The Cooperative Election Study (CES) is the largest academic survey focused on American elections. Since 2006, the study has interviewed more than a half-million Americans to capture their views on contemporary policy debates, their engagement in political and social life, and their vote choices in federal and state elections. The study is a collaborative enterprise partially funded by the National Science Foundation and involving the participation of hundreds of scholars and students across dozens of academic institutions across the country.
CARA analyzed the data from the CES.
In 2026, we are finally at a point where we can confidently report survey findings about the youngest (and oldest) American Catholic adult generations. To do so we use the Pew Research Center’s generational year definitions. The youngest, Gen-Z were born between 1997 and 2012, however we can only “see” those born 1997 to 2006 in current adult survey data (i.e., ages 18 and older). It’s with these youngest Catholics that there seems to be the greatest interest in data.
How Democratic or Republicans are Catholics by Generation?
How Conservative or Liberal are Catholics by Generation?
|
ADULT CATHOLICS |
ALL |
SILENT |
BOOMERS |
GEN-X |
MILLENIALS |
GEN-Z |
|
REPUBLICAN |
24 |
21 |
25 |
26 |
24 |
19 |
|
NEITHER |
43 |
52 |
44 |
42 |
41 |
45 |
|
DEMOCRAT |
33 |
27 |
32 |
31 |
36 |
36 |
|
CONSERVATIVE OR VERY |
29 |
52 |
36 |
31 |
21 |
16 |
|
SOMEWHAT CONSERVATIVE |
12 |
9 |
14 |
12 |
11 |
10 |
|
MIDDLE OF ROAD/UNSURE |
34 |
20 |
30 |
35 |
36 |
45 |
|
SOMEWHAT LIBERAL |
10 |
8 |
8 |
8 |
12 |
11 |
|
LIBERAL OR VERY LIBERAL |
15 |
11 |
12 |
13 |
20 |
19 |
CARA answers
Overall, in 2024, adult Catholics were 33% Democrat, 24% Republican, and 43% independent, affiliated with some other political party, or were unsure of their party affiliation. Gen-Z Catholics were a bit more Democratic (36%) and a bit less Republican (19%). The most Republican segment of Catholics were Baby Boomers (25%) and Gen-X (26%). All generations were more likely to be Democrats than Republicans and all have a plurality who do not affiliate with either major party.
Party affiliation is only half of the story. Overall, Catholics tend to be more conservative than liberal when describing their political ideology. I have often described the median Catholic voter is a center-right Democrat and we can see the Catholic vote shift from Democrats to Republicans and back over time. Forty-one percent either describe themselves as very conservative, conservative, or somewhat conservative compared to the 25% who say they are very liberal, liberal, or somewhat liberal. Broken down by generation, there is a distinct pattern where we can see older Catholics being more conservative and younger Catholics less so. However, rather than liberals supplanting conservatives among younger Catholics it is more likely that they identify as middle of the road or not sure of their political ideology.
The CARA data deals with those who self-identify as Catholics. We know that most Catholics don't frequent parishes. The Catholics we find in parishes regularly are probably more likely to be conservative than liberal, and more likely to be Republicans than Democrats.
ReplyDeleteThe CARA data helps to explain the lack of "political activity" that Jim, Katherine and I find in our parishes.
Very simply in daily life (families, work) most Republicans and Democrats who are Catholic don't experience fellow Catholics as being very partisan, because in fact most of them are not. Most Catholics are unlikely to make assumptions about the party loyalty of other Catholics and are unlikely to think someone is a fellow Democrat or Republican unless that person clearly says so. Most of us keep politics to ourselves and people whose politics we know.
On the other hand, parishes are clearly conservative in the sense that they are pro-life, in favor of marriage, against divorce, against sexual misconduct, having children, etc. Very few Catholics have liberal views about these issues.
However, most Catholics are for loving neighbors, taking care of the poor, immigrants, homeless, the ill, the imprisoned, etc. We all know that comes from the Gospels and while liberals may for these things, you don't have to be a liberal to believe in them.
In fact, they are all a part of the tradition of Catholicism. We did not build huge school systems, hospitals and social service organizations to promote liberalism. We did to preserve our traditions and help others.
"Very simply in daily life (families, work) most Republicans and Democrats who are Catholic don't experience fellow Catholics as being very partisan, because in fact most of them are not. Most Catholics are unlikely to make assumptions about the party loyalty of other Catholics and are unlikely to think someone is a fellow Democrat or Republican unless that person clearly says so. Most of us keep politics to ourselves and people whose politics we know."
DeleteBingo. Many of us aren't very partisan, and don't want to be. Especially given how dysfunctional political parties are at present, especially the MAGA group.
This data does not account for the many liberal Catholics who ceased to identify as Catholics. I have no doubt that the Conservative aura of parishes has made them unwelcome. I have no doubt that they find no support for being Democrats in our parishes.
