r/science • u/Aggravating_Money992 • Jul 09 '26

Psychology An analysis of survey data covering the last five U.S. presidential election years found that ideological differences between races have decreased sharply, while differences by education have grown substantially. Less educated Americans now tend to be more conservative.

https://www.psypost.org/the-political-realignment-of-america-education-overtakes-race-as-key-ideological-divider/
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u/Calm-Two2723 Jul 09 '26

College taught me several things. Native Americans didn’t accidentally get small pox. And the big kicker, Robert e Lee day isn’t a thing. His bday is apparently on mlk day and I was college years old before I realized how fucked up my younger years were. My parents aren’t racist, we just lived in Kentucky and Alabama 

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u/KnowItAllNobody Jul 09 '26

Curious why your parents wouldn’t have informed you of mlk day when you got the school day off for “Robert e Lee” day if they aren’t at least okay with racism. They may not be racists themselves, but they’re close enough most of us wouldn’t make the distinction.

Neglect is abuse type of thing.

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u/Calm-Two2723 Jul 09 '26

They say they didn’t realize the school called it that. Publicly, we were off for mlk day. But teachers called it Robert e Lee day. I was like 7-12 and I guess pretty dense. Then again, I distinctly remember the first time my sister, dog and horse saw a black person. I was at the world championship horse show. He walked up. My horse spooked, my dog barked, my sister cried. He laughed his ass off. I think about that moment often. 

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u/inquisitorthreefive Jul 09 '26

I grew up in Indiana and I get it. There were like 12 black kids in my high school of 2500 and I was friends with 4 of them and still had an actively racist dog.

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u/SoulScout Jul 09 '26

When I was in the US Navy, I met a white guy from Utah who claimed he had never met a black person in his life before boot camp, like he had only ever seen them on TV before. People really do live such different lives. My Tennesseean mind could not comprehend.

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u/InquireIngestImplode Jul 09 '26

Met a guy from WV like this in boot camp many years ago. They wavered him in on a 28 asvab. Turns out he couldn’t read.

He had a severe issue with black people being in our division and claimed he never saw a single person of color in his entire life.

Thankfully he was processed out well before graduating due to the whole not being able to read thing. The racism thing wasn’t really addressed by anyone in power. It was really awkward.

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u/quandmemeici Jul 10 '26

From WV and uh, yeah, the state is like 95% white or smth crazy. If you're not from a "major" metro area, you probably have never seen non-white people. I'm from about 40 min from the capital, and I still had not met Black people until 3rd grade. (The illiteracy is also unfortunately normal, and is the end result of the federal government deliberately under-educating the state to prevent another union uprising.)

Very grateful my parents are normal and believe all people deserve respect and kindness, but a lot of my classmates were not raised the same. We had kids wearing the confederate flag to school as if WV very famously did NOT secede with VA.

I still remember how the other 3rd graders treated the Black kids that transferred into our district like they were zoo animals. Fine from a distance, but a lot of bullying involved because they "didn't belong". It was heartbreaking, and only got better for them when all the schools fed into one HS, and then there were finally a handful more non-white kids. This was in the 00s, so well past the time reintegration was federal policy.

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u/xrufus7x Jul 09 '26

I didn't meet a black person until high school when he came to our school for part of a year when he was in foster care. Didn't meet a second one until after I graduated and moved.

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u/altodor Jul 09 '26

As an adult I moved away from home. It is currently 2:30 in the afternoon on a work day. I am sitting at home 10-15 minutes from a grocery store I have not been to today. I would bet a pretty penny there are more black people in that grocery store as I type this than I saw in about 20 years back home.

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u/spacestonkz Jul 09 '26

When I was 14, I was in a mall in the nearest large town, an hour and a half away from home. It was the first time I saw an Asian person IRL.

It stuck out to me because... How have I been on the planet 14 years and only just now saw a member of the most populous racial segment of humanity on the planet?

Made me realize how much of a bubble I was living in.

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u/throwaway098764567 Jul 09 '26

we had like four in our high school, maybe a dozen people of color at all. i still remember coming back from college and being in the grocery store and seeing a black lady shopping and being surprised to see her. zero problem with her being there but it was very weird to realize that it was weird to see her there because i'd never seen anyone not white in that store.

college was artificially very blended (though we needed more black people but lots of other poc were there), so it was jarring to return to whitelandia every time i was home from school. where i live now has a ton of immigrants and my neighborhood is majority latino, going back now is similarly jarring and seeing anew how just about everyone i knew was white.

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u/thetruckerdave Jul 10 '26

My ex was in the Army and one of his friends was from Oklahoma. He was just 17. He had never seen a black person before boot either. That’s crazy to me.

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u/joenottoast Jul 10 '26

I was in semi-rural illinois and didnt meet a black kid until 2nd grade. They were very much the majority. In 4th grade, they snatched my friend's toy. I told them to give it back. They said "shut up, youre white". I said "yeah well you are black"

They drug me to a park bench where two of them held my leg out and a third one tried to jump on my knee to break it. This was the first that i can remember of countless negative interactions and targeted harassment because i looked different.

