Siloed Opinions
Conversations with friends—who also happen to be Trump voters.
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Several of my friends will be voting for Donald Trump. They are charming, empathetic, engaging, and thoughtful. On the phone, via text, or over a meal, their wit and warmth generate smiles and laughs. When I was laid off from work, one of them invoked so much optimism and encouragement about my future employment prospects, that I thought he had missed his calling as a motivational speaker. These friends volunteer, tip generously, and give to charities. They love their families, neighbors, colleagues, and country. They live humbly, with grace and dignity, and are quick to deflect praise as a team effort, or as luck. They are educators, employers, and small business owners who personify the stereotype of the good Americans who live in what are often and pejoratively called the flyover states.
But they don’t. They, we, live on Long Island, in and around the district recently represented by the infamous prevaricator, George Santos. My friends admit that, like Santos, Donald Trump is an astounding fabulist. They find him neither funny nor frightening. Their forthcoming votes for Trump-Vance reveal less about their enthusiasm for him or his rhetorical gymnastics, and more about what they perceive is an existential threat to the United States. Simply put, they see the U.S.A. in disrepair, and don’t believe that V.P. Kamala Harris or the Democratic Party can restore and renovate what’s broken. They are so disillusioned, so distraught, and so distrustful of political and social institutions (Congress, courts, media, political parties, schools), that they are amenable to rupturing those institutional bedrocks in the hopes that something, anything, replaces them.
While some of their fears are rooted in a mythologized nostalgia (neighbors who all knew each other and always looked out for one another, schools that successfully taught students, no litter on the streets, no disruptive homeless beggars), to dismiss their concerns as invalid—as racist, sexist, or homophobic—without listening to them, amounts to illegitimizing their genuine anxieties. In their own way, they’ve told me that they feel ignored or dismissed, as if the mainstream media and their liberal neighbors don’t even care to engage with them.
It’s tough for me to feel their pain, but I try to understand where they are coming from. Still, I’m more worried about the smashing of norms that are the foundation of an already-tenuous republic. When I share podcasts and essays by David French, Joe Klein, Bill Kristol, Tim Miller, or Andrew Sullivan, among others, who remind us that the founders intentionally made our political institutions thorny and slow to progress, or that those institutions, if irreparably broken, may be replaced by leaders and regulations that are autocratic or undemocratic, my friends listen, yet remain unpersuaded. While never stating so explicitly, they articulate that desperate times call for desperate measures, and that the perils of representative democracy are reserved for chattering academic and media intellectuals. You and your team are the distrustful ones. We on the other hand have faith that strength and common sense will repair and resolve. The contradictory nature of these claims—that times are imminently calamitous, and that democracy inevitably will endure—may be lost on them. Admittedly, the phrase “lost on them” suggests an intellectual superiority, reinforcing their claim that the country is divided between snobby, intellectual liberals and everyone else. They may respect that I have a Ph.D., but they don’t want one, nor do they want their friendship network to be comprised mostly of Ph.Ds.
The democratic backsliding literature, and the related work that explores the historical roots of Trumpism, are riveting, depressing, and meticulously written. My friends haven’t read Anne Applebaum’s Autocracy, Inc., Issac Arnsdorf’s Finish What We Started, Erwin Chemerinsky’s No Democracy Lasts Forever, and John Ganz’s When the Clock Broke. I have devoted decades trying to understand the complex relationships between political institutions and political behavior. There is no joy in summarizing books to friends, nor in sharing the texts’ foreboding conclusions. It feels forced, unfriendly almost, to tell loved ones that representative democracy is fragile, or that illiberal proclivities lurk among us and our neighbors. Yet by staying mute, I strangely sympathize with the far left; perhaps my reluctance to disclose my perspective is a silent form of complicity, a tacit acceptance of the world that is and will be.
In his prescient 1948 article “Public Opinion and Public Opinion Polling,” Herbert Blumer argues that public opinion is not atomistic. Rather, he alleges that the nature of public opinion is contextual, and concerns how groups operate and are organized. According to Blumer, public opinion is about who interacts with whom, and the nature of those interactions.
It is this latter point that is overlooked by scholars and journalists who instead too often focus on polling methodology (e.g., samples and response rates), and less about the nature of private and public discourse, and how those conversations shape what we believe and why we believe it.
Disagree with the extreme Left or Right, and expect rage and vitriol. We want no part of you, and we don’t even want to hear your dissenting perspective. You. Are. Canceled. Similarly, gaslighting is also now a norm utilized by political activists and media celebrities. How can you possibly believe [insert idea here] (e.g., Biden is in charge? Harris is capable? Trump is sane? Vaccines don’t cause autism? Foreign aid is worthwhile? Israel is/is not an apartheid state?). You must be nuts!
It's too easy and obvious to blame social media and our limited attention spans for exacerbating these odious trends. We would all benefit from taking more phone and computer holidays, reading and pondering more, and dedicating time to reconnect, re-wire, in person.
