Wow, Report Just Out! Google manipulated from 2.6 million to 16 million votes for Hillary Clinton in 2016 Election! This was put out by a Clinton supporter, not a Trump Supporter! Google should be sued. My victory was even bigger than thought! — Tweet from President Donald Trump – 8/19/19
Psychologist lists 14 reasons why voters support Trump, from “practicality for Trump’s morality” to “racism and bigotry.” Psychology Today– 12/27/18
We Are Divided
The United States is dramatically divided over President Donald Trump. As we approach the 2020 Presidential election, we still argue about what happened in 2016. Psychologists are weighing in on both sides of the discussion.
It’s not helping.
A recent Facebook post highlighted the “psychological explanation” of how voters support Trump. It sets out fourteen points explaining the “psychology” of Trump supporters, all of them derogatory. In summary, the report claims that Trump supporters are:
- Immoral
- Distracted by Trump’s showmanship
- Obsessed with celebrity
- Wanting to watch “the world burn”
- Overly sensitive to threats
- Afraid of dying
- Pretending to have more political expertise than they really have
- Possessed with a misguided sense of entitlement
- In a bubble of their own making
- Mentally vulnerable
- Narcissists
- Wanting to dominate others
- Authoritarian personalities, and
- Many are racist bigots.
“Pop” Insults
Now, there are a whole lot of people who support Donald Trump. I’m as baffled as the next Democrat about how he attracts them. But I’m not willing to call all of them names, nor say they are all somehow “mentally deficient”. Perhaps that’s why this “study” appeared in a popular magazine, Psychology Today, rather than in some scientific journal under more rigorous scrutiny.
It’s “pop” psychology, and while it might be personally satisfying for anti-Trump folks to read how “deficient” Trump voters are, it is neither true nor useful in the battle against Trumpism. First of all, it boils down to just name-calling. That’s not going to win votes, and it’s not going to convince those who voted for Trump in 2016 to change their minds in 2020. Insults are more likely to harden their position. It doesn’t add to constructive change in the American electorate, it simply makes the divide worse.
Second, it doesn’t recognize the real issues that Donald Trump finds in American politics. The first step in defeating Trump is that Americans need to realize that his version of populism did connect. It can’t just be about the mental “defects” of his supporters; we can’t just write-off 46% of the American electorate. It should be about what he does that resonates with Americans. Then Democrats need to convince some of them that either it’s not true, or a Democrat can do it better.
Bias and Google
Calling someone immoral, distracted, obsessed, vulnerable, and of course narcissistic and racist is not likely to change their mind, or vote. But using psychologists to prop up your view works both ways. Yesterday the President quoted a psychologist’s study claiming that Google searches persuaded 16 million voters to choose Clinton over him.
Again this was a “pop psychology” study (CNN), published in a way to avoid the rigors of actual scientific research. The study examined “Google Searches” on issues to see if Clinton would come out on top of Trump in the search listings. The researcher claims that Google was “slanted” for Clinton, by having 95 people, including 21 self-described independents, rate the relative positiveness of Trump or Clinton searches.
The Australian Extrapolation
The defects in the study were numerous. First, Google DOES favor “real” news sources, such as CNN, or the Wall Street Journal, or the New York Times over such sources as Breitbart or the Blaze. Since Trump certainly got more “play” in the latter, it’s not too surprising that he didn’t “win” this part of the study.
Taking those “biased” results, the study’s author extrapolated that between 2.5 million and 10 million American voters were swayed by Google’s pro-Clinton leanings. That was based on research he did in an Australian election.
The extrapolation, based on a different population in a different part of the world, seems far-fetched. Add that it uses twenty-one independents to predict millions of votes, and it seems beyond belief. But even that wasn’t as far a reach as the President tweeted, turning the number into 16 million voters.
Hillary Clinton noted in her responding tweet:
The debunked study you’re referring to was based on 21 undecided voters. For context that’s about half the number of people associated with your campaign who have been indicted.
Enough Troubles
There’s enough bad news, fake headlines, and misleading tweets in the world, without adding pop psychological studies that have little basis in fact. What happened in 2016 is explainable without psycho mumbo-jumbo. Division played into the hands of Trump’s forces then, and continues to do so today.
The election of 2020 is critical to putting America back together again. Looking for ways to further divide is the Trump strategy. Democrats need to focus on the opposite.