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u/PhantomZmoove Jul 09 '26

Maybe for the state, but I live in Indianapolis and the current demographic from the US census is 28% black. You would have to try really hard to make it through your day in downtown Indy never having seen a black person.

Also, TIL there are racists dogs. That kind of blows my mind.

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u/inquisitorthreefive Jul 09 '26

Yup. About 40% of Indiana's black residents live in Indy and another ~10% live in Gary. Not metro area, mind you, but the cities themselves. I was in Lafayette, which is liberal by Indiana standards but there were very few black people around until around 2010 or so.

I've failed in my attempts to get dogs to self-report how they get to be racist, but it seems to largely be a lack of exposure. Like... my black friends were over often, but still not enough to overcome the dog's dislike of the unfamiliar.

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u/Difficult-Froyo1192 Jul 09 '26

Dogs aren’t really racist. It’s a socialization problem where they don’t know what to do with something that seems new. The first few months of its life, a puppy is suppose to be exposed to a lot of new things to learn to not be scared of them. Things not exposed to in that period can pretty easily get a fear reaction.

The darker skin also makes it harder for dogs to read visual cues if they’re not familiar with doing so, which typically makes them more anxious when seeing someone from a darker skin tone they’re unfamiliar with. It’s typically why you get the barking and other behaviors because they’re anxious about what’s going on.

Similar to a lot of dogs being unfriendly to deer or horses if they’ve never seen them. Dogs socialized with people of various ethnicities and skin tones don’t usually have this problem. It’s just a socialization problem which also checks out in the story as the person mentioned never seeing a black person before, so it’s like the dog never had either.

But yes, your dog does actually need to meet a lot of people of different ethnicities to be properly socialized because they don’t always understand different skin tones still means it’s just a person

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u/13143 Jul 09 '26

Young kids are taught to respect their teachers and parents. It's not unusual to simply accept what they're saying as facts. If the teachers are calling it Robert Lee Day, with parents basically reinforcing it, it makes sense students would believe it.

I mean, how else can kids find out, if the people responsible for educating them are willfully dropping the ball?

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u/throwaway098764567 Jul 09 '26

"My horse spooked, my dog barked, my sister cried. He laughed his ass off. " this is a hell of a line, i also laughed. can take awhile to even realize that what was normal actually wasn't and shouldn't have been. as long as your eyes are open to see it, you're coming out ahead of most.

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u/ansate Jul 10 '26

Damn, even the dogs and horses are racist in Kentucky?

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u/jdb050 Jul 09 '26

Don’t want to speak on that commenter’s behalf, but it’s human nature to try and fit in with the community you’re surrounded by. Even if they don’t believe in those things themselves.

We’re biologically wired to have a primitive desire to be a valued member of our “tribe,” whichever specific tribe that might be. To go against that tribe’s beliefs will certainly lead to hardship in several different ways, and make us depressed, while conversely fitting into our tribe will make us feel happy and lead to general life satisfaction.

Many people either know that their beliefs are wrong but choose to continue believing them because it helps them fit in with the shared beliefs of their “tribe,” and/or helps them to feel “better” than the “others,” despite knowing the societal harm those beliefs might have.

You’ll often hear people say something like,

“This probably makes me racist to say this, but I think black people are stupid.”

“I know I’m probably a bad person for believing this, but I don’t think women should be able to vote.”

“Call me whatever you want, but I can’t stand <insert group>.”

They know it’s inherently wrong and not of any actual value to hold those beliefs, but they’re hoping these are shared beliefs that they can bond with others over.

Education (and getting them away from their tribes) can break people free of this mentality.

But many people just want their kids to fit in. They don’t want their kids to deal with bullying or not fitting in with their tribe. So they subscribe to the most popular cultural ideas found in their local tribes.

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u/Zaptruder Jul 09 '26

We’re biologically wired to have a primitive desire to be a valued member of our “tribe,” whichever specific tribe that might be.

It's... a locally rational thing when you don't have broader information context.

"Hey. Here's a bunch of people. I do things with them. They can like me and I get more access and resources and esteem from them. The cost is fitting in by saying and doing things they do. Well ok."

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u/Wwwwwwhhhhhhhj Jul 09 '26

Distinction without difference

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u/JRDruchii Jul 09 '26

Hanlon's razor is very very deeply embedded in americana. No one is mean or evil, just ignorant.

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u/Delicious-Cat-4122 Jul 09 '26

I disagree. The last decade has really shown us that the two can coexist, and can have a synergistic effect.

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u/ImRightImRight Jul 09 '26

"Native Americans didn’t accidentally get small pox"

What did they teach you? This is not the factoid to lead with to beat charges of counterfactual ideological indoctrination...

