Trump voters, explained

[Aroura]

This article on Cracked is, for one thing, not humorous at all, but takes a serious look at why Trump voters even exist.
I already had a little understanding of their anger, resentment and disenfranchisement.  I know a lot of Trump voters feel like they are at the bottom and being pushed ever further downward.  But this article did a better job of explaining why than I could have.

how half of America went insane

The theme expresses itself in several ways -- primitive vs. advanced, tough vs. delicate, masculine vs. feminine, poor vs. rich, pure vs. decadent, traditional vs. weird. All of it is code for rural vs. urban. That tense divide between the two doesn't exist because of these movies, obviously. These movies used it as shorthand because the divide already existed.

We country folk are programmed to hate the prissy elites. That brings us to Trump.

This is true.  In big epic movies, usually the poor farmer is the hero, and the rich city dwellers are the bad guys.  

If you'd asked me at the time, I'd have said the fear and hatred wasn't of people with brown skin, but of that specific tribe they have in Chicago -- you know, the guys with the weird slang, music and clothes, the dope fiends who murder everyone they see. It was all part of the bizarro nature of the cities, as perceived from afar -- a combination of hyper-aggressive savages and frivolous white elites. Their ways are strange. And it wasn't like pop culture was trying to talk me out of it:

It is like us vs them.

It's not just perception, either -- the stats back up the fact that these are parallel universes. People living in the countryside are twice as likely to own a gun and will probably get married younger. People in the urban "blue" areas talk faster and walk faster. They are more likely to be drug abusers but less likely to be alcoholics. The blues are less likely to own land and, most importantly, they're less likely to be Evangelical Christians.

Mario Tama/Getty Images

A day without hellfire and brimstone is like a day without sunshine.

In the small towns, this often gets expressed as "They don't share our values!" and my progressive friends love to scoff at that. "What, like illiteracy and homophobia?!?!"
Nope. Everything.

This seems to be what is driving the huge political divide in our country.  WE see them as backwards, racist, homophobic, mysogonistic barbarians, and they see us as, well, I think they see us as a new version of Sodom and Gamora.  God will destroy us all, and take them with us, even though all this sinning city living isn't their fault.

Anyway, the article is really spot on.  I was born and raised on a farm, but both of my parents are liberal.  My dad was born in a big city, my mom was a country girl who had gone to the city and been successful, then returned to the country to raise a family.  But they both retained their city values, and it CLASHED.  I remember when my Catholic grade school teachers were handing the kids Vote for Reagan buttons, my mom just lost her shit! How dare they influence her kids with politics!  Of course, she was almost alone.  Everyone around us wanted to vote for Reagan, she was a little island of liberalism in a sea of conservatives. 

To this day, most of my old friends remain conservative.  As a kid, I didn't care of course, but now I see it. Those who stayed in the little town, even the ones I have always viewed as very intelligent, remain conservative.  I'm guessing at least some are voting for Trump.  I know they all hate Hillary, never see a word about how bad Trump is, though.
The few of us who moved to cities and got a college education or became part of the arts or technology are different, though.   Even an old boyfirend I keep in contact with, he moved to the city and has stayed very, very poor, but his views are socially progressive. 

This feels like a mini civil war.  Brother against brother, which one stayed in the small town, which stayed on the farm.  Can the 2 ever reconcile their views?  I'm tired of unfollowing my friends on facebook.  I'm becoming reclusive because I live in a fairly rural town, it's very red.  I can't talk to hardly any neighbor without it coming up, and then I have to bite my tongue or become even more of a social pariah.