Note: trying again with this post because the timing didn’t work out so well last Friday since bad news was dumping so fast we couldn’t get it cleared off the sidewalk before the next batch hit.
I think this is an exciting opportunity, and I would really love for you guys to read about it and share your thoughts in the comments.
So… we had an interesting zoom yesterday with the founder of the group whose boots on the ground work we supported for the FL special elections. In case you don’t recall, I am referring to the group National Ground Game.
We thought we would be supporting the same effort again for the NY special election, but sadly FFOTUS listened to someone who knew that seat would be seriously at risk. So no NY special election.
Instead, we had a meeting to talk about what’s next for this group, and what’s next is something new and different, and I think exciting.
But first, let me talk about what happened in my neck of the woods earlier this week.
Turning Point USA Founder Charlie Kirk receives a warm welcome to the University of Illinois
Disgusting creature. Just looking at that image makes my nostrils flare as if I had just stepped in puppy poop barefoot.
URBANA — Charlie Kirk received a standing ovation as he took the stage at Foellinger Auditorium Tuesday night for his “American Comeback Tour.” The packed crowd was a sea of red, with attendees decked out in Make America Great Again gear and American Comeback shirts.
The tour features stops at colleges across the country, where Kirk provides an open forum to debate students on their political concerns. Kirk is the founder of Turning Point USA, a non-profit conservative organization dedicated to promoting American patriotism in young people.
The event at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign drew both students and community members. In his opening remarks, Kirk sympathized with Gen Z audience members about what he called a culture war on men. He also said statistically the happiest women are wives and mothers, not CEOs.
The tour is designed to give leftist students a chance to challenge Kirk’s conservative beliefs directly, and encourage an open conversation on the reality of U.S. politics.
My correction to that last paragraph:
The tour is designed to convert disengaged, liberal or liberal-leaning young people to his conservative views.
Republicans kicked our butts with that approach in the recent election. All those young white males voting for Trump was not a spontaneous occurrence.
So, back to what’s next for National Ground Game.
They plan to go head-to-head with Charlie Kirk at his campus events, with National Ground Game bringing their own influencers to the table, literally, on the ground at the same campuses at the same time.
The two locations that are left on Kirk’s spring tour are in Texas and Wyoming, and that’s where Nation Ground Game plans to start, sort of as a proof of concept. Turning Point USA takes the summers off, but National Ground Game is planning a summer tour of their own in swing states (sans Charlie Kirk) to get young people involved and registered to vote.
Our Balloon Juice fundraising has primarily been focused on under-represented groups. Black, Native, AAPI, Latino, formerly incarcerated, etc. That will still be our primary focus. Something like this would be a new addition, focusing on a group (mostly young white males) that are way over-represented on the other side.
So, for everyone who has been saying “we are losing the young white males, we’re screwed if we don’t turn that around, why the fuck aren’t we doing something about that??” here is one possible answer.
We are definitely not going to fund this for Texas or Wyoming, but they have agreed that we can direct our funds to specific states. So I can completely see us doing flash fundraising for this when they are going to states we really care about.
To be clear, this post isn’t asking for donations. Let them do their proof of concept in these last two locations against Charlie Kirk in his Spring tour before we fund this new effort.
But I wanted to let you know about this conversation and hear your thoughts at first blush, after hearing a bit about the concept.
First comment
Nearly every thread is filled with awfulness, which isn’t out of line because there’s so much of it!
But I am hoping we can kind of stay on topic here, rather than only talking about all the awfulness?
Trying to look ahead at possibilities for action and get some feedback about what I presented.
This is not an open thread.
WaterGirl
As I wrote up top, I am trying this post again because the timing didn’t work out so well last Friday when bad news was dumping so fast we couldn’t get it cleared off the sidewalk before the next batch hit.
I think this is an exciting opportunity, and I would really love for you guys to read about it and share your thoughts in the comments.
WaterGirl
University of Illinois is located where I live, and Champaign-Urbana has always been considered a liberal bastion in downstate Illinois.
The thought that there are young people here who are eating up the Turning Point garbage makes me sick. I love the idea of going toe-to toe when and where Charlie Kirk is out there recruiting young people.
Mr. Bemused Senior
Thank you WaterGirl. I look forward to reading more about this.
chemiclord
What I’ll say is that I sincerely doubt Charlie Kirk or any right-leaning pundit did anything more than give voice to the anger and frustration young white men have.
They were sold a bill of goods by their fathers and grandfathers, a bill that the rest of society (rightfully) did not respect in the slightest. No, women do not owe you shit, much less sex, just because you exist in their presence. No, companies do not owe you jobs just because you’re a white man. No, you are not guaranteed a single goddamn thing.
Instead, we demanded things like courtesy, respect, and for them to take a goddamn shower and step outside once in a while. And that was an intolerable list of demands given to the Gamergate and gooner/incel crowd.
These young white men were never going to be on our side. The only thing people like Charlie Kirk has done is weaponize them.
SW
I used to despair about the fuckwits of my generation while gaining inspiration from the young. I realize that they particularly the boys have good reason to feel alienated. I wish that it would drive them to explore creative solutions rather than masturbating away their blue balled rage with the likes of Chucky Kirk.
Professor Bigfoot
Thank you, WG… I’m looking forward to reading this thread. (and my apologies again for helping derail it last time!)
Another Scott
Agreed that we have to meet people where they are, listen to them, talk about their concerns. This sounds like a good approach.
I’m reminded of attending a small afternoon/early evening Roe v Wade rally at the SCOTUS (during Clinton’s term, I think). As I recollect it now, there were maybe a dozen of us marching in a circle and chanting, some with signs. There were maybe half as many protestors with signs and chants, and maybe that many reporters and video and still camera people. We talked briefly with a local TV reporter and everything was very low-key.
Until one of the protestors started getting very agitated and in someone else’s face and suddenly all the press and camera and video people swarmed them and jockeyed to get into position to record the drama.
And in maybe 30 seconds it was over.
But they got their drama and the press coverage and took over the framing of the reporting.
So, a few people can make a difference. (Something like) 80% of life is showing up, and a tiny fraction of the people who show up can make a big difference.
Going to red and almost purple areas and showing the normies that there are sensible people with sensible views, that one doesn’t have to be cowed to go along with the monsters, is important.
Thanks for your work on this, WG. And thanks to everyone in the trenches, doing the work, and pushing to make things better.
Best wishes,
Scott.
Josie
Sounds interesting. I would have to hear more about their specific objectives and how they plan to meet them. I do like the idea of meeting face to face with people rather than using advertising campaigns. I think Beto’s idea of having the volunteers keep in touch with people after the initial contact (registration) was a good one.
Dan
Too bad the state with more Harris voters than New York (Texas) isn’t a “state we really care about”.
Kristine
@SW:
If they follow his path, they are told that they are perfect as they are and it’s up to everyone else to step aside/do the work. After being buffeted from all directions by change, that’s music to their ears
Not sure how we combat that.
ETA: If some group can figure out a way, though, it’s worth a shot.
chemiclord
@Kristine: And that is the problem. It’s less any message we make, but that the right wing reactionaries are going to be able to give them a more appealing message because the right wing is able to lie as easily as they breathe.
The problem is that the message that Kirk gives them is what they want to hear.
Fair Economist
@chemiclord: I disagree. Online channels, notably YouTube but including many others, have been pushing right-wing propaganda, especially to young men, for years. Many people have tried starting up YouTube accounts slumming as teenage boys and reported how quickly YT starts serving them RW or fascist propaganda. Leftie as I am, it still shows up in my feed on a weekly basis.
Melancholy Jaques
@chemiclord:
He’s selling bro culture more than anger & frustration, but I get your point.
That aside, the question is, what are we selling? What is our message to the next generation of voters?
khead
Still not quite right…
The tour is designed to troll and preach to the recently converted…… who were probably reached and/or converted by Rogan, etc. The dudes wouldn’t really listen to Charlie Kirk if you put a gun to their head. If they show up at this “tour” at all, they are there to “flex”. And then whine.
lowtechcyclist
The polling I’ve seen says that college-educated white men lean only slightly red, so I’d think college-age men is a group we definitely should be targeting. Plus after they hear from a group like this, the women in their lives can take it from there.
