at least to the degrees of it we see on the Republican side. Efforts to create Rush/Hannity style radio and talk shows have not drawn enough audience to keep advertisers. Were Hillary to demonize the press as Trump does, or disparage his looks, she would have been toast. The comment about Trump's "basket of deplorables" did not rouse her base. And she forgot it is "elitism" when Dems do it. Dems as a group respond less well to conspiracy theories and us/them frames which scapegoat out groups/minorities.

Trump certainly demonizes, and caricatures: crooked Hillary, little Marco, lyin' Ted, low energy Jeb, not to mention Mexican rapists and fake news. And in doing so he lowers standards and debases the nation from its highest office. But this only works because, among his supporters, traditional standards and norms have already been or were ready to be discarded. Not sure politicians caused that. I look more to other kinds of social change in education and media (especially the rise of Fox News), including the internet. That stuff creates bubbles more so than politicians. Evangelical churches appear important contributors to the alternative worldview espoused by Trump supporters, as well groups like the Federalist Society and CPAC and the NRA, and to some degree think tanks like the Heritage Foundation and Freedomworks. Settle all that on top of an increasing wage gap (and a wealthy class prepared to maintain that gap) and increasing minority population, and a segment of the population is ready for a WALL and someone who will "say what everyone is thinking but afraid to say." When Trump steps onto the stage he appears to me more the effect than cause of Trumpism.

If politicians are not the primary or immediate cause of the breakdown in norms we have been discussing, then it is doubtful the problem will disappear when Trump is impeached or voted out. There are probably politicians who could help repair the damage, but it's not clear who would elect them. Not people who respond to what everyone is (with good reason) afraid to say.

[Dill]

(07-23-2019, 10:43 AM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: Who said wholly? 

This was more true prior to the advent of the internet.  Those who currently live in bubbles are doing so by choice.  it's the easier, safer, choice, but it's still a choice.
Which was the whole point of the article in OP.  Currently the "left" has further retreated into it without, apparently, recognizing the limitations of doing so.

Not sure who "the left" is here. Your article spoke of Democrats.

Agree someone might "choose" to live inside or outside a specific bubble.

Do you mean people are choosing to do that, while agreeing it is not possible for anyone to live outside bubbles altogether?

[Dill]

(07-23-2019, 10:46 AM)Belsnickel Wrote: By freeing up my resources, such as time and money, to work with other organizations that promote these policies and also do the actual work. By working with youth in the BSA to teach them about conservation and planning service projects for them to do that will help them gain an appreciation for these efforts.

I don't want centrism, but the ideologues and the centrists are currently battling in the party in such a way that prevents any realistic benefits. I can have a greater impact devoting myself to other organizations.

No doubt your choices will have greater local impact. But what about voting in Federal elections?

Getting Trump out of office would surely benefit all the progressive goals you mentioned. And he will likely still be there unless enough people in enough states vote Democrat next year.

[Belsnickel]

(07-23-2019, 10:55 AM)Dill Wrote: No doubt your choices will have greater local impact. But what about voting in Federal elections?

Getting Trump out of office would surely benefit all the progressive goals you mentioned. And he will likely still be there unless enough people in enough states vote Democrat next year.

My local Democratic party isn't going to have much of a role in that. The city in which it operates is very blue when it comes to state and federal elections. Were I a county resident, I could have more of an impact in making a difference. But not here in the city.

[Sociopathicsteelerfan]

(07-23-2019, 10:46 AM)Belsnickel Wrote: By freeing up my resources, such as time and money, to work with other organizations that promote these policies and also do the actual work. By working with youth in the BSA to teach them about conservation and planning service projects for them to do that will help them gain an appreciation for these efforts.

I don't want centrism, but the ideologues and the centrists are currently battling in the party in such a way that prevents any realistic benefits. I can have a greater impact devoting myself to other organizations.

That this question was even asked of you is a perfect indicator of the political times we live in.  The current thinking is, "you're either with us or against us".  I mean, how could you possibly make a difference if you aren't glued to the Democratic party at the hip?  It's just not possible.

(07-23-2019, 10:51 AM)Dill Wrote: Not sure who "the left" is here. Your article spoke of Democrats.

You're right, the Dems typically lean to the right, my bad.

Quote:Someone might "choose" to live inside or outside a specific bubble.

Again, stating the point of the article.

Quote:Do you mean people are choosing to do that, as opposed to choosing to live outside any bubble whatsoever?

