Lefties may not "seek them out" but the right is just fine here in KingCo And Seattle. Bartending for twenty years here, I know who some are. But as a "leftist" I always got along just fine. Just don't be a racist, misogynist, homophobic loon (or carries a weapon) and wingers will do just fine here.

@1:

"Racist, misogynist, homophobic loon or carries a weapon". That describes roughly 98% of wingers.

I have people in my circle that have differing views from me, and I'm totally ok with them being as wrong on the issues as they would like to be.

@3 we're also in an era where any political idea is lumped in with extreme political ideals. For eg, Oregon passed statewide rent control, which I'm against (I think it'll reduce new starts and lead to long-term higher rents in order to subsidize the lucky few who will be inculcated in artificially low rent locales, effectively paid for by the poorest renters). That sounds like a fairly benign political different of opinion. However, in these days, that view makes me a "nazi fascist" and, per your quote, no need to be tolerant of my opinion - as dummy mcfuckface demonstrated for you just prior. (it should go without saying that opinions on rent control don't make you a nazi or a dove)

Oh no we don't tolerate intolerance whatever will we fucking do

Good. Herzog should spend every Thanksgiving with homophobic Christian fundamentalists.

Nice bothsiderisms!

Sure. Let’s replay last weekend’s CPAC freak show and debate how it’s possible that all of those deranged, hateful lunatics weren’t dragged off to an institution by the people in white lab coats.

So what are we supposed to be listening to:

That tax cuts for billionaires are great for the middle class when 40 years of data tells us otherwise?

That white (trash) Americans are inherently superior to everyone else?

That unregulated pollution is good for people and the environment?

That women should be forced to give birth with no choice?

That shoving assault rifles into the hands of every deranged lunatic with a grudge is just awesome for children and society?

That their treasonous, ranting, lunatic usurper in the White House has every right to dictatorial powers?

That truth, morality, reason, and decency are unknowable?

These are the political positions of today’s Republican party, and they have nothing to offer the people of this nation but endless misery and more failure.

BOTH SIDES, Katie.

In fact, reportedly, the SPLC is about to designate Seattle as a Certified Hate Group.

This comment thread certainly proves Atlantic magazine's assertion.

@8 - Well - they can talk about cats, to seek common ground, and still have a pleasant dinner.

Nah, I have no plans to listen to crooks and bigots. I'm wearing out the mute button on my TV remote as it is, with half of MSNBC shows consisting of "Ooooh, Trump said something stupid, let's play that for you".

I'm not going to tolerate someone who thinks that I should be dead because I am mixed race/queer/etc. If that makes me "politically intolerant," fine. Sorry not sorry.

It’s also notable and entirely self-explanatory that these phony calls for civility and tolerating intolerant bigots are entirely one-sided and aimed at liberals, especially those of us that are most likely to be harmed by Republicans’ cruelty, kleptocracy, and insanity.

BOTH SIDES ZOMG!

You know it's not just Democrats and Republicans. There's plenty of vitriol between groups on the left.

There's something fishy about that map. Florida and South Carolina are at the "Most Intolerant" end in every single county and that attitude ends exactly on the state border. What's the theory for this? Surely those Florida counties along the Alabama border have more in common with Georgia than they do with Miami.

Check out the methods, wtf. This is based on a survey of 2000 individuals, Then they picked some arbitrary attributes (education, race, etc) and correlated those attributes to the "tolerance" of those 2000 individuals. Then they heat-map the counties based on the prevalence of those attributes within that county. I'm no sciencetician, but that sounds like a bunch of bullshit to me.

That is the fascinating thing about Slog;
some of the most hate filled bigoted people in the country wrapped in the sanctimonious cloak of self-righteousness and 'tolerance'.
The lack of self-awareness is impressive.

Our county is in the 7 percentile...

@15: Yeah, the Atlantic magazine (and just about everyone else) does that extrapo-magic all the time - but why does it bother you now?

@Alden is correct. It's a bad survey and subsequent attempt at correlation, and here, a bad write-up. The Atlantic article doesn't even define the key term of "politcal prejudice" while at the same time is quite comfortable describing specific counties populations as politically intolerant based on "political homogeneity" and fewer "cross-cutting relationships". If such prejudice can be assigned via homogenous neighborhood characteristics I'm curious how far the authors would extend this logic.

But get those clicks!

@16:

See @7...

