Looking at political media and campaigns through the lens of Mythology.
Roland Barthes in his book Mythologies writes about the ways that the professional wrestling industry operates of narratives that the viewer is creating subconsciously. Barthes creates this theory surrounding the idea of the Myth, that through cultural signifiers we grasp ideas that aren’t grounded in truth, but rather what appears to be. Guy Debord talks about his analysis of the commodity abundance of the Post WWII era as a precursor to an era that is obsessed with imagery and the idea of “having over appearing”. The ideas of semiotics attempt to understand the meaning in a world of myth, something that can be identified, but hardly ever subverted. Within American politics, we see an abundance of narratives centering on the appearance of candidates, distracting from policy and focus on what he or she wants to appear to be. For Jimmy Carter, it was a working-class southerner from Georgia, who listened to Americans. For Donald Trump, it was an outsider rich man who could make struggling Americans richer. For Yang, it’s a true New Yorker, Reagan a true American, and Biden a true uniter. The strategy poised by political candidates is a sign of American politics and politics as a whole. We can see through countless of examples that representation rather than substance and policy is being more cared about in this country. People will grasp on to the kind character of Jimmy Carter before they look at his policy prescriptions, Donald Trump’s wealth before looking at his foreign relations, Obama’s charisma before looking at his plans in the Middle East. While these candidates may have been good or bad is not the point, but the point is to look at how we look at politics as a whole.
The case study of Andrew Yang in ways can serve as a way that appearance dominates the media cycle. Questions by media regarding Yang’s understanding of New York culture, what his favorite songs and sites are. Andrew Yang portrays himself within advertising as a true New Yorker, someone who cares about the people of New York through references to pop culture and presentation. The “Real New Yorker” debate is a sign of American politics that has been shown to light with the rise of Donald Trump and the expansion of Spectacular politics. What makes the case of Andrew Yang even stranger, is Yang’s platform was initially more policy-based around UBI rather than outlandish things about his character. Although the ideals of the “Yang Gang” did ground themselves within the youth culture and rampant rise in new economic ideals and policy such as Medicare for All, Green New Deal, and Yang’s ideas of UBI, Yang’s mayoral campaign differs a lot from his presidential primary campaign. Yang has repeatedly presented himself on talk shows, podcasts, and advertisements talking more about his thoughts on bodegas, basketball, and Jay-Z rather than the pressing issues of policy. The narrative around the true New Yorker allows for candidates to use spectacular characterizations to boost their appeal, rather than work on the things that people fight for in this country around the policy. Andrew Yang built his platform off of the idea of policy to relieve the struggles of working-class mothers and working-class people in general, while his policy has not changed, his marketing and campaign have shifted to the myth of the “Real New Yorker” has taken place of the more policy-based campaign from 2020.
Yang has never held elected to the political office yet, which is similar to the rise of Donald Trump in the republican party. While Yang is not a populist nor spouts rhetoric close to Trump’s, Yang’s rise to popularity for New York Mayor requires the image of being a relatable man and a true New Yorker. Yang attempted to come off as a relatable man to the Iowan people in 2020 but ended up losing badly, he tried through debates, and anecdotes, yet his support for his policy-driven campaign was not, spectacular enough. While Bernie was a policy-driven candidate in some regard, the term and image of progressive were seen as change, something appealing to young voters. Bernie’s left-wing populism was a much more successful tactic rather than the policy-driven tactics of Yang. We have seen that policy has taken a backseat in politics for the age of the Internet. While Yang’s UBI may not have been popular, giving a reason why he lost, Yang didn’t play the game correctly. Joe Biden’s campaign ran off the image of unification. The campaign slogan “Fighting for the soul of this county” or “Build Back Better” was built upon anti-Trumpism and centrism for the most part. While Biden himself would enact policy, later on, it wasn’t until after the primaries that the conversation focused more upon policy than character, defending himself from attacks of his past.
