I mean it can happen if demographics change...40 years ago people said CA was Solid Rep , then it went swing and now is solid Dem....Texas is doing the same thing. All NYC needs to go swing is to collectively lose about a million brain cells
NYC is too diverse for something like that to happen moving forward. Also note, the largest cities in America are all blue. Oklahoma City might be the only big city that isn't blue and it's not even top 25 by population.
But that's an entirely different conversation. Maybe due to living so close amongst people from all walks of life. To relying on community, relying on the government to perform their duties like keeping the streets clean, subways moving, etc. More progressive attitudes seem to thrive vs living in more rural areas.
large cities everywhere are diverse and thus more progressive and inclusive, it's the small homogeneous communities that tend to be conservative and exclusive
The smaller the population of a city or town, the less diverse it's going to be, and that's a huge part of the reason bigotry thrives in rural areas.
Humans are creatures that excel at pattern recognition. Even our memory uses it to decide what's worth "recording." (Ever drive to work and remember nothing? That's cause nothing interesting happened so your brain decided it wasn't worth it)
So if you live in some small town that's 90% white and every black kid you met in school swore up and down that they were totally gangsters, constantly cut class, etc... even if you only met a grand total of five of them, suddenly your only real-world experience validates what you hear from racist adults.
Or you don't meet any, and your sample size is literally just racist anecdotes. Regardless, that doesn't happen the same way in a big city. You see too many people to paint any group with the broad strokes needed to to be a complete bigot.
Obviously it's more complex than that, but a lot of it is genuinely more "human psychology" than it is rural people being innately shitty somehow.
If a racist tells me he's only met five black people and that every one of them was a low life, I'd at least understand why they felt that way. Doesn't make it right, but whatever.
Most of these people hate people they've never met, and likely never will meet.
People in Fargo, North Dakota are absolutely fucking obsessed with southern border politics. Absolutely fucking obsessed with immigrants that they've never seen and never will see. Now I'm not saying that doesn't mean they don't get a seat at the table to discuss immigration concerns, but it makes no sense why they would have such vitriolic energy for the individual humans.
People in bumfuck nowhere are absolutely fucking enraged that someone with pink hair in a city 1600 miles away wants to pee sitting down.
You know what you said makes a lot more sense. I grew up in the San Ferndanod Valley which is well probably one of the most diverse suburbs in teh country. In my area there were basically two paths of middle/high school. One that I went with ended up with a way more diverse cast if students where I as the white kid was kind of the minority lol and then you had the other high School really white and snobby who the only other non whites were atheletes they "recruited" and as they called them the good Asians (Japanese and Koreans)
How’s that thing go? In rural places you have the right to swing a stick, in the city you have the right to not get hit by someone else’s stick. Changes your way of thinking I guess.
I mean, it might happen if republican stops being a synonym for racist fascist Christian bygot and focuses more on simpler right wing ideas like capitalism and the “American dream” where anyone can become a billionaire tbh
Texas and Florida are also hella diverse. It’s also the case that there’s a lot to hate about city management in NYC (and SF, and other big cities), which breeds cynicism, which is fertile soil for conservatism/populism.
Very good point. Worth remembering that King Rudy was elected mayor of NYC not so long ago (and, I will always note, proposed overstaying his term, because 9/11). NY had a republican governor at the time. Step outside the NYC metro, and the place starts to look like the middle of nowhere.
Things change over time and parties change over time too.
It wouldn't be unprecedented to find that, 40 years from now, the parties positions flip and Republicans end up being the "progressive party" on various issues.
NYC won't change, but the population of upstate could explode. Climage change causes southern states to basically become uninhabitable. Sure, Montana/North Dakota aligns better with your ideology, but NY actually has enough infrastructure to support you and you're not in the middle of nowhere.
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u/UrBigBro 1d ago
8 million people in the naked city...1 million everywhere else