Friday, May 13, 2016

Sociology Understands the Difference Between "Most People" and "Each Person"


The hardest part of teaching sociology is getting students to see how we can make generalizations about groups which are true of the group in general, without being true of each in individual in the group.

One teachable aphorism I came up with this year is "Sociology Understands the Difference Between 'Most' and 'All'".

Today a refinement of that aphorism came to me, which appears in the title of this post.

Wednesday, May 11, 2016

White resentment of African Americans is a strong predictor of support for Donald Trump.


This survey found that, on a 17-point scale, a majority of white Republicans fell into the top four levels of racial resentment, and fully a quarter took the most extreme position.

If you can't see the whole chart in your browser, please follow the link to the original article.


White Against Black 

Whites were surveyed and placed on a 17-point scale that gauges the racial resentment they feel toward African-Americans. Here is the percentage of Democrats, independents and Republicans who fell into the least resentful (having a positive view of blacks) and most resentful ends of the scale. 

24%
of white Republicans were at the extreme end of the resentment scale.
20%
Democrats
Independents
Republicans
15
10
5
LEVEL OF RESENTMENT:
Most
Most
Most
Least
Least
Least
22
42
58
23%
10%
0.4%
of Democrats