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Thank you for proving my point.

Do you really think that’s a fair assessment of what “MAGA” have been doing for the past 8 years? Maybe the last 4 years, but they were hardly saying such things when their boy was in office.

Actually, I don’t care. What I really want to know is what your point is? “They do it, so it’s okay if we do it?” They are, for the most part, a bunch of reactionaries. Trump’s base is largely uneducated, lower-middle-class white Christians who don’t understand why liberals are radically deconstructing Western civilization around their ears and are terrified of the Brave New World liberals are ushering in. They are reacting out of fear, panic, and resentment towards a cultural elite that considers them ignorant rabble that needs to be told to shut the fuck up, rather than educated – and often it appears that the cultural elite doesn’t want to explain itself because whenever it tries, it’s so obviously intellectually bankrupt that even the uneducated rabble can see right through it.

Shouldn’t you be better than that? Isn’t that your whole premise? That you’re smarter than them?

The question was glib nonsense. It’s not about how one reacts to any individual thing Trump does, especially not when that thing is itself a reaction to the larger context of the liberal/left reaction to Trump’s mere existence.

what I didn’t say - and what I was clearly referring to with that quote you’ve pulled about me not saying a thing - is that I don’t view them as human, as you insinuated I said. if that’s your interpretation, you are incorrect.

I said “You’re utterly incapable of even considering people who disagree with you as fully human.” What I meant is that you see them as “actively proud of being gullible, stupid, victims to their celebrities,” which portrays them as less than fully human. You are viewing them as caricatures of people, not as people.

i doubt it too, because there is a constant fundamental disconnect between what conservatism purports to be and what it actually practices. I doubt it’s possible for you to explicate it either in a way that isn’t immediately contradicted with the actions taken by your leaders and community, too.

Conservative ideology emphasizes the preservation of traditional institutions, values, and practices, advocating for a cautious approach to change. It values individual responsibility, limited government intervention, free-market economics, and the protection of personal freedoms. Conservatives often stress the importance of maintaining social order, national security, and a strong sense of community and cultural heritage. They believe that established traditions and institutions are time-tested and should be upheld to ensure societal stability and continuity.

Any contradictions are likely explained by a liberal’s misunderstanding of the concept of personal freedoms, which is best understood as the freedom to act within the bounds of moral behavior. Because conservatives value sanctity and liberals do not (see Haidt), liberals are often confused why conservatives can claim to value freedom while seeking to repress sacrilegious activities.

i’m sleepy so let’s wrap it up like you all like to do: This has been fun, thanks for taking the L.

When you have to declare premature victory, you are only making it obvious you can’t defend yourself.

“I’m so stupid I think I can win an argument by making up quotes. I literally have no idea what a strawman argument is.” - Facebones

What a powerful argument. Not at all the reaction of an arrogant, elitist, hypocritical crybully.

I’ve said and believe nothing of the sort.

So you didn’t say “They’re actively proud of being gullible, stupid, victims to their celebrities?” Because it’s right there on my screen and I was able to copy and paste it from your comment, which shouldn’t be possible if you didn’t say it.

this doesn’t surprise me at all. your entire political ideology would collapse if you didn’t unconditionally loathe someone.

You’re projecting. It’s your political ideology that is based on unconditional hatred. I doubt you could even begin to explicate the conservative ideology in broad strokes, let alone specifics. Like many liberals, you think conservatism is entirely an expression of bigotry and closed-mindedness. That is a deeply ignorant and self-congratulatory belief that people like you cling to because it prevents you from questioning your own ideology, and is, in fact, an expression of your own close-minded bigotry.

I actively try to remember there’s a real person with a rich internal life on the other end

Wow, You have really pulled the wool over your own eyes. You reduce everyone on the right to idiots who are proud to be gullible victims, and then pretend you try to think of your political enemies as people with actual internal lives? No you don’t. Stop bullshitting yourself.

Kind of missing the point there, bub.

“Trumpism” isn’t even a thing. You give Donald Trump far too much intellectual credit.

Do you care to elaborate on how Trump is revenge?

Starting in the 1960s, this country entered into a “culture war” that is, in many ways, similar to the Protestant Reformation of the 16th century. On one side, you have the postmodern liberal/left, which is motivated primarily by critical theory originating in post-Marxist philosophical movements. On the other side, you have modernist and traditonalist right (i.e. libertarians/neocons and the Christian right (I would be part the later group)). The right has been losing the culture war badly since the 1980s and the left has near total cultural dominance now, and has begun the process of destroying the modernist/traditionalist right through the school systems and its control of media. This has made the right feel utterly powerless and humiliated by the left, and has left them questioning whether the Republicans were ever actually representing them or were just stooges for the postmodern left the whole time.

