Should We Listen to Trump Supporters? | Episode 174

Dennis Sanders: 00:37

Hello, and welcome to Church and Main. Church and Main is a podcast that is at the intersection of faith and modern life. I'm Dennis Sanders, your host. We look for god in the midst of the issues that are affecting the church and the largest society. You can learn more about the podcast, listen to past episodes and donate by checking us out at churchandmain.orgorchurchandmain.substack.com.

Dennis Sanders: 01:04

Consider subscribing to the podcast on your favorite podcast app and leave a review. That helps others find the podcast. You know, it's been a while since I've done a solo episode and I don't like doing them as much as I used to, partially because I think they can be a bit self indulgent and partially because some of my early episodes, I feel like I didn't know what I was doing. And so, you know, I I'd rather not do them as much. But this was one I felt like I needed to get off my chest.

Dennis Sanders: 01:42

Being that it is an election year, it is something that I wanted to talk about. And, that is talking about, engaging with Trump voters. So I'm not going to go into a whole lot about this, except that I feel like the way that we usually deal with Trump supporters isn't well, it doesn't work. I think, I was actually looking at an article from The Dispatch, which is, a centre right publication that I really enjoy. And, they were kind of interviewing people, who are Trump supporters.

Dennis Sanders: 02:24

And, it's interesting reading the comments, which of course you should never do, but I did. And people were just kind of making fun of people and calling them morons, calling them idiots. And and I kept thinking, this is not this doesn't work. This is not gonna work. But I think that that's kind of how we deal with things.

Dennis Sanders: 02:46

And, what I'm going to do here, and it's something that I really wanted to I felt like today I wanted to do this and I want to get it out as soon as possible. It's really, what I'm kind of gonna be riffing off of 2 articles I wrote. 1 in August of last year. And one I wrote, I believe, in late January. And so of this year.

Dennis Sanders: 03:09

So I wanted to kind of talk about these things and and let the chips fall where they may. People may like it. People may give it some thought. People also may think I'm full of it. But I think it's something that I wanted to bring up and wanted to share.

Dennis Sanders: 03:25

And so, I hope, I hope you listen. So, here I Here we go. I'm gonna go ahead and start reading it and, we'll go from there. Jesus calls us to love our enemies and pray for our persecutors and that means loving the people who not are probably not the right people. In reality, it means loving sometimes the people who are the opposite of everything that we believe in.

Dennis Sanders: 04:02

Damn hard to love someone that seems unlovable. And yet, this is what we're called to do. And I think, as Christians who live in the United States, especially at this particular moment, it is something that we have to do for the sake of our nation and for the sake of our world. Back in August of 2023, New York Times columnist David Brooks came out with a provocative op ed and it had the title, What if we are the bad guys here? What follows is an essay of introspection regarding the continuing popularity of Donald Trump.

Dennis Sanders: 04:41

He counters the off told and comforting comforting tale told by those opposed to the former president about his rise to power. And you know the story, Donald Trump and his followers are reactionary force of bigots afraid of social progress, the total progress that this nation has made in the last 50 to 60 years. They either want to slow the progress down or turn back the clock, harming people of color and LGBTQ Americans. Those of us who oppose him are the forces of enlightenment and progress standing firm against these dangerous forces. It's a tempting story.

Dennis Sanders: 05:17

It's a comforting story. There is even some truth in that story. It's a way to console ourselves in this very fraught time. Whatever happens, we can rest assured that we are ultimately on the right side. And what about those Trump supporters?

Dennis Sanders: 05:35

Well, we tell ourselves that Hillary Clinton was right. They are deplorable. That is a story and like a lot of things of life, as I said, there's a whole lot of truth in it. But what if it's not the whole story? What if those of us who opposed trump aren't so pure?

