It Was Cultural Anxiety That Drove White, Working-Class Voters to Trump

[riversedge]

It Was Cultural Anxiety That Drove White, Working-Class Voters to Trump


https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/05/white-working-class-trump-cultural-anxiety/525771/?utm_source=twb

A new study finds that fear of societal change, not economic pressure, motivated votes for the president among non-salaried workers without college degrees.



White Americans carried Donald Trump to the White House. He won college-educated white voters by a four-point margin over Hillary Clinton, according to exit polls. But his real victory was among members of the white working class: Twice as many of these voters cast their ballots for the president as for Clinton.

In the wake of Trump’s surprise win, some journalists, scholars, and political strategists argued that economic anxiety drove these Americans to Trump. But new analysis of post-election survey data conducted by the Public Religion Research Institute and The Atlantic found something different: Evidence suggests financially troubled voters in the white working class were more likely to prefer Clinton over Trump. Besides partisan affiliation, it was cultural anxiety—feeling like a stranger in America, supporting the deportation of immigrants, and hesitating about educational investment—that best predicted support for Trump.
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This data adds to the public’s mosaic-like understanding of the 2016 election. It suggests Trump’s most powerful message, at least among some Americans, was about defending the country’s putative culture. Because this message seems to have resonated so deeply with voters, Trump’s policies, speeches, and eventual reelection may depend on their perception of how well he fulfills it.

In September and October 2016, PRRI and The Atlantic surveyed American voters about how they were feeling about politics. Researchers specifically focused on white, working-class voters—people without college degrees or salaried jobs. This group accounts for one-third of American adults. They make up a bigger share of the population in the Midwest than they do in any other region, and more than half of rural Americans are part of the white working class....................




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President Trump and Vice President Pence meet with workers at the Carrier factory in Indiana Evan Vucci / AP

[geek tragedy]

1. we're in real trouble. These people love Trump because he's as dumb and bigoted as they are. nt

[Johonny]

3. Cultural Anxiety seems like a friendly way to call a snowflake a dumb bigot

but we already knew these people voted based on hatred, propaganda, and bigotry. Trump is his base. He consumes the same propaganda, hates the same bogey men, and doesn't bother to educate himself to the same political realities as the people that voted for him. When he's on stage it isn't an act, he's them only richer and more famous thanks to TV. Woot America.

[geek tragedy]

4. it is the politically correct way of describing the bigotry of ignorant dumbfucks nt

[Demtexan]

2. A bunch of them will die off with Trump care.

My sister and brother in law will.
Both have major health problems.

[Hoyt]

5. In other words, white wing racism.

Last edited Tue May 9, 2017, 10:00 PM - Edit history (1)

[Hortensis]

6. Financially troubled whites more likely to prefer CLINTON!

That's the only real surprise here for me. That white working people tended to realize Clinton would be better for them economically flies against millions of words of anti-Democrat, anti-Hillary commentary.

As for the cultural anxiety--you bet! That's huge.

But also huge is the enormous advantage that right-wing negative fear messages fanning that cultural anxiety have over positive liberal messages of aspiration and commonality. Fear and resentment are far more powerful motivators than hope and generosity. That survival instinct thing.

[athena]

7. I'm not surprised.

It was the media that tried to ignore that this election was about misogyny and racism and tried to claim it was about the economy. They tried to argue that Democrats should throw women and minorities under the bus in order to please working-class white men. In fact, anyone who cared about the economy would have voted for Hillary. Her message was clear. She was the one who talked about jobs and about health care. She was the one who offered workable plans. Trump only had, "Make America Great (read White-Male-Dominated) Again".

I am really glad this information is finally coming out. It was sickening, after the biggest demonstration of misogyny and racism in history, to be told that the message sent by the electorate was that we should abandon women and minorities to focus on poor, white men.

[Hortensis]

9. I'm glad too, also for those reasons. Just hope it gets around.

I'm afraid the insider MSM in DC and NY have their own reasons for staying committed to their memes and that as we approach 2018 discussion of everything Hillary supposedly did wrong in 2016 will only ramp up. Many have spent their whole career betraying journalistic standards where she is concerned. That special Hillary standard of anything-goes "ethics."

[forjusticethunders]

15. It is important to note

UNLIKE for minorities, educational attainment is not a proxy for class. Minorities have to go to college and get educated to break into the middle+ class, a lot of white people inherit their wealth or business from Daddy and thus don't need to go to college. So Clinton kept it close with college educated whites because they have less stake in the whiteness construct and had to work their way to relative prosperity.

At least that's my theory.

[OKNancy]

8. To them blacks are getting way too uppity

gays are being treated like everyone else, and women are gaining too much power.
There isn't enough religion either.

I've been saying this all along. I live among them.

[Blue_true]

10. "Cultural anxiety". A cuter way of saying race based fear. nt

[JHan]

11. Yes but the "she had no message" "economic anxiety" narratives are sexier.

More data that will be ignored by the pundit class.

[haele]

12. They keep calling them "working class" when they're really suburban or commuting whites.

There are plenty of working class whites both in the cities and in truly rural areas that are solid democrats who didn't vote for Drumpf. It's the semi-skilled/skilled/professional whites who moved to the suburbs for "the schools", "the (protected) traditional community neighborhood" or some other nonsense rather than live near poor or city neighborhoods, that voted for Drumpf.

The whites who want to live in Pleasantville, where everyone knows their place and there's very little conflict of interests.
The ones who are fearful that they'll have to live in a community where people who are too much not like them might come and live, where they may have to moderate their actions or, heck, be nice to people they don't like.

The ones who are always whining for the good old days, when Mom was always there and Dad was out working half the day and calmly exhausted when he finally came home. Everyone had their role, and knew what they had to do, and the kids could be cluelessly happy as they toddled on through school to college, and magically become a grown up with a good paying job.

It seemed sooo easy back then - when you were a kid, or when your life revolved around your neighborhood or small town, and the rest of the world would just leave you alone (unless you got drafted, or a job offer somewhere else).

Haele

[Abu Pepe]

13. latest euphamism for racism nt

[Stinky The Clown]

14. File this under "No Shit, Sherlock!"