Omnes Omnibus
I will just note that a university the size of U of I is going to have quite a few conservative students no matter how liberal its reputation is. The fact that a bunch people showed up for Kirk’s traveling circus and shitshow does not mean that he is persuading anyone.
Melancholy Jaques
@SW:
Really? Any more reason than any other people?
Kristine
@chemiclord:
That’s an uphill battle all the way for any group that takes it on. Maybe they can peel off a few here and there, but they’re fighting those young mens’ other influences, their peers, etc.
I don’t want to cross off any opportunity to peel away votes, but this is a tough one. This group will be really resistant to any argument that they’re being lied to.
lowtechcyclist
Can I ask where the 57% figure on the sign in the sidebar pic comes from?
AP reported that white women favored Trump by 53-45. That’s bad enough, thanks.
suzanne
@WaterGirl: Martin had some great comments last night about the challenges that young people are facing today w/r/t launching….. college or job training, housing, mobility. I think we have not been as vocal/active on these issues as we needed to be, and that leaves a vacuum.
People mock the importance of communications, but speaking directly to people’s concerns — even if they seem silly to others — is a first step to grabbing people’s attention.
Delicate Butterfly
Clearly the answer is to increase the criticism and ridicule of white males.
lowtechcyclist
@Omnes Omnibus:
Good point!
dc
@Melancholy Jaques: The ones who are fans of people like Kirk certainly think so.
chemiclord
@Kristine: This is where I’d say that you still need to do it simply because even if it only changes one mind, every mind changed counts.
But we have to accept going in that it’s not going to yield a lot of fruit, and we should be trying to identify people who are ready to hear a different message. Because until they want to hear a different perspective, you might as well be trying to convince a wall.
gene108
I hope these guys are practiced and prepared, when they challenge Kirk. Right-wingers are well versed in swatting aside liberal arguments with misrepresentations and flat out lies, or are very good at evading giving a direct answer.
It’s a gamble our side has not been good at in this sort of setting.
Omnes Omnibus
We could always do fuck all instead. I am sure that would be effective.
The Audacity of Krope
My, awful sensitive, aren’t we?
I’m not seeing any ridicule of white men, at least up to the point where you commented. I see some comments discussing the range of relevant issues, some pointing out subgroups where we’ve had success. I think the most antagonistic thing I heard is that it shouldn’t be to the exclusion of other groups.
It’s almost like you have an agenda to foment white grievance. Or at a minimum confirm your own chronic feelings of white grievance.
Professor Bigfoot
@Omnes Omnibus: I’m watching this thread for the express purpose of seeing what ideas come out for how white people can reach those angry young white men; and so far the closest things I’ve heard to an approach seems to be “try to understand them, appreciate the difficulties they face so that you can meet them where they are.”
Bupalos
Like Trump, Kirk and the college conservatives thrive on rot. I’ve seen chunks of his little road show and the way it works is a really simple passive jiu-jitsu on the fact that most young people do not actually understand or inhabit the theories of liberalism they live within. They are often completely tongue-tied at the lightest “reasonable” pushback and unable to counter incredibly simple fascist-inflected propositions with anything but orthodoxy or cant that doesn’t feel like lived experience at all.
I think these are profoundly effective at ideological recruitment for them. The whole point is a kind of demonstration aimed at establishing that people don’t really mean or even understand what they are saying, that what they are saying is in different ways just an expression of power politics. Kirk himself at times verges on Putinesque nihilism, almost going down roads that suggest no one ever means what they say.
Anyway, I’d recommend actually watching some of these and thinking about the serious structural weaknesses on our side that make half-bright hucksters like Kirk and Trump effective.
Delicate Butterfly
@The Audacity of Krope:
Look until white men grapple with their actions, there can be no healing.
Melancholy Jaques
@dc:
Right. Fans always believe the refs are biased against their team. But aren’t we the reality-based community?
What I see the point is that Republicans are building goodwill and (reportedly) getting votes from young (mostly white) males by selling bro culture with guys like Rogan, Kirk, the Tate brothers, the Paul brothers, & no doubt many I’ve never heard of. What are we Democrats doing? What should we be doing?
I am at a loss, myself, but I am eager to hear suggestions from other, smarter people.
West of the Cascades
I hate Illinois Nazis. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZTT1qUswYL0
WaterGirl
@chemiclord:
I agree with your second sentence there, but strongly disagree with the first.
Like the Illinois lottery slogan – you can’t win if you don’t play.
The Audacity of Krope
@Professor Bigfoot: Which are all important factors in reaching anyone about anything.
I think one of the most important factors is forming broad and inclusive friend groups. That’s something we can all do regardless of what side of any divide we are on.
Allies aren’t always effective advocates and that is doubly the case when their allyship is based on abstract notions of justice rather than lived experience with other people.
One of the bad guys’ main points of attack is to go after our efforts to coordinate; unionization, student activism, creating discord in online spaces. They’re attacking community, because community is what will get us out of this.
WaterGirl
@Professor Bigfoot: Very kind of you!
lowtechcyclist
@suzanne:
It’s hard to be vocal about problems if you don’t have solutions for them. I don’t know what Federal policy can do about college costs, since the public universities are state-run. And you’ve got a better handle than I do on why housing costs so much, and I don’t see any brilliant answers there either. I missed that thread, so maybe Martin had some good suggestions.
ISTM that Biden did the one thing he could move the needle on: his policies brought about full employment, which presumably made it easier for young people to find jobs, and decent-paying ones at that.
The GOP’s answer for young white men is just: get rid of the competition from women and minorities. We’re not going to offer them anything similar because that’s horrible.
The one thing that occurs to me about college and young men is that, sure, it’s expensive, but it’s expensive for young women as well as for young men. But a lot more women are getting college degrees, and it’s not because of DEI. So what’s the deal with young men? Why are they getting their asses kicked by women?
ETA: ISTM that until we understand what’s going on there, there’s only so much we can offer in the way of solutions.
Mr. Bemused Senior
I think about what I can do as an individual. Mostly that is support others whom I regard as sharing my convictions. Adam Schiff is one example.
Most of the people I know are already on our side and are as appalled as I am by the Trump administration. There is one family member who is on the other side and I plan to visit him soon. When we spoke recently he was clear in his support for deportations, regardless of the lawlessness. I am trying to figure out how to discuss this with him.
I don’t know how to persuade a large number of people. The tools of mass persuasion have been deployed ruthlessly, mostly by the Republicans. I hope we can find a way to counter this without descending to their level of malevolence and mendacity.
The Audacity of Krope
@Delicate Butterfly: Oh, you were being serious?
Well, in that case, perhaps explore more constructive solutions.
Bupalos
@Delicate Butterfly: Can you explain your vision for what The White Men “grappling” in this way looks like or how it comes about?
The Audacity of Krope
@Bupalos: We conduct a seance and conjur our literal demons, then we oil up and wrestle.
WaterGirl
@Josie: I like that they are starting now, not in 2028. Like building brand loyalty, it takes time. :-)
H.E.Wolf
I’m curious whether you think that’s a good idea, a poor idea, or [your specific opinion here].
My own efforts are directed toward demographic groups other than this one, so I’m not qualified to opine. :-)
TheOtherHank
I feel like every time Charlie Kirk shows up in public he should be pelted with diapers.
Edit: It is not necessary that be filled with anything
Delicate Butterfly
@Bupalos:
It’s not my burden to fix them. I am exhausted enough just from the daily struggle of living in this country. Do not ask those of us with the most burden to carry to carry even more.
WaterGirl
@Dan:
Fair enough. I worded the poorly! I keep seeing things like “we should stop trying to turn TX blue” on here, but maybe I let a few loud voices lead me to think that was a common sentiment.
I have not given up on Texas.
If there is interest in helping to fund their TX visit this spring, I would be totally up for it. I just didn’t think there would be enthusiasm for it.
But I would love to support these folks in their “proof of concept” in TX.
suzanne
@lowtechcyclist:
Agree. But, like….. this is what any healthy political party should do! Find out about what challenges affect people and work on solving those problems.
