Americans Much Less Radical And Much More In Synch Than They Think
The great novelist Rudyard Kipling, mourning the gulf of misunderstanding between the British and their Indian subjects, lamented in 1892 that that “Oh, East is East and West is West and never the twain shall meet.”
He may have written the same sentiment today, referring to the red, more conservative and blue, more liberal states. But Kipling may have been pretty wrong.
Throngs of rabid trump supporters attended a Nazi-like rally at New York’s Madison Square Garden where speakers referred to Puerto Rico as a “floating island of garbage” and that Democratic presidential candidate, Vice President Kamala Harris, is a whore led by her “pimp handlers.”
A New York Times op-ed noted that “fear and anger can make any person more vulnerable to charlatans,” a sentiment that might explain why so many suffering Americans are drawn to trump, the worst charlatan to ever compete for the presidency.
And the ancient Chinese philosopher Lao Tzu could have been offering the narcissistic trump a primer on leadership when he wrote, “A leader is best when people barely know he exists. When his work is done, his aim fulfilled, they will say: We did it ourselves.”
David Cox, head of the local, Ohio building trade council, was asked why it was getting harder to win Democratic support among workers when the workers were getting more work than they had seen in 35 years.
“It takes a little while for these guys to wake up,” Cox said.
Cox may be the closest to the truth.
There you have it: Apparently insurmountable gaps between the red trump states and the blue Kamala Harris states; a seething anger that leads people to back the politician who says what they want to hear, even if it is total hogwash; and the failure of voters to connect reality with their current state of affairs.
The general thought is that both sides are guided by their bête noire. The reality is much more nuanced.
A recent survey concluded that more than three quarters of Americans “believe our differences are not so great that we cannot come together.” The proportion of people who share similar views about the most hotly debated issues is greater than most Americans realize.
“Yet someone scrolling through a social media news feed, or switching on cable TV or talk radio could be convinced that we’re a country heading towards civil war,” the survey found.
The survey concluded that many Americans have a deeply distorted misunderstanding of each other, a situation that has been labeled America’s “Perception Gap.” This gap leaves people hostile over the wrong, extreme perceptions of other. The larger a person’s perception gap, the more negative their views are of the other side, according to the survey.
The study showed that an important source of polarization is the false beliefs people have of their political opponents. The survey found that when Democrats and Republicans believe that the more extreme their opponents’ views, the more threatened they become.
“They start seeing each other as enemies, and start believing they need to win at all costs. They make excuses for their own side cheating and breaking the rules to beat the other side. And as our public debates become more hateful, many in the Exhausted Majority tune out altogether,” the survey deduced. “People with large perception gaps are more likely to describe their opponents as ‘hateful,’ ‘ignorant’ and ‘bigoted.’ This points to the vicious cycle of polarization: the Americans who are most engaged in political issues and debates spend the most time reading, watching and listening to media that portrays the other side as extreme, further increasing their hostility and distrust and widening their Perception Gap.”
The survey was completed by “More in Common,” a non-profit whose mission is to “understand the forces that drive people apart, find common ground and bring people together to tackle shared challenges.” “More in Common” partnered with the global research firm, YouGov, to survey 2,100 Americans on issues including climate change, patriotism, sexual assault, police conduct and more. “More in Common” has teams in the U.S., United Kingdom, Poland, Germany, France, Spain and Brazil.
“Almost two-thirds of Americans describe themselves as either Democrats or Republicans, and with every passing year each side seems to dislike the other more and more,” said the “More in Common” statement. “We trust each other less, we fear each other more, and we struggle to understand how those on the other side of the political fence could possibly hold so many wrong-headed views.”
The organization found that a major misconception is that the gap between Democrats and Republicans is unbreachable. The misconception is largely due to the white heat of personalized social media feeds and a tendency for people to live in bubbles of like-minded friends.
In many ways, the survey showed that the two sides are much more alike than different. An example was a question that looked at the commonly-held belief that Democrats and Republicans hold mutually exclusive, extreme views. The survey showed that just 30 percent of those polled said they believe the opposite party has extreme views.
“We asked Americans what they themselves believed and what they estimated people on the other side believed,” the mission statement said.
For some examples, there was a fairly narrow 33 percent gap on how people felt about whether “properly controlled immigration can be good for America.” The gap consistently shrunk and commonality surfaced with statements like “Racism still exists in America” (28 percent gap); “Sexism still exists in Americans” (19 percent gap); to virtual agreement by Democrats and Republicans that “Donald Trump is a flawed person” and that “People are right to be concerned about how climate change might affect us.”
Among other areas, there was a 37 percent gap on whether “most people are bad people”; and there was just a 28 percent gap of beliefs in the statement, “I am proud to be an American though I acknowledge my country’s flaws.” The different opinions begin to converge and dissipate with questions like “law abiding citizens should have the right to bear firearms” (24 percent); America should not be a socialist country (25 percent); and the U.S. should not abolish the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency or ICE, (13 percent).
Hidden Tribes
In one of the largest national studies of America’s polarization ever conducted, More in Common’s “Hidden Tribes” report found less differences than might be expected among the seven political “tribes.”
The largest group or tribe called themselves the “Politically Disengaged” tribe, with just 26 percent believing that the other side was too political.
The two groups with the smallest percentage of believers are the most ideological groups of Democrats and Republicans, known as “Progressive Activists” (8 percent) and the “Devoted Conservatives” (6 percent.)
