Democrats need to prioritize Economic over social issues

[Rookie Yinzer]

Democrats need to turn out younger voters and voters of color. You can discuss both economic and social issues without abandoning your base to run after Deplorables that will never vote for a Democrat.

Nobody is discussing going after voters that will "never vote Democrat," though...?

Maybe not in this particular thread but this idea exists and has been floated by those who think whispering about black and brown issues will soothe the minds of triggered whites who have abandoned the Democratic Party in droves over the past decade. Quite a few of them are not coming back no matter how much you throw the actual Democratic base under the bus for their approval.

[Virginiá]

Maybe not in this particular thread but this idea exists and has been floated by those who think whispering about black and brown issues will soothe the minds of triggered whites who have abandoned the Democratic Party in droves over the past decade. Quite a few of them are not coming back no matter how much you throw the actual Democratic base under the bus for their approval.

I'm not sure what the numbers add up to exactly, but I feel like Democrats could be in a good position if they married the Obama coalition and the Clinton coalition, while making further inroads with college educated whites. Not that the coalitions are all that different really, but the combo would add in a lot more WWC voters.

Obama 2012 districts + Clinton 2016 = a comfortable majority, no?

[YE]

I know that you're not one of the "less not care about social issues," but after Hillary lost lots of Atlasians advocate for "let's throw social issues under the bus to bring back the WWC!" So even if you don't mean it, it's understandable why omegascarlet would feel like trans issues and minority issues would be talked down - because they have been.

If you ask me, it depends on what people define as "social issues". I think I share a view with almost all red avatar posters here that doing what Hillary did and yell "Vote for me because Trump is bad" because she was too timid to stand for something is not good enough. I do think it is OK for Democrats in socially conservative areas to be pro-life/pro-gun if they're reasonable on economic areas, largely because I feel these should be urban/rural issues rather than partisan issues.

In order for the Dems need to build a coalition in the same manner that FDR and Reagan did, and trigger a realignment, and build a working majority that will actually resolve many of the fundamental problems, they are going to need people who voted for Barack Obama in working class areas in the Rust Belt. The main reason for this is the composition of the Senate that, a branch that obviously the Democrats need to maintain in order to actually get stuff done when they win the White House.

[YE]

Maybe not in this particular thread but this idea exists and has been floated by those who think whispering about black and brown issues will soothe the minds of triggered whites who have abandoned the Democratic Party in droves over the past decade. Quite a few of them are not coming back no matter how much you throw the actual Democratic base under the bus for their approval.

I'm not sure what the numbers add up to exactly, but I feel like Democrats could be in a good position if they married the Obama coalition and the Clinton coalition, while making further inroads with college educated whites. Not that the coalitions are all that different really, but the combo would add in a lot more WWC voters.

Obama 2012 districts + Clinton 2016 = a comfortable majority, no?

http://www.centerforpolitics.org/crystalball/articles/just-how-many-obama-2012-trump-2016-voters-were-there/

You appear to be correct. It's hard to tell for sure for a number of reasons indicated in the article, but let's just say 6.9 million were Obama/Trump voters. That's a swing of just under 14 million votes towards the GOP. Clinton won by 3 million votes in terms of the PV. If the Democrats were able to sway a half of Obama/Trump voters, they'd win the PV by 10 million votes - a 2008 style margin. Of course it's possible that many socially liberal Romney/Clinton votes come home with someone like Bernie or Warren as the nominee, but given the main driver of their votes wasn't economics and given Trump's unpopularity, I'm skeptical that it'll be as much as some pundits would indicated. Also this doesn't take into account Obama 2008 voters, which I suppose aren't 100% unwinnable either, although tougher than the Obama 2012/Trump 2016 group.

[Since I'm the mad scientist proclaimed by myself]

The Democrats need to be the party of the common man not special interests. The 53 year old worker from Scraton PA needs to vote Democrat because he will fight for ending RTW. The 34 year old African American min wage worker in Hattiesburg MS ought to vote Democrat because he will fight for criminal justice reform, ending for profit prisons, and a higher minimum wage.

I guess the 19 year old Trans woman on the street seeing everything fall apart because her parents kicked her out and no one will hire her because she's a "t####y"  is just a special interest who doesn't deserve help.

When was this ever stated? Don't pull things out of thin air.