Given one has to be morally bankrupt or completely stupid to be a Republican, It should not surprise anyone that most folks who don't already have to deal with them on a regular/personal basis, just don't want to do so anymore than they have to. As for the politically intolerant label, it's rather upside down given the unavailability of abortion services, voter suppression, war on drug, etc BS going on in red states.

A lame clickbait exercise in textbook garbage-in garbage-out statistical analysis that confirms our dreary, predictable contrarians priors? This post writes itself!

Every now and again I see a truck with a confederate flag driving around.

I mentally catalog that as a Confederate.

It’s helpful to do so.

One went by me the other day and I didn’t see because I was just walking, not paying attention. Black dude in a car calls me the n word, says something to me, and drives off.

I was kind of confused because I had no idea what he said to me but I saw the truck a block or so up and put it together.

The limp has something to do with it.

He said “So there are _ in Seattle”.

@7: Tolerance includes the acceptance of adversarial views to co-exist peacefully with yours so that your adversaries can do the same. If those views are legal, and not threatening your life, health, or property, then you can afford the graciousness and the civilly the moment demands.

Just a quick note about the methodology description in the article:

Obviously, a nationwide 2,000 interview survey wouldn't yield enough data to make such granular county comparisons on its own. Rather -- from what I can glean from Atlantic's description -- the initial survey simply identified the general demographic and geographic characteristics correlating heaviest with political intolerance. Then it looks like they modeled and analyzed the full, nationwide registered voter list (all 227+ million of us, presumably) to identify the counties with the heaviest concentrations of voters sharing those particular traits.

It seems to be a correlation of a correlation, more or less.

Well, my brother is a Trump loving Republican who volunteers at the Chamber of Commerce. As for me, I’m somewhere left of Rosa Luxemburg. Despite this, I love him more dearly than any other human being on Earth, and I always will. He’s been the only real friend I’ve ever had since the day I was born.

I don’t think he’s a bad person at all. I think he’s mistaken, and that’s okay. We’re all human, and we all make mistakes. We both have looked at the facts, and arrived at very different conclusions. This in no way implies that either of us is deficient in our mental capacity or moral character. It merely implies that we think differently.

Politics aside, he’s my own flesh and blood. Political opinions come and go, but family is forever. We don’t agree on much of anything politically, but one thing I hope we will always agree on is that.

I dunno if he reads the Stranger, or the comments section. If he does, he’ll probably recognize me just based on this post. I love you, my dear brother, and I always will. There is nothing you can do, or say, or think, that will ever change that.

Even if you’re completely wrong on the politics.

And you know what? I’m Seattle as hell. I love this city so much, I shit pine needles and glitter, I sweat coffee, and when I cry, what comes out has the same salinity as the waters off Alki Beach.

Step 1: Characterize all people in an out-group as bigots.

Step 2: Strenuously assert the need/right to suppress bigotry in any form.

Step 3 (optional): realize that Step 1 was a classic example of bigotry.

Keep doin' you, SLOG. You're all lovely people.

"If those views are legal, and not threatening your life, health, or property, then you can afford the graciousness and the civilly the moment demands."

So raindrop just said that Republicans have views that people don't need to be gracious or civil toward. Not that we need his permission to bash racists, misogynists, LGBTQphobes, et al., but cool.

"To do this assessment, PredictWise first partnered with Pollfish to run a nationwide poll of 2,000 adults to capture people’s feelings about the other party..."

That's 2 people for every 3 counties in America. That's quite an extrapolation. There's a 1-in-3 chance no one in King County was even polled.

Something I don't see addressed in the article is the fact that big cities, like Seattle, have a very high transplant rate. This is to say that it's not like your small town KY (where I grew up) where the overwhelming majority of residents live there because they were born there.
This means that a lot of people in Seattle came here with different ideas, and with greater exposure to people with different cultural and political backgrounds than somebody that never left their small town.

My personal anecdotal experience is that I left KY at 17, joined the military, and was very much a Bush supporter. Long story short, I ended up in Seattle and 18 years later I'm about as liberal as anybody gets.

I'm not misinformed about the people sitting on the other side of the political aisle. I know exactly who we're dealing with. I see their bigotry every day on my personal Facebook feed. I've got a brother who says he's never known a racist person, and he's the tolerant/educated one in my family. My sister's 2nd husband was a man whose favorite curse word was a combined racial and homophobic slur that I can't even type out for fear of being banned.