ReplyDeleteAny real outreach to them has to be based on the making our parishes more friendly to liberals and Democrats who are interested in immigration, the poor, the environment, etc. We should be able to do that because these are compatible with loving our neighbors.
What I find amazing about this data, is that across the generations those who continue to identify as Catholic are more likely to be identify as Democrats and liberals.
Not only do Catholic leaders need to find ways to welcome Democrats and liberal Catholics, Democrats and liberals need to become better at welcoming Catholics who may not totally agree with them. I think Bernie does a good job of this. He has made pains not to read people who are against abortion out of the Democratic party.
Jack - are there studies that show that Catholics who have left the church are disproportionately liberal? My personal observation is that many types of people leave the church for many reasons, not all of which (e.g. money, sexually abused, didn't like the new priest, kids bullied at Catholic schools) align neatly with the conservative/liberal divide.
DeleteThe Irish Catholic milieu I come from isn't particularly conservative; politically, they have tended to be liberal-ish Democrats. The Irish American women probably more liberal than the Irish American men.
DeleteJim, I think you are right that Catholics leave the church for a lot of reasons. Most of the ones I know left because they are remarried without an annulment from their first marriage. Some others because they don't like the priest. Or issues with kids. I have relatives who are drifting out over not having access to First Communion class for their son without paying a $400 fee. They live in an affluent community, and probably for most people that isn't a problem. I'm pretty sure they could negotiate out of the fee. But they shouldn't have to. (I guess that falls under "money issues")
DeleteI should clarify that the fee is for all religious ed classes, not just for First Communion age.
DeleteThese numbers are interesting, but they don't correlate directly with MAGA identity. Some percentage of Trump voters don't consider themselves MAGA. It's quite possible that Catholics voted for Trump in 2020, not because they are MAGA true believers, but for some other reason, such as a greater sense of political than religious identity, or dislike for the Democratic candidate and what she stood for.
ReplyDeleteI think it is true that some Catholics voted for Trump for other reasons than being MAGA true believers. I hope they are noticing, though, that MAGA is part of the package. MAGA is the essence of who Trump is. If they voted Republican because they believe in classic conservatism, that isn't what they got.
DeleteFrom primaries in 2016 about a third of Americans approved of Trump and more than a third did not. That has remained relatively constant because the essence of Trump, the TV entertainer was well established. Some people find his character at least very entertaining if not attractive.
DeleteThat third is mostly Republican; that Republican primary majority translated not only into become the candidate and president but also into control of the Republican party.
Part of Trump's attractiveness is that he has campaigned against establishments, in Washington, the media, and in his own party.
Trump is vulnerable in the general election; he did lose probably more to Covid and the economy than to Biden. And, of course Biden was merely the establishment answer of "never Bernie" when it became evident (again) that Bernie might win the primaries.
Jim, It seems the only thing that Dems stood for that was objectionable to the RCC was keeping abortion legal. The fact that they were able to ignore the overwhelming number of anti- christian (what Jesus taught) policies that trump promoted and has doubled- down on doesn’t say much for their true beliefs nor for their conscience formation.
DeleteJack -“ Any real outreach to them has to be based on the making our parishes more friendly to liberals and Democrats who are interested in immigration, the poor, the environment, etc. We should be able to do that because these are compatible with loving our neighbors.”
DeleteIOW the parishes need to start educating their parishoners about the church’s Social,Justice Teachings.
Jim, I’m sorry. But I can’t ever welcome MAGAs. I have too many in my own family. I literally can’t find a single way to justify their support of this man and his policies of hate. I have no desire to have them next to me in a pew. Katherine is more tolerant than I am. You say they couldn’t stand what Kamala stood for - she favored religious freedom and thus, abortion rights. She never preached hate - as trump did. He ran on a platform of hate. But they didn’t object to that? I can’t stand what trump stands for - hate, lies, corruption, greed. racism, promotion of violence, absence of compassion, immorality, amorality, etc, etc. that’s what all those white Catholics support.
"It seems the only thing that Dems stood for that was objectionable to the RCC was keeping abortion legal. "
DeleteThe bishops would tell you that Democrats stand for a number of other things that contravene church teaching, from abolishing religious conscience protections to promoting same sex marriage in school curriculum to transgender minors changing the sex identity they were assigned at birth. And it's quite possible we can add opposition to Israel's right to exist to that list.
And while you are certainly right that Catholic voters don't bring the Catechism with them into the voting booth, some of these issues that are dear to Democrats and progressives are kryptonite to conservative voters. If Democrats don't want Catholics to vote for MAGA candidates, they do need to nominate candidates who would appeal to Catholics - the great majority of whom, as Jack's numbers in the post show, range somewhere between moderate and very conservative.
"You say they [Catholic voters?] couldn’t stand what Kamala stood for"
DeleteI don't think I've ever said that? But I do think that, for whatever reason, and despite Kamala Harris's attempts to moderate her image during the 2024 election, gettable Catholic conservative voters never quite came around to her.
