“If you've been persuaded that the greatest threat to your way of life is a trans girl on the other side of the state who wants to play on her middle school softball team, not only won't you ever consider voting for a Democrat, but you won't ask much of your Republican representatives, either. You won't hold them accountable for the condition of your streets or the lack of economic opportunities in your town.”
Ibid., p. 239
#Trump #rural #white #WhiteRuralRage #democracy #Republicans
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"Come Election Day, despair is a Republican candidate's chief asset, because that despair is easiest to convert into anger, and that anger into votes. ...
The stores in your hometown are all shuttered? It must be because the Wall Street bank tweeted out an image of a Pride flag.”
~ Ibid., pp. 237, 239
#Trump #rural #white #WhiteRuralRage #democracy #Republicans
/60
“So, like all right-wing parties that depend on rural voters, the Republican Party has an interest in maintaining, not alleviating, their struggles. Rural voters who are satisfied and optimistic might consider the entreaties of both parties, but the more dissatisfied and angrier they are, the more they'll stick with the GOP."
~ Ibid., pp. 236-7
#Trump #rural #white #WhiteRuralRage #democracy #Republicans
/59
“Since Donald Trump's rise, the national media have devoted tremendous attention to the political grievances of rural White voters. Reporters and pundits routinely descend upon rural communities, sit down with locals at diners and sports bleachers, and listen earnestly to what downscale rural White voters have to say, but the same national media hardly notice that rural minorities exist or are aware that they have legitimate complaints of their own."
~ Ibid., p. 201
#WhiteRuralRage
/58
"With clear eyes and full hearts, rural Whites recognized Trump's exclusionary, reality-defying, undemocratic, and violent tendencies – and then rallied behind him because of, not despite, his repeated disregard for America's most sacred democratic traditions."
~ Ibid.,
“Millions of rural White voters seem undeterred or even thrilled by the former president's statements and actions. In fact, they are the only major geo-demographic cohort among whom Trump performed better in the 2020 presidential contest than he did four years earlier."
~ Ibid., p. 195
“Nor can economic anxiety explain why rural African Americans, Latinos, and Native Americans – all of whom face even greater economic and health challenges than their White neighbors – exhibit stronger democratic commitments than do rural Whites. We offer a simple explanation for this racialized aspect of the patriotic paradox: Non-White rural citizens are not now nor have they ever been part of what we call America's essential minority”.
~ Ibid., p. 194
"That skepticism proved fatal for more rural Americans than would have died had heartland vaccination rates mirrored those nationwide percentages.
Not every rural White American espouses xenophobic, conspiratorial, undemocratic, or violent attitudes. But rural Whites are overrepresented across all four of these threats.”
~ Ibid., pp. 173-4, 194
#Trump #rural #white #WhiteRuralRage #ConspiracyTheories #VaccineRefusal #COVID #ScienceSkepticism #xenophobia #violence
/54
“QAnon believers are one and a half times more likely to live in rural than in urban areas. ...
Scientific skepticism proved especially lethal when rural Whites – the citizens most dubious of pandemic experts – refused safe COVID-19 vaccines at rates higher than urban and suburban citizens."
~ Ibid., pp. 173, 194
#Trump #rural #white #WhiteRuralRage #QAnon #ConspiracyTheories #VaccineRefusal #COVID #ScienceSkepticism
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“The attitude of too many rural Whites may best be described as ‘I love my country but not our country.’ Their brand of exclusive patriotism appears conditioned upon maintaining or remaking the U.S. political system to their advantage at the expense of equality and opportunities for Americans different from them."
~ Ibid.
#Trump #rural #white #WhiteRuralRage #democracy #Constitution
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William Lindsey 