Ignore The New Power Demographic at Your Own Risk: Young Male Voters

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Wendy McElroy
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Cries of “Trump is Hitler!” and attempted assassinations have dominated coverage of the upcoming presidential elections. This deprives an intriguing issue of attention. An August 24th New York Times article by culture columnist Claire Cain Miller states the issue: “In some ways, this presidential election has become a referendum on gender roles.” Gender gaps between how men and women vote are not new. But “it is now close to, or certainly in the ballpark of, the biggest gender gap we’ve ever seen,” according to Paul Maslin, a pollster at FM3, a public policy-oriented opinion research firm.

The Politico article, “The ever-widening gender gap,” sketches a more specific picture,

In 2004 and 2008...that gap was seven points. By 2012, that number increased to 10 points and it grew to 11 four years later. In 2020, it rose again to 12 points, powered by Trump’s 15-point loss among female voters — 57 percent to 42 percent. Polling ahead of the 2024 race shows signs the divide has widened even further...The most recent New York Times/Siena College poll in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin revealed that 55 percent of registered men support Trump compared to just 39 percent of women — a staggering 16-point difference. The Times/Siena poll conducted last week in Arizona, Georgia, Nevada and North Carolina likewise found the exact same difference.

The gap seems especially wide among Generation Z or those under 30 years old. The Brookings Institute reports, “In politics, we are seeing a gender gap amongst today’s youngest voters—aged 18 to 29—with young women being significantly more Democratic in their political leanings than young men.” Much of the young female vote is being driven by the US Supreme Court’s 2022 ruling, which reversed Roe v. Wade and returned jurisdiction over abortion to the states. Reproductive rights is now a passionate election cause.

Young men seem to be motivated, not so much by a specific issue, but by their resentment of the current culture. If true, the upcoming elections will express the “Breitbart Doctrine,” named after the late conservative journalist Andrew Breitbart. This doctrine states “politics is downstream from culture.” To change the politics of a society, you must change its culture because politics originates from culture which, in turn, originates from the values of individuals who constitute society. Simply stated, if a person’s values and culture are transformed, his politics transforms accordingly. 

The culture surrounding young men is dramatically different from that of their fathers, and the change has not been kind. The Brookings Institute notes, “Young men increasingly feel as though they have been experiencing discrimination.” For decades now, prominent voices of political correctness, which is now called social justice, have blamed men as a gender class for a long slate of social wrongs. And, for young men, the past few decades constitute all of their lives. This means they have heard about their collective guilt since birth, and it would be natural for them to feel resentful for being castigated as a class for social wrongs. Such young men are reportedly turning to Donald Trump as a symbol of more traditional and proud manhood.

What grievances or sense of discrimination are young males likely to bring into the voting booths with them? The International Council for Men and Boys lists twelve: 

1. Education. OECD’s Programme for International Student Assessment’s states: “...boys are significantly more likely than girls to be disengaged from school, get lower marks, repeat grades, and play video games in their free time.” It also claims that, “Gender differences in achievement” are explained by “social and cultural contexts reinforce stereotypical attitudes and behaviours.”
2. Health. According to World Data, men in the US “will live to be 74.8 years old on average. On average, US women are 5.4 years older, reaching an age of 80.2.”
3. Child Labor. Globally speaking, International Labor Organization claims that, on a global level—of boys aged 5 to 17—11.2 percent are in child labor, compared to 7.8 percent of girls.

4-6. False Allegations, Violence, and Partner Abuse. An international survey by End to DV finds that men are the victims of most false allegations. An article in Cambridge’s American Political Science Review concludes that men experience more violence than women. For example, “Estimates across conflicts classify men as between 1.3 and 8.9 times as likely to be killed in war as women.” With Partner Abuse, most studies confirm that men and women are victimized at roughly equal rates, even though far fewer resources are available to male victims.

7. Parenting. In their work, Benevolent Sexism in Judges, a Cornell Law School professor and a Magistrate Judge detail the severe disadvantages divorced men face in family courts, especially regarding custody.
8. Crime. The results of the study “Does the Criminal Justice System Treat Men and Women Differently?” indicate that, “while men and women are treated differently by the criminal justice system, these differences largely favor women.”
9. Homelessness. Of the nations that keep sex-specific data on homelessness, Davia Research finds 76% of the homeless are men.
10. Work Place. Davia Research also indicates that men face 15 times the number of occupational deaths, compared to women.
11. Reproduction. A recent Newsweek article points out, “men are legally responsible to financially support any biological child, yet have never enjoyed the right” to refuse the responsibilities of legal fatherhood. Most women can choose to terminate their pregnancies.
12. Media. The International Council for Men and Boys offers the following stats on coverage: “Men: 69 percent unfavorable, 12 percent favorable, and 19 percent neutral or balanced.”

Whatever you think of the listed grievances, they may have power through young male voters.

Fortunately, the mainstream media is waking up to this issue and the need to address cultural alienation of men, which has too often been ignored or denied. No longer. The mainstream media is sounding an alert about how losing so much of the male vote could spell defeat for the Democrats. As early as 2020, USA Today discussed how male voters may have determined Biden’s election victory. Newsweek’s recent coverage of the issue, cited above, is an in-depth treatment of how male disillusionment leans into a Trump victory. A YouTube video inspired by a Wall Street Journal poll asked, “Why are young men turning Republican?” On CNN, left political commentator Michael Smerconish stated that men, especially white, working-class men, are the new swing voters. An Axios headline reads, “Boys vs. girls election intensifies.” The issue of male voters has received more attention in the last few months than it has in several years.

It is a sad reflection on society if push-for-power elections are the spark that brings the general gender gap to the forefront of attention. Men are doing badly, and it is partly because society has been structured against them in favor of women. This imbalance hurts women as well as men. Women need healthy and well-adjusted men to be life partners, loving family members, friends, good neighbors, co-workers, and the peaceful strangers you pass on the street. The last thing women need is to live beside a generation of resentful men who act on their resentment, especially if the feeling is justified.

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