As for why are women kicking ass in college? Probably a lot of reasons; the modern service workforce and education put a lot of value on conscientiousness behaviors, and there is some evidence that women master those a little bit earlier in life on average. But women are just as affected by high college costs and it is a mistake to think that only men were looking for student loan forgiveness. It would have made a huge difference for me and many of my friends. (Pro tip: that’s part of why Republicans hate it.)
Bupalos
@Delicate Butterfly: I’m going to suggest “Poe’s Lawyer” as a new nym. Whether you’re serious or doing an act, I appreciate the purity of these posts.
WaterGirl
@Omnes Omnibus: Fair point. But I would say the ones walking away with MAGA hates and MAGA merch were persuaded.
Paul in KY
@Delicate Butterfly: You have to make it uncool to be a right wing douchewad.
dc
@Melancholy Jaques:
There are plenty of young White men who support equality, care about the environment, human rights, etc. and who don’t need to be privileged in order to feel fairly treated. Start with them.
I teach at a university, I’m around them all the time.
Paul in KY
@Professor Bigfoot: Errr, not from me…
Bupalos
@The Audacity of Krope: I think we both got catfished, and from opposite ends of the boat!
Paul in KY
@West of the Cascades: Probably the best part of that pic (tho the music was great too)!
suzanne
I want to note that I think finding out what is affecting young white men and crafting a message that meets them where they are are really important tasks….. for paid, professional marketers and consultants. As part of a larger strategy for outreach and winning.
It’s not the work of normies or volunteers or voters. And certainly, no one who is uncomfortable with it should be expected to do this work.
WaterGirl
@Kristine: What I particularly like is the timing.
When I was trying to teach Tucker to stay out of the kitchen, I had to catch him the second even one little paw stepped over the threshold.
That’s what I love about this. This group and Charlie Kirk will be on the same campuses at the same time, and these National Ground Game will have “influencers” (I hate the name, but that’s the world we live in) to take on the Kirk bullshit in real time.
And the influencers they have lined up have WAY more followers than Kirk. *thought probably not more than Rogan, who someone suggested is driving all of this anyway. But Rogan won’t be there, and Kirk will.
Paul in KY
@Mr. Bemused Senior: Tell him ‘they can deport your white ass too, you dummy’
WaterGirl
@lowtechcyclist: That was somebody’s protest sign. No idea why they picked 57 and not 53, unless it could be the stats for their particular state or location.
Or they are like me and do not like the number 3, but like the #7. Only slightly not serious about that. :-)
Splitting Image
@Delicate Butterfly:
I don’t know if you’re speaking in jest, but this is the correct answer.
The truth is that people who voted for Trump are suckers.
A few billionaires are going to get everything they wanted out of Trump’s misrule, but everybody else who voted for him is going to get screwed. Name any reason people give for voting for Trump, and I guarantee you that Trump’s actions will make whatever they were griping about worse.
It isn’t only white men either. Women who voted for Trump are suckers. Black men who voted for Trump are suckers. Even a lot of very rich people who voted for him are suckers. Rural Americans who voted for him are suckers.
Of all of these people, white men are the ones who most consistently fall for the con and doggedly resist making any effort to learn how they’ve been played.
So yes, criticism is in order, and ridicule is in order. Until white men decide on their own to be less of a bunch of saps, they will continue to be suckers and losers.
lowtechcyclist
@Omnes Omnibus:
What I heard gene108 saying was that our people need to be prepared when they go into fora like that.
My own WAG is that going in unprepared might well be worse than not showing up at all: if what the audience sees is Kirk (or whoever) seemingly demolishing attempted rebuttals from liberals, that will just settle the issue in the minds of many if not most of them. At least if it’s just Kirk spouting off without any rebuttal, it leaves open the possibility that there might be a convincing rebuttal, rather than them thinking they’ve already heard the liberal rebuttal get demolished.
Charlie Kirk isn’t just responding to rebuttals with thoughts that just came into his head. He’s been doing this awhile, and he’s probably pretty good at laying down convincing right-wing bullshit. If we send people in to challenge him, best that they spend time preparing so that they can bring their A game.
WaterGirl
@West of the Cascades: I was about to say “you’re not alone, the Blues Brothers hated them, too” and a second later I realized that your link was YouTube and that was surely what you are linking to.
:-)
Belafon
@Dan: As a Texan, any money and time right now can be better used for closer states than this one, until we stop electing people like Abbott and Paxton.
Bupalos
@suzanne: Right! It’s important to remember that these are not human beings that should be interacted with, they are a potential political resource to be mined strictly by professionals.
Belafon
@Melancholy Jaques: Sadly, our message is “If everyone acts like an adult, things will be better.”
WaterGirl
@Paul in KY:
A little louder now…
You have to make it uncool to be a right wing douchewad.
That is part of what this effort hopes to accomplish. The other part is to offer an alternate view in real time.
WaterGirl
@suzanne: Agree.
If anyone thinks that influences are not professional marketers and consultants… well, let’s just say I would be really surprised if the overlap isn’t 95%. Just with a different spin and a different thing they are selling.
Fair Economist
In terms of what’s happening to young men, I have a friend who teaches in community college. He finds there’s a huge motivation gap between young men and women. He finds the women generally work at the class, even though most of them have children and/or jobs, while most of the men live rent-free at home, don’t have jobs, and just play video games all night. That would put the blame on pre-college socialization – men (tend to) think they can just have fun and get what they want anyway, while women (tend to) have learned they have to get stuff done first.
The Audacity of Krope
It is uncool. But they protect each others’ toxic traits, so they stick together and perceive themselves as having their own bespoke version of cool for that.
WaterGirl
@lowtechcyclist:
I think that’s true, and I think they are.
suzanne
@Bupalos: Anyone who wants to interact with them should do so if they want. Expecting the uncompensated labor of people of color and women in an effort to persuade white men…. understandably that is not a thing that some people want to engage in. And they shouldn’t be expected to do so.
Besides, marketing efforts at this level are professional efforts. It’s a whole realm of expertise. We donate shit-tons of money to the Party and campaigns… this is what they’re supposed to be spending it on.
Belafon
@gene108: It’s definitely tough when facts don’t matter.
Redshift
@Bupalos:
LOL, I love it!
Bupalos
I think there are a lot of people on our end of the spectrum who think within this frame. Can you expound on what “is in order” means here?
WaterGirl
@Fair Economist:
That might make for an interesting discussion on a post dedicated to that?
Harrison Wesley
It’s been a lot of years since I was a young white man, angry or otherwise. As a white Olde Farte I would ask an AYWM who is more likely to be an ally in getting what he wants, somebody who doesn’t look like him but wants the same things, or somebody who looks like him but already has all those things. Since I don’t know any Youngs of any kind I have no idea what works.
Redshift
@lowtechcyclist:
Yes, while Kirk and his ilk are recruiting, we shouldn’t forget that provoking outrage they can distort to support their “look, they’re oppressing us” shtick is a big part of why they do these events, too.
The Audacity of Krope
@Bupalos: I was trying to think of the name of the internet phenomenon demonstrated by my interaction with trollish 🦋.
Thanks for this.
Delicate Butterfly
@Splitting Image:
Exactly, we cannot continue to paper over the way in which whiteness fundamentally distorts what is acceptable here
Belafon
@Delicate Butterfly:
As a white male, let me just say that we don’t get enough criticism, but even more so, we aren’t required to properly respond to valid criticism at any reasonable measure.
Bill Hicks
I find that avoiding ethical/moral arguments and concentrating on economic arguments is the best way to convince young white males and Trump supporters. Everybody loves money (If you are a money hater, I can help), but a lot of these Trump supporters have very different values than you do.
Professor Bigfoot
@H.E.Wolf: My concern will always be this: that we never, ever, under any circumstances whatsoever, throw anyone’s rights and freedoms and lives under the bus to get those white mens votes.
It’s a task for white people to reach out and try to get those white men; but one hopes not like they did in 1877.
