Does respectability politics have a place in America’s value of harmony?

In the U.S., relying on “respectability politics” undermines the very foundation of the country’s stated reverence for diversity. Respectability politics espouses the philosophy that, to earn respect, the only route is to adopt the dominant culture’s value system and to speak in the value-language of that dominant culture. Where’s the diversity in that?

The long-standing challenge for those who are not part of the dominant culture is to balance respect for one’s “tribal” culture with respect for some forms of assimilation. President Obama, for example, tried to encourage more men in the African-American community (along with other “Black identity” individuals) to embrace the practice of keeping nuclear families intact— as an involved father and partner. Yet, he was quite vocal that one need not apologize for “being Black." Rather, one should celebrate positive cultural traditions and values (while remaining aware of the harshness of Black history).

No community or subculture should think of itself in terms of needing “self-policing” (another aspect of respectability politics). Every community should think of itself in terms of benefiting from self-improvement. There’s a huge difference here. One is oppressive and the other is empowering. Self-improvement suggests that we are in charge of our cultural and individual behavior and that we get to decide what constitutes an “improvement.”

I am sympathetic to the notion that we are all a whole lot more alike than we are different, but that does not mean that one community should spend its energy proving that it is happy to be totally aligned with the dominant culture. To be so is to, at best, stand in the shadow of that dominant culture—receiving none of the light. A social psychology in which one feels the metric is “to what degree the culture aligns with what the dominant culture says, does, and believes” sets up an unhealthy imbalance in terms of respect and appreciation. The challenge is that most (all?) dominant cultures insist on this imbalance and on using themselves as the metric for superiority.

However, any community/subculture that has an inadequate voice does well not to be outright oppositional. It’s my experience that it is not possible to find acceptance from anyone we are shouting at with a hostile epithet. Any community that wants acceptance and respect needs to embrace ways of commanding respect without alienating those who are most receptive to the right for that respect. There’s a difference between righteous indignation and in-your-face hostility. I am looking at this from the perspective of someone who has lived within the dominant White American culture my whole life. However, I pay attention to what goes on around the world. No matter what regional culture I’ve observed (e.g., Nigerian, Indian, Brazilian, French), no one is “converted” by hostile attacks.

A mature individual knows how to command respect without demanding it. And if commanding respect without demanding it works best when dealing with those who are sympathetic, that is even truer when dealing with those who are not receptive, such as many people in a dominant culture.

Respectability politics reminds us that a culture is unlikely to be embraced if it loudly negates the values and behaviors of the dominant culture. That is just a practical observation of the way that societies and individual human psychology work. It is dangerous, though, if that realization is not balanced with insistence on retaining what is beautiful and cherished in the culture that commands respect.

In the U.S., the choir must sing in harmony, never in unison. Do not ask the baritone to sing the soprano's part.

Can President Trump "make America great again"?

“Great again.” The question is, how will we measure “great” and “again”? What were the halcyon days of the United States and in what ways?

The GDP Definition of “Great”— The White House, despite all its internal, warring factions, is defining “great” strictly in terms of economics: GDP, job numbers, and Americans’ disposable income (a questionable indicator of The American Dream). You would think that by paring down the dozens of issues that affect the U.S. and its people to these three would make it very easy to be “great.”

The Historical Definition of “Again”— But maybe, not great again; even during the Reagan years, people in the bottom tiers of the U.S. socioeconomic classes were struggling, some kinds of taxes were replaced by other kinds of taxes. Unemployment tends to follow international economic swings, so the fact that things actually got worse while Reagan was president is somewhat similar to what President Obama inherited as the globe was taking an economic dive (in large part due to financial institution over-extension with debt offerings). Again? Under FDR? Truman? Nixon? Reagan? Bush #1? Bush #2?

The 2017 Federal Budget Definition of “Great”— Almost every issue is now framed in terms of theories about what will make the U.S. GDP grow faster than that of other countries. The exceptions are increases in military funding, Dept. of Homeland Security funding, and a $1T investment in “infrastructure” (to be a shared expense with businesses that participate). “The Wall” is based on a different theory of economic benefits vs. the cost of construction, maintenance, and staffing. Drawing from the White House budget document, we can see the places where Americans can expect less:

• Major reduction in healthcare insurance availability and in healthcare services available.
• Reduced and eliminated financial institution regulatory oversight (reintroducing the circumstances that led to the financial institution collapse of 2007–2008)
• Substantial reduction in access to Medicaid, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance, temporary financial assistance (aka “welfare”), and the Children’s Health Insurance Program for families living in poverty
• Substantial reduction in government oversight/administration of student loans
• Substantial reduction in funding for teacher training, after-school programs for children living in poverty, and programs designed to give children living in poverty and those with disabilities or other learning disadvantages a “boost” in completing their education and being prepared for post-high school education/training; move from support for public schools to greater support for private and religious K-12 schools
• Reduction in support for farmers/agriculture (plus the elimination of much of the workforce that plants, tends, and picks the crops)
• Reduction in retirement benefits for federal employees (other than senators and House representatives)

