7 ms·

To be perfectly frank: everyone on the coasts suddenly cares a lot about poor rural flyover-country and Appalachian people's problems because they elected Trump

by ashark 9y ago

To be perfectly frank: everyone on the coasts suddenly cares a lot about poor rural flyover-country and Appalachian people's problems because they elected Trump and they'd really like them not to do anything like that ever again. His election is being taken as a cry for help of the involuntary, show up at the bank without pants and reeking of alcohol while screaming about how lawn gnomes are out to get you sort. The articles are on HN because they're all over the media generally, and because most of HN would probably also prefer that someone like Trump not be elected again in the future.

InitialLastName 9y ago
I don't think it's wrong to work to understand the motivations and needs of a newly visible and politically active (and potentially destructive) demographic. We don't need to degrade anyone to ask, "what can we do to find reasonable candidates that represent the views of these constituents?" when the alternative is the election of people like Trump.
- ashark 9y ago
  I wasn't trying to degrade anyone with that description, just present the point of view that I think is driving these sorts of articles in such quantity and prominence. I think it's fair to say that Trump's winning the nomination, let alone the election itself, was seen as an alarmingly insane thing to have happened by many (liberals and conservatives) and, by those who've taken it as a sign there are issues that need to be addressed, is seen as more than a little similar to an individual, very public display of desperate lunacy of the sort warrants intervention and assistance. Like, "whoa, that seemed like an OK thing to do? Oh man, you must need some help, let's figure out what's gone so wrong in your life and try to fix it." I doubt his voters see it that way, though, hence the "involuntary" part. I don't think they were attempting to get across quite that impression with their vote, though the effect of having some of their problems addressed may be the same in the end. Certainly many were expecting Trump himself to be the agent of change in their lives, not a bunch of liberals and "RINO"s who now want to (metaphorically, but also kind of literally) help them sober up, get some counseling, and maybe get signed up for public assistance and job training.
  - throwanem 9y ago
    Well, I can't speak for anyone else, but - and I've said this before on HN, actually, to no more effect than I expect it to have this time - I voted for Trump precisely in order to scare the everloving bejesus out of the US progressive left. Because, from where I sit, either that happens, or something a hell of a lot worse. Because if you guys don't get your shit together and start looking after even those people who don't agree with your politics, and believe things you think are contemptible, and live lives that you don't understand and don't want to - we're going to end up seeing the kind of enormities which will make history forget Hitler's genocide, just as Hitler made history forget what the Turks did to the Armenians. A nation which once sought to be - which once was - a bastion of hope for a better world, a beacon for downtrodden people the world over, will instead collapse into the kind of ruin that poisons the world for decades to follow, that taints the very ideas in which it originated. Every hope that anyone has ever invested in this nation - uncounted millions of immigrants, including your ancestors and mine - will become worth less than nothing. Also, you and everyone you care about will almost certainly suffer and die, and just as likely so will I and everyone I care about, and so will more millions than in any such atrocity before, because - as with so many things - every time we go this route of horror, we get that much better at it. So there's that. Maybe I sound like I'm scared shitless. If so, it's only because I am, all the time now. If you're not, why in God's name aren't you? Because we're both sitting on the same pile of sweating dynamite and gunpowder. If it goes off, I doubt either of us will find much consolation in the fact that the other one's also just been blown sky high. I'm not asking for a bomb squad to swoop in and save us all like something out of the last act of an episode of 24. It's just that I sure think it'd be nice if people would stop playing with all these goddam matches and do something constructive for a change.
    - dragonwriter 9y ago
      > I voted for Trump precisely in order to scare the everloving bejesus out of the US progressive left. That much seems to have worked, but... > Because if you guys don't get your shit together and start looking after even those people who don't agree with your politics, and believe things you think are contemptible, and live lives that you don't understand and don't want to - we're going to end up seeing the kind of enormities which will make history forget Hitler's genocide, just as Hitler made history forget what the Turks did to the Armenians. I'd say mutual hatred across the political divide got much worse, not better, as a result of Trump, so on that ground your effort seems to have backfired. I'm not sure why you thought that voting for the leading merchant of that kind of political contempt would mitigate it.
- dionidium 9y ago
  What's wrong here is that anyone thinks this demographic -- by which you seem to mean "people who don't live on the coast" -- is newly visible.
dragonwriter 9y ago
The opioid epidemic is pretty serious on the coasts, too. And lots of use cared about the rest of the country before the election, too.
- ashark 9y ago
  Sure, but the recent popularity of the topic, and the typical subjects of the coverage (not likely Hillary voters, often rust belt and coal country folks) is probably because it's been chosen as a leading answer to the question "holy crap, how did Trump happen?!" That's why you see articles about it everywhere now.
  - dragonwriter 9y ago
    Articles about it were all over for at least a couple years before the election (though the election itself drew a lot of attention for a while.) I don't think that's because Trump's election sent shockwaves back in time, though I guess I shouldn't dismiss that out of hand.