Delicate Butterfly
@Belafon:
Agreed, there really should be some mechanism to compel white men to properly respond to valid criticism.
Elizabelle
This is stalkery of me, but, on a precinct by precinct basis, I would love if an engaging Democrat (ideally from that area) visited each and every Biden voter who did not turn out in 2024, and asks why. And listens, carefully. What were the influences? What were the messages — not necessarily accurate — that were received> Really listen.
Some may be misogyny or misogynoir. But I think some other factors were in play, and we need to find out.
Also, visit the nonvoters. Engage and listen.
The Audacity of Krope
Seconded, thirded, with a bonus fuck Newsom and Fetterman and Suozzi.
suzanne
@Fair Economist:
That’s the “conscientiousness” behavior. Showing up on time, doing work that might bore you, etc. Essential to success.
cmorenc
The main problem isn’t progressives doing a better job of debating / dealing with Charlie Kirk. Rather, it was the vastly larger audience and influence of Joe Rogan being so Trump-friendly. We don’t have any equivalently influential figure on the left with anything like that sort of mass audience of younger U-40 men. Also, Rogan is a much more friendly and engaging personality than Kirk, and is much less one-dimensional in his array of guests and topics, his audience is far broader than political junkies – not that his Trump-leaning shows weren’t crucially influential in the 24 election with the younger male demographic. Harris made a crucial tactical blunder by not coming to Rogan for a 3-hour show, instead of thinking there was much more value-added in stumping in Wisc, Mich, and Pa for the umpteenth time in the closing days. She is sharp enough, especially by that part of the campaign, that she could have faovorably handled or swatted away anything Rogan tried to throw at her.
Professor Bigfoot
@Bupalos: But at the same time it is most certainly not the job of those in the marginalized communities under threat by those same white men to do it, either.
This is a job for other white men, and I’m afraid there are damned few capable of the work on the ground.
Gin & Tonic
I’m old and out of touch, but haven’t young white men always been assholes to some degree? Rogan and Kirk and the like aren’t *creating* something, they’re giving a space for something that’s already there, and amplifying it, IMO.
Credentials: my dear wife and I created a young white man, and had to work plenty hard to have him *not* become an asshole (I think mostly successfully.) But if this work isn’t done in the home, starting from a young age, it’s hard to counteract later.
karen gail
@chemiclord: Not just fathers and grandfathers but also their “christian” religion; generation after generation of males have been told that women were created to be subservient. To hear from preacher that god created men to rule over women, that god created women to serve men; this has been the message that was first preached when the Roman Catholic Chruch was founded.
The Audacity of Krope
Which is why I say, yes, it is primarily our responsibility. But we can’t be simply left to our own devices either.
WaterGirl
@Professor Bigfoot:
Absolutely. And not just white male votes. Any votes.
Professor Bigfoot
@WaterGirl: That presupposes that the right-wing douchewad in question ever considers himself as such.
Or is he filled with “righteous” indignation and it’s others who are the real problem?
Redshift
@Mr. Bemused Senior:
I might try pointing out that we need due process not because it’s a constitutional requirement or because we want to be nice to people, but because without it, the government can declare people guilty with nothing more than “because we said so.” And that they’re already doing it to white people. (That’s CBP with people arriving rather than deportations, but you don’t need to mention that unless they try to make that distinction.)
Alternatively, since polling shows that (like with a lot of conservative policies) a lot more people are against every specific aspect of Trump’s immigration operation than say they disapprove of his handling of immigration, maybe try to get more specific. And always remember that when challenging factually wrong things (like JD Vance’s “20 million illegals”), it’s usually more effective to start by asking where they’re getting their information from rather than pointing out that it’s false.
(Caveat: this is all theoretical, I can’t say I have a lot of experience doing this.)
jonas
@Fair Economist: Teenage life for too many young men today is a social-media fueled blizzard of UFC roid rage, vaping, Andrew Tate shit, and country and/or rap music glorifying the worst tendencies of the gender. And all those fandoms also orbit TrumpWorld.
We’ve got a big problem on our hands.
tam1MI
@cmorenc: Harris made a crucial tactical blunder by not coming to Rogan for a 3-hour show
Spoiler alert: It has since come out that Harris made good faith efforts to go on Rogan, and he kept stiff-arming her. Then he finally offered (in bad faith) for her to come on his show, he insisted she had to come in person to bend the knee and turned down her offers to talk with him remotely.
That fucker never had any intentions of bringing her on his show.
suzanne
@cmorenc:
I will note that this is true because they are better at this comms game. It’s not an accident. They see their voters and they get in front of them.
They Call Me Noni
@lowtechcyclist: Young men are getting their asses kicked by young women because parents are raising them to be able to make their own way in this world and not depend on a man.
Mr. Bemused Senior
@Redshift: thanks, I’m thinking along similar lines. Arbitrary state power is how things go in Russia and I think he may respond to that analogy.
People don’t like to have it pointed out that they are suckers (as mentioned above), especially when it’s true
I will report back after the visit. I doubt I’ll have anything conclusive but maybe I can make some progress. 🤞
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@WaterGirl:
I didn’t know you were there. We have a good friend who usta live off of Prospect. Spent many a night at the Esquire over the years until he moved to Chicago.
karen gail
@Gin & Tonic: I agree, having brothers convinced me that young white men are assholes; not only that my father and his brothers who set an example of how to be assholes. Grandpa used to despair and wonder where he went wrong; great grandma told him that he tried to give them a better life so they were out struggling to help put food on table at 14. Plus, she added, you took them to church every Sunday where they learned that women are suppose to obey and serve men.
Bupalos
@suzanne: I’d say the “compensation” for all of us is that maybe we get to live in a United States that resembles or even exceeds the one we all have taken for granted as given, when it is actually an extreme historical outlier. If it were somehow possible for this to be a successful “whites only” fight I guess that would seem most just, personally I think that kind of consideration is naiive and mired in magical thinking. “Wait for the whites to grapple with their issues” is a recipe for disaster.
Rusty
We are kind of living through this in real time. Our youngest of 4 is our only boy, now 16. He is more conservative than any of the other 5 in the family. Focusing on college I think is too late. He was getting messages in high school and even middle school. There id a huge amount of cultural formation that is happening Tic Tok even in the tween years. Thankfully he through a freak set of circumstances ended up in a much more progressive high school environment that has been nudging him away from the wrst of it. I don’t have any great answers, but we need to start early.
laura
I went back to college as an art student in 2022 after I retired. First day of Fall semester Turning Point USA was on campus doing their white power recruitment. I skaddled over to the bookstore and bought a large foam core poster board and a big marker and made my protest sign in class. It says these fuckers are nazi’s with a directional arrow. That day, and every day since, when they showed up in the quad with their table I’d grab my sign from the back of the car and go sit right next to them and say nothing- just let the sign speak for itself. Yes, my knees were knocking. No, I never let fear undermine my resolve. I’ll be back for more classes in the fall, and my sign is on our hall closet ready to go with me again.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@lowtechcyclist:
We should but the problem with that is it’s often presented as an “either/or” issue and when we talk about this in that context, it simply reinforces what somebody said as far back as 2018 that the Dems have a “gentrification problem”. And we’ve seen that play out in electoral spades since. Today’s conversation is an outgrowth of that problem.
It’s one reason why student loan relief was seen by a lot of people as simply another giveaway to entitled white people. I bring this up not to question whether or not it was good policy, but it’s wider political implications are always conveniently overlooked by white, urban “liberals” who spend most of their time in effect shitting on the minority poor and everybody else who doesn’t agree with them.
tobie
What appeals to young, white men would likely not appeal to me. That’s fine up to a point. I just had a conversation with a young coworker who was an organizer for Sanders in 2020. Oy…the ease with which he blames everything on “the establishment” and the rot in both parties was shocking to me. It must be nice to live in a world where good and evil are so easy to identify. All I can say is that 50 million American voters seem to be a-okay with abusing immigrants and throwing out due process. I’m not a politician so I can point fingers at those voters. They own this mess.
scav
OK Giant Suckers we don’t have to hate break!
