The Bane of the Blue Collar

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Gist – "The Bane of the Blue Collar"

Podcast Information:

• Title: The Gist
• Host/Author: Peach Fish Productions
• Episode: The Bane of the Blue Collar
• Release Date: July 2, 2025
• Description: For thirty minutes each day, Mike Pesca challenges himself and his audience in a responsibly provocative style, aiming to transcend rigidity and dogma. The Gist offers surprising, reasonable critiques of the left, the right, any party, or idea.

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Introduction: A Rocky Box Office Weekend

• Timeframe: [00:00 – 07:06]

Mike Pesca opens the episode by reflecting on a disappointing box office performance for Pixar's new feature, Elio, which grossed only $21 million. He humorously introduces Joan C. Williams through a playful exchange about the movie's underwhelming debut. The segment sets the stage for discussing broader themes of decline, both in Pixar's creative output and metaphorically, in societal structures.

Notable Quote:

"Elio was part of a Pixar losing streak and I've been trying to figure out why."
— Mike Pesca [00:58]

Pixar's Decline and John Lasseter's Influence

• Timeframe: [07:06 – 26:55]

Pesca delves into the reasons behind Pixar’s faltering performance, attributing it partly to overstated animation techniques referred to as "bean mouth," which critics argue renders characters predictable and visually unappealing. He connects this decline to the departure of John Lasseter, suggesting that Lasseter's exit was one of the most significant casualties of the MeToo movement in Hollywood, impacting Pixar's creative and financial success.

Notable Quotes:

"John Lasseter was perhaps the most consequential casualty of the MeToo era."
— Mike Pesca [06:30]

"While there was some Republican pushback against the proposed repeal of the Inflation Reduction Act, creating blue-collar jobs takes a long time."
— Joan C. Williams [17:16]

Introducing Joan C. Williams and Her Book

• Timeframe: [26:55 – 07:06]

Mike transitions to introduce Joan C. Williams, an esteemed academic and author of Outclassed: How the Left Lost the Working Class and How to Win Them Back. They discuss the central premise of her book, focusing on how the Democratic Party has marginalized the working class by shifting focus towards issues prioritized by more educated, liberal voters.

Notable Quote:

"Joe Biden tried. Yeah, he walked the picket line, as you well known."
— Joan C. Williams [07:49]

The Decline of Union Influence

• Timeframe: [07:06 – 13:11]

Joan C. Williams explores the diminishing role of unions in the American workforce, noting that union density has plummeted to around 5.5% in the private sector over the past decade. Despite a resurgence in public support for unions, actual membership has not rebounded, which undermines the Democratic Party's traditional stronghold on labor issues.

Notable Quotes:

"The American public has gotten the message that unions are one of the things they need to protect against the power of big business."
— Joan C. Williams [08:54]

"If we start, you know, wiser wising up, it will be."
— Joan C. Williams [09:15]

Income Stagnation and Economic Inequality

• Timeframe: [13:11 – 17:51]

The conversation shifts to economic issues, with Williams highlighting how wages for non-college workers have stagnated despite significant increases in productivity since World War II. This disconnect has eroded the middle class, leading to heightened economic insecurity and fueling discontent among blue-collar workers.

Notable Quotes:

"The wages of non-college voters have completely leveled off by and large."
— Joan C. Williams [10:42]

"The American middle class has really gotten screwed and they know it."
— Joan C. Williams [11:31]

Pre-Distribution vs. Redistribution: Policy Solutions

• Timeframe: [17:51 – 31:28]

Williams argues for a shift from redistribution—where wealth is taken from the rich and given to the poor—to pre-distribution, which focuses on ensuring that individuals earn fair wages from the outset. She emphasizes that policies should enable hard work to translate into economic stability without relying solely on government intervention.

Notable Quotes:

"Everyone else doesn't earn enough."
— Joan C. Williams [16:33]

"We already try. I mean one thing that we saw in Biden... creating more blue collar jobs... Democrats... interpreting it correctly."
— Joan C. Williams [16:51]

Cultural Disconnect and Communication Gaps

• Timeframe: [31:01 – 35:26]

The discussion delves into the cultural divide between the Democratic Party's educated elites and the working-class voters they aim to represent. Williams critiques the party's inability to communicate effectively with non-college voters, often relying on jargon and cultural norms that alienate the very constituency they seek to engage.

Notable Quotes:

"We need a class lens and understand how this is going to be received by people without college degrees."
— Joan C. Williams [29:21]

"We take stability for granted. People in their fragile and failing middle class... they have a sense that their neighborhoods are fragile."
— Joan C. Williams [37:09]

Impact of Media and Radical Voices

• Timeframe: [35:26 – 44:47]

Williams discusses the role of media in amplifying extremist voices within both the left and the right, exacerbating political polarization. She emphasizes the importance of having a class-conscious approach within the Democratic Party to counteract the negative impact of radical rhetoric and regain trust among working-class voters.

Notable Quotes:

"If we require people to talk like this, we are going to lose."
— Joan C. Williams [27:45]

"The media has become very segmented.... small groups are going to have an outsized effect."
— Joan C. Williams [34:38]

Policy Missteps and Voter Alienation

• Timeframe: [44:00 – 43:59]

The conversation touches upon specific policy missteps, such as the misbranding of immigration policies and policing reforms, which have led to voter alienation. Williams argues that these missteps are not solely due to external media narratives but also stem from the party's own inability to align policies with the priorities of the working class.

