I find it astonishing that anyone would ask this. The only time I've ever been asked this question has been by pollsters. In my social circle, anyway, the taboo on this question is very strong.
Well, in my group, there's no taboo on telling people your political opinions and voting behavior, only on asking (because it's nobody else's business unless you choose to make it so). So in practice, I know the political stances of most in my social circle.
It's not that shocking. It makes a really good short hand question to find out where someone is politically. You could spend ten hours discussing what the perfect immigration system looks like or you could ask who they voted for and get a baseline to go off of. The question only removes nuance if you stop right after.
It's a good point but the flip side is not every point in time is 1932 Germany.
How do we keep a democracy where ideas we don't agree with can still be implemented if there's a majority (assuming minority rights are protected reasonably well) while at the same time ensuring we don't end up with democracy being used as a tool to get a totalitarian regime.
For a more recent example we can look maybe at Türkiye.
Preventing ideas that are still within the boundary of a democracy from being implemented is not democracy either.
The US e.g. has a Supreme Court and a constitution. Presumably as long as that court is functional and the constitution is applied then all is good?
Unfortunately I'm not familiar enough with Germany's fall into fascism and whether there was some sort of watershed moment where it was clear that something was broken and could still have been remediated.
> Unfortunately I'm not familiar enough with Germany's fall into fascism and whether there was some sort of watershed moment where it was clear that something was broken and could still have been remediated.
Fascism is an easy sell when it's immediately preceded by the Weimar Republic.
In my friend group it's clear as day: either you voted to kill and deport other people in the friend group or you didn't. Pretty obvious the group would like to know if you're secretly interested in their demise.
If you’re sure you already know what other people think, I guess there’s not much point in asking them their opinions? You’re not going to listen to their answers anyway.
All you really want to know is what category to put them in.
> Voting for Donald Trump is unarguably an evil action in my book.
I'm not sure why I'm bothering, but I'll bite.
I didn't vote for the guy, don't like the guy, never have.
Trying to understand _why_ people _did_ vote for him is much more important than declaring half the country (really like 30-35% of the country, more people didn't vote than did vote for a specific candidate) evil.
If we need to assign blame, Biden should have dropped out long before he did so the democrats could have found their next Obama, or something.
Or maybe, just maybe, people were desperate for a change and they were manipulated into a false sense of illogical hope.
The question is, why did they need hope? What was so wrong, in their mind, that we all ended up here?
Or, just declare them evil and hold a useless sense of moral superiority. This solves nothing, but I suppose it makes you feel better.
I’m not I the states and only see America through the media and social media like this.
You ask why did they need hope, do you have an answer why did they need hope? What’s so bad in America that people could be manipulated as you put it.
It feels a like a repeat of Brexit, where people vote against there own material gains to punish others because that’s the quickest high they can get https://youtu.be/GPgatTnVvVY
Brexit is a good example. I think many people just can't extrapolate/predict the results of their actions and understand the policy (assuming politicians are even honest about it in the first place). For most objective smart people Brexit seemed terrible (hey lemme reinforce my ego a little) but expecting your average person to be able to understand that is tough. Also there is a parallel universe somewhere where Brexit maybe has a positive outcome. These things aren't fully deterministic. Similarly people always seem to buy the immigration crime and jobs schtick. And it's also not false that if you open your borders to a stream of people it is likely to change what your country looks like. There's a reason most countries don't have completely open borders and give everyone citizenship the day they set their foot past the border.
What's so bad in America? You'll be surprised how many people have hard lives in America. A lot. And I think when it's bad there, it's really bad.
Okay, but I've known a lot of people in America who've had fucking terrible lives--with the same kinds of problems that Trump voters have--and didn't vote for Trump.
