Sunday, November 13, 2016

GRIEVANCES ARE FOR WINNERS ONLY

Tina Brown in The Guardian:
Liberal feminists, young and old, need to question the role they played in Hillary’s demise. The two weeks of media hyperventilation over grab-her-by-the-pussygate, when the airwaves were saturated with aghast liberal women equating Trump’s gross comments with sexual assault, had the opposite effect on multiple women voters in the Heartland.

These are resilient women, often working two or three jobs, for whom boorish men are an occasional occupational hazard, not an existential threat. They rolled their eyes over Trump’s unmitigated coarseness, but still bought into his spiel that he’d be the greatest job producer who ever lived....

The angry white working class men who voted in such strength for Trump do not live in an emotional vacuum. They are loved by white working class women -- their wives, daughters, sisters and mothers, who participate in their remaindered pain. It is everywhere in the interviews. “My dad lost his business”, “My husband hasn’t been the same since his job at the factory went away”.

... rust belt women and plenty of others saw him as the rough, tough boss who would bring the business back, and with it the manhood of the sad guy they love.
Frank Bruni in The New York Times:
From the presidential race on down, Democrats adopted a strategy of inclusiveness that excluded a hefty share of Americans and consigned many to a “basket of deplorables” who aren’t all deplorable. Some are hurt. Some are confused.

Liberals miss this by being illiberal. They shame not just the racists and sexists who deserve it but all who disagree. A 64-year-old Southern woman not onboard with marriage equality finds herself characterized as a hateful boob. Never mind that Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton weren’t themselves onboard just five short years ago.

Political correctness has morphed into a moral purity that may feel exhilarating but isn’t remotely tactical. It’s a handmaiden to smugness and sanctimony, undermining its own goals.
Trump voters are offended by the way we characterize them, and by the way we characterize Trump. Meanwhile, Hispanics, Muslims, and blacks were bombarded throughout the campaign with racial invective from Trump supporters. Jews who criticized Trump were found their Twitter feeds and email in-boxes full of Nazi imagery. And backing Clinton meant to many people, that you were an "elitist."

Hillary Clinton was described throughout the campaign as a liar, a crook, a "nasty woman," and, of course, much worse:







But after an election, I guess the right to feel aggrieved and insulted belongs exclusively to the winners.

14 comments:

Carol Ann said...

Sorry, no. You vote for the guy endorsed by the KKK, you're deplorable.

Nefer said...

So much horseshit in that article.

I am so tired of being told that we have to feel/should have felt the pain of the deplorables. Jobs! The economy! I'm sorry, but if they were that concerned about themselves and other "little guys", why the holy flying fuck were they supporting a rampaging thieving pig who stiffed working guys every single chance he had?

The economy was steadily improving under President Obama and President Clinton would have kept the same systems in place. Of course, it could have improved much better and more quickly if the republicans had not made it their goal to make the President fail and so refused to consider any bill that might actually help Americans.

The trumpanzees had access to the same factual information everyone else had. That they could not or would not study and make an intelligent decision is no one's responsibility but their own. That they positively responded to Trump's message of hate and exclusion is no one's responsibility but their own.

In their rallies and in their signs and shrieks and invective there was little talk of actual policy and a whole lot of misogynistic, racist bull.

I'll save my empathy for the people that the poor put-upon deplorables are frothing at the mouth to destroy. How the fuck will destroying marriage equality bring back out-dated jobs in coal? How will cruelty to Americans who are not christianists* bring Trump's factories back to the US from China?

*I don't consider anyone claiming to be Christian who approves of Trump and his hateful viciousness to be an actual Christian.

Grung_e_Gene said...

Grievance and restentment, like gun rights, are exclusively the domain of white right-wingers.

Grung_e_Gene said...
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Bob M said...

My only source of comfort post election is the knowledge that even though they have won, Trump supporters are still miserable and unhappy. Trump winning didn't change a single thing for them. Of course in the long run this is going to make them if anything even more of a danger. Still at least until Jan 20th their continued unhappiness gives one a bit of grim satisfaction.

Unknown said...

All the horrible things about Trump that make most people recoil in horror, are in fact, things his followers adore.

Charon04 said...

I can not say anything frankly or honestly that would obscure my opinions of them. If my opinions bother them, if they resent my opinions, so be it, there is nothing honest to be done.

So be it, Trumpers - resent away. I will enjoy some schadenfreude when those jobs you folks expect Trump to produce for the Real American's benefit never materialize.

Yastreblyansky said...

The two weeks of media hyperventilation over grab-her-by-the-pussygate, when the airwaves were saturated with aghast liberal women equating Trump’s gross comments with sexual assault, had the opposite effect on multiple women voters in the Heartland.Those ladies realize their menfolks only beat them up out of economic anxiety.

Leo Artunian said...

I find it astonishing that so many pundits' take-away from this debacle of an election is that everyone -- especially progressives and people of color -- has to be more concerned with soothing white people's feelings. Because of course it's always all about white people.

doughenning said...

So let me get this straight....Hillary lost the election because Liberals weren't PC enough? Now I really have heard everything.

Victor said...

Only white people - mostly males - are given the opportunity to be deplorable, and stay that way.

Minority Americans are usual DOA if they so much as whine.
And women get shunned and cast aside. And called some really nasty terms.

I'm ashamed to be an older white male, and will stay that way until... I don't know when...

Jimbo said...

I cannot say it better than Nefer's post above. The fact that these Trumpers don't realize that the GOP doesn't care about the so-called white working class voters at all is very depressing and that we are going to relive a more bizarre version of the Bush Administration and another economic crash, this time with more climate change is horrifying.

rclz said...
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rclz said...

the people I know, relatives, who voted for Trump are either racists who've been racists forever and rich people who only care about their tax breaks. Yea, deplorable fits ever single one of them.

The only saving grace is they all live on the east side of the state and there are enough of us on the west side to cancel them out and then some.