But let’s imagine that we do, and in an attempt to reduce friction, we collectively decide not to discuss presidential politics. Among friends, making eye contact, our phones on silent, how should we talk? About what? If and when we find ourselves disagreeing, and inevitably we will, then what?
We can (a) engage and disagree civilly, (b) disagree uncivilly, or (c) agree to disagree, and change the subject. Engaging (a) may be challenging, but if friends are capable and willing, that’s ideal. There is always the possibility of getting angry and losing one’s temper (b), but that possibility has been with us since we developed emotions and vocal cords.
Today’s American political discourse permeates with anti-intellectualism, conspiratorialism, cynicism, dilettantism, and dogmatism. It is the dilettantism—the belief that having done our research (often on social media and from algorithms given to us) that we now are quasi-experts who can draw meaningful conclusions that should most disturb us, and which I believe will drive us to (c) changing the subject, and not trying to engage with one another.
I don’t tell my baker friend how to make a loaf of bread. His expertise on baking is something that I admire and covet. Likewise, my data scientist friend’s expertise in machine learning is so vast and deep that I would not know how to claim proficiency in his vocation. I stay in my lane and am wiser for it. Unlike baking or computer programming, the civic sphere is a public endeavor. But, there, we no longer rely on experts and mainstream journalists to gather facts for us. Instead, we retrieve ostensible knowledge from others, in the form of summarized snippets (e.g., X, Facebook friends), or from podcasters and prognosticators who appear to be experts on everything. If they can impart their “take” on immigration, healthcare, taxes, energy policies, and wars abroad, even if they do not have formal training expertise on these matters, why shouldn’t we? Well, we do, and it is noisy and erroneous. We’re now all in everyone else’s lane, lending credence to inexpert, uncrystallized opinions, including our own and our friends’. The result is a cacophony of unprofessional, unreasoned discourse, parroting talk show hosts and infotainment providers, without a whiff of footnotes or nuance.
When my friends share opinions, we hear ourselves getting out of our lanes, and then have to make a choice. Dissent or disengage? Among my crew, it’s the latter. We agree to disagree, and change the subject. The benefit of silence is that we don’t argue. Our blood pressure does not rise, or not for long, and we can maintain a modicum of civility. The downside is that after we express our respective, differing opinions (which are astute to us, but misguided to them), we never seek to understand one another. More critically, just because we are silent, doesn’t mean that private opinions still aren’t being formed—about them or their worldview. Our silent disengagement may reinforce what Walter Lippmann called ‘the pictures in our heads’ – stereotypes, about others, and ourselves.
When my friends converse, we don’t pay much attention to whether the information we have processed is false, accurate, fact, opinion, or a combination of the above. Our tribal silos provide us with our own unique news sources, making it difficult to agree on what is news, what is newsworthy, or even what has immediately transpired. The result is an unpleasant quality to our conversations. We are less trusting, and quicker to change the subject when our team (insert race, religion, sexual orientation, profession, class) has been ostensibly violated or harmed.
We don’t have political role models to aid us here. Donald Trump fuels a Manichean discourse because, I suspect, deep down he believes it. As he ages, he’s now getting louder and more drastic. Kamala Harris sounds so scripted and at times vacuous that it is unclear what, if any, hortatory style she embraces. Save Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, I don’t hear a politician who speaks in paragraphs. If only Denzel Washington or Audra McDonald had military and foreign policy experience and political ambitions.
A few days a week, I go to a local bakery to read The New York Times and enjoy a morning espresso. There the morning regulars—landscapers, office clerks, small business owners, and retirees—make small talk, mostly about sports. We rarely dip into politics, largely because we know we’re not aligned, but, when we do, we try to keep it jocular. Once, I was asked, “Wouldn’t you agree that if it were not for COVID, Donald Trump would be one of the greatest presidents of all time?” I was flummoxed, partly because I know the question was genuinely asked, and not to rile me. I expressed my disappointment in Trump, less about policies or even January 6, but around his coarseness. “I want a president who is dignified and not angry, who conveys the best of us, not bitterness.” He listened, but I could tell he was unpersuaded. We changed the subject and, as we often do, shook hands when departing. I love that guy and his family, but our worldviews are oil and water. That he could ask me the question, however, spoke well of him. He really wanted to hear my answer. Another time, reading the newspaper alone, a stranger pointed to my paper and said upon exiting, “That paper is Marxist garbage!” I did not respond but was rattled, if only because of his loud voice. He was genuinely upset that he saw someone reading The Times.
I occasionally forward news to my friends, including one who told me that there is nothing I can do to move his vote to Harris. During the Vance-Walz debate, he expressed sincere joy that two politicians were debating with civility. “Wow…I’m seriously speechless. This debate is restoring my faith in U.S. politics.” I found Vance and Walz overly scripted and woefully predictable. I yearned for better questions and sharper answers beyond memorized talking points. But my friend’s comments restored hope that friends, in the age of Trump, still have the capacity to opine together, to love one another, and our country.
Robert Eisinger is a political scientist whose research concerns the intersection of political behavior and institutions. He is the author of numerous works, including The Evolution of Presidential Polling (Cambridge University Press, 2003).
