tag:theconversation.com,2011:/us/topics/whites-36654/articleswhites – The Conversation2018-09-17T10:52:20Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1017102018-09-17T10:52:20Z2018-09-17T10:52:20ZAre today’s white kids less racist than their grandparents?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/236459/original/file-20180914-177938-pydhqr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Do we have any reason to believe that each new generation of white people will be more open-minded and tolerant than previous ones?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/father-young-son-closeup-how-supports-623462078?src=nMVsyazUNXDIBFKyJXQceA-3-48">Elvira Koneva</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In America’s children, we often see hope for a better future, especially when it comes to reducing racism.</p>
<p>Each new generation of white people, the thinking goes, will naturally and inevitably be more open-minded and tolerant than previous ones. </p>
<p>But do we have any reason to believe this? Should we have faith that today’s white kids will help make our society less racist and more equitable? </p>
<p>Previous research has had mixed findings. So in order to explore more fully what white kids think about race, I went straight to the source: white children themselves. </p>
<p>In my new book, “<a href="https://nyupress.org/books/9781479803682/">White Kids: Growing Up with Privilege in a Racially Divided America</a>,” I explore how 36 white, affluent kids think and talk about race, racism, privilege and inequality in their everyday lives.</p>
<h2>The limitations of survey data</h2>
<p>Before beginning my research, I looked at what previous studies on the racial attitudes of young white people had found.</p>
<p>According to some researchers, we do have reason to be hopeful.</p>
<p>Using survey data, they found that <a href="https://press.princeton.edu/titles/9910.html">young white people are expressing less prejudice</a> than generations before them. For instance, white support for segregated schools – a traditional measure of racial prejudice – has <a href="http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674745698">dramatically decreased over a 50-year period</a>. And <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0002716210386302">surveys show</a> that younger whites are less likely to express racial stereotypes than older whites.</p>
<p>But a second group of researchers disagreed. They found that whites today simply articulate racial prejudice <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0957926500011001003">in new ways</a>. </p>
<p>For example, <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0002764215588811">according to national survey data</a>, high school seniors are increasingly expressing a form of prejudice that sociologist Tyrone Forman calls “<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Changing-Terrain-Race-Ethnicity/dp/087154492X">racial apathy</a>” – an “indifference toward societal, racial, and ethnic inequality and lack of engagement with race-related social issues.” </p>
<p>Racial apathy is a more passive form of prejudice than explicit articulations of bigotry and racial hostility. But such apathy can nonetheless lead white people to support policies and practices <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/du-bois-review-social-science-research-on-race/article/racial-apathy-and-hurricane-katrina-the-social-anatomy-of-prejudice-in-the-postcivil-rights-era/95F372BBEB724011527316B718A40604">that align with the same racist logic of the past</a>, like a lack of support for social programs and policies designed to address institutional racism or an indifference toward the suffering of people of color.</p>
<p>Other researchers question the ability of surveys <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/2332649217705145">to capture honest responses from whites about race-related questions</a> or <a href="https://academic.oup.com/socpro/article-abstract/56/3/403/1707581">to describe the complexity of whites’ perspectives on race</a>. </p>
<p>As useful as surveys can be, they don’t allow us to fully understand <a href="https://rowman.com/isbn/9781442276239/racism-without-racists-color-blind-racism-and-the-persistence-of-racial-inequality-in-america-fifth-edition">how white people explain, justify or develop their views on race</a>. </p>
<h2>What the kids are saying</h2>
<p>In order to better understand how white children think about race, I interviewed and observed 30 affluent, white families with kids between the ages of 10 and 13 living in a Midwestern metropolitan area. Over the course of two years, I immersed myself in the everyday lives of these families, observing them in public and in the home, and interviewing the parents and the kids. A few years later, when the kids were in high school, I re-interviewed a subset of the original group.</p>
<p>These children had some shared understandings of race, like the idea that “race is the color of your skin.” But when I brought up topics like racism, privilege and inequality, their responses started to diverge, and there was more variation than I anticipated. </p>
<p>Some kids told me that “racism is not a problem anymore.” But others told me in great detail about the racial wealth gap, employment discrimination, unequal schooling, and racist treatment of black kids by police. </p>
<p>As an 11-year-old named Chris explained:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“I think that the white kids, since they have more power in general in society … disciplinary actions aren’t brought down as hard upon them. But when it’s, you know, a black kid getting in trouble with the police … I think people are going to be tougher with them, because, you know, [black kids] can’t really fight back as well.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Although some of the kids had much greater understandings of the history of racism in America, others flattened time and lumped all of African-American history together, while also mixing up names and dates. </p>
<p>One 11-year-old named Natalie told me:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“Racism was a problem when all those slaves were around and that, like, bus thing and the water fountain. I mean, everything was crazy back in the olden days. … But now, I mean, since Martin Luther King and, like, Eleanor Roosevelt, and how she went on the bus. And she was African-American and sat on the white part. … After the 1920s and all that, things changed.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>When it came to the understandings of privilege and inequality, some kids made comments like, “There’s no such thing [as privilege]. Everyone gets what they deserve in life, if they work for it.” </p>