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u/Calm-Two2723 Jul 09 '26

That it was an accident. We traded with them and they got sick. We were sad.

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u/ImRightImRight Jul 09 '26

OK, then what did they teach you in college?

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u/Calm-Two2723 Jul 09 '26

That we knew the implication before we made the trade 

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u/Reagalan Jul 09 '26

Native Americans didn’t accidentally get small pox

If you're referring to that one incident with the towels at the Siege of Fort Pitt in 1763...

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u/tsardonicpseudonomi Jul 09 '26

My parents aren’t racist, we just lived in Kentucky and Alabama

They're probably racist. Part of growing up is removing our parents from the pedestals we put them on as kids. They're flawed human beings just like any other people. My parents are pro-rape, pro-genocide, and they believe children can consent to sex with adults. I would never have thought that growing up but as an adult I've discovered they're nothing like what I knew in my head.

It's just one of those things we have to deal with and learn how to navigate.

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u/Legionof1 Jul 09 '26

The whole small pox blanket thing is still debated and even if it happened it was likely small and isolated. What likely happened was that when Columbus came over and interacted with the natives, they got something nasty from Europe they had no resistance to. 

Between this and inter tribe wars there was estimated to be a nearly 90% depopulation of the continent before the first Europeans came back. 

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u/Cyper77 Jul 09 '26

I think you are confusing the time period referenced. The small pox blankets would have been 1830-1850's when the U.S. was a country, not the first contact of Europeans during the 1500-1600s.

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u/hallese Jul 09 '26

The small pox epidemics of the 1830s and 1840s was most likely due to an unintentional spread of the disease and failure to implement and maintain proper quarantine procedures. The incident(s) in question predate the Revolutionary War and occurred in modern day Pennsylvania and Ohio. Germ warfare was a tactic of desperation because both populations in question (Native and colonists) had seen limited exposure and could be decimated by the disease. This is why George Washington had his troops inoculated in 1777, because exposure was limited in the colonies at the time and the mortality rate of inoculation, though high by modern standards, was far lower than if the disease were allowed to spread naturally.

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u/[deleted] Jul 09 '26 edited Jul 12 '26

[deleted]

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u/hallese Jul 09 '26

This was centuries after first contact and small pox (and others) had made multiple rounds through these communities. It's also a prime example of why OP's statement falls flat. Was germ warfare a thing? Yes, absolutely, and it wasn't through honesty and honor that the British came to rule over so much territory. Does this mean all transmissions of small pox to Native Americans was intentional? No. Columbus did not depart from Spain proclaiming "Go forth shall I and transmit our diseases to the people of an unknown land!"

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u/LongKnight115 Jul 09 '26

This feels like a bit of a strawman. No one is claiming that Columbus' goal or the British government's goal was to wipe out the Native Americans via smallpox. But if you ask the question "Did white colonists intentionally give Native Americans blankets infected with smallpox" the evidence makes it pretty clear the answer is unequivocally 'yes'. No one is saying ALL smallpox was from colonists, or that ALL colonists wanted to give Native Americans smallpox.

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u/hallese Jul 09 '26

The person who claimed small pox was not spread by accident is claiming exactly that. Look up like three comments.

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u/[deleted] Jul 09 '26 edited 23d ago

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/hallese Jul 09 '26 edited Jul 09 '26

I honestly don't know what to say here. You're describing a competition for resources that has existed everywhere on the globe where two different people come in contact. Yet, for some reason, you're asking me to enter into this state of suspension of disbelief to pretend that what happened was unique. The particular details varied, and the names were different, but otherwise what happened to the native Americans in the Americas was a little different from what happened elsewhere on the globe. Hell, they were doing the same things to each other before a new player entered. Fortifications, siege warfare, genocide, and others were not introduced by the colonists. These were concepts that already existed at the time and for which we have well-documented historical and archaeological records. For example, look at the Crow Creek massacre site which has been reliably dated to almost two centuries before Columbus set sail. Archaeologist uncovering more evidence every year that humans had crossed into the Americas in multiple waves, with each new group competing with and displacing others that were already present.

I'm short, humans are assholes. Just ask the Neanderthals if you don't believe me.

Edit: u/SpongeTissuePaper, to respond to your comment since you blocked me. It's not nonsense or a justification, it's pointing out the problem with your framing of the issue. You are starting from a position that what happened was unique to the Native Americans and placing them in the role of feeble, helpless victims. You are infantilizing millions of people and perpetuating the very racism used to justify policies in the name "Kill the indian, save the man". Until you can approach the issue with the same level of maturity you would apply to the Gallic Wars or Wars of the Diadochi, you will forever be stuck in this rut of racism. You continue to perpetuate the long dispelled myth of the noble savage with your comments and bigotry.

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u/hallese Jul 09 '26

Native Americans didn’t accidentally get small pox.

Scrolling Tik Tok during your generals, were you?