Why Are Big Cities So Liberal?

A map showing how counties voted in our last election reveals something you already know. America’s big cities are the bastion of left-leaning, progressive policies and are the core constituency of today’s Democratic party. In the American southwest you see a number of blue counties that are heavily Hispanic and there is a band of blue counties in the American south due to a large African-American vote. But it’s America’s large cities that are centers of Left-wing progressive rule and all its consequences. The city of San Francisco is only 6% registered Republican.

Why is this? I don’t think the answer is complicated. To be a committed Leftist Progressive requires you to be as far removed from reality as possible. For a citizen in a big city bread materializes on the shelves at Whole Foods. Electricity is generated by throwing a switch. Gasoline is found magically under the pumps at your local Exxon station. People to the left of center politically define themselves as idealistic. And one of the characteristics of idealism is its removal from the real world.

People who live in big cities can afford to be idealistic because they do not deal with the challenges of the real world. There are other people like them. 

The most leftist venue in the Western world is the academic community—and they are the more protected from the real world than any group that has ever lived. Colleges are the most non-religious institutions in society. Again, it is because they are removed from evil and its consequences. Educators in general are protected from the consequences of their ideas and their secular religions. They live inside the protective bubble of taxpayer money and police protection

Another predominately left wing group is government bureaucrats. They face few real world consequences for their ideas.

Environmentalists are rich and their wealth protects them from the real world and  allows them to indulge in what Mark Mills calls green magical thinking.

It is surprising how many wealthy heirs and heiresses support left-wing causes. But then I shouldn’t be. They, too, have been shielded from harsh reality by wealth generated by others. 

The people who favor defunding the police tend to be people who are isolated from the consequences of lawlessness. Congresswoman Cori Bush of Missouri has called for taking money away from law enforcement but she spent $70,000 last year on private security.  She is shielded from the consequences of her own ideology.

My thesis is further proved by looking at those who are to the right of center.

People who live close to the land and make their living from it tend to vote the opposite way of city dwellers. They deal with the harsh realities of the natural world. A person on an oil rig in Wyoming can’t ignore reality like a person working in an apartment in a New York high rise. People who farm, ranch, and mine essential minerals from the earth tend to vote on the right.

People who have children are more likely to be Christian and conservative than the general population. Many years ago I read that the single event in life that makes you more conservative than any other is becoming a parent. The demographer Mary Eberstadt argues that having children is the preeminent event in life that makes you more religious. Apparently having children shows you your need for God.

Police and the military tend to be more conservative. The closer you are to the sinfulness of man, to the consequences of evil, the more likely you are to turn to God and be more politically conservative. 

There is a great positive in all of this. Reality is God’s friend. The more you are exposed to the real world the more likely you are to see your need for God and be drawn to Him. Even in universities—every square inch of which has been corrupted by the Left—you find far more Christians in the sciences than in humanities. Why? Science is tethered to reality and the God of the Bible is found in the real world, not in man’s sinful fantasies.

In the long run, reality wins. God wins. So take heart my brothers and sisters. We worship a triumphant God.

Thanks for listening. May our God bless you this day in a mighty way.

More Resources: Mary Eberstadt on how having children draws you to God: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/justin-taylor/how-the-west-really-lost-god-an-interview-with-mary-eberstadt/

Cori Bush’s spending on private security: https://www.foxnews.com/politics/squad-cori-bush-defund-police-advocate-private-security

Mark Mills on Greens living in an alternative universe: https://www.manhattan-institute.org/green-energy-revolution-near-impossible