Nothing. Every civilization has its deranged, but they used to get shoved to the margins. One party cynically mined theirs for decades, and consequently there is a whole lot more of them. It would take more decades to return a preponderance of them to the real world.

I think we have to keep speaking to Trump voters with kindness, patience, and respect. (That's not counting the real extremists waving tiki torches, or the Crashtar-style trolls — they're uninterested in conversation and have no place in it.) Contrapoints has this great saying, "If you want to convince people you have to meet them where they are."

So where are they? Above all in rural areas. The electoral collage and Senate maps favor Republicans because they favor low-population states. It's important not to look at them as a bunch of cousin-fucking book-burning opioid addicts, however tempting. If we keep looking down our noses at them, SolRo style, then basic math and geography says we'll do much worse in the Senate than we'll deserve from the popular vote.

They are disproportionately white non-Hispanic (though with exceptions, the big surprise this November is Cuban-Americans in Florida), disproportionately religious especially Evangelical. They feel their historical grip slipping. It's fucked up, but people losing their old unfair privileges feel 'under attack', especially if ASIDE from those privileges many of them are in really bad shape.

I think then it's just doing a lot of listening, and talking about what's really important to them. How's your health care? How are the schools in your area?

I quite like what Biden's been saying these last days: "To make progress we have to stop treating our opponents as our enemy. They are not our enemies. They are Americans."

Now, with all that, of course I don't realistically think we can change the minds of most of them. But if we could open the eyes of ten, twenty percent by 2022? That would change everything.

Basic meth and geography

Touché sir. :–)

I vacillate between the two positions. I think it's probably best to listen, but offer counter perspectives only when asked for, but also refuse to be domineered (expressed respectfully as possible given the context).


***ALSO****

I want everyone to check this twitter thread that details the responses from a focus group of people who leaned Biden, but flipped to Trump in the last two weeks of the election.

It is sort of a sobering reality check for one's assumptions about messaging and what voters value.

Focus group questions and answers:
https://twitter.com/dannybarefoot/status/1326210279387099136

This small thread describes the focus group:
https://twitter.com/dannybarefoot/status/1326204307318984704

As I've mentioned an insufferable number of times, the punchline of the too-twee-but-still-interesting book at theauthoritarians.org (written 700 years ago, back when W had us scratching our heads) makes the conclusion that, basically, there is no arguing with these fuckheads. Their super-power is appreciating cognitive dissonance the way some people relish the smell of their own farts. They are remarkably bad at recognizing bad arguments where the conclusion is something they agree with.

The only remedy the writer could muster--for which it's way too late--is to interact with authoritarian-worshippers, who tend to have very caricature-ish pictures of the Others (gays, libruls, ethnicities), in non-confrontational ways. (The example he gives is joining a community effort to clean up riverbanks.) So that, gradually, they'll start realizing that they're just other people, not cartoonish villains.

But arguing with them? Showing them reasons to modify their beliefs? It's a complete waste of time. They just retreat into their shells. It's quite sad!

Interesting twitter thread, simon

Interesting link, Simon

My general observation of the far right is that they are highly isolated and/or insulated. They fear outside opinions or contradictory facts to the point of denying any reality they do not directly observe over long periods of time.

Ex. Conservative fishermen (young ones especially) will typically be violently against conservation efforts because, one, it can hurt their short-term income but also that their personal experience shows that fish are endless and bad catches are because of bad luck. And these same fishermen can become conservationists but only after decades of personally observing environmental degradation.

also most of the young people who are a bit more open-minded & have the means to do so usually leave rural america right after high school and don't look back - their talents get poached by the larger cities in blue states and the downward economic/social/cultural spiral "back home" continues

their idyllic situation is where the will of agribusiness reigns supreme, nobody acts weird, and those dumb city faggots & mud people just shut up and buy our corn. if you're not on board with that you're probably gonna have to move or learn to be miserable/do meth