I agree that diversity is good, but I think it's important not to disregard the very real knowledge and lived experiences of people living in cities. They aren't intolerant because they don't know any better. They are intolerant because they do know better.

Since when does wanting my taxes to be reasonable, thinking citizens are better at making decisions than government and believing that welfare for the able-bodied is dehumanizing, make one a racist?

Well, Katie, maybe it has something to do with MAGA trash idiots like Joey Gibson and Matt Shea pushing hate rallies, or the dolt who made a pilgrimage all the way from Chicago to Seattle last summer wearing his MAGA cap proudly--something he stubbornly felt took courage. All those who worship Trumpty Dumpty and believe all its lies and propaganda are nothing other than sanctimonious, racist, xenophobic, homophobic, misogynist, and capitalist neo-fascist RepubliKKKan garbage. I have zero tolerance for such toxic waste. Tough shit.

@28: It doesn't make you a racist at all but your question was too delicious a layup for blip.

@8 Original Andrew for the WIN!!! Bravo!
@11 originalcinner: Agreed and seconded. I am SO fucking glad I got rid of my TV years ago and avoid Twitter.
@16 Whoa Nellie: You must be losing vital brain tissue by the day. Get help.
@23 Wandering Stars: While I salute your open mindedness, I could never be around your brother. Especially if he so strongly believes that Donald Trump, Mike Pence, Brett Kavanaugh, Joey Gibson, Matt Shea, and those like them are right.

This is exactly the kind of article that should be both-siderist, Katie. Don't ask King County residents to be introspective and be more accepting of opinions of others in the state if you don't ask folks in Clark, Spokane, Yakima counties to do the same.

Many moderates and conservatives live in Seattle and surrounding towns and cities. Some despise Trump and the hard religious right. Some have been liberals; some are growing more liberal; some synthesize from diverse sources to develop their own philosophy; some have quit the Republican Party to protest Trump's ascendancy. They do not need to be treated like curious zoo creatures by liberals out to mimic open-minded discussion by saying hello at a party but privately dismissing their views as "wrong" and "stupid." The tragedy here is that Trump and many of his followers traffic in the same kind of ugly stereotyping and simplistic blaming as many on the left do--different ideology but same psychology. Here's to the courage of the true philosopher to consider diverse viewpoints, to risk peer rejection, to risk sabotaging one's career--for the sake of developing a culture that encourages thoughtful debate. That's missing. And, Katie, The Stranger has been calling moderates and conservatives "assholes," "pig fuckers," "shitheads," "fucking bigots" for many, many years--and with righteous impunity, as if in declaring someone else a "racist" or "corporate asshole" they validate their left-wing street cred for friends to see so they, God forbid, are not suspected of daring to have a conservative thought now and then (oh, the horror). Here are some radical, radical ideas: I might be wrong. I need to question. I need to ask and research and test, and even then I might to do more of the same. That kind of philosophical humility is where to start, not simply mimicking tolerance by having a friendly chit-chat moment with a conservative. And that's where The Stranger has been lacking, what its sanctimonious mockery of anyone who disagrees with its views or does not impress its "Control Board."

Maybe it’s that we just accept the fact that Republicans are horrible people.

In an article about political intolerance, "...there are plenty reasons to assume republicans are hucksters and racists..."

@39: That's copasetic. Tolerance can include associating unpleasant adjectives with whom you find objectionable.

Oh. Jesus. Another litany of straw men and fallacies.

Ever hear of the Tolerance Paradox? Of course not. Look it up.

We have just seen the right tilt faaaaar right. It’s not some disagreement about tax policies or government regulations. The so-called Conservative party in this country officially adopted platforms that seek to strip rights from thier fellow citizens and at best offer apologia for out-and-proud white supremacists and at worst openly embrace them as elected representatives. Stop pretending that Seattle is just a meanie leftist echo chamber when it’s ONLY the left even held to this standard at all.

Go on. Go to a right leaning outlet and even attempt to counter the orthodoxy. Even with the best of intentions and tolerance you will get your ass booted immediately. Go to one of the Pro-Trump subreddits. Go on. Test your theory out.

Meanwhile SLOG has been completely brigaded by rightwing trolls for the last four years - like almost every other internet space. Because they don’t give a shit about your tolerance unless they can weaponize it against you.

North Carolina?

I guess you can pretend to be tolerant when you are actually oppressing minorities.

