When I first begin this anthropology blogging activity I was quite judgmental of Democrats. As a person with beliefs mainly aligning with conservative values, I found Democrat views as quite corrupt, to say the least. But over my fieldwork of talking politics with my friend this quarter with our interviews, I have found that Democrats and Republicans aren’t really that different. In the sense that even though we have our differing opinions we actually want the same things. Between my friend and I, we both want peace, we want people to get along. We both want to live successful lives, go to college and acquire well-paying jobs. We can both communicate and listen to the other and come to a compromise on a certain topic. We don’t focus on winning and proving ourselves right over finding an agreeable compromise. I believe this is the problem with our political issue in America. If I’m correct, Arlie Russell noted this too in her book, “Strangers in Their Own Land,” our political issue is from a lack of effort to agree and compromise. In some cases a lack of looking for what we agree on instead of what we don’t agree on.

Based on my reading of the book, “Strangers in Their Own Land,” I’ve found that I don’t even agree with a lot of what Republican say, and I would have identified with Republicans in the past. But I also agree with some of what Democrats say. There are things that both sides want. This book has helped confirmed my opinion formed during the fieldwork, which is that the political parties can compromise and better America if everyone was willing. But I am by no means saying you must give up your beliefs. When my friend and I compromised on a topic, it was when we found a solution that would benefit both sides. Even though it is not completely what I’d like, it would be beneficial for America.

Besides politics, I’ve learned quite a bit about states like Lousiana in Russell’s book. The oil companies and what has happened over time because of them. What the area is like, based on a couple of descriptions provided. And what the people are like, how they behave, and what they like to do with their time.  

In my first blog post, I wrote about the empathy wall described by Arlie Russell. A wall that is keeping you from being empathetic with an opposing side. Over the course of my fieldwork I believe this wall has crumbled a little bit, but not quite the whole way. I don’t believe it will ever fully fall because we do have different beliefs and values that probably won’t change. However, through my fieldwork, I have gained some insight into a few of the Democratic views. For example, abortion and the LGBTQ community. By having an insight into why they hold their beliefs, instead of just knowing what they believe, allows you to be more sympathetic, empathetic, and diplomatic when discussing political issues.

This WordPress blog that I have used has helped me to record and report my findings from my fieldwork and what I’ve learned from Russell’s book. It has also been a useful tool to make it simple to give feedback to fellow students.

In farewell, I have one bit of advice. This advice is exactly what anthropology is, and the purpose of our fieldwork. But, don’t just dwell on your own beliefs and views, and don’t assume what the beliefs and views are of those around you. Take the time to go out there and learn their whys for them, not just what they are through the internet. It’ll make the world a better place.

Bye, my fellow students and readers. It has been a good quarter, and may all the next quarters go even better.

I read chapter twelve of Arlie Russell’s book, “Strangers in Their Own Land.” In this chapter, “The Cowboy: Stoicism,” Arlie was invited to a Sunday Lunch get together by Mike Tritico. It was hosted by Cappy and Brantley from the Pentecostal church. The rest of the invited members were from the local Baptist church. During the Sunday Lunch, a debate between Donny and Mike was planned. First, they debated the Lake Charles EDC leak in 1994, then briefly they talked about the protection of workers and the accepting of twenty thousand Syrian refugees proposed by Obama. Arlie mentions the Vidalia onion that stays at Cappy’s house on the dining room table they were sitting around. The onion is a warning, half serious and half joke, not to fight. One of the main points of the chapter was that the debate never became a fight. They always stayed civilized and communicated with each other.

During the debate, Donny made the argument that “…real people -not the government- should be telling us what is or isn’t risky.” Which he later clarified to mean the laws and regulations enforced by the government. He stated that “Once something is regulated it’s hard to un-regulate it. And so, year after year at first -it’s just a little at a time- but then after a while, it’s like it is now, hardened cement. Everything is regulated. We’re all stuck in cement… With its overload of regulations, the government is almost living our lives for us.” He believes we should not be told by government how to live. That we should be able to live our lives ourselves, choosing our own risks to take. For example, they shouldn’t be closing down a bridge because the clay it is built on may be unsafe due to an oil spill. He believes we should be told by a “real person,” and then we choose whether we want to take the risk or not. This belief of Donny’s is a belief I’ve held myself. Reading his argument only influenced it to become a little stronger. Before I read this chapter, I would have been okay with closing down a bridge. I don’t like the regulations that I see as pointless and controlling. But, in all seriousness, why can’t people be allowed to live their lives with their own risks. If they want to die on the bridge, so be it. We, if we are really a free people, should be allowed to do whatever we want so long as it doesn’t harm others.