The devil is in the details. For example, a quick look at the spreadsheet in the budget document shows that the federal deficit decreases as percent of GDP for a couple years, and then it increases as percent of GDP. Another issue is whether the targets for these reductions are achievable. As an example, look at reductions in Medicaid as a way of understanding what’s behind some of these cuts. The major fraud committed with Medicaid comes from healthcare providers. (In Medicare, the major fraud is split between insurances billing for services not received by patients and healthcare providers delivering treatments that are not needed or are over-billed.) However, the “remedy” being offered in Congress and the White House is to reduce the number of people who are eligible for Medicaid. It’s not clear how remedying something other than the root cause of the problem will make things great for anyone other than those insurance companies and healthcare institutions that are unscrupulous.
And then there’s this: The theories about rapid GDP growth for middle- and working-class Americans and for the working poor are based on a premise that has been proven false: When corporations make more profit, their shareholders benefit, especially if they don’t expand their workforce. By law, corporations are required to maximize shareholder returns. The stock market rise is based on the belief that corporations will continue to make record profits, not that they will expand their workforce.

We’re already great! The U.S. is already great. In fact, in many ways, it’s the best it’s every been… even if you just look at GDP. Yes, the U.S. can get even better, but that’s different from claiming it’s not great now and it will be later. Unfortunately, “Make America great again!” has a sound bite advantage over “Make America even better than it’s ever been!” American nostalgia for what never was is infamously resistant to facts.

U.S. Quality of Character— Since the November election the rest of the world has been judging the U.S. more harshly. They had their frustrations with G.W. Bush and Barack Obama— frustrations that pale in comparison to what they’re feeling now. They’re judging the President and the 63 million Americans who voted for him because the White House’s notions of what makes a “great” country should include a lot more than GDP.
Let’s assume that a “great America” has something to do with the “quality of character” of the nation in the way that it treats its citizens, residents, and world neighbors. Quality of character includes being

• honest & prudent
• self-disciplined in behavior
• respectful of others
• collaborative
• well-informed
• generous/benevolent
• dependable
• persistent & consistent
• principled (making decisions and behaving based on fundamental ethical principles)
• benevolent/generous (of spirit and deed)
• responsible (taking responsibility for one's words and deeds, plus looking out for all Americans, in our case)

In other words, for the U.S. to be “great,” its leader(s) need to have these qualities of character. Of the eleven characteristics listed, President Trump demonstrates about one (persistent but not consistent; principled in some ways and lacking integrity in others— awarding 1/2 for each).

Quality of Character and Treatment of Americans— Further marginalizing people living in poverty, including the working poor (67% of those on Medicaid), taking funds from the public schools that working-class and poor families must depend on for a quality education, and increasing the financial assets of the upper class disproportionately more than that of the middle- and working-classes are actions that are contemptuous of many, if not most, Americans. This is a consistent mentality: The wealthiest nation on Earth should do whatever it can to accelerate its economic growth, even at the expense of others. And the wealthiest individuals in the U.S. should do whatever they can to accelerate their financial growth, even at the expense of the rest of the nation. This is not a mentality we normally associate with a high quality of character. It is selfish in terms of assets and power. It applies to many in the current White House.

Quality of Character and Treatment of Allies— Since the beginning of Donald Trump’s bid for the presidency, he has maligned, snubbed, and disrespected U.S. allies and their leaders while praising despots like Vladimir Putin, Kim Jong-un, and Rodrigo Duterte. His profound deficit in knowledge about world affairs is not just a deficit in being "well-informed"; it is actually a deliberate preference not to know the facts: He would not attend intelligence briefings after the election, deeming them a waste of his time; he says he does not like to read and prefers to base decisions on his “gut.” In a meeting with President Xi Jinping, Trump volunteered that ten minutes spent talking about North Korea introduced him to some of the complexities in dealing with Kim Jong-un and that government. (And that statement was given the same importance, by Trump, as noting that the chocolate cake they’d had was “fantastic.”) However, it is not just Donald J. Trump who is treating allies with disregard. There are others in the White House who are rabid nationalists (not just Steve Bannon, by the way). To be clear: Most members of the U.S. Congress, especially the Senate, recognize the importance of respectful and tactful international relations… especially with allies. They, too, represent the nation and, in that capacity, their quality of character should be acknowledged, at least in that regard.

Can President Trump make America great again? Probably not, unless we consider only GDP and not who within the U.S. benefits from that. Surely not, if we consider the quality of character of the nation’s leadership and the nation’s domestic and foreign policies.