The rest were more toward the moderate range of the political spectrum. A total of 11 percent said they were “Traditional Liberals”; 15 percent identified as “Passive Liberals”; 15 percent as “Moderates”; and 19 percent as “Traditional Conservatives.”
It may sound counterintuitive but people who regularly read the news were found to be the least aware of the other side.
“We found that the more news people consumed, the larger their Perception Gap,” the statement said.
The survey found that people who said they read the news “most of the time” were nearly three times more distorted in their perceptions than those who said they read the news “only now and then.”
However, not all news sources are created equal. Some news sources are associated with larger Perception Gaps, like Breitbart, Drudge Report and popular Fox talk radio programs such as Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh. Large Perception Gaps were also associated with liberal sources such as Huffington Post and the Daily Kos.
The only media source that most people associated with better understanding of other Americans’ views were the traditional television networks of ABC, NBC and CBS.
Another counterintuitive finding was that education makes for better informed Americans. In fact, the more educated people tend to be less informed. Republicans’ misperceptions of Democrats do not improve with higher levels of education and Democrats’ understanding of Republicans actually gets worse with every additional degree they earn.
“This effect is so strong that Democrats without a high school diploma are three times more accurate (about the attitudes of others) than those with a postgraduate degree,” the survey found.
The survey noted that one cause for the perception gap among more educated Democrats is that they are likely to have fewer Republican friends than Democrats with less education.
“Highly educated Democrats are the most likely to say that ‘most of my friends’ share their political beliefs,” the survey noted.
The more educated Republicans, however, reported having about as many Democrat friends as less educated Republicans.
Another myth that was busted by the survey was that social media platforms provide a personalized way to get news and commentary from anyone and everyone so that users get a cross section of their community’s political views.
The truth, according to the survey, is that only 26 percent of American reported sharing social media posts about politics. Americans who view more social media have a higher perception gap about their adversaries than the national average. Those who do not post on social media have an average Perception Gap of 18, and those who do post on social media have an average Perception Gap of 29.
“The political content we see on social media is therefore disproportionately from people with a more distorted understanding of the other side, further adding to the problem,” the survey found.
Meanwhile, another poll found that if the presidential races were decided solely on policies, Harris would be the clear winner because voters overwhelmingly prefer Harris’s agenda to trump’s. This is partly because poll found that Harris has done a poor job communicating what she stands for while Republicans have cunningly mis-defined her brand for her.
The questions were included in a recent YouGov survey, which blind-tested voters on more than 100 policy proposals. It expanded on a smaller YouGov survey in July when President Joe Biden was still on the ticket.
Nearly all of Harris’s proposals received majority support among registered voters. Only half of Trump’s did.
Among the Harris proposals, 90 percent of those polled said they favored funding detection technology to intercept fentanyl and other drugs at the border. Her most accepted proposals include crime, social and reproductive issues, education, the environment and health.
Those surveyed said they trusted trump more on issues involving “crime” and “guns.” But Harris’ plan to require background checks for all gun purchases had 86 percent support. Other areas backed by Harris and receiving voter support were for job training and substance abuse care for former prisoners and a national database tracking police misconduct. Trump has opposed both gun background checks and the police misconduct database.
The least popular Harris plan was to increase the number of refugees admitted to the U.S., a proposal supported by 32 percent of those asked.
Among the most popular trump proposals was his recent pandering to eliminate taxes on Social Security income with 85 percent support. He also has support on his plans for the economy.
Trump’s least supported plan is to cut regulations on cryptocurrency, with 24 percent in support. He also was poorly received for his proposals on health and crime. Trump’s proposal to impose the death penalty for drug-related offenses had support from 29 percent of the voters polled. Trump’s plan to give police full protection against civil suits also got most thumbs down with just 31 percent in favor.
The survey found that most people oppose efforts to ban race-related books and content in public schools. Harris has called for an inclusive curriculum that examines racial policies , known as critical race theory studies. Trump has fought against such studies.
Most of those surveyed said:
They supported shutting down the southern border to new entrants if an average of more than 5,000 migrants per day try to cross unlawfully in a week. Harris has supported the plan, which was included in a bi-partisan immigration proposal that was defeated after trump urged Republicans to vote against it.
Most agreed with imposing tariffs on other countries’ imports equal to the tariffs imposed by those countries on American exports.
Most agreed with ending teacher tenure in K-12 public schools.
Most want to prevent some kinds of militarized equipment from being sold to local police agencies.
Like Harris, most would ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, while trump has championed opposition to any gun control laws.
The poll found that many believed that some of Harris’s plans were actually proposed by trump. One example was the false belief that both candidates support Harris’s proposal for greater detection of fentanyl at the border. The fact is that trump has opposed the plan.
Harris has proposed restricting exports to China of advanced technologies with military applications. The survey found that 40 percent believe that trump made the suggestion.
Another false belief was Harris’s plan to close the border if an average of more than 5,000 migrants try to cross each day in a week. A total of 40 percent said they believed it was trump’s proposal.
Trump and Harris support boosting domestic and oil and gas production but 60 percent of the voters thought that only trump supported the increase.
Other areas of misunderstanding about plans supported by both candidates include:
Boosting domestic oil and gas production. The poll found that 60 percent of voters think only trump want the increases.
Allowing fracking for energy production. Among those polled 52 percent think only trump wants to permit fracking.
Both candidates want to increase federal funding for local police departments but 47 percent think only trump supports the plan.
Harris and trump have endorsed requiring insurers to cover in vitro fertilization. But trump has opposed fertility care while Democrats tried and failed to pass a law on the proposal.