Political Memes

My experience is varied. Some of the rural folk, but also the men who think they’re above that, and think Trump will cut their taxes. Evangelicals too.

I’ve even gone off on some religious nut to “repent his following an Antichrist,” which spooked him enough to make him leave.

My experience is almost solely with the rural and religious. By the time I lived in a place where the suburban middle-class civility politics variant of right-wing ghoul was a significant population, I had gained a much greater ability to be discerning in who I chose to be in my social circle.

Calling them on that outright rarely does anything, unless we can get someone else to follow up with the same until we wear them down. And they blow up every single time.

I'm honestly of the opinion that 95% of them are unsalvageable by any means.

The point of hammering them on these points is to make them ashamed and quiet again to reduce the spread and acceptance of their vile shite.

You can't cure the disease, but quarantine can reduce its spread.

See, my first instinct is to call those elites they love? Manipulate Liberals. But that takes work and deep cultural access and context to discern, and I rarely have that.

Unfortunately, calling the elites that they love 'liberals' or 'socialists' just gets them angry at you for daring to defame their good holsum corporate masters. Even before Elongated Muskrat was a conservative darling, trying to point out that he was sucking government subsidies at great cost to the taxpayer got many conservatives I spoke with genuinely angry. "Yes, he's a businessman, that makes him smart!"

This is why I usually start with a frame of hating Liberals. Out loud. 5-10 minutes of “sounding like Tucker” to get them nodding along. Invite them to learn. Whether they do or don’t, make them feel smart for even nodding along… And then switch the frame when we hit a natural pivot point. It doesn’t work every time, but they at least walk away respecting me for not being an elitist Liberal.

See, when that pivot point hits, the conservatives I've known all either laugh it off or get angry. It's not "Oh wow, I actually agree with these points!", but "Ha ha, that's a neat trick, like asking someone for Pen 15" or "This damn dirty crypto-liberal is trying to trick me with his mind games!"