I mean what's your point here? Okay, so this guy I know had a terrible life and now he's a Trumper--you want me to say it's just okay that he wants to kill my trans friends in a very literal way (as in he's accumulating guns, touts the "kill your local pedophile" slogan, and openly states that trans people are pedophiles)? Sure, I can empathize with the guy having lost everything when he was younger, but empathy doesn't mean we have to ignore the danger he poses.
It's never ok to threaten or use violence against people. But there is a range of opinions on trans rights from should man who declare themselves to be female allowed to participate in woman's sports (why do we have woman's sports in the first place?) or use woman's change rooms, to whether the state should fund sex change operations, to questions around when minors can make decisions about their body vs. parents opinions vs. protection of children rights.
What you're describing is never right and should be dealt with by law enforcement. That's likely far from where many of Republican voters are on this topic.
> What you're describing is never right and should be dealt with by law enforcement. That's likely far from where many of Republican voters are on this topic.
I mean, sure, even the guy I mentioned doesn't directly say he wants to kill trans people.
But you remove all healthcare and social support for trans people, and they start committing suicide--as anyone would given those conditions. You remove all protections for trans people, and they start getting killed. Republican leadership can keep their hands clean--they just look away and let the fringe do the dirty work. And the same is true for a dozen other groups. For example, there's no real controversy about the homeless (most agree that homelessness is bad)--you just look away and do nothing and they die of homelessness.
All that adds up to that a vote for Republicans is a vote that results in these people dying. Whether your opinion is that those people should die or not, is sort of irrelevant, if your vote results in them dying.
You seem to be under the impression that if a Republican voter feels that trans people deserve to live in their head, that means they aren't voting for trans people to die, but that's simply not the case. If you believe in your head that trans people deserve to live, and then vote for a guy who does a bunch of stuff that kills trans people, you're voting to kill trans people, and your fuzzy kind feelings in your head are irrelevant.
And finally: what country do you live in where trans people can safely call law enforcement? Because it's not the US.
> But you remove all healthcare and social support for trans people
What does that even mean? Healthcare is a mess for everyone already. Social support? What does “social support” in the context of trans people actually entail? Spending enough time and resources to normalize the concept? Support what? How?
If you think somehow bigots will eventually change their tune, I have a bridge to sell you.
Most Trump supporters are pretty explicit that making people like me feel bad is their primary goal. There's a lot who just want Mass Deportations Now, and a handful of hard single-issue voters on something or another, but the cruelty is the most common thread. The Republican party is right now selling official merchandise (https://shop.gop.com/products/liberal-tears-mug) celebrating the fact that they've successfully upset me.
Why should I believe that they're disguising some secret, more sympathetic motivation? I spent a long time hoping that was the case, because I don't want to believe that so many people favor inflicting harm for its own sake, but there's a point where trying to understand someone in terms I find reasonable becomes falsely putting my own ideas in their mouth.
Or... Trump isn't evil, he loves America and is doing the things he said the President should do since the 1980s. People who blanket think Trump is evil are victims of propaganda. People who voted for him are the ones paying attention.
I'm not voxl, but I do want to point out that he didn't declare anyone evil. He declared an action evil (the action of voting for Donald Trump).
That's an important distinction to me because I believe people can change and start choosing better actions.
But, a whole lot of people haven't changed, still support Trump, and until that changes, those people are dangerous.
And sure, we can empathize with the reasons that got them to do that, but it doesn't follow that we should just pretend what they did was okay, especially is they continue to do harmful things.
I said it was an evil action, I didn't call them evil. This is the standard essentialism fallacy of morality. Doing an evil thing does not make your inherently evil. Holding slaves in 1800s is evil, but I don't think the people are inherently evil.
I have a pretty good understanding of why people didn't vote, the block I care about a lot more. The people that did vote for Trump specifically either are ride or die conservative, fell victim to misinformation, or are otherwise uneducated.
Trying to say that Biden and the DNC is "too blame" for someone picking a president that is happy sending citizens to an El Salvador prison is something. I expect a bit more from the electorate myself, and think they should take some accountability for their own mistakes.