<p>Other kids disagreed, like 11-year-old Aaron:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“I think [whites] just kind of have the upside. … And since much of society is run by white people anyway, which is an upside, more white people are, you know, accepted into jobs, so they get the upside. So, yeah, I do think they have the upside.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>I also found that many of the children expressed forms of racial apathy. When a black teenager was shot and killed by a police officer in the community, 16-year-old Jessica told me that she “did not care” about black people being killed because they “obviously did something to deserve it.” </p>
<p>But some kids, like 16-year-old Charlotte, had a very different reaction:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“It should all be stopped. There is actually a problem and a system that allowed this to happen. … Technically, legally, what that officer did was ‘okay’? It’s like, well, maybe that’s the problem. Maybe killing black people shouldn’t be legally ‘okay,’ you know?”</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>The importance of a child’s social world</h2>
<p>Why such stark differences among these kids?</p>
<p>It wasn’t simply a matter of these kids repeating the views of their parents.</p>
<p>I found that their perspectives were shaped less by what their parents explicitly said about race and more by the social environments these kids grew up in – and how their parents constructed these environments. </p>
<p>Decisions parents made about where to live, where to send their kids to school, which extracurricular activities to enroll them in, where they traveled and what media they consumed work to create what I refer to as a child’s “racial context of childhood.” </p>
<p>Within this racial context, kids developed ideas about race by observing and interpreting what was going on around them. And because of important variations in these social environments, the children made sense of race in different ways.</p>
<p>In this sense, my work builds on existing scholarship on how children develop understandings about race and racism in the context of <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0002713809604386">family</a>, <a href="https://www.rutgersuniversitypress.org/learning-race-learning-place/9780813554297">place</a>, <a href="https://www.rutgersuniversitypress.org/race-in-the-schoolyard/9780813532257">early school experiences</a>,<a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/integration-interrupted-9780199736454?cc=us&lang=en&#">elementary and secondary schools</a>, <a href="https://rowman.com/isbn/9780847688623/the-first-r-how-children-learn-race-and-racism">child care</a> and even <a href="https://academic.oup.com/socpro/article-abstract/49/1/58/1665430?redirectedFrom=fulltext">summer camp</a>. </p>
<p>All of these aspects of a child’s social environment play a role in shaping how they learn about race.</p>
<p>Are white kids less racist than their grandparents? My research with kids doesn’t give us any reason to believe that each new generation of white people will naturally or inevitably hold more open-minded and tolerant viewpoints on race than previous generations.</p>
<p>Dismantling racism in the United States will require more than just passive hope.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/101710/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Margaret Hagerman does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Over the course of two years, a sociologist studied a group of affluent, white kids to see how they made sense of sensitive racial issues like privilege, unequal opportunity and police violence.Margaret Hagerman, Assistant Professor of Sociology, Mississippi State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/927952018-03-30T16:30:18Z2018-03-30T16:30:18ZMartin Luther King Jr. had a much more radical message than a dream of racial brotherhood<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/212711/original/file-20180329-189827-l3ylbh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. addresses marchers during his 'I Have a Dream' speech at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Martin Luther King Jr. has come to be revered as a hero who led a nonviolent struggle to reform and redeem the United States. His birthday is celebrated as a national holiday. Tributes are paid to him on his death anniversary each April, and his legacy is honored in multiple ways. </p>
<p>But from my perspective as a <a href="http://paulharvey.org/about">historian of religion and civil rights</a>, the true radicalism of his thought remains underappreciated. The “civil saint” portrayed nowadays was, by the end of his life, a social and economic radical, who argued forcefully for the necessity of economic justice in the pursuit of racial equality. </p>
<p>Three particular works from 1957 to 1967 illustrate how King’s political thought evolved from a hopeful reformer to a radical critic. </p>
<h2>King’s support for white moderates</h2>
<p>For much of the 1950s, King believed that white southern ministers could provide moral leadership. He thought the white racists of the South could be countered by the ministers who took a stand for equality. At the time, his concern with economic justice was a secondary theme in his addresses and political advocacy. </p>
<p><a href="http://okra.stanford.edu/transcription/document_images/Vol04Scans/184_1957_The%20Role%20of%20the%20Church.pdf">Speaking at Vanderbilt University in 1957</a>, he professed his belief that “there is in the white South more open-minded moderates than appears on the surface.” He urged them to lead the region through its necessary transition to equal treatment for black citizens. He reassured all that the aim of the movement was not to “defeat or humiliate the white man, but to win his friendship and understanding.”</p>
<p>King had hope for this vision. He had worked with white liberals such as <a href="https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/king-papers/documents/myles-horton-1">Myles Horton</a>, the leader of a center in Tennessee for training labor and civil rights organizers. King had developed friendships and crucial alliances with white supporters in other parts of the country as well. His vision was for the fulfillment of basic American ideals of liberty and equality. </p>
