What is it like to be a Trump supporter?
Conversation
Replying to
I suspect the left might significantly advance its interests by suspending priors while investigating that question
2
13
This is why I've bet on Trump to win - everyone I am exposed to still has no effing clue who his supporters even are, let alone what they think
2
This really is not true. It’s the most over-investigated social question I’ve ever seen asked. And the answers are good. I’m pretty confident I know who they are better than I know who Hillary supporters were. The gap that remains is in personal empathy. We kinda still don’t care
3
8
*actively don't care as a matter of political ideology
This was the quiet part of the liberal platform for a while, but now it's become an out loud platform position. They're deplorables, after all.
Great for rank-and-file discipline, absolute trash for strategy.
1
It’s a part of all platforms to actively not care about outgroup core. It’s just that it‘s more or less costly politically depending on the size, homogeneity, and ressentiment levels of the ignored group. Here it was/remains costly because all 3 variables are off the charts.
1
3
It's always been part of them to do so, but quietly and in a way which they could be shamed into changing behavior if it became obvious.
We appear to have lost that protection on both sides.
(Or maybe the grass is just greener in my memory.)
1
I think it’s kinda healthy actually. Pretending to care when you don’t is a hard posture to maintain in a social media panopticon world. Nex-gen politics = mutually assured apathy.
I think the level of active antipathy that's been stoked lately is detrimental.
"Who gives a shit, really?" is a power move I haven't seen perfected in politics. It'd be nice, to be sure.
1
Show replies
Maybe finding ways that we can reassure each other that we don’t have to care is the part of way forward. Problem now is that left & right both believe “the other side” is bent on extermination, or at least total domination, and so react with fear and defensive aggression.
1
8
Make Politics Boring Again. For most voters, it's like the engine light on the car. Don't expect engine light to go on. Will probably ignore for quite a while, even if agree engine light is potentially v. serious. When bonus or tax refund comes in: fix it immediately. Bonus=vote
1
Don't confuse apathy with prioritization within a mental model. Pragmatically, it makes sense to ignore a terrible President until you can do something (even minor) about it, like vote, at which point you suddenly "shift." Again, engine light's no use until you can respond.
1





