Why northwest is so liberal?

[dazzleman]

Exactly what is a "racist" area?  By your definition, that is an area that contains only white people, who claim to be extremely tolerant of minorities, as long as there are no minorities around to be tolerant of.  The term "limousine liberal" comes to mind.  Tolerance is very easy when it demands nothing of you.

I think there is something to the observation that whites who live with other races are more conservative than those who do not.  If you live in an area in which you are paying a real price for liberal policies, in terms of failing education, high taxes, and high crime, then yes, you may well become less "tolerant" of the liberal policies that are hurting your quality of life than you would be if you were living in areas where liberal policies don't have that same cost.  And because liberal policies hold that white people are to blame for all problems, these policies tend to pit white people against others, and push whites away from those policies, in a way that does not happen where the races do not live together, such as in Vermont or Oregon.

I live in a "liberal" area that is very "tolerant."  On the block on live on now, I have never seen a single non-white person (other than those who have come to visit me).  I live right now our local high school, and I have never seen a single black kid going into that school, though the statistics say that it is all of 1% black.  When I sold my last house, a couple of my neighbors passed warnings to me about not selling my house to blacks.  There is no public housing -- it would never be allowed.  And yet it is a mecca of "tolerance" according to those who live here.

Right next door to my town is a city with significant numbers of blacks and Puerto Ricans.  It has high taxes, high crime and bad schools.  Of course, the whites living there are very "racist" and make sure they live in separate neighborhoods from blacks, and that their kids are in private schools.  But are they really any less "tolerant" than those in my town who mouth tolerance, but make sure they live miles away from any minorities?  The people in my town simply have more economic options, and that allows them to make a fake pose of tolerance that those living in mixed areas can't make without significantly, and perhaps fatally, compromising their quality of life.

I personally have no tolerance for limousine liberals who talk the talk but don't walk the walk.

[dazzleman]

[
Its possible that your generalization follows directly from mine - familiarity breeding contempt, etc.  But I think that 'racism' is a bit of a strong word.  Just because two population groups, largely corresponding to two races, see their political interests as diametrically opposed, does that mean they're racists?  

The "racist" label is something that liberals like to throw on anybody who doesn't support their policies, or any white person who opposes anything that is intended to benefit minorities.  It's a word that no longer has any meaning to me.

My own experience is that everybody is racist to one degree or another.  There is mindless racism that is rooted in the need to look down on somebody, and then there is "self-interest" racism that is simply rooted in a desire to avoid problems that will compromise your own quality of life.  Even some blacks practice "self-interest" racism in avoiding some heavily black areas that are filled with crime and decay.

I have also observed no real difference in the level of racism between "liberal" and "conservative" parts of the country.  In the liberal northeast, the black population lives almost completely separately from the white population.  These liberal areas that have blacks are no meccas of tolerance, whatever claims liberals may make.  There is a phoniness and hypocrisy that is mind-boggling among limousine liberals.

[dazzleman]

I just wanted to point out that some generalizations can be a little dangerous. Southern politics seem to be dominated by blacks voting one way, and whites the other, and currently the GOP is the party for the whites. So I don't think that the situation there can be compared to that of other parts of the country. I think it primarily depends on what kind of experiences you get. If the majority of immigrants or people with another skin colour, that you have met have been criminals, then you're more likely to become racist, and vice versa.

I don't if there's much point in attacking sterotypes, like "limousine liberals", so I won't start with "redneck conservatives"...

The difference between limousine liberals and redneck conservatives is that redneck conservatives come much closer to practicing what they preach.

In most areas where blacks and whites co-exist, they vote differently.  It's not just the south.  The difference is a matter of degree.

[dazzleman]

Actually black people and white people often vote the same way, generally the lower down the political tree the office is the more likely you are to see no racial voting.
At least in the Deep South (I've not looked into it anywhere else).

It's sometimes true but not always.  In the last 3 New York City mayoral elections, all of which had, for a change, a viable candidate from each major party, voting was almost entirely along racial lines.  Blacks and guilty white Manhattan limousine liberals voted Democratic, while middle and working class whites voted Republican.  The big issue was crime, and most whites were quite explicit in blaming blacks for the prevalence of crime.  It's interesting to see this in a "liberal" bastion of "tolerance" such as New York.