November 30 2016 Dispatch #7 Day 22 Post-Ascendency of White Supremacy & Misogyny (PAWSM)
OK, if I wrote a dispatch everyday about White Supremacy and Misogyny, my head would burst open and make terrible mess on my computer.
BUT, today is a MUST SCREAM-OUT for Resistance to the Democrats in the House and Senate who are busy whitesplaining the election and normalizing White Supremacy.
►Wait, what do I mean by WHITESPLAINING?! Wiktionary says whitesplaining is the act of a Caucasian person condescendingly explaining racism and/or sociopolitical issues related to race to a non-Caucasian audience presuming the listener’s inferior understanding because of their race. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/whitesplaining#English
►This is what I mean by WHITESPLAINING: Actions of usually Caucasian persons condescendingly or ignorantly or misleadingly explaining that white supremacy doesn’t operate/exist to a usually Caucasian audience presuming/cultivating the listeners’ inferior understanding because of their ignorance, deliberate denial, and/or privilege.
To wit: Democrats lost the election because Democrats lost the working class voters who are hurting economically and angry. And who is the primary reason for this failure? Why, Nancy Pelosi of course – the next available woman. (As Hillary won the popular vote by 2.35 million – 48.2% of the vote compared with Trump receiving 46.5% — it does become harder to blame her.)
REALLY!?!? Don’t you mean WHITE working class voters?! SERIOUSLY!?!? These people have apparently forgotten a few important details about the election. Gee, it has only been three weeks, but I guess this is what happens when Whitesplaining necessary to normalize White Supremacy takes precedence over reality.
Here are numbers that push back against Whitesplaining:
Among white voters (who made up 70% of voters), Trump won 58% to Clinton’s 37%. Trump’s margin among whites without a college degree is the largest among any candidate in exit polls since 1980. Two-thirds (67%) of non-college whites backed Trump, compared with just 28% who supported Clinton, resulting in a 39-point advantage for Trump among this group. Due largely to the dramatic movement among whites with no college degree, the gap between college and non-college whites is wider in 2016 than in any past election dating to 1980. Trump won whites with a college degree 49% to 45%. White women voted for Trump by 53% to 43% for Clinton
Clinton won 88% of black voters to Trump’s 8%, and 65% of Hispanic voters to Trump’s 29%. Clinton won 52% of voters with annual incomes below $50,000 to Trump’s 41%. Trump won 49% of voters with annual incomes above $50,000 to 47% to Clinton. Clinton won 53% of voters with annual incomes below $30,000 to Trump’s 41%.
Trump won the rural vote by 62% to 34% and the suburban vote by 50% to 45%, while Clinton won the urban vote by 59% to 35%. The difference between rural/suburban and urban votes has everything to do with white flight in response to racial tensions, desegregation and school busing. In the early days of white flight, two federal policies — the construction of the interstate highway system and mortgage guarantees for the new suburbs — pulled whites out of cities. Read and learn about White Supremacy ongoing impact on US social history:
Trump’s campaign gleefully and proudly appealed to White Supremacy, Misogyny, Xenophobia, Islamophobia, and Bigotry writ large. And white people voted for him, not just working class white people, but all kinds of white voters.
Whitesplaining the election involves immediately forgetting Trump’s dog whistle strategies for winning votes, strategies even more egregiously despicable than Jessie Helms. (Oops, you Whitesplainers have probably forgotten about Jessie Helms.) Trump never acknowledged his leading role in the birther campaign that intended to denigrate our black president.
Whitesplaining means that the Republicans are once again REWARDED for these despicable tactics. Republicans are REWARDED for eight years of non-stop racism/white supremacy designed not only to block the leadership of a black President, but also to incite white supremacist fears and backlash. These tactics, including government shut-downs, inflammatory rhetoric, and outrageous lies, deeply harmed the country.
Whitesplaining forgets the Supreme Court’s 2013 ruling that invalidated key parts of the Voting Rights Act. Millions of would-be voters didn’t participate because of obstacles designed to discourage them; these likely suppressed enough minority voters to cost Clinton the election.
For example, Wisconsin adopted a photo-ID law. In Milwaukee, where a large number of African Americans don’t drive or have licenses, turnout declined in 2016 by 41,000 compared with 2012. (Clinton lost Wisconsin by 20,000 votes.) Turnout was significantly lower than in 2004 and 2008; the drop-off was steepest in the poorest precincts. “No matter how hard one tries to attribute this to lower voter interest in this election, the stark drop must be attributable to impact of the photo-ID rule,” argues Kristen Clarke, head of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-election-really-was-rigged/
We heard Trump’s views on how bad things are, and we heard how upset white people are about the economy. So how did the country actually fare during the 8 years of Obama’s Presidency? According to the US Census Bureau annual “Income and Poverty in the United States: 2015 and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2015, the nation is improving. Less than a decade after one of the worst recessions in modern American history (created under Republican administration), the US Census Bureau reported that household incomes are up, poverty rate is down, and the number of people with health insurance is at 90%, a record high. Huh….how about that….
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