Yes, which the article states as well.  I don't know that anyone can "live" outside their bubble, but they can certainly venture out of it via numerous sources.  If a person chooses not to do so then yes, by definition they are choosing not to do that.

[Sociopathicsteelerfan]

(07-23-2019, 10:55 AM)Dill Wrote: No doubt your choices will have greater local impact. But what about voting in Federal elections?

What about anything he stated would prevent him from voting in Federal elections?

[CJD]

(07-23-2019, 09:53 AM)Dill Wrote: I don't think that is just "recency bias." Think back to fights-make-news Gingrich and his 1994 GOPAC memo on the control of media through control of language, emphasizing the importance of words like "traitor" and "hypocrisy" in describing political opponents. https://fair.org/home/language-a-key-mechanism-of-control/.

Not sure West was wrong about Bush; though I have more respect for Bush's judgment than West's.  Trump has not yet sent 4,500 Americans to their death in an unnecessary war, but he is doing more "infrastructural" damage to government than Bush did.

Well, maybe I'm giving the Republicans the benefit of the doubt. I wasn't politically aware in 94, so I don't know exactly what was going on with Gingrich. I just remember the Bush days as, comparatively, tame to what we're doing now. And if Bush did actually not care about black people, he was an awful lot more subtle about it than Trump is haha.

Quote:"They do it more" is not the point of my response though. I am concerned with how the OP/Common Ground has framed the issue using poll results. We are told in the Common Ground poll that 79% of Republicans think racism is still a problem in the US.  But 57% agree with Trump's tweets against the squad, according to a USA Today poll.https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2019/07/17/trump-tweets-poll-unamerican-offensive-partisan-divide/1748737001/. Only 45% found the tweets "racist."


And a Marist poll showed that Trump's popularity increased after the tweets. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2019/07/22/trump-approval-rating-new-high-npr-pbs-poll-after-racist-tweets/1796556001/.

These are not fringe numbers. So if one asks people "Is racism still a problem today?" there need be some further qualifying questions to ascertain what they mean by this. E.g., Dems could mean that racism, as in discrimination against minorities (especially black), is still with us. Others could mean that whites are now more discriminated against (like Christians! lol).  So if Dems guess that only 50% of Republicans think racism is a problem, as Dems understand racism, they might not be so far off as 79% suggests. 

You know...I honestly didn't even think of it like that. It's just such a foreign thought that white people or Christians are the ones suffering from racism in America that it didn't even occur to me that Republicans may actually feel that way.  

I saw that article but didn't read it. I found it pretty hard to imagine. It may be one of those cases of people "being sick" of being "called racist" and are therefore sticking up for someone else who's "being victimized" by the "racist left" in that way. I hope it isn't because the racists were super happy that he was blatantly racist. But you never really know what people's motivations are.

Quote:Also, when formulating poll questions, it is good to remember that Americans as a group sound "progressive" when asked about principles. E.g., is equality good, racism bad etc. But when you ask about specific policies or cases, results are often flipped, as we have seen with the Trump tweets.


The question of "demonization and caricature," in my view, is made more difficult by media bubbles, and in turn makes describing/defining media bubbles more difficult. E.g., is it "demonizing" Obama and Susan Rice to claim they used government power to spy on the Trump campaign? Not if one believes they did, and certainly not if they actually did. 

In my view, people striving for "common ground" or to repair division would do much better to address the issue of how "alternative facts" and the like come to circulate so little contested in the current mediascape. Part of this has to do with the discrediting of institutions like the MSM and the FBI, which enables new "bubbles" to arise protecting disinformation, in part by making people resistant to counterfactuals and counterarguments from the get go as "far left" liberal media propaganda.

So I think reaching common ground or repairing the division and battling alternative facts are...basically the same thing. Like, look no further than the interaction at the beginning of this thread. I mentioned that Republicans and Democrats are pursuing the same basic goals (Ending or minimizing illegal immigration and decreasing the number of abortions in this country) but going about it in completely different ways, in terms of policy. And for making that distinction, I was accused of being politically blind for the mere sin of making the liberal viewpoint appear to be "rational."

Now, obviously, stating the liberal goals in those two instances the way I did was meant to expose that Liberals really aren't open borders loving, baby killing maniacs that they're made out to be by politicians and, as you said, media outlets like Fox News...but that they're, you know...rational people. With goals rooted in logic and hope to reach a better position than we are currently in.
In effect, combating the "alternative facts" of what Liberals actually believe. Unfortunately, it was not taken that way (whether intentionally misunderstood or accidentally misunderstood is not really important). The point is I failed to break down that wall of alternative facts in that scenario. But that was the theoretical end goal.