<h2>Letter from Birmingham Jail</h2>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/212712/original/file-20180329-189830-1cycrcv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/212712/original/file-20180329-189830-1cycrcv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212712/original/file-20180329-189830-1cycrcv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212712/original/file-20180329-189830-1cycrcv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212712/original/file-20180329-189830-1cycrcv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=512&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212712/original/file-20180329-189830-1cycrcv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=512&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212712/original/file-20180329-189830-1cycrcv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=512&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A handwritten copy of ‘Letter From a Birmingham Jail.’</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Richard Drew, file</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>By the early 1960s, at the peak of the civil rights movement, King’s views had evolved significantly. In early 1963, King came to Birmingham to lead a campaign for civil rights in a city known for its history of racial violence. </p>
<p>During the Birmingham campaign, in April 1963, he issued a masterful public letter explaining the motivations behind his crusade. It stands in striking contrast with his hopeful 1957 sermon. </p>
<p>His “<a href="https://www.africa.upenn.edu/Articles_Gen/Letter_Birmingham.html">Letter From a Birmingham Jail</a>” responded to a newspaper advertisement from eight local clergymen urging King to allow the city government to enact gradual changes. </p>
<p>In a stark change from his earlier views, King devastatingly <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/retropolis/wp/2018/01/15/martin-luther-king-jr-s-scathing-critique-of-white-moderates-from-the-birmingham-jail/?utm_term=.21b80fcd96ad">targeted white moderates</a> willing to settle for “order” over justice. In an oppressive environment, the avoidance of conflict might appear to be “order,” but in fact supported the denial of basic citizenship rights, he noted.</p>
<p>“We merely bring to the surface the hidden tension that is already alive,” King wrote. He argued how oppressors never voluntarily gave up freedom to the oppressed – it always had to be demanded by “extremists for justice.” </p>
<p>He wrote how he was “gravely disappointed with the white moderate … who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom.” They were, he said, a greater enemy to racial justice than were members of the white supremacist groups such as the Ku Klux Klan and other white racist radicals. </p>
<h2>Call for economic justice</h2>
<p>By 1967, King’s philosophy emphasized economic justice as essential to equality. And he made clear connections between American violence abroad in Vietnam and American social inequality at home. </p>
<p>Exactly one year before his assassination in Memphis, King stood at one of the best-known pulpits in the nation, at <a href="https://www.trcnyc.org/history/">Riverside Church in New York</a>. There, he explained how he had come to connect the struggle for civil rights with the fight for economic justice and the early protests against the Vietnam War. </p>
<p><a href="http://kingencyclopedia.stanford.edu/encyclopedia/documentsentry/doc_beyond_vietnam/">He proclaimed:</a></p>
<blockquote>
<p>“Now it should be incandescently clear that no one who has any concern for the integrity and life of America today can ignore the present war. If America’s soul becomes totally poisoned, part of the autopsy must read ‘Vietnam.’ It can never be saved so long as it destroys the hopes of men the world over.”</p>
</blockquote>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/212710/original/file-20180329-189821-fwse6h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/212710/original/file-20180329-189821-fwse6h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=440&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212710/original/file-20180329-189821-fwse6h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=440&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212710/original/file-20180329-189821-fwse6h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=440&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212710/original/file-20180329-189821-fwse6h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=553&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212710/original/file-20180329-189821-fwse6h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=553&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212710/original/file-20180329-189821-fwse6h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=553&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson, right, talks with civil rights leaders at the White House in Washington, Jan. 18, 1964.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>He angered crucial allies. King and President Lyndon Johnson, for example, had been allies in achieving significant legislative victories in 1964 and 1965. Johnson’s “Great Society” launched a series of initiatives to address issues of poverty at home. But beginning in 1965, after the <a href="http://www.pbs.org/johngardner/chapters/4c.html">Johnson administration</a> increased the number of U.S. troops deployed in Vietnam, King’s vision grew radical. </p>
<p>King continued with a searching analysis of what linked poverty and violence both at home and abroad. While he had spoken out before about the effects of colonialism, he now made the connection unmistakably clear. He said: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“I speak for those whose land is being laid waste, whose homes are being destroyed, whose culture is being subverted. I speak for the poor in America who are paying the double price of smashed hopes at home, and death and corruption in Vietnam.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>King concluded with the famous words on <a href="https://www.carnegiefoundation.org/blog/the-fierce-urgency-of-now/">“the fierce urgency of now,”</a> by which he emphasized the immediacy of the connection between economic injustice and racial inequality. </p>
<h2>The radical King</h2>
<p>King’s <a href="https://www.archives.gov/files/press/exhibits/dream-speech.pdf">“I Have a Dream,”</a> speech at the March on Washington in August 1963 serves as the touchstone for the annual King holiday. But King’s dream ultimately evolved into a call for a fundamental redistribution of economic power and resources. It’s why he was in Memphis, <a href="http://kingencyclopedia.stanford.edu/encyclopedia/encyclopedia/enc_memphis_sanitation_workers_strike_1968/">supporting a strike by garbage workers</a>, when he was assassinated in April 1968. </p>
<p>He remained, to the end, the <a href="http://kingencyclopedia.stanford.edu/encyclopedia/encyclopedia/enc_nonviolent_resistance/">prophet of nonviolent resistance</a>. But these three key moments in King’s life show his evolution over a decade. </p>