Dennis Sanders: 05:57

David Brooks tells the story of American culture from the 19 sixties onward, but he looks at it from the viewpoint of a trump supporter and it paints a very different picture from the story that many of us believe in. He writes, the story begins in the 19 sixties when high school grads had to go off to fight in Vietnam, but the children of the educated class got college deferments. It continues in the 19 seventies when the authorities imposed busing on working class areas in Boston, but not on the upscale communities like Wellesley where they themselves lived. The idea that we're all in this together was replaced with the reality of the educated class live lie class lives in a world up here and everyone else is forced to live in a world down there. Members of our class are always publicly speaking out for the marginalized, but somehow we always end up building systems that serve ourselves.

Dennis Sanders: 06:58

The cultural and economic forces of the past 4 decades or so have benefited many of those anti Trumpers. While those who ended up supporting Trump have had to deal with job insecurity and fractured families. Brooks continues or Brooks adds, it's easy to understand why people in less educated classes would conclude that they are under economic, political and cultural and moral assault and why they've rallied around Trump as the best warrior against the educated class. He continues, Trump understood that there was a great demand for a leader who would stick his thumb in our eyes on a daily basis and reject the whole epistemic regime that we wrote in on. Now, of course, Brooks is no Trump supporter, but his article was apocalyptic in that it revealed what might be the sin of those of us who are worried about the rise of Donald Trump again.

Dennis Sanders: 08:01

As someone who, in myself, has come from an economically depressed area of Flint, Michigan and has seen how the working class and working class families have been ripped apart by changes in our society. I think he's correct. Just because we're on the right side doesn't mean that we're pure. But the thing is, is that showing any concern for this group of people is going to get pushed back and Brooks got it. Responding to the his article, Zach Beauchamp of Vox said shared surveys and studies that tried to debunk brooks and he speaks for many when he says that trump voters really can't be reconciled with other Americans.

Dennis Sanders: 08:47

And this is what Beauchamp says, quote, the reality is our deep political divide is rooted 1st and foremost and profound and largely irreconcilable views of who America is for and what its social or hierarchy should look like. Unquote. The reaction to Brooks article is reminiscent of how another New York Times columnist Brett Stevens was was received when he wrote that he was wrong about Trump voters. He shared some of the same things that he noticed in an article last summer. People who felt neighborhoods were unsafe or schools were not as good and felt America was in cultural and economic decline.

Dennis Sanders: 09:31

He says, quote, it's one thing for social mores to evolve over time, aided by respect for differences of opinion. It's another for them to be abruptly imposed by one side on another with little democratic input but a great deal of moral bullying. The reaction was very similar to Brooks and that it was blistering. There was no interest in trying to understand these voters. So who are these voters?

Dennis Sanders: 09:59

Well, let's go back to 2016 during Donald Trump's first presidential run. What was fascinating about that run was how a few things were coming together that brought to 4 some of the problems facing America. In the fall of 2015, Angus Deaton won the Nobel Prize for Economics for his work with his wife and Case and looking at the white working class in America and how they were dying at a young age from what was being called the depths of despair. Also in 2016, Chris Arnottie, a former bond trader on Wall Street, started walking across America, meeting people he later called back row America. These were people that were forgotten by both political parties.

Dennis Sanders: 10:47

And that same year, JD Vance before he went over to the dark side, released his book, Hillbilly Elegy. And that book was released to wide acclaim and shed light on the lives of broken families in the Rust Belt and other areas. These and other events served to provide some context as to why Donald Trump was becoming so popular, even though he his character was so terrible. What we learned was that large swaths of America weren't doing well. In some aspect, they might be doing well financially, but they weren't doing well emotionally or spiritually.

Dennis Sanders: 11:27

Now, 6 since 2016, there has been this discussion as to what pushed people to vote for trump. And the argument has swung back and forth between either changing demographics or a love of authoritarianism on one side or economic and cultural concerns. Now, I think that the answer lies between those two choices. Though I tend to believe that the struggles of the working class are a strong factor, not the only factor, but a strong one. But that said, it seems like among many of my fellow never Trump republicans and democrats, the belief is that And so my response to that is, so what?

