Talk:Silent majority

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Could someone rewrite this article and incorporating reference? As it stands it's almost unintelligible.

I removed "see also" links to the Moral Majority and Straw man because it isn't apparent how they relate to the Silent Majority. The straw man fallacy refers to attacking a weak version of another's argument, rather than the actual opposing argument, and is not relevant to this article. --DDerby-(talk) 23:12, 18 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Attacks on Anti-War Protestors

The people referred to as the silent majority were not facile at writing letters to the editor, voting in primaries, or attending caucuses, but some of them expressed themselves in other ways. They hurled bottles and bricks at anti-war marchers. At the University of Iowa, when protesters (I was nearby but was not one of them) blocked marine recruiters at the student union, some members of the football team appeared with spikes on and ran over the protestors after knocking them down.Carrionluggage 00:55, 9 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

That's horrible. They have a right to protest, just as you do. – Aquarelle 12:12, 9 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

On a semi-related note, an old high school textbook of mine showed a picture of a counter-demonstration by construction workers. I can't find this picture anywhere, but if it is public domain I believe it would make a nice addition to the article. Sort of reinforcing the point made in the article concerning the blue-collar make-up of the Silent Majority. - Chops79 00:18, 25 April 2006 {UTC}

conservative bias?

I think this article may have a conservative bias. When you say "made up the backbone of America" and "didn't have the time or ability" to participate in politics you're implying that their views are superior to liberal ones--Ezadarque 22:32, 26 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Liberal bias:

"who didn't support civil rights for African-Americans" - That is a completely false characterization of Nixon's policy and the policy of the greater GOP. Check the voting record for the civil rights acts of the 1960s. Republicans out-voted Democrats in favor of civil rights every time.

"who didn't support desegregation" - Nixon supported desegregation. Check the record. He opposed busing because he didn't believe the government should be in the business of tearing apart traditional African-American communities.

Shall we edit both then?--Ezadarque 22:32, 26 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

"Liberal media?"

The article takes Nixon's "great silent majority" as good coin, "vindicatd" by the 1972 election. It neglects to add that within less than three years, Nixon was facing impeachment and forced to resign, and mass opposition to the Vietnam war had forced a complete US withdrawal.

More disturbing is the reference to the media covering protests in order "to boost the media's own left-wing bias." This is unsubstantiated--and certainly at odds with its treatment of the protests against the Iraq war.

The article invokes the 2000 election as a confirmation of the existence of the "great silent majority." It attributes the controversy in 2000 to a "liberal media" which called the election for Al Gore because it was supposedly working off of exit polls "focusing on radical leftists and black voters in Florida." It states that the results were reversed by "later estimates of voters." None of these extremely questionable assertions, which appear to conform to a definite conservative agenda, are substantiated.--Bvanna 18:14, 9 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Article Neutrality

This article is very much not neutral. I think that it is a good article to have (the concept of the silent majority is referred to often in politics). However this article makes a number of unsubstiated claims and uses language that could be interpretted as offensive to the socalled leftists and also those who form part of the silent majority61.69.174.127 12:00, 5 February 2007 (UTC)jjansson Agreed. --136.152.146.223 21:47, 1 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

In bad need of a cleanup...

Pages like this are the reason many scoff at Wikipedia as a legitimate reference. It is unorganized, unsubstantiated, and sounds to be authored by a C student attempting to stretch one sentence into four. Editing a jumbled mess such as this is sadly beyond my own attempts; perhaps a better soul will put it on themselves. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Tmoss (talk • contribs) 04:22, 12 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Origin

I think Madam Nhu in Vietnam first came up with the expression. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.239.66.81 (talk) 05:32, 15 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If you have a source, and can edit the article in a way that improves it, you might want to mention it in the article. SlowJog (talk) 17:42, 17 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I just heard on the radio that as a candidate in the presidential primary, Nixon gave what is called the "Silent Center" speech in May, 1968. Apparently, the phrase from this speech eventually evolved into "Silent Majority." See http://weekendamerica.publicradio.org/display/web/2008/05/16/silent_center/

SlowJog (talk) 17:42, 17 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

How do I get rid of that box around my signature?

The box is created by blanks at the beginning of a line. Str1977 ^(talk) 16:40, 24 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Here are some good discussions of the origin of the phrase, with citations: http://www.phrases.org.uk/bulletin_board/12/messages/1058.html --24.46.164.83 (talk) 02:24, 5 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Requested move

The following is a closed discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the proposal was Please note that official Wikipedia policy allows the primary article to be titled without parentheses. In such a case, according to WP:MOS-DAB, an {{otheruses}} tag will be added at the top of said article.

This article should be moved back to "silent majority," because this article is about said term. —Tokek (talk) 01:18, 20 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I've moved it back, as the recent move appears to have been undiscussed and there are pretty strong indications that this is the primary topic. If that is not clear, a new move discussion can be initiated. older ≠ wiser 01:50, 20 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Bevan's use of "the silent majority"

Nye Bevan, the founder of the NHS in the UK, used, in the 1940s, to call women, ‘the silent majority’. Msrasnw (talk) 19:39, 24 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]