Thread.
Q: “Republicans enact policies that hurt their own constituents.
So why do people vote for them?”
A: It has to do with the purpose of government.
For some people, purpose of government is to help people. We think fairness is possible and the government's job is to create fairness.
Others have a different view.
They think there’s a natural order: Some people belong on top; others at the bottom.
They think people with money and power deserve their money and power.
1/
Example: The white supremacy theories that informed the Confederacy.
Hierarchy people don’t believe equality is possible because they don’t think people are equal.
They think the purpose of government is to allocate power and maintain the hierarchy.
When a government helps people, they think the government is taking from the “makers” and giving to the undeserving.
When people lower than them on the hierarchy demand equality, they think those people want to “replace” them.
2/
19th century America was a strict hierarchy (specifically, a patriarchy) with White men at the top and Black women at the bottom. Black women literally didn’t own their own bodies.
White women were kept out of the professions which kept them dependent on men, which gave men control over them.
19th-century laws reinforced the hierarchy.
Rape laws preserved the hierarchy and were designed to protect (white) men from false accusations, they weren't designed to protect women from attack.
3/
. . . If a woman got raped, it was seen as her fault. (She was supposed to be guarding the “goods.”) Even after the Civil War, the rape of a Black woman wasn't seen as a crime.
Even men low on the hierarchy benefitted. Think of it: They had no trouble getting a woman. Women literally couldn't say no because they had no options.
Then along came the Civil Rights and women's rights movements and the patriarchy was dismantled.
We are riding the backlash. . .
4/
If you take a long view of history and consider how long we lived in a patriarchy, you can see how rapid the recent changes have been.
The rapid changes enrage and unsettle the hierarchy people. They think liberals are destroying what was good about America. They want to go back to the “good old days” when America was “great.”)
That's why they want to outlaw abortion, make medicine expensive, and dismantle the regulatory agencies created by the New Deal.
5/
Hierarchy people use law enforcement to maintain the hierarchy. That's why the Republican slogan of "law and order" didn't really mean law and order. It meant "put Black men in jail.”
Fairness people see law enforcement as a way to create justice.
Fairness presidents like try to create fairness to make life better for everyone.
Yale Prof. Timothy Snyder explains what hierarchy leaders do when they are in power.
6/
When hierarchy leaders are in power, they try to consolidate their own power to reinforce the hierarchy.
Because they can’t govern by devising policies to better the lives of the citizens (which is a move toward equalization) they create crisis and spectacle.
GOP members have said that if when come to power, they’ll impeach Biden investigate Hunter Biden.
They’ll create a thrilling show. Their followers will cheer.
(See why a reality show host was an effective hierarchy president?)
7/
I think of history as a push and pull. The liberals and progressives push us forward. The reactionaries and regressives push us backward.
The founders rejected monarchy, but they created a hierarchy. They allowed slavery and women couldn’t vote.
“We the people” meant white, mostly landowning educated men.
One way to view history is out groups trying to be recognized as “people.”
Hierarchy people have always been with us.
When we create fairness and equality, they try to roll it back.
8/
It's constant work.
One thing that makes it hard work is the constant pushback from the hierarchy people.
The other problem is fairness people get disillusioned and attack the system with the same fury as hierarchy people (but for a different reason.)
They expect perfect fairness which is never possible because human beings are fallible and there is constant pushback.
9/
FDR, Thurgood Marshall, Susan B. Anthony and others taught us the way forward.
We got out of the age of robber barons with the New Deal.
The solution is here:
https://terikanefield.com/things-to-do/
The way to save democracy is with more democracy. See my list for more.
10/
Okay, so how do we strengthen democracy? The way to strengthen democracy is with more democracy, or what Barack Obama calls citizenship. As Obama said in 2020: Even if the methods are new, sowing the seeds of doubt, division, and discord to turn Americans against each other is an old trick. The antidote is citizenship: […]
"#11: Also, if you’re a teacher, assign novels and stories about real-life young people who step up and do what the adults seem unable to manage."
@Teri_Kanefield Thank you for your insights today Teri!
I have a question: most Republicans I know would refute their characterization as 'hierarchy' people. Most of them would want to be left alone by the government and be allowed to retain control over their life and plans as much as possible. They see legislation ruling their speech as impediment to free expression, and do not appreciate 'overreach' by the government.