But it was a weird election: President Biden's nomination was inevitable until he failed in the first debate with Trump and was pressured by his own party leaders to drop out of the race. Then Kamala was substituted for him without having run in a primary and giving Democratic voters a chance to weigh in on her candidacy. And her campaign was quite abbreviated. Some Americans probably had an impression of her already, after she had run poorly in 2020 and then having been the recipient of some negative media coverage while vice president. My thought is, she didn't have a fair chance to re-establish herself with American voters.
In addition to the toxic (to conservatives) Democratic positions I listed a couple of comments back, I think Trump had a lot of success in the 2024 election running against what he and his MAGA campaign call "woke". Conservatives resent being told what to believe and how to think. Democrats were vulnerable to this. They may still be vulnerable to it. Trump has made anti-"woke" a major initiative of his current presidential term, as with his attacks on Ivy League school administrations, racial preferences in college admissions, and so on.
DeleteI don't doubt he will try to "sell" (politically) this week's Supreme Court decision, abolishing explicitly racial redistricting under Title 2 of the Voting Rights Act, as an extension of his anti-"woke" initiative.
"Anti-woke-ism" uses a lot of straw-man logical fallacies. (example: a person hired under DEI is by definition unqualified). Of course the Democratic party has some straw men of their own (such as, if you are against abortion, you are against women's rights) So they spend a lot of time demolishing one another's straw men, to the neglect of actual governance according to their constitutional duties.
DeleteFor a period of time a few years ago, my employer required all employees to attend mandatory DEI training. It was not as radical as what one saw reported in the conservative media about this training. I thought some of it was quite good (although I must admit that, when I had to watch the same videos the 2nd or 3rd year in a row, it got really old really fast). But I also heard remarks from employees who resented having to be exposed to what they perceived to be ideological brainwashing.
DeleteAnd when DEI principles get translated into affirmative action policies in hiring, promotion or, in the academic world, admissions policies, the level of resentment goes up several magnitudes.
Really? Is it woke to believe in a founding principle of America - that all men (sic) are created equal? Is it woke to believe that denying equal rights to citizens because of race, gender, sexuality, or religion is wrong? Is it woke to believe in the founding principle of separation of church and state? That it’s wrong for one religious group (the Catholic Church) to try to impose its theology on all ( the 81% who aren’t Catholic)? Is it “conservative” to support a state using all its power against a private company (such as De Santis v Disney)? Threaten law firms and media etc with lawsuits in order to impose the will of the president? Is it conservative to have the federal government take an ownership stake in major companies like Intel? Is it woke to believe in freedom of speech? Freedom of assembly? Academic freedom - without the federal government dictating to colleges and universities who they can admit, who they can hire, what they can teach in PRIVATE universities? Is it woke to object to a President referring to Latinos as criminals and rapists? To refer to all immigrants of color - like Latinos and Haitians - as vermin? As rats? Is it woke to object to vilifying those of non- christian religions as evil - like Muslims?
DeleteIs objecting to book bans woke? Is supporting hard fought civil rights laws woke? Is objecting to glorifying confederate leaders who were traitors to the country in order to preserve the evil of slavery woke? Is objecting to the elimination or whitewashing of slavery and Jim Crow laws woke?
The Democrats don't preach hate Trump does and has from his first days as a candidate when he mocked a disabled journalist, encouraged violence against protestors at his rally, inciting fear and hatred of immigrants and refugees. He uses vulgar language always but especially to refer to women. Tragically, most of the rest of “ conservatives” have followed this pied piper in the evil he preaches. . No - I often disagree with Dem policies, but they don’t preach hate. I’m sorry - but nobody who claims to be Christian (or a patriotic American) should follow this hate- preaching man who is trashing all of our constitutional rights - especially those that have helped the disadvantaged.. I will not welcome them. I may pray for them - that they will change- I can even forgive - but only from a distance. I can’t welcome them. Ever.
On the sort of thing that makes DEI necessary, or at least a pretty good idea: my wife, who is very smart (smarter than me, for whatever that's worth) has reported this phenomenon throughout her career:
Delete* Some corporate exec will call a meeting to discuss and solve a difficult problem.
* Within the first five minutes, my wife will propose a solution.
* Everyone ignores her.
* Discussion ensues for another 45 minutes.
* Some executive type, invariably a man, will then propose the same solution my wife had proposed at the beginning of the meeting, as though it had just occurred to him.
* Everyone else extols his brilliance. The idea is adopted.
Jim, that happened to me many times. I’m sorry - but not surprised - that it’s still happening. Now imagine you are a black female professional like my daughter- in- law. There is still a lot of dis rumination out there and trump,and MAGA want even more of it.
DeleteOne college admissions officer at an Ivy explained that they build a community - so some athletes get in with lower academic creds than some whites. Legacy admissions used to be rampant at manycolleges. But this officer said that seeing an applicaction from a minority who may not have been 4.0 GPA and 1500+ SATs but who had accomplished a great deal in spite of poverty etc - and whose academic achievements were high enough that they could do the work ( they turn away thousands who could do the work) might get an edge - they provide a living example of how people can achieve in spite of obstacles, and they can educate their white peers on the realities of being a minority in America.