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Back near the dawn of democracy, an old and (in an age when male beauty was the stuff of some of the finest sculptures ever created) famously ugly ex-sculptor would sit in the Athenian agora and try to make those who came to him learn be clear about their terminology and their foundational beliefs in such areas as religion, friendship, courage, honor, the law. He enjoyed pricking the self-inflated balloons of those who assumed themselves to be experts, and in doing so often incited mirth in his younger followers and chagrin and rage in those so challenged.
Athenian democracy at the time was not like ours. It was far more personal and direct without all the representative layers we’ve created to try to protect us from extremes.
At the same time, the essence of democracy was already evident - that it only worked as well as it might if its participants understood the reasoning behind it and how it was designed to work. Even then, of course it was an experiment - not a finished product. Indeed, one of the hardest parts of it was just that - not only was it an experiment, it had to remain ongoing. At the point at which its participants believed the process finally set in stone, it would fail.
It worked best if reason prevailed over passion, except the passion to preserve it. It worked best when the value of individual rights was balanced with the needs of the community. It worked best when its participants understood that freedom does not come without an equal measure or responsibility for one’s actions. It worked best when its participants understood that it was unavoidably messy and often quite slow and inefficient. It worked best when ‘we the people’ could together find, amidst whatever differences we felt divided us, enough of the courage, the honesty, the understanding, the tolerance, the compassion, the wisdom, the humor, and the sheer common sense to rule ourselves from the bottom up without allowing our differences to tear us apart.
This is what I find so hard to understand about today’s Republican Party, and why, while I still try to engage with those who support Trump, I am increasingly unwilling to give them the benefit of the doubt in terms of trying to understand where they are coming from. It is because by en large, and led by the example of Donald Trump, they exhibit none of the essential characteristics I’ve listed above.
As Dr. Eisenger notes, many of them in their personal relationships may be quite personable, supportive, understanding, caring, generous. But to those they believe to be 'outside the pale’ of Trumpism or even old time Republicanism, they show none of that. The Democratic Party has some of the same problems, but to no extent whatsoever to the same degree (spoiler, I’m an Independent - have been all my voting life)
Part of the problem, to me, is our ossified binary political party system, a situation our founders feared but they then themselves initiated. Every time I hear or listen to someone identifying him or herself as a Republican or a Democrat instead of as an American, I cringe. Because if we are not all Americans first and all that other stuff at least second. we cannot long maintain this most crucial of all experiments in human government.
Another part is the woeful ignorance on the part of so many of us about our Constitution and the blueprint it created. It would be bad enough if this were a problem just among voters, but when it is also a problem among our legislative representatives it is far worse And when it happens in the presidency it becomes eventually destructive of everything we were designed to be.
Well. I’ve gone on long enough. As an American of nearly 80, my time in that most fortunate status is running out. I am the product of what most would call an ‘elite’ education. I’ve been at times a soldier, a merchant seaman, a construction worker, and yes of course, a paper boy on a bicycle, rain, snow, or shine, and I’ve taught our history to elementary school student for just over 40 years. In my classrooms I have always striven to tell our story as fully and honestly as I could, but always with the optimism of a true believer in the promise of our founding. To my own chagrin, I would find it hard to be so were I still in that classroom.
This seems to indicate a high level of partisanship: “Simply put, they see the U.S.A. in disrepair, and don’t believe that V.P. Kamala Harris or the Democratic Party can restore and renovate what’s broken. They are so disillusioned, so distraught, and so distrustful of political and social institutions (Congress, courts, media, political parties, schools), that they are amenable to rupturing those institutional bedrocks in the hopes that something, anything, replaces them.”
As has been well-reported in numerous publications, the USA is currently in good shape. Our post-pandemic recovery may be the best in the world. Obviously, our situation is not perfect; but it never has been and never will be.
So what is it about the current moment in our history that leaves these people feeling “so disillusioned, so distraught, and so distrustful of political and social institutions … that they are amenable to rupturing those institutional bedrocks”?
The only explanation I can think of is that they are responding to rhetoric, not reality. And we all do the same thing to some extent: believe in our preferred (and usually tribal) narratives even when actual evidence refutes those narratives.
But the people this writer mentions sound as if they are very specifically repeating Trump’s talking points. Trump has, of course, been insisting against all evidence to the contrary that our country is in a historically hopeless situation.
So the question is not just why would these people believe him, but why would they believe him when their own lived experience ostensibly shows his claims to be categorically false?
There may not be any simple answer to that question. It may involve Fox News, social media, lifelong political affiliations, or many other factors. Human nature may simply be too easy to manipulate.
We ultimately depend upon good character as the ultimate “institutional bedrock.” And when a prominent leader such as Trump abandons that essential element of civic society, it’s shocking how many people he’s able to intimidate and manipulate. That’s one of the great revelations of our times.
Many would find that observation to be condescending. But in that case they really should be able to explain how and why they embrace a demagogue’s narrative of doom and gloom in an era of (relative) peace and prosperity.