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In case it's useful to anyone on HN working in/on politics, I've been with some Trump supporting and voting people lately, and my takeaways: - They hate the id

by arikr 9y ago

In case it's useful to anyone on HN working in/on politics, I've been with some Trump supporting and voting people lately, and my takeaways: - They hate the idea of getting in trouble for using the wrong pronouns for people. A few strongly disliked, and most somewhat disliked, having to use non-traditional pronouns at all. - They were very upset about stories of people being suspended from elementary school after using the wrong pronoun - They were upset about a professor getting in trouble for wanting to only use male and female pronouns based on biological gender - "Don't force it down my throat and I won't force it down yours" - They feel like they cannot express their views without being attacked. In response, they now express their views much more aggressively and will attack others (sadly). - They hate hate hate many things that they associate with social justice warriors, e.g. political correctness, "safe spaces," etc. - They like Trump's outwardly strong stance on terrorism - They were concerned about the decline of religion, and worry that this will lead to more radical extremists (with the radical extremists converting people who feel disenfranchised and purposeless) - They support gay marriage but were upset at a story of a store keeper who got in trouble for refusing to serve a gay couple - They (as former legal immigrants) hate the idea of illegal immigrants skipping the queue - Extreme distrust of the mainstream media - Extreme distrust and disliking of Hillary Clinton - Strong distrust and disliking of Obama (will update if I recall their stated reasoning) - Generally seemed pretty anti-politicians I'm not intending to invite a discussion as to whether their opinions are right or wrong. I'm just posting these here because I think that for anyone on HN working in politics, it may be important to know why your opponents dislike (their image of) you. See also: http://blog.samaltman.com/what-i-heard-from-trump-supporters http://blog.samaltman.com/what-i-heard-from-trump-supporters And on changing opinions: https://psmag.com/news/why-even-your-best-arguments-never-work-64910 https://psmag.com/news/why-even-your-best-arguments-never-wo... https://twitter.com/csallen/status/914926162379460609 https://twitter.com/csallen/status/914926162379460609 https://ozanvarol.com/how-to-change-a-mind-yours-or-someone-elses/ https://ozanvarol.com/how-to-change-a-mind-yours-or-someone-...