<p>This remembering matters more than ever today. Many states are either passing or considering measures that would make it <a href="https://blog.oup.com/2016/12/religion-second-redemption">harder for many Americans</a> to exercise their fundamental right to vote. It would roll back the huge gains in rates of political participation by racial minorities made possible by the Voting Rights Act of 1965. At the same time, there is a <a href="https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/race/reports/2018/02/21/447051/systematic-inequality/">persistent wealth gap</a> between blacks and whites.</p>
<p>Only sustained government attention can address these issues – the point King was stressing later in his life.</p>
<p>King’s philosophy stood not just for “opportunity,” but for positive measures toward economic equality and political power. Ignoring this understanding betrays the “dream” that is ritually invoked each year.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/92795/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Paul Harvey does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>King Jr., remembered today mainly for his non violent resistance, was a radical reformer who called for a fundamental redistribution of economic power and resources .Paul Harvey, Professor of American History, University of Colorado Colorado SpringsLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/900932018-02-01T11:40:36Z2018-02-01T11:40:36ZWhy I teach a course called ‘White Racism’<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/204346/original/file-20180201-157485-ptxtjt.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Florida Gulf Coast University professor Ted Thornhill discusses his course on 'White Racism.'</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Aaron Nunes-Zaller</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><strong>This article was published on Feb. 1, 2018. Prof. Thornhill now teaches at Western Washington University.</strong></p>
<p>The need for students to learn about racism in American society existed long before I began teaching a course called “White Racism” at Florida Gulf Coast University earlier this year.</p>
<p>I chose to title my course <a href="https://gulfline.fgcu.edu/pls/fgpo/szkschd.p_showdetail?termcode=201801&crn=12999">“White Racism”</a> because I thought it was scholarly and succinct, precise and powerful. </p>
<p>But others saw it differently. Many white Americans (and some people of color) <a href="https://townhall.com/columnists/toddstarnes/2018/01/10/universitys-white-racism-course-sounds-like-blame-the-white-guy-101-n2432697">became upset</a> when they learned about this course. </p>
<p>Thousands took to social media and far right <a href="http://www.foxnews.com/us/2017/11/28/white-racism-course-at-florida-university-teaches-that-america-is-white-supremacist-society.html">news sites</a> and racist blogs to <a href="https://saboteur365.wordpress.com/2017/11/10/black-professors-course-on-white-racism-creating-controversy/">attack the course and me personally</a>.</p>
<p>Some 150 of these individuals sent me hateful and threatening <a href="http://time.com/5098776/white-racism-class-fgcu/">messages</a>. </p>
<p>It might be tempting to blame the hostility to my course on the current political climate in which the president of the United States routinely makes overtly <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/01/15/opinion/leonhardt-trump-racist.html">racist statements</a> and receives some of his strongest <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2017/08/13/one-group-loved-trumps-remarks-about-charlottesville-white-supremacists/?utm_term=.22ce6984fc2c">support</a> from members of white racist hate groups. But I cannot recall a time when scholarly critiques of white supremacy in the United States have not been met with scorn. </p>
<p>For instance, an identically titled <a href="https://catalog.uconn.edu/soci/">course</a> taught at the University of Connecticut also <a href="http://articles.courant.com/1996-11-19/news/9611190253_1_race-and-racism-white-racism-sociology">ignited controversy</a> when it made its debut in the 1990s.</p>
<h2>‘White racism’ is nothing new</h2>
<p>Whether a course is titled <a href="http://www.newsweek.com/tackling-whiteness-college-campuses-725212">“White Racism,”</a>or <a href="https://african.wisc.edu/content/problem-whiteness">“The Problem of Whiteness,”</a> or any other appropriate term, in no way diminishes the academic legitimacy of the course. <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=jcijJkoD6AoC&printsec=frontcover&dq=inauthor:%22Joe+R.+Feagin%22&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiW6Z3klfzYAhURzlMKHUrTAcEQ6AEIPzAE#v=onepage&q&f=false">Scholars</a>
have used the term for decades.</p>
<p>I’ve taught courses on racial stratification in the U.S. for nearly a <a href="https://fgcu.academia.edu/TedThornhill/CurriculumVitae">decade</a> myself. The course, and others like it, are all anchored in a damning body of historical and contemporary <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Racist-America-Roots-Current-Realities-and-Future-Reparations-3rd-Edition/Feagin/p/book/9780415704014">scholarship</a>. That scholarship shows that Europeans and their white descendants colonized what would become the United States as well as other places around the <a href="https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=sTzRKLqcmbUC&oi=fnd&pg=PA35&dq=global+white+supremacy+book&ots=4zWYKnx6vh&sig=G5NE-R0kBZDjvtudKsoN3FtKjek#v=onepage&q&f=false">globe</a>. They practiced all manner of inhumanity against non-whites. This has included <a href="https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300181364/american-genocide">genocide</a>, <a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/files/17700/17700-h/17700-h.htm">slavery</a>, murder, <a href="https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781442230286/Jim-Crow's-Legacy-The-Lasting-Impact-of-Segregation">rape</a>, torture, theft, <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2014/06/the-case-for-reparations/361631/">chicanery</a>, <a href="http://books.wwnorton.com/books/The-Color-of-Law/">segregation</a>, discrimination, intimidation, <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2011/08/world-war-ii-internment-of-japanese-americans/100132/">internment</a>, humiliation and marginalization. This is inarguable.