Defining the 21st Century Democratic Party

[hepcat]

I would love to see the source data for all these claims of massive numbers of young men who are rage quitting society because of unattractiveness/women rejecting them. I just can’t find any evidence this is true anywhere.

[Blackhawk]

There was only one such claim.

[Zarathud]

Up your game young men, and quit being such colossal dicks. You'd be amazed how attractive that can be.

I had so many women talk to me when I was taking my daughters to the parks. Sometimes I wished I could say “They’re not my children, I’m just helping out for the day.” As quite a few times, I learned the ladies were doing the same.

I had a much younger sister (16 years). I wish I could have told this secret back then.

[Zarathud]

I believe that people are rejecting “protecting the vulnerable” pitch of the Democrats. No one wants to be thought of in that way, least of all young men.

So I could see the message of protecting women/gays/trans/minorities as “they have no policy to help me.” The positive message of Hope didn’t connect with too many. Why?

Trump offers no policy, but he’s selling a feeling, hate and vengeance. And bribes to waitresses(no tax on tips) and his business friends. People can understand that. Cruelty is his motto — you’re fired.

Robert Reich after the Clinton administration warned that in his post-government across in rural America people would agree with him until he identified himself and his positions in the Democratic Party. Then he heard “but you’re all immoral.” They stopped listening once he was labeled.

This has been a long-standing problem. Nancy Pelosi was a master at saying nothing but buzzwords that mean nothing to non-Democrats. It made her easy to demonize. The message gets downgraded automatically, like a built-in algorithm.

The only person doing work breaking that barrier IMO is Pete Buttigeg. He goes on FOX and gets his message across in a way that’s forcefully but not disrespectful. Yes, they have him on because he’s a known gay. But more Democrats need to have that vibe of “rural guy” just talking. It’s part of Joe Rogan’s appeal. And people listen to his crazy.

I am convinced that policy no longer matters. It’s all presentation and image. And Democrats have too long been pigeonholed as California libs. That’s who Kamala’s was, after all. Either they need to grow politicians in a different mold, or they need to get their own celebrity whose image is well known and lends itself to voters generally. Oprah. Tom Hanks. Mark Cuban. LeBron James. All people whose reputation can’t be driven by FOX or algorithms.

[ImLawBoy]

I'm highly dubious of any claim by Scott Galloway on anything but marketing.

Yeah, he's Jordan Peterson lite. He must be good at marketing, though, to have sold himself as an expert on youth sex issues.

1. I would ban algorithm based suggestions from social media. If you look it up yourself fine.

First Amendment would prevent this.

2. Young men need resiliency training. Kids need to be taught how to fail. Jessica rejected you - move on, you suck at basketball - practice, you got a C- work harder next time.

This is hard to quantify, but I don't think this is the issue you think it is. Every generation thinks the ones that follow are coddled and weaker without any real evidence. Their resiliency training is life, and they're living it - just like we did.

3. I would show young men if they work hard and if they do well they will succeed. With real role models. Young men respond badly to being told what to do. But they respond to leadership.

This isn't much of a policy so much as pie-in-the-sky aspiration without much in the way of fact behind it.

4. ban social media and online video gaming for under 18s.

Even going beyond the impossibility of enforcing this and the First Amendment issues, imagine what happens when the kids turn 18 and are suddenly drinking from the firehose of social media without any real preparation for it.

5. Properly funded public education and civics training. A informed population is a successful population. the 1960s we put 10%+ of our gdp into nasa and education because we wanted to beat the soviets to the moon. We reaped the rewards of that for 40 years.

I mean, this would be great and all, but "fiscal conservatives" don't seem much interested in funding education.

6. Rebuild community spirit with college credit/money toward college for community service in your local area or peace corps service.

I don't know how much community spirit this would build, but getting people into public service - building empathy - would be a great thing.

[Skinypupy]

This quote rings especially true right now, and seems to be at the core of the whole damn issue:

I don't know how to convince you that you should care about other people.

[Blackhawk]

4. ban social media and online video gaming for under 18s.

Even going beyond the impossibility of enforcing this and the First Amendment issues, imagine what happens when the kids turn 18 and are suddenly drinking from the firehose of social media without any real preparation for it.

I can attest to this. I have seen it multiple times - parents who forbade their kids from the risky things in life, effectively creating a one-family ban. I saw it with friends in high school, I saw it with other kids as a parent. Without exception it was a disaster. As soon as the kids left the house and were introduced to the seedier side of reality, they imploded. Without guided exposure during their formative years, they had no idea of how to handle pressure, vice, subtle risks, and the other things that we all see every day. At least one person I knew in high school was dead before he finished college because of it.