Yang for a multitude of reasons failed his campaign in 2020. But what could be a sign of the populous is the media coverage (or lack thereof) of Yang by networks such as MSNBC. Media networks perpetuate myth more than anyone due to the fact they operate for profit. Media networks will want to attract viewers through oppositions and clashes between candidates and narratives they can play off of. Bernie Sanders’s campaign gained much media attention in some ways despite him and in some ways in a good light. The narratives from Bernie’s campaigns allow for a red scare on the right with Fox News as well as the characterization of generations from more liberal networks. The opposition of the moderate left vs. the radical left, the younger voters vs. the older voters. The biggest question being posed by media networks was “Who can unite the country?”. While the question seems paradoxical due to the fact that the media is a reason for division, anti-Trumpism was the most prevalent issue among democrats in most cases. While Bernie tried to steer the issues towards policy in some cases, the road for Biden was the unlikely victory of any other democratic candidate to beat the incumbent. This is where Yang lost the media. Yang was not progressive enough to be on the coverage of Warren and Sanders and not moderate or established enough as Joe Biden or as known as Michael Bloomberg. Yang’s appeal was missing because it wasn’t spectacular or mythical enough, even with a large internet following.
One of Roland Barthes’s examples of what he calls “Myth” is how Romans are portrayed in the movies. Barthes says that through signifiers that are purposely put by producers of shows and movies, Romans in the movies have very distinct characteristics to show traits we assume they have. An example of this is the sweat that is purposely shined upon,
“…all the faces sweat constantly. Labourers, soldiers, conspirators, all have their austere and tense features streaming (with Vaseline). And closeups are so frequent that evidently sweat here is an attribute with a purpose. Like the Roman fringe or the nocturnal plait, sweat is a sign. Of what? Of moral feeling. Everyone is sweating because everyone is debating something within himself; we are here supposed to be in the locus of a horribly tormented virtue, that is, in the verylocus of tragedy, and it is sweat which has the function of conveying this “
Roland Barthes Mythologies
The Real New Yorker is a narrative that is the perfect signifier for a relatable New York man that you can trust. The actions of doing photoshoots with a basketball, going to a bodega, and listening to Jay-Z. Andrew Yang embracing the myth is a story of a candidate that led himself through championing a policy to fall back into the very thing he opposed. The myth of the Real New Yorker is an arbitrary label that signifies trust, struggle, and solidarity. The problem with the myth is that it diverts us from substance. While Yang stresses a fellow New Yorker, his stances on Pro-Police policies rather than reform and the idea of Asians needing to increase “American-ness” can show a different side from the image created. That his policy prescriptions and beliefs may be the thing at fault rather than the character and how many times you’ve been to the Hot Dog cart on Lexington. The Real New Yorker allows politics to dissolve as a subcategory, a race to a pop quiz on city culture that is rooted in niche things unrelated to policy or the job of the mayor. This isn’t unique to Yang, it is more prevalent to shift to the tactic of representing a message.
Yet this tactic is met with the hardship of meeting the arbitrary standard that constantly shifts, trying to be the real New Yorker is a true prize that never has a true goal. Andrew Yang on interviews being asked about his favorite subway station might make him perceived as not a true New Yorker but a person who wants to seem as such. Yet people in this case who try to subvert the myth end up grasping on to it, as they still believe if someone met these arbitrary standards they would be a “Real New Yorker”. Rather it is not the signifier of Real New Yorker at face value that is the problem, but the signified traits voters would derive a Real New Yorker to have. In ways, we cannot subvert myths, yet we can easily identify them. Some New Yorkers identify the potential phony of Andrew Yang being a Real New Yorker, but not the phony of the concept of “The Real New Yorker”. Because the bottom line is that just because someone is a “Real New Yorker” doesn’t mean they are connected to the people of New York. 8 million people live in New York City, that doesn’t mean every one of those people is understanding of the average person in New York City or the struggles of New York. The Real New Yorker not only is distracting, deceptive, and irrelevant, but the Real New Yorker also never is solidified, a metric to keep media coverage and views rolling in on a topic that doesn’t take much for the viewer to digest.