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/204055/original/file-20180130-107687-t4ua3z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/204055/original/file-20180130-107687-t4ua3z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=902&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/204055/original/file-20180130-107687-t4ua3z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=902&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/204055/original/file-20180130-107687-t4ua3z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=902&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/204055/original/file-20180130-107687-t4ua3z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1134&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/204055/original/file-20180130-107687-t4ua3z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1134&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/204055/original/file-20180130-107687-t4ua3z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1134&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Young male students protest school integration in Birmingham, Alabama, in 1963.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Watchf-AP-A-AL-USA-APHS268312-African-American-/e7382a8b2ba748c8a073f188913d5af3/4/0">AP</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Most Americans may have a general awareness of <a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/files/17700/17700-h/17700-h.htm">the trans-Atlantic slave trade</a>, <a href="http://books.wwnorton.com/books/webad.aspx?id=10235">Jim Crow laws</a>, <a href="http://store.doverpublications.com/0486779998.html">lynchings</a>, housing and labor market discrimination, and <a href="https://www.vox.com/michael-brown-shooting-ferguson-mo/2014/8/19/6031759/ferguson-history-riots-police-brutality-civil-rights">police brutality</a>. Where we differ is about the gravity and scope of these white racist practices and the extent to which their effects continue to this day.</p>
<p>This disagreement is due in large part to many white Americans (and more than a few folks of color) subscribing to what <a href="https://www.academia.edu/7934256/_If_People_Stopped_Talking_about_Race_It_Wouldnt_be_a_Problem_Anymore_Silencing_the_Myth_of_a_Color-Blind_Society">I</a> and <a href="https://www.ucpress.edu/ebook.php?isbn=9780520938755">others</a> refer to as the myth of a colorblind society.</p>
<p>This myth holds that the United States is a “post-racial” society where race is no longer related to individuals’ life chances. Some buy into this myth to the point where it prevents them from recognizing the everyday realities that show the United States is <a href="http://www.sup.org/books/title/?id=20253">white supremacist in nature</a>.</p>
<p>But the myth of a colorblind society crumbles underneath a substantial body of social science research that documents how race still matters in numerous areas of American life. For instance, the evidence shows that race still matters in the <a href="https://scholar.harvard.edu/files/pager/files/pager_ajs.pdf">labor market</a> and <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0002764211433805">workplace</a>, <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/despite-the-best-intentions-9780195342727?cc=us&lang=en&#">education</a>, and even in access to <a href="http://www.michigan.gov/documents/mdcr/VFlintCrisisRep-F-Edited3-13-17_554317_7.pdf">clean water</a>. Race matters in <a href="https://www.nap.edu/read/12875/chapter/1">health care</a>, <a href="https://thenewpress.com/books/chokehold">the criminal justice system</a>, and even everyday <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1559-1816.2009.00489.x/full">retail</a> and <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0010880403260105">dining</a> experiences.</p>
<p>Still, many refuse to believe that racism persists. They point to the civil rights legislation of the 1960s or, more recently, the election of Barack Obama as the 44th president of the United States, as <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Yes-We-Can-White-Racial-Framing-and-the-Obama-Presidency-2nd-Edition/Harvey-Wingfield-Feagin/p/book/9780415645386">evidence</a> of the <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=QNV3XwST4WIC&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false">“end of racism”</a> or at least the <a href="http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/D/bo13375516.html">“declining significance of race.”</a></p>
<p>Some might suggest that it would be easier to talk about white racism if it were done in less inflammatory or offensive ways. Perhaps this delicate approach — one that takes into account what author Robin DiAngelo refers to in her <a href="https://books.google.com/books/about/White_Fragility.html?id=ZfQ3DwAAQBAJ&source=kp_cover">forthcoming book</a> as “<a href="http://libjournal.uncg.edu/ijcp/article/view/249">white fragility</a>” — might be desirable or necessary for those who are fearful of the consequences of speaking unvarnished truth on racial matters. But when it comes to professors who deal with racial stratification, we should not be whitewashing reality.</p>
<h2>Can there be ‘black racism’?</h2>
<p>The most common complaint about my course that I’ve encountered thus far is that anybody can be racist. They ask indignantly: What about “black racism”? Or what about other forms of racism they <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1745691611406922">believe</a> exist on the part of Latinos, Asian Americans and Native peoples. My answer is: There is no such thing as <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/reverse-racism-isnt-a-thing_us_55d60a91e4b07addcb45da97">black racism.</a> </p>
<p>I am in no way the only one who holds this view. As <a href="https://sociology.duke.edu/people/eduardo-bonilla-silva">Eduardo Bonilla-Silva</a>, president of the American Sociological Association, <a href="http://news.wgcu.org/post/white-racism-textbook-author-speaks-fgcu-0">said here at FGCU recently</a> when asked if it would be fair to have classes such as “Asian Racism” or “Latino Racism”: “We can all be prejudiced, yeah? So, black people can be anti-white, but there is a big difference between having prejudiced views about other people and having a system that gives systemic privilege to some groups.” </p>
<p>Indeed, blacks did not develop and benefit from a centuries-old comprehensive system of racial oppression comprised of laws, policies, practices, traditions and an accompanying ideology — one that promotes the biological, intellectual and cultural superiority of whites to dominate other groups. Europeans and their white descendants, however, did. This is <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Systemic-Racism-A-Theory-of-Oppression/Feagin/p/book/9780415952781">systemic racism</a>. And students in courses such as mine are introduced to the scholarship that attests to this reality, past and present.</p>
