Why are people voting for Trump? Are they all that stupid?

This is a topic that hits very close to home for this American.

Growing up in a conservative, republican household, I have always been taught and raised with certain ideologies. Both of my parents are conservatives and always have been. I was taught that capitalism keeps the country running, being a republican serves in everyone's best interests, and that liberals mean well, but have no real sense of how to run the nation. For my father, he despised the idea of the government helping our family. On a very low income and trying to support us on his struggling business, he was determined to make it work because it was his job - not the president's - to provide for us, even if we did meet the qualifications for government aid. In his mind, the liberal idea is to make everyone on the same page: regardless of income or hard work, the playing field should be leveled.

And he isn't wrong.

To some, that makes sense; to him, that's unfair. He struggled and worked incredibly hard to pay rent and keep a roof over our heads, put food on the table, and raise his kids alongside my mother, who also decided in recent years to get a part-time job to help out with the expenses. If he could do it all with so little, and no help from the government, why did Joe down the road get bailouts and food stamps for his pack of smokes and bourbon?

Trump is a lot of things to those watching around the world. A bigot, a buffoon, an imbecile unfit to run a country. He is intimidating to those not lining up with his "Make America Great Again" ideals, laughable to our international friends watching, and infuriating to those who feel his presidency would step on all the progress that has been made in the area of social justice.

But to many conservatives, like my father, he represents something else entirely.

He represents a fresh start. I think we can all agree that Trump is one of a kind. He is blunt, straight-forward with what his stances are, and represents the business aspect of politics and emphasizes its importance. Trump stands as a result of all the hard work my father has fought through all his life. He promotes himself as a politician like no other - as someone who can stand up and say the things that he does without fear of backlash, Trump is gutsy and refreshing. And with a slogan like "Make American Great Again," well, that's all my father has ever wanted for his family.

My father and I butt heads when it comes to political ideologies. Of course, we argue when the topic of Trump comes up. But that does not, in any way, make his opinions invalid. That does not, in any way, make him stupid. My father is the wisest and most hard working man I know, and has guided me through everything in my life, regardless of circumstance. He exudes qualities that I respect and demand in any relationship: love, strength and patience. I am one of his biggest fans.

So, the next time Trump comes up in the news and your knee-jerk reaction is "Pfft. Those Americans. What idiots!" - I urge you to think. Everyone's situation is different. You cannot know someone's reasoning for their political views without knowing what they've been through or believe. Instead of sitting in front of your television or computer screen with popcorn to see what crap-storm Americans have hailed down next, get up and do some research. Educate yourself on why there are Trump supporters. You don't have to agree with them - I certainly don't - but you should not assume they are all brainwashed imbeciles. We are all human, with our own unique human experiences, and while, yes, some are inherently cruel and racist bigots, the reality is the majority are not. You can think Trump is an ass, and so are his supporters, but be careful with assuming. Assuming makes a...well, you know....out of you and me.

In OUR future, you wouldn’t look twice

Racial meanings are an interesting and fickle phenomenon. When they are circulated by common discourses and entrenched in a society, they become completely naturalised. They are seen as “common sense”, instantly recognised, part of the culture’s “language” and do not need explanation. The association of certain races with certain meanings becomes invisible and unquestioned, even amongst those who are concerned with the treatment and representation of races.

But when someone outside that society takes a peer inside, this system often exposes itself for what it truly is, a pervasive collection of arbitrary shorthands. That is exactly what I experienced a few years ago when I read about a controversial poster from South Africa.

The literal meaning of this poster is quite clear. There is an interracial couple. The slogan – “in OUR future, you wouldn’t look twice” – promises that whoever DASO are, they are committed to a racially tolerant society.

But what interested me wasn’t the poster itself, it was its reception in South Africa. It attracted wide controversy because it supposedly reinforced White male dominance. For example, Zet Luzipo, president of the Congress of South African Trade Unions, said “The poster says, ‘Join the DA to have an affair with a white person’. It entrenches the white supremacy that we fought against during the liberation struggle. We will not be excited with having an affair with a white person; we will not be enticed by that.” (Cadet 2012)

White dominance? White supremacy?

I didn’t see it. I checked the poster again (ironic). I could see no text, framing, action, expression, gesture or stance that suggested the White man was dominant. Nor was the imagery marked with any stereotypes. They had nigh-identical poses and there was no other content except the slogan. We know nothing else about these people. I could not ask for a more neutral and equal representation. Literally just two people standing there. I became confused.

Was I just really oblivious? There was a national outcry and I was looking at the same image that everyone else was, so there must have been something to cause such an accusation. So I asked a group of people about it, some of whom were from, or had lived in, South Africa. “How is White male dominance depicted? The man is slightly taller? I’m confused. I don’t see it,” I said. Some Americans concurred; it was not just a matter of not sympathising with the concern, it was a matter of not understanding why it even exists.

The replies were quite enlightening for all. To those in that society, they could just point to the poster as if it was self-evident, and it would answer for itself. But they knew that I and others in the group were not familiar with South Africa, so they were forced to understand our viewpoint to understand our question. They had to look at the imagery objectively, devoid of any social meanings, as if from a robot or alien’s perspective. That’s when we managed to dissect assumptions and get to the heart of the interpretation.

The power relationship is seen as inherent to the situation depicted, regardless of how it is depicted. A toxic mix of racism and sexism meant that people saw what they were primed to see in the combination of a White male and a Black female. And they saw a lot. The male is the taker and the female is the taken. The marker of light skin is intrinsically representative of oppressive White groups, past and present, and the signifier of dark skin is intrinsically representative of oppressed Black groups, past and present. In all relationships between “different” people, one member is supposed to be in charge, because that’s just how things work. Together, these unspoken assumptions combined to form some sort of mental obligation to figure out which person is the dominant one in this visual pairing of sexes and races. They all came to the same conclusion without realising how much socially constructed meaning they had stacked on top of the original poster. The White male is seen as dominant because a White male image means dominance.

With the illogicity of the situation exposed, it became sadly clear just how entrenched racial meanings can become in a society. The people who protested about the poster did not realise they were re-circulating unspoken stereotypes of racial dominance in their interpretation, even as they condemned White supremacy and racism.

Someone then pondered how the poster could be adapted, so that it would still depict an interracial White male/Black female couple in some way, but would not accrue any implications of dominance in his society whatsoever. Nobody could think of a way.

The connotations of colour were inescapable.

Works cited

Cadet, Danielle. “Interracial Poster Sparks Controversy In SouthAfrica”. HuffPost Black Voices. The Huffington Post, Inc., 27 March 2012. Web. 25 March 2016.