"They Belittle Us"

Trickle down economics has led to trickle down politics. Our leaders need to start listening to people, not tell them what we're doing FOR them.

Back in 2016, I took my recorder and mic to a parking lot outside of a grocery store in Las Vegas. I was gathering answers to a question NPR was posing to listeners - and asking member stations to record. The question was about anxiety in the voting public.

Talk about an understatement.

I talked to a man, Nicholas, from Iran who was an engineer. He came to this country at the age of 15 during the revolution. Which means, when I was talking to him in 2016, he was in his 50s.

There is a big age discrimination going on when it comes to jobs in this country that nobody talks about. I have three engineering degrees, 22 years of experience, and I’m working minimum wage as a security guard. Before I used to interview at one place and I end up with five different job (offers).

Almost everybody I talked to mentioned low pay and high costs.

I talked to a man, Josh, and his mother, Maryann, who were angry.

I knew when I approached them they were Trump supporters. There was a hardness about them. A hardness that comes from a lifetime of working backbreaking jobs for horrible bosses, with no benefits or respect. A hardness that comes from just barely scraping by. The hardness of living in poor housing. The humiliation of giving the cashier your SNAP card to pay for groceries, only to have them or the person in back of you snicker.

I talked to Josh and Maryann for about 9 minutes. Letting him, mostly, talk. Letting him work through till he finally got to the nub of what he wanted to say. He started by noting that all the candidates were corrupt. Then he said this:

They belittle us. You know, the working class. They belittle us a lot. They sit there and they judge us. Who are they to judge anybody.

I liked Josh. We were looking into each others’ eyes. We were talking. Listening. He lamented that nobody does that anymore. We’re all on our phones.

I also knew that Josh was a harbinger. There were a lot of people in 2016 who felt unseen, dismissed, belittled.

The Democrats had eight years to change that. To let Josh know he was important. To get angry at the things he was angry about. To position themselves as the change makers, the champions of the unseen.

I have no idea if Josh and his mother are still alive. He was a young man, so he probably is. But even if he had been, say, murdered, no Southern Nevada politico would have made anything of it.

But when United Health Care CEO Brian Thompson was gunned down, a majority of Democrats in the House and Senate expressed outrage. And belittled people who were pointing out the anger simmering under the hero worship of Luigi Mangione.

Later, after Trump took office, Senator Chris Murphy was shocked when Trump shut down USAID. “They’re going to kill children,” he said.

Yes, Senator Murphy. The Heritage Foundation conservatives are perfectly fine with killing Black and Brown children, and they have been telegraphing this since the Obama administration started including LGBTQ rights in its foreign aid portfolio. Hell, they’ve been telegraphing this since the words “Obama” and “administration” were put together.

But that’s a cultural issue, right? A cultural issue which Republicans can base their entire philosophy around, but which Democrats see as a losing proposition to defend. Or go on offense for.

Democrats can’t seem to reframe the racism and anti-trans sexism as a human rights issue.

After all, you can’t attack hate if you kinda sorta agree with it. Right?

Also, please tell me the difference between killing children in Africa and killing children in Gaza? Shouldn’t we want living, healthy children in both places?

Back in 2018, I did a short stint at Wisconsin Public Radio. We did an interview with a woman who had written a book about white liberal racism.

She wrote about being with white kids who were nervous driving into a neighborhood where mostly Black people lived. In Madison. They watched a group of kids laughing and talking as they walked across the street.

“This is a bad neighborhood,” one of the white kids said.

She told a story about a father - an academic at the university - whose daughter was beside herself because her teacher was being, to her, obviously racist to her best friend. The white parents tried to talk to their daughter. They tried to talk to the school. They tried to talk to the teacher. All to no avail.

The little white girl was so distraught, her parents decided to take her out of that school and put her in a private school.

So she wouldn’t see the racism.

And wouldn’t be upset.

They did not offer to put her best friend - who was experiencing the racism - in a private school.

These are the people Josh was talking about in that parking lot in 2016. People who bathe in their intelligence and their virtue.

People who are absolutely shocked at the Trump administration’s cruelty.

But who still avoid people like Josh and his mom.

And are certainly wary of a Black man walking around in the halls of their university building.

Liberal racism and classism, in many ways, is the worst kind. Because it is utterly unaware. And horribly arrogant.

The national conversation regarding Democrats is about frustration that they’re not doing anything to counter Trump. I don’t think they need to do anything to counter Trump. That’s playing on Trump’s field.

They need to take their game to another field, and make that game so exciting that people will come watch and cheer and dream of someday playing that game.

Right now, Democrats have to rethink what it is they stand for. Then they have to tell us.

We need to know what their philosophy is.

We need them to contrast what makes them different, not from MAGA and Trump, but from George Bush and John Roberts. And Reagan. We most definitely need Democrats standing up and telling us how Reagan steered us down the wrong track.

We need them to stand for ideas, like raising the minimum wage (and with it, acknowledging that the poverty rate is a joke), instituting Universal Basic Income, and shoring up Social Security, which is neither a Ponzi scheme nor insolvent.

Democrats have to stop focusing on the next race and focus on the next decade. And then the decade after that. They have to be leaders who are fierce and passionate and show the Josh’s and Maryanns of the world that they not only see them, they’re angry on their behalf. And they’re going to do something.

This means a change in focus from every individual Democratic office holder.

Because we know who Democrats stand for right now. It’s not Josh or Maryann. It’s not the engineer immigrant from Iran facing age discrimination. It’s not any of the kids talking and laughing as they crossed the street in Madison.

The reason people voted for Trump - or didn’t vote at all - is because they are tired of being belittled and unseen. They are tired of the constant struggle for dignity. They are tired of justifying their humanity.

Start talking to people about policies that can bring back their dignity. Start looking them in the eye and showing real anger at their stories. Start hearing everyone. Get them to support your game. One whose rules are hope and dignity and economic and social equality. Understand their anger, and offer them something better to salve it.

In the coming months, I will look at specific issues people face, and the policy solutions that will make people’s lives better.

I’m not going to talk about the politics of it. Though I will point out the racism and sexism that plays a role.

Because, let’s face it, a lot of the dismantling of our social and economic systems are steeped in racism and sexism.

Right now, though, I’m tired of diagnosing what’s wrong. I’m gonna start writing about how we can make it right.

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