<p>For instance, students will read and discuss pieces by and about <a href="http://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Black-Reconstruction-in-America-1860-1880/David-Levering-Lewis/9780684856575">W.E.B. Du Bois</a>, <a href="https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781442276222/Racism-without-Racists-Color-Blind-Racism-and-the-Persistence-of-Racial-Inequality-in-America-Fifth-Edition">Eduardo Bonilla-Silva</a>, <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Racist-America-Roots-Current-Realities-and-Future-Reparations-3rd-Edition/Feagin/p/book/9780415704014">Joe Feagin</a>, <a href="http://www.law.columbia.edu/faculty/kimberle-crenshaw">Kimberlé Crenshaw</a>, <a href="https://www.scholars.northwestern.edu/en/publications/racial-exploitation-and-the-wages-of-whiteness">Charles Mills</a>, <a href="https://thenewpress.com/books/chokehold">Paul Butler</a>, <a href="https://www.nikkikhanna.com/">Nikki Khanna</a>, and <a href="https://nyupress.org/books/9780814719701/">Derrick Bell</a>, among many others. They will also do work that will strengthen their ability to identify and confront <a href="https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781442276222/Racism-without-Racists-Color-Blind-Racism-and-the-Persistence-of-Racial-Inequality-in-America-Fifth-Edition">colorblind racist statements</a>.</p>
<h2>Public money for a public problem</h2>
<p>Some detractors of my course have suggested that students stand a better shot at getting a good grade in my course if their racial politics align with my own. This is nonsense. If a student finds peer-reviewed empirical evidence counter to that covered in the course, I would welcome the opportunity to review it.</p>
<p>Agreeing with my take on racial matters doesn’t impact a student’s grade. Whether a student earns an “A” in any of my courses is entirely dependent on the quality of the work they produce.</p>
<p>Another criticism I’ve heard is that I am teaching a course titled “White Racism” at a public university at taxpayer expense. Not only should my course and others like it be taught at public colleges and universities, they must be taught at such institutions. </p>
<p>Florida Gulf Coast University President Michael Martin has strongly and publicly supported my academic freedom to teach my “White Racism” course.</p>
<p>“Reviewing the course content is much more instructive than passing judgment based on a two-word title,” he said in a <a href="http://mediad.publicbroadcasting.net/p/wgcu/files/201801/statement_re_white_racism__11-29-17_from_president_martin.pdf">statement</a>. “At FGCU, as at all great universities, we teach our students critical thinking skills by challenging them to think independently and critically about important, even if controversial, issues of our times.”</p>
<p>Indeed, white supremacy and white racism remain terrible and intractable features of American society. It is in the public interest that students be provided with not only an opportunity to learn about the origin, logic and consequences of white racial domination but also how to challenge and dismantle it. The public university classroom is among the best places for this to occur.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/90093/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ted Thornhill is affiliated with the American Sociological Association and the Midwest Sociological Society. </span></em></p>Controversy ignited when a Florida Gulf Coast University professor began teaching a ‘white racism’ course this year. Ted Thornhill says his course is rooted in a ‘damning body’ of evidence.Ted Thornhill, Assistant Professor, Florida Gulf Coast UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/886222017-12-19T01:41:52Z2017-12-19T01:41:52ZThe dangerous belief that white people are under attack<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/199751/original/file-20171218-27538-1r9g2jc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Lucian Wintrich, left, leaves court on Dec. 11 after charges of breach of peace were dropped. In November, Wintrich had delivered a speech at the University of Connecticut titled 'It's OK To Be White.'</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/It-s-OK-To-Be-White/3ea3ce0016ad4ee28fc1bf9299351b92/5/0">AP Photo/Jessica Hill</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In August, the Justice Department <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/01/us/politics/trump-affirmative-action-universities.html?mwrsm=Email&_r=1">decided to investigate instances of bias against whites</a> in university admissions. Since then, campuses have been flyered with “<a href="http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/its-okay-to-be-white">It’s okay to be white</a>,” and in November, <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/US/conservative-speaker-arrested-white-event-uconn/story?id=51451426">violence erupted</a> at the University of Connecticut during a speech about discrimination against whites.</p>
<p>Are white people actually under attack? </p>
<p>After all, in the U.S., whites have historically been viewed as perpetrators of bias, and racial minorities as the victims. </p>
<p>But perceptions of this relationship have shifted. According to a <a href="https://www.rwjf.org/content/dam/farm/reports/surveys_and_polls/2017/rwjf441554">recent survey</a>, the majority of whites – 55 percent – now believe that whites experience racial discrimination. </p>
<p>What’s more, whites <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2011/05/22/is-anti-white-bias-a-problem/jockeying-for-stigma">believe bias against their group is increasing</a>, while believing bias against blacks is declining. </p>
<p>What’s behind this dramatic change in attitudes? </p>
<p>Research from my lab and others has found that social changes are a big reason. We’ve also found that these perceptions of bias – despite not being grounded in reality – can have real consequences.</p>
<h2>The threat of social change</h2>
<p>There’s comfort in predictability, and people have a psychological tendency <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1751-9004.2012.00427.x/full">to favor the status quo</a>.</p>
<p>For some, a preference for the status quo also means a preference for a social order in which whites have more status, power and wealth than racial minorities. </p>
<p>This reality – <a href="http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/11/01/how-wealth-inequality-has-changed-in-the-u-s-since-the-great-recession-by-race-ethnicity-and-income/">still ingrained in American society</a> – was <a href="http://www.people-press.org/2008/11/13/section-2-the-president-elects-image-and-expectations/">seemingly interrupted</a> by Barack Obama’s historic presidential win in 2008. </p>
<p>After his election, <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022103109000286">many started believing</a> racial progress was taking place. There was the sense that more racial minorities were occupying the high-power, high-status positions historically reserved for whites. </p>
<p>For many, this was a good thing. But for the subset of white Americans who think that they rightfully deserve to have a higher status than racial minorities, it was unsettling: Were they falling behind? Was society becoming stacked against them? Had whites become victims?</p>
