Odd little survey. The Cato Institute looked at the “walking on eggshells” thesis. They asked if people tend to self-censor their political views for fear that expressing them could negatively impact their lives. Cato finds “the political climate these days” keeps 62% of us from saying things others might find offensive.
Cato slices its data this way and that, comparing liberals to conservatives, the less-educated to the better, the young to the old, etc. The article spreads a lot of pixels fretting about how people now feel less free to express their political opinions at work for fear of financial penalty:
Americans with diverse backgrounds share this concern that their employment could be adversely affected if their political views were discovered: 38% of Hispanic Americans, 22% of African Americans, 31% of White Americans, 35% of men, 27% of women, 36% of households earning less than $20,000 a year, and 33% of households earning more than $100,000 a year agree.
Self‐censorship is apparently “on the rise” in the U.S. We know because Cato tracks these feelings all the way back to 2017.
A particularly surprising finding was that Americans who have these concerns are somewhat more likely to support the firing of Biden or Trump donors. A third (33%) among those who worry that their political views could harm their employment supported firing either Biden or Trump donors, compared to 24% of those who were not worried about their views impacting their jobs. This suggests that those who fear reprisal or economic penalty for their political views are not entirely distinct from those who seek the same for others.
Okay, that is surprising. Charles Koch’s libertarian think tank presents its other findings as somehow aberrant and a threat to free expression. But how many people feel free to discuss their religion at work? Their sexual fantasies?
Having a degree of self‐censorship is part of being a mature, well-adjusted adult. It likely was so long before 2017. We have no way of knowing from Cato’s surveys whether or not 62% of people feeling a need to self‐censor certain views is what we once called normal.
Futurist Sara Robinson (formally of Orcinus and AlterNet) posted observations on the Cato survey to Facebook:
Lots of stuff in the article that’s worth consideration, not least the tremendous political, economic, and cultural costs to the country that come when people can’t trust each other enough to say what they’re honestly thinking. I know that I’ve got a long and growing list of stuff that I shut up about, and the list of people I’m willing to open up with is getting shorter just about as fast. The loss to everyone is real, and it’s a discussion worth having.
But the other part that struck me was that, being Cato, they also played up the research showing how many Democrats won’t hire a Trump voter — and strongly implied that this was about anti-Trump bigotry. I think that’s wrong — for reasons that I’m frankly surprised that Cato, of all orgs, missed. Let me explain.
As an employer, I have a legal obligation to provide my workers with a safe workplace where they can do their jobs free of harassment and bigotry. If I fail, I can be sued, so there’s serious liability attached here.
If I hire a Trump follower, that liability goes straight to 11. How can I convince my female employees that they’ll be safe if I hire someone who thinks it’s fine for a man to grab a woman by the pussy? How do I look my Iranian clients in the eye after I bring in an employee who approved of the Muslim ban? What can I say to reassure my Jewish staffers when I’ve put their futures in the hands of a supervisor who agrees that the Charlottesville mob included “some very fine people”? What do I tell our Mexican-American vendors when they have to deal with someone who’s cool with seizing their nieces and nephews and sticking them in baby cages?
This isn’t hypothetical. These are the precise questions my employees’ attorneys will ask in court if I hire a Trumper who harasses them on my dime and my time. That attorney can argue that I have full liability for this situation, because I should have known better. And if I knew up front that this person supported Trump, that inference wouldn’t be far wrong.
You don’t need to be a bigot to steer clear of these people. All you need is enough common business sense to keep a potential walking EEOC complaint off your payroll in the first place. These attitudes have no place in the context of a modern business, and people who are likely to drag them in should rightly be considered too risky to hire.
I named my first blog Undercover Blue because working at the time in the reddest part of South Carolina I kept my politics to myself. Dittoheads in the office 25 years ago listened to El Rushbo on headphones and (wisely) pretty much kept their opinions out of the aisles. More to the point, our employers were not paying us to stand around the coffee pot discussing politics and we didn’t. That wasn’t self-censorship as much as being responsible employees.
Still, I wrote under my own name while regularly employed for a decade and a half: online, in the newspaper, and here. Any H.R. staffer with limited Google skills could find me and in seconds know my politics. But I had a rarefied skill and a reputation for being good at my job, reliable, and easy to get along with. And since I kept to work at work, I never caught any blowback even in Trey Gowdy’s backyard.
A psychologist friend had a father who was a hoarder decades before the condition had a TV show. At her wedding reception, it became instantly clear her sister had no “filter.” She blurted out whatever came into her head, no matter how creepy. I kept my distance and have no idea how she made her living.
Update: In this context, how could I forget to mention Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s (D-NY) smackdown of Rep. Ted Yoho (R-FL) and his filterless ilk?
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Note: The pandemic will upend standard field tactics in 2020. If enough promising “improvisations” come my way, perhaps I can issue a COVID-19 supplement.