Donald Trump is the epitome of everything the postmodern left hates. He’s crude, belligerent, brashly honest about things you’re not supposed to be honest about, but essentially a congenital liar in all other regards. He’s sexist, he’s borderline racist, he’s anti-intellectual, and he’s a rich, powerful straight white man who makes absolutely no apologies for it and is absolutely swimming in unearned privilege.

That’s why the right supports him. The right isn’t even allowed to question the left’s agenda, it’s dogma. They’re not allowed to participate in politics and culture anymore, they’re only recognized as the “bad guys,” the “enemy.” They feel like the only thing they can do is put a thumb in the left’s eye and make them hurt. So that’s why they are in love with Trump, and not a more sensible candidate like DeSantis. Because Donald Trump’s mere existence makes the left gnash their teeth.

I think people like that honesty. Nobody wants to live in a rigged system.

That’s certainly part of it. They do think everyone is as corrupt as Trump, but only Trump is willing to admit it.

However, (and I think this is the part where you’ll get frustrated with me) he seems to be highly and openly corrupt. I think he wants to make corruption and abuse of power seem normal so that when he does it, he can act like it isn’t a big deal.

I totally agree. The man is beyond corrupt. I genuinely believe your average family dog has a better understanding of morality than Donald Trump, who may possibly be the most venal, corrupt person to ever hold the office of President. It’s either him or Jackson. As I believe I said earlier, I’m not a Trump supporter. I’m a socially conservative Catholic who is moderate to liberal on economic issues, so naturally I’m very much opposed to the Democrats, but Trump doesn’t really hold any appeal to me (except insomuch as his election might bring Project 2025 to fruition). I’m also Gen X, so I’ve known who Trump was for 30+ years and absolutely cannot take him seriously. But I totally get why the conservative base – which is mostly made up of unideological reactionaries – has embraced him.

What’s your point? That I came here willing to argue with you caused lingh0e to fail a basic reading comprehension check?

You people engage in insults and tone-policing because you’re mindless NPCs whose politics is based entirely on group identification and you’re not actually capable of making real arguments. None of you can actually dig down into your belief system and justify it from first principles, nor do any of you have any real grasp of the intellectual underpinnings of your beliefs, nor are you cognizant of the history that has brought us to this point. You’re just screeching monkeys, flinging shit at things because you’re emotionally agitated. None of you actually thinks. That’s why lingh0e reacted with rage to a comment they didn’t even parse correctly, and it’s why you think I came here “angry” (you’re projecting your own emotions onto me).

My beliefs are entirely irrelevant.

What is relevant is that those who are ignorant of history are doomed to repeat it.

I love how you people don’t even question your own absurd narratives. Just pure self-righteous arrogance and the certainty that everyone but you is stupid. You’re utterly incapable of even considering people who disagree with you as fully human, and then are legitimately surprised when the people you look down on with arrogant contempt loathe and hate you.

You’re trying to paint the GOP as hypocrites, but it doesn’t work because your own hypocrisy is too obvious. Liberals don’t care about law & order. Trump isn’t being prosecuted because the left has suddenly become champions of justice. Everyone can see how the law is being perverted to persecute Trump for the political threat he represents.

The only people you’re fooling is yourselves. Nobody else is buying this.

Nelson Mandela was a convicted criminal when he was elected president of South Africa. Vaclav Havel was a convicted criminal when he was elected president of the Czech Republic. Corrupting the legal system to criminalize political opposition does very little to make a political figure less popular. Often, it just makes them martyrs.

The policies that stop ICE from seperating families at the border? Trying to end the acts of throwing them in large metal boxes with no water, some dying, in 110 degree heat?

Are those Democrat policies? Is that what you mean to suggest?

Or are you thinking of other policies?

Yes, I was thinking about Democrat policies. And while it’s true that separating families at the border is a policy that began under Obama, I think it’s largely thought of as a Trump policy.

I meant policies like using mass immigration as a stop-gap measure to deal with the negative population growth caused by liberal anti-family values and embracing globalism to the detriment of American workers (which the right is also guilty of, but Trump is as much a thumb in the eye of the Republican establishment as he is the Democratic establishment).

Clearly, it’s too call everyone who is voting for him a fascist, declare that democracy has fallen, and throw a temper tantrum in the middle of the street. Honestly, there’s probably nothing that can be done at this point. After 8 years of histrionics over Trump – four of which he wasn’t even in office – it would be almost impossible to change the right’s perception of the left as arrogant, elitist, hypocritical crybullies.