Notable Quotes:

"We need to rethink our feeling rules, who we empathize with."
— Joan C. Williams [43:27]

"Defund the police... Democrats really did play footsie with."
— Mike Pesca [36:30]

Conclusion: Bridging the Gap

• Timeframe: [44:00 – End]

As the episode wraps up, Mike reflects on the insights provided by Joan C. Williams, emphasizing the urgent need for the Democratic Party to adopt a class-conscious approach. By reconnecting with working-class voters through effective communication and policies that ensure economic stability, the left can regain the support it has lost.

Notable Quote:

"People need to understand that their self development and stability are being overlooked."
— Joan C. Williams [37:16]

"You have to empathize with people who are economically and culturally different."
— Joan C. Williams [43:27]

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Key Takeaways:

1. Decline of Unions: The reduction in union membership has weakened the Democratic Party's traditional influence among the working class.
2. Economic Inequality: Stagnant wages despite rising productivity have eroded the middle class, fueling discontent among non-college workers.
3. Pre-Distribution Policies: Emphasizing fair wages and economic opportunities from the start can better support the middle class than relying solely on redistribution.
4. Cultural Competence: The Democratic Party must bridge the communication gap between educated elites and working-class voters by adopting a class-conscious approach.
5. Media Influence: Segmented media amplifies radical voices, making it crucial for the left to present relatable and authentic messaging to regain trust.
6. Policy Alignment: Effective policies must resonate with the priorities of the working class, avoiding alienation through misaligned initiatives.

Recommendations for the Democratic Party:

• Reinvigorate Union Support: Actively promote and support unionization efforts to rebuild trust with working-class voters.
• Adopt Pre-Distribution Strategies: Implement policies that ensure fair wages and economic stability without over-relying on government redistribution.
• Enhance Communication: Develop messaging that speaks directly to the economic and cultural concerns of non-college voters, avoiding jargon and elitist tones.
• Class-Conscious Policies: Integrate a class lens into policy-making to address the unique challenges faced by the working class, alongside race and gender considerations.
• Manage Radical Influences: Mitigate the impact of extremist voices within the party by promoting inclusive and relatable leadership.

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Final Thoughts:

In "The Bane of the Blue Collar," The Gist episode provides a compelling analysis of the Democratic Party's disconnect with the working class. Through Joan C. Williams' expertise, listeners gain insight into the structural and cultural changes necessary to rebuild this crucial political base. The episode underscores the importance of aligning economic policies with the lived experiences of blue-collar workers and adopting a communication style that resonates beyond the party's educated elites.

Acknowledgments:

• Producer: Cory Wara
• Social Media Outreach: Astra Green
• Coordinating Producer: Ashley Khan
• Production Support: Michelle Pesca

Closing Quote:

"The ground under our feet is very small."
— Mike Pesca [37:16]

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This summary captures the essence of the "The Bane of the Blue Collar" episode of The Gist, highlighting the critical discussions on economic inequality, cultural disconnect, and strategies to realign the Democratic Party with the working class.

Transcript

[Joan C. Williams]

Foreign.

[Mike Pesca]

It's Wednesday, July 2, 2025 from Peach Fish Productions. It's the gist. I'm Mike Pesca and July 2nd means it's close to July 4th and July 4th means big box office weekend. Despicable me for. But what I want to do is look back on a box office weekend that wasn't big. In fact, I will read the headline from Variety. It wasn't even the head. It was the second part of the headline. Though it should have been the headline. Elio lands worst debut in Pixar $21 million. This was their new feature.

[Joan C. Williams]

Elio, your life isn't up there, Elio.

[Mike Pesca]

You need to make friends.

[Joan C. Williams]

I just want to belong somewhere. So if any aliens are listening, please come and get me. Okay, bye. Love you. It's really happening. We search the universe for the dreamers and stargazers like you.

[Mike Pesca]