by ashark 9y ago

InitialLastName 9y ago

I don't think it's wrong to work to understand the motivations and needs of a newly visible and politically active (and potentially destructive) demographic. We don't need to degrade anyone to ask, "what can we do to find reasonable candidates that represent the views of these constituents?" when the alternative is the election of people like Trump.

ashark 9y ago
I wasn't trying to degrade anyone with that description, just present the point of view that I think is driving these sorts of articles in such quantity and prominence. I think it's fair to say that Trump's winning the nomination, let alone the election itself, was seen as an alarmingly insane thing to have happened by many (liberals and conservatives) and, by those who've taken it as a sign there are issues that need to be addressed, is seen as more than a little similar to an individual, very public display of desperate lunacy of the sort warrants intervention and assistance. Like, "whoa, that seemed like an OK thing to do? Oh man, you must need some help, let's figure out what's gone so wrong in your life and try to fix it." I doubt his voters see it that way, though, hence the "involuntary" part. I don't think they were attempting to get across quite that impression with their vote, though the effect of having some of their problems addressed may be the same in the end. Certainly many were expecting Trump himself to be the agent of change in their lives, not a bunch of liberals and "RINO"s who now want to (metaphorically, but also kind of literally) help them sober up, get some counseling, and maybe get signed up for public assistance and job training.
- throwanem 9y ago
  Well, I can't speak for anyone else, but - and I've said this before on HN, actually, to no more effect than I expect it to have this time - I voted for Trump precisely in order to scare the everloving bejesus out of the US progressive left. Because, from where I sit, either that happens, or something a hell of a lot worse. Because if you guys don't get your shit together and start looking after even those people who don't agree with your politics, and believe things you think are contemptible, and live lives that you don't understand and don't want to - we're going to end up seeing the kind of enormities which will make history forget Hitler's genocide, just as Hitler made history forget what the Turks did to the Armenians. A nation which once sought to be - which once was - a bastion of hope for a better world, a beacon for downtrodden people the world over, will instead collapse into the kind of ruin that poisons the world for decades to follow, that taints the very ideas in which it originated. Every hope that anyone has ever invested in this nation - uncounted millions of immigrants, including your ancestors and mine - will become worth less than nothing. Also, you and everyone you care about will almost certainly suffer and die, and just as likely so will I and everyone I care about, and so will more millions than in any such atrocity before, because - as with so many things - every time we go this route of horror, we get that much better at it. So there's that. Maybe I sound like I'm scared shitless. If so, it's only because I am, all the time now. If you're not, why in God's name aren't you? Because we're both sitting on the same pile of sweating dynamite and gunpowder. If it goes off, I doubt either of us will find much consolation in the fact that the other one's also just been blown sky high. I'm not asking for a bomb squad to swoop in and save us all like something out of the last act of an episode of 24. It's just that I sure think it'd be nice if people would stop playing with all these goddam matches and do something constructive for a change.
  - dragonwriter 9y ago
    > I voted for Trump precisely in order to scare the everloving bejesus out of the US progressive left. That much seems to have worked, but... > Because if you guys don't get your shit together and start looking after even those people who don't agree with your politics, and believe things you think are contemptible, and live lives that you don't understand and don't want to - we're going to end up seeing the kind of enormities which will make history forget Hitler's genocide, just as Hitler made history forget what the Turks did to the Armenians. I'd say mutual hatred across the political divide got much worse, not better, as a result of Trump, so on that ground your effort seems to have backfired. I'm not sure why you thought that voting for the leading merchant of that kind of political contempt would mitigate it.
dionidium 9y ago
What's wrong here is that anyone thinks this demographic -- by which you seem to mean "people who don't live on the coast" -- is newly visible.

dragonwriter 9y ago

The opioid epidemic is pretty serious on the coasts, too. And lots of use cared about the rest of the country before the election, too.

ashark 9y ago
Sure, but the recent popularity of the topic, and the typical subjects of the coverage (not likely Hillary voters, often rust belt and coal country folks) is probably because it's been chosen as a leading answer to the question "holy crap, how did Trump happen?!" That's why you see articles about it everywhere now.
- dragonwriter 9y ago
  Articles about it were all over for at least a couple years before the election (though the election itself drew a lot of attention for a while.) I don't think that's because Trump's election sent shockwaves back in time, though I guess I shouldn't dismiss that out of hand.