Why does the media bothsides the antidemocratic threat when it is so clear that Republicans pose the entirety of the threat?

SUMMARY: Both rightwing and mainstream media sources insist that bothsides engage in antidemocratic violence equally. A careful consideration of the evidence reveals that it is the Republican Party rank and vile that poses the biggest threat of violence to our democracy and their apologists that are normalizing it. The minuscule number of leftists supporting political violence do not support the Democratic party, but hate the Republicans. However, it is clear that the main instigators of violence are overproduced elites, the overeducated sons and daughters of the wealthy who do cannot find work to support themselves in the manner to which they have grown accustomed.

KEY WORDS: Political violence, Polarization, Overproduced Elites, Mainstream Media, Divisive Rhetoric, 6 January Insurrectionists, Maverick Activists

COMMENT QUESTION: What you think of the asymmetry of political violence and support for antidemocratic means to achieve the social goals of the left and right?

Ye Olde Blogge has been exploring the issue of political polarization and violence lately as we approach the 2024 elections. We’ve been unpacking a recent article on the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace website by Rachel Kleinfeld. Check out our earlier posts:

The report contained support for two arguments frequently made by Ye Olde Blogge, as well as a new argument that resonated with us.

Unveiling the Inner Racist of White People

Why do white people suddenly hate democracy and vote for candidates who will destroy it?

Behavioral Economics Predicts The Inner Racist of White People Will Destroy Democracy for Right to be White

In the past, we’ve argued that MAGA and Republican support is driven by the racial animus of white America. There is no other way to explain the support for Trump and Republicans in 2016 and the increases in the white vote that they saw in 2020. Let’s summarize Kleinfeld’s reporting on a 2018 Democracy Fund survey on political views of Americans.

  • LEAST SUPPORT FOR DEMOCRACY: moderates defined as those with views representing both sides of the political aisle
  • MOST SUPPORT OF A STRONG LEADER: moderates who believe that such a leader can ignore Congress and elections
  • ANSWERING THE CALL OF THEIR INNER RACIST: 28.9% of the electorate who support the liberal idea of redistributing the wealth while believing that American citizens should be White [sic, and sick, knowhatimean?], Christian, and born in the US.
  • REPUBLICAN PARTY BOUND: People with these views have been answering the siren call of I2I4 since 2016 in increasing numbers.

Forgive us for shouting a resounding, I KNEW it!

Also, let’s consider that MAGA is between 30 and 35% of the electorate.

The Emerging Antidemocratic Authoritarian Pro-Violence Factions in US Politics

The Authoritarian Violent Racist Right

Is there a political model that will help us predict the direction that our democracy will take in the next year or so?

What Happens Post-Trump: The Path of Political Disintegration, Part 1

There is a growing antidemocratic faction on the rightwing of the American political spectrum. These people sound like they are members of the overproduced elites who play a significant role in destabilizing their countries because boredom. Overproduced elites are the children of the monied class who go into professions but can’t find jobs because there are just too many of them. They end up underemployed or living in their parents’ basements and are looking for something to put their prodigious talents towards that isn’t too proletarian, like 6 January-style insurrection.

It’s gotta be somebody’s fault that they can’t get employment at the level of luxury they’ve become accustomed, so scratch your ass to find the answer, it’s the darkening of the American demographic, obvs!

Over Produced Elites Fueled the 6 January Insurrection
What explains the conservative white voters' willingness to give up on democracy? It's too much of a risk!

“Elite of the left behind” or Democracy is Too Much of a Risk, Give Us White Minority-Rule Autocracy Instead

You may recall our earlier reporting on the demographics of the January 6 insurrectionists (emphasis added):

  • The states the people charged in the insurrection have been in proportion to the state’s populace except for Kentucky, Maryland, Missouri and Montana. They sent more than their fair share. Kentucky, sure, but Maryland? Really?
  • Fifty-two percent of the insurrectionists were from counties that Biden won. What? Before you go scratching your ass, there’s something else these counties have in common: they have all seen declines in the white, non-Hispanic populations. Hunh? Go figure.
  • The demographics of arrested insurrectionists: average age, 40; 40% are business owners or hold white-collar jobs; and only 9% were unemployed. Contrast that profile with the demographic of earlier far-right extremists: 61% under 35; 25% unemployed; and very few white-collar employees. In other words, it ain’t and never has been about economics.
  • The median household income of the average Trump voter is $72,000.00 per year, which is well above the average.
  • White privilege and racial angst are central organizing principles of those on the right, according to research findings.
Overproduced Elites Stock the Ranks of the Pro-violence Authoritarian Right
How does the 10% transfer wealth upward and how is Biden stemming the flow?