WE'RE NOT A HIVE MIND OF PAROCHIAL ELITIST SNOBS MASQUERADING BEHIND A CYNICAL VENEER OF TOLERANCE AND LOVE! FUCK YOU!111111

LoveTrumpsHate

All you need to know comes from reading the comments. I miss Seattle as a city, but I'm so glad I left the hive mind. (I'm still very liberal, by the way. Just don't like the lack of discourse in Seattle.)

Rodney king asked why cant we all just get along.

My willingness to be tolerant starts or stops with the other person's intentions. If they hold ideas that seek to obliterate another person's rights (such as anti-choice, homophobes who believe gay people should be killed and/or converted, or that Jewish people control the world and should be exterminated) then I am not going to tolerate that. Breaking down our current problems to individual feelings is a pretty basic mistake too, as anyone who has more than a passing connection to reality would know. It's a systemic problem in many instances.

@44: That's perfectly reasonable.

I think that all that can be expected is to politely engage with those of adversarial viewpoints (whom also extend the same respect and courtesy) for an interesting, informative, and possibly constructive results.

"prejudiced against the political other"

What do you mean by prejudiced? Republicans elect Trump but thinking that Republicans are racist is prejudiced? what planet do you live on?

"leftist utopia"

Seattle? People who say that typically also think that Clinton is a socialist which places them somewhere not too far to the left of Attila The Hun.

Anthropomorhpise Me, Prior to the 60's, Seattle was "liberal" only in the sense that it was generally pro-labor because of the large manufacturing employment base. The echoes of McCarthyism were strong here, lasted several decades, and included gems like the Canwell Hearings of the late 40's, which terrorized the faculty of the UW and destroyed the lives of several locals. City employees were expected to sign "loyalty oaths" as a condition of employment and, as you note, discrimination was rampant in every facet of life, including the labor unions.

This started to change with the rise of Asian and African-American politicians such as Ruby Chow, Wing Luke and Sam Smith, and the sudden prominence of Seattle bought about by the Century 21 exposition.

As the sixties progressed, Seattle - like most west coast cities - became a place for young people who rejected their parents values to migrate to. This caused some strife in the city, but the UW was a major influence in shaping the city in that era.

As the 70's came about, and Seattle's economy collapsed, there was increased interest in social programs and progressive movements, such as the Forward Thrust initiatives. From there, technology became the new driver of the economy, bringing with it people from diverse walks of life who recognized the value of education and diversity. Unfortunately with that came "gentrification", which had both winners and losers - if you owned your house in a neighborhood like the CD, you had a goldmine. If you rented, you were most likely displaced.

Times change, cities change, and politics change. You can blame "liberals" all you want, but a lot of the blame can be placed at the feet of Republicans, who essentially gave up and settled for novelty candidates like noted bible-addled nitwit Ellen Craswell.

This thread proves itself

@53: Didn't even take an hour.

Republicans elected Trump by mistake. Don't blame them for agreeing with him or you just might hurt their little fee-fees.

"We need to scrap the two party system and look to multiparty parliamentary systems so real people in between the madness on the edges can be heard."

@47 -- As someone on the leftist Edge of the Madness,* I say that's a BINGO, Mellow.
Plus, give us ranked-choice Voting.

*didja know, Jesus was a Socialist, too?
True Story.

It's mildly amusing to see the very same people who come here to defend Trump's actions every day, claim that liberals are bigots for being intolerant of bigotry. You know just like they claim liberals are racist for pointing out systemic racism and just like liberals must hate men for pointing out rape culture. Clearly, we are dealing with geniuses.

All you have to do is read the comments here to prove the point. How long until this rag folds too?

I didn't realize there were so many Republicans who didn't vote for a blatantly racist xenophobe. It just explains why he didn't get elected.

Better dead than (live in a) Red (State)

The internet has warped our culture. It seems fitting, in a sad way, that a city that can claim multiple tech companies as it’s economic base, should experience that warp to such a degree.

Other cultures consider the eyes the windows to the human soul. When you only interact with others from behind a computer screen, how can you look into those windows of the soul?

It’s easy to dehumanize people you cannot look in the face. It’s also easy to see the world in terms of absolute concepts, to become harsh and unforgiving, intolerant and unable to see shades or gradations.

They’ve done this to us too, and that further lends itself to the instinctive, natural response to punch back at those who have punched us. It takes an act of supreme will against all human nature to resist the urge to beat someone down if they take obvious joy from the act of beating you down, doesn’t it?

