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Matt Katz: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Welcome back, everybody. I'm Matt Katz, reporter in the WNYC newsroom, filling in for Brian today. Now, a call in for young people who are actively dating. Let's say those of you in your 20s, 30s, have you had a hard time finding someone to date who you align with politically? 212-433-9692. Polls show young women are trending more Democratic, and young men are increasingly leaning to the right.
How has this dynamic affected your dating life? We want to know how your politics factor into your relationships, especially for young people. 212-433-9692. You can give us a call, you can text us. 212-433-9692.
We're talking about this because one of our producers saw an article in the Wall Street Journal, which reported that young men under 30, according to polls are skewing increasingly conservative, young women are much more likely to vote for Democrats. This is a trend, it's increasing. 20 somethings in the dating scene, if you've noticed this, give us a call 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692.
Some important background is that voters under 30 have been a pretty unwavering pillar of the Democratic electorate since the late '80s when Reagan left office. It's pretty noticeable that young men have recently been defecting. They're becoming more conservative and the Wall Street Journal gets into a whole slew of reasons for this, including a response to wokeness, a sense that white men are demonized, men specifically are demonized.
Listeners, especially young people, we want to hear from you. How has this dynamic affected your dating lives, your romantic relationships, maybe your friendships? Have you seen a noticeable difference over the past few years? It's also important to know this shift toward Trump among young men isn't among just white men who have historically leaned Republican, it also includes Black and Latino men.
Before Biden ended his bid for reelection earlier this month, the Wall Street Journal found that Trump was winning support from a majority of men under 30. If that stays true on Election Day, it would be the first time the Republican Party won that demographic, young men in over two decades. The Trump campaign has found a lot of success in framing Trump as something of an antihero, and that's clearly very appealing to a lot of young men who feel like they've been left out of the narrative or marginalized by progressive politics, by what they would call woke politics. Those who feel abandoned by the Democratic Party for that reason and others.
Several of the men who were quoted in this Wall Street Journal article, they said they hide their conservative views when looking for a partner because women they know have said that they won't date right-leaning men. Also, listeners, if you're a Democrat, who will date a Republican, but maybe only if they repudiate Trump or maybe you're a Republican, who will date a Democrat if they let's say oppose socialism.
Are there any of those folks out there? We're opening this up to anybody who wants to talk about what it's like to be in a relationship to date at this time of such hyperpartisanship. Give us a call 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692. One other thing, the calls are flowing in I'm told but one other thing before we get to the calls is the issue involving reproductive rights. The headline of this Wall Street Journal article was "America's new political war pits young men against young women."
One of the main reasons it cites for women moving further left is reproductive rights. Women are leaning more to the left on issues like LGBTQ rights and childcare. Democratic messaging on these issues appears to be resonating more with women than men. The Trump campaign is definitely appealing to a kind of traditionalism when it comes to gender dynamics, a return to masculinity as a thing to be celebrated.
This was something that was evident at the Republican National Convention. We've heard some rhetoric to this regard from Vice presidential nominee J.D. Vance. This is a dynamic out there and our lines are open for a highly informal poll to figure out if this is a dynamic that is occurring here in the New York area. Again, give us a call, text us your story, 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692.
I want to quote one piece of this article here. "Young men now favor Republican control of Congress and Trump for president after backing President Biden and Democratic lawmakers just four years ago and 2020." Meanwhile, women under 30 remain strongly behind Democrats for Congress and the White House. They're also far more likely to call themselves liberal than they were two decades ago. Give us a buzz 212-433-WNYC. That's 212-433-9692. Matt Katz, filling in for Brian Lehrer today. We are taking your calls on dating as political affiliations between young men and young women.
Maybe there's other reasons why you're having difficulties out there in the dating scene, but if politics is one of those reasons, give us a buzz. I'm sure it has to be for someone. I believe we have a couple of callers coming in right now, but let's take a quick break, and then we'll go back to the phone lines. This is Matt Katz, I'm filling in for Brian Lehrer today, and we will take your calls right after this.
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It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Welcome back, everybody. I'm Matt Katz, filling in for Brian. We are talking in the last few minutes of today's show about how political polarization affects dating life. Let's go to the phone lines. Adam in Toms River. Hi, Adam. Thanks for calling in.
Adam: Hi. How are doing?
Matt Katz: Great.
Adam: I noticed amongst my peers that some of them are far left and far right. I'm pursuing a relationship right now. I guess it's easier to be independent rather than far left or far right and observe how things are going because it's sometimes just way too far left or far right.
Matt Katz: It's easier you mean if you're starting a relationship to espouse independent centrist political views. Is that what you're saying?
Adam: Respecting how the left looks at things, and how the right looks at things, just looking at things from an independent perspective, makes it easier to just have a relationship, and there not be so much disagreement. Even with Trump, and what he believes, it's easier to have a conversation really from an independent perspective, even though it doesn't really get looked at as much as either side.
Matt Katz: Thank you, Adam. Good advice. Appreciate it. Let's go to Tom in Columbus, Ohio. Hi, Tom.
Tom: Hey, thanks for taking my call.
Matt Katz: Sure.
Tom: I'm a 27-year-old, I am a registered Republican, and I definitely have noticed on the dating apps, specifically girls will have written in their bios that they don't even want to get a message from anyone who's a Republican. I think it's sad because we see this kind of polarization in a lot of different levels in our society these days. I don't know if that's necessarily a good thing to just have these prerequisites which honestly seem arbitrary at a certain point.
Matt Katz: Reply real quick. I'm curious, will you just blow it off if somebody says, "I only want to talk to a particular type of person." Does that say to you, "I don't want to communicate with them."
Tom: Yes because it's especially hard on online to break through that barrier if they've got it set up. You don't really get a chance to.
Matt Katz: Thank you, Tom. Appreciate it. Thanks, everybody for listening and calling in. I'm Matt Katz. This has been The Brian Lehrer Show. It's been fun sitting in. Stay tuned for All Of It.
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