This is awesome. There is even some sentiment that the movie is not called El but Elio. That sentiment comes from the trailer I just played. No matter didn't make enough money for me not to call it Elio. Like the pizza, Elio was part of a Pixar losing streak and I've been trying to figure out why. There is one suggestion that it's bean mouth. I read you a headline from the cbc. Did bean mouth really kill Pixar's Elio at the box office? I'm like, no one saw Elio. We're supposed to know the characters. There's a guy named Bean Mouth. No, I found out that bean mouth is shorthand for an animation technique. And if you think about the mouths of and this is a non Pixar excellent animated short, Wallace and Gromit. You know how their mouths are formed. Well, a lot of characters in late Pixar movies have that mouth shape. And the critics of this animation style, but also the brain trust behind the style are saying these bean mouth movies are predictable. They're off putting to the eye. Bean mouth becomes the shorthand or perhaps maybe the synecdoche for why the movies aren't working. This is not the reason, by the way. It's nice to blame something on bean mouth, right? You always need a villain. I believe in Monsters Inc. It was Randall in Toy Story. It was the kid next door in Cars 2. It was. Man, I don't really remember Cars 2. I do remember who directed these great movies that made a lot of money for Pixar and that also put Pixar on the map and continue to make money. And in fact, perhaps now the only way Pixar is ever going to make any money anymore is just by mining the old intellectual property. Toy story. Toy Story 2. Cars. Cars. To the director of that was a guy named John Lasseter. John Lass. Lasseter is no longer at Pixar. And I was thinking, I did an analysis and I said this guy might be the most costly casualty of the MeToo era. I want to make clear I'm not weighing in on if the man was a sexual harasser or wasn't. Maybe I am. And saying that there's a lot of evidence that he was. He was at least inappropriate in the workplace. But he was jettisoned at exactly the time when anti sexual harassment came to a head and people were hashtagging me to and saying time's up. And the movie industry cast about and cast out reportedly figures who quite deserved it, you know, Kevin Spacey, James Franco. John Lasseter was also jettisoned and I read a bunch about why. He made a lot of people uncomfortable, maybe even worse, seemed to get obsessed with some girls. So I'm not at all excusing his actions. I am just trying to perhaps make the case that his was the most expensive, the most consequential jettisoning of certainly the Hollywood version or era of Me too, maybe MeToo overall, because I listed all the movies where he was the director, then he became the executive producer. And adjusted for inflation the box office of these films, from Toy Story through the Incredibles through the sequels Brave and the Monsters movies and Cars three, Coco was his last movie. While there, the GROSS Incomes were 745 million for the first Toy Story, 1.4 billion for Finding Nemo, a billion for Up, 1.4 billion for Toy Story 3, over a billion for Inside Out. So he was cranking out billion dollar movies and then he was let go. Incredibles 2 and Toy Stories 4, capitalizing on the intellectual property where he was either the original director or the executive producer. Those did great. Those made over a billion. And then came Onward, Soul, Luca, Turning Red Light, Year, Elemental, and now the disastrous Elio. Soul was good. I don't know how many of these other movies I saw. A lot of these were hurt by the fact that there was a pandemic and they went online before they went in theaters. But now Pixar is seen as a desiccated husk of what it once was. And we're talking. Talking. I just said it. Billions of billions of dollars. We're talking hundreds and hundreds of jobs, we're talking artistry and we're talking bean mouths. So that's it. That's my only point. It would be a lot easier if I said something like John Lasseter was done dirty. They should have retained him. They should have found a way to work with them. Not saying any of that, just trying to make the case that this man was perhaps the most consequential casualty of the MeToo era. Put that in your bean mouth and chew on it on the show today. You know, yesterday we had eye on Bethany McClain, great reporter, daughter of the Mesabi Iron Range. I love saying that. The daughter. And then at the end she gave a plug. Oh, you should talk to Joan Williams. That woman's smart. Indeed I did. I took her advice. Actually, I'm retconning it. I had talked to Joan a couple weeks ago. We held onto it for just the right time for someone else to recommend her. And now Joan Williams is here to talk about her book, Outclassed how the Left Lost the Working Class and How to Win Them Back. Joan C. Williams, up next. Today I am outclassed, literally. Jonesy Williams is a giant in her field, actually giant in a lot of fields. She is an academic and she teaches at the University of California, San Francisco Law School, UC Hastings. Affiliation? I can't list all her academic affiliations, but what she does is she studies some theory, a lot of practicality, and always marries it to the current moment, the current social moment, the current political moment. So what's the political moment? Now I'll read you the name of her book, Outclassed how the Left Lost the Working Class and How to Win Them Back. Joan, welcome to the gist.

[Joan C. Williams]

Delighted to be here, Mike.

[Mike Pesca]

So I'm going to in this interview, we're going to circle back to the basis of your methods and thesis, but I want to jump right in. And the first thing, you don't have to convince me this happened, the left lost the working class. But the first thing I always think about, about the how to win them back part, is an emphasis on unions, because that is very easy for the Democrats to point to. We have the pro union strategy and they don't. So a couple of questions, but one is how important is their union strategy per se, and in practical terms, how much can they implement that and convince the rest of the potential Democratic voters who aren't in unions that the Democrats stand for them?

[Joan C. Williams]

Well, you know, Joe Biden tried. Yeah, he walked the picket line, as you well known. And unions used to be at the center of what Democrats stood for. And then my generation of hippies kind of came up and we cared more about abortion rights and climate change and racism and sexism. And Democrats sort of shifted attention onto those issues because they were the Democrats.

[Mike Pesca]

The hippies then became the Democrats, the.

[Joan C. Williams]

Hippies became the Democrats. And then the Democratic Party focused on the issues that were cared most deeply to, to college educated folks. And they weren't unions.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Joan C. Williams]

And meanwhile sort of the merchant was launching a very sustained and successful attack on unions. So what is union density and the private workforce, like 6%? Yeah, something like that.

[Mike Pesca]

It hit a record of like five.

[Joan C. Williams]

And a half percent. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Mike Pesca]

In the last decade.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Joan C. Williams]

I mean, I was just reading polling this morning that Americans are now more pro union than ever.

[Unknown]

Yes.

[Joan C. Williams]

American public has gotten the message that unions are one of the things they need to protect against the power of big business. Business. There's actually a bigger gap now than any time Since I think 1964 between support for unions, which has really climbed, and support for big business, which has really fallen.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Joan C. Williams]

That should be working for Democrats every minute of every day. And if we start, you know, wiser wising up, it will be.

[Mike Pesca]

See, I look at the union issue as. Since unions are now 5 or 6% back in the 1970s, if the Democrats were the party identified with unions, it didn't matter if, if Democrats had these luxury beliefs or these, these beliefs that maybe didn't connect with the blue collar because 30% of the blue collar owed a lot of their income to Democratic policies, I.e. unions, now that it's only 6% plus whatever in the public workforce. But I.

[Joan C. Williams]

And Democrats don't even have union members anymore.

[Mike Pesca]

Yeah, this is what I'm saying, that even if they're identified as pro union and they have the pro union policies and the Republicans don't, it's not enough. It's not practically improving the lives of voters. They could say, oh yeah, you're aligned on this issue, but it'll never improve my life. My workforce is never going to go union. Or if it does, it'll be like the Starbucks union and they'll be complaining about wearing long sleeve shirts.

[Joan C. Williams]

You know, I think one of the core facts is that after World War II, wages used to rise when productivity did.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Joan C. Williams]

If that had continued, wages would be 43% higher than they are now. Productivity rose. I think it's six or eight times more quickly than wages did.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Joan C. Williams]

And the wages of non college voters have completely leveled off by and large.

