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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   31065 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of January 16, 2023

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Trump voting hard red state pipe fitters, electricians, etc) to flip shit because they didn't want to be forced to have more kids than they already had or get trapped into child support, and they voted accordingly. Another who'd gone from lib to DeSantis fan over COVID lockdowns and anti-woke stuff swung back to the Democrats over it. I can't emphasize this enough; people I know who use the N word as an adjective on a daily basis for household objects and even bird species + believe in Q-anon stuff were incensed and pulled the lever to give the pro-choice side a landslide victory when abortion rights came up to a vote.

This is hard to believe that they would react so strongly to largely symbolic bans coming from a party that has been saying this is precisely what they want to do for decades. It would be like suddenly losing it and flipping republican because Democrats decide to give blacks some effectively symbolic reparations checks for $100 or something.

1.) People don't hurt parties for what they say they'll do - this is consistent. This annoys us lefties when the GOP consistently (outside of a small period when Trump initially won) want to privatize or radically cut Social Security or Medicare, and voters in focus groups literally don't believe it. For both sides, the voters only hurt them when they actually do things.

2.) There was a very decent chunk of what could be described as 'leave me the hell alone' voters to Trump - anti-immigration, pro-gun, but also pro-choice. Blue collar non-college educated non-religious voters who don't hate religious people, but also don't like God botherers sticking their nose into their business.

With Roe v. Wade overturned, a guaranteed floor on abortion access that previously existed was removed and folks who voted Republican but did not favor hardcore pro-lifer bans now had real skin in the game and the opprotunity to vote directly on it in multiple states.

If it's "symbolic" because of varying state laws, I disagree. I would not consider NYC gun bans, mandatory registration and other impositions "symbolic" just because a New Yorker could hypothetically go to New Hampshire and buy an AR15 in cash from some guy outside Denny's. Additionally, pro-life factions are creating and promoting legislation to penalize people who travel out of state for abortions or those who assist in such.

Also the scenario you describe sounds pretty realistic to me. In this case though it's not total party flips, it's people voting contra most expectations on an issue when that issue is put before them directly.

That scenario would totally happen, though.

It would be like suddenly losing it and flipping republican because Democrats decide to give blacks some effectively symbolic reparations checks for $100 or something.

I think that's also quite plausible, perhaps because of the symbolic element: symbols can be precedents unto themselves, "making an example" of someone or something is effectively establishing that you could do the same thing to others, and overturning Roe was, in a sense, a reservation of the right to make impositions.

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