Not everything that comes naturally is good. Deadly nightshade, for example, is 100% natural. So is foxglove, and a species of mushroom known as the ‘avenging angel’, or another called the ‘death cap’. I do not recommend these as salad ingredients, despite their completely organic quality. Remember that cyanide is also a product of nature.

Sometimes, you have to do that which runs contrary to human nature to survive. To resist the urge to dehumanize those who have dehumanized you, especially when they exist mostly as abstract concepts, mere lines of text on a computer screen and maybe a jpg and not much more than that, is difficult, yet necessary. If we do what comes more naturally, we run the risk of becoming the very monsters we despise.

Close your laptop. Put away that organic salad. Go for a walk. While ambulatory, look a human in the eyes. Stop then, and have a real, human conversation;. Rehumanize yourself.

This comment thread shows how many hijack the academics of the debate just to grind their axes.

Anthropomorhpise Me, are you suggesting that no people of color profited from the gentrification of the Central District? Should those homeowners of color have refused to sell to white people and instead sold to other people of color, even if it meant less profit? Should white people sell their homes at less than market value to prove their wokeness? Is one’s real estate transactions the only proof of liberal authenticity?

You make no sense, dear.

@62: very well said. Thank you. And, of course, one can still have and express strong opinions. But remember to listen, too. It's okay to acknowledge if one is wrong; it's okay to acknowledge an "enemy" makes a good point occasionally or is fundamentally a good person. It's okay to admit and espouse a conservative or liberal opinion your friends denigrate. Changing your mind doesn't make you a traitor, compromising wimp, coward, "RINO," "DINO," or "sell-out." Perhaps life is, indeed, complex, and it is healthy to experience doubt, wonderment, and curiosity, even if friends and peers disapprove. Don't be intimidated by the name-callers and reductive labelers. Stay honest, authentic, empathetic.

@60: Yes, devout Republicans, like myself, voted for Mrs. Clinton in 2016.

Study is dumb, The Stranger hot take is dumb, 90 percent of the comments are dumb. I'm more interested in what THAT says about King County.

Also, Trump is a dumb cunt and so is the entirety of his base. I guess I'm intolerant of dumb fucks.

Nothing says "I'm right and you're wrong" quite like all caps, don't you agree @41?
/sarcasm
/because republicans can't tell it's sarcasm

The entire premise and conclusions of this and the original Atlantic article is absurd. According to Wikipedia, "As of 2016, there were 3,007 counties, 64 parishes, 19 organized boroughs, 10 census areas, 41 independent cities". With a sample size of 2,000 people, more than a third of the counties weren't even surveyed if the respondents were distributed geographically, and almost all weren't if they were distributed by population.
There is no way anyone can come to the conclusion from this data that the least tolerant communities "tend to be whiter, more highly educated, older, more urban, and more partisan themselves." Due to racism more highly educated people, unfortunately, tend to be whiter. They also tend to be older as it takes years to earn a degree.
The only conclusion one can come to from this survey is that people with more education don't like the opinions of people with less education. To which I say "as it should be", and, "duh."

71
You evidently equate being educated with the attainment of degrees.
Silly boy.

@27 Understood, but it's an extremely broad claim for their sample size (they literally show every district covered in the article). Surveying 2,000 people in King County alone would barely tell the story.

@36 Catalina Vel-DuRay: Thanks. Spot on and seconded.
@47: Get your shots and a flea bath already, muffy (my middle finger is pointing at you, too, sweetie. XO).
@53 & @54: And yet here you are. Go take a look in your bathroom mirrors.
@56 kristofarian: While I cannot agree with the vituperative muffy @AK47, I concur with you that ALL of U.S. citizens need to be equally represented and heard. And that RepubliKKKans are truly horrible people.
@61 tempur_tempur: For the WIN!

@AK47: Trigger much?

Washington’s 8th Legislative District, which covers most of King County, just elected their first EVER Democratic Representative (with every previous representative being Republican)... but yeah they’re totally all far-left liberal hippies out there

@52 Catalina Vel-DuRay: Spot on, bravo, and thank you yet again for another further enlightening Seattle history lesson (more on the years prior to LBJ are additionally helpful for me, as I didn't come along until the mid 1960s; I'm among the last of the Boomers).

I knew the prejudice would be strong in this comment thread and I wasn’t wrong. Very disappointing though really many of the comments here prove the point of the article perfectly. Also “white trash,” is a racial slur and the hypocrisy is killing me.