[Mike Pesca]

Well, I've seen a lot of alternate statistics on that. I'm not talking about, you know, Weirdo statistics. I'm talking about stuff that, you know, Matt Iglesias and some really reputable people will say. Well actually by a lot of, I'm sure you've seen these statistics. By a lot of measures there has been some middle class wage growth. And also of course, you know that productivity, the denominator is the amount of hours worked.

[Unknown]

Right.

[Mike Pesca]

So you could, yeah, you could just like fewer people to get the same factory output and great, you're more productive. It's not helping the workers.

[Joan C. Williams]

Well, it certainly didn't help the workers. Yeah, but I mean there's a lot of, I mean there's like a whole chapter worth of data in there. The American middle class has really gotten screwed and they know it.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Joan C. Williams]

Over 90% of Americans used to do better than their parents. Now it's just an even shot.

[Unknown]

Right.

[Joan C. Williams]

And people know this. People feel it in their bones. And unions of course were a big part of that picture. But I think the messaging that's going to work for Democrats is that, you know, hard work should pay off in a stable middle class life. Democrats, when they think about income inequality often have thought in the past decades about government redistribution programs. And there's a heck of a lot among the middle, and this is the middle status voters in routine jobs kind of waiting for the other shoe to drop. Those are the people who are flocking to the far right both in Europe and United States. Support among that group for government redistribution is wildly lower than support for labor market policies that make it, make it possible to work hard and earn a stable middle right.

[Mike Pesca]

They're not for redistribution. They might not know the word, but they're for predisposition, which means the job should pay more to begin with.

[Joan C. Williams]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And so that's, that is a very important part of the American message now, the Democratic message. Now a lot of that has been translated into a focus on blue collar jobs and that's the way that Biden administration interpreted it. But it's really that no matter what job you have, if you are working hard, you should be able to earn a stable middle class life instead of what's happening now.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Joan C. Williams]

Which is like five part time jobs, no benefits, no health, may, maybe you can't even afford health insurance even with Obamacare, no child care. This is impossible for people. No wonder they're angry.

[Mike Pesca]

Should is a great thing to say if you're a politician and it might resonate with voters, but there's a huge difference between should and will or should. And this can work without redistribution. I would understand how redis distribution would work. There's an enormous amount of money being generated in some industries. AI and so we take some of that money via taxation and we redistribute it to everyone else via social services or maybe even minimum income. But how would pre distribution practice minimum.

[Joan C. Williams]

Income won't work by the way. But anyway. Yeah, that's not going to be popular.

[Mike Pesca]

It's not going to be popular and I don't know how you get it to the level, I mean really makes a factor of people's lives.

[Joan C. Williams]

Do you have kids?

[Unknown]

Yes.

[Joan C. Williams]

Do you want them to earn a minimum live? Minimum standard of living? Is that your asking?

[Mike Pesca]

Yeah, I know it seems like minimum guaranteed income, right?

[Joan C. Williams]

No, that's not, that's not what people aspire to. People want to work hard and get, get the solid benefits of their labor. So I mean I think what we have to understand is that the, the far right in country after country has tapped this anger, this economic anger and has very successfully deflected it away from economic elites, from the merchant right, to quote Thomas Piketty's term, and focused it instead on political elites. Anger towards government and cultural elites, anger towards kind of middle class, kind of woke, woke wars. And we have to. Democrats too often have said, you know, let's we stand for joy. Well.

[Mike Pesca]

Do they, I mean, is this their. I, I know that.

[Joan C. Williams]

I mean that was literally, that was literally.

[Mike Pesca]

But I wrote a piece in the Atlantic saying it seems like they're more like the HR department. They're you know, persnickety finger waving. No, you can't do that. Here are the regulations. Doesn't seem particularly joyous.

[Joan C. Williams]

Well, I mean the, the, the Democrats don't have an ear tuned to the economic anger of the middle class.

[Mike Pesca]

This is true.

[Joan C. Williams]

I mean to say, oh, inflation's going to be transitory, don't worry about it. No, is not the right idea. Basically globalization only gave the American worker one thing and that's cheap Nikes. While the wages were falling, falling, falling, inflation was bound to be incendiary. So the move for the left is to connect with that anger over economic issues and redirect it back where it belongs onto economic elites to acknowledge the anger against political elites and not to keep fanning the flames of the anger against cultural elites. Because I and my type, I'm a San Francisco progressive, too often lack the cultural competence to really connect with what it means to be middle class culturally.

[Mike Pesca]

Yeah, I'm going to get to that. But tell me how pre distribution would work. What's the what are the policy planks that equal pre distribution?

[Joan C. Williams]

The rich have too much.

[Mike Pesca]

Yes.

[Joan C. Williams]

Everybody else doesn't earn enough.

[Mike Pesca]

That's the diagnosis. So how do we pre distribute?

[Joan C. Williams]

You know, as I always say, I'm not a policy. Yeah, I'm not a policy person.

[Mike Pesca]

No, I agree.

[Joan C. Williams]

I'm not an economist.

[Mike Pesca]

And by the way, you win elections. I was just talking about this. You win elections by having the right diagnosis. You don't win it by having the right prescriptions.

