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US Politics: Rural Southernification… (thanks Zorral)


Ser Scot A Ellison

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TsarGrey

 

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Well, if the goal is to avoid worsening cycle and possibly even escalating violence, I think actually trying to reason with conservatives might be way to go. As far as it takes, anyway.

Also, while I guess the next paragraph might possibly come across as rude (it's not meant to, but I'm not in the mood to cater for possible perceived micro-agressions), I found your post nice to read, should that matter.

A general note both to you and the rest: if you don't want to engage with the conservatives, then don't. But I think that picking the common-enemy approach instead may only make things worse. You kind of lose the right to complain about the rising polarization if you willingly partake in it, I'd say.[/quote]

How can anyone rationally engage with a group of people (Trumpanista Republicans) who are explicitly rejecting rationality?  How can we have a reasoned debate with people who reject reason?  The Trumpanistas… seem to me… to be holding the idea of rational reasoned debate hostage to their desire to be permanently enshrined in positions of power.  

How can that position be rationally engaged?

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Furthermore, the original point was that reasoning with people doesn't work to convince them to change their mind. Appeals to emotion and shared identity are what work.

So @TsarGrey - good little Russian he is - is advocating a process which he also believes will not be as effective. 

Furthermore, the notion that people are decrying polarization is stupid. There are a lot of problems that polarization makes worse, but the core issue is one side believes that a whole lot of people should have no right to vote, no right to general human rights, and no right to even survive. The problem isn't polarization. The problem is one of the poles is an illiberal authoritarian minority ruling system.

I don't want to compromise with those people. I want them to be entirely minimized and ostracized. 

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23 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

How can anyone rationally engage with a group of people (Trumpanista Republicans) who are explicitly rejecting rationality?  How can we have a reasoned debate with people who reject reason?  The Trumpanistas… seem to me… to be holding the idea of rational reasoned debate hostage to their desire to be permanently enshrined in positions of power.  

How can that position be rationally engaged?

Appeal to their heart. Some of them may have one, I believe.

Or to put it differently: make them see that they actually do not want what they think they want. If you bother to check the book I spoke about (The Coddling of the American Mind) you'll find at least one anecdotal example where I think this approach worked.

14 minutes ago, Kaligator said:

good little Russian he is

Close, but no cigar.

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1 minute ago, TsarGrey said:

Appeal to their heart. Some of them may have one, I believe.

Or to put it differently: make them see that they actually do not want what they think they want. If you bother to check the book I spoke about (The Coddling of the American Mind) you'll find at least one anecdotal example where I think this approach worked.

So why do you argue that you should reason with them?

Heck, we should not be reasoning with you by the above viewpoint, right? We should be appealing to your emotional values. We should be asking you why you are comfortable identifying as conservative when conservatives tried to take away my sons insurance for cancer, or tried to take away your friends ability to marry. 

1 minute ago, TsarGrey said:

Close, but no cigar.

Sorry - Belarusian then?

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29 minutes ago, Kaligator said:

So why do you argue that you should reason with them?

Because that's the word others used.

29 minutes ago, Kaligator said:

Heck, we should not be reasoning with you by the above viewpoint, right? We should be appealing to your emotional values. We should be asking you why you are comfortable identifying as conservative when conservatives tried to take away my sons insurance for cancer, or tried to take away your friends ability to marry.

Check the other book (The Righteous Mind), page 336 onward, to find Haidt writing about yet another book, Conservatism by Jerry Muller, and the left's alleged blind spot, moral capital... if you care. I find the conservative approach to life to be fuller, more nuanced and more liberating than the progressive one. I think it may capture the human experience better. I identify as a conservative because I think I am. My emotional values - the ones you might possibly appeal to - are conservative in their nature.

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40 minutes ago, TsarGrey said:

Appeal to their heart. Some of them may have one, I believe.

Or to put it differently: make them see that they actually do not want what they think they want. If you bother to check the book I spoke about (The Coddling of the American Mind) you'll find at least one anecdotal example where I think this approach worked.

Close, but no cigar.

I have tried.  

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Dude, I already reached out. I talked to you people, and said my piece. 

@TsarGrey
 

Sure, you talked about the need for empathy and civility and then immediately accused others of being partisan liberals who’d operate in bad faith and not worth engagement—but will belabor yourself to continue on, fully expecting a fruitless experience out of the hope some good could come of it. 

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Do you?

Also, I happen to think that the way your side speaks to mine may often not be effectiv


I don’t like the core substance of the politics of people I’m opposed to. Not just just the packaging.
Far right nationalists often adopt feminist talking points to beat up on immigrants. To an extent this is effective roping in some folk or getting them to passively stand aside as the immigrant group is targeted and has their safety and rights threatened.

I see little cause for celebration if instead of screaming their bigotry in explicitives they were polite, cordial whilst they worked to brutalize a particular  group.

Maintaining an aesthetic of civility in terms of discussion is not as important mitigating the severity of brutality or cruelness to me. So I’m not going to cheer on someone for being civil whilst they advocate for something barbarous.

