I went on a short run today and had some random thoughts bubble up that I want to write down so here goes. I think some people have a tendency to think in terms of relatively homogenous social units - old people, red/blue states etc - when those things are really full of conflict

and difference internally. They're cross cut by class, gender, race, dis/ability, migration status, etc. This tendency to homogenize is especially mistaken when the evidence is in how people vote. An egregious one IMO is the 'white women voted for Trump' myth, which takes the

fact that of the 67% of white women who voted in 2016 between 47 and 52% voted for Trump and generalizes it to that population as a whole. Thats just an inaccurate claim and it leaves out the internal contention in that category. I think a similar thing happens with some people's

take on red and blue states. I've seen a lot of 'welp, the red states are getting what they asked for now', which is wrong headed because there aren't really broad social consensuses on politics in place in those places or anywhere else.

To my mind the policy differences between red and blue states should be seen as variations in institutions and techniques of domination and rule. Those institutions and techniques act different on different people. Generally the higher up people are in society the more those

institutions and techniques act by legitimating - people are made to feel represented, heard, existing channels are a vehicle for them. Generally the lower down people are the more they're made to feel resigned or frightened. (There's a book I like a lot that gets into this, by

Goran Therborn, The Power of Ideology and the Ideology of Power.) And I'll note that even in blue states there are policies that are right now going to kill a lot of poorer people during the pandemic - CA and NY aren't letting enough prisoners out, Cuomo's cutting medicaid,etc.

My hunch is the tendency to treat internally divided groupings as overly homogenous is a mistake that is in some way shaped by people's middle class status and by having institutions of rule act on people in that group in specific ways. I also suspect this tendency is closely

related to electoral politics, though I'm unsure if it's an independent mistake that feeds into electoral politics (electoral depoliticization imo!) or if it's a mistake that in part is produced by electoral politics and/or the institutions thereof.