<p><a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0956797613508412">In a series of studies</a> conducted while Obama was president, psychologist Cheryl Kaiser and I were able to show how this phenomenon played out. </p>
<p>We asked participants to either read an article about racial progress or a neutral article. Then we assessed whether they believe whites experience racial discrimination. We also assessed the extent to which they endorsed the racial hierarchy.</p>
<p>Among white participants who endorsed the racial status hierarchy, those that read about racial progress believed whites experience more bias than those who read a neutral article.</p>
<p>It’s important to note that this wasn’t the case for all whites: If participants rejected the racial hierarchy, they didn’t increase the belief that whites are discriminated against after reading about racial progress.</p>
<p>Essentially, this study indicates that some whites don’t welcome social progress – they actually respond by seeing themselves as victims of discrimination. </p>
<p>The country’s growing racial diversity is also likely fueling perceptions of anti-white bias. While whites currently comprise the majority of the U.S. population, <a href="https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2015/cb15-tps16.html">recent census projections</a> suggest that within the next several decades, whites will become a numerical minority. </p>
<p><a href="http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0185389">According to recent research</a>, if whites are alerted to this trend, they are more likely to fear being discriminated against.</p>
<p>In sum, social change – whether it’s racial progress or increasing demographic diversity – has caused some white Americans to see themselves as victims of racism.</p>
<h2>The slippery slope of whites feeling victimized</h2>
<p>My other research with psychologist Joseph Wellman suggests that this phenomenon isn’t benign. It leads some to adopt perspectives that could, ultimately, exacerbate social inequity.</p>
<p>For whites who are particularly eager to maintain the racial social order, the idea of anti-white bias is particularly alarming. It implies that the entire social system is unstable, and they are eager to restore it. </p>
<p>These people might attempt to “reestablish” the group’s position because they believe it has been damaged.</p>
<p>This could play out in a number of ways.</p>
<p>One way is through support for other white people who claim to be victims of racial discrimination. There’s a tendency <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0146167201272010">to respond negatively</a> to black people who claim to be victims of discrimination: People see them as complainers who use racism as an excuse for their shortcomings. </p>
<p>White people who support a racial hierarchy, on the other hand, <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022103113001480">respond relatively favorably</a> to other white people who claim to be victims of anti-white bias – and say they’d be more willing to help those whites out.</p>
<p>They also might respond by trying to minimize opportunities for other racial groups. For example, when white people think they’re being discriminated against, my collaborators and <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022103114001620">I found</a> they’re less inclined to support affirmative action policies. They say they’re also more willing to support policies that help white people, like efforts to address discrimination against whites.</p>
<p>It goes without saying that in a country where racial <a href="http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2016/06/27/1-demographic-trends-and-economic-well-being/#blacks-still-trail-whites-in-college-completion">educational, employment and wealth disparities</a> persist, greater attention to bias against whites (and less to bias against racial minorities) would only exacerbate social inequality.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/88622/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Clara Wilkins does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A majority of white Americans now believe that white people experience racial discrimination, and memes like #ItsOkayToBeWhite are only fanning the flames.Clara Wilkins, Assistant Professor of Psychology, Wesleyan UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/785622017-06-29T23:51:11Z2017-06-29T23:51:11ZWill women vote for women in 2018? It depends on if they’re married<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/176255/original/file-20170629-16051-1cwjfo1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">EMILY's List helps elect pro-choice Democratic women candidates to office.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Charles Dharapak</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The 2018 elections promise to be the “<a href="http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/trump-backlash-could-make-2018-new-year-women-ballot-box-n718976">Year of the Woman</a>,” with more women planning to step into local, state and federal elections than ever before. </p>
<p>This represents a significant change. The United States has some of the lowest female political representation in the world. Only 24.8 percent of <a href="http://www.ncsl.org/legislators-staff/legislators/womens-legislative-network/women-in-state-legislatures-for-2017.aspx">state legislature seats are occupied by women</a>. As more women consider entering politics in response to Donald Trump’s sexist <a href="http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/trump-backlash-could-make-2018-new-year-women-ballot-box-n718976">remarks during the election</a> and the <a href="http://www.npr.org/2017/02/23/515438978/trumps-election-drives-more-women-to-consider-running-for-office">historic Hillary Clinton loss</a>, findings from <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1065912917702499">our study</a> on voter attitudes offer a warning: Candidates shouldn’t assume women will vote for other women.</p>
<p>This was evident in the 2016 presidential election. Hillary Clinton worked to appeal to female voters but performed <a href="http://time.com/4566748/hillary-clinton-firewall-women/">poorly among white women</a>. Some have argued Clinton’s personality caused her inability to <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/11/white-women-support-gop/507617/">emotionally connect to voters</a>. </p>
<p>However, our research indicates that Clinton’s failure to capture the white female vote is, in part, based in something more fundamental – marriage.</p>
<h2>The fate of women</h2>
