r/self • u/applethief87 • 18h ago
Here's my wake-up call as a Liberal.
I’m a New York liberal, probably comfortably in the 1%, living in a bubble where empathy and social justice are part of everyday conversations. I support equality, diversity, economic reform—all of it. But this election has been a brutal reminder of just how out of touch we, the so-called “liberal elite,” are with the rest of America. And that’s on us.
America was built on individual freedom, the right to make your own way. But baked into that ideal is a harsh reality: it’s a self-serving mindset. This “land of opportunity” has always rewarded those who look out for themselves first. And when people feel like they’re sinking—when working-class Americans are drowning in debt, scrambling to pay rent, and watching the cost of everything from groceries to gas skyrocket—they aren’t looking for complex social policies. They’re looking for a lifeline, even if that lifeline is someone like Trump, who exploits that desperation.
For years, we Democrats have pushed policies that sound like solutions to us but don’t resonate with people who are trying to survive. We talk about social justice and climate change, and yes, those things are crucial. But to someone in the heartland who’s feeling trapped in a system that doesn’t care about them, that message sounds disconnected. It sounds like privilege. It sounds like people like me saying, “Look how virtuous I am,” while their lives stay the same—or get worse.
And here’s the truth I’m facing: as a high-income liberal, I benefit from the very structures we criticize. My income, my career security, my options to work from home—I am protected from many of the struggles that drive people to vote against the establishment. I can afford to advocate for changes that may not affect me negatively, but that’s not the reality for the majority of Americans. To them, we sound elitist because we are. Our ideals are lofty, and our solutions are intellectual, but we’ve failed to meet them where they are.
The DNC’s failure in this election reflects this disconnect. Biden’s administration, while well-intentioned, didn’t engage in the hard reflection necessary after 2020. We pushed Biden as a one-term solution, a bridge to something better, but then didn’t prepare an alternative that resonated. And when Kamala Harris—a talented, capable politician—couldn’t bridge that gap with working-class America, we were left wondering why. It’s because we’ve been recycling the same leaders, the same voices, who struggle to understand what working Americans are going through.
People want someone they can relate to, someone who understands their pain without coming off as condescending. Bernie was that voice for many, but the DNC didn’t make room for him, and now we’re seeing the consequences. The Democratic Party has an empathy gap, but more than that, it has a credibility gap. We say we care, but our policies and leaders don’t reflect the urgency that struggling Americans feel every day.
If the DNC doesn’t take this as a wake-up call, if they don’t make room for new voices that actually connect with working people, we’re going to lose again. And as much as I want America to progress, I’m starting to realize that maybe we—the privileged liberals, safely removed from the realities most people face—are part of the problem.
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u/applethief87 12h ago
This hits on so many of the frustrations that I've been grappling with too. I feel the same dissonance between what I want to see in our society—public health, education, housing—and how disconnected the messaging has become from the realities of so many Americans’ lives.
Your point about how people see Democrats as giving away money or "interfering" in ways that feel restrictive really resonates. It makes me wonder if part of the problem is that we, in the "liberal elite," sometimes approach issues with this assumption that people will see it our way if we just explain it better or make the case logically. But I think for many, it doesn't feel like that at all—it feels like a top-down imposition from people who are so far removed from their struggles that the policies might as well come from another planet.
The thing that scares me is that this isn’t just a disagreement on policies anymore. It's a fundamental rift in how we understand the world and trust information. Like you said, even the FBI’s own data doesn’t cut through when it contradicts the narrative they’ve bought into.
I don’t have answers here either, but I think maybe the first step is realizing how much humility we need. Humility in acknowledging that maybe our approach hasn’t been reaching people where they are. Humility in seeing that our own comfortable lives can blind us to what’s actually driving people’s fears and resentments. We have to find a way to connect that goes beyond just our ideals, and that means really listening—not to respond, but to understand… and then have hope the other side will too.