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Enbastet's avatar

I am a New York Jew and grew up with liberal principles as a given. Any Republican neighbors - who were all non-college - were just assumed to be wrong. It was a bubble but it is still how the city is. Minority and non-Orthodox Jewish voters are to the Left and blue collar Whites and Orthodox Jews are to the Right, and fortunately we have the numbers.

I certainly accept the power issue as a motivator, but non-Hispanics have to understand that there is also a strong current of "I and mine are here" that makes many Hispanic voters look at immigrants as interlopers. There is also the fear of being classed with them. We Jews experienced that in the early 20th century, when German Jews who had made their place here opposed the entry of Eastern European Jews both out of embarassment at their ostentatious Jewishness and rougher ways and becuse of fear that anti-Semites would now also attack them.

It is a combination of wanting to be ensconsed as they feel that they have earned and actual fear that it can be stripped away. That then translates to Hispanic border officers beating immigrants and Hispanic voters voting for power for Whites or for Hispanics whio serve Whites. It is seen as self-preservation.

The irony is that, even with gerrymandering, they probably have the numbers to oust the White power structure and bring in better policies on health and education and wages, but they self-limit because the status quo may be a devil but it is the devil they know.

Let me just point out one other thing, which I think goes to Dem failures on messaging to this community. "Latinx" is a construction of white academics whose overriding concern is purity on gender but Latino and Latina voters prefer to call themselves that and did not ask for "x" and do not use it. It therefore acts as a distancing issue rather than an encompassing one. As another Wonker noted when I commented that "people with uteruses" and "pregnant people" rather than "women" when reaching out on reproductive rights is very off-putting to average, well, women whom we need to reach: "Democrats have to learn to talk like normal people."

The main issue is to listen to community workers who understand the nuances of how a community feels. Good intentions from outsiders will always fall flat.

OK - gotta go.

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RogationDays's avatar

Honestly, I don’t know what term to use anymore. I usually go with Hispanic but that is apparently not correct either. I just don’t want to make anyone feel bad or not included. I spent 8 years in NYC. It felt like coming home even though we’ve been San Franciscans since the Gold Rush (which incidentally is the Jewish line of the family…first Wells Fargo agent in California, then the Irish during the Civil War, my Italian grandfather arriving when he was 14 in the 1890s, followed by the old Penn stock running away from his family in 1900….the melding of the Catholics, Protestants, and Jews was a rather volatile mix that led to a lot of atheists. I was raised by my grandmother who raised by her grandmother (who was the one who came as a child during the Civil War)…so the family stories are all vivid to me). Anyway, I loved NYC and am so sad that I can’t go back because I couldn’t afford to live there. I always thought it would be the perfect place to retire because you don’t need a car, great medical, and lots of places to shop (or get delivery). I was there for the 80s. I don’t even recognize it anymore. I’m staying in Texas but will find some place in the East that is not as hateful as this place. People who are openly Dem are routinely threatened here.

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