This belief of regulations and allowing people to take their own risks leads straight into his second point, “We have to be able to take risks… To live in civilization, you’ve got to take risks.” He explains that almost all events, discoveries, and industries that led to our modern civilization were achieved with risks. His example was logging, it is a large part of our society, and it comes with risks. And if we were to focus on perfection, taking no risks, we would barely get anything done. This belief of his I must agree with on the smaller scale. For the reason that I myself have had to take risks to get things done. I mean, how would a guy ever walk up to a girl if he doesn’t want to take risks? (lol) But, on the larger scale, I disagree. Donny was arguing that we shouldn’t over-regulate industries, that the workers should be allowed to take risks. Risks like breathing in fumes in an oil industry. Or risks that a pipeline could break, which was the start of their debate, the Lake Charles EDC leak in 1994. This belief has influenced me to think more about industries and the risks involved. The ups and downs.

In the case that risks become reality and disaster happens, like the huge oil spills. We will just have to endure and continue. As Donny states, “I’m strong. You’re Strong. Mother Nature is strong. We can take it.” This kind of belief, however influential it may be to some fun men like myself (the “suck it up” mentality), is not very good in the long term. It has only influenced me to be even more scrutinizing towards the lack of care many industries have for the environment. Yes, mother nature will probably survive, but that doesn’t mean the lack of care isn’t going to catch up with us eventually.

These beliefs of Donny’s, Arlie thought was very much like the mentality of Cowboys. Which I infer was the reason for titling this chapter, “The Cowboy: Stoicism.” She also believes that if the state of Louisiana itself had been seated at Cappy and Fay’s dinner table, they probably would have taken Donny’s side. Which she supports further with the fact that it is legal to gamble and to carry a loaded gun into a bar. In this way, Louisiana appeared as a Cowboy kind of state to Arlie. Arlie also takes notice to the fact that Donny never thought of himself as a victim. In fact, he was critical of liberal-sounding talk about victimhood. And that Donny, and possibly the whole of Louisiana, “…were braving the worst of an industrial system, the fruits of which liberals enjoyed from a distance in their highly regulated and cleaner blue states.” Meaning the Louisianians don’t believe they are victims, and they endure the industries. While the liberals think they are victims, and that they need more regulations. But if those regulations were put in place, the industries would not be producing as much. Producing products the same liberals use. This is an interesting possibility for part of the disagreement between the two political groups.

The part of the chapter about taking risks to get things done may help me to better understand the person I am spending time with. He is hard working no doubt. But he is not a risk taker. And if Donny’s idea that you need to take risks to get things done is true. Then is he reducing what he could be achieving by being a no risk taker? Next time I see him I’ll ask about it. What made him start avoiding risks? And does he believe that is stunting his output? As of this moment, I am unsure how it would help me understand him, but I believe it will once I ask him about it. Risks are in everyone’s life, so what there something that happened to him that made him avoid risks? And depending on the scale of what happened, it could tell a lot about the way he is and the believes he holds. Because it is partly due to a person’s history that they choose one thing over another.

 

Source book-

Hochschild, Arlie Russell. Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right. New York: New Press, 2018.

On my quest to find somebody politically different than me, I well… got lost. I couldn’t find anybody, probably because I didn’t search very hard. A close friend of mine who I told about the assignment told me he was of democratic view. At first, I felt kind of stupid for not choosing him earlier. I had never really talked politics with him before.

I chose to do the interview in the car while he was driving us to watch a play at SPSCC. For questions, I merely made a list of subjects in disagreement by democrats and republicans and asked him about each one. He didn’t have much reason or story to why he believed what he did. But merely based his beliefs on a few ideologies which I will get into.

My first question was gun control. Should we ban “assault weapons,” or “extended” pistol clips, and should we increase the level of background checks needed to purchase a gun? On this subject, we were on a full agreement of opposing such laws. He had no story for why he thinks that merely that he believes such laws will not help the gun issue in America in the least bit. Which I agree with.

Next, I asked him what he thought of abortion. My friend said he is for it in certain situations. He believes that people should have the right to do whatever they want. But, if the pregnancy goes beyond the early stage of a zygote, which he believes after that it becomes its own living thing, then the abortion would be murder. Even though I did not previously hold this belief, it made sense when he talked about it. And I came to agree with him on that matter. However, he believes there should be a limit to how many abortions somebody can get. That if the girl really can’t raise the kid, or the situations were not good, then okay. But if the girl is purposely not caring about getting pregnant because she knows she can just get just an abortion, then it’s wrong. How exactly you would facilitate such a process or limit, he was unsure of. If the situation was rape, we were both completely in agreement about allowing abortion.

