{"id":18383,"date":"2020-06-30T22:05:00","date_gmt":"2020-06-30T19:05:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/white-power-flare-up-in-retirement-haven-reveals-tensions\/"},"modified":"2020-06-30T22:05:00","modified_gmt":"2020-06-30T19:05:00","slug":"white-power-flare-up-in-retirement-haven-reveals-tensions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/white-power-flare-up-in-retirement-haven-reveals-tensions\/","title":{"rendered":"#\u2018White power\u2019 flare-up in retirement haven reveals tensions"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#\u2018White power\u2019 flare-up in retirement haven reveals tensions<\/strong>”<\/p>\n

\n THE VILLAGES, Fla. \u2014 There has always been a low-boil tension in The Villages retirement community between the Republican majority and the much smaller cohort of Democrats, but a veneer of good manners in \u201cFlorida\u2019s Friendliest Hometown\u201d mostly prevailed on golf courses and at bridge tables.<\/p>\n

Those tensions, though, flared two weeks ago during a golf-cart parade for President Donald Trump\u2019s birthday in which a man shouted, \u201cWhite Power,\u201d when confronted by anti-Trump protesters. A video clip of that confrontation in America\u2019s largest retirement community was tweeted app<\/a>rovingly by Trump last weekend and then taken down.<\/p>\n

Some residents say they\u2019ve never seen anything like the politically inspired hostilities that have surfaced over the past several months.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s like a powder keg here,\u201d said resident Alan Stone. \u201cAnd Trump is just stirring the pot.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the past, when conflicting political views came up in The Villages, residents said it was best to say, \u201cI disagree,\u201d and quickly change the topic. But the emphasis on good manners has been tested like never before in recent months with the spread of the new coronavirus, the resulting stock market gyrations for a population that largely lives off retirement investments, the presidential race and the calls for racial justice following the death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police.<\/p>\n

\"Supporters<\/img>
Supporters of President Donald Trump wait outside in a town square in The Villages.<\/span>AP<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cThis has been brewing. Most people kind of agree not to discuss politics \u2026 and it had been accepted that with things being so divisive, you don\u2019t get into it,\u201d said Catherine Hardy, chair of the Sumter County Democratic Party.<\/p>\n

The Villages\u2019 population of more than 120,000 residents \u2014 among the fastest growing areas in the US in the past decade \u2014 is about 98 percent white, according to the US Census Bureau. There are more than twice as many registered Republicans as registered Democrats in Sumter County, where most of The Villages is located.<\/p>\n

The Trump parade occurred June 14 in the planned community immedia<\/a>tely after a vigil was held by an African American philanthropic group to honor Floyd and the Black Lives Matter movement. Most of the attendees at the vigil had left by the start of the Trump parade, although a white woman wearing \u201cBlack Lives Matter\u201d on her shirt shouted profanities at the Trump supporters as they drove by in golf carts. A man driving by in a golf car responded by shouting, \u201cWhite Power,\u201d a racist slogan associated with white supremacists.<\/p>\n

\u201cMost people, up until now, even if people felt that way, it was socially unacceptable to voice it,\u201d Hardy said of the man\u2019s remark. \u201cThe difference is under Trump, you can spew that hatred. What has changed is now it\u2019s more acceptable.\u201d<\/p>\n

The political partisanship can now be seen in the most mundane places, said Ira Friedman, who with his wife, Ellen, have volunteered for Democratic presidential candidates during their 18 years in The Villages.<\/p>\n

\u201cGo to the postal station and see people picking up their mail. If they\u2019re wearing a mask, they\u2019re Democrats. If they\u2019re not wearing a mask, talking to each other, bumping into each other, they\u2019re Republicans,\u201d Friedman said.<\/p>\n

The flare-up at the Trump parade doesn\u2019t represent the vast majority of residents of The Villages, although with the election year, there are some people, \u201cwho are exercised\u201d and are becoming more vocal in expressing their views, said John Calandro, chairman of the Sumter County Republican Party.<\/p>\n

\"Ira<\/img>
Ira and Ellen Friedman talk about the recent events in The Villages, Fla., retirement community at their home.<\/span>AP<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Because of the coronavirus, more residents than usual are staying at home and watching the news<\/a>, rather than going to the retirement haven\u2019s famous happy hours and dances in its town squares, he said.<\/p>\n

Some residents worry that the tensions of the past few months may make retirees think twice about moving to The Villages, whose founders have been longtime donors to Republicans and GOP presidential candidates. The Villages is often a popular campaign stop for GOP national and statewide candidates.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think The Villages wants this kind of publicity,\u201d Stone said. \u201cPeople are saying, \u2018What the hell is going on in The Villages?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

But Calandro said any dissension among residents is overblown.<\/p>\n

Calandro said when he plays golf with his Democratic friends, the biggest fights they get into aren\u2019t about politics \u2014 they\u2019re about who gets to take an extra putt on the green without being penalized.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe aren\u2019t having arguments on every street corner here,\u201d Calandro said. \u201cThe Villages is still The Villages. We worked all of our lives to live here and it\u2019s a great place to live.\u201d\n <\/p><\/div>\n

Source<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

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“#\u2018White power\u2019 flare-up in retirement haven reveals tensions” THE VILLAGES, Fla. \u2014 There has always been a low-boil tension in The Villages retirement community between the Republican majority and the much smaller cohort of Democrats, but a veneer of good manners in \u201cFlorida\u2019s Friendliest Hometown\u201d mostly prevailed on golf courses and at bridge tables. Those…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[30042],"class_list":["post-18383","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general","tag-white-power-flare-up-in-retirement-haven-reveals-tensions"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18383","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18383"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18383\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18383"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18383"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18383"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}