Author: Eugene Scott / Source: Washington Post
President Trump has unabashedly positioned himself as a culture warrior, doubling down on language and views that alienate large numbers of Americans because it plays well with the groups that support him most. But last night’s speech by Robert DeNiro at the Tony Awards suggests that “Hollywood elites” are taking a similar approach.
The Associated Press reported:
“De Niro, a staunch Trump opponent, dropped a couple of F-bombs heard clearly by the Radio City Music crowd Sunday night. The CBS television audience heard dead silence instead before he raised his arms — twice — and earned a sustained standing ovation.”
More specifically, De Niro said:
“I just want to say one thing: F— Trump. It’s no longer down with Trump. It’s f— Trump.”
Many Trump supporters argue that people like De Niro — a wealthy celebrity who has shown little empathy for them — are why Trump won. When Trump voters hear De Niro curse the president, they hear the Oscar winner cursing them.
De Niro’s language — and perhaps more importantly, the crowd’s enthusiastic support of it — is the latest reminder that the tribalism phenomenon only worsened since the 2016 election.
A 2017 Pew Research Center survey reported that Americans are less likely than in the past to hold a mix of conservative and liberal views.
Reflecting growing partisan gaps across most of the individual questions in the scale — even those where both parties have shifted in the same direction — Republicans and Democrats are now further apart ideologically than at any point in more than two decades.
The large demographic shifts…
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