This sort of morally superior "trying to get the last word" thing is childish.
You didn't acknowledge the distinction between calling a person evil, and calling a person's actions evil. There isn't a way to "restate your point" that voxl said something he didn't say which would make it any less of a straw man argument.
You're not talking past him--he responded directly to what you said--you're just incorrect.
And you don't even have to admit you were incorrect: you can just have a little red-faced moment alone by yourself in front of your computer and then move on with your life without posting a response. And that would be better than posting this posturing thing where you pretend that some restatement of the singular incorrect point you made would be more correct if only it weren't so exhausting being correct.
I'm a Trump hater. I'd vote for a jar of mayonnaise before voting for him. I think he'll be one of the most impactful presidents in US history for terrible reasons.
> The people that did vote for Trump specifically either are ride or die conservative, fell victim to misinformation, or are otherwise uneducated.
But this take is very dismissive of Trump voters, trying to find an easy way to avoid the conclusion that the majority of them are sane and rational people who liked what he was saying. Perhaps because it's an uncomfortable truth.
While I admittedly despise Trump, I'm under no illusions that I'm somehow meaningfully better or superior than those who support him.
If you're sane and rational and decided that you liked Trump's promises (with "rational" implying that you were actually listening to what he'd do, and not blindly accepting his nonsense about "I'll make everything perfect immediately!"), that leaves only the possibility that you're evil. Or a Russian operative, I suppose.
His promises on things he can actually do are exclusively for things that are wantonly destructive and incomprehensibly stupid (tariffs, mass layoffs), hateful and incomprehensibly evil (mass deportations without due process), or straight up treason (pardoning J6 insurrectionists, breaking alliances). If you voted for this person, you have to either be so stupid that you believe his obvious lies, or so evil that the things that aren't lies are things you like.
Many people who voted for tribe X voted for tribe Y a few years back. Have these people irredeemably changed in your eyes? Are they stupid for doing so? Is it possible for stupid, easily believing people to choose tribe X again? Does it make their stupidity disappear?
Does choosing a correct tribe increase intelligence and reduce gullibility?
One increasing view we hear today is of the "uneducated ignorant malleable masses". Should we think of our fellow tribe members this way?
The question being asked by people in tribes are "what to do with stupid/evil people" and history shows examples of tribes attempts to answer that.
I don't think you're disagreeing with me. The comment I responded to says that calling Trump voters ignoramuses was -
> trying to find an easy way to avoid the conclusion that the majority of them are sane and rational people who liked what he was saying.
My point is that to vote Republican in 2024 you must either be insane, irrational, or outright evil. It doesn't make you that way, it reveals that you already were.
> Many people who voted for tribe X voted for tribe Y a few years back. Have these people irredeemably changed in your eyes?
I think that Biden->Trump voters, or Obama->Trump voters, are incredibly stupid or short-sighted. There is no good reason to have done that. If you were a consistent Republican voter you might instead be a selfish racist piece of shit, but if you've switched from the Democrats in recent years the only option I have is to assume you're a gullible idiot.
And to be clear, yes, I think this is specific to the time we're in. I don't think I'd say this in 2000, for instance - it was pretty obvious that W was not going to be a good president, but he was not an incomprehensible choice, and you could imagine people who thought Gore's brand was tainted by association with Clinton's various forms of griminess. But Trump and his merry band of lunatics are not simply "the other tribe". They are an obvious and unprecedented threat no matter what your values are, unless your only value is breaking shit for the lulz.
One way perhaps is to think about the permanence of judgements.
Think about how many people would need to switch sides for the next election. Would their status as lunatics and gullible and idiots be instantly revoked and become mentally healthy, rational and intelligent after they are on the correct side?
Many politicians would say they would remain idiots even when they vote for them and that a cynic might say that politics is just about two tribes warring against each other on a battlefield where they seek to manipulate a group of idiots to their side.
