At present the blog is evolving to be more eclectic. For those new to looking at it I suggest going beyond the opening page look at the blog archive on the right, and randomly clicking on some of the other entries for the past year with photo essays of my travels around Portland, Oregon. At the least take a look at what I posted here in March.
Updated: April 13, 2022
April 12, 2022
Right-wingers are much more in your face than liberals, at least this is how I see it.
No bothsidesism here if my observations traveling around the Portland, Oregon area is any indication, those with far right sentiments are much more likely to "advertise" their viewpoints in more public ways, and often in a more obnoxious manner than liberals.
From what I see right-wingers are more likely to use the backs of their cars as billboards and their houses to rub their beliefs in the faces of those who are on the opposite side of the political spectrum. Are they psychologically different than liberals? What personality characteristics do these people have in common?
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| The Massachusetts photo was taken by Grace Welch |
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| This photo is of a vehicle in front of the house shown below with the Trump flags. |
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| This was at a Costco store. |
My opinion is that these are people who feel marginalized and often ostracized by what they perceive as the mainstream whether in popular culture or the media.
They take their lead from the grievance politics of Trump and his most outspoken cadre of newsmakers.
Some of them may tick of all or most of the psychiatric diagnostic criteria for being paranoid or delusional, and others may just be gullible. Some may recognize that time is not on their side as the demographics of the country shift so that in the foreseeable future white people will be in the minority.
Update: This article sums up how Trump exploits the fears of many white people:
Excerpt (note the reference to malignant narcissism, a subject I have written about many times): The relationship between the leader and follower in a political cult such as today's Republican Party is deep and powerful. Diane Roberts of the Florida Phoenix summarizes this unhealthy psychodynamic:
Republicans are angry.
So very, very angry.
Deranged White Man Syndrome has not yet been listed in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, but it's just a matter of time.
Seriously, these dudes (and they are mostly male-gendered persons) are on a rampage of rage and loathing which cannot be healthy….
Living in a constant tantrum must be exhausting for Republicans. I suspect that somewhere in the deep recesses of their brains, they know that while they may hold power at the moment, the world is changing.
And they can't stand it.
Let's hope they get serious therapy: This is a sick, sick, sick bunch of people.
To the uninitiated — and also to those who have just become numb to it all — Trump's North Carolina speech was an uninspired recitation of his personal grievances, malignant narcissism ("I've got to be the cleanest, I think I'm the most honest human being, perhaps, that God has ever created") and victim fantasies, mixed with now-standard talking points about the Big Lie, the 2020 election and Jan. 6, "parents' rights", "invaders" at the U.S.-Mexico border, supposed crime and barbarism in "Democrat-run" major cities and an assortment of lies both small and large about Joe Biden and the Democrats.
These people generally suffer from confirmation bias because those who follow the media by and large consume far right "news" sources. In the right-wing media people like Tucker Carlson exacerbate their fears and basically tell them how to think, or to put it more accurately, how not to think.
When I see liberals expressing their views via signs and such I have yet to see over-the-top displays. For example these two houses are across the street from each other in the small Oregon town of Aurora.
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| This is the home of the man who has the vehicle with all the Marine stickers on its back. |
This car is in his yard along with the maroon one (below) with the Marine stickers. |
| My hunch is that this man bought an old police car and thinks that the emblem he put on the door will lead some people to mistake his car for a real police car. |
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Here he is. His house is an eyesore, made worse because it is on a street with historic homes including the one across the street from his, which are kept in excellent shape.
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I generally find liberals expressing themselves in a more restrained way. Here are some examples:
I don't have any political stickers on my car. I have two Westie stickers on the bumper, one covers a hole and the other a dent. The window sticker is for Massachusetts retirees.
One of the reasons I don't have so much as a small Biden/Harris sticker on the car is that I don't want to provoke an incident when I am exploring our rural areas and looking for new places to eat. Some of them have signs like this:
I sometimes end up in towns which are decidedly pro-Trump and where my car stands out enough as it is among the pickup trucks. For example in Molalla:
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| The man in the red plaid shirt is talking to two men at another table. |
I could easily overhear the conversation of the men at two of the tables, one shown above, who were obviously regulars and townies, and all they were talking about was the comparative merits of different kinds of guns.
