That book is so totally "OMG, what's WRONG with those people???" Emphasis "those people."
While that's one interpretation, there's Long been conflict in the US on the rural-urban axis - see Andrew Jackson's vision versus Alexander Hamilton's vision
Race is only useful in this sort of thing as a predictor of rough economic class, and even then it's less than useful. IOW, I don't think it's specifically race.
I'm curious. This is a question that's plagued me my entire adult life. Why are many people against being called "those people" or "these people"? Is it a connotation thing---as in previously someone trying to marginalize a population would refer to them casually as "those people"?
Or is there some deeper insult that I am missing due to not having experience of it?
> The joke is that the rural people are oppressing themselves.
That's a bit smug[0].
>"Urban elites" have long advocated for policies that would benefit the rural poor but the white rural poor are dead set against any policy that would also benefit black people.
Certainly these urban elites could enact these beneficial policies for their (largely black) urban poor in their own cities without the interference of the white rural poor. How well is that working out?
There's a grain of truth to this, but it's a frankly smug attitude. It's a bit of a hand wave ("because racism") that allows urban elites like you and me to avoid asking what it is about _us_ and our politics that many white working class people find so repulsive.
So let's ask the question, then. What makes progressive social policies (ignoring loaded issues like reproductive options and gun control) so distasteful to some of those who would most benefit?
I'll provide a starting hypothesis for discussion's sake: maybe urban disdain for the suburban and rural lifestyles (exemplified by complaints about "subsidizing" rural areas) turns people off before they hear the good ideas?
An alternative hypothesis based on my own rural extended family: maybe one group decides based on what they are led to believe is practical or effective, while the other group decides based on what they are led to believe is "right" or moral, and the rhetoric of either side cannot penetrate the thought process of the other?
I don't think ramping up to a $15 minimum wage is going to be a practical or effective economic stimulus for small family businesses in rural upstate NY, but that's what they're going to get thanks to their urban compatriots who know better[1].
In fact this is the perfect illustration of how the non-rich are manipulated into supporting the policies of the rich. Lots of people oppose the minimum wage increase on the basis of its impact on small businesses, but the reality is that small businesses have their margins squeezed to zero by their landlords, who raise rents as high as the market can bear. When the government sets a minimum wage they are effectively defining a non-negotiable boundary around the rent-wage-profit function for businesses. Business owners might be willing to pay higher rents and lower wages, but the minimum wage prevents them from doing this. This is better for workers (who get paid more), better for the economy at large because it puts money in motion (minimum wage earners spend 100% of their earnings and save nothing), neutral for the small business owners whose margins were already minimized, and worse for landlords. The only people who should be opposed to this are landlords, but they succeed in manipulating many others over to their side.
This is a perfect example of how a smug person simply hand waves away any counter arguments by using personal attacks (in this case claiming that OP is being manipulated), followed by the smug person declaring "Why won't these stupid people just realize that I am smarter than them and have it all figured out!"
> What makes progressive social policies (ignoring loaded issues like reproductive options and gun control) so distasteful to some of those who would most benefit?
I'm not going to claim to answer for anybody but myself -- in large part because (a) I'm an urbanite too and (b) my politics can be least inaccurately described as "anarchist" -- but to me, this question really comes down to one point: respect/maturity.
Much of the modern progressive social policy package sounds to me like somebody saying "Tsk tsk, daddy's little princess deserves better! You sit back, I'll deal with this!" (Wages too low? Have a horrid health insurance plan that doesn't cover what you need? Housing in short supply? Don't fret, Just vote Progressive! We can legislate your woes away!)
That attitude is OK if "princess" is only 8 years old -- but only because a child is not mature enough to make many decisions, nor expected to be capable of executing on them. Should the target of this attitude be 18, it becomes mildly condescending since "princess" is on the verge of being a legal adult. However, should this be directed toward someone who is 28 or 38 [as all universal government policy inevitably must], the concern arises that whomever carries this attitude will never be treating "princess" like a capable, autonomous adult peer.
You may find concern and compassion in the progressive social agenda, but all I will ever perceive is condescension and thinly-disguised contempt.
I think this is why the only reasonable end-game for progressive ideas is a universal basic income. The point of positive social policy should be to lift everyone along the bottom/middle as much as possible while lowering the ceiling for the top as little as possible, and I believe that UBI, universal healthcare, and universal education will do that (increased taxes offset by increased social stability and economic growth).
At least for me, the question is not, "How can I show these 'little people' how to live better," it's, "What resources would I need to get back to where I am now if I found myself in situation X?" I don't see how that is condescending.
Look, I'm sure progressives don't mean to sound patronizing when pushing for any of their pet programs -- however, the truth of the matter is you are no more able to dictate how people feel about what you say than you can the weight bearing capacity of a bridge or the speed of a computer program. [That is -- you can exert some control, but it's not done by directly writing the answer on the blueprints.]
