#if leftists hadn't been so cruel rude etc after the election

[sparklesthefatcat]

election take that I'm putting here b/c I've officially sworn off twitter: I totally understand the impulse to be irritated frustrated furious w/ liberals right now. I am too! but I have to ask: has condescending to liberals or democrats ever convinced them on anything?

the left has established that we shouldn't condescend towards working class trump voters, and indeed liberals repeatedly doing this is why they can never win working class trump voters over. so why on earth do we think that condescending to liberals is somehow a winning strategy? that they're not also worthy of respect, listening to, compromise and collaboration as we try to build more support for our vision of the world?

especially given how much of the liberal understanding of the world and reaction to the election is shaped by identity politics (which again, I think we can and should critique!) it's also really hard for me to not see our dismissiveness of liberal concerns as coming from some amount of racism and misogyny! like actually it's worth validating that some people find a lot of meaning in representation! that's not dumb! & also, how can we move folks beyond representation politics towards a vision for liberation?

frankly, if nonwhite & queer leftists can hold space and empathy for working class trump voters who choose racism and queerphobia in response to economic pain, then I think it's outrageous that we can't hold space and empathy for women and POC harris supporters who chose moderate liberal policy in response to racism and queerphobia! it sucks that that dichotomy is the option we have, but we didn't blame trump voters for their shitty choice in the shitty dichotomy back in 2016, so why on earth are we blaming harris supporters for their choice now?

we don't/shouldn't call trump voters 'stupid' for voting for trump, because that won't convince them to vote differently. we CANNOT keep calling liberals 'stupid' for voting for democrats because that's not going to convince them to change their party either.