I would suggest that thinking about one's allies as idiots isn't a good thing. (Maybe their status does change instantly - in that case the idiots have the potential to be intelligent which weakens the original judgement) However it's also a difficult thing to do as it would compromise one's own group identity. It makes the binary groups more fuzzy. It introduces an overlap in the venn diagram of us vs them. Thinking of an "other" as potentially one of "us" reduces the internal coherence of the "us" group - it opens the borders.
People in groups like to keep the group strong and the borders secure. To open the borders is a difficult and painful thing. It's understandable that the binary tribal politics remains strong as it benefits both tribes.
But I guess for prioritizing the happiness of the friend group, some amount of ignorance is needed if someone in the group is ultimately going to model the world on "they kill and deport or they don't" given enough information to make that declaration, and eventually a person on the other side is encountered?
I understand that some things can be more important than just having fun though, down to personal values.
"To be ignorant" sounds like a moral failing on its face, but I feel it is increasingly becoming required in some circumstances with the explosive amount of information available to subscribe to nowadays.
I'm talking more about not bringing up politics to avoid giving too much information to people who will make up their own conclusions based on those facts and aren't amenable to change. And choosing not to bring up politics for the purpose of figuring out who out of the friend group is the selfish asshole.
Yes, because it's literally not a thing that I see happen. It seems like a terribly intrusive question to ask, and I certainly wouldn't ever feel comfortable asking anyone.
> What your "social group" does is outside the norm.
Perhaps now, but myself and most of my social group are old enough that it absolutely was the norm when we were younger. I was unaware that this was a thing that had changed.
> They are using ignorance to maintain tribal unity
Certainly not, since most know each other's political stances through the ordinary course of interacting with each other over the years.
> My guess is that your actually not astonished at all.
You guess wrong, so your personal attack here is powerless.
> pretending you're unaware of how abnormally impartial your group is
I never claimed my social circle was impartial at all, let alone "abnormally impartial". You're reading things into my statements that aren't there.
> Saying you're pretending is not a personal attack.
Saying I'm pretending is the same thing as saying that I'm lying. But it doesn't really matter either way. Your claims about what's in my head are mistaken. You are, of course, free to think anything you like.
>Saying I'm pretending is the same thing as saying that I'm lying. But it doesn't really matter either way. Your claims about what's in my head are mistaken. You are, of course, free to think anything you like.
Correct, I think you're lying. But that's an extreme way to put it. You're more humble bragging.
Again, it wasn't an attack. Even if I say you're lying it's not an attack either. I'm just stating what I'm thinking.
Ordinarily, this is where I'd leave it (a real discussion is impossible if one side thinks the other isn't being honest), but I'm really curious...
You've used the term "humble bragging" twice now. What in my statements do you think counts as a brag? I was just saying what my personal experience is, and I can't think of what I've said that would be anything to brag about, humble or otherwise. My experience is just my experience, not some kind of superior one.
I think asking another person or a friend who they voted for is not really "astonishing". It felt like you were using that to sort of show off your position as someone who both would never do that and hangs out with people who don't do that. It's like the position established in the article was "obvious" because you're "superior". That was the slight tone I was sensing.
Well, your read couldn't possibly be more wrong. I don't think my situation is anything better than anyone else's, so there's nothing to "show off". Your mindreading machine is broken.
But you think I'm a liar, so there's no point in talking about this any further. Thanks for your response.
On one hand, it feels like this question is a lot more relevant than ever. It's easier to ignore politics when each side doesn't see the other as an existential threat to their way of life.
Like it would be easy not to ask someone's religion when there isn't a 35% chance they're going to say "extremist martyr".
But I don't ask this question if I don't think I know the answer already, and I only ask it with people I think I can have a conversation with.
I find it astonishing that anyone would ask this. The only time I've ever been asked this question has been by pollsters. In my social circle, anyway, the taboo on this question is very strong.