DeleteLike Jim, while I agree that there is discrimination against people because of the race, religion, ethnicity, etc., I have also found the “woke training” to be overdone.
ReplyDeletePart of the overdone, is the notion that I should regard myself as a “privileged White male.” I rarely think of myself as white or male, and never as privileged.
My dad was a steelworker, my mom a housewife. Neither was privileged. They both worked hard to buy a home, remodel it, and build a cabin. They saved their money rather than investing it. Dad had an eighth-grade education; mom was a high school graduate.
Most of my undergraduate education was free because I was a pre-divinity student. My graduate education and postdoctoral education were free through fellowships, research and teaching assistantships.
We were working class becoming middleclass, neither poor nor wealthy. First the teaching positions and then the mental health positions that I held were not high paying. If I had married and had children, I would not have been able to work in them unless my wife also worked full time with equal or better pay than mine.
My personal income in my late fifties was at the 85% percentile which placed me as an upper class but not rich person; when I retired at age 60 that fell to the 70th percentile which placed me near the top of the middle class.
However, my household income in my late fifties placed me at the 61st percentile, i.e. a very middle-class person and my retirement income placed me at the 46% percentile, barely in the middle class.
Socially I benefitted a lot by being single and having a PhD. Money has never meant much to me. I lived comfortably with what I made. Like my parents, I saved my money and never personally invested in the stock market.
I worked in the mental health system at a time when women began to assume upper management and CEO positions. My observation was they succeeded by doing the things that needed to be done. They did not spend any time advocating for women for these positions. As an upper management person my best bosses and colleagues were women.
At the same time, I usually went to American Psychological Association meetings at which women, minorities and gays often complained about discrimination against them. However, most of these people worked in jobs that paid a lot more than mine in the public sector. Very few psychologists chose to work in the public sector and serve the most severely disabled people. Perhaps if they served these people they would have felt they had far less to complain about in their own lives.
I am sad that overt discrimination has reappeared in our society and that we are going back on some of the practices that seemed to mitigate it. However, I also see attempts to saddle all white males with guilt because we are all "privileged" was a mistake. It goes against my fundamental belief that we are all equal.
I encountered discrimination a few times in my career - but only in the corporate environment. As a freelance consultant I was fine. I loved it - being independent - the office politics and gossip and resentments swirled around me but didn’t touch me. Women have generally gone into “ caring” sectors like mental health in greater numbers than men. I suspect they didn’t have to fight as hard for recognition and promotions as women in other fields did. I was in the first generation of computer professionals. A number of my colleagues were African American women and they opened my eyes to their reality. Decades later my African American daughter in law faces some of the same challenges as her predecessors 50 years ago. However she has been very successful because she is extremely good at her job.
ReplyDeleteMany white men whine about “reverse discrimination”. There is also a lot of angst out there in MAGA land that too few women are willing to marry and have children these days. The young women graduate from high school in greater numbers than the men. More go to college and graduate than their male peers do. More women get graduate degrees than men except in a couple of still male dominated fields - engineering, physics, and math. As many women as men obtain medical and law degrees. Women today have choices that their grandmothers - and even mothers of my generation - did not have. They have no desire to give up careers they love, and lifestyles they enjoy to marry men who expect their wives to take care of all the domestic and child rearing chores AND keep incomes high at the same time. Multiple studies show that most husbands/fathers now do a bit more than the men of previous generations in the home, but the women still carry most of the load.
From my reading now (not personal experience- too long out of the working world) too many white males believe that they are entitled automatically to get the jobs many women and minorities now have. Affirmative action opened long closed educational and employment opportunities to millions of women and minorities during the last 50 years. Generally these policies paid off handsomely for their colleges and employers. Perhaps these affirmative action hires and students were incentivized to work harder than their white male peers, knowing that they were being more closely scrutinized to see if they “performed” well enough. White privilege is a real thing. White male privilege is also - too many of these whiney young men feel that they are entitled and shouldn’t have to actually compete with women and racial minorities.
Back in the seventies when I was teaching college, I found myself advising women who wanted to be nurses that they had the talents to be doctors and advising men who wanted to be PhD psychologists but were not competitive that they could do much the same work as M.S.W.s
DeleteThe feminist myth was that women's talents were suppressed by men. At the end of one of my talks to an advisee about going to medical school she said: "You sound just like my dad and my boyfriend!" The reality is that many fathers are delighted with daughters who have careers, and many men look forward to a wife with a career. And in the seventies when it would have been very easy for this woman to get married and be a nurse when she had time, becoming a doctor was not the easy choice no matter how much social support.
The guys who want to be PhD psychologists were not driven by male privilege but by social expectations that they should aim high and be competitive. I doubt that they had fathers or girl- friends who assured them that could be as happy but not as financially successful being a M.S.W. as having a PhD.