First footage of a (youngster) colossal squid, (Mesonychoteuthis hamiltoni) in its natural habitat, amusingly enough in this case meaning near the South Sandwich Islands.
WaterGirl
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: The Esquire is a good place.
Professor Bigfoot
@The Audacity of Krope: Those who are capable understand the need to actually listen to the voices of those marginalized communities; it’s how they came to be where they are.
But let me be clear– while it is true that those young white men will not listen to the message (heh) coming from other white men, it’s absolutely guaranteed that they will not listen to anyone else. Are, in fact, apt to consider those voices to be antagonistic to them by their mere existence.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@tobie:
77 million ‘Murkins although it’s hard to gauge how many of them have ‘buyers remorse’ at this stage.
Yeah, despite my ranting above, what will appeal to young white men won’t appeal to me. It’s a tough needle to thread. Now, what might appeal to the minority poor and other low-info/low-motivation voters probably would appeal to me and a broader part of the Democratic Party. But again, it’s all a tough balancing act.
Josie
@Gin & Tonic:
I raised three young white men, and not one of them grew up thinking that they didn’t have to work for what they wanted. They also learned to respect women and to consider them equals. Two, as husbands, share all housework and childcare equally. As you pointed out, many of these attitudes are learned in the home.
Professor Bigfoot
@They Call Me Noni:
“A man is not a plan! A man is a companion!”
Raven
@WaterGirl: Known as the snake pit lounge to us old timers.
Elizabelle
@laura: Proud of you!!!!
Do you have students and other passerby talk to you about that?
lowtechcyclist
@suzanne:
I wasn’t really thinking about student loan forgiveness in the context of young people getting started in the world. Since it wasn’t a continuing policy, but essentially a one-off, it seemed to be a big help for people in their 30s through 50s who were still paying off loans, but I don’t really see a connection to young people just out of college (or deciding whether to go).
No argument from me that college should be a lot more affordable – hell, tuition should be pretty close to free for anyone who can get in, AFAIAC.
Bupalos
@Professor Bigfoot: My take of course is that once we’re engaged in dividing ourselves up into appropriate ethnic and gender categories and deciding who’s job it is to do what, we’re actually engaged in losing.
The left has ceded the territory of universalizing language and the language of freedom. We’re going to get our heads kicked in by even incompetent boobs like Trump until we fix that.
Glory b
@cmorenc: I read that Rogan admitted that she tried to reschedule and reconnect with him several times, to no avail.
He seemingly felt guilty about her getting dragged about not going on his show.
Redshift
@chemiclord: I disagree with almost all of that. There is plenty of evidence that the anger and frustration were stoked to toxic levels instead of just happening organically and ready to be exploited. There is also plenty of reporting from tech journalists about how the online spaces like gaming, “influencers,” and social media are absolutely dominated by right-wingers, drawing people in not just because they tell them comforting lies, but because “everyone is doing it” is even more powerful when there’s not much of an alternative.
Efforts like what’s being proposed for colleges may be too late to divert more than a fraction of them, but a fraction isn’t nothing.
lowtechcyclist
@Redshift:
Not sure I follow you. Going “help, help, I’m being repressed, come see the violence inherent in the system” is a plus for them?
Glory b
@tam1MI: Thanks, you said it better than I did.
Interesting Name Goes Here
@tam1MI:
And this is part of why I have so many problems with so many people on our side currently. Look at how quickly “Harris didn’t engage with their side correctly” became entrenched. It smacks of 2016’s “Hillary didn’t go to swing states enough” garbage.
Professor Bigfoot
@Josie: “Yo’ mama didn’t raise you right” is sometimes appropriate. Obviously your boys’ mama DID raise them right.
Belafon
@tam1MI: Harris did try to get on the show, and he kept her from appearing.
lowtechcyclist
@Delicate Butterfly:
Unless you’re someone’s boss, is there a mechanism to compel anyone to properly respond to valid criticism?
Doesn’t seem to me like there even should be.
Professor Bigfoot
@Bupalos: If this country had been a multicultural democracy for the last two hundred and fifty years, I’d agree with you.
But the history of this country is one of white men subjugating the fuck out of EVERYONE ELSE; and now expecting us to kumbaya with them and shun “identity politics.”
As white men fight to dismantle the multicultural democracy we’ve actually had since CRA64 and VRA65..
Bupalos
@Redshift: If you guys haven’t actually watched one of these you should. What Kirk is engaged in is basically a lighter and more academic version of “libs of tic-tok.” The tag-line for both could be “you know this is all bullshit.” Kirk is giving a demonstration that the interlocutors do not really believe or understand what they are saying. Which of course they largely don’t, because they are largely college kids spouting cultural slogans.
Kirk’s deal is “your version of reality is empty, handed to you by others, and no fun. My version of reality is also empty, but I come by it honestly and on my own, and it’s more fun.” We’ll have lost the ability to see how effective this is. Partly by losing touch with our immaturity (of course I except Baud here) and partly by being in denial about a hollowing out of liberal values and institutions.
lowtechcyclist
@They Call Me Noni:
I agree that that’s how most young women are being raised these days, and that’s a good thing. But they’re not also training young men to do the same and not depend on a woman?
Destroy Oh Boy
The right wing roadshows to college campuses is an ongoing phenomenon. Whatever negative energy they draw from it is fodder for the enthymeme: right wing ideas are not welcome on college campuses. It is a cry of censorship from the hills. Then Kirk, or Shapiro, or whomever else is the gadfly du jour “wows” the crowd by presenting right wing ideas pithily and silencing critics. This is done by the selective capture of certain well meaning lefties who engage thoughtfully… but unprepared for the expert rhetorical shenanigans that the gadfly has prepared. This creates the counter enthymeme: right wing ideas should be welcomed at college campuses.
IMO, the real key is to not show up and feed it energy. Let it be as if Kirk were visiting Dallas Theological Seminary: a bunch of like-minded wankers huffing their own farts. Zero engagement and zero oxygen. Any other kind of engagement is playing into the strength of their enthymemes. Bringing in counter influencers only rewards the strategy.
Charlie Kirk doesn’t belong on campuses because he is a fascist. Full stop. He has every right to go where he wants and blather… Lord knows the billionaires backing his big-headed life love his blather. But if it is to a room that only has fans, then there is no energy, no memes, no owning the libs. That is the welcome he deserves. Thinking anyone can do anything other than put a pie to his face is playing the right’s game.
Destroy Oh Boy
@lowtechcyclist: Of course. Anything that makes college campuses look like cancel culture is a plus. The whole point of gadflies like Kirk going to campuses is to demonstrate that right wing idea are being censored when they, in fact, superior to left wing ideology. All Kirk needs is counter protest or a well-meaning rube getting “crushed” by a bit of rhetoric to play to that enthymeme.
Redshift
@lowtechcyclist:
If only we could get across to the youngs that the true reason it isn’t is because of conservatives and white supremacists.
Basic timeline: A movement that college should be for everyone (maybe part of the post-Sputnik education drive) -> efforts to make state schools very affordable -> student protests and liberal ideas -> conservatives decide everyone shouldn’t mean everyone, and it was better when college was just for the white elite -> slashing funding, turning grants into private sector loans and all the rest.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Redshift:
Another “wonderful” thing that got it’s start under Reagan. Watched it unfold first hand. And what’s happened in the decades since was entirely predictable…and desirable from a right wing frame of reference.
Melancholy Jaques
@dc:
Plenty =/= Enough to win elections regularly.
Or at least it doesn’t seem that way. I’ve taught high school & middle school in Los Angeles. My anecdotal experience is that while there is far less anti-LGBTQ in the culture than thirty years ago, the young males in my classes – not one white kid among them – nearly all really admire Trump, Rogan, the Paul brothers, & other people I would describe as stupid assholes. None of these kids are political. The closest they get to expressing any political thought is that they all say they hate the police.
Bupalos
This is an oft recurring theme. I don’t really understand it. Is this literal, like you feel that there are unjust demands being made by white people to do something not in black people’s interest? Do you think it’s really more in white people’s interest, and thus it implies a kind of relative loss? I really do wonder about the thought process behind this theme of “x group expects y group to…”
lowtechcyclist
@comrade scotts agenda of rage:
Year in and year out, Dems do a shitload of stuff aimed at helping the proverbial working class and rural Americans.
