“Is your phone off, Patriot?”
“Are you continue to a Republican?”
“That is getting SAD!”
“HOW MANY TIMES ARE WE GOING TO HAVE TO ASK?”
The midterm elections are approaching, and political messaging teams are hard at work overwhelming inboxes across America. And while Republicans and Democrats rely heavily on guilt trips to squeeze money out of voters, the language they employ is markedly different – and says loads about what’s fallacious with each of them.
Princeton researchers reviewing greater than 100,000 campaign emails from December 2019 to June 2020 found they rose from a peak of about 600 a day in December to twice that in June – and that didn’t include text messages.
But, despite the annoying nature of the communications, they appear to work, perhaps because they’re so meticulously crafted. Toby Fallsgraff, email director for the Obama 2012 campaign, explained to NPR how the campaign would test as much as 18 versions of a message on certain subscribers before sending it out widely. Emails brought in roughly $500m for the campaign. A couple of years later, Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign asked for money 50 other ways in a single month.
So what does all this linguistic fiddling say in regards to the parties behind it? With just a couple of weeks before voting begins, the Guardian sorted through a few of the most memorable messages of the 2022 campaign to make clear the query.
Republicans
For the GOP, it’s all about unswerving loyalty to the party – and to the good overlord, the chosen one, he who alone can fix it. He is just not running for office this yr, but his party seems unaware.
Text messages from the Republican National Committee dangle a big selection of perks: donate and you possibly can be an element of the Trump Gold Club, the Trump Advisory Board (he undoubtedly takes direct calls from members), the Trump Free Speech Committee (I used to be flattered to receive an “EXECUTIVE INVITE” to this one), the 1 Million Trump Social Club, or the America First 100 Club. Failing that, you possibly can grow to be a Trump Social Media Founding Supporter or get on the Trump Life Membership List (the messages don’t specify what it might mean to be a lifetime member of Trump). Gifs of the ex-president often adorn the underside of emails.
And if none of those clubs are for you, beware the RNC’s wrath. “Don’t you care?” asked a message on 30 June. “Our records show your Trump Advisory Board membership status is STILL PENDING ACTIVATION!”
This was just considered one of many similar messages that arrived after a failure to donate. In February, I used to be threatened with “possible suspension” – from what, I’m unsure – if I didn’t provide my “$45 payment”. Then in April: “Patriot! YOU NEVER ANSWERED!” (Capitals theirs.)
Later, things got passive-aggressive. “Do we want to speak, friend?” the party wondered. A couple of weeks after that, in May: “We’re not mad, we’re just asking. Why haven’t you pledged to follow Pres. Trump on Truth Social [his social media platform]?”
All of those, it must be noted, were positively gentle compared with an apparently real message that made the rounds on Twitter and within the media a yr ago, in step with Latest York Times reporting in April 2021 describing a “defector” list supposedly maintained by the GOP:
These NRCC fundraising texts are getting intense pic.twitter.com/2Smm3NXCYy
— Andrew Solender (@AndrewSolender) October 14, 2021
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However it’s not all accusatory – the party employs flattery as well. In June, I learned that I used to be the party’s “BEST PATRIOT”, despite the delinquent behavior that had so recently forced it to reprimand me. The party’s forgiving nature was on display again in August, when my “strong support” – I had never once donated – “earned … a spot on the 2022 Republican Advisory Board”.
Clearly, the party’s marketing team believes donors are motivated by accusations of insufficient loyalty. In a March email describing the invasion of Ukraine, the party said a poll had found most Democrats would flee the country if the US found itself in the same position. “So we must ask: Would you fight to your country if it was under attack? Researchers need your response by midnight tonight. Should you don’t respond in time, we are going to assume you side with the Democrats who wouldn’t fight for America.”
Those Democrats, after all, are framed as not only opponents but enemies of the people, as on this February message, when Ketanji Brown Jackson made her approach to the supreme court:
“HELP US! Biden’s Radical Supreme Court pick desires to TOTALLY TRAMPLE your right to:
-1st Amnd
-2nd Amnd
-RIGHT TO LIFE.”
I’ll admit, this text did leave me somewhat concerned about my right to 1st Amnd and wondering what, exactly, the “right to RIGHT TO LIFE” was – was Jackson planning to legalize homicide? One other message was similarly poetic, simply stating:
“T Y R A N T
B I D E N”
Demands for loyalty might sound to contradict the Republicans’ supposed mantra of liberty above all, but George Lakoff, distinguished professor emeritus in cognitive science and linguistics on the University of California, Berkeley, says it matches with the best way he describes the conservative worldview.
We operate in response to the concept that the nation is a family, and on the precise, that family is driven by a “strict father” who “knows right from fallacious. What he says must be is at all times correct, and it is best to do what he says,” Lakoff says in a phone interview. “The Republican party is an authority-based system. It says, ‘That is how things must be and let’s make them that way.’”
As for the clash between an authoritarian viewpoint and the party’s professed love of freedom, Lakoff says it’s easy: “There are two different views of freedom,” and on the precise, freedom “means you’re free to make use of whatever authority you’ve got”.