choko 9y ago
No offense, but those are all anecdotal observations and include no demographic information. As one person in millions, why do you feel your unscientific observations on this topic are relevant?
- sievebrain 9y ago
  Polling and statistical generalisations hide a lot of detail - they can generally identify the what, but whether they get the why is much more hit and miss. Most obviously without anecdotal reports on what people believe, pollsters would not know what questions to ask.
- rapsey 9y ago
  I'm a trump supporter and I agree with all of those and I doubt many fellow supporters disagree with anything of it either.
- drc555 9y ago
  he never proclaimed them to be true , it is indeed unscientific observation. what gets under your skin ? Disclaimer : I am on neither side .
  - choko 9y ago
    Nothing is really "under my skin", I just don't see how these observations about a few select Trump supporters are valuable in the grand scheme of things. It comes across as stereotyping.
2K17 9y ago
Dislike Trump/Brexit/etc. but voting for those is the only way to express the outlined views anonymously and be heard. That and waste as least money on unjust wellfare-seekers as possible.
Yhippa 9y ago
> - "Don't force it down my throat and I won't force it down yours" > - They were concerned about the decline of religion, and worry that this will lead to more radical extremists (with the radical extremists converting people who feel disenfranchised and purposeless) I'm curious about how they envision remediation of the decline of religion without shoving it down people's throat.
- sievebrain 9y ago
  Probably they don't. You can be concerned with something without government force being your proposed solution.
  - wolfram74 9y ago
    a thing can be possible while still being improbable.
- irrational 9y ago
  I can be concerned about the decline in size of scoops of ice cream at the corner store without envisioning any sort of remediation. Concern about something and an expectation of remediation don't necessarily go hand in hand.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
0xCMP 9y ago
I've seen this as well. The above opinions are held by the majority of trump supporters I know and have been held for a long time before trump.
vertex-four 9y ago
Let's ignore the cesspit that's Twitter for the moment, since I don't know how it works, and focus on interactions in the real world. > They hate the idea of getting in trouble for using the wrong pronouns for people Relatively rarely happens. Does tend to happen if you repeat it consistently and show no attempt at learning - at that point, it's subtle bullying and disrespect. > having to use non-traditional pronouns at all Most enby people I know are at least not actively uncomfortable with people using binary pronouns, although I'll continue to point out that singular they has been correct grammar for longer than anyone has been alive. They might decide to pursue activism towards greater awareness, and some of that is likely to be student activism - they're also likely to create and participate in social spaces where they're respected. It's generally not a problem in workplaces, since enby people are almost universally terrified of being out about their gender at work. > They were very upset about stories of people being suspended from elementary school after using the wrong pronoun Doesn't appear to have actually happened. Some kid got sent to the Principal's office once, and I assume got talked to and sent back to class, since no news source says anything else. I can't figure out the actual details on what happened to cause the kid to be sent to the office, since every news story on the subject seems to have a different set of facts, strongly suggesting that at least some of those facts were partially made up. I suspect some teacher was on edge about potential bullying - which definitely happens - didn't realise the kid didn't already know, and the issue probably got resolved without any lasting harm to anyone. > They were upset about a professor getting in trouble for wanting to only use male and female pronouns based on biological gender Now that we're talking about adults in an educational setting where people are intended to interact professionally with each other, a failure to respect the adults you interact with - and the people who part-fund your job, at that - is likely to get you fired, yes. The only way you can twist this to be a bad thing is if you thoroughly believe that people with nonbinary genders are not worth respecting. > They feel like they cannot express their views without being attacked How do they think many of us feel, and have felt for decades? We spend ridiculous amounts of energy trying to calm their fears, anyway - I spend much of my social time explaining to people in real life why their (usually unintentionally) misguided ideas about trans people are based on incorrect facts. --- I don't know how to solve these problems. Most of it is continued education, but how are we going to educate people when there's systems in place - often religious and political - specifically intending to keep people in the dark about reality?
kafkaesq 9y ago
All generally valid viewpoints, of course. There may be questions of degree, and more fundamentally, of proportion to other issues not mentioned. But taken individually, I can get where they're coming from on nearly all of these bullet points. (In particular: while I personally don't think political correctness comes anywhere near in significance to the issues it (clumsily) tries to address -- it is a significant problem in itself, and I can see why it provokes so many negative feelings in people). It's the fact they chose, as a frontman for this body of positions, a person who's not only blatantly incompetent -- but who may very well get large numbers of us killed (for example, by unnecessarily provoking a confrontation with North Korea) and/or potentially cause extreme, irreparable damage in a whole bunch of other ways -- that's the part I don't get. Or that they can't see this basic disconnect (between the sentiment of their positions; and the reality of the end result of the course of action they advocate in response to this sentiment). When it should be blindingly obvious. EDIT: Failed to notice that this thread represents the very essence of a "pure politics" discussion, and hence is strongly against site guidelines. Nonetheless your analysis was very succinct and thoughtful.
- gfodor 9y ago
  The thing that seems to have gotten lost is that ultimately the choice for all Americans was between Trump and Hillary. There are many millions of Americans who came into 2016 with the view, established over the last 2 decades, warranted or not, they would never, under any circumstance, vote for Hillary Clinton for president. Within that group, there were many who felt that they would do anything, including vote for a person like Trump, to prevent such an outcome. Trump is hated now but it's easy to forget what a fundamental difference this was. There were large swaths of voters who would have voted D if literally any other person with a pulse was on the ticket. For the most part, In fact, those people did do just that when they voted for Obama TWICE in the last two elections: https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/2016-election/obama-trump-counties/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/2016-electi... I think the narrative that the electorate embraced Trump belies the fact that just as much, if not more, of the dynamic was that the electorate, unsurprisingly, rejected Hillary specifically (who by the way, as is known now, cheated the candidate who probably deserved to be on the ticket.)

by arikr 9y ago

choko 9y ago

No offense, but those are all anecdotal observations and include no demographic information. As one person in millions, why do you feel your unscientific observations on this topic are relevant?

sievebrain 9y ago
Polling and statistical generalisations hide a lot of detail - they can generally identify the what, but whether they get the why is much more hit and miss. Most obviously without anecdotal reports on what people believe, pollsters would not know what questions to ask.
rapsey 9y ago
I'm a trump supporter and I agree with all of those and I doubt many fellow supporters disagree with anything of it either.
drc555 9y ago
he never proclaimed them to be true , it is indeed unscientific observation. what gets under your skin ? Disclaimer : I am on neither side .
- choko 9y ago
  Nothing is really "under my skin", I just don't see how these observations about a few select Trump supporters are valuable in the grand scheme of things. It comes across as stereotyping.

2K17 9y ago

Dislike Trump/Brexit/etc. but voting for those is the only way to express the outlined views anonymously and be heard. That and waste as least money on unjust wellfare-seekers as possible.

