Dehumanizing groups of Americans has allowed Trump, MAGA, and Neoliberals to take power.

Dehumanizing Americans was the tool Trump, MAGA, and Neoliberals used to take power, and in the process, are decimating our government to empower the oligarchs.

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Dehumanizing groups of Americans

Podcasts (Video — Audio)

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Summary

The host argues that right-wing politicians, MAGA media, and neoliberal elites keep power by systematically dehumanizing women, immigrants, Palestinians, Black Americans, and other marginalized groups; this erosion of empathy distracts voters from overwhelmingly popular progressive economic demands and normalizes cruelty that enriches the powerful.

• Dehumanization is a deliberate psychological tool that turns public anger away from corporate exploitation and toward scapegoated communities.

• Trump’s branding of immigrants as “rapists,” Israel’s portrayal of Palestinians as less than human, and police narratives about “dangerous” Black people all follow the same playbook.

• Media misinformation machines perpetuate these myths, while progressive voices must counter them with patience, facts, and human stories, rather than ridicule.

• Even many self-identified progressives unwittingly harbor misogyny, racism, or xenophobia; dismantling those biases requires intentional personal work.

• Building durable solidarity means centering on shared material struggles, such as low wages and unaffordable healthcare, while refusing to let cultural wedge issues fracture the majority.

A just society rejects scapegoating and stands up for the full humanity of every neighbor. Progressives must lead by exposing dehumanizing rhetoric, amplifying stories of mutual aid across lines of race and nation, and organizing around the bread-and-butter policies that the vast majority already supports.

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Premium Content (Complimentary)

Donald Trump, the MAGA movement that props him up, and the neoliberal elites who bankroll and flatter them all prosper because they methodically strip humanity from the people standing in their way. When progressives note that solid majorities support a higher minimum wage, universal healthcare, affordable housing, and climate action, they confront an obvious mystery: if the electorate already wants a progressive agenda, why do reactionaries keep winning? The answer lies less in policy disagreement than in a well-honed strategy of dehumanization that fractures potential coalitions before they ever coalesce. By persuading one anxious constituency that some other group—immigrants, women, Palestinians, Black Americans, the poor—does not fully count as “us,” reactionary politicians shrink the moral circle and muffle empathy. Once empathy is gone, cruelty becomes a selling point rather than a scandal.

Polling illustrates the raw potential for multiracial, cross-class solidarity. A 2024 Data for Progress survey found that more than 80 percent of voters—including large majorities of Republicans—believe the current $7.25 federal minimum wage “is too low” and support a substantial increase. Similarly, broad support is evident for paid family leave, higher taxes on the wealthy, and Medicare for All. Yet the right wins elections by shifting the conversation away from material concerns and toward cultural flashpoints infused with coded contempt. Social-psychological research confirms that when political rhetoric labels targeted groups as less than fully human—“vermin,” “animals,” “thugs”—listeners grow more willing to endorse repression, deportation, and even lethal violence.

Trump’s 2015 campaign-launch diatribe remains the template. He declared that Mexican migrants “bring drugs… bring crime… are rapists,” a claim repeatedly debunked but endlessly recycled, because it performs the essential act of lowering the perceived human status of its targets. Once migrants are “rapists,” caging children or denying asylum hearings becomes normal policy, not moral calamity. The pattern repeats with women. A Manhattan jury concluded in 2023 that Trump sexually abused and defamed writer E. Jean Carroll; rather than end his career, the verdict barely dented his primary polling, because years of sexist messaging trained followers to treat women’s suffering as background noise. The Washington Post

Abroad, dehumanization reaches genocidal intensity. Since Israel’s assault on Gaza began in October 2023, independent trackers have documented more than 60,000 Palestinian deaths and tens of thousands more injuries, the overwhelming majority civilian. The scale would spark global outrage were Palestinians granted equal moral standing. Yet, MAGA influencers and their neoliberal enablers echo Israeli talking points that conflate an entire occupied population with the militants who struck on October 7. When people absorb that framing, they treat mass bombardment as regrettable “collateral damage” instead of mass slaughter.

The same technique underwrites domestic policy. Falsely branding welfare recipients as lazy “takers” justifies shredding food assistance; portraying public-sector unions as selfish “special interests” paves the way for austerity; describing urban neighborhoods as war zones validates militarized policing. Each rhetorical move shrinks sympathy and enlarges the space for profit extraction—privatized prisons, charter-school networks, fossil-fuel leases—favored by corporate neoliberalism. In this sense, MAGA authoritarianism and Clinton-era market fundamentalism operate as two sides of one coin: both depend on convincing a precarious majority to look down on someone else rather than look up at concentrated wealth and power.

Breaking the cycle demands more than fact-checking. Facts matter, but empathy mobilizes. Progressive communicators must name dehumanization when they see it, connect every slur to the policy violence it enables, and then invite listeners into a larger “we.” That means highlighting shared economic grievances—stagnant wages, unaffordable health care—and demonstrating how scapegoating immigrants or queer people leaves those grievances unsolved. At the same time, billionaires laugh all the way to the bank. It means telling richer, more inclusive stories about America’s multiracial past and possible future, so that viewers do not default to the zero-sum myths they have been sold. It also means modeling respectful engagement, even with misinformed callers, because every recovered neighbor is one fewer recruit for dehumanizing crusades.

The good news is that the public’s moral imagination remains plastic. The same survey data showing support for progressive economics also shows that attitudes toward immigrants, trans people, and Palestinians improve when respondents hear firsthand stories or see imagery that affirms common humanity. The task, then, is relentless humanization: amplify migrant nurses who kept hospitals running during the COVID-19 pandemic; uplift Black entrepreneurs revitalizing Main Streets; platform Gaza doctors treating children by flashlight; and celebrate white rural voters who are unionizing Amazon warehouses. Each vignette erodes the false walls erected by demagogues, reminding audiences that the destinies of all working people are intertwined.

Ultimately, dehumanization thrives on silence and complacency. Progressives can win, and the country can heal, only if they speak about dignity as loudly and creatively as the right talks about contempt. The math already favors solidarity. The morality does, too. What remains is to bring both into noisy, unmistakable alignment—so that the next time a would-be ruler calls another human being an “animal,” the crowd refuses to cheer and instead walks away together toward something better.

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