<p>We used data from the <a href="http://www.electionstudies.org/">American National Election Study</a>, which has collected data on American voters’ attitudes since 1948. In 2012, more than 2,000 women were asked: “Do you think that what happens generally to women in this country will have something to do with what happens in your life?” </p>
<p>Those who answered “yes” were then asked to report the extent to which what happens to others affects them. We used this measure to identify “gender-linked fate,” or the extent to which women see their futures as tied to those of other women. We found that married white and Latina women were less likely to view their fate as tied to other women. </p>
<p>We then tested whether this impacted their political attitudes. We found that when married white women felt disconnected from other women, answering “no” to the question above, they were less likely to identify as a Democrat, and more likely to hold conservative political views.</p>
<p>In contrast to these married white and Latina women, single and divorced whites and Latinas were more likely to see their futures tied to other women. As a result, they were also more likely to identify as Democrats and liberals.</p>
<p>Black women, regardless of marital status, were most likely to see their futures as tied to those of other women and consistently voted democratically and held progressive attitudes.</p>
<p>In part, this captures a difference in message. While the Republican Party has focused their efforts to redress gender inequality in a <a href="https://www.gop.com/issue/family-values/canonical/">platform that emphasizes family values</a>, Democrats have focused more explicitly on equalizing opportunity by <a href="https://www.democrats.org/party-platform">reducing institutional gender discrimination</a>. </p>
<p>Single and divorced women resonate more with the Democrats’ message, with four times as many respondents in our data reporting that the Democratic Party did a better job looking out for women’s interests than the Republican Party.</p>
<p>So why does marriage alter white and Latina married women’s political alliances? And, why do black women not follow the same trend?</p>
<h2>You and me: Marriage and changing behaviors</h2>
<p>Research suggests that marriage generally shifts individuals’ attitudes and behaviors. For example, evidence shows married women become more conservative on gender-related issues over the course of their marriage and perceive themselves as having <a href="http://journals.cambridge.org/article_S0003055400096404">less in common with other women</a>. In part, this captures the fact that many married couples become more similar to each other in their <a href="http://journals.cambridge.org/article_S0003055400096404">attitudes and behaviors</a>. </p>
<p>Someone could reasonably ask, why does marriage make married women more conservative, rather than making men more feminist? It’s a matter of <a href="http://escholarship.org/uc/item/9s54f2mc">power and resources</a>.</p>
<p>Women consistently earn less money and hold less power, which fosters <a href="http://search.proquest.com/openview/dd0061f9909b9804f40e0bca440d047d/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=25922">women’s economic dependency on men</a>. This dependency increases if women reduce employment and rely on husbands’ earnings following the birth of a child. Thus, it is within married women’s interests to support policies and politicians who protect their husbands and improve their status. </p>
<p>Some married women <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/026098279190018P">perceive advances</a> for women, such as lawsuits to mitigate pay discrimination, as coming <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.2307/1389781">at the expense</a> of <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/0162-895X.00253/full">their male partners</a>. In part, this captures the shift in married women’s alliances from the individual to the marital union. Women who depend on their own income are <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/179725/summary">more supportive of feminist issues</a> such as abortion, sexual behavior, gender roles and family responsibilities, which widens the political gap between single and married women. </p>
<p>It follows that politicians cannot expect married women to vote as a block on women’s issues. </p>
<p>The only exception to this rule may be black women. An existing <a href="http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674325401">body of research shows</a> that blacks are better able to identify systematic forms of discrimination because of their experiences with it. Thus, they are more likely to see their futures as tied to other blacks. Our study shows this extends to gender as well. Black women are better able to identify gender discrimination regardless of marital status and, as a consequence, they vote more progressively.</p>
<h2>Lessons for female politicians</h2>
<p>Given that married women make up about <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/election/results/exit-polls">30 percent of the electorate</a>, what lessons might 2018 hopefuls draw from our research? </p>
<p>First, targeting messages to the demographics of the audience can make a difference – and this includes race, class and marital status.</p>
<p>Second, don’t assume that married women will connect to other women based on a notion of shared womanhood. Rather, feminist messages of discrimination and sexism may be more compelling to women who shoulder disproportionate levels of <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?hl=en&lr=&id=qvhyAwAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PP1&dq=Continuity++and+Change+in+the+American+Family&ots=UFAJphSZLG&sig=C4W3P1Pz87TxrMF5jO6ebCCYabw">inequality, poverty and job insecurity</a> – single, divorced and black women.</p>
<p>Finally, messages about economic struggles should be expanded to the family level, to better capture the challenges of married couples. </p>
<p>As we deepen our understanding of women’s voting patterns, the 2018 elections may prove a momentous expansion of women’s political representation.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/78562/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Leah Ruppanner receives funding from the Australian Research Council. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Christopher Stout and Kelsy Kretschmer do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Research shows that married women tend not to relate as much to other women. This makes a big difference when a woman is on the ballot.Leah Ruppanner, Senior Lecturer in Sociology, The University of MelbourneChristopher Stout, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Oregon State UniversityKelsy Kretschmer, Assistant Professor of Sociology, Oregon State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.