You have to prepare your kids for reality, not hide them from it. Assume that you won't be there when it matters.

[Grifman]

Well that was certainly money well spent:



That said the Dems under Biden did far at more for the working class than the Republicans ever did. I still don’t know how they don’t get credit for it. They pushed for an additional round of Covid relief that the Republicans opposed, they got a child care credit passed, they strengthened the ACA, and probably more that I can’t remember now. Who does none of that matter?

[Grifman]

Here’s take on where the Democrats went wrong, a fair amount I tend to agree with:

[Victoria Raverna]

Maybe if the economy has not suffered from a bad bout of infliction, Harris would have won. I don't know, the economy is always number one for voters so maybe that was it in the end. But it is clear that the demographics that Democrats relied upon are no longer as reliable as they were in the past.

I keep hearing "it's the economy, stupid" as the reason they lost. Harris promoted several specific policies to help drive down inflation and things she would do to make things more affordable overall. Trump's response was...20-25% tariffs, tax cuts for the rich, and deporting 2/3 of the agriculture and service industries. None of which are likely to help.

Yet the people who all say they're hurting the most voted for his solution in droves, most of them citing "the economy" as the driving factor in their decision. I get that American's are generally quite stupid and uninformed, but what could or should she have done differently there?

When one person says "here's how I'll address it" and the other says "I'll wave a magic wand and give everyone a pony" and the majority of American's say "Ooo look, a pony!", I don't know how you combat that.

I think the problem is that Trump's team managed to sell that economy is bad, things are more expensive under Biden. Then in interviews when asked about what Biden's policy that Harris is going to change, she can't answer that. And because of that, people who blamed Biden for their economic situation think Harris is going to continue the same "failed" policy of Biden. So I guess Harris lost because she was too loyal to Biden and couldn't say anything bad about Biden's policy.

[Victoria Raverna]

I'm highly dubious of any claim by Scott Galloway on anything but marketing.

But circling back, the discussion was over your claim that we needed to address young men who weren't gettin' any action (if I might paraphrase) and were angry about that...so...incels. You threw out some rather startling statistics (that I can't find any source for) in the process, and stated that we needed to address that group via policies.

What policies do you advocate that will address the grievances driving the incel community to support Trump?

4. ban social media and online video gaming for under 18s.

This is useless. The young men that supporter Trump were not under 18 years old. You shielded them from it then at 18 years old, they'll be bombarded on social media.

It is better to let them get used to it from earlier age and know that there are a lot of stupid ideas and stupid people on social media and online video gaming.

[Blackhawk]

I think the problem is that Trump's team managed to sell that economy is bad, things are more expensive under Biden. Then in interviews when asked about what Biden's policy that Harris is going to change, she can't answer that. And because of that, people who blamed Biden for their economic situation think Harris is going to continue the same "failed" policy of Biden. So I guess Harris lost because she was too loyal to Biden and couldn't say anything bad about Biden's policy.

That logic doesn't flow to the conclusion you reached.

[Victoria Raverna]

I think the problem is that Trump's team managed to sell that economy is bad, things are more expensive under Biden. Then in interviews when asked about what Biden's policy that Harris is going to change, she can't answer that. And because of that, people who blamed Biden for their economic situation think Harris is going to continue the same "failed" policy of Biden. So I guess Harris lost because she was too loyal to Biden and couldn't say anything bad about Biden's policy.

That logic doesn't flow to the conclusion you reached.

And what is the correct conclusion then according to you?

[Zarathud]

Trumps team were able to minimize Kamala with misinformation and played on the racism. I’ve heard several people this week explain their vote by saying Kamala had no policy plans (untrue as it was online) and never did anything on her own (also untrue as she was Attorney General and Senator). In a longer campaign, those untruths would have been harder to pull off.

[Blackhawk]

I think the problem is that Trump's team managed to sell that economy is bad, things are more expensive under Biden. Then in interviews when asked about what Biden's policy that Harris is going to change, she can't answer that. And because of that, people who blamed Biden for their economic situation think Harris is going to continue the same "failed" policy of Biden. So I guess Harris lost because she was too loyal to Biden and couldn't say anything bad about Biden's policy.

That logic doesn't flow to the conclusion you reached.

And what is the correct conclusion then according to you?

Your points are largely valid up until you started drawing conclusions from them. Then:

1. That the reason she didn't comment was more likely that her team had rushed to build a platform, and didn't have detailed policy plans in place yet, although she did have the basics. "Loyalty to Biden" was unlikely to have been a factor.
2. Realizing that, as much as people want a scapegoat, there isn't "a reason" Harris lost. There are hundreds of small reasons that added up.

[waitingtoconnect]

4. ban social media and online video gaming for under 18s.