So perhaps it’s no surprise that so many Republican fundraising messages, short on nuance and written in easy language, sound like a parent chastising a wayward child, while others warn of encroaching enemies. The subtext: donate now – otherwise you’re in serious trouble with Dad.
Democrats
The opposing party is equally inclined to hyperbole, though it often takes a really different tone – considered one of vulnerability and occasional self-flagellation. “We’re downright BEGGING you,” wailed the topic line from a late-September Democratic email. “Election day is 64 days away and we’re getting nervous,” warned a text early last month.
It’s really upsetting to need to send multiple texts and emails daily: “This isn’t easy for me,” wrote Joe Biden in April. A couple of months later: “I hate to ask.” (If Republicans’ word alternative was occasionally odd, Democrats made mistakes of their very own – this particular message suggested I “take a moment to read this email, after which chip in $0 to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee”, which I did.)
Republicans’ emails weren’t entirely free from vulnerability in messages reminiscent of, “If we fall even a dollar short, we are going to lose the House to Pelosi FOREVER,” which can be pretty remarkable even for Pelosi, a known mortal. But such warnings were still underscored by a way of menace, while Democrats seem content to seem pitiful: “we’re PLEADING”, “we’d miss our goal”, “chucking up the sponge”.
Once they’re not PLEADING, Democrats, in classic Democratic fashion, struggle to get their message out. While Republicans spit out transient, easy messages, Democrats offer subject lines like this from April: “I hope you’ll read this long email about how the DNC is bringing advanced data infrastructure to 1000’s of midterm campaigns this yr, after which consider chipping in to support that work.” What red-blooded American could resist?
Perhaps working more within the Democrats’ favor, the messages contain a way of heat: as an alternative of “Patriot”, the recipient is “Friend”. The word “please” is abundant. And there’s a way of community: “That is the time to fight for our country with every part we’ve”, “considering of this team,” “You power the DNC [Democratic National Committee].”
And in one other feature that’s typical of the party more broadly, the Democrats haven’t any trouble hauling out celebrities from Barbra Streisand to John Legend (all of whom appear to have a remarkably similar writing style). “Matthew, I’m sure that you just weren’t expecting to listen to from me today,” Martin Sheen texted me, accurately, a couple of days ago, together with a beautiful picture of his own face.
If Republican messaging aligns with Lakoff’s “strict father” worldview, Democrats’ touchy-feely messaging matches his description of the progressive mindset, which he calls “nurturant parent”. That’s the empathetic figure who “isn’t imposing on the kid but slightly wants to search out out what you wish”, Lakoff says. “For the Democratic party, democracy is predicated on empathy. Why would you’ve got a democracy, you recognize? With a purpose to help other people, to ensure everybody gets treated equally, that everyone gets what they need from the federal government.”
The “begging” and “pleading”, then, appear to be based on the belief recipients want to do good; describing nervousness and sinking hearts appeals to empathy. And Barbra, John and Martin are all just a part of the family.
And what would a nurturing family be without guilt trips? After all, Democratic guilting is more “have you ever forgotten the parents who worked so hard to boost you” than the Republicans’ “when you don’t cough up now, you’re dead to me”:
Did I…date Nancy Pelosi and completely ignore it? pic.twitter.com/UVDSr7tCMq
— Megan Collins (@ImMeganCollins) October 1, 2022
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As for the more complex language involved in Democratic messages, Lakoff says, “Democrats are likely to assume what I call Cartesian rationality: that’s that it is best to give you the option to reason things out. They usually provide you with reasons for things after which it takes some reasoning to get there. The Republicans are likely to just say, ‘That is the way it is.’”
Across the divide
Though each party’s tone may be very different, there’s plenty that appears just in regards to the same – well beyond the red, white and blue formatting of every email.
Together with weaponizing guilt, each parties make use of what may be described as trickery. The 2020 Princeton study found manipulative tactics in emails were widespread – including “devious” techniques reminiscent of formatting emails so they give the impression of being like they’re a part of actual conversations between you and a campaign. Most of the emails I received, seemingly from Democrats specifically, had subject lines that contained “re:”, despite the fact that I’d never written to them.
Much more deceptively, I received Republican emails with subject lines reminiscent of “Your flight is CANCELED”, with no indication that they were political emails until you opened them – the sender was labeled as “urgent notice”. (On this case, it turned out the e-mail was warning me that I used to be about to lose access to a proffered dinner with Donald Trump.)
And while definitions of left and right can fluctuate, says Justin Gross, associate professor of political science on the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, there’s one thing that clearly unites each party: “a distaste for what the opposite side is doing”. Because the pollster and political strategist John Zogby put it in an email: “They each must hear from me since the sky is falling.”
That fear, Gross says, is “enormously motivating”. “Once we feel that anxiety that’s form of collected from a bunch of sources” – the rolling ball of political worries that seems to get larger daily – “we feel like we don’t know what to do about it”, Gross says. When parties ask for donations, “it’s form of a channeling of: well, no less than you possibly can do that.”