The attitude was implied. "Economic issues" vs "special interests" much?

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I was not demanding an "upper middle class centrist" "feel-good" party. Learn to read. I was angry about trans issues being talked down to and insulted(not to mention the metric ton of other "social issues" that have an extreme impact on the lives of people in the margins).

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That doesn't change the fact that the democrats used to be awful bastards on social issues. Unions tend(ed?) to be conservative on these issues.

Since when did special interests mean trans issues? Special Interests means wall street, big pharma, giant tech lobby companies etc.

That post did not have trans issues being insulted anywhere? And when I was talking feel good upper middle class party, I meant people in the party that are socially liberal (when it suits them) and take donations from special interests (not trans issues) and do nothing to help the poor and instead pass deregulation and refuse to put a left-wing economic agenda on the table.

Unions played a pivotal role in the civil rights movement as did many union democrats (Hubert Humphrey) and unions disproportionately help people of colour. The fact that democrats used to be awful on social issues was not because of unions.

The context of this question is "economics vs social issues", not "economics vs corporations". Learn to context and implication.

[Intell]

The Democrats need to be the party of the common man not special interests. The 53 year old worker from Scraton PA needs to vote Democrat because he will fight for ending RTW. The 34 year old African American min wage worker in Hattiesburg MS ought to vote Democrat because he will fight for criminal justice reform, ending for profit prisons, and a higher minimum wage.

I guess the 19 year old Trans woman on the street seeing everything fall apart because her parents kicked her out and no one will hire her because she's a "t####y"  is just a special interest who doesn't deserve help.

When was this ever stated? Don't pull things out of thin air.

The attitude was implied. "Economic issues" vs "special interests" much?

You must be logged in to read this quote.

I was not demanding an "upper middle class centrist" "feel-good" party. Learn to read. I was angry about trans issues being talked down to and insulted(not to mention the metric ton of other "social issues" that have an extreme impact on the lives of people in the margins).

You must be logged in to read this quote.

That doesn't change the fact that the democrats used to be awful bastards on social issues. Unions tend(ed?) to be conservative on these issues.

You're the first person I've run into that thought "special interests" were somehow trans issues. I was making an allusion to Harry Truman's 1948 DNC speech with that line in particular, with the intended meaning that I didn't want the Dems up the Wall Street/big phrama's ass.

[Since I'm the mad scientist proclaimed by myself]

The Democrats need to be the party of the common man not special interests. The 53 year old worker from Scraton PA needs to vote Democrat because he will fight for ending RTW. The 34 year old African American min wage worker in Hattiesburg MS ought to vote Democrat because he will fight for criminal justice reform, ending for profit prisons, and a higher minimum wage.

I guess the 19 year old Trans woman on the street seeing everything fall apart because her parents kicked her out and no one will hire her because she's a "t####y"  is just a special interest who doesn't deserve help.

When was this ever stated? Don't pull things out of thin air.

The attitude was implied. "Economic issues" vs "special interests" much?

You must be logged in to read this quote.

I was not demanding an "upper middle class centrist" "feel-good" party. Learn to read. I was angry about trans issues being talked down to and insulted(not to mention the metric ton of other "social issues" that have an extreme impact on the lives of people in the margins).

You must be logged in to read this quote.

That doesn't change the fact that the democrats used to be awful bastards on social issues. Unions tend(ed?) to be conservative on these issues.

You're the first person I've run into that thought "special interests" were somehow trans issues. I was making an allusion to Harry Truman's 1948 DNC speech with that line in particular, with the intended meaning that I didn't want the Dems up the Wall Street/big phrama's ass.

I didn't read the other posts in the thread. The way I've seen trans issues brushed aside by some "leftists" talking about muh economics does not make me keen on giving the benefit of the doubt to someone going "economics over special interests" in a thread titled "Democrats need to prioritize Economic over social issues".

[Since I'm the mad scientist proclaimed by myself]

I don’t know why everyone believes I’m advocating running after voters that will never go Democratic. I specifically said that for democrats to win back the rust belt they need to turnout low-income nonwhite and young voters in the cities, not screwing around in rural white areas. However I believe that how you turnout nonwhite and young voters is through talking about left-wing economic policies (single-payer healthcare, Free college, and 15 dollar minimum wage) instead of transgender bathrooms.