Our society may have opened the door to women and minorities being competitive, but it has not opened the door to white men being non-competitive by finding joy and happiness in being a husband and father. There are a lot of things out there like art and music that both men and women might find great joy but little financial success. Successful husbands might support a wife with such a vocation, but few wives are likely to support a husband with such a vocation.
I think life might be very much better if both male and female children had adult models who fully developed without being successful in the market.
At one time to be wealthy meant to live a life of leisure, now to be wealthy means you have to work, i.e. be involved in the marketplace. Now the people who have leisure are those who are less wealthy.
We need a new ethic of creative leisure rather than our present consumption leisure which is measured by earnings.
I think the white males who feel they are victims of reverse discrimination are a subset. Just observing the people in my sons' generation it seems like most of them have moved on and are used to equality in the workplace. Both sons have women for bosses and it doesn't seem to be a big deal. Of course everyone wants to be treated fairly and any time there is discrimination it causes hard feelings.
DeleteThe other night we watched a documentary on the African American women who manually performed calculations for the US space program in the 1960s. I think there is a movie about it.
Katherine, did the documentary about those women show that they were physically serrated from the rest of the NASA staff?
DeleteIt did say that their work area was separate. However one of the women said that if it was needed for her work she would join the meetings with the NASA men, and no one pushed back.
DeleteTheir work area was separate and so was their restroom! Couldn’t use the whites only restroom. John Glenn trusted Katherine Johnson’s calculations-more than the computers - which were new tech then.
Deletehttps://www.theguardian.com/film/2016/dec/11/black-women-mathematicians-nasa-john-glenn-space-race#:~:text=Three%20Black%20women%20mathematicians%20worked%20on%20the,safely%20from%20his%20orbital%20spaceflight%20in%201962.
Katherine, yes, the feature film is called "Hidden Figures". It's pretty good. 93% on Rotten Tomatoes! I haven't noticed it televised in quite a while, but I'd think it is shown on one or another of the cable channels from time to time.
DeleteI saw the film while still in theaters. Wonderful. For black women to get jobs like that in the hostile southern environment was amazing. The only time I observed that prejudice first hand was on a family vacation to Florida in 1957. I saw the old woman who owned the motel treat her black man worker with ongoing contempt. What hell it must have been to have to work on a job as a black man for that nasty bigot. Not that the North didn’t have its flavor of racism. But it was in-your-face there.
DeleteMy first job out of college was at IBM. They were recruiting new college grads by the thousands to teach them computer programming. There were no CS majors then. For several months I shared an office with a lovely African American woman. Connie was a bit older than I was - probably around 30. She was married and had two kids. We chatted a lot and I really liked her. So one day I invited her (and her husband and kids) to come to a barbecue at our house. She didn’t answer at first. Then she told me that she would enjoy that but her husband would never agree to socialize with white people outside of work. He had grown up somewhere in the south and had witnessed too much abuse and brutality of friends and family by whites. She told me he didn’t trust anyone who was white—not even her nice white officemate.
DeleteMy black daughter in law has many stories about being treated with disrespect and contempt, and of her friends and family (they all live in Florida) also being treated with disrespect and contempt. Racism is alive and well, and unfortunately growing stronger because of trump’s war against DEI - which is essentially a war against minorities. People now brag on the internet about being racist even before trump made it ok.
There had to be racism before Trump because it was a big factor in getting him elected. Ironically, I think Obama stirred it to the surface, even though he bent over backwards to avoid speaking out or acting on black problems. I always remember the expansive inclusiveness of the original Star Trek series. But even there, beautiful Nichelle Nichole who played “Uhuru”, was the victim of prejudicial treatment behind the scenes. She wanted to quit the series but was dissuaded by none other than Martin Luther King who told her that she was sending out a great message, a vision of the future.
DeleteI loved the Uhuru character.
DeleteThere was a lot of diversity in those old Star Trek episodes. Some were earthlings. Some were not. I remember one episodes where there were some spherical rock like things. The earthlings assumed they were inanimate, and were treating them carelessly. Turned out they were sentient beings. Oops.
Stanley, I think you are right that some people were "triggered" by Obama being elected president. I saw a meme with his picture. It said, "Do you miss me yet?" Most decidedly yes. When we have to learn a lesson as a society, it seems like it has to be in the most painful way possible.
I was always somewhat naive. I actually thought that Obama’s election was evidence that racism was mostly dead in the US.. i didn’t vote for him because I didn’t think he had enough of the right kind of experience - he was a neighborhood organizer and a freshman in Congress with no international policy experience. But after he won I still thought his election was a good sign. He was obviously very smart and well educated and he would learn. And he did because he actually studied policy papers. He respected expertise. Little did I realize that the hate and racism was still simmering and that his election made it boil harder. Then trump- who was totally unqualified -totally ignorant of economics and international policy and clueless about how the government works- came along and campaigned on inciting fear hatred of immigrants and others of color, and made it ok to be racist. And he won.