How Does the Wealth Pump Work to Transfer Billions from the Middle Class to the 10%?

If that was the insurrectionists, who are these authoritarian and violence supporting rightwingers?

  • Distrust ALL American institutions and elites
  • A LOW sense of agency
  • STRONG feelings of grievance and victimhood
  • Feel threats to traditional gender roles and white supremacy JUSTIFY the use of political violence and authoritarianism.
  • LESS partisan and affectively polarized than feeling their white male privilege threatened

This is not an insubstantial number of people. This is MAGA Republicans we’re talking about. There are, literally, millions of them.

They Sound Like Hochschild’s Conservative, Rural, Christian, White Voter
What causes the Republican base to continue voting for Republicans?

The Making of the Republican Stooge Voter: A Review of “Strangers In Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right”

Hunh, that also sounds like Arlie Hochschild’s description of the conservative, rural, Christian, white voter she studied in Cancer Alley sacrificing themselves for corporate greed and telling themselves it was all worthwhile if it weren’t for those meddling kids slipping all the lazy undeserving Blacks, Browns, Muslims, and Others into the queue of the American dream ahead of them. Surely they would’ve had all their American dreams come true by now if it hadn’t been for all those lousy commie pinko fags, amirite?

The Minuscule Pro-Violence Factions on the Left

Bernie Princesses

The Bernie Princesses Don’t Understand Sanders’ Role in Our Democracy

Contrast the willingness of rightwingers to resort to violence in order to uphold authoritarianism and preserve their favored social structure with the observations regarding individuals on the left.

  • PARTISAN Democrats are moderates not progressives.
  • Polarized lefties are HIGHLY and POSITIVELY politically active, engaged, and aware.
  • ACTIVIST MAVERICKS are the problem on the left:
    • Younger, wealthier, and male, i.e. overproduced elites who stir up shit because boredom and privilege
    • Far-left ideology
    • DISLIKE the Democratic Party — they were the annoying sadistic Bernie Bros of 2016 — but HATE Republicans, so affectively polarized
    • Willing to support political violence to achieve democratic goals of greater racial and democratic representation, and they aren’t even doing it ironically, so go figure.
    • 60% support property crime and 28% interpersonal violence!
    • Fuck these guys, amirite? Luckily, they are a teeny-tiny minority of the left and the American electorate.

Addressing Bothsidesism in Political Violence

A Quickie: The If-Someone-Shows-You-Who-They-Are, You-Should-Believe-Them Election

These are the currents running through the American electorate in 2024:

  • THE ANTIDEMOCRATIC RIGHT makes up a plurality of the Republican party, approximating I2I4’s floor and ceiling, 30% of them.
  • THE VIOLENT LEFT is an obscure negligible minority of Democrats and the left who waste their votes on third parties or self-righteously not voting non-ironically helping Trump to win in 2016 so they could continue bitching about the ineffectiveness of Democrats (that last bit was me and not Kleinfeld, but you know it’s true).
  • BOTH GROUPS have apologists who justify their behavior. For Republicans, this has allowed a minority to take over the party and let the rest of us conclude that they are all reaping the rewards of fascism. While on the left, the Bernie Bro dregs have no influence in or out of government except in their own heads big and small.

The problem is that the existence of the minority of violent lefties allows the MSM thirsting for a horse race to bothsides Republican habitual violation of democratic norms, values, and behaviors. Kleinfeld concludes that it is this bothsidesism that is tearing the country apart while ignoring the asymmetry of the threat.

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Image Attribution

This image was generated using Poe’s StableDiffusionXL bot using the prompt, A movie poster for “Republicans Attack” showing Republican elephants destroying the Capitol building