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Is there some other way to make them change their mind? Besides forcing them, that is.

In terms of abortion rights, lgbt rights, it’s less important to make conservatives okay with it than it is to protect.

Most of the states that had sodomy laws before the Supreme Court nullified them had populations not against them.

 

Also how many liberal members of US Congress have come out and said the US isn’t a democracy? And not be immediately condemned by the political party they alighted with?

 

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11 minutes ago, TsarGrey said:

So have I.

I don't think you understand American conservatives. They don't want to have a good faith conversation at this point in time. In fact, one of the major drivers for them today is to try and hurt and/or humiliate liberals. Just look at the vaccine response. Liberals are for the vaccine so they, consciously or unconsciously , have to oppose it, even when Trump tells them to get the shot. 

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9 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

I don't think you understand American conservatives. They don't want to have a good faith conversation at this point in time. In fact, one of the major drivers for them today is to try and hurt and/or humiliate liberals. Just look at the vaccine response. Liberals are for the vaccine so they, consciously or unconsciously , have to oppose it, even when Trump tells them to get the shot. 

It feels like schadenfreud has become the prime mover in American society…

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The roads of how we got here in full authoritarianism and hate, there are so many.  New paths arrive all the time. Why nobody is surprised that the US white right crazy supports the Taliban and other groups of that nature.  They are Them.

"THE GEN Z GIRLS REPPING THE ‘TRADWIFE’ LIFE
How TikTok and a Gen Z aesthetic are selling a lifestyle used to justify misogyny and white supremacy in America"

https://melmagazine.com/en-us/story/tradwife-gen-z

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. . . .  Q: When did you start to investigate how some of these right-wing, deeply misogynistic ideas are gaining traction with young women again? 

I graduated with my master’s in December and a large part of my thesis was the relationship between the alt-right and Christianity, and how newer Gen Z offshoots are branching out from alt-right culture over the last five, six years. It’s young people who swear they’re not part of the alt-right, but have undeniable roots in it, like the American Identity Movement or Nick Fuentes and the Groypers. These are groups that are oriented at the “campus level,” under the age of 25, generally. I’ve been keeping an eye on this cohort for a long time. 

It occured to me that the female side of this movement isn’t brought into the fold a lot because, for instance, the Groypers are very exclusionary toward women. Ultra misogynistic. Yet they have these expectations for how they want their future wives and families to look. And I wondered how these incel overtones would work in relationships. Of course there’s the fundamentalists — Fundy influencers — but they tend to be older, married and more focused on a conservative Christian view. So where would younger girls fit in? And what kind of content are they putting out?

Q: What’s the history of this subculture, and why is the Gen Z approach so different

The idea of tradwife has been around forever. In the strictest sense, it would be a stay-at-home mom, who only takes care of the kids and the house, never the money or even politics. But Gen Z is changing the imagery around these ideas in a very modern way. 

One example is a girl I call “Sarah” in my article. She’s very in tune with counterculture aesthetics online. She’s got bleached hair, sparkly Nike Airs, black nails, Hello Kitty, almost a new-goth look. So she’s very much in teen-girl pop culture, but she also goes to the Groyper conventions. She is actively participating in far-right events and spreading that in between her non-political content. 

I also came across a TikTok called Trad Wife Hype House, which is now deleted, unfortunately. But it was a typical goldmine of teenage girls, 16 at the youngest, who had clearly been raised religiously in working-class households. But they were selling pro-fascist politics and talking points, and no one seems to understand the impact this has.  . . . .

 

 

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12 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

I don't think you understand American conservatives. They don't want to have a good faith conversation at this point in time. In fact, one of the major drivers for them today is to try and hurt and/or humiliate liberals. Just look at the vaccine response. Liberals are for the vaccine so they, consciously or unconsciously , have to oppose it, even when Trump tells them to get the shot. 

That is a large part of the conservative reluctance.

Trying emotionally appeal to them hasn’t ceded as much positive results as simply making going unvaccinated an impediment to people’s daily life socially.

This may hurt many conservative feelings. It’s effective.

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“As we all know, reality has a liberal bias” — Stephen Colbert, 2006 White House Correspondents Dinner.

A bitter culture war started (or reignited, since this is an actual forever war) in the 1960s.  It turns out that one side of that culture war was much better equipped to handle the accelerating changes in technology, society and the economy ever since.  That may not necessarily confer an ultimate objective moral victory, but it sure looks like one side has prospered while the other lost power, influence, prestige and economic standing.  The wheel turns.

People by and large don’t change their values or beliefs.  Most just cannot.  So when the values and beliefs that are core to their identity become a significant detriment in their everyday life, the only natural reaction is to rail against the enemy: those with opposing values and beliefs, who prosper as they suffer.  In the absence of success, having a detestable enemy to blame provides a lot of succor; which political leaders have exploited since the dawn of humanity.