Continuing the drive down the freeway, I inquired about his beliefs on gay marriage and transgender. For both these subjects, he merely said nobody should tell them what to do. If they want to live that way let them, it is their choice. However, he is against the huge push for it. For example, the LGBTQ signs all over schools, the numerous bathroom signs, plays, and movies. Because why try to force people to accept your beliefs when you won’t accept theirs. Saying, why force people to accept your beliefs of LGBTQ when you won’t accept their beliefs against it. My friend believes the laws should allow it, but not enforce it. I gave him a real example of where a gay couple asked a Christian bakery to make them a cake for their wedding. The Christians refused. And the gay couple sued them until they ran out of business. He said that was wrong.

We again had the same views on the death penalty. Which was that only people who have committed serious crimes on purpose should be put to death(eg murder). Or people who would not live out a normal life, people who will not change. That if these people are basically staying in prison their whole lives should be put to death. We should not be wasting public money to feed them and keep them imprisoned. But, the people who will change should be allowed to, allowed to be given another chance.

The only issue we did not agree on at all was immigration. He sees it that people who are looking for a better life in America should be allowed as long as they are not bringing big problems with them. I never did inquire to what “big problems” were, I assumed he meant diseases or if they were victims of murder so they came to America to avoid their government. My friend is half Asian and half white. Being raised in a family where one of the family was an immigrant if he said he was against immigration it would be like saying he wished he was never born. With this background, I can see why he holds those beliefs.

My friend has the ideology that people should be free, able to do whatever they want as long as it is not harming others. He grew up in a family with one Asian parent and one white. His father was in the marines. And he currently goes to SPSCC with me, in the past, we both went to ORLA together. On political subjects like these, he leans toward the factual and freedom side of things. Rarely did he have an experience, story, or childhood to support his beliefs. He just held on to facts and freedom. As he did not believe in gun-control because there is no proof to how it will help. And freedom to LGBTQ people to do as they please.

Through this whole interview, it became less of an interview as it did a discussion. We went back and forth sharing our opinions and what we thought of the other’s opinion. Coming to the conclusion that we were basically neutral in the scheme of politics. We changed enough in opinion for me to be a Republican, and he a Democrat. But we were able to discuss and agree on most subjects. This really made me begin to see Hochschild’s dilemma, the ever-increasing divide in politics. Even though we had different beliefs, we could discuss and come to a conclusion. This I think the real issue is what Hochschild(as far as I read in her book that is how it seemed) thought, which was that people needed to understand each other’s experiences and why they believe what they believe. But that isn’t really the issue, the issue is just a lack of communication. The political sides debate, yes, but they don’t really try to find something that suits everyone. They want to be right, they want it their way. But, do take into account this is a much smaller scale, my friend and I could discuss and come to a conclusion. We did not try to make ourselves right.

The first step in my ethics plan for my interviewing will be, to be honest, and open regarding my work. As I go about finding somebody who is open to being interviewed, I’ll need to explain that this work is for me to understand their political beliefs, and write a blog about it. I’ll also fully explain the book we are using(Strangers in Our Own Land), the class, the expectations of my interviews, and that I will not reveal his/her identity. As the interviews progress, I will make sure to write down what was said, protecting and preserving those records for further use. Then when it comes time to publish my finding on my blog, I’d have previously asked permission to publish what they said and make the results fully accessible. Making sure to preserve their opinions, beliefs, and words without changing them in any way by my own opinion. The reason that I will hide the identity of my source is to protect their identity and reputation, and I will try to keep their integrity(not saying anything that will degrade them). Throughout this whole process, I will maintain a respectful and ethical/professional relationship with my interviewee. I will not insult them, argue, or treat them disrespectfully, first off, they probably wouldn’t even let me interview them if I was behaving in such a way. Secondly, by maintaining a respectful and professional relationship, the source is more likely to share information, feel respected, and work with me through the whole process.

To continue our example of a process to use to run our own interview from Hochschild’s book, I chose the last chapter in Part 1 of Strangers in Their Own Land to summarize. Her 1st point was the logic of the people in Louisiana for bringing in oil companies to the state, that more oil means more jobs, and more jobs mean less need for government aid, and less dependence on the government the better off we will be(Hochschild, page #73). Hochschild finds that these oil companies actually brought very little jobs or benefits to the state. The oil company will bring in about 10% of the jobs, but only for the period required to build it, afterward, it only takes a small group to maintain it. Seven out of ten of this 10% of jobs in the state, however, are being filled with Mexicans outside of the area. Bringing very little benefit to the people, and the foreign workers were not spending their money in town, but sending it away. This was her 2nd point, and probably the most important because it raised questions in her mind as to how any of it made sense. Why bring in oil companies if they barely benefit you, and they cause pollution? As her 3rd point, Hochschild looked into how such an oil company can get a community to accept it. She found a report by J. Stephen Powell of the Los Angeles based consulting firm Cerrell Associates. That reported that such companies did not try to change the minds of residents predisposed to resist but to find citizenry unlikely to resist, like Louisiana. Powell made a list of characteristics companies look for to find least resistant citizenry, longtime residents of small towns in the South or Midwest, high school education only, Catholic, uninvolved in social issues, involved in “nature exploitative occupations, conservative, republican, and advocates of the free market. Hochschild found that the area of Louisiana that accepted the oil company had many of these characteristics(Hochschild, page #81). But this only brought more questions to her mind. How do these characteristics cause this? What about their beliefs cause these decisions? Hochschild concluded that the “empathy wall was much higher than she’d imagined and that she could see what they didn’t, but she couldn’t see what they saw.

