Know your audience!
You know what's interesting about the debates? The way Kerry, Bush, etc. refer to their audience. Being in usability, we're always obsessed with audience. Who are they? What do they think? What do they want to do? How can we find out more about their goals/tasks/needs?
Well after watching the debates, I think that the candidates employ similar methods to the ones I do. At times, people ask me how what I do is similar/different to what marketing experts do. I mean, in so many ways it's the same. We collect demographics, we try and match what the people want and what they need.
You know what I think that Bush and to some extent, even more Kerry, found out during the research phase of "know your audience." I think they've found out that no one wants to be referred to as poor, or lower class, or even working class. They constantly say middle class, middle class, middle class. Why is this so?
Some ideas...
- People who are poor, working poor, or living near or below the poverty line do not consider themselves to be poor. Perhaps the middle class is a state of mind:
Bush blatantly ignored the minimum wage issue. Did anyone else notice that? He was asked if he would support a higher minimum wage and just completely avoided the question. He started talking about education and the "No Child Left Behind" bullshit - oh i mean, Act, yes that's what it's called. But his answer to the minimum wage question was apparant. He doesn't favor it and wouldn't advocate raising it. The current federeal MW is $5.15. Now here in WA we have a little more progressive approach and our minimum wage is $7.16. Which means, if you earn the MW you'll be making between $10,000 and $15,000 per year. Do you think that is a livable wage?
So, I guess my point is this: Do you think that the campaigns decided one of the following, when they were doing their audience research:
Well after watching the debates, I think that the candidates employ similar methods to the ones I do. At times, people ask me how what I do is similar/different to what marketing experts do. I mean, in so many ways it's the same. We collect demographics, we try and match what the people want and what they need.
You know what I think that Bush and to some extent, even more Kerry, found out during the research phase of "know your audience." I think they've found out that no one wants to be referred to as poor, or lower class, or even working class. They constantly say middle class, middle class, middle class. Why is this so?
Some ideas...
- People who are poor, working poor, or living near or below the poverty line do not consider themselves to be poor. Perhaps the middle class is a state of mind:
"There is no real definition of the middle class in the United States, assert economists and sociologists, who say "middle class" always has been more of a state of mind than an actual economic status."- Perhaps the middle class is just a myth?
Bush blatantly ignored the minimum wage issue. Did anyone else notice that? He was asked if he would support a higher minimum wage and just completely avoided the question. He started talking about education and the "No Child Left Behind" bullshit - oh i mean, Act, yes that's what it's called. But his answer to the minimum wage question was apparant. He doesn't favor it and wouldn't advocate raising it. The current federeal MW is $5.15. Now here in WA we have a little more progressive approach and our minimum wage is $7.16. Which means, if you earn the MW you'll be making between $10,000 and $15,000 per year. Do you think that is a livable wage?
So, I guess my point is this: Do you think that the campaigns decided one of the following, when they were doing their audience research:
- People don't think of themselves as poor, so we don't have to directly address issues of poverty.
- The poor don't vote, or if they do, they don't live in swing states - so fuck them.
- The poor are so busy working, they don't have time to watch the debates.
posted by Emma Rose @ 22:58
5 Comments:
At 11:36 AM,
jeremy said…
Hey em,
that's an interesting point. The poor vote probably vote at a lesser rate, but they also have no way to create an uproar over an issue. Advocates for poverty issues can't get on TV and they don't have a block voting apparatus, like seniors or gun nuts for example.
Also, there doesn't seem to be much class consciousness, as there was during the industrial era and the simultaneously growing union clout through the first half of last century.
Democrats have traditionally been for social safety net programs and have been haunted by the tax and spend stigma. I think this is why they stick to addressing the "middle class". Clinton even made political points by aligning against the safety net of welfare.
Conservatives have nothing to gain by talking about the poor. If they are conservative poor, it is because of either God or disfigured Patriotism and not because of any issue except the cliche of low taxes. Oh yeah, and those $300 dollar checks. It's possible too that the conservative poor are hoping, not implausibly, that the right will bring back slavery and they might finally feel above someone.
sorry to ramble, work is not very inspiring.
At 1:55 PM,
jeremy said…
I've been thinking more about this. It goes hand-in-hand, like Morrissey and his boyfriends, with why the poor would vote against their interests and for a Republican.
This is an interesting article about this phenomenom: http://mondediplo.com/2004/10/02usa
One telling point is that Democrats since Clinton have been strongly Free Trade. I've never understood this from a political perspective or an economic perspective. All the old industrial towns in the Midwest have been screwed. And, Bush actually voted to protect steel recently and then changed his mind. So, in this instance, the poor are thinking rationally in saying Democrats harmed them in the 90's.
Also, without talking about the poor, the anti-intellectualism, blatant religiosity, down-home attire, and thinly veiled racism is directly pandering to the poor, even if they don't use the word. I read somewhere that the Republicans started to win the south when they were able to play the race card more effectively than the Demos sometime in the 1960's.
At 2:55 PM,
Emma Rose said…
Well I think there are two groups that we are talking about, no not Morrissey's preference for you over me, but rather the rural vs. urban poor.
At 3:25 PM,
Anonymous said…
oops, I posted in the wrong spot. the poor are usually less educated and more likely to believe the shit that comes out of dubya's mouth. A client at my work (obviously very poor-soc.sec.recipient) actually passed out greeting cards to other members and staff stating "if you would like to continue to receive the services we currently receive, then you need to vote for Bush". and we all know a vote for Bush is a vote for social services. Oh, I forgot to mention he is crazy (uh...mentally ill) too. actually, most of my clients are smart enough to hate Bush, and they are supposed to be the crazy ones. Jenn
At 12:42 PM,
Anonymous said…
Ohh, I agree with Jeremy on a few things:
1) The Dems have all but forgotten about the poor. A great example of this is this whole Stem Cell research business. Not that I don't think it's promising research, but if you want to save some lives (which is what the end goal of Stem Cell research) then invest some of that $$ into the places where people are dying of very treatable problems. We have something like the 2nd highest infant mortality rate of all industrialized nations, but no one talks about that. Why? Because poor mothers don't have lobbying groups in DC. And the thing is, we could be doing both and maybe Kerry will, but The Dems certainly didn't come through in the 90s.
And about playing the race card in sixties - http://bobdylan.com/songs/pawn.html
Post a Comment
Links to this post:
Create a Link
<< Home