Dennis Sanders: 12:24

Does that mean that we just ignore them? Do we continue to call them names and talk about how they're stupid? And do we think that if we do all this, Trump supporters will magically change their minds? Now my point here is not to excuse the excesses of Trump supporters. It's hard to get bypass why people would support someone that behave so horribly and frankly tried to steal an election.

Dennis Sanders: 12:49

But it's about trying to understand them and that means seeing them as human beings and not as the other. And it means that we have to love our enemies. What if we actually listen to these people? What if we found ways to connect instead of simply condemning them? We hear a lot about how dangerous a second Trump turn will be to America and how it will harm if not end, American democracy.

Dennis Sanders: 13:19

And I agree with all this. Now I don't think that Trump is going to be a new Hitler. I don't necessarily think that American democracy will end if he becomes president. But that doesn't mean Trump doesn't have to be, but that also means that Trump doesn't have to be a Hitler and American democracy doesn't have to end for things in a second trump turn to be really, really bad. I think that this is a man that is nursing a major grudge and he seeks to unleash his fury at those who wronged him should he become president again.

Dennis Sanders: 13:59

When I was writing one of the articles about listening to never Trump, I mean listening to Trump supporters, Political had an interesting, profile of a man named Ted Johnson in New Hampshire. He was initially going to support Nikki Haley but then he switched to Donald Trump. Why? Because he thought that Donald Trump was and I quote, a wrecking ball. Johnson wanted someone who is going to destroy the regular order.

Dennis Sanders: 14:27

He knew that Trump was a jerk and a person of terrible character, but frankly, none of that mattered. He needed someone that could burn it all down. Now it's easy for us to just write them off and write off all of the other Trump supporters as crazy and possibly bigoted, but what if there's something more going on here? But the true fact of the matter is most of us who oppose Trump don't care. We didn't care much in 2016 and we've really don't care now.

Dennis Sanders: 15:01

I've been around never Trump conservative and progressive circles long enough to know that what we call that we call Trump supporters anything from being cult members to racist. Whatever we call them, the message remains the same. We don't want to know them and we don't think much of them. Now I mentioned Hillary Clinton earlier and she back in 2016 got tons of grief for her deplorables comment and I think rightly so. But there is another part of that statement that people forget.

Dennis Sanders: 15:35

This is what she said after the deplorables comment and she said quote, but the other basket the other basket and I know I see friends from all over America here. I see friends from Florida and Georgia and South Carolina and Texas, as you as well as, you know, New York and California. But that other basket of people are people who feel the government has let them down. Nobody cares for them. Nobody worries about what happens to their lives and their futures.

Dennis Sanders: 16:03

And they are just desperate for change. It doesn't really even matter where it comes from. They don't buy everything he says, but he seems to hold out some hope that their lives will be different. They won't wake up and see their jobs disappear, lose a kid to heroin, and feel like they're in a dead end. Those are the people we have to understand and empathize with as well, unquote.

Dennis Sanders: 16:27

I wonder what would have happened had Clinton led with this or minimized the deplorable comment. Clinton knew that some of the people voting for Trump weren't terrible people, but they were just dealing with the anxieties of life. Why do people want to vote for someone that they know is so toxic? Many of us, myself included, shake our heads in disgust, think that people are just afraid of a changing America and just don't like black and brown people or gays or anyone that just isn't white. And some of that is true.

Dennis Sanders: 17:04

But why aren't we curious to learn more? Why aren't we interested in wanting to persuade them to seek a better way, not by shaming them, but by loving them? One of the hardest things we as followers of Jesus are called to do is to love our enemies as Jesus says on the Sermon on the Mount. And I notice especially in mainline churches, we talk about this verse and look condescendingly at our conservative sisters and brothers who can't seem to love people that are different from But the reality of that statement is that we are called to love those who might not love us back. Loving our enemies means that sometimes we are called to love assholes.