Delete"I actually thought that Obama’s election was evidence that racism was mostly dead in the US."
DeleteSame. When, in retrospect, that 2008 election probably was a catalyst for bringing a lot of latent racism to the surface.
I don't know if it was naivete. It was probably at least partially that, in the circles in which you moved (and the same was/is true for me), casual, overt racism had (very nearly) ceased to exist. That's still true in the circles in which I move.
“ in the circles in which you moved (and the same was/is true for me), casual, overt racism had (very nearly) ceased to exist.”
DeleteThat was the case for me, I thought, until our son married a black woman. Most of it was subtle but it was surprising that a couple of men I know asked to see our son’s baby pictures right after he was born. They didn’t totally disguise the fact that their interest was prompted by curiosity about his complexion. They didn’t ask to see the grandchild photos of others in our small social group. One friend asked me bluntly on learning of our son’s engagement - “ And that’s ok with you and George?” I had never heard him ever disparage any black colleagues ( we were work friends - he was my major client for 10 years .
I hope it's a case of "two steps forward, one step backwards", and eventually we'll get to where we aspire to be.
DeleteKatherine, I hope so too. But our son and his family aren’t waiting around for a return to racial civility. The racist focus of the Trump administration, now supported by the SC, will not be undone very soon. Ironic since Thomas was one of the earliest beneficiaries of affirmative action. So they are moving permanently to Spain this summer, two years earlier than the original plan. Our youngest son and his family are lily white. But he now has his French citizenship and they plan to move permanently to France in the summer of 2028 - not because they are potential victims of the heightened racism in our country like his eldest brother’s family but because it’s a much safer and more family friendly place. Plus there isn’t a war on all the freedoms - speech, the press, assembly, religion, academic freedom etc. They are not Hungary. The fall of Orban is a sign of hope but the MAGA folk are still trying to implement Orban’s techniques here to suppress our freedoms. Not to mention France and Spain have far superior (and affordable) healthcare systems, which they have firsthand experience with. And their kids won’t have to undergo active shooter drills.
DeleteIt makes-me sad because we will see them even less frequently than we do now, but I think both sons are doing the best things for their families. People emigrate when quality of life deteriorates where they live—for the same reasons our own grandparents and ancestors came to the United States— to give their children a better life and future. MAGA might die a slow death and some sanity might slowly return in America, but they aren’t hanging around to see. Both have lots of experience living overseas, even the family going to Spain, who have spent only 5 summers there, and they know that the quality of life there is better than here. So if their kids grow up there it will be a very good thing for them.
Where I grew up in Michigan in the 1960s, casual, overt racism was definitely in the air - it was something that children learned from their parents and repeated without a qualm - lots of "n-words". I guess it was socially frowned upon in those days (my parents didn't countenance it in their home), but it was impossible, at least for me, not to be affected by it in some ways. Maybe the next generation will do better.
DeleteAnne, I'm sure your kids have done their research and spent a lot of time in the countries they plan to move to. Right now the European countries are in a better place with their governments than we are. But France has a rising far right party; Marine Le Pen nearly was elected several times. And Spain had an actual fascist dictator in living memory. They still have their own right wing faction. Everyone has to do what they feel is best for their family. But the way I see it most countries have issues simmering under the surface, and are only one or two election cycles away from a toxic government.
DeleteAs the economic effects of the Iran fiasco ripple throughout the world, I don’t see it as being good for democracy and tolerance. When people are stressed economically, they don’t become nicer. I can’t blame anyone for leaving the US. I don’t even acknowledge the national anthem anymore. It’s just that, as a dying empire, our mischief is making things worse everywhere. Where can you go to escape from this?
Delete"Where can you go to escape from this?"
DeleteThe voting booth.
I think orbans defeat and the reaction of the overwhelming majority of Europeans to what trump is doing in the US and the world will slow the rise of right- wing extremism in Western Europe. They are mostly horrified by what trump is doing according to polls there. Trumps approval rating there was always low but is now in single digits. The Le Pens have grown their movement but because of the multi- party legislature in France they are unlikely to ever be dominant. Spain is very progressive - and very secular these days. That is a very important development in their politics. They remember the Franco era and have no desire to go back to that. Franco was supported by the Catholic Church, which has lost most of its influence, especially with younger adults and those with higher education levels, because of the church’s support of Franco’s fascist regime..
DeleteBut America is sliding rapidly into being run by right- wing extremist authoritarians. The SC is aiding and abetting the GOP attempts to steal the election through the gerrymandering on red states. They allowed Louisiana to halt its primaries after mail- in ballots were already sent so that it can start over after redrawing the election maps to disenfranchise blacks. California has fought back and so has Virginia but the Virginia Supreme Court has thrown out the new Dem. map. This year is pivotal and the GOP is pulling out all the stops to prevent the loss of House and Senate. They will cheat, intimidate and do everything they can think of to steal the mid-term elections, and the red state Supreme courts and the national SC are letting them. I had hoped our son would wait until after the mid- terms but they see no hope that the steal won’t happen. Once it does, it will be a very long time before American Constitutional freedoms are fully restored - if ever-or that the new official racism of our government will be abandoned. They have better odds in Europe.
