Do you vote the way you do because of your race?

[BurtWorm]

[loveable liberal]

1. toenail clippings.

I must admit, I've been keeping my toenail clippings. On election day I dropped them all in the bottom of a large teacup. They spelled out "obama" so thats how I voted.

[azmouse]

2. I've never voted by race or gender but I can't speak for anyone else.

[Fovea]

3. Handedness.

I vote sinister.

[Left Is Write]

7. Me too.

Go LEFT!

[blondeatlast]

4. Wow--I thought of all people, DUers would be way more wonkish than what I'm seeing here.

But I guess we love simple answers as much as anyone. :shrug:

[nc4bo]

5. Nope. In fact, before 11/04/08, I voted exclusively for the white guys

who happened to be candidates I thought would make good presidents.

This time, it just so happened that the candidate I learned to love just happened to be a black guy :).

(I'd also have picked the white woman if she'd won the primary).

[stillcool]

6. How can I not?

My perception and views of life, are based on my environment, which is based on my race, heritage, social structure. I would like to think I've moved far beyond that place where those initial spoon fed beliefs were formed, but still, the only world I know is the one I've seen through my own eyes.

[BurtWorm]

8. What is your race, if you don't mind my asking?

[stillcool]

9. white

[BurtWorm]

10. And you were brought up to think of yourself as white?

Your whiteness is an essential part of your mental makeup? You're white, therefore you think a certain way?

[stillcool]

11. I am what I am..

how can I see through anything but my own eyes? I can imagine lots of things, but I can not know them. I was orphaned at the age of one. I can imagine what it's like to have a family, but I don't know what that is like. Do I vote a certain way because I was an orphan? Absolutely.

[BurtWorm]

17. But the question I'm asking is what does your being white have to do with how you vote?

Does it have as much to do as your gender, or the way you feel about yourself? Or your class? Where does it enter into your voting decisions?

This is actually a lot more complicated a question than can be answered with a simple yes or no, of course. If the issue at hand is tax-related, your class will probably enter into your thinking. If the issue is abortion, your gender may.

If the issue is gay marriage, does race enter into that?

Would you weigh the benefits to white people of endorsing gay marriage? Would a black person, or an Asian person, weigh their race on that question: what would gay marriage mean to me as a black person, or an Asian person?

[stillcool]

19. I don't know what it is like..

to be black in America. But what I imagine is that being part of any sub-set of society, brings with it a structure and a belief system based on survival within the walls of that community. I think religion is a tool to provide a sense of security against a hostile world, and that many of our social beliefs are formed from fear. Why would anyone vote to strip the rights of another person? I don't know. What part of being gay is intolerable within the parameters of a certain social structure? I don't know. But I think all hate is based on fear, and perceived threats to one's survival.

[blondeatlast]

18. Trying to see your point here--I'm white--but as a product of white privilege

(which I might add, my husband is not) I have the luxury of "ignoring" my race.

Things are "supposed" to go my way. The leaders are "supposed" to be my color, I'm not "supposed" to feel discrimination, I'm almost never (see below) considered an "other."

If I'm understanding you correctly, you feel "otherness" as a white person. That's a concept I can't comprehend (and since my husband has faced some discrimination I'm more aware of it).

Race, to my self-knowledge, has NEVER influenced my vote one way or another. Are you saying that as a "white" person, it has influenced yours? I just don't get that.

I don't ever have to think about my race (except on the rare occasions when I'm surrounded by people of my husband's heritage, as did indeed happen recently. That is the ONLY time I have ever felt like an "other").

[stillcool]

20. What I'm saying is that...

how I vote is based on who I am. If I were anything other than who I am would I vote the same way? I have no idea. How could I know that? We are basically all the same, and as people we can all see ourselves in others, but our self identity which is based from where we start in life shapes our views, no?

[SweetieD]

15. I agree with your sentiments. I hate the "I don't see color" baloney that

everyone buys into. Race, nationality, gender, income, neighborhoods, class all have bearings on how we see the world around us. It is one of many factors that creates one's political identity.

[BanzaiBonnie]

16. The choices were too simplistic

Thank you still cool for expanding this subject.

Anyone who says they are beyond "where they grew up" is in some respects not being honest with themselves. At least that's MY belief. YMMV.

That said, I would never consciously allow anything other than the character of the person and their stand on issues to influence my vote. When I take that test with the pictures that show people of all colors, I end up with a slight preference for people with darker skin. Being blonde and blue-eyed, with fishbelly pale skin, I have always thought all shades of brown skin to be much more pleasing.

[camera obscura]

12. and I don't vote my gender either

[jonnyblitz]

13. much to Ralph Nader's dismay, I am into "gonad" politics.

j/k :hi:

[TexasObserver]

14. No. Yes. Sometimes. Maybe.

[old mark]

21. Other. You see where centuries of white rule have brought us -

I thought it only fair to give the other guys a chance, now that we've fucked everything up so bad.


mark

[AlCzervik]

22. I'm pretty much the republican deomgraphic based on income and i voted for Obama

41 year old married white women that doesn't mind paying higher taxes and neither does my 44 year old white husband, "we make more, we're doing better hon, we should pay more".

[Cerridwen]

23. Yes. Human.

I may be a specie-ist, but I usually vote for humans before all others. I've been fortunate; I've never had to vote against a dog or cat. There have, however, been a few snakes I was able to vote against.

But all in all, yes, I always vote human race first.

I'm just weird that way.