The only reason the Dems have a ‘gentrification problem’ is that most of those rural and white working class voters vote Republican anyway, because Republicans will tell them everything’s the fault of Blacks and illegal immigrants and uppity women and so forth.
No, we shouldn’t let those folks who won’t vote for us anyway tell us that we shouldn’t help people who might do so. Fuck that noise.
Redshift
@lowtechcyclist:
Absolutely, what they’re selling is grievance. “They’re biased and intolerant because they won’t let me spout my hate speech!” (not the term they’d use, of course) is part of that.
Professor Bigfoot
@Bupalos: White people don’t listen to us.
Why should we put ourselves out there AGAIN when *white people simply will not listen to us?
We tried to tell you what was happening, and white America chose otherwise.
Don’t come looking for Black people to “get out in the streets” because white people couldn’t bring themselves to do the right thing last November.
Deal with that first.
Paul in KY
@Splitting Image: Hear hear!!!
lowtechcyclist
@Destroy Oh Boy:
Where’s the part where they’re being censored? Seems to me they’ve got plenty of bandwidth.
Dorothy A. Winsor
Mai Naem mobile
I realize it’s just the pic from the UI newspaper but there’s basically one young white(possibly white? hispanic? Middle eastern? Ethnicity) male in the pic. The others are all middle aged/old white guys and ,oh, one white female.
Bupalos
@Professor Bigfoot: No one “listens” to anyone in the sense of being convinced of political arguments. What changes people is repeated exposure and eventual recognition of common ground and shared interest that merges into some version of shared identity.
“Leave it to the whites” is in this sense a profoundly bad idea in practical terms.
The Audacity of Krope
Slight disagreement where most of the problematic white behavior I encounter appears borne of ignorance rather than intentional malice. They don’t see the subtle things.
And while I will agree again that white men have a lot of work to do with other white men in improving our entire cohort; as a gay man, I have witnessed interventions by straight white male allies. I’m pretty sure such interventions are the precise thing people have in mind when they think of “humorless, authoritarian liberal scolds.”
Those interactions don’t tend to center genuine respect, but rather an authority pushing inclusion v one pushing exclusion. This is why I hang on the suggestion of integration and personal efforts to form diverse communities starting right at the personal social level.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
I agree; starve them of attention. Kirk is a lying sack of shit anyway, what ever his politics.
Paul in KY
@The Audacity of Krope: It sure aint uncool enough (IMO).
Chief Oshkosh
@Professor Bigfoot:
How do black people reach out to angry young black men?
I’ve aged out; I don’t know any angry young white men or any angry young black men, so I’m completely ignorant of what may be tried and true approaches, or even untried, but probably useful, approaches. What are your suggestions?
Paul in KY
@Bupalos: All of it. Should be a target rich environment. Also can slag the weirdos/dingbats on the ‘Left’ that espouse stupid and counterproductive views/slogans (ala ‘Defund the Police’).
Bupalos
This strikes me as very well put and I’m reminded of the recent “intervention” on behalf of the trans legislator Sarah McBride. She was being intentionally misgendered by a Republican legislator and was doing a brilliant job of returning serve and showing the dude what this felt like simply by calling him “madam” in return. She was actually existing in this professional/social space and in a way even extending a kind of undeserved respect to process and leaving it to the Republican to be the one to make the issue. It was truly impressive and would have become moreso if the entire hearing had proceeded that way. But an ally stepped in and basically said we just can’t have this hearing, he won’t stand for it.
The way you phrase that, a battle of the authority of inclusion and the authority of exclusion is perfect and I haven’t heard that before.
Paul in KY
@Bill Hicks: Good point. They are certainly be played for suckers.
Paul in KY
@Professor Bigfoot: Good point. I’m just trying to get them not to vote MAGA. They can vote Green or Libertarian or Commie. Just not R.
Fair Economist
@jonas:
Yep, and they do it to sell crap. It happened to my son, although he got sucked into alien nonsense more than the roid-ragy stuff you’re talking about. And boy, did they sell him. He’s convinced that in order to live he has to have bottled water, $9 juices, upscale vape juice and vapable pot, and an array of absurdly overpriced haircare products. On a half-time job at Taco Bell. Did I mention he has no money for groceries?
What we want would be counter-programming – but how do we pay for it? It’s paid for by exploiting these young men, who spend their money on these overpriced or downright fraudulent products the influencers advertise. Hard to see us doing the same.
sab
@Bupalos: If Black people start publicly protesting they will be arrested, injured or killed. Middle-aged white people protesting so far haven’t been. So I have no problem with the current state of protesting. It seems to at least be getting attention to the issues.
Paul in KY
@Professor Bigfoot: That’s where they have to be educated on how much of a loser one is who supports MAGA, etc.
artem1s
Time to start protesting all the car dealers – especially the used car lots. Bernie “Willie Loman” Moreno – R-OH Tariff Lover is just fine with the tariffs because all the used car salesmen get to take advantage of supply and demand. He obviously does not care about any of his other constituents who won’t be able to afford any car once the price gouging commences.
The Audacity of Krope
I’ve been noticing the phenomenon a lot through my life, but I didn’t come up with that framing until a couple weeks ago when a family member, a nurse, was complaining about the scolding she got for addressing a trans woman by the name on her medical chart, her deadname, from the patient’s mother.
I tried to explain that this mother still has her place of privilege and is probably still dealing with her own issues about her daughter’s gender status. No trans person is to blame in this scenario.
Paul in KY
@tam1MI: I would have called his bluff. As a politician you have to abase yourself all the damned time (when trying to get campaign funds, etc.), so (to me) going there in person (oh the horror) is something you have to do. Fucking LBJ or Truman would have been there (IMO) and then would have had a grand time slagging ole Joe and his douchewads.
Professor Bigfoot
@Bupalos: So, you expect women and other marginalized people to reach out to these angry white men.
I daresay there are better uses of our time and energy than trying to find common ground with those who would chose a felon over a Black person.
Paul in KY
@Rusty: Best of luck to you! Be a great example and hopefully when he gets to college, alot of the examples you have shown him will click. I found out my parents were a whooooole lot wiser than I had thought once I hit college.
Paul in KY
@laura: God bless you! You rock!
Professor Bigfoot
@The Audacity of Krope: Ah, but you see, I’m talking about the subconscious effect of whiteness on white men… they will reject anyone else’s assertion that they have anything at all that white men need to learn or hear or understand.
They won’t listen not because of malice, but because they’ve been socialized that they have no reason to.
Which, as always, brings me back to white men thinking and “grappling” with the role of whiteness in their day to day and day by day choices and beliefs.
Wyliecoat
As a person who wants to be in the persuasion business but has a very poor head for details, it would be enormously helpful to have a set of arguments and rebuttals laid out clearly against the views these guys spout. Like “If they claim this, this is the answer” for each issue. For instance: yesterday someone was asking for an answer for “Kilmar Garcia is a member of MS13 and he was only technically left off.” There are many ways of responding to this, but what is the most effective? If we had good responses and could share them with everyone on the left as a preemptive preparation, we would feel more confident about wading into these hostile territories. Hope that makes sense.
Paul in KY
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: IMO, it was more ‘It’s one reason why student loan relief was seen by a lot of people as simply another giveaway to entitled NON-white people.’
The Audacity of Krope
@Professor Bigfoot: I’d respectfully suggest to start with the earnest but not fully hip allies. They need more than just the theoretical notion that everyone should be treated with respect. That’s the start, not the end.
Professor Bigfoot
@Chief Oshkosh: By sitting them down and talking to them.
By teaching them and informing them of the history of Blackness on this continent.
By giving them “the talk.”
By helping them understand that “they can’t do what their little white friends do.”
We don’t have the same problem white people do.
Interesting Name Goes Here
@Paul in KY: You miss the point – he was never going to let Kamala on his show. Rogan dicked around until it was impossible to get a visit, then turned around and said that Kamala ghosted him.