[Joan C. Williams]

I mean, we already try. I mean one thing that we saw in Biden, the Biden administration is that even if you really sincerely focus on creating more blue collar jobs, number one, it takes a long time. Although there's some Republican pushback against the proposed repeal of like an inflation reduction act. So people in red states know that they were getting blue collar jobs.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Joan C. Williams]

Creating blue collar jobs takes a long time and it's a challenge because as you pointed out, automation. But that's no excuse for the Democrats not saying part of this, part of the solution is blue collar jobs. But everybody deserves to earn a stable middle class life, you know, and if we 3/4 of Americans are skeptical of big business and you know, that means, means big business is going to earn and the wealthy are going to earn a little less. So you can have a stable middle class life for your family if you work hard, which we know you do.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Mike Pesca]

I would probably tell a pollster I'm skeptical of big business. And if they said, well, which big businesses? I would say, I don't know, it seems like Bezos has a lot of money. And then if you look at my Amazon queue, it's four things every day. So there is what you tell a pollster and what you even maybe feel. And the revealed preferences, the revealed preferences.

[Joan C. Williams]

Of Amazon is an amazing logistics company. Now I, I actually, I also order from Amazon, but I, I try to exhaust every other avenue because it's an amazing logistics company that exploits its workers. You can have an amazing logistics company without allowing it to exploit its workers in the way that it does.

[Mike Pesca]

But, but who doesn't exploit their workers? Like what are the alternatives? Like that the ideal of the mom and pop, it's nostalgic, but you know, can you really move up in a mom and pop company that's selling Ace hardware?

[Joan C. Williams]

I mean, I think that's, that attitude towards small business is another thing that Democrats have to lose. Huge numbers of people in the United States work for small business. And even more important, and small business owners are a really important constituency Both in terms of the votes, but more so even in terms of the aspiration. Because if you're an order taker in like a pink collar job or even a blue collar job, your aspiration is to be an order giver. This is one of the reasons why Trump was so popular. He tapped this right and the kind of. Or.

[Mike Pesca]

And that's so insightful.

[Joan C. Williams]

Right people, if you think about it, the idea of owning a small business is a much more realistic path to a stable middle class life than socialist revolution.

[Mike Pesca]

Realistic, less bloody. It's been tried before. Maybe your uncles have done it. They probably haven't been revolutionaries. If they were in the United States.

[Joan C. Williams]

Democrats should be driving. Republicans are for big business, we're for small business. We don't really exploit that. And we've got to begin to understand that small business has a profound hold on the imagination of blue, pink collar, routine, white collar people.

[Mike Pesca]

What about, let's go back to the ideals of the hippies or the policy preferences of the Brahmin left, which is your phrase, to match the merchant right. They not only pursue policies that don't resonate with the right, but. But they sometimes pursue policies, or at least voice positions that actively repel anyone who might be a Democratic voter. Why?

[Joan C. Williams]

Well, you have to understand that there's really a cultural. Of course Democrats sadly have become the party of college graduates. And you have to understand that the cult that class is expressed through economics. We've been talking about economics. But class is also expressed through cultural differences. So for example, blue collar people, they're focused on self discipline, the kind that kind of gets you up every day on time without an attitude to a maybe not very glorious job. And they highly value the institutions that shape self discipline, religion, the military, traditional family values. Non college voters endorse traditional family values more than college educated ones. That's just a fact of life. And there's also a specific middle. Blue collar, I'm going to call it blue collar. But we really need mean these middle status voters and routine jobs. There's a, an accepted form of. They have their own talk, traditions, authenticity, sincerity. Tell it like it is. One of the one Trump voter said. Trump doesn't sugarcoat things. Yeah, he unders, he enacts a working class style culture. Look at Democrats. We. I always think of Rachel Maddow. I mean what is the style culture? What are the talk traditions that she enacts? It's sort of like I'm an intelligent person talking to you. Another intelligent person. It's like a college seminar that Kind of talk is heard by people who never went to college as condescending.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Joan C. Williams]

That kind of talk is heard as that they're not an important audience.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Joan C. Williams]

And also, I mean, my crowd, we focus not on self discipline, we focus on self development. That's what we need and that's what we feel for our jobs and that's what we feel entitled to.

[Mike Pesca]

And also novelty is the big part.

[Joan C. Williams]

Of it that you've written about. Edginess, sophistication. Sophistication is just a way my crowd displays its high human capital to others. In the elite, it's heard as very condescending.

[Mike Pesca]

How does the sophistication manifest itself? What counts as sophistication? There's sophistication among the blue collar right there. Some brands are better than others. Well, there's actually a lot of brand sensitivity among the blue collar.

[Joan C. Williams]

There's a. There's a big riff about sophistication. I mean, but basically, in until about 1980, this cultural expression of class was expressed that the elites preferred high culture, classical music, non elites preferred low culture, popular music. And then around 1980, elites decided that non elite culture was pretty cool, but they still needed a way to distinguish themselves from those below. And so now you can have pink flamencos in your yard so long as you do it with irony.

[Unknown]

Right? Right.

[Joan C. Williams]

John Fetterman once said that his district was an irony free zone. So this enactment of irony sophistication is part of the social display of being part of the educated elite.

[Mike Pesca]

Right. Look at the uniform, the de facto uniform of the tech world. Right. It was 50 years ago. It was the white shoe law firm and the three piece suit. And now you could dress more or less like a slob, or more like a slob if you're Sam Altman Freed. But yeah, that's just a manifestation of exactly what you were saying, that.

[Joan C. Williams]

But you display your human capital so people know you're not just some schlump.