Yhippa 9y ago

> - "Don't force it down my throat and I won't force it down yours" > - They were concerned about the decline of religion, and worry that this will lead to more radical extremists (with the radical extremists converting people who feel disenfranchised and purposeless) I'm curious about how they envision remediation of the decline of religion without shoving it down people's throat.

sievebrain 9y ago
Probably they don't. You can be concerned with something without government force being your proposed solution.
- wolfram74 9y ago
  a thing can be possible while still being improbable.
irrational 9y ago
I can be concerned about the decline in size of scoops of ice cream at the corner store without envisioning any sort of remediation. Concern about something and an expectation of remediation don't necessarily go hand in hand.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]

0xCMP 9y ago

I've seen this as well. The above opinions are held by the majority of trump supporters I know and have been held for a long time before trump.

vertex-four 9y ago

Let's ignore the cesspit that's Twitter for the moment, since I don't know how it works, and focus on interactions in the real world. > They hate the idea of getting in trouble for using the wrong pronouns for people Relatively rarely happens. Does tend to happen if you repeat it consistently and show no attempt at learning - at that point, it's subtle bullying and disrespect. > having to use non-traditional pronouns at all Most enby people I know are at least not actively uncomfortable with people using binary pronouns, although I'll continue to point out that singular they has been correct grammar for longer than anyone has been alive. They might decide to pursue activism towards greater awareness, and some of that is likely to be student activism - they're also likely to create and participate in social spaces where they're respected. It's generally not a problem in workplaces, since enby people are almost universally terrified of being out about their gender at work. > They were very upset about stories of people being suspended from elementary school after using the wrong pronoun Doesn't appear to have actually happened. Some kid got sent to the Principal's office once, and I assume got talked to and sent back to class, since no news source says anything else. I can't figure out the actual details on what happened to cause the kid to be sent to the office, since every news story on the subject seems to have a different set of facts, strongly suggesting that at least some of those facts were partially made up. I suspect some teacher was on edge about potential bullying - which definitely happens - didn't realise the kid didn't already know, and the issue probably got resolved without any lasting harm to anyone. > They were upset about a professor getting in trouble for wanting to only use male and female pronouns based on biological gender Now that we're talking about adults in an educational setting where people are intended to interact professionally with each other, a failure to respect the adults you interact with - and the people who part-fund your job, at that - is likely to get you fired, yes. The only way you can twist this to be a bad thing is if you thoroughly believe that people with nonbinary genders are not worth respecting. > They feel like they cannot express their views without being attacked How do they think many of us feel, and have felt for decades? We spend ridiculous amounts of energy trying to calm their fears, anyway - I spend much of my social time explaining to people in real life why their (usually unintentionally) misguided ideas about trans people are based on incorrect facts. --- I don't know how to solve these problems. Most of it is continued education, but how are we going to educate people when there's systems in place - often religious and political - specifically intending to keep people in the dark about reality?

kafkaesq 9y ago

All generally valid viewpoints, of course. There may be questions of degree, and more fundamentally, of proportion to other issues not mentioned. But taken individually, I can get where they're coming from on nearly all of these bullet points. (In particular: while I personally don't think political correctness comes anywhere near in significance to the issues it (clumsily) tries to address -- it is a significant problem in itself, and I can see why it provokes so many negative feelings in people). It's the fact they chose, as a frontman for this body of positions, a person who's not only blatantly incompetent -- but who may very well get large numbers of us killed (for example, by unnecessarily provoking a confrontation with North Korea) and/or potentially cause extreme, irreparable damage in a whole bunch of other ways -- that's the part I don't get. Or that they can't see this basic disconnect (between the sentiment of their positions; and the reality of the end result of the course of action they advocate in response to this sentiment). When it should be blindingly obvious. EDIT: Failed to notice that this thread represents the very essence of a "pure politics" discussion, and hence is strongly against site guidelines. Nonetheless your analysis was very succinct and thoughtful.

gfodor 9y ago
The thing that seems to have gotten lost is that ultimately the choice for all Americans was between Trump and Hillary. There are many millions of Americans who came into 2016 with the view, established over the last 2 decades, warranted or not, they would never, under any circumstance, vote for Hillary Clinton for president. Within that group, there were many who felt that they would do anything, including vote for a person like Trump, to prevent such an outcome. Trump is hated now but it's easy to forget what a fundamental difference this was. There were large swaths of voters who would have voted D if literally any other person with a pulse was on the ticket. For the most part, In fact, those people did do just that when they voted for Obama TWICE in the last two elections: https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/2016-election/obama-trump-counties/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/2016-electi... I think the narrative that the electorate embraced Trump belies the fact that just as much, if not more, of the dynamic was that the electorate, unsurprisingly, rejected Hillary specifically (who by the way, as is known now, cheated the candidate who probably deserved to be on the ticket.)