Paul in KY
@Destroy Oh Boy: That’s part of the making it uncool to be a right wing douchewad. Someone says they’re going to it and they get hit with laughter and comments wondering why they’re going to waste 2 hours of their life, etc. etc. This hopefully being said by the girl they’d like to bone.
Gvg
@cmorenc: it wasn’t a mistake. He only invited her late, when she was already committed elsewhere under conditions she couldn’t accept. He did that on purpose too.
He was never going to have her on.
Professor Bigfoot
@The Audacity of Krope: Thank you, and one tries.
I know it sometimes seems like my only “schtick” here is to beat on white men to get them to understand the role of straight white maleness in their very subconscious thoughts.
I say this from experience— it took me a minute to learn to STFU and listen to women; and I STILL screw up from time to time (rarely, but I’m still on guard for it). It’s why I say once you see the patriarchy, man, you can’t stop seeing it. It’s EVERYWHERE.
Paul in KY
@Redshift: Seems sort of easy: ‘What have Republicans ever freaking done that would make you think they would want college to be cheaper or free?!?!?! Do you know how any Repub rolls when it comes to making things cheaper or easier for the non-rich?!?!?!!?’
They Call Me Noni
@Professor Bigfoot: Agree.
Bupalos
Again, your “you expect” formulation just baffles me. I spend very little time in the prediction business, it being a sure route to bankruptcy. I don’t “expect” that or “expect” you to moderate your hyper-identity politics framework. Neither in the sense that it’s likely to happen or that you owe it to me or someone else.
My argument is that intentionally breaking down this ethnic/gender slice-and-dice and adopting more universalizing language centered on common human freedom is how we win and hold this country together. This is a claim about practical politics. In predictive terms I fully “expect” you to reject that because your statements here appear to be fully in the grips of theoretical ideology and rarely have a whiff of any kind of practicality to them. “White men need to grapple with their actions, and until they do” reads to me as a kind of passive reheating of arc-of-justice unreality.
The Audacity of Krope
@Professor Bigfoot: I agree wholeheartedly. So much listening has to happen, but first we need to get people in the same room.
Professor Bigfoot
@Bupalos: I think we’re done here.
Professor Bigfoot
@The Audacity of Krope: And to get everyone in the same room, you have to have a level of trust.
Trusting that the people you’re in the room with aren’t there for the express purpose of DARVOing you.
The Audacity of Krope
@Professor Bigfoot: Well, I truly wish I had a suggestion to help that.
FTR, I don’t extend a lot of trust to white people, myself.
Splitting Image
@Wyliecoat:
This gets discussed a fair bit in the scientific community, usually in the context of Creationism. What it boils down to is that these guys have perfected the art of shovelling bullshit at you faster than you can do the research necessary to rebut them. This is known as the “Gish Gallup”.
The only way to beat the Gish Gallup is not to play. The trouble is that the entire conservative ecosystem is totally devoted to the Gish Gallup. Trade, the military, climate science, vaccines, trans rights, everything. It’s all lies and bullshit from top to bottom.
About all anyone can do is ask the question “How many times are you going to let a guy like that lie to you?” I’ve seen numerous people say this about Elon Musk. When he was talking about a technical issue that they knew nothing about, he would sound reasonable and well-educated. When he started talking about a technical issue that they knew a fair bit about, they would realize he was bullshitting. Trump is the same, although he is not nearly as good at it as he used to be.
Paul in KY
@Professor Bigfoot: By your reasoning, we’re all fucked.
brantl
@lowtechcyclist: If you count all the women that didn’t vote at all, but were eligible to vote, as well as those who voted for ANYONE other than Harris, it’s probably 57%.
Paul in KY
@Wyliecoat: He was running away from MS13, for God’s sake! Why would you ever believe anything they say!!!
Paul in KY
@Interesting Name Goes Here: He talked on his show about her going on, etc. etc.. Make him do it. Go camp out there. Leave a metaphorical horses’ head in his bed if that’s what it takes. It might have shaken things up in the race! To me you have to make EVERY EFFORT. Bribe him.
Paul in KY
@Gvg: Make him admit it.
dc
@Melancholy Jaques: It’s not my job to covince them. I’m doing other stuff, defending other people. If you want that job, then take it. What I’m pretty sick of is doom doom doom. Don’t have anything but buts to add to a conversation? Ask yourself why and what are you doing here trying to demobilize everyone?
Chief Oshkosh
@Professor Bigfoot:Thanks for the suggestions.
This seems like good parenting or mentoring, specific to the needs of the individual and to the goals of the parent or mentor. But…you’ve met some of their parents and coaches, right?
I wish this were not such a sad state of affairs, but snark is all I have about that front.
I have the distinct unpleasantness of having to deal with some of those “mentors” in my professional life, and somewhat less so, in my personal life. They’re only getting worse as Trump and the elected Republicans (and Fox and AM radio and…and…and) reinforce the lies and give them permission to be worse and worse human beings. I’ve long ago run out of conversations to have with those people. There’s no “there” there. They truly are reprogrammable meat sacks (as cynically noted by one of the Conservative operatives some years ago), and the remote control is in the hands of christo-fascists and white supremacists.
So, I don’t know that there is anyone in the lives of many (most?) angry young white men who will provide wise and reality-based mentorship along the lines of what you suggest. My wife and I try to effect change in different areas (her forte is criminal justice reform and I tag along), but I don’t yet see how I can play a role in this area. Always looking, though.
bluefoot
@WaterGirl: I haven’t started reading the comments but I want to say I like this. I’ve asked the question before what is our counter programming to the organized and well-funded efforts to radicalize young men. We need to try things and see what works in what situations. There isn’t going to be a silver bullet, and doing proof of concept on different things is an excellent idea.
JoyceH
@Wyliecoat: How to respond to the MS 13 claim – advise the person to beware when the Trump administration says something repeatedly, loudly and angrily, because that means they’re lying. There was a claim made and no judge found it credible because there was no proof. Loud angry repetition is not proof. You might also point out that not many suburban dads are gang members.
Professor Bigfoot
@Paul in KY: I keep hoping you guys will have something, because I got nothin’.
And if you white dudes ain’t got nothin’, then we are fucked, and may God have mercy on us all.
ETA: is it THAT hard for white men to look honestly at whiteness and how it affects and directs them? Or is it just that everyone else is expected to “bend the knee” to their whiteness?
Professor Bigfoot
@Chief Oshkosh: We have the documented history from the Enslavement to the Edmund Pettus Bridge, from the sack of Black Wall Street to the torture and murder of Emmit Till.
That is bound to focus the mind of that young Black man.
That young white’s demographic history is of committing those crimes against people whose existence offends them… speaking as a Black man, I don’t know how you get through that ingrained sense of entitlement.
frosty
@Professor Bigfoot: On this thread as well as a lot of others, I see commenters agreeing (e.g. on the subject of messaging), reiterating the goal, then finishing with “I don’t know what we can do about it.” AFAICT it’s from the whole spectrum of age, race, ethnicity, etc. of the jackaltariat.
I’m not going to say we’re fucked, but it’s going to be a long haul and I hope WG’s contacts can try a lot of things and find out a few that work. I’ll support it any way I can, not to include persuading people in person. After 20 years of canvassing I can attest I’m lousy at it.
ETA: On your ETA, I think it’s hard for anyone to look outside their own lives and really understand how someone else lives. I have a friend who thought photo IDs for voting was a trivial issue until I asked her how someone who didn’t drive and didn’t have a Driver’s License could get to a DMV for a state ID. It was the first time that had occurred to her.
Mr. Bemused Senior
Ah yes. “Repeating an argument does not increase its persuasiveness.” If only this were true outside a well-run courtroom. [Or even inside one where “pounding the table” is effective.]
He came here at age 16 running away from threats. That’s not proof per se but to me it’s indicative.
bluefoot
@Professor Bigfoot: I wish I had an answer to your question about it being that hard for white men to acknowledge and examine their whiteness. I will say for one friend, it took watching video of George Floyd and subsequent retelling of experiences of Black men for him to realize he lived in a completely different world/context than his Black friends and neighbors. Even though he’d heard their stories before, something about that time finally started the dominoes falling. Now he’s an outspoken ally.
tangentially, it was George Floyd and the pandemic that made me decide to stop trying to spare the feelings of white people and stop soft-pedaling my experiences for their comfort.