I don’t see any end to this polarization until conservative values enable economic and social prosperity, or conservative values dwindle in our population below the size for a mass identity group.  I don’t see either happening for a while.

I guess in the meantime the conservatives can rejoice that (and take hope from) their tribe is winning in Afghanistan, Iran, Russia, etc.

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1 hour ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

Sure, you talked about the need for empathy and civility and then immediately accused others of being partisan liberals who’d operate in bad faith and not worth engagement—but will belabor yourself to continue on, fully expecting a fruitless experience out of the hope some good could come of it.

Am I not correct?

Also, I'm not belaboring myself. Did that already with the original post, if that counts for anything. I reply to people who reply to me... selectively and as long as it suits me. And no, I'm not trolling either. Want me silent? Stop replying.

1 hour ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

I don’t like the core substance of the politics of people I’m opposed to. Not just just the packaging.
Far right nationalists often adopt feminist talking points to beat up on immigrants. To an extent this is effective roping in some folk or getting them to passively stand aside as the immigrant group is targeted and has their safety and rights threatened.

I see little cause for celebration if instead of screaming their bigotry in explicitives they were polite, cordial whilst they worked to brutalize a particular  group.

Maintaining an aesthetic of civility in terms of discussion is not as important mitigating the severity of brutality or cruelness to me. So I’m not going to cheer on someone for being civil whilst they advocate for something barbarous.

I never told you to simply accept everything conservatives do.

1 hour ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

Also how many liberal members of US Congress have come out and said the US isn’t a democracy? And not be immediately condemned by the political party they alighted with?

I'm not going to bother with this, so you can stop bringing it up.

1 hour ago, Tywin et al. said:

I don't think you understand American conservatives. They don't want to have a good faith conversation at this point in time. In fact, one of the major drivers for them today is to try and hurt and/or humiliate liberals. Just look at the vaccine response. Liberals are for the vaccine so they, consciously or unconsciously , have to oppose it, even when Trump tells them to get the shot.

Well, yeah... they do all this stuff that just makes no sense. I think I get them, to a point anyway... but many of the things they believe and consequently do are just too out there.

Of course, that may be because one might say that I myself bleed Red in the Blue sea. Too brainwashed by all this liberal (in the non-American sense) and socialistic thinking, I guess.

Oh, and for the record: the previous paragraph doesn't mean that I believe in the various right-wing conspiracy theories that might be imagined.

But more seriously, some of them might actually be affected, if one bothers to try. Not every Trump voter is impossible to reach.

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I would need training. What I have was two vax hesitant friends want to visit, and can’t understand or have never heard of Delta. The other vax hesitant person is somewhat agoraphobic. Thinking of the reactions as being trauma reactions helps. I’m glad the greyhound bus is not running. 

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My conservative friends do not read as broadly as I do. Their reading is highly restrictive and I fail to see much nuance. Rather the opposite. The conservatives that I know are unable to imagine other peoples feeling and lifestyles so they keep saying what they were told. Mindlessly.

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1 minute ago, HoodedCrow said:

My conservative friends do not red as broadly as I do. Their reading is highly restrictive and I fail to see much nuance. Rather the opposite. The conservatives that I know are unable to imagine other peoples feeling and lifestyles so they keep saying what they were told. Mindlessly.

...huh.

12 minutes ago, HoodedCrow said:

I would need training. What I have was two vax hesitant friends want to visit, and can’t understand or have never heard of Delta. The other vax hesitant person is somewhat agoraphobic. Thinking of the reactions as being trauma reactions helps. I’m glad the greyhound bus is not running. 

I don't know whether this is to me, but if it is... then sorry, can't help you.

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1 hour ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

It feels like schadenfreud has become the prime mover in American society…

I wouldn't say it's that pervasive, but it is the core of right wing politics. 

1 hour ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

That is a large part of the conservative reluctance.

Trying emotionally appeal to them hasn’t ceded as much positive results as simply making going unvaccinated an impediment to people’s daily life socially.

This may hurt many conservative feelings. It’s effective.

 

49 minutes ago, TsarGrey said:

Well, yeah... they do all this stuff that just makes no sense. I think I get them, to a point anyway... but many of the things they believe and consequently do are just too out there.

Of course, that may be because one might say that I myself bleed Red in the Blue sea. Too brainwashed by all this liberal (in the non-American sense) and socialistic thinking, I guess.

Oh, and for the record: the previous paragraph doesn't mean that I believe in the various right-wing conspiracy theories that might be imagined.

But more seriously, some of them might actually be affected, if one bothers to try. Not every Trump voter is impossible to reach.

Nah, if you voted for Trump twice you're a fucking goner. I worked in political communications for years, and over that time plus high school and college I made many friends who were active and worked in Republican political circles. I'd say 9 in 10 I'm still in touch with have left the party and they say their attempts to try and convince the ones that are staying are useless. There's simply no getting through anymore. That ship has sailed. The only way for them to realize they're in a death cult is if they internally realize it. Moderates and liberals trying to talk to them is mostly a waste of time. 

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