Could you not insult us fighting for the right to exist like that?

[IceAgeComing]

I don’t know why everyone believes I’m advocating running after voters that will never go Democratic. I specifically said that for democrats to win back the rust belt they need to turnout low-income nonwhite and young voters in the cities, not screwing around in rural white areas. However I believe that how you turnout nonwhite and young voters is through talking about left-wing economic policies (single-payer healthcare, Free college, and 15 dollar minimum wage) instead of transgender bathrooms.

I think you're a little confused about the bathroom thing; let me explain it a little.

The status quo in most of America (and indeed the world) is that trans people go into the bogs that they present as - in some places this is a legally protected right (as here, in the 2010 Equality Act); in other places its heavily implied, plus also I'm pretty sure that trans men going into the ladies would, em, attract some attention.  When the trans issue became more publicly visible the Republican parties of a number of states - most notably North Carolina - elected to try and pass laws stating that trans people can only go into toilets based on their birth certificate with some very strong criminal sanctions for anyone going against this.  Now this is silly for a whole litany of reasons: firstly how on earth do you enforce this without having to pay someone to basically check everyones identification before they enter a toilet (and then what if someone doesn't have ID?) and secondly, well, you're putting transwomen at risk from assault or criminalising them if they wish to lessen that risk: since the choice that they have is either use the male toilets and stick out like a sore thumb with obvious issues, or use the ladies and hope that you don't get caught.  You've also got the thing about expecting trans men to use the ladies bathroom which isn't good for... anyone really (although everyone tends to forget about trans men in these discussions); plus also the law also has impacted on cis people as well: I can't find my old source for this but one case that happened right after the law was introduced was a shop not allowing a cis women to use their ladies toilet because they thought that she looked too much like a man: and although cases like that are rare the fact that any of them happen at all means that you're putting even more women at risk.  That's why we should oppose these bills: because actually they put more people, most notably women, at risk than the status quo everywhere else in the world does, and that's something that is very bad.

Note that this isn't us advocating for a change in the law or anything: this is the other side trying to change things to hurt a vulnerable group of people: and although that doesn't have any impact in my position being right or wrong it does mean that the framing of the issue is entirely different: and on issues like this its much easier to be the status quo and let the bigots try to defend why they want to change the law.  I also think that its our responsibility to fight against people that seek to imply that an entire community of people are automatically sex offenders; which is basically what these sort of laws do.

So basically what you are suggesting is that the left, in order to win, ought to throw a very vulnerable group of people under the bus .  Firstly, that's the totally wrong thing for us to do, and goes against the history of left wing organisations globally, who've often been the first people to fight for minority groups, and considering that both economic and social justice have been key parts of generic left/socialist/social democrat/progressive/whatever thought going back since the beginning of the last century.  Shockingly, I think that electing to not oppose policies that hurt people in order to get a political advantage is an incredibly nasty thing to do: it'd be like saying that the Democrats shouldn't have fought so hard against the Republican attempted healthcare reforms because if they'd have passed, then the Democrats would have gotten votes from it.

Secondly; I think that you heavily overestimate the amount of people who are so viciously transphobic out there that they'd dramatically change their votes just on that issue.  I'd point towards the two main people who've made the issue key parts of their campaign or who passed and defended passing legislation on this area: McCrory lost in North Carolina and Moore heavily pivoted towards focusing on exclusively social issues after the scandal came up and its hardly changed the polling (also the polls are terrible so who really knows).  I'm pretty sure that the votes that you would gain from not fighting on ground like this would more than be counterbalanced by lesser enthusiasm from predominantly younger people who'd be less likely to show up and vote.  What I think that we can do, and should do, is refine our messaging to better explain to people why these laws are so bad and why they should stand with us in opposing them: and while not presenting a totally different and contradictory message in different communities, try to target our campaigning in order to present the messages most likely to win in different areas.  That doesn't mean throwing anything away or changing our beliefs: it means being more tactical with our presentation.

[Celebi]

There's 100 million people in the US that are without health insurance or underinsured. Tens of thousands of them die every year and hundreds of thousands go bankrupt. In contrast with that there's less than 1% of transsexuals. Guess which group of people could help democrats win in a landslide.
I'm not saying democrats should abandon social issues completely, but focus on economic issues and then maybe if there's spare time quickly also mention abortion, gay rights etc... (possibly without insulting heterosexuals, white people and men).
Choose you priorities. People are dying and going bankrupt because they cannot afford something as basic as health care. This sure should take a precedent before some obscure minority group getting insulted.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Might it be an idea to change the emphasis on abortion from "we have a right to it" to "It will happen so better to be done safely"?

