THIS is xenophobia!

Gee whiz, this was an ugly election season.  I even stayed up until the results were announced so I could be sure it was finally over (not wanting a repeat of 2000).  Now we can all take a deep breath and return to our normal lives, right?

Not so fast.  Hillary supporters are demonstrating in the streets, tweeting vile comments and posting articles hysterically predicting doom for the country and claiming that every female in the USA must fear for her safety.

From what I read, Facebook has been burning with inflammatory comments.  (I have seen a few that were extreme, but none so bad that I felt I needed to "unfriend" the writer.)  I have read opinion columns by syndicated columnists and by Hollywood celebrities that paint a dystopian picture that is completely at odds with the daily lives of most Americans.  They read as if laws were repealed, convicts released, and open season was declared on sex crimes and crimes of violence on Wednesday morning November 10th.

Much more measured were columns in the New Republic by David Dayen  and The Guardian by Thomas Frank.  There was acknowledgement that liberal elites and the media (redundant, I know) completely misunderstand the fervor that underlay the Trump campaign.

When Trump had the temerity to discredit the Gold Star parents and speak about banning Muslims from immigrating to the U.S., the word "xenophobia" gained currency -- and rightly so.  Far too many Americans are fearful of Muslims because of radical Islamic terrorism.  Far too few Americans encounter Muslims on a regular basis.  Those who work with, attend school with, live next door to Muslim Americans tend to recognize them as people not unlike themselves.

Diversity has been a value pursued in academia and in many businesses for this very reason.  Associating with people unlike ourselves -- racially, culturally, religiously and otherwise -- enriches everyone.

I am grateful to have learned this lesson first hand.  I attended elementary school with African-American kids.  My high school had a high percentage of Jewish students, as well as African-Americans.  (Apart from one family of migrant farm workers who settled permanently, I had no such exposure to Hispanics, though.)  As a college student and young adult, I encountered other people who were different than I.

As a result, I am accustomed to engaging in polite, respectful dialogue to explain my position on an issue and listen to the positions of others.  I have even, until the last Presidential cycle, enjoyed spirited discussion of political differences.  It has been different this time, for the following reasons.

1.  The candidates -- and their supporters -- made it personal.  Both Clinton and Trump attacked their opponent's morality, honesty, competence, trustworthiness, etc.  Is it any wonder, then, that the post-election dialogue continues that pattern by attacking the person who voted for ______ as stupid, blind, deluded, or even un-Christian?

2.  The news media, in pursuit of ratings, circulation or clicks, latch onto the most controversial and inflammatory aspects of the campaign and give exposure to even the most lurid 'news items.'  So supporters of one candidate have explosive accusations to lob at the opposition, and will continue those attacks even when the initial item has been refuted or explained.

3.  Social media has depreciated the value of truth and civility.  Twitter and Facebook have provided a means for the most outrageous "information" to get wide exposure.  For example, there was a piece circulating that quoted Tim Kaine as proposing to ban the Catholic Church from the U.S.  It was written as satire, but because it began with a legitimate quote, it appeared genuine. It was shared by two of my Facebook friends, not realizing that it was bogus.

4.  Most importantly, though, I think is the xenophobia that exists in the news media and other parts of the opinion-shaping, policy-making elite.  Fox News' Tucker Carlson pointed out that none of the Washington DC/New York City news media have a clue what motivates the voters in Oshkosh or Terre Haute.  (They may not even know they are real places with real voters!) And it is my assessment that this cultural ignorance leads to a fear of those citizens.  Racial hatred against Hispanics, not economic self-interest, must motivate someone who worries about the impact of illegal immigration because his job has been lost or wages lowered.  The NRA member who keeps guns for hunting or for self-defense cannot be appalled by Sandy Hook or Charleston shootings.  If you support the police when Black Lives Matter foments violence, you must be a racist.  If you believe in traditional marriage, you hate gays.  Apparently, these liberal elites do not believe it is possible to hold views that differ from their own and still love and accept blacks, Hispanics, LGBT+ people, Muslims, etc.

Xenophobia -- fear of the stranger.  Yes, there are white working-class voters who never encounter people of color, of other nationalities or languages, or LGBT+ folk on a regular basis; but with immigration, migration, and transience that number is much lower than the coastal elites imagine it to be.  I suggest that the attitudes of the average church-going Midwesterner are far more tolerant than those of the average Ivy League professor or NYT/WashPo reporter.  That has to be the case if the latter are fearful of riots and violence ensuing from the mere fact of Trump's winning the election.  (Oh, wait.  Riots and violence have ensued -- just not by the white working-class.)

THIS is the real xenophobia:  the irrational fear by coastal elites of those strange Midwesterners who attend church, own guns, oppose abortion, value traditional marriage, attend High School football and NASCAR, and who want a Supreme Court that will protect First Amendment religious liberty as assiduously as First Amendment freedom of expression.