What I haven’t seen pointed out much, however, is that Trump’s racism rests on a vision of America that is decades out of date. In his mind it’s always 1989. And that’s not an accident: The ways America has changed over the past three decades, both good and bad, are utterly inconsistent with Trump-style racism.
It’s not just Trump. It’s his supporters. THIS IS HOW THEY ALL ARE. Blithering about Al Sharpton, bitching about TV shows and singers they don’t know, posting Facebook memes about how “if you know what this butter knife is, you’re my age” and all this other elderly, embarrassing shit. And no, it isn’t ageism. I know 90-year-olds culturally younger than most of these people and some of the worst offenders are younger than me.
You don’t have to have your tits way up high to know how to just Google Ariana Grande instead of making Taco Bell jokes and comparing the number of writers on a Beatles song to the number of people who produce for Beyoncé.
It’s why Hillary was the perfect foil for Trump, because most of his voters are still quietly pissed about Bill — young, high, horny, dodging the draft — beating H.W. Bush. It’s hard to explain to people who weren’t there but trust me, his election upended SO MUCH CULTURAL SHIT, not the least of which that he was friends with many African-Americans and was seen to move with an ease in a world lots of white people hated and feared.
(When Democrats followed him up with an ACTUAL BLACK PRESIDENT oh boy, were we off to the races.)
Due to persistent and vicious segregation they have no experience of black people that isn’t either entertainment — sports — or poverty. They have no conception of a black middle class, of a black upper class. Their last cultural reference to a black person was Michael Jackson, for shit’s sake. Maybe Bill Cosby, and that worked out GREAT.
They’re still muttering angrily about Rodney King asking for it or telling stories about how their kids had to come home from school early because the “black kids” were going to beat them up in the riots.
The world they’re living in is changing all the time and they’re out here proudly shouting that they’ve shut their eyes. The cultural stuff matters because it’s a harbinger; the books you read and the music you listen to is the sound of the world around you.
They stopped listening to America 30 years ago and they have no intention of taking out their earplugs anytime soon.
A.
I am almost exactly the same age as Krugman, and my reading of the “sweep of history” leads me to the same conclusions as him.
PS, love your blog.
Great post!