What do progressives really believe? Trump followers might be surprised at the reality.
Since the rise of Donald Trump as a viable presidential candidate in the 2016 primaries, I’ve read about a million articles—and written a few—attempting to explain to Democrats who Trump’s followers are and what they believe.
To huge swaths of the center-left population, the right’s beliefs appear so loony that folks want interpreters to explain what the heck’s going on and why.
But after the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol, it occurred to me I’ve read nothing that attempts to explain to Trump’s legions who progressives are and what they actually believe. Republicans are as clueless about Democrats as Democrats are about them.
In a vacuum of knowledge, misinformation and outright propaganda fill the void.
New York Times columnist and Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman seemed bothered by that, too.
“One striking aspect of the Capitol Hill putsch was that none of the rioters’ grievances had any basis in reality,” he observed in a January 11 piece. “No, the election wasn’t stolen — there is no evidence of significant electoral fraud. No, Democrats aren’t part of a satanic pedophile conspiracy. No, they aren’t radical Marxists — even the party’s progressive wing would be considered only moderately left of center in any other Western democracy.”
Still, Krugman used his space mainly to lambaste Republican leaders for tolerating and spreading wild misinformation. He didn’t elaborate on why most things Republicans believe about their port-leaning cousins are wrong.
Having friends and parishioners on both sides of this divide, I thought I’d offer here a primer for Trump followers and other conservatives who are as confused by the left as the left is by them:
▪ As Krugman said, Democrats aren’t members of a satanic pedophile cult. They’re not lizard people. They’re not extraterrestrials. In fact, they’re your neighbors, the same people you went to middle school with. They’re your doctor, your kid’s little league coach, the guy who fixes your car, your favorite aunt, the woman you play golf with. They’re patriotic people, but understand patriotism a tad differently than you might.
▪ They can be as illogical, militant and hard-headed as anyone, but, that said, they put a great deal of stock in critical-thinking skills. They try hard not to believe anything simply because it was posted on the internet by an anonymous troll. They examine sources, documentation, evidence.
For good or ill, they tend to rely on experts who are more informed in a given arena—diesel repair, human psychology, political science—than they are. They realize there are a lot of things they don’t know, so they pay attention to those who do (or should) know, who’ve spent their lives studying the subject.
▪ They believe in science. They don’t worship science. But given their confidence in critical thinking and experts, they’re admirers of science’s empirical, verifiable approach to solving mysteries, and its reliance on following facts wherever they lead, even when the facts make us uncomfortable.
Thus, if, say, 95 percent of leading scientists agree evolution is true or that climate change is man-made and dangerous, Democrats will listen, even if that contradicts what they were taught in Sunday school or causes the corporation they work for to spend billions in environmental upgrades. They’ll adjust their beliefs or practices to fit the emerging facts, rather than vice versa. They’ll wear masks because scientists say it’s the best way to slow down a pandemic.
▪ They believe in limiting immigration from other countries. There might be some progressive somewhere who believes in open borders; I’ve never met one. Generally, Democrats believe in controlling immigration, but in greeting immigrants who try to come here illegally with compassion rather than brutality.
▪ They believe in the police. Some live in places where police officers are all that’s standing between them and mayhem. But they also want the police to do better than they’ve sometimes done in the past, to treat everyone fairly and with minimal violence.
▪ They love America. They love democracy. They love capitalism. But because they love these things, they want us to improve them. Sometimes they’re probably right about the shortcomings they see. Sometimes they’re not.
In every big family, no matter how troubled, there are the kids who want to ignore problems, present a unified front and pretend everything was just fine the way it was, no need to change, keep moving, nothing to see. And there are other kids who say, nope, everything isn’t fine, the old ways don’t work now, I love you all but we’ve got issues to fix. Democrats tend to be those latter kids.
▪ Most believe in God. A whole lot of the Democrats I know are Christians. Quite a few are churchgoers serious about their faith.
Nationally, 55 percent of Democrats or those who lean Democratic identify as Christians; 38 percent attend church at least monthly. These aren’t overwhelming numbers, but that’s a far cry from the right’s stereotype of Democrats as anti-God anarchists.
Those on the left who identify as Christians tend to lean more toward the New Testament than the Old Testament. They focus on God’s mercy more than on God’s wrath. They emphasize the Scriptures that tell us to heal the sick, feed the poor and seek justice for outcasts. For some, faith propels their politics.
In our current social turmoil, it’s beneficial to keep in mind that, whoever you perceive as your adversary, that person might not be the monster you’ve imagined him to be.
Paul Prather is pastor of Bethesda Church near Mount Sterling. You can email him at pratpd@yahoo.com.
This story was originally published January 21, 2021 at 11:53 AM with the headline "What do progressives really believe? Trump followers might be surprised at the reality.."