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I agree with your take on this, but I do think a little further context is needed. As I recall, part of the reason the "Great Replacement" stuff picked up steam was in response to articles in places like Slate celebrating the impending demographic demise of the white population in the West.

It was one of those situations where the narrative turned on a dime. Similar to when seemingly overnight we went from "defund the police" to "nobody actually wanted to defund the police." It went from "thank god white people are doomed" to "where did they get this crazy great replacement idea?"

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I think it's fair to criticize the author of the article and the free press though, because this isn't some random guy on Facebook who reacted negatively to a slate headline. This is a guy who presumably got paid by a media outlet that claims to be factual to put lipstick on the pig of people reacting negatively to the demographic destiny stuff .

As Randolph noted, the emerging democratic majority was a theory that was simply proven wrong. The GOP has been able to gain non-white support after the Obama years without shedding too much of their party principles. Id be forgiving of a random commentor not realizing how wrong it is, but again, the Free Press? If they are selling what they say they are selling, they should know better.

You have psychos publishing screeds about how they want to repeal the 19th amendment. Should the free press do an article about the GOP plan to disenfranchise women?

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I don't consider discussing why people feel a certain way to be lipstick on a pig, especially when it turns out that they have plenty of good reasons. Weather democrats are doing this intentionally or not, it's ridiculous that the media has forced the question outside the Overton window.

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Well, as I wrote, I agree with Singal's critique of TFP in this case. But his article is also about the Great Replacement Theory and how it caught on.

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This book/thesis in particular - which both authors have now rejected, but the idea stays alive in social media posts about how "all the old white people will die and we will become a progressive country" or other things to that effect

https://capitalresearch.org/article/the-thesis-that-drove-american-politics-crazy-part-1/

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That’s an interesting link, thank you. I haven’t read that book in a couple of decades and it refreshed my memory a bit.

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The big weakness of that theory is that people get older....

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Care to provide a link to the Slate piece?

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