It doesn't strike me that this reasoning is congruent with a 'hierarchy' focused personality?
@Teri_Kanefield
Well written, easily understood
Explains so much
Such as ERA NEVER passing
And
The gerrymandering and other voting *restrictions*
GQP REALLY is ALL about money and POWER (controlling women and minorities)
They really don't even know HOW to GOVERN, anymore!
They're of the *plantation owner* mentality
Do AS I SAY,
NOT as I do
It feels like that mentality, us vs YOU, is what is keeping us divided
It isn't policy, for them, anymore
It's quite worrisome
Thanks, Teri
@Teri_Kanefield all history heretofore has been the history of class war.
The state is the weapon of the ruling class to keep the working class under control.
Seems basic Marxism is being rediscovered, through many a USAian Anarchist.
See if this works: It's an old blog post on the same topic.
This is a brilliant thread! Thanks for the clear thought and explanation.
@Julz No.
We got out of the age of robber barrons with the New deal.
@Teri_Kanefield What is "the system"? Are we only looking at American government, or capitalism?
"Perfect fairness" is unachievable, but is that the only replacement system the "fairness people" are contemplating? ( NOTE: perfect generalization is also never possible. The two camps narrative is a bad product of the two party system.)
It is probably possible to find better systems have been shown to work in history, but there is usually a question of scale.
@Teri_Kanefield thanks for the sobering thread, Teri. I'm glad you came over here from the dark site.
This shows how generational wealth is ruining this country. Perhaps those who have earned their wealth from entreprenuership or whatever do deserve their money and power.
But then the failsons that inherit that wealth, thus also believing their "power", is how we get what we have now ruining not only this country, but the world. Elon and Donald (and his failspawns) are exemplary of this.
@Teri_Kanefield Thank you for this thread! I've struggled to find the right phrase for the different PoVs. Fairness has been easier for me to elucidate. But, for the contrasting PoV, it seemed glib or simplistic to reduce it to "unfairness." (Although often, it seems to be the point.)
Hierarchy is more apropos for the origins of that worldview. And helps me understand why people with that frame of mind get so hostile when the "order of society" is disrupted, even if it has no impact on them.
@Teri_Kanefield As with everything, people are spread across this in a spectrum of viewpoints. It's not binary!
In my experience one trap those of us on the "fairness" side fall into is a tendency to believe that a system that was built to perpetuate injustice can be re-built to ensure perfect justice.
But that is simply not the case.
We can build systems to protect minorities from oppression, but those systems will be run and maintained by humans.
Very much so, for the hierarchy people, the notion of whiteness is an adjustable aperture.
@Teri_Kanefield The thing is, our modern day policing grew directly out of slavery so no version of that is going to be anything but racists and designed to subjugate. #DefundThePolice
https://naacp.org/find-resources/history-explained/origins-modern-day-policing
Have you connected with Alec Karakatsanis on Twitter? @equalityAlex
Here's one post on law enforcement that parallels your own thinking.
https://twitter.com/equalityAlec/status/1593423258375815175?s=20&t=BZ3pd3QHW264l2YmvOUDHQ
@Teri_Kanefield
Not quite sure this is the right place to put this, but want to engage you in the following issue which is only slightly tangential:
The problem I have with the slogan "defund the police" is that it makes an easy target and doesn't really say what most of us mean.
What I mean, at least, is to reapportion the police funding so that we only used armed officers as needed, and we use social workers, etc. when an armed response is not warranted.
@jesseliberty
I think "defund the police" is a terrible slogan.
But much of what police do can be handled by social workers and other service workers.
@Teri_Kanefield We are in violent agreement 🤣
Glad you are here, should generate some very interesting conversations.
@Teri_Kanefield I am a married 64 yo white male who has no need whatsoever for the police. To me they are pointless and are actually dangerous to your safety.
At no time in my life has the police ever been a good thing. They dont stop crimes. They are only after the fact. Each and every time I have had interactions with them has not been a pleasant experience.
I for one would be glad to see our police forces reorganized into a different type of safety office.
I moved to @law-and-politics
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