Even going beyond the impossibility of enforcing this and the First Amendment issues, imagine what happens when the kids turn 18 and are suddenly drinking from the firehose of social media without any real preparation for it.

I can attest to this. I have seen it multiple times - parents who forbade their kids from the risky things in life, effectively creating a one-family ban. I saw it with friends in high school, I saw it with other kids as a parent. Without exception it was a disaster. As soon as the kids left the house and were introduced to the seedier side of reality, they imploded. Without guided exposure during their formative years, they had no idea of how to handle pressure, vice, subtle risks, and the other things that we all see every day. At least one person I knew in high school was dead before he finished college because of it.

You have to prepare your kids for reality, not hide them from it. Assume that you won't be there when it matters.

I suppose you are right. To some extent though playing CoD or doomscrolling all day is the same thing. The real world isn’t as fun and in the real world cats aren’t our undisputed lords and masters.

[Blackhawk]

Stupid real world.

[RunningMn9]

Two losses against a candidate such as DJT tell me something is seriously wrong.

Yes, but the problem is with the patient. The problem in this election wasn't Harris or Democratic messaging. The problem is the electorate. The problem is a media that whitewashed Trump's insanity. You can't fix that with a different candidate, or campaign messaging. No one's listening.

You are trying to find the right recipe for your bushel of apples, without realizing that too many of the apples are rotten. You can't unrotten them.

The GOP ran the worst candidate in US history. The GOP ran a mediocre campaign. They didn't win because of a flaw in Harris, or a flaw in Dem messaging. They won because of a flaw in us.

[Kraken]

Sadly true.

I happened upon this local story about local results. Pittsfield is a city of 43,000 with about 32,800 registered voters, about 21,000 of whom actually voted.

The total turnout currently stands at just under 64% — a considerable drop from the last presidential election in 2020 and well below Benjamin’s prediction of at or above 73%.

“We did drop down at least 10% in our percentage totals," she told WAMC. "And the only thing I can attribute that to is, 2020 we were in a COVID year, and I had over 12,000 people come into city hall or vote by mail, and we processed all those internally. We didn't send all those early ballots to the polls, so, there would be no way they could have processed all of them. But we had 12,000 people vote in person in 2020.”

This year, that number dropped to a little over 8,000, a difference of around 4,000.

...

2024 also differentiated from 2020 in Pittsfield’s vote split between the Democratic and Republican Parties. While the Democrats won the state in both contests, 2020 saw Joe Biden’s successful campaign bring in over 16,400 Pittsfield votes. Kamala Harris’s failed bid this year brought in only around 14,500. While Donald Trump’s 2020 run secured a little over 5,000 votes, his 2024 campaign attracted over 5,600. In Trump’s first campaign in 2016 – when 71% of city voters went to the polls – fewer than 4,800 Pittsfielders cast ballots in his name.

So: Harris received 1,900 fewer votes than Biden did while trump improved by 600 votes. That leaves 1,300 presumed D votes missing. If overall turnout was down 10%, a lot of Democrats sat this one out.

[Unagi]

Two losses against a candidate such as DJT tell me something is seriously wrong.

Yes, but the problem is with the patient. The problem in this election wasn't Harris or Democratic messaging. The problem is the electorate. The problem is a media that whitewashed Trump's insanity. You can't fix that with a different candidate, or campaign messaging. No one's listening.

You are trying to find the right recipe for your bushel of apples, without realizing that too many of the apples are rotten. You can't unrotten them.

The GOP ran the worst candidate in US history. The GOP ran a mediocre campaign. They didn't win because of a flaw in Harris, or a flaw in Dem messaging. They won because of a flaw in us.

Absolutely 100% spot on.

[RunningMn9]

If overall turnout was down 10%, a lot of Democrats sat this one out.

I hope they suffer the most in the days to come.

[RunningMn9]

If I was in charge of defining the 21st Century Democratic Party, I wouldn't change a goddamn thing. What I would do, is offer absolutely no resistance to this Administration. Give the American People what they want, and let them suffer. At this point, the only way back is for the American People to suffer enough that they are never willing to do this again. Until then, it's not going to have anything to do with candidate selection, or messaging, or trying to appeal to a population whose only source of information is social media memes. Let the world burn.

[Grifman]

If I was in charge of defining the 21st Century Democratic Party, I wouldn't change a goddamn thing. What I would do, is offer absolutely no resistance to this Administration. Give the American People what they want, and let them suffer. At this point, the only way back is for the American People to suffer enough that they are never willing to do this again. Until then, it's not going to have anything to do with candidate selection, or messaging, or trying to appeal to a population whose only source of information is social media memes. Let the world burn.