[Mike Pesca]

And we'll be back in a minute with more of Joan Williams talking about her book. Outclassed. Professor Joan C. Williams, who is a leading light in feminist legal theory, didn't put that aside, but concentrated on the question of the left and the working class. She came by the studio. I got to talk to her for a while here. Now, the rest of that conversation. So I think that I wouldn't point to Rachel Maddow as the example of the left doing it wrong or talking incorrectly because she's at least talking to the audience that she's talking To I think of actual politicians who lard their phrases with jargon and academic speak and just words like, like, we saw this a little bit. Not that Bernie Sanders is so highfalutin, but him talking about Slotkin, talking about, let us not talk about oligarchs and Bernie talking about oligarchs, that's maybe not even the best example. But phrases that people.

[Joan C. Williams]

Bernie attracted a lot of people and blew it. Very red districts.

[Mike Pesca]

He did. And people like when Bernie says oligarch and the way he pronounces it and it resonates with them. And most, most of the people showing up know what an oligarch is. But it doesn't matter the 20,000 who show up. It matters the 50,000, 80,000 whose homes those 20,000 are going to go to and try to communicate with. And if they say this guy, you know, Donald Trump, he wants to be a king or emperor versus he wants to be an oligarch, it will probably land better with them. But I do think a lot of the jargon and a lot of the talking and then Tim Walls congratulating himself for code talking to the white men is if the red or potential red voters hear it.

[Joan C. Williams]

Tim Walsh had such potential.

[Mike Pesca]

He did. I interviewed him when he just got elected to Congress. And he was really an English teacher who had a military background.

[Joan C. Williams]

Remember when he paraded up his high school basketball, was it Basketball team. Football team is just like, please.

[Mike Pesca]

It was performative.

[Joan C. Williams]

It was performative in a way that connected to middle America.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Joan C. Williams]

And then he, then he lost it.

[Mike Pesca]

Okay, so, okay, so that's what you're saying. But what happened to Tim Walls? Is it just that to operate within Minnesota politics or Minnesota Democrat DFL politics makes you use phrases like code talking? That just is a natural consequence.

[Joan C. Williams]

You know, that's the kind of talk that signals inadvertently that your major audience is college educated elites.

[Mike Pesca]

Right. And so it becomes so Tim Walls knows who the voter is, but 90% of his day is with staffers, is with members of the media, is with college educated elites who are experts, maybe lobbyists, all college educated elites.

[Joan C. Williams]

You know, I don't, I don't fault Kamala Harris. I don't fault Tim Waltz. This, this is a train wreck that's been happening since 2012.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Joan C. Williams]

One of the things that my book is trying to do is to explain to my crowd, college educated progressives, why we can't require people to talk like this. Because if we require people to talk like this, we are going to lose.

[Mike Pesca]

But Joan, it's not Just talk like this. It's. Think like this. It's to really believe.

[Joan C. Williams]

That's why it's a book, not a. Not a sentence.

[Mike Pesca]

Yeah. I think. I think Barack Obama, he's graduated magna cum laude from Harvard, didn't he? And he was headed.

[Joan C. Williams]

He also had a Kansas grandma.

[Mike Pesca]

He had a Kansas grandma.

[Joan C. Williams]

Barack Obama knew how to talk to.

[Mike Pesca]

These people and he still does. And if you look at.

[Joan C. Williams]

He does.

[Mike Pesca]

If you look at his speech. Speech at the dnc, he didn't have to. He took time and he carved out. Hey, let's say you have the grandma who's a couple months behind you on the edgiest social justice thing. Have grace towards her.

[Joan C. Williams]

Yeah.

[Mike Pesca]

And the point isn't that like, that's an obvious point and I don't think Tim Walsh would disagree with it. When you have 20 minutes to make your speech and two minutes is on that. That's showing you how much he understands exactly the phenomenon you're talking about. And I think how many. How much that others within the party don't. Others within the party want to wave the banner of whatever it is intersectionality or dei. They firmly believe in that and they think if you don't, you're a racist.

[Joan C. Williams]

You're talking to someone who spent the last 10 years doing DEI.

[Mike Pesca]

I know. I want to. I want to ask you about that in a sec.

[Joan C. Williams]

So I think it's really. I mean. And you know words like Latinx.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Joan C. Williams]

Which has become. Well, the reason it was invented is because the Spanish is. Would be Latinos.

[Unknown]

Yes.

[Joan C. Williams]

And that inscribes the unspoken, eternal masculine.

[Unknown]

Yes.

[Joan C. Williams]

Right. So. And that's what. That's why. I think that's why we invent stuff like this.

[Mike Pesca]

Well, who's.

[Joan C. Williams]

We have to.

[Mike Pesca]

Not the.

[Joan C. Williams]

My total crowd. They're talking about my crowd.

[Mike Pesca]

And there is a word, Latin, which actually does that a lot better than Latinx.

[Joan C. Williams]

Well, yeah, it's just like moving on. We should be Hispanics. We have to understand that. Although this is. I understand why we make this stuff up. We have to have a class lens and understand how this is going to be received by people without college degrees. That's the class lens we lack and that's why we end up shooting ourselves in the foot most days a week. We need to understand that. We're talking if we want to win back college voters. We're talking to people to whom that sounds affected and to. If we. And to who hear that as us telling them, you don't even know how to talk. You're so stupid. We have to understand that. I mean, I have a gender lens, you know, I've worked on gender for probably 40 years. I have somewhat of a racial lens. I've worked on race intensively for the last 10 years. We need a class lens too. As F. Scott Fitzgerald said, you need to be the sign of a truly intelligent person is to be able to keep two contradictory ideas in your head. Yeah, we need to keep two non contradictory ideas in our head. Race and class. These are not mutually exclusive. They overlap. They're very complex relationships. Of of interest only maybe to a, a professor who studies social inequality.

[Mike Pesca]

But we need someone who wants to win an election.

