My mother (72, white religious conservative Kansan) has consistently voted for Republicans her whole life, although she would say that she always votes for the conservative candidate who is best on the issues (who just happened to have always been a Republican.) She was married to a preacher/missionary for 12 years and considers herself a devout Christian woman. She (and almost anyone) would consider herself a very hard worker and she’s worked pretty much her entire life, helping to run a church, and then later running a daycare center in our various homes growing up, and then as a low-wage worker drone in the restaurant industry. But having said that, she and her 6 kids (9 counting step-kids) have also been the recipient of various forms of social aid for most of her life, at various points along it, such as food stamps, social security, ADC, orphan’s benefits, widow’s benefits, straight up “welfare” and state and federal aid for medical and mental issues and pretty much every possible form of aid that governments give, to include charity from churches and personal friends, while also holding down 1 or 2 jobs and raising multiple kids and families. She’s (usually) someone who would NEVER self-identify as a Democrat, and would reluctantly concede that she’s a Republican, but she’s firmly in favor of most social programs, “as long as they’re aren’t just geared to the people of color” (Mom will say “colored people” and then say “blacks” in a hushed tone, like that’s a dirty word, and then settle on “African American,” but she’s 72 and doesn’t want to offend.) But a funny thing about Mom—she’s a GOoPer because she’s a religious conservative, but she actually believes and practices that stuff about “If you have two cloaks and thy brother none, give him your coat!” and “it’s harder for a rich man to enter the gates of heaven than the eye of a needle” and “love thy neighbor” (unless they are gay, and then “we love the sinner but hate the sin.” Her first husband—and my father—was/is gay and Mom has wrestled with that for 50 years now.)
Mom’s come a long way through an incredible amount of trauma at the hands of 3 different abusive husbands, who all sought to control her. But she has grown as an independent woman these last few years and constantly surprises me. She also has an undergraduate degree in social work that she has never used in the work force (preacher/missionary didn’t want her to work, outside of the massive work for the home/church. But do keep working, quietly, please, at the church).
I myself am very non-religious and my Japanese wife is culturally Buddhist the way I am culturally “Christian.” Mom visits us in the Detroit-metro area from her home in small-town Kansas for a week every summer. She’ll take a 21-hour train ride from Lawrence, KS., with a stop in Chicago, to get to Detroit. She’s here for the week.