(Thread) What we mean when we say, “It’s about race”

(and sexism and homophobia and fear of difference)

In response to my thread on Trump-GOP-Russia love, @barryszuul, says, like c'mon, we're still not past that?

Here's a roundup of scholarship giving the answer. https://twitter.com/BarrysZuul/status/1155050383900889088

1/ Way #1: The Authoritarian Dynamic

In their essay, “Authoritarianism is Not a Momentary Madness, but an Eternal Dynamic within Liberal Democracies,” in @karen_stenner and @JonHaidt offer a psychological explanation.

2/ An “authoritarian dynamic,” occurs when a person with an “authoritarian disposition” is faced with a “normative threat.”

A person with an “authoritarian disposition” is averse to complexity.

Authoritarians value obedience and conformity over freedom and difference.

3/ Those with authoritarians dispositions have a “bias against different others (racial and ethnic outgroups, immigrants, ‘deviants,’ etc.)

Stenner cites studies showing that across all cultures about 33% of the population has an authoritarian disposition.

4/ This means authoritarianism is “substantially heritable.”

A normative threat is something that threatens “sameness and order."

When confronted with a normative threat, authoritarians have a strong reaction. They become fearful, angry, and cruel.

5/ Trump governs by creating normative threats. He deliberately keeps the authoritarians riled.

Liberal democracy naturally becomes more diverse (for example, by expanding voting rights).

As diversity expands, the conditions arise for a demagogue to stoke their fears.

6/ Hence, a cycle. Democracy expands, authoritarians react.

According to this theory, Trump happened because liberal democracy (diversity) exceeded the capacity of many people to tolerate it.

Now on to Way #2.

7/ Way #2: MAGA means back to the days without all those pesky regulations.

People are amazed that the Trump-GOP keeps breaking laws.

They are breaking the laws they don’t think should exist.

MAGA means take us back to the age of robber barons. See https://twitter.com/Teri_Kanefield/status/1070708168949346304

8/ In the 1920s, money laundering, stock market manipulation, predatory loans, etc. were not so illegal.

White men could get rich by grabbing and taking.

Ever since regulatory agencies were established, people have been trying to get rid of them.

They don’t want regulations.

9/ Regulations moved the seat of power from one to the other
It's not hard to see why some people don't like those regulations.

Way #3: The Paranoid Style in American Politics

10/ Hofstadter conducted a thorough review of American politics from before the founding of the nation to McCarthyism and noticed a pattern among a small impassioned minority on the fringes of the political spectrum.

He called their behavior the “paranoid style” in politics.

11/ He called their behavior the “paranoid style” in politics.

Those embracing the paranoid style of politics believe that unseen satanic forces are trying to destroy something larger in which they belong.

They “feel dispossessed” . . .

12/ . . . and that “America has been largely taken away from them and their kind.”

They are “determined to repossess it and prevent the final act of subversion.” 

They therefore adopt extreme measures, and will stop at nothing to prevent what they see as an impending calamity.

13/ According to Timothy Snyder, Putin realized that Russia could not compete with the West. The EEU could not compete with the EU. NATO had too much power.

So instead of competing in a contest he couldn’t win, Putin set out to make the West like Russia.

14/ For decades Russians have been infiltrating the American right wing —the NRA and evangelical churches, (where Putin's homophobia has appeal).

Remember Maria Butina?

Russia (according to Snyder) selected America’s president and ran a campaign to get him elected.