Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Cincinnati is a fairly liberal city (went for Obama 75% in 2012) in a county (Hamilton) that is split about 50-50. Then the surrounding suburbs become progressively more conservative as you go further out. Cincinnati has always seemed to be big on politeness, so I've never experienced anything more intense than a few animated disagreements. We do have our fair share of those who prefer to yell and scream than debate and dialogue but they seem to be a small minority. I think it can be easy for all of us to let our emotions get the best of us from time to time.
Full disclosure I am a self-identified Democratic Socialist, so I guess you could say I fall further down on the liberal spectrum than most. That being said, I find most people most places to be polite and accommodating if you show them courtesy and respect. I am troubled by the recent trend I've seen, mentioned by the OP, of people moving to where others all think the same way they do. I think it leads to a profound disconnect and mutual distrust between liberals and conservatives. I think we need to foster dialogue and mutual respect, especially in such an unfortunate period of hyper-partisanship.
I can't give you an answer but I think you might like this book and I highly recommend it since your question is not what people are doing these days:
It's called "The Big Sort: Why the Clustering of Like-Minded America Is Tearing Us Apart" by Bill Bishop. It's about how we self-sort to live in neighborhoods with people who look like and think like we do.
"Over the last decade, as 100 million Americans have moved from one place to another, they’ve clustered in increasingly homogeneous communities...Americans have always moved around restlessly. But whereas in earlier times large flows of people — the “great migration” of African-Americans to Chicago in the 1950s, for instance, or the “hillbilly highway” that took white Appalachians to the Midwest after World War II — were motivated primarily by the quest for economic opportunity, American migration is now inspired at least as much by “lifestyle” choices as by economics. “We have built a country,” Bishop writes, “where everyone can choose the neighbors (and church and news shows) most compatible with his or her lifestyle and beliefs. And we are living with the consequences of this segregation by way of life: pockets of like-minded citizens that have become so ideologically inbred that we don’t know, can’t understand, and can barely conceive of ‘those people’ who live just a few miles away.”
I think it depends on the individual. Some people are so highly charged on certain issues, they have no room for others' opinions. I have ended friendships over this - when someone tells me several times "no, you're wrong" about something that's an opinion, not a fact, I don't want to spend time with that person. Life is too short to defend your position against an immovable object.
If you run into people like that ANYWHERE, you will have conflict. The city doesn't matter.
I would guess that enclaves that are more politically charged in general will tend to find more of the "not getting along" problem. These are typically boiled down to smaller sections of places, not entire cities.
I think it depends on the individual. Some people are so highly charged on certain issues, they have no room for others' opinions. I have ended friendships over this - when someone tells me several times "no, you're wrong" about something that's an opinion, not a fact, I don't want to spend time with that person. Life is too short to defend your position against an immovable object.
If you run into people like that ANYWHERE, you will have conflict. The city doesn't matter.
I would guess that enclaves that are more politically charged in general will tend to find more of the "not getting along" problem. These are typically boiled down to smaller sections of places, not entire cities.
No. Such a metro doesn't exist. The powers that be want no one of different political ideologies getting along at all. They want political polarization and all that "evil" that belongs to the other party has no place in your society. They must be shunned, and banned.
I would say many mid-sized to large U.S. cities have this pattern (with exceptions of course)
1. Mostly Liberal core, students, LGBT population, young professionals, higher minority population than the suburbs
2. Inner-ring urban/older suburbs, still more Democratic leaning
3. More conservative leaning suburbs and exurban areas, typically higher % of Caucasian residents and families
In general I would say Liberals and Conservatives already ARE peacefully coexisting in metro areas, just in different distributions depending on the community.
That being said if you are the type to flaunt your beliefs and engage in sociopolitical debates than you might get flack depending on your setting. I don't think an outspoken Christian evangelist supporting Ted Cruz would make a ton of friends in downtown San Francisco. Similarly an outspoken Bernie Sanders supporter might not be the most popular person in certian suburbs of Birmingham, Alabama.
There are very few places in the country where one side is truly nonexistent.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