I even read your original post in this thread as asking the right sort of question to exert that control: "When progressives put forth a program, what is it their opponents hear that seems distasteful?" and I gave you my answer to that question.
> I think this is why the only reasonable end-game for progressive ideas is ...
Just... stop right there. First off, I wasn't trying to address any sort of ivory tower, idealized "progressive ideas" -- yes, I'm sure there are academics who want something like universal income, healthcare, education, etc. I'm talking about the ones agitating in the streets for a $15 minimum wage, or the politicians who were willing to pass Obamacare instead of single-payer programs. In fact, I find it highly likely that such ideologues are ostracized even among left-leaning groups in the US, because that is not what is put forth by most progressive (Democrat) politicians.
Second, I don't really have any feelings one way or the other about those programs. Like the examples above, I don't think human beings have direct, final control over (or even enough knowledge to say in advance) what systems will or won't work. Instead, we need to attempt a great many different things -- yes, UBI among them -- to sort out which ideas are good or bad, because not all possible flaws are immediately obvious. [Remember in my last post how I said I'm 'nearly' an anarchist? This is most of what I meant -- making sure there's always room for experiments in governance, in order to reduce our ignorance about the mercurial nature of things.]
Thanks for your response. I am trying to understand every step of the process that leads to the philosophical disconnect between different viewpoints, not just advocate for a specific cause (though I do have some causes in mind that I believe, at present, to be most beneficial to everyone). I'm trying to get myself and everyone else to play the long game, as it were -- to look beyond here, now, self, and party.
Is it really that hard to figure out for some issues? Take gun control.
Violent gun crimes are nearly non-existent in rural settings. Plus, gun plays an important role for rural folks including: hunting, pest control on farms, self-defense when the police are 30 minutes away, etc.
Is it that surprising that rural folks say "Hey, that sucks you have a lot of gun crime, but why do I have to give something up that has value to me?"
"Violent gun crimes are nearly non-existent in rural settings."
This cannot be the basis of a rational policy, because it's false. Gun violence is much higher outside of cities. Please go to this site and set the stats to "Intent of injury: Violence-related" and "Mechanism of Injury: Firearm".
I don't mind subsidizing the rural areas (the fact is that a great majority of my state and county taxes do go to help those areas). If they need the help, I'm happy to help. I just find the situation a bit ironic given the rhetoric (and political anger) that is repaid.
>What makes progressive social policies (ignoring loaded issues like reproductive options and gun control) so distasteful to some of those who would most benefit?
The unsupported assumption here is that those policies would be beneficial.
Let's look at a specific policy, then, such as a universal basic income (that means no means testing, no policing of morality, no step-wise dropoffs in benefit as income changes). Most of the working class would receive the same net income, or more. There would be no more income-driven involuntary homelessness. There would be less incentive to avoid working part time because UBI benefits would still be paid. The UBI would be funded by the surplus productivity that results from automation and consolidation (i.e. professionals and corporations pay higher taxes).
What factors (emotional, moral, intellectual, cultural, derived from propaganda, whatever) feed into a decision to support or not to support UBI, as an example?
> There would be no more income-driven involuntary homelessness.
Well, I strongly doubt that a UBI that could actually achieve that is actually sustainable in the near term, especially absent a concrete policy that prevents zoning and other related policies from being used to prevent adequate housing affordable to those made more theoretically able to afford it by the UBI from being produced.
And I'm kind of an enthusiastic backer of UBI as a general concept after spending considerable time looking into it and thinking about how to make it work; I suspect that a lot of the working class is going to be even more skeptical of "free money" promises to start with.
Often the policies ignore basic differences in expressed values. UBI is cast as a change to improve their lives. The problem is that we're talking about populations whose political memories can be neatly summarized as "Someone promised to improve my life with a policy, then things got worse".
At the core of it, they don't trust you. Nothing you can say matters after that.
The questions are, why are positional concerns so obscenely powerful here as opposed to elsewhere, and why are positional concerns so obscenely powerful now as opposed to earlier?†
†Note the latter is somewhat questionable, as we had a black underclass to systemically persecute for a long time, and this action is blamed for everything from our lack of a public healthcare system to the gaps in our educational policy favoring high-income areas to suburban roadbuilding to the prevalence of private neighborhood & household swimming pools.
After (falsely) calling them all racists who would cut off their nose to spite their face, I can't imagine why dislike the ideas of their "urban betters."
While that's one interpretation, there's Long been conflict in the US on the rural-urban axis - see Andrew Jackson's vision versus Alexander Hamilton's vision
Race is only useful in this sort of thing as a predictor of rough economic class, and even then it's less than useful. IOW, I don't think it's specifically race.
A better resource is "American Nations: A History of the Eleven Rival Regional Cultures of North America" http://www.amazon.com/American-Nations-History-Regional-Cult...