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The dictionary defines “grievance” as “a real or imagined wrong or other cause for complaint or protest, especially unfair treatment.”
That definition is neutral.
But in American political discourse, grievance is usually a one-way street. It’s Republicans who have grievances.
Politico wrote that “Trump returns to grievances for his closing argument”; NBC News told us in August that “Trump falls back on grievances as he slides in the polls”; The Washington Post warned us this summer that “America’s grievance-fueled politics poised to continue after Trump shooting.”
Meanwhile this summer, The New York Times wrote a deep-dive on President Biden’s anger over having to step down. The article said he was “bitter” about being pushed out of the 2016 race by Barack Obama, and described him as having “anger, fear, pride and regret.”
But he did not have a grievance.
“Grievance” is also used when describing controversial social issues. For instance, The Washington Post recently published a series about politics spilling into the sports, such as Colin Kapernick’s protests for racial justice and the debate over whether transgender athletes can play on girls and women’s sports teams. The series was titled: “How grievance splintered American sports.”
The use of the word of grievance in these instances is grammatically correct. It’s also correct from a political sense.
There is a lot of grievance at Trump rallies!
People feel aggrieved over immigrants. They feel aggrieved over what Trump calls “the radical left.” They are aggrieved over the cost of food, and they nurse grievances over cultural changes that feel threatening.
Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign was more upbeat than Trump’s, but there was plenty of grievance as well. Most elections are decided on grievances voters feel, at least in part, even when Democrats win.
Her are some sentences that could have accurately described her campaign:
- Post-Dobbs, Democrats are hoping to capitalize on female grievance over losing access to abortion rights.
- In the wake of the Supreme Court ending affirmative action in college admissions, will Gen Z grievance boost Democrats?
- Democrats are trying to channel grievance in the LGBT community over the GOP’s new laws that restrict health care for transgender youth.
Those sentences/questions all sound a bit ridiculous, because they would never make it into a newspaper, magazine or TV show.
The reason, of course, is that when talking about elections, grievance is code for: The people with these grievances are wrong to feel the way they do. It’s as if the “real” has been erased from the definition, leaving just “imagined.”
But Nov. 5 fractured the Democratic coalition. Trump made significant gains among Latino and Black voters. He did better than expected among women and young voters.
These are people who the media usually does not say have “grievances.”
The point of this is that the overuse (or one-way use) of grievance is the latest case of misunderstanding the electorate. It dismissed why many people are angry and why they vote the way they do.
With Republicans building a more multiracial and diverse coalition than they have in years, it’s probably time to retire "grievance."