At this point, I would not argue with anyone who wants to leave the US. The rest of the world (except for Israel) seems to be trying to set up a workaround to deal with the loony tune US. It’ll be painful for everyone but especially for Europe, which was so tied up with the US which is going downward fast. We managed to get Europe into confrontation with Russia and into a very bad situation. Germany, industrial leader of Europe, had its manufacturing killed by the cutoff of Russian gas.
DeleteAs for voting, I will always vote despite its not making anything better. Even when the people I voted for won, the Democrats, they did nothing to reverse Republican changes. Repubs move the country to the right, Democrats maintain status quo. It’s a ratchet.
Jim said: “Where I grew up in Michigan in the 1960s, casual, overt racism was definitely in the air...” Where I grew up in southwestern PA in the 1950's casual overt prejudice against people because of their race, ethnicity and religion was definitely in the air.
ReplyDeleteRace was not the largest part of that mainly because Blacks were segregated by where they lived and by their work. They were mostly in the Monessen area which had huge blast furnaces and Blacks did the undesirable work. Very few in Charleroi, the middle-class shopping district where I went to high school, or the finishing steel mill were my dad worked. There were a handful of Black students in high school. I remember mostly the Bedford twins. Everyone thought they were cute, never heard anything disparaging about them. Never heard anything bad about Blacks from my family mainly because we had no reason to talk about them.
When we bought our cabin, we considered buying a lot on the Ohio side of the Lake as well as Pennsylvania. The PA salesman made sure we knew that the Ohio people were NOT discriminating against Blacks. Dad bought the PA lot because it was on the crest of a slight hill in the otherwise flat former farmland, “good drainage.” Mom and Dad were both impressed by Jesse Jackson as were a lot of other steelworkers when he ran for president.
The first Black that I got to know well was my Benedictine priest Greek teacher at Saint John’s Minnesota. But I only got to know him well much later when he spent a sabbatical year at UMass-Amherst while I was doing my postdoctoral research fellowship. They had an excellent Black studies program. He was well liked by students at Saint John’s and ultimately became Vice-President for Student affairs. As part of his sabbatical, he had visited a Benedictine Abbey in Newark that ran a high school mostly for inner city kids. He was tempted to transfer there, because he obviously made a deep impression upon the students there. However Benedictines vow stability, and he was deeply attached to Saint John’s. A decade or so later when I visited Saint John’s he had died, rather unexpectedly. The deep affection of his fellow monks was very evident. He was originally from the Bahamas. At dinner in Amherst, I asked him why he had chosen to go to college at Saint John’s. He smiled kindly and said it was one of the only places at the time that accepted Blacks. (Saint John’ s had a priory and high school in the Bahamas).
Painesville is the well-integrated seat of Lake County. When I came to work for the County the chair of the Mental Health Board was Black which deeply impressed me since while Lucas County had had a Black board member or two, none had made it to board chair. Karl was descended from Jamaica. Painesville was once home to Black attendants (mostly from Jamaica) for the passenger trains; the trains stopped here to change crews. He was a real estate agent, and had played important roles in the community in founding the mental health center, etc. He once said, “my people” criticized me for belonging to a “white man’s church, but I respond that the church of Desmond Tutu is good enough for me.” He did an excellent job of quietly getting college fellowships for Black students funded by major Lake County industries. A real community leader, the Post Office is now named after him.
The number of Blacks like the number of gays that I have known are few in number but were impressive. I think it is easy to overcome being exposed to societal prejudice which is merely nominal by other people and not attached to people whom one regularly encounters. Most of the research literature supports this view.
Far more extensive in my childhood was prejudice against Protestants and ethnics again ethnics. In the steel mill where my dad worked men regularly used slang about each other’s ethnicity. My mother’s mother objected to her marriage to my dad because he was Polish. Never mind that my grandmother a German had married a Protestant Englishman probably because he had a good job as a foreman in the steel mill. She was going to refuse consent until Mom was 21, but Mom said she would go and get a civil rather than a church marriage in West Virginia. My grandmother really never accepted Dad. I had always though that Polish and Lithuanians mostly got along since my grandparents had married. However, as a Jesuit novice when I spent a month working at a retreat house, I was the favorite of the woman kitchen manager because we were both Polish. She hated Lithuanians fortunately I leaned this before talking about my Lithuanian grandmother.
ReplyDeleteMy public educational system was dominated by Protestant teachers. The Bible was read every morning. When my high school geometry teacher refused to give me a 100% on my report card even though all my 100% and one 98% rounded up to that, someone said it was likely because I was Catholic! When I failed to get the outstanding student scholarship award, it was because I planned to enter the Jesuits.
