This article is a few months old now, but I think it’s an incredibly important area of research and something that explains a lot of why America is like it is and how red states stay red.

Excerpt,

A study I co-authored with fellow researcher Kevin Morris, published in December in the American Political Science Review, finds that traffic stops by police stops in Hillsborough County reduced voter turnout in 2014, 2016, and 2018 federal elections.

Our study compared the voter turnout of Hillsborough motorists who were stopped by police shortly before and after each election. Drawing on information about each person’s turnout in past cycles, we found that these stops reduced the likelihood that a stopped individual turned out to vote by 1.8 percentage points on average. The effect held when accounting for characteristics like race, gender, party affiliation, past turnout, and prior traffic stops to improve our comparisons. The discouraging effect of stops was slightly higher in 2014 and 2018.

These results make clear that the collateral consequences of policing—including worsening outcomes for economic security, educational attainment, and health—also extend to political participation. If the communities who are most frequently subjected to policing are also discouraged from voting as a result, it could create a vicious feedback loop of political withdrawal.

Why would traffic stops make people less likely to show up to the polls? Past research has already established that the most disruptive forms of criminal legal contact, like arrest and incarceration, discourage people from voting. Our study shows that low-level police contact matters in the same way. If a traffic stop makes a motorist fear that the government will harm them, it can prompt a withdrawal from civic life that political scientists call “strategic retreat.” Motorists might worry that a routine traffic stop could escalate into police violence, a more common outcome for Black people in particular. Beyond justified fears of violent victimization, voters might also bristle at the perception of being targeted to raise revenue through excessive ticketing. Accordingly, if incarceration ‘teaches’ would-be voters that their government is an alienating and harmful force in their lives, traffic stops could catalyze a similar form of ‘learning.’

Full study is available here, and here’s an archived thread from a dumb website where one of the research study authors answered questions.

  • @TokenBoomer
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    231 year ago

    Thinking differently is appreciated. We shouldn’t all think the same. The problem comes when that thinking lacks humanity and empathy and love.

    • @KoofNoof
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      -271 year ago

      If you truly believe people who vote Republican lack human empathy and love you might be spending too much time in liberal echo chambers for such an extremist view

      • @[email protected]
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        191 year ago

        The Republican version of empathy and love of indistinguishable from cruelty for the out-group. Like how they “love” women by implementing policies that kill them. And also just killing them as partners.

        • @KoofNoof
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          -101 year ago

          It’s because they love life and want to protect the baby inside the woman

          • @[email protected]
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            61 year ago

            How do you square the circle where lovers of life kill more women through policy relative to other, similar policies?

            • @KoofNoof
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              01 year ago

              I think most republican voters would agree to allow abortion in cases of rape or death of the mother. It’s the republican politicians who go to the extreme to outright ban it

              • @PostmodernPythia
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                11 year ago

                I’m sure that’s very comforting to the families of the people who’ve died in pregnancy and childbirth in the states where abortion is illegal because of the voting choices of Republicans. I’m sure it’s even more comforting to the victims as they bleed out.

          • @eatthecake
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            11 year ago

            Do they realise the woman is alive? Do they care about her life? I don’t think so.

      • @TokenBoomer
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        61 year ago

        You have no friends and I feel sorry for you.