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ZorbaTHut  1yr ago (text post)   Edited 1yr ago   38244 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of September 12, 2022

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Something lost in the Martha’s Vineyard story is that the island is the vacation destination of the wealthy Democrat elite. Its architecture, town planning, and aesthetic preference are relics of a bygone era, Massachusetts’ original European American history. If you’re unfamiliar with the island I urge you to have some fun in google street view; I’m familiar with it because I vacationed there with a cousin who was doing an opera program, if that doesn’t explain enough. It calls to mind an earlier America of fabulously wealthy well-bred Europeans living in Federalist-styled homes over generations, exerting control over the planning of towns and showcasing their wealth with opulence and beauty.

The demographics of Martha’s Vineyard are also a relic of the past. It is 2% Latino and .3% Asian, 88% white with some parts 100% white. Its 0-9 age group is 94% White, 0% black, 0% Asian, and 0% hispanic, with the rest “mixed”.

The symbolism of Martha’s Vineyard is strong. Here is a place for wealthy white democrats to live in a Disneyland of traditional White America. They may claim that they stand with immigrants, when the Hebrew Center goes door to door handing out posters, but they have consciously chose to live in a White American paradise, where the demographics, aesthetics, and political influence are direct ancestors of 19th century Massachusetts. I suppose it’s easy to advocate for Democrat policies when you inherit a mansion on Martha’s Vineyard, and the Floridian governor is highlighting this dissonance by sending as few as 50 Hispanics to the island, enough to cause a national controversy.

https://www.mvcommission.org/sites/default/files/docs/web01_MVSP%20FINAL%20PRINT%202019-03-21-3.pdf

https://statisticalatlas.com/school-district/Massachusetts/Marthas-Vineyard-School-District/Race-and-Ethnicity#figure/ethno-racial-composition-per-year

It calls to mind an earlier America of fabulously wealthy well-bred Europeans living in Federalist-styled homes over generations, exerting control over the planning of towns and showcasing their wealth with opulence and beauty.

It did occur to me, having only been to MV once in the off-season, that these rich Democrats vacation there and leave the houses mostly uninhabited during the colder months. We should be sending them our homeless, too, in addition to our illegal immigrants.

Someone made a point that Arizona gets 2% of it's population in migrants annually, which would be 400 to MV 20,000 permanent residents. Sending migrants to sanctuary cities is the best possible policy, they've expressed support for this and signalled their support and welcome so it's only fitting that they receive at least the proportion of migrants that border states receive.

I’m pro immigration and I agree, send them where people express desire to help them

I don't think it's lost in the story that rich mostly-dems live in Martha's Vineyard lol, the central messaging has been something along the lines of "You rich democrats vote for open door policies so much, why don't you have some illegal immigrants of your own?"

Diversity for thee, not me me. 'Red' areas, in general, tend to be much more diverse ,especially economically, and culturally , and even racially, compared to wealthier blue areas. If you go to any urban red area, the full spectrum of America represented...poor people, rich people, blacks, Latinos, conservatives, liberals, girls with piercings and tattoos , rednecks, single mothers, etc.

The demographics of Martha’s Vineyard are also a relic of the past. It is 2% Latino and .3% Asian, 88% white with some parts 100% white. Its 0-9 age group is 94% White, 0% black, 0% Asian, and 0% hispanic, with the rest “mixed”.

Probably white includes Jews

'Red' areas, in general, tend to be much more diverse ,especially economically, and culturally , and even racially

I would like proof of that diversity trend.

Diversity for thee, not me me. 'Red' areas, in general, tend to be much more diverse ,especially economically, and culturally , and even racially, compared to wealthier blue areas.

While I'm sure you can find some red county that is more diverse than some blue county, I am extremely skeptical that this holds as a general statement. Red states in the midwest, for example, tend to be somewhere between very and overwhelmingly White (in the 75-90% range). Red states in the traditional South are not as White as the Midwest thanks to substantial Black minorities, but are still distinctly majority White and tend to lack other large minority population. Texas and Florida are the big outliers.

Within-state comparisons tend to be a similar story, e.g. in Illinois downstate is a) very white b) very red, while the purple collar counties and blue Cook/Chicago have large minority populations.

I mentioned other forms of diversity: cultural, educational, economic. These are often more important than just race.

Red states in the midwest, for example, tend to be somewhere between very and overwhelmingly White (in the 75-90% range).

That's probably because it includes large rural populations.

consider the racial makeup of Austin Texas:

White (Non-Hispanic) (48.2%), White (Hispanic) (21.2%), Asian (Non-Hispanic) (7.65%), Other (Hispanic) (7.58%), and Black or African American (Non-Hispanic) (7.4%)

Berkeley, CA actually has a higher % of whites (50%) and smaller % of Hispanics (14%)

Texas is a huge outlier compared to other red states (and Austin is quite liberal). LA county is half hispanic and has large Asian and Black minorities as well, and the state as a whole is about 1/3 white, 1/3 hispanic, and about 1/3 everyone else.

I mentioned other forms of diversity: cultural, educational, economic.

And I find this equally questionable. Major metro areas are generally very blue and also the most diverse along almost any axis unless you're engaging in a lot of categorical gerrymandering.

The metro areas where the GOP loses least badly mostly have very large Hispanic populations- pheonix, DFW, Houston etc.

While I agree that it's a preserve for the elite, I don't think it's so much white America as rich America. See this line from the link about the posters:

Then the MVHC SAC began getting calls from visitors who had seen the posters here and wished to bring them back to their winter communities. Two such people are Andrea and Deborah Bolling. The sisters are from a prominent African-American political family and are long-term summer residents.

Have enough money, and nice enough manners to show that you were raised in the appropriate class and/or background, and your skin colour doesn't matter. The controversy isn't so much about being Hispanic, it's about being the 'wrong type' - the poor and needy. They support immigrants - so long as they know their place. Work in the service industries or come around to landscape the gardens and clean the houses as required, and that's lovely. Land in a bunch to look for equal treatment as the wealthy residents claim they want to treat them, and that's an imposition. The Martha's Vineyarders are prepared to be welcoming, on their terms.

I don't think they're racist in the sense that they hate black people. I think they're racist in that they prefer to live in this type of society that white people made. I have no problem with that, I feel the same, but I think it's fair to rub the hypocrisy in their face that they're making that impossible for everyone else.

White people made the whole country though? I’m not really sure what you mean there

And? By the logic of disparate impact, the residents of Martha's Vineyard (which includes the Obamas) are "openly white supremacist". It's a community founded in, steeped in, and projecting outwards colonial Whiteness. The residents should welcome their town of stolen land being aggressively decolonized by Latinx folx with indigenous ancestry.

Less schadenfreudenly, has anyone ever been happy with the claim of "I'm not racist, just classist"?

I am in total sympathy with the efforts to reclaim stolen land from systemic racists by peaceful occupation of that land by Indigenous and BIPOC folx. Congratulations to the state governors and mayors enabling Latinx-identified bodies in their quest for reparations by providing them with transport to the colonialist territories!

First the Vineyard, then the Capitol!!

And Greg Abbott did bus migrants to the Vice President’s doorstep.

Less schadenfreudenly, has anyone ever been happy with the claim of "I'm not racist, just classist"?

Almost everyone trying to exercise control over their own neighborhood has been basically happy to hear that from their neighbors, as near as I can tell.

Fair enough. It appears to me to be the sort of claim that people are happy to share off the record, in person. I was thinking more about public, on the record claims.

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