Prejudice lurks in odd places. My father had worked part time installing car radios for a Jewish shop owner. He even went to Jewish funerals, and Mom and Dad visited them in Florida where they had retired. Mom had a belief that we were descendent from German Jews on here side of the family. No real proof. However, at various times, I have encountered Jews who ask me if I am Jewish. Most recently many people think I look like Bernie Sanders even when they don’t know that I like him.
When I was a postdoctoral fellow my mentor and most of the social psychology faculty were Jewish. However, they seemed to have a deep resentment against Polish. My mentor once expressed that the Polish were much worse than the Germans! Once at a dinner reception for a visiting lecturer by one of the Jewish faculty, his wife began disparaging local Polish farmers for being Polish. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see how husband motioning to shut up his wife because I was Polish. Perhaps if I had been Jewish or even promoted my possible Jewishness maybe I would have ended up at a university?
I suspect many people experience some degree of discrimination because of race, religion, ethnicity or gender even though many of them may not really notice it. Unfortunately, some people experience a great deal of very personal discrimination from many people for some reason. That is very regrettable, and even more regrettable that we have lost some of the progress we were making to minimize that.
My Baptist grandma was not initially happy about Mom getting engaged to my Catholic dad. But she accepted it and put a good face on it for the wedding. (or so I was told, I wasn't there!)
DeleteIt didn't help that in 1950 they made the couple stand outside the Communion rail for a mixed marriage. At least they didn't have to get married in the sacristy, like Dad's Catholic mother and his Lutheran father. Lot of mixed marriages in my family.
There were 3.3 million Jews in Poland before the Holocaust. Most were killed. There are now 10,000-20,000 Jews in Poland. Many Polish Jews think that the Catholic Poles turned away from them. Here is an AI suMary
Delete“ Economic Rivalry and Modern Nationalism
In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, as Poland struggled to regain independence, modern nationalism took a sharp anti-Jewish turn.
• The Endecja Movement: The National Democratic Party (led by Roman Dmowski) argued that Jews were an economic threat to the Polish middle class. They organized boycotts of Jewish businesses with slogans like "Swoj do swego" (Buy from your own).
• Interwar Tensions: In the 1930s, universities implemented "Ghetto Benches" (segregated seating for Jewish students) and "Numerus Clausus" (limits on how many Jews could enroll), which left a lasting scar on the Jewish community's perception of their Christian neighbors.
3. The Trauma of the Holocaust
The Holocaust is the most painful chapter in this relationship. While Nazi Germany was the perpetrator, the "bystander" dynamic created immense resentment.
• Conflicting Memories: Jews remember the betrayal of szmalcownicy (blackmailers who turned Jews in for money) and the indifference of many neighbors. Conversely, many Polish Christians focus on the 3 million non-Jewish Poles killed by the Nazis and the fact that Poland has the highest number of "Righteous Among the Nations" (people who risked their lives to save Jews).
• Competitive Victimhood: Tension often arises today because both groups feel their specific suffering is being minimized by the other.
4. The Post-War Era and Communism
After WWII, the rift widened due to two major events:
• Post-War Pogroms: Even after the Holocaust, some Jews returning to their homes were met with violence (most notably the Kielce Pogrom of 1946), often fueled by rumors that Jews were trying to reclaim property or were part of a "Jewish-Communist" conspiracy.
• **1968 Purge: The Communist government launched an "anti-Zionist" campaign in 1968, stripping thousands of Jews of their citizenship and forcing them to leave Poland. This felt like a final betrayal to those who had stayed to rebuild the country. “
Jews came to provide a layer of management between the nobility and the peasants in Poland. That is a possible source of added resentment against Jews. It is an indictment of human nature more than Jews specifically that Israel now performs genocide, cruelties and aggressions that rival the Nazis while employing the Holocaust as a justification. And this toward a people with no prior history of antisemitism at least on the order of Europe’s. This does not justify the probable resurgence of antisemitism that will probably ensue following what I believe is inevitable, the collapse of Israel following the dissolution of the US empire. Iran is the beginning of the end for the US Empire. If the US or Israel resort to nuclear weapons, possibly the end of everything.
DeleteKatherine, yes, all countries have issues. But I think the US may be too far down the road to authoritarianism to recover. The GOP is doing everything it can to steal the mid- terms and the courts, including the SC, are making it easier for them to steal the elections. This year will tell the story - will the America we were disappear forever? Will our rapidly disappearing Constitutional freedoms be restored?
ReplyDeleteThe Le Pens have tried and tried to become the most powerful party but haven’t made it. Since France’s legislature is composed of multiple parties I don’t think the Rally party will ever be able to totally impose their agenda on France. Spain is very progressive now and very secular. They still remember Franco and have most Spaniards no desire whatsoever to return to fascism. Plus the Catholic Church has experienced a severe decline there in influence. They were strong supporters of Franco but they no longer influence the Spanish the way they once did. Unless the US really does change course in November it seems that the future is brighter in France and Spain than here.
Duplicate comment but I can't figure out how to delete it. The option doesn't show anymore when logged in.
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