Another prevalent example is the platform of Joe Biden for the 2020 primaries. As previously stated, Biden operated off of the idea of “electability” in an appeal to the average democrat who is deciding between a polarizing populist and an established centrist. The question is, how do you compete with the spectacular nature of a youth movement? In February, Bernie Sanders in his campaign based upon anti-establishment rhetoric and polarizing policy that won him both the Iowa Caucuses and the New Hampshire primary, creating great momentum for the incoming Super Tuesday. At this point, Joe Biden had been seen as a longshot as candidates were dropping like flies after failed campaigns. Then, the South Carolina primary showed how Biden would push his campaign until November.
Biden had been a local in South Carolina being involved with the community for years, while these things were earned and cannot be completely manufactured as shown, Biden banked on the idea of him being involved hard to win over South Carolina. Particularly the Black vote (which differed substantially from Iowa, Nevada, and New Hampshire in terms of proportion) pulled through for Joe Biden and was able to ride him to eventually the presidency. Going back to the question, How do you go against a youth movement? The answer is to become a President for everyone. There is nothing to beat when a person can appeal to everyone in some way, and while that may not be the case when it comes to far-left progressives and Trump supporters, a majority of the democratic party is made up of those who are primarily anti-trumpists at this point. To appeal to them you need to give them a thing that they can universally be against. The Democratic primary winner had the task of going up against an incumbent that was a leader of a cult-like base that had arisen in the largest numbers the Republican Party had ever seen. The polarization of Trump was that many people disliked him, but those who disliked him varied from moderate republicans such as Megan McCain and progressive democrats such as Bernie Sanders and AOC. The question of electability was on everyone’s mind as the narrative of an underdog story became to formulate, and a fear of the 2nd term for Donald Trump arose in the Democratic party. It was rather the reluctance of Trump than the appeal of Biden that drove Biden’s win in SOME areas in the county. Biden at that time was able to create his campaign through the idea of unifying the county. His slogan, fighting for the soul in this nation was not only a jab at Trump and an appeal that he would speak for Americans but also an idea that he can unify these groups against the Trump Regime. The narrative of the True Uniter is devoid of whatever Biden plans to do. While Biden in my opinion can make amazing steps in the right direction regarding policy, COVID recovery, and pushing for much more progressive legislation than once thought, Biden could have not done any of the above and still have one. The reason being that Biden ran off the idea that he was the true uniter of the Anti-Trump movement, someone who was established and could bring in the Megan McCains and the AOCs to vote for the same candidate. While this may be true, this is not a trait of Biden, it’s a fear of Trump, which creates the Myth that this is something inherent in Biden. While any other candidate may not have been able to be as convincing of Biden when it came to the role of the “True Uniter”, Biden rode the idea of the True Uniter to victory, as his victory in the primary was led with a wide-ranging appeal at the 2020 DNC with people from various political spectrums. The Republican Party for the most part doesn’t need to appeal to unity and hasn’t in the Trump Era. The Republican Party operates off of its base and gets the power from counter culture among lots of over things, the Democratic Party on the other hand is not a unified structure, rather a spectrum of many believes that people call the “Big Tent”. To appeal to the idea of unifying a large base such as the Democratic Party wasn’t even one of the pushes from people like Hilary Clinton in 2016. Rather it was Biden that created the idea of unifying the Democratic Party and unifying the country that created the figure that he was able to portray himself as.
The point I make by writing this is a reference back to Barthes’s early works in the 1950s and applying it to modern American Politics. While these things may be true, that Yang is a Real New Yorker and Biden is a True Uniter, these things are grounded in myth and representation. That these things don’t matter without analysis of policy prescriptions and actions rather than appearances and flattering rhetoric. It is important to identify myths before they develop, and even if we cannot overcome them, it is important to spot them.