The calm down, think twice, do the work post-election issue
Postcard #8
Hello and welcome back to another edition of THE POSTCARD, Unregistered’s fortnightly roundup of recommendations.
Thoughts, tools, and treats
This is not a blog about politics but about the world in our own lives. So, what does last week’s seismic shift mean for you and me? I assembled election coverage that offers takeaways beyond the news cycle – and some real-world comfort.
Takeaway #1: Cultivate curiosity, not condescension
The world witnessed, to quote Andrew Sullivan in a pre-election-article for The London Times, „democracy in its fullest, if foulest, American glory.“ Commentators like Sam Kriss, Jesse Singal, and Ezra Klein doubt that doubling down on one-size-fits-all-explanations and drawing „the boundaries of who is decent and who is deplorable ever more clearly“ will help anybody. When Latinos and blacks moved in record numbers to a candidate who was anything but unknown to them, the Democrats lost more people of color than ever in a presidential election, plus a large number of gay voters, and the winner gained support from every racial group except white people, what else can this mean than a clarion call to acknowledge that reality is messy, complicated, and ambiguous?
Singal asks: „How important is winning to you versus feeling good about yourself and being congratulated by your peers at your ever-shrinking coalition’s annual conferences and galas?“ He’s done with pundits who live in denial: „That doesn’t mean they’re bad people or irresponsible pet owners, or that every word they’ve written is false, or that they don’t have insights on this or that issue — it just means that they set out on a big, important quest, and they’ve failed miserably.“
That’s why, over at Persuasion, Yasha Mounk points out that even if you understandably despise the man about to return to the White House, it matters for future coverage to face the facts and be „forthright when the administration gets something right,“ or, when their cult of personality and contempt for constitutional democracy turns out to inadvertently strengthen societal support for and cultural defense of democracy, thus becoming a blessing in disguise. The takeaway? Look closely at what will happen and how the whole thing unfolds (including consequences unintended by those in power). Welcome if your worries are proven wrong.
Takeaway #2: Think culture, not just economics
Yes, social issues were a significant driver in this election, as David Brooks rightly pointed out: „I guess it’s hard to focus on class inequality when you went to a college with a multibillion-dollar endowment and do environmental greenwashing and diversity seminars for a major corporation.“ However, he adds, „there is no economic solution to what is primarily a crisis of respect.“ Eventually, elections are about what people value and how they want to live, in other words, culture. Therefore, Francisco Toro reminds the liberal elites of their responsibility: „Voters get it that those elites have power beyond their electoral numbers, because they’re hugely dominant not just in the administrative state but also in the knowledge making institutions—from universities and newsrooms to think tanks and activist organizations—that incubate the policy ideas the administrative state then embodies.“ He is convinced that a combination of economic abandonment with cultural contempt made voters accept an authoritarian narcissist as „a price worth paying for the enactment of policies that have no chance otherwise.“ Which is a compelling reason to share Yascha Mounk’s concern that America’s example „should serve as a loud warning to moderate forces in other parts of the world.“
Takeaway #3: Work, don’t whine
Sam Harris, equally unsparing with both sides in what is arguably the one article everybody should read about the 2024 election, asks progressives just how serious they are and how much they really care. He urges those advocating for change to do the hard work if they want more than a backslap from their peers and feel sorry for themselves. The third takeaway? Argue. Be inviting. Tell better stories. Show good examples. Deliver. Prove that you are trustworthy. A positive, concrete, and credible narrative makes all the difference, Freddie deBoer points out: „You have to beat them with appeals to making a better world for voters; you have to give voters their bread. Voters don’t care about norms, and the universe doesn’t care about what’s fair.“
Takeaway #4: Take the long view
As unequivocal as Trump’s comeback certainly is, Ezra Klein reminds his readers that, after the triumphant victory of George W. Bush in 2004, it was unthinkable that „an antiwar Black man with the middle name Hussein whose politics were forged in Chicago“ will become the next president of the United States of America. And yet, Obama’s win in 2008 was, as John Gruber emphasizes, far larger than Trump’s this year, measured either by Electoral College results or the popular vote. The same holds for Obama’s 2012 reelection. Takeaway? You may want to follow Rachel Haywire and „Unfollow all doomers.“
Takeaway #5: Detox
Katherine May and Mike Sowdon plea for „percolated, precipitated, (...) oak-matured“ takes. Don’t obsess, they suggest, over policy details and the daily dramas. Instead, focus on the bigger picture. In a similar vibe, Cal Newport recommends: „Take a break from social media. Stop listening to news podcasts. Unsubscribe, at least for a while, from those political newsletters clogging your inbox with their hot takes and tired in-fighting.“ He considers setting up „a Sunday-only paper subscription as my main source of news this winter.“ So, the last and probably the most important takeaway is to unplug and protect your soul. Read a book. Meet real people. Take a walk in the woods.
Noteworthy
“I have always been puzzled by those critiques. It seems to me, on the contrary, that those who call themselves men and women of progress should not tie themselves to the social theory least able to accommodate their various programs of emancipation. If there is no way to inspect and decompose the contents of social forces, if they remain unexplained or overpowering, then there is not much that can be done. To insist that behind all the various issues there exists the overarching presence of the same system, the same empire, the same totality, has always struck me as an extreme case of masochism, a perverted way to look for a sure defeat while enjoying the bittersweet feeling of superior political correctness. (...) Is it not obvious then that only a skein of weak ties, of constructed, artificial, assignable, accountable, and surprising connections is the only way to begin contemplating any kind of fight? (...) One’s own actions ‘make a difference’ only in a world made of differences.“
—Bruno Latour: Reassembling the Social. An Introduction to Actor-Network-Theory. Oxford University Press 2015, 252-253.
A mystery link leading into the unknown
Even now, the world is much larger than the front page of a newspaper.
As always,
Dirk
P.S.: Feel free to send me pointers to articles, books, sites, pods, tools, and treats that could be interesting for this roundup. While I cannot promise to link them, I read and appreciate every hint.