As far as demonizing the media, I think lies, like Obama spying on Trump, are definitely demonizing. It's one thing to have proof of something and it making the other party look bad. It's another to just say nonsense and hope your followers eat it up with no investigation into the sources and their reliability. 

[CJD]

(07-23-2019, 10:47 AM)Dill Wrote: No doubt there are politicians who demonize and always have been.You might agree it is far worse than at any time since 1954, and that Trump is the worst all time offender, shattering norms of decorum almost daily (E.g., your mention of his criticizing previous presidents would be a mild example.) Not sure how AOC uses similar tactics. Does she degrade and humiliate the other gender or racial groups? I have not read all her tweets.

Admittedly, I am mostly told that AOC uses similar tactics. I don't have explicit examples because, until this whole racist tweet debacle, I didn't really pay close attention to what she said or thought. I'd see the occasional article and think "yea, that makes sense" or "eh, that's a little aggressive, AOC," but ultimately she's just a freshman representative from one of the most blue areas in the country. We don't even have evidence that she can get re-elected yet or if she'll be Primaried by the moderate democrats in 2020. I was obviously aware of her and liked that she shared principles with Bernie, but I didn't follow every AOC related news story that ever existed like many Republicans do. 

I guess one good example would be when she implied that Nancy was pushing them out due to their race (by saying "women of color" when she could have easily just said "women" and the same message would have been portrayed), but this kind of example pales in comparison to what Trump does.

Quote:I can no longer see politicians as the primary cause, though clearly one side is the greater offender.


Dems need to feel voting matters, but don't respond all that well to demonization as a tactic, or at least to the degrees of it we see on the Republican side. Efforts to create Rush/Hannity style radio and talk shows have not drawn enough audience to keep advertisers. Were Hillary to demonize the press as Trump does, or disparage his looks, she would have been toast. The comment about Trump's "basket of deplorables" did not rouse her base. And she forgot it is "elitism" when Dems do it. Dems as a group respond less well to conspiracy theories and us/them frames which scapegoat out groups/minorities.

Trump certainly demonizes, and caricatures: crooked Hillary, little Marco, lyin' Ted, low energy Jeb, not to mention Mexican rapists and fake news. And in doing so he lowers standards and debases the nation from its highest office. But this only works because, among his supporters, traditional standards and norms have already been or were ready to be discarded. Not sure politicians caused that. I look more to other kinds of social change in education and media (especially the rise of Fox News), including the internet. That stuff creates bubbles more so than politicians. Evangelical churches appear important contributors to the alternative worldview espoused by Trump supporters, as well groups like the Federalist Society and CPAC and the NRA, and to some degree think tanks like the Heritage Foundation and Freedomworks. Settle all that on top of an increasing wage gap (and a wealthy class prepared to maintain that gap) and increasing minority population, and a segment of the population is ready for a WALL and someone who will "say what everyone is thinking but afraid to say." When Trump steps onto the stage he appears to me more the effect than cause of Trumpism.

If politicians are not the primary or immediate cause of the breakdown in norms we have been discussing, then it is doubtful the problem will disappear when Trump is impeached or voted out. There are probably politicians who could help repair the damage, but it's not clear who would elect them. Not people who respond to what everyone is (with good reason) afraid to say.

There is a debate to be had about whether Trump is the cause or the symptom of this whole debacle going on on the Right at the moment. I personally, in the past, have leaned towards cause simply because he came out of nowhere to become the most prominent racist politician that we've had in decades. But maybe that just means the voters have been yearning for a guy to just say what they're thinking, making Trump the symptom...

I agree that Fox News carries a large portion of the blame. But, if I remember correctly, they were against Trump for the majority of the primary season in 2015. It wasn't until he actually won the nomination that they started to change their tune. You saw that in people like Lindsay Graham and Ted Cruz as well. That tells me, at the very least, even Fox News was resistant to embracing racial stoking as a political strategy until it was essentially forced down their throats by the voters (incidentally, Trump is kind of the exact reason why Democrats have super delegates).

So maybe the cause was the perfect blend of a candidate willing to stoke the base's racism along with the bases' long held desire to be stoked XD. Which was first? The chicken or the egg?