Yeah, but the "inclusive" thing then goes the opposite way. People pat their backs about how progressive, empathetic, and inclusive they are.
Then my wife's friend who lives in Long Beach and is certainly in the group one may describe as "woke" goes to Las Vegas and complains endlessly on their group text about how everyone in Vegas is a MAGA hatter and how horrible it is.
Empathetic and inclusive, as long as you completely toe the line they've put in the dirt.
The urban "progressive" tribe, to their credit, are somewhat good at becoming inclusive with the regards to race, or sexual orientation, etc. They no longer tolerate diversity of thought/opinion, though. They ABSOLUTELY have an out-group, and they have no empathy for that group, as evidenced by the way they talk about them.
This strikes me as a somewhat universal problem. We are all members of many tribes, and we all often delight in out-grouping each other.
The urban "progressive" tribe look down on all sorts of folks. It's gross and it's bad. I got into it with someone who was talking bad about never wanting to go to Texas because of something with politics, and I pointed out the Houston, Dallas, Austin are all places they would find perfectly lovely and suitable to their tribe (not to mention they're about to move to a much redder state with a few blue dots, one of which they will live in). S
tate lines are in many ways very imaginary, the world doesn't really change when you cross them.Now of course, the flip side is true. A lot of rural folks will be painted as and describe themselves as good, hard working salt of the earth folks. And they'll be all manner of catty and crappy to other people as well. They'll be afraid of the big scary cities, cold and unwelcoming of outsiders, intolerant of a great many things.
And of course, unless we're aggressively political in each other's faces (or aggressive in other ways), we are all pretty good at getting along if we want to be. My parents are probably too political in certain ways (less aggressive than many), and yet they'll drive to very rural spots and get in chats with strangers they might see as different in the abstract.
(Your acquaintance with the vegas things sounds like she’s doing some projecting. Which, to be fair, we all do a fair amount of, projecting things we see as sinister on things mostly mundane. )
