Thread by @SlavaMalamud

Every single "both sides" story, every single Ohio diner feature, the entire idea of listening to Trumpers and asking their opinions is ENTIRELY predicated on the notion that dumbass white people are uniquely entitled to have their voices heard because they are "real America."

For some inexplicable reason, nobody ever comes to ask me shit, to find out what Russian-born public school teachers in Baltimore think about the political climate. I am well-read and well-informed, I can speak in complete sentences.
But I must be fake America or something.

What is there to be heard from Trumpers that is still a mystery? We know why they vote for him. We know their guiding forces are hate, resentment and fear. Everyone knew this 5 years ago.
What matters is feeding that destructive and mendacious notion that they are "real America."

For whatever reason, the media bought into it. They have swallowed it whole. The idea that these hateful, uninformed, stupid people are real America because they eat at diners, wear flannel, have Anglo names and go to church.
And this, friends, is fascism's foundational block!..

The idea that something called "real America" can be identified and distilled into a standard, based on residence, appearance, employment and a set of personal behaviors. The idea that a Gemma June from Arkansas, Walmart clerk, is a real American, while Ahmed from NYC is not...

The idea that Bobby Lou Jr. from rural Oklahoma needs to be listened to and reassured because of what he eats for dinner and the fact he coaches Little League, while a biracial doctorate student in sociology at Oklahoma State is an ivory-tower elitist detached from real America.

Everyone has decided that these people have a unique, important, instructive insight into America's problems, even though they are uninformed and full of hate and conspiracy theories. And the reason for that is not their numbers.
It's because they are white and have Anglo names.

And everyone here is preconditined to consider them "real Americans", and this is fucking dangerous, and nobody seems to understand just how dangerous it is.
Even after four goddamn years!

But the reason I am an American now is because the country I was born in decided to start figuring out who "real Soviets" were and who deserved to be listened to based on the language they spoke and last names they had.
So, despite the fact I don't (and can't) coach Little League

... hate peanut butter and have a name nobody spells right, maybe it's worth it to listen to me? Maybe I am an American, too?
Or literary anyone.
Or, better yet, do any story that is NOT about where real America is and who represents it.
Don't feed fascism. Is it too much to ask?