Why do Progressives believe that Donald Trump will not help unify the country?

Neither Progressives nor Conservatives are hopeful that the United States (its citizens, voters, or elected officials) is about to unify anytime soon. Divisive thinking is now pervasive in the culture and has become systemic. Systemic conditions are extremely difficult to change.

As an example, a business culture can become so systemic that even getting rid of some of the people in the organization and replacing them with others rarely changes the entire business culture. Often, the new hires (at any level of the company) evolve to conform to the existing culture. Changing the CEO to someone with very different behaviors (a new role model) and a set of articulated, new expectations can help, to the extent that the CEO is strong-willed and aligned subordinates can weed out employees (starting with managers) who won’t or can’t conform to the imposed culture. If the company is sufficiently large, this change can take 5+ years to happen. Meanwhile, the company will be quite divided. Consider Carly Fiorina during her tenure at Hewlett-Packard (a name which she strategically referred to as “HP.”) She was strong-willed and discarded most of “The HP Way,” a statement of values advocated by the founders and embraced by many employees. With Fiorina’s imposition of a new culture, employees left in droves as they were committed to those long-time values—some resigning, others fired. But Donald Trump cannot fire members of Congress. He cannot fire Progressives. Governing the U.S. is not reality television and it is not corporation management. Progressive thinkers have a vote.

Progressives have been watching and listening to Donald Trump’s direct comments and behaviors for a long time. Many believe that the best predictor of the future is the past. In a few ways (not many), President-elect Trump is not as extreme a Conservative as those who are becoming the new establishment, that is, the alt-right and Tea Party Republicans. If congressional Republicans decide their best hope for keeping their jobs is to line up behind Trump, there will be only a very few points of political policy on which there’s a chance for Progressives and Conservatives to find common ground. Mostly, the distance between progressive thinking and conservative thinking is growing as the alt-right cements their power.

Why would even moderate conservative politicians line up behind President-elect Trump’s political positions? They might hope that lining up would reduce gridlock in Congress. Voters are tired of congressional gridlock… and might actually come to realize that if they keep voting for Republican incumbents, that gridlock is not going to go away.

Those who voted for Trump in the primaries were clearly not disturbed enough by his personality and open bigotry to vote for another Republican primary candidate. And 47% of those voting in the general election chose Trump. (Well, actually, it’s the Electoral College, since Secretary Clinton received almost 3,000,000 more popular votes than Trump. But the point remains that 47% of voters chose Mr. Trump.) The division is with the voters. There are people who will accept having a man committed to discrimination and there are people who won’t stand for that in any elected official, much less the president of the United States.

Five days after the election, President-elect Trump announced that he will not totally rescind the Affordable Care Act. I guess he still doesn’t understand separation of powers in the U.S. Constitution, as such changes are the responsibility of Congress. But if he pushes for the ACA to be improved and not discarded entirely, Conservatives in Congress can line up behind that. They don’t have to be 100% opposed to the entire ACA anymore because it can stop being called “Obamacare.” Their congressional home base will not desert them. It remains to be seen who has the most to gain with the modifications: healthcare providers, healthcare insurers, or the populace.

It is on social issues of equal rights, equal opportunities, and equal treatment that Progressives are certain there is no possibility of finding common ground. Progressives know that Trump is closer to progressive beliefs in only a very few of his political positions and that he has been quite the bigot in his own professional life. Many Progressives believe that Trump mostly played to his base of bigots and misogynists to gain prominence with large, admiring crowds and that Trump wants to keep those bigots’ support for another presidential election in 4 years. Appointing Stephen Bannon, well-known white nationalist and alt-right spokesperson, to the position of chief White House strategist and senior presidential advisor says volumes about where Trump is headed on civil rights. It is not toward anything that even moderate Conservatives could support, let alone Progressives.

Trump is not a deep thinker (he has volunteered that he prefers shallow thinking), but he has street smarts and instincts for how to be top dog. Progressives’ biggest concern is that civil and human rights will regress under President-elect Trump’s leadership. Already, we are seeing more hate crimes and hate speech from other bigot, xenophobes, and misogynists who feel they’ve been empowered by Trump. Appointing a white nationalist to a senior position states clearly that President-elect Trump could not care less about being a unifier.

People of color, women, people with disabilities, non-Christians, and people with non-straight gender identities can expect to experience day-to-day discrimination that is more open and more pervasive. Enforcement of existing civil rights legislation and of the U.S. Constitution’s provisions for equality with respect to race, national origin, religion, and gender is not going to become stronger under Donald Trump and his chosen administration.  Will Progressives embrace this? These attitudes and behaviors are repugnant and antithetical to Progressives’ beliefs.