>>2816859it's probably more like 25-30%, and it's not entirely that they're lumpen, it's that most parties have a core support of around this size. a chunk of those aren't lumpen, but they're assholes and strongly negatively polarized against liberals. so long as the enemy is worse, it's easy to keep a chunk of your support.
UK labour is a good illustrative example. in 1983 they ran on a "notoriously" left-wing manifesto and lost badly… they got 28% of the vote. in 2005, having just started the iraq war and proven incredibly right wing in power they got… 35% of the vote. in 2010, having continued the iraq war, appointed a dour scotsman as their leader, spent years infighting, in the midst of an economic recession, having contradictory stances on immigration (at once promising "british jobs for british workers" to pander to the BNP vote
and accidentally insulting a woman whining about immigration as a "bigoted woman" in a hot mic moment) they got… 29% of the vote.
why am i telling you this? to illustrate that labour loyalists were loyal to labour no matter what labour did. why? because the conservatives were always worse, and because labour always gave them a handful of breadcrumbs to show there was an inch between them and the conservatives.
in 2019 labour lost badly after a massive press and institutional campaign against the party, with its own MPs sabotaging it, and a wrecking campaign to give the party an unworkable brexit position. they got… 33% of the vote. in 2024 they ran a bland man on a bland manifesto who spent his whole time attacking the membership of the party and they won with… 32% of the vote. but these things have limits: in power, still tacking to the right, with their opposition apparently irrelevant, and still attacking their support base, the dam has given way and labour are now on 16% of the vote and falling. but this has taken more than 35 years of the party actively hating its own membership and supporters and even then
half of that core
still haven't abandoned the party. i personally know people who would be just as if not more scathing about the party's record
and they are still party members because the party as an abstract ideal is part of their identity even as the party as an actually existing organization is half moronic and half evil.
that all said, a notable chunk of all societies clearly are - to be glib - cunts. in the UK this pools in the ReformUK vote, which is much more correlated with socially reactionary views than with socioeconomic status. ReformUK types are, of course, massive Trump fans despite nominally being British nationalists and despite America being the single country most responsible for destroying Britain's empire and prestige.