That concedes to the theocrats' idea that women don't have a right to control their own bodies.

the important thing is the result though. Who cares if you concede on something symbolic?

[Unapologetic Chinaperson]

There's 100 million people in the US that are without health insurance or underinsured. Tens of thousands of them die every year and hundreds of thousands go bankrupt. In contrast with that there's less than 1% of transsexuals. Guess which group of people could help democrats win in a landslide.
I'm not saying democrats should abandon social issues completely, but focus on economic issues and then maybe if there's spare time quickly also mention abortion, gay rights etc... (possibly without insulting heterosexuals, white people and men).
Choose you priorities. People are dying and going bankrupt because they cannot afford something as basic as health care. This sure should take a precedent before some obscure minority group getting insulted.

Killings of Transgender People Hit a Record High in 2017

Also, from the same article, proof that social and economic issues intersect:

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[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

this thread is a false dichotomy. The best way to help transgender people - even more than anti-discrimination ordinances, and significantly more than unisex bathrooms - is through economic measures. Transgender people are more likely to be estranged from support networks, disproportionately require more healthcare and often lack as much cash for emergencies. Therefore the best policy is pushing for a general increase in welfare that lifts all boats equally. That is the point of being left-wing - you try to help underprivileged persons.

Real talk: not many people change their vote because of transgender people. Many people are casually transphobic, yeah; but that isn't enough to change their vote unless they are really, really obsessed with transwomens' genitals (and are generally loopy). After all, in the 60's many people were casually racist and happy to vote for the people who introduced the CRA; many people are perfectly capable of being casually sexist while simultaneously supporting female politicians. People are happy to lend their vote against their own personal biases as long as there is something for them in it too.

I believe the Dems' main issue is how they foreground "social issues" and view them as important primarily for appealing to niches rather than being part of the overall narrative. There's also a very weird tendency to racialise issues that cause them to a) be less useful in a general election campaign and also b) attract a very weird logic.

[Unapologetic Chinaperson]

I believe the Dems' main issue is how they foreground "social issues" and view them as important primarily for appealing to niches rather than being part of the overall narrative. There's also a very weird tendency to racialise issues that cause them to a) be less useful in a general election campaign and also b) attract a very weird logic.

The idea about "racializing issues" makes sense - or at the very least becomes less weird - when you realize that race permeates every facet of American life, from criminal justice to education to housing to employment. Of course, this doesn't contradict your overall argument that social and economic issues are inherently intertwined (it obviously strengthens it).

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

But this is not something you particularly wish to emphasise in a general election campaign for several reasons:

- voters normally like being catered to, and they don't particularly like even the whiff of being told they're privileged. (to give another example, almost all Americans have a lot more disposable income, good health and privilege than those in developing countries, but it would be a brave politician to run on telling 99% of the electorate they're spoilt compared to farmers in Ethiopia)

- when you overly emphasise racial issues, you create a weird effect where it can cause everybody else to "consolidate" against your party. One user on here saw it coming, and it's no surprise that user is really interested in Indian politics because such voter behaviour: all Hindus of all castes consolidating against a Muslim minority (or other weird ganging ups on castes) is a classic election behaviour that has burned the Indian Left in recent years.

- it's very hard to ignore the effects of social constructs like race, tribe, ethnic group, confessional group, nationality etc in societies. But that doesn't mean it is tactically useful to get consumed by them. I would also argue that it is also morally imperative for the Left to destroy racism, and as such destroy the concept of race. Although America is not colourblind, it should be the goal to become colourblind: which will never happen if problems like poverty are constantly being framed as primarily racial issues.

There is a really weird strain of thinking that starts to break down when you really think of it (like, African Americans are disproportionately represented in poverty stats, but the poverty stats wouldn't magically become better if the impoverished classes were ethnically representative of the nation as a whole).

[Chunk Yogurt for President!]

The Democrats already won on social issues, now all the left is doing is mopping up the remaining opposition and punishing wrongthink.