I largely agree, and I have read some political commentators saying the exact same thing. Remind the people that you opposed X and why, but don’t fight tooth and nail to prevent X. I wouldn’t go as far to say “no opposition” as the people need to know what you stand for, but remind them this is Trump’s world, the world you voted for, and now you have to live it. Just like some of the real life examples already noted elsewhere in this forum. Only then might people wake up - if we can get to the other side of this.

[LordMortis]

I wish I could get on board with that. I just can't.

[Blackhawk]

If I was in charge of defining the 21st Century Democratic Party, I wouldn't change a goddamn thing. What I would do, is offer absolutely no resistance to this Administration. Give the American People what they want, and let them suffer. At this point, the only way back is for the American People to suffer enough that they are never willing to do this again. Until then, it's not going to have anything to do with candidate selection, or messaging, or trying to appeal to a population whose only source of information is social media memes. Let the world burn.

Despite my situation, I might even agree. What they do can be undone.

Except that what they want to do likely involves turning future elections into a technicality, ala Russia. If they're allowed to do that, then it doesn't matter how much the populace wises up. If they're allowed to do that, the only way to roll things back would involve massive violence.

[LordMortis]

Except that what they want to do likely involves turning future elections into a technicality, ala Russia.

Likely?

[WYBaugh]

Except that what they want to do likely involves turning future elections into a technicality, ala Russia.

Likely?

Exactly this. I want to show this to everyone throwing out the 'It's only 4 years' crap.

[YellowKing]

He also said he could end the war in Ukraine in 24 hours before he was sworn in, but nobody's actually expecting that to happen.

[Grifman]

Interesting article, echoing some other things I am reading:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... republican

[RunningMn9]

Interesting article, echoing some other things I am reading:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... republican

Voters belief things that are demonstrably false and oftentimes contradictory, and nothing you can say to them will change their minds. Got it.

[waitingtoconnect]

As for men; the guardian has a piece on this; abuse of women is on the rise:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... -my-choice

And that people believed the lies is a common thread:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... republican

[Victoria Raverna]

If I was in charge of defining the 21st Century Democratic Party, I wouldn't change a goddamn thing. What I would do, is offer absolutely no resistance to this Administration. Give the American People what they want, and let them suffer. At this point, the only way back is for the American People to suffer enough that they are never willing to do this again. Until then, it's not going to have anything to do with candidate selection, or messaging, or trying to appeal to a population whose only source of information is social media memes. Let the world burn.

Despite my situation, I might even agree. What they do can be undone.

Except that what they want to do likely involves turning future elections into a technicality, ala Russia. If they're allowed to do that, then it doesn't matter how much the populace wises up. If they're allowed to do that, the only way to roll things back would involve massive violence.

But Americans have guns so they can fight back that type of government, right?

If not then the sacrifice of children with the mass school shootings are for nothing.

[Smoove_B]

But Americans have guns so they can fight back that type of government, right?

I'm not sure if serious.

There is zero chance any number of armed Americans could do anything against the American military -or- our militarized police departments.

American guns will be used against other Americans, full stop.

[waitingtoconnect]

If overall turnout was down 10%, a lot of Democrats sat this one out.

I hope they suffer the most in the days to come.

When the whole campaign from trump was to make democrats suffer you can bet they will.

Not sure if I’d want to be a registered Democrat in some states right now or a registered Democrat in the public services or military.

[Unagi]

But Americans have guns so they can fight back that type of government, right?

I'm not sure if serious.

There is zero chance any number of armed Americans could do anything against the American military -or- our militarized police departments.

American guns will be used against other Americans, full stop.

Yep.

The 2A isn't about making sure we can fight off a bad government with our muskets anymore. It's so we can just tear each other apart if we want to.

[Skinypupy]

But Americans have guns so they can fight back that type of government, right?

If not then the sacrifice of children with the mass school shootings are for nothing.

Thanks for the laugh, that’s the funniest shit I’ve read in a long time.

[Skinypupy]

For my own mental health, I took the step this morning of nuking my X/Twitter account. I have never posted, commented, liked, or shared a single thing on that platform, but had gotten into the bad habit of spending hours doomscrolling every day. Not healthy.

While I still want to stay informed, the OUTRAGE, the gaslighting, and the plain stupidity from both sides has become entirely overwhelming. And not just around politics…literally anything that happens in the world has to be accompanied by a chorus of howler monkeys flinging whatever shit at the screen they think will get them the most attention.

Hoping that unplugging from that firehose of bullshit will help me not feel so anxious and angry all the time. We shall see…

[RunningMn9]

Same here.

[Grifman]

So much for the youth vote:

[Blackhawk]

So much for the youth vote

So much for the future being better than the past.