US Election results

[IwantToRetire]

Kamala Harris 27
45.2% popular vote
12,768,875 votes

Donald Trump 99
53.8% popular vote
15,275,564 votes

270 to win

U.S. election results 2024 | CBC News

6/11/2024 @ 01:25 GMT

Is it being stocked in schools as a result of government policy? Do you want a party that will limit those types of books being in schools?
Is it just being printed by a publishing firm, and being sold in private shops? In which case what would you actually want a right leaning government to do? Bn obscene books? Ban books that preach unhealthy messages to children? Both are options, but I don't see the point in voting for someone out of anger at something which isn't directly in the governments control anyway. Its like voting for Labour in the general election because you are mad that they collect bins on Wednesdays not Thursdays now. Thats the local councils remit.

In America its weirder because so much of educational decisions (what books belong in school libraries etc) is a matter for States/local education boards not the President anyway. I can understand people not voting left because they were annoyed at Dylan Mulvaney getting a private audience with Joe Biden, or at the White House event where the transwoman got their tits out, or at title 9 being eroded etc etc etc. Because that actually is in the President's power.

The trans issue is a bit special, because there is quite clear evidence that there was an attempt to astro-turf support for the movement and influence politicians (Denton's). So, I don't think people are wrong to see the connections and patterns. But the way you deal with a party mandating the inclusion of transwomen in women's support is by not voting for that party (if its a red line for you). The way you deal with a publishing firm advertising a book about how great it is that transwomen are in women's sport is by not buying that book and maybe also boycotting the publishing firm. Muddling the two together doesn't help and makes it easier to dismiss people's genuine concerns as "culture wars".

You could have a super right wing government and unless they started cracking down on free speech, you would still have people posting crazy left wing views on Twitter, or calling everyone to the right stupid, or making left leaning movies. Saying "its stuff like this that makes me vote for the right" is.... a bit silly.

Sorry - that was super long and by "it" I realise that I meant the first book (about boys and girls and neither) not the second.
With the second though... I guess if it persuaded me that actually mixed race marriages were OK when previously I thought they weren't it could change my politics. Thats one of the things really good literature can do. (And is I think what they are trying to do with the pro-trans messaging. It worked to an extent but it is also backfiring because it didn't talk about some of the issues. So people are finding that reality doesn't match with the idealised version of the world. The democrats are also finding that out too. In parallel to but slightly later than the rest of the electorate to their cost)
But presumably the book about race would only push your vote "left" if the right were saying they wanted to ban mixed race families. Which isn't much of a thing in the UK at least. This book is about 70 years old and maybe it changed minds, but it didn't change any laws The Chequer Board by Nevil Shute | Goodreads

Just edited as wasn’t sure I had read correctly,

Tonight's strictly thread:

I'm not going to comment further but it's interesting to see the metaphorical eye rolling in real time.

This👆!!!!

A common refrain from entertainment journalists, actors, writers and show-runners these days, when describing their new series, is to say to the straw man anti-SJW TERFS that exist only in their heads, "This is not FOR you so don't watch it, we don't want you as our audience", and then a month later the trade papers report that viewing figures are disastrous and nitpicky articles are written by media journalists baffled as to why no-one is watching this wonderfully woke thing and why is the bloody fandom being so toxic and complaining about how badly written/acted this vehicle for The Message is 🤷‍♀️

That is funny utopia. I have not even been reading the reviews so missed all of that.

I mean I did see some of the posts by the writer, Russel Davies to the effect that this was the way it was going to be written and sod off if you didn’t like it. I guess as you say, people just sod off as Davies seemed to want people to do.

I predict that the the Dr Who series will stop and be rebooted again in 20 years time. And those who loved the Matt Smith Dr and the David Tennant version will watch with nostalgia. It I think this latest ‘reimaging’ will go down as a fizzer of a series but for poor writing and overblown moralising rather than for the reasons that the writers will try to spin.

Oh no Hell, you missed Amandla Stenburg's (The Acolyte) diss track!