Paul in KY
@Professor Bigfoot: It shouldn’t be that hard to see (how being White in this country is a big leg up)! I can’t get in their (White douchewad types) head, thank God, but many are ‘born on 2nd base and think they hit a double’. They tend not to be very introspective, as you can imagine, and get defensive about positive things that have happened to them that probably were helped along by being White.
That’s why I like derision and making it ‘uncool’ for them to vote GQP. Maybe inside they’re still racist assholes, but all we want is for them to stop pulling that lever (at this point). From there, we can then work on changing other aspects of their behavior/world view.
We have GOT to get a Dem back in that Whitehouse!!!!
Professor Bigfoot
@frosty: I do it continually with regard to the lives of women as compared to my own.
Maybe I’m just asking too much of that demographic.
Gloria DryGarden
@Josie: if you and gin and tonic wrote a book, or had a podcast on this, it would be of great interest.
the men who expect privilege and subservience, are getting their asses locked, and are no doubt searching for trad wives. The rest of young men are having a better chance at equal partners, and stronger richer relationships, because women have more independence, and because people like you raised your boys in the way you have.
tobie
David Hogg is turning out to be just the putz many of us feared he would be as vice chair of the DNC. He could be putting money into a 50-state strategy, into crafting a new media strategy, or into building infrastructure in states that are going to see a population spike in 2030. Instead he’s putting all his energy into organizing primaries against elected Dems who don’t meet his purity tests.
Is there a single populist progressive who is not a Trojan horse?
Baud
@tobie:
So the DNC will interfere in primaries?
Every accusation is a confession.
Professor Bigfoot
@tobie: Here’s a guy who has credibility primarily because he’s a white guy with NO legislative experience.
Melancholy Jaques
@Professor Bigfoot:
It’s possible. Are we surprised that a swaggering person who says & does whatever he wants, bullies & punishes anyone who he dislikes, treats women like sex-bots, & never suffers any consequences for it appeals to young males?
What is it, exactly, that we are trying to accomplish? Do we want them to vote for Democrats? Is there some other goal?
Professor Bigfoot
@Melancholy Jaques: I want them to recognize that their own freedom is utterly dependent on the freedom of every damn body else.
To understand that they are not inheriting the world of privilege that their grandfathers did, but that if they’d just give it a chance, this would be a better one.
They’ve never been “not-free,” so they don’t get it when we say “ain’t nobody free until everybody is free.”
Interesting Name Goes Here
@tobie: “Progressive” as a label is fast joining “populism” as one of those words that people frankly need to stop using or giving legitimacy to because they’ve been co-opted…well, hijacked, really, by individuals who never had any good intentions to begin with. Neither word means what it used to.
schrodingers_cat
@tobie: David Hogg is just a bog standard Bernie bro who wants to harm the Democratic party. He spouts lefty rhetoric so the usual suspects will be forgiving of him.
Interesting Name Goes Here
@Paul in KY: Pulling a Laura Loomer, however metaphorical or literal you want to take that, doesn’t look good on anyone, and there is zero doubt that any attempt to force the issue would have been used against her by either Rogan or his supporters.
It was a setup, plain and simple.
tobie
@Professor Bigfoot: Is it really so hard for white guys to pull on the same rope as everyone else? We’re in an existential crisis right now. We don’t have time for this crap.
(Sorry…I know I’m preaching to the choir.)
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@tobie:
Am I the only one who doesn’t see the big deal? Incumbents aren’t entitled to their seats. Let the primary voters decide
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
That being said, I’d prefer he’d do a 50 state strategy
Joy in FL
I’ve only read about half the comments in this thread, but before it drops off, I want to add this thought.
I have no experience with the kinds of white males that are MAGA types. I find it hard to understand how anyone could align themselves with that deceitful, dumb, cruel ideology. That would make it hard for me to be effective in any outreach to them.
I became really aware of my ignorance about men who think they are being treated unfairly when we had the Zooms about the book Black Pill with Elle Reeve. Reading that book was a mind-opener for me and really showed me the immense gap between my most fierce areas of resentment and how puny they are compared to those of the people her book is about.
So I’m saying this in this post because I assume and believe that the “influencers” that National Ground Game has are way more aware than an “innocent” like I am could ever be. We need people who can talk on equal footing with MAGA believers; I’m glad NGG is making that their work.
Now I’ll go back to reading more comments.
BTW, there is a YouTube meeting tonight, 8-9 eastern time, for “a nationwide call to find out how we can build on the resounding success on April 5th and keep the pressure on Trump, Musk, and their enablers in Congress.” You can go to Mobilize and it’s probably easy to find.
WTFGhost
Okay, define the problem.
What are young, white, males, looking for?
What are they not finding?
Next, what are they *told* they are looking for?
Good jobs, that are now “being reserved for minorities.”
Sex, without having to deal with women being human beings, not sex receptacles.
A feeling of being better than others, because of the color of their skin.
A sure knowledge they are better than others, because they chose to be evangelical, rather than to follow a religious creed or calling, especially those that demand you be good people.
A certainty that they’re hundreds of times better than Mexicans, and Asians, and Muslim folks, and Jewish folks (except Israelis!), and womenfolk, at everything, and should have jobs, sex, and social/religious superiority over all.
Um. My first questions really were sincere. And my second answers aren’t intended to be smart alecky. When I hear of “how do you attract young white men?” I have no idea what anyone wants, needs, or cares about.
I do know one thing: men should have the right to show emotion, and other people should have the responsibility to recognize that not all negative emotion is a sign of hostility. After that, my “men’s rights” gets really fuzzy.
YY_Sima Qian
Of course the siren song of white patriarchy will appeal to a lot of impressionable young white men, especially as young people as a whole are experience heightened scarcity, precarity & anxiety as Martin & others have pointed out. The siren song doesn’t work as well on women & minorities (in the aggregate, plenty of exceptions), but the appeal to young white men would be obvious. Kind of a reverse dynamic of how the young marginalized minorities (especially men) were drawn to comic books.
Solution? It is still easier for government policy to address the sources of scarcity, precarity & anxiety, & do so in a way that promote equality of opportunity & egalitarianism, than for said policies to regulate morality & suppress people’s baser instincts. The latter have to be addressed at the facility, community & societal levels. Promoting empathy & reduce toxic masculinity in media, entertainment & mass culture, to start. They can be part of the education curriculum, too, but that is a school board by school board fight. So, a grass root level struggle, not one to be imposed from the above by elected politicians. Political leaders do not make for suitable candidates for the moral vanguard, although they should proudly & confidently express their personal beliefs.
Soapdish
Statistically speaking, the best way to beat the lottery is to not play.
WTFGhost
@Gin & Tonic: In my opinion, they have a point, but they’re misusing it.
Look: there are a lot of rules for proper behavior for men, and not all of them privilege a person. One of those rules, is, displays of negative emotion are punished, swiftly. Well, not all negative emotions are hostile; some are the result of mere pain.
Men are supposed to be able to negotiate sex, from the first glance, to the first bedding, and they have nearly no guidelines for real relationships, only charlatans who swear that women like a man who treats them as an inferior.
Men are supposed to be strong, brave, and able to lead, when necessary, but our society mistakes cowardice for real courage, and fury for strength, and believe that men are at their best when they want to harm someone who has done something personally to the man, usually as a result of fridging of some form. Furious revenge is a “many” trait, you see – not merely beating the bad guys, and putting them in prison for a long time.
A lot of things about manhood have changed, and a lot of expectations have changed, but, there’s not a lot of good messaging about men, for men. There’s been a lot more rebellion against the change, than support about living through it, and remaining a truly masculine man, rather than a toxic asshole.
Gloria DryGarden
@Melancholy Jaques: you’re describing a group against which one migh5 aim voter suppression. If one wanted voter suppression at all, or if others are employing it. Just saying.
Paul in KY
@Interesting Name Goes Here: I disagree.