[Joan C. Williams]

We need both.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Mike Pesca]

So if we had the class lens, would we or the people who had as much of the class lens as they do the race lens, would the signs be. They'd be unbelievably appalled if they made a gaffe that offended a blue collar person. That if Bette Midler said, well, West Virginia, they're all backwards, it would be the equivalent of a disqualifying racist remark that she'd have to spend 10 years getting back from. That's, that's how we know we have a class lens that.

[Joan C. Williams]

Well, I mean the, the sort of. We have a culture inadvertently, we have a culture of casual class insults. Another example is like climate deniers.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Joan C. Williams]

Climate denier says if you disagree with me on climate change, you're just plain stupid. It's understandable why that's heard as a class insult. If you look at climate change, it's really high up in the concerns of me and my crowd. Really high up for non college voters. It's number 14 according to one poll. And the reason is because we're focused on the end of the world, they're more focused on the end of the month.

[Mike Pesca]

Right.

[Joan C. Williams]

And they're very concerned that that costs are going to raise, that blue collar jobs will be jeopardized, that this will raise costs. We have to understand that their prior. And they're just really concerned about economic issues. Why? Because they and their kind have gotten screwed and now they have five part time jobs and no childcare. That's what they're concerned about. And so the, the terms like climate denier are part of this, this tradition of kind of casual class insults.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Joan C. Williams]

Deplorables clinging to guns and religion. Why didn't people run that through their head? It's because we don't have a class lens.

[Mike Pesca]

I think that there are many people who are happy to use the words climate deniers. There may be on the pointed edge of the spear in terms of activism, Greta Thunberg, you're not never going to get her not to say that she believes that the, the Sunrise movement, they're going to go into senators offices and you know, clamor for the most aggressive implementation of the Green New Deal. But, but they shouldn't, they shouldn't speak for the Democratic politicians. They shouldn't speak for the mainstream. But don't you think part of this they're always going to be radical heard.

[Joan C. Williams]

Say these people vote against their self, their self interest.

[Mike Pesca]

Oh yeah. This is the what's the matter with Kansas idea.

[Joan C. Williams]

Yeah, yeah. My, my crowd says that all the time.

[Mike Pesca]

But my, I'll get to that. And I love the chapters in your book where you say yeah, but what about the fact that blue states are so much better for divorce rates than red states and you point out that this is just snooty is all that is. But isn't it also the case we're always going to have a pointy edge of the spear. We're always going to have radicals in the last. And I think this is maybe because of media, but maybe some other things you could put your finger on. They have been given such an outsized voice and it's true on the right too. But the outsized voice that the Sunrise movement has been given to call Anyone who isn't 100% on board with their prescriptions climate deniers is a little bit unprecedented in politics.

[Joan C. Williams]

Well, you know, the media has become very segmented. That's true. On the other hand, what you, you need is for progressives as a general group to have a class lens to know don't go there. That's not going to end well.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Joan C. Williams]

And so long as progressives as a group don't have that class lens snafus, even if they're made by a relatively small group, are going to have an outsized effect because we need that's really to have.

[Mike Pesca]

Because otherwise if these small groups say something stupid, if the Democrats have a class, no one will identify the right.

[Joan C. Williams]

Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. I mean shame on us that that resonates.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Mike Pesca]

And and also because acknowledge that right. And the right wing media, they're going to want to apply that to Democrats.

[Joan C. Williams]

They're always going to pick that up.

[Mike Pesca]

Right.

[Joan C. Williams]

But if people go nah, you know, Democrats are sometimes they're highfalutin but boy, they're fighting for me.

[Unknown]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Joan C. Williams]

And you know they, the Gretchen, I was a quote Gretchen Whitmore, fix the damn Roads.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Joan C. Williams]

That's how Democrats should talk.

[Mike Pesca]

And then there's the other part of it. Let's take defund the police, which a dozen members of Congress literally supported and a few dozen more said those vague words that would indicate that they did support it. So it wasn't the majority of the Democratic Party, but it was enough to get smeared with. Now when I bring that, that, when I bring this point up that Democrats, no Democrat except the really radicals who wanted to disqualify, qualify themselves from any district that wasn't D +45, when I bring this up that Democrats shouldn't have played with that idea. It's anathema to especially the black and Latino communities that you want, that you want to help. Right. I always get the pushback that this is a lie, this is an exaggeration. No one really said that. And I kind of shake my head and said enough said that, enough said that. And there was enough lack of, of pushback from the Democratic establishment that it became, call it a smear if you want, but that's why the smear stuck. It was real enough. And you can't just blame it on the right wing media system.

[Joan C. Williams]

Well, you kind of can blame it on the right wing media system, but the right win media system is here to stay.

[Unknown]

Okay.

[Joan C. Williams]

And any thing that we do that can be presented as a class insult will be presented as a class insult. This is part of the landscape that's not going to change. I mean what people need to understand and again this is not just being captive to a small group. People in general on the, you know, on the college educated people need to understand that kind of. We take stability for granted. You know, the issue is how much self development can we manage to get yet.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Joan C. Williams]

But especially.

[Mike Pesca]

Right. The ground under our feet is very small.

[Joan C. Williams]

Not young people, we can talk about that later. But we take stability for granted. People in their fragile and failing middle class, these people who no longer have access to the dream of earning more than their parents, they really value stability. That's their aspiration. I, my husband grew up with a father as a factory worker. And I know why can't we put the spoons in a different place? And he finally said to me, I associate change with loss. And that's true of a whole great range of people. It used to be true and now it's more true. You know, why Change for them has been loss.

[Mike Pesca]

Right.

[Joan C. Williams]

Economically, culturally and.

