Last week, while everyone was frantically hitting refresh, I came upon a post from Latif Nasser showing how a crest of consistently blue-voting counties from Arkansas to the Carolinas lines up perfectly with the shoreline of North America during the Cretaceous Era. The links? Being underwater ➡️ fertile soil ➡️ farmlands ➡️ slavery & sharecropping ➡️ high Black populations today.
(Look this up, it’s fascinating!)
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Maps tell stories, which is why I’m kinda obsessed with them and could stare at them all day. Even when they aren’t electoral maps! In fact, I’d say the red-and-blue one we’ve all been staring at isn’t the best storyteller.
If you were to grab three West Virginians, odds are, one voted for Biden. Statistically. But you probably wouldn’t expect that if you automatically see red with West Virginia. The reverse it true for a consistent blue state like Oregon. Mississippi has a wall of blue counties, roughly 4x the amount of blue counties in the state of New York.
Why does this stuff matter, beyond reminding us of the Electoral College’s shortfalls?
🔵🔴 If we do need a road that leads us away from the divisive, polarized climate right now, research shows that the binary red-and-blue map increases perceptions of polarization and political stereotyping, versus more accurate purple maps.
🔵🔴 These maps also lead to the erasure of organizers who work to mobilize voters and participants in communities in states where we have the most stereotypical views. We saw the impact of Black women in Georgia and Navajo leaders in Arizona. There are many others creating movement in Missouri, Alabama, Texas, and many other places. When their efforts are ignored by a national audience, it becomes easier for their urges to be ignored by national leaders.
🔵🔴 And ideological stereotyping allows us to paint places with a broad brush, envisioning the South as racist while ignoring the problems in our own backyard. I’m writing this from California where this happens alllll the time. Like @Chimamanda_Adichie’s TED Talk points out, there’s danger to telling a singular story.