@biscuitandcake That's fair enough, I understand your take.
I was just trying to think of an example that demonstrated a cultural shift to the right, rather than to the left (which it would be in Australia if suddenly there were books on the shelves talking neutrally about anti-miscegenationists). I think I'd want to push back against a big cultural explosion of racist thought, and voting progressively is one of the only ways I feel I could do that. Not because I'd think, if the Greens got the balance of power they'd make sure these books were banned. But because the relationship between culture and politics goes both ways.
So I can understand why crazy genderist books pushed people to vote for Trump. I don't think that's nescesarily because they want a political solution - they're not hoping children's publishing will be nationalised. They just want cultural change and one way to bring that about is via change of government. (I think - all this is just me looking in from the outside trying to make sense of things).

I had indeed!! But I have seen it now and my! my! I am convinced!

I mean it was a slick production and very catchy don’t get me wrong….

Amazing! That's a total of one person persuaded by the song!

#savetheacolyte

I am such a sucker for an earworm!

I stopped watching Who during the Capaldi era, and I’m a big fan of Capaldi the actor so it was the stories/writing. I’m also a fan of Jodie Whittaker so tried her era but again couldn’t get in to it. The current chap seems nice enough but the glossy, shiny, singing (!) version of Who isn’t for me.

The core of Who (for me) is the Doctor and companion around the console of the Tardis troubleshooting the latest crisis that the Doctor has managed to land them in. The Doctor being fundamentally a “good” person who has also fucked up and done a lot of “bad” things. Plus has a weird obsession with humans and Earth. But the Doctor has gravitas due to age and the multiple personalities and experiences he holds in his head - Matt Smith captured that perfectly despite his youth. Last couple of incarnations, not so much.

Hit post too soon - so to tie it back to the Democrats, style over substance will always lose in the long run, particularly when you lose sight of what made you successful in the first place.

My adult children are massive Who fans. Ever since we got them DVDs of the old 60s, 70s series. They loved the reboot and were looking forward to Jodie Whitaker's interpretation. But she was burdened with awful scripts. They are in mourning now. Can Richard Ayoade save the ' franchise' ? Maybe park it for another decade as a pp suggested.

Twitter post from Elizabeth Warren: "black Womxn, Black trans and cis women, gender non conforming and non-binary people are the backbone of our democracy." Tells you all you need to know about why they lost.

Don't forget Latinx.

Did their brains all seep out of their ears? I thought Elizabeth Warren was an intelligent woman?

Apparently Elizabeth Warren doesn't care about Latinx.

As it turns out, the feeling is largely mutual.

Black women are the one demographic the Democrat party have managed to keep hold of. Its like they want to drive them away too? Very weird...

White working-class men were given up on a long time ago. And they've voted with their feet in the US. Here too, to some extent.

Actually cringing for her.

Ironically, Joe Biden's policies were probably more pro the working class than most recent politicians (especially Trump). He wasn't perfect, but there were lots of sensible but boring policies that benefitted that demographic. The problem was IMO, there was also a lot of style over substance posturing (things like Mulvaney being invited to the white house) that broadcast completely the wrong message. And issues like transwomen in women's sports which were deeply unpopular but which didn't really affect white men so much as women (but men might be against them because of their daughters, wives etc. Its why sorting people too closely into identity groups and assuming they will vote based on those identity groups tends to backfire). But the transgender stuff was seemingly quite unpopular with white working class men -they were probably the demographic least hurt by it in reality.
The democratic party just seemed completely confused about what most people wanted from them. I genuinely believe they thought the trans stuff was a clear vote winner. The danger is, that the way so many different things ae classed as "left wing" they decide they went too far left, through the baby out with the bathwater re worker's rights/standing up to corporations and end up making themselves even less appealing.

I think by 'backbone of our democracy' she means this is who is voting for us. Which is all well and good but it's not enough to win elections so they need to think on that and regroup.

What does it even mean? How are these people - particularly the gender non-conforming and non-binary people - the "backbone" of US democracy? Everyone has one vote, right? So how can one group of people be more of a backbone than any other group? What happened in the long ago days of, ooh, 10 years ago, before non-binary was a thing? Who was the backbone then?

I have never listened to Sam Harris before, but this is very good, and even-handed