[Mike Pesca]

Right, right. The whole creative destruction for them is.

[Joan C. Williams]

Just destruction, you know, and so we, they more highly value stability. They have more of a sense that their neighborhoods are fragile. You know why? Because they are than ours. More of a sense that they'll be vulnerable without the police. They have more of us. They don't like disorder. So disorder at the border is something that's really going to hurt us.

[Mike Pesca]

Well, what about that? It's not just was disorder at the border. I was reading in the Liberal Patriot, which is Rui Te share his substack. I think it was a guest writer. He listed five things that the Democrats signed on to that voters just hated and they should have been able to see it. And one was don't call it. Call it. You don't have to call it open borders, but a border policy that prioritized humanity towards asylum seekers versus just keeping the number of legal and illegal immigrants in America as low as can be. So this was one policy that Democrats just hated. Another was the policing policy. Another was any tick down these policies that the Democrats, not just a small portion of them, but the Democrats really did play footsie with. Why did they. Why did they go down that road?

[Joan C. Williams]

You know, no figure in the far right has been successful without putting immigration at the center.

[Mike Pesca]

Yes.

[Joan C. Williams]

And that's because far right.

[Mike Pesca]

But I always think, I always think that throughout time and throughout political systems, when you have a right and a left in a country, there are only a few constants. And a constant is openness to immigration is a constant of the left. And a bit of xenophobia or just wanting to preserve the culture as it is is a constant of the right.

[Joan C. Williams]

You know, Trump's border policy, Trump's immigration policies. I mean, he's gone so far that he's lost most of the American public. I mean, disappearing people is kind of a step too far. Yes, but Trump's in general, his attitudes or his policies towards immigration are one of the only policies a lot of the American public still approve of.

[Mike Pesca]

Right.

[Joan C. Williams]

And again, you have to. To think about this in terms of culture. Our crowd, we're really proud of being part of a globalized elite. Yeah, we're stressing our high highest status category. We're members of an elite. And part of the way we display our sophistication is by being members, you know, by being global citizens, people who are Americans or Brits or whatever, who are not part of the elite. They also stress one of their highest status memberships being American. So if you look at college grads and non college grads, non college grads are more patriotic. They're prouder of being American. They define their ambit of social responsibility in a more place based fashion. And that's one of the reasons why immigration is a whetstone for anger against elites.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Joan C. Williams]

Now I think, number one, who was it? Oh, by the way, remind me, who killed the immigration bill?

[Mike Pesca]

Sure.

[Joan C. Williams]

Cynically, I mean that should have been on every Democrat's list from the moment he did it.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Joan C. Williams]

We were trying to create order at the border and guess who didn't want it? He wanted to jerk you around for his own political reasons.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Joan C. Williams]

Deflecting the anger and focusing it back on him.

[Mike Pesca]

That's, that's how, that's how I'd have played that. And that's not only good talking point, but it's actually true.

[Joan C. Williams]

My husband was as the additional advantage of being true.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Mike Pesca]

Which is small these days, but it's also true. But for three years, the Biden administration, even if that bill passed, it wouldn't have changed things massively.

[Joan C. Williams]

It's a pretty horrible bill.

[Mike Pesca]

Yes. And for three years the Biden administration, and I wonder how much it was actually Joe Biden and his instincts. Because Joe Biden in the 80s or the 90s would not have had these instincts. No, they.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Mike Pesca]

So Joe Biden prioritized. We're not going to separate families. We're going to treat people with humanity. And you should treat people with humanity. But that is not the priority of the American people. Or it's not the priority of the American people when these very cynical Southern governors put these migrants in the U.S. cities. Yeah. And then as you write about, he had this moment where he was talking. He finally gets around to decent enough policy that matches where the public is. And he uses the phrase illegal immigrant. And then it's three days of apologizing for the phrase. And to me, fair or unfair, that's a disaster. And exactly what you're talking about.

[Joan C. Williams]

Well, you know, I think that the immigration as an issue is really framed by kind of the feeling rules of the elite. Who we're supposed to empathize with.

[Mike Pesca]

Right.

[Joan C. Williams]

We're definitely supposed to empathize with people of color. Immigrants, lgtbq. White working class people. Oh, they're racist, they're deplorable, they're ignorant, they're climate deniers. Those feeling rules are bound to put a target on the back of guess who? Immigrants. People of color bullying trans kids.

[Unknown]

Yeah, yeah.

[Joan C. Williams]

The way to talk about bullying trans kids is the way John Fetterman said, like if you get your jollies bullying trans kids, I think you need a different job up.

[Mike Pesca]

But all of this is under the David from rubric. If you don't solve the problem, the fascists will.

[Joan C. Williams]

Yeah, exactly. And boy, the fascists are solving the problem. We need to rethink our feeling rules, who we empathize with. And again, one, you can't empathize with people disadvantaged by race, disadvantaged by gender, and could be completely blind to people disadvantaged by class. If you don't want to lose people disadvantaged by class. Oh, by the way, who have we lost? Non college voters.

[Mike Pesca]

Joan C. Williams invented feminist jurisprudence and is now the author of how the Left Lost the Working Class and How to Win Them Back. Joan, thank you so much.

[Joan C. Williams]

I didn't invent it, I helped. Everything is a community. Thank you, Mike.

[Mike Pesca]

And that's it for today's show. Cory Wara produces the gist. Astra Green is our social media outreach specialist. Ashley Khan is the coordinating producer for the for the Peach Fish Productions. Michelle Pesca does all of it and more for the Peach Fish Productions. And Leo Baums out. I don't know. Watching Pixar movies improve. J? Peru De Peru. And thanks for listening.