Dennis Sanders: 17:47

And many Trump voters are assholes. Does that mean that we accept whatever garbage they say? Do we allow them to mistreat us and our friends? No. But it does mean being willing to listen.

Dennis Sanders: 18:02

It does mean asking them questions. It does mean treating them as a child of God. As Christians, we are called to love the enemy. But we are far too often wanting to turn it into loving those that we deem acceptable. We want to make it about diversity.

Dennis Sanders: 18:23

But that passage says that we are called to love the unlovable. Daryl Davis learned to love the unlovable. Maybe you've heard this story before. Years ago, he went to a parade as a 10 year old. It was 1968.

Dennis Sanders: 18:46

He was a young African American boy. He was one of 2 black kids in a troop and a parade was lined in with an all white crowd and people started to yell at him. As his parents were trying to explain what was going on later in the day, he wondered, how could people hate me when they don't know me? That was a question that remained in his head for 2 decades, for several decades, I should say. Over time, Daryl became a musician.

Dennis Sanders: 19:23

And one evening there was a white man that was impressed with him and his playing of the keyboards. After his, gig, they sat down for drinks. And the man was amazed that he was actually talking to Daryl. Daryl wondered why. Well, the man replied that he was a Klansman, and the 2 of them continued and for the 2 of them to talk and have a drink was odd.

Dennis Sanders: 19:55

Well, that got Daryl thinking. He started basically a passion to strike up relationships with known klansman. He actually even went to clan rallies with his new friends and invited klansman to his concerts and to his home to meet his diverse friends. In one case, he had a friendship with the imperial dragon, the head klansman of the United States named Roger Kelly. And in a CNN interview, Roger said he was glad for the relationship, but he believed his views were cement were cemented.

Dennis Sanders: 20:32

He wasn't going to change, except they weren't. Over time, the relationship changed Kelly so much that he left this clan and gave his clan outfit to Daryl. Daryl has created friendships with Klansman over and over again. These were people who were racist and they changed. And they changed not by being shamed, but by simply having a relationship with an African American man.

Dennis Sanders: 21:04

Davis was able to talk to someone who was truly the enemy to great effect. The thing is is that if he could do this with a member of the Klan and not just one member, but many members. Maybe we could talk to Trump supporters. None of this means that we're all gonna agree with them, but it does mean seeing them not as monsters, but as the flawed human beings that they are. The flawed human beings that God loves.

Dennis Sanders: 21:39

As we head into this election year, as many of us are concerned about a second Trump term, maybe the best way to make that not happen is by persuading Trump supporters. And by doing that, by listening to them and talking to them and not necessarily treating them as the other. Calling people bigots isn't very effective. As much as it is satisfying, it's not effective. It only deepens the partisan divides in our country and frankly, it only ends up empowering Trump and his ilk.

Dennis Sanders: 22:21

But reaching out in love and listening to others. Well, that might change the world. So that is my essay. Do with it as you will. I'd love to hear from you, know what you have to say.

Dennis Sanders: 22:45

Maybe you don't agree. There are a lot of people who I've written this don't agree. But I'd love for you to talk and maybe talk with others. And, if you are a Christian to even pray, what is God calling you to do? Thank you for listening to this solo episode.

Dennis Sanders: 23:11

And, if you are, I do have actually other episodes coming up and new, several interviews. So, do stay tuned. I do want to say that, if you are interested in what is being put out, if you're one of the, like, you know, 5 people that listen to this, consider actually making a donation. You can do that by, if you, read these or get this via Substack, you can subscribe and become a paying member. It's $5 a month or $60 a year.

Dennis Sanders: 23:49

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Dennis Sanders: 24:19

And I hope that you would pass this episode along to family and friends that might be interested. That is it for this episode of Church in Maine. I'm Dennis Sanders, your host. Thank you so much for listening and thank you for, being willing to listen to my rambling. Take care everyone, God speed, and I will see you very soon.