Calling all those who voted for Donald Trump racist is wrong
“We must”
When Trump said he may rip up the Iran deal or deny South Korea a nuclear umbrella, the mere act of saying it out loud changes policies in those countries
Faisal Al Yafai
When he strode across the stage as the next president of the United States, the audience cheered loudly. Many wept. They were moved not by his policies he was, after all, largely untested by great office but by a feeling, a desire for change. That was Barack Obama eight years ago as much as it was Donald Trump last week.
Those who did not see Trumps victory coming have not been paying attention. I cant claim to have foreseen a Trump victory on the scale that transpired, but it was clear for some time that the reflexive Trump cant win stance of so much of the media and the political class was not reflecting a wider reality.
Nor is it only Trump and America. Something is changing in western societies. It is not racism: it is far bigger and more dangerous. It is the rise of an entirely new, post-truth politics. The desire for change, so palpable in 2008 with Obama, has returned in a new form.
The reason it is not obvious yet is that the political and media class, left and right, Republican and Democrat, remain oblivious. This political and media class forms a bubble, a group with a shared language, shared assumptions and a shared world view.
Inside this bubble, words and nuance matter. Speaking about political and social issues in an acceptable manner is the price of entry. Getting it wrong leads to ostracisation.
Some may call this political correctness. I dont the way political issues are talked about really matters. Using the wrong language about women, ethnic minorities or religious groups sends a clear message and can lead to violence.
When Trump said he may rip up the Iran deal or deny South Korea a nuclear umbrella, the mere act of saying it out loud changes policies in those countries. Neither will wait to discover if he is serious. Politicians must be taken at their word, and people ought to believe politicians can be as outrageous as their words. But outside the bubble, political language matters less. It is this simple but far-reaching element that leads to a fundamental disconnect between the political and media establishments and tens of millions of ordinary people. They literally do not speak the same language.
This is most stark on immigration and race. When those inside the bubble hear a voter speaking in broad terms about African-Americans, Mexicans or Muslims, without the appropriate caveats and qualifications, they immediately dismiss them as bigoted. But most people do not know the acceptable words to use; they are not exposed to them day after day. When they talk to the media or politicians, they do so as they would to one another.
Most would be horrified by the reality of Trumps ban on Muslims. Its just they dont know any and dont think Trump is being serious. In other words, in the phrase that is now much-used to explain the Trump phenomenon, while his critics take him literally but not seriously, his supporters take him seriously but not literally.
None of this is a reflection on Trump himself nor his character. Many of the worst adjectives levelled at the man are deserved. But one of the main reasons that Hillary Clinton lost was because the bubble has spent too much time listening to Trump and not enough time listening to those who voted for him.
I dont, by the way, accept the argument that Trump carefully calibrates his statements to appeal to his base. On the contrary, he says outlandish things because he believes them. But the question is about those who vote for him: do they also believe these outlandish things?
The mistake of the bubble is to assume that, even if they do, those are the primary reasons for voting for Trump. Clinton suggested as much, calling half his voters a basket of deplorables. But to dismiss tens of millions of voters and many millions more across the West as racist is to fundamentally misunderstand what is happening.
Yes, there is a reaction to changing demographics and patterns of work. Yes, gender played a part. Yes, there is pandering to ugly instincts. But the wider group of voters simply look to their own self-interest. And they see no one, left or right, talking their language and understanding their problems. That is a profound and damning indictment of the bubble: that Americas two largest parties left tens of millions of people with no one to vote for but Trump is a monumental failure of politics.
And it will not be the last. There is a populist wave sweeping western democracies. It is a post-fact populism, full of fear, anger and resentment. Like most seismic shifts, it has been happening for some time below the surface, but the financial crisis and the Syrian civil war have brought it into the open. Those who harness it best will sweep to victory. Next year, it will sweep across Germany, France and the Netherlands as they face elections. It will reach other countries, too. By the time it has washed across western societies and those farther away I strongly expect that we will not think of the Trump presidency as the worst of its effects. The wave is just beginning to grow.
thenational.ae