This chapter’s three points can also be questions I can ask the person I will be observing and interviewing for my fieldwork. The first point about jobs and government aid, I’ll ask what their opinion is of bringing in oil companies for an increase in jobs. And what their beliefs are on government aid pertaining to government power or overreaching. The second point about the increase in jobs by oil companies and foreigners taking the oil company jobs, I can ask, “What do you think of foreigners taking American jobs,” And, “Do you think the benefit of oil companies are worth their impact?” Thirdly, the idea that companies target certain groups, pointing at Republicans and Conservatives over Democrats. Since I will be interviewing a Democrat, I will ask whether they believe Republicans/Conservatives are more likely to accept oil companies. And, especially if they say yes, if they think Republicans/Conservatives care less about the environment. I’ll ask them what their opinion is of the political groups, do they have pre-assumed ideas of what their beliefs are? This particular question I need to ask in a more polite way, with curiosity, not as though I’m asking her what she hates about me. I am of the Conservative view over other political views, but I disagree with oil companies. This question will provide insight of what a Democrat thinks of Republicans/Conservatives, which will give me a better understanding to how the groups disagree, and what different beliefs and conditions caused those differing opinions in the political groups, or as Hochschild said, to see what they see that I can’t see yet. These three questions I will make sure to ask the person I interview. And when the time comes, reveal my findings on my future blog posts.

Hello, I’m Edward Suppes, I am mostly of the conservative view, some republican. The purpose of this blog is to find someone who is politically different than me, someone of the democrat political view, and to tell that person’s story and try to understand why they believe what they do.

My first step in this process, assigned in my Anthropology class, is to describe how Arlie Russell Hochschild set out to do something similar. Hochschild is a Democrat, opposite of me, trying to find out why Republican/conservatives believe what they do, and what circumstances led to those beliefs. Hochschild describes the “empathy wall,” an obstacle to the deep understanding of another person. Where we feel indifferent or hostile to those who hold different beliefs. How we put new information into our own thinking, never truly understanding why the person believes what they do. She thinks it is possible to do without necessarily changing our own beliefs, to know others from the inside, to see reality through their eyes, to understand their links between life, feelings, and politics(Hochschild, page #5). Hochschild believed one of the best ways to find out, was to leave her own democrat neighborhood and state, and enter a Republican area, to live their way of life(Hochschild, page #10). She wrote about it saying, “through a close-up view of this issue, I reasoned, I could uncover the wider perspective that drove people’s responses to it and to much else” (Hochschild, page #?). Hochschild thought that by living their way of life, living in close proximity to Republicans and their environment, learn why they have the perspective on political issues that they hold. In my case, I already live in a majority Democratic state, I’ll just need to pick someone who is knowledgeable about why they believe what they do.

Hochschild, and I accept that a healthy democracy depends on a collective capacity to work things out(Hochschild, page #8). This is a purpose for understanding the beliefs of the opposing side, to have a healthy democracy where we can agree and settle on a choice that will better America as a whole. Hochschild as part of her introduction in the first chapter tells the reader of her own opinions as a Democrat. And what confuses her about Republicans. For example, she wondered why Republicans were against taxes, big government, and federal agencies, while Republicans who needed Medicaid and food stamps welcomed the programs(Hochschild, page #10). Hochschild did not understand this, and she desires to learn their view, understand their circumstances, lifestyles, and feelings. And through her book, Strangers in Their Own Land, she describes her thoughts, discoveries/experiences, and the results of her studies. We are reading this book in my Anthropology class to get a preview, an example, of how we might go about crossing the empathy wall and discovering why the opposing view believes what they do. In my search, I’ll be interviewing a Democrat, to learn about their life, circumstances, and believes in an attempt to find equal ground, to know why they believe what they do, to “cross the empathy wall.”

 

Arlie Hochschild’s book~

Hochschild, Arlie Russell. Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right. New York: New Press, 2018.