Friend Infected With Right Wing Brain Worms - What to Do?

yeah that makes sense. I think there are elements of this on parts of left & right too (how partial critiques of power often are, combined w uncritical support for other parts- usually in different ways ofc) but what we call the centre is literally defined by it

I feel there's also a significant focus on character for centrists. The system is broadly ok and when its not its because a bad person got behind the wheel. Once we're able to get rid of that bad person everything will be ok again.

Its almost like an inverse cult, the individual isn't the guy coming into the fix the broken system. The individual is the one that has broken the system

idk, i feel like i'm _more_ focused on character than i was as a centrist. to, uh, circumlocute the current fracas a bit, i clearly remember excusing a lot of bill clinton's behavior on the basis that it had no bearing on governance, everybody does it, etc., etc. i'm not so willing to overlook such behavior now. couple that with the unwillingness to break with or acknowledge flaws in any of Our Democratic Norms and I tend to read the "it would be fine if it wasn't for this Bad Actor" as the sort of excuse-making behavior displayed by most people when confronted with stupid facts or inconvenient truths.

It's complex, as we've seen from the overlooking of Biden's character, but I'd say its more about the negative characteristics of the person deemed 'bad' rather than any particular positive/negative characteristics of the replacement. The reason things are bad is due to individuals, that should be replaced, because if its not individuals its something deeper - and there is not such thing as a centrist who thinks the underlying system needs more than tweaks (otherwise they wouldn't be a centrist)

The main desire of the centrist is for peace and quiet, though now they have had a taste of that Russiagate and Brexit good stuff who can say if they'll be able to go back to normal life once a generic suit is in charge again

I feel there's also a significant focus on character for centrists. The system is broadly ok and when its not its because a bad person got behind the wheel. Once we're able to get rid of that bad person everything will be ok again.

maybe true but can i suggest another spin that might also be true for centrists (or at least feels true for this sometimes called centrist)? the system is not an independent construct but rather emerges from the actions of individuals in concert. it is the way it is because the people who participate in it are the way they are. therefore if you want to change the system you need to elevate the consciousness of the people. changing the system (form of economy, form of government, etc) without changing the people gives you the same results in a new wrapper - or sometimes even much worse results despite the best of intentions in revolution!

Woo, dig it

Yes, its not to say there is some correct way of looking at the world. There are different lenses, and sometimes different ones are appropriate, or work for different individuals. There's nothing wrong with being centrist (or left, or right, or some of these things in some contexts and others in other contexts). All views give us some of the picture

I generally don't like talking in generalities as you run into trouble much quicker (one of the reasons I like this particular thread is that its focused on specific situations, up until recently at least). Any generality is full of holes, so I'm not positing this as a hard and fast rule

A generality is of course where the brainworm makes it nest (out of the finest 5G), and hatches its eggs

Trump continues to change the people in order to change the system and we're all incredibly lucky he's been only able to do so for a relatively small number of positions that are powerful on paper but relative figureheads compared to the bureaucracies they "command." Now we just have to ensure he doesn't get to nominate anybody else for the SCOTUS ever again.

Woo, dig it

― Kate (rushomancy)

(post to be read in Roger Daltrey's voice)

Any generality is full of holes

well, not always

:)

There's nothing wrong with being centrist

Prepare to be FP'd.

I do agree that context is paramount. On a more or less international borad such as this one, it's sometimes easy to forget that 'left' and 'right' do not mean the same thing from country to country.

Or region to region.

Exactly, right! In face, one second let me make sure I get the syntax right

I'm not a Democrat or Republican, a liberal or a conservative I think for myself!

you should all see what "left" and "right" mean in china, it is mind melting.

it is mind melting what they mean in the US tbf

i gave up on saving a friend from right wing brain worms
today. he posted a meme with contextless obama quotes about the economy from the past 10 years and when i asked him for citations he said “turnabout is fair play.” when i asked him what he meant he said i didn’t fact check anyone who said trump told people to drink bleach. when i pointed out that people were alarmed enough that lysol made a statement he started yelling about how trump didn’t mention lysol. o...k? that’s not what i meant? i meant that people took trump seriously enough that corporate comms teams, the most conservative people out there, felt compelled to respond? anyway, who has the energy.

not jeb, that's for sure

http://www.quackometer.net/blog/2020/05/unboxing-a-5g-protection-device.html

every time I read about amazing innovations like that I think I'm in the wrong job. Maybe I'll retrain as a Subtle Energy Engineer.

How is everyone doing with their RW friends and family with all thats going on? Any unexpected softening of stances?

My RW cousin hasn't mentioned it. Its almost certain he will be dispassionately pro-police, and I just can't go there.

I haven’t spoken to my mother or sister since before Memorial Day, but my sister (who lives in a suburb outside Hennepin County) shared what she thought was a LOL meme on FB, I called her out in the comments, and all her friends liked it and DMed me to say they’re going to deprogramme her in person after lockdown.

My cousin's two teenagers (and two divorces) have apparently worn away the vestiges of her snake handling Pentecostal upbringing, so it's been a nice surprise to see that brain worms can be killed.

I never try to talk to my RW relatives about this stuff online; I just call them out on shit they say when it's egregious and I'm there in person to hear it. FWIW all of them support justice for George Floyd in the individual case, but trying to talk to them about systemic police violence against black people, or putting the rioting/unrest into context for them is a fool's errand.

I was about to say "I don't have any" when I saw a post from a friend of mine sharing a CANDACE OWENS video of all fucking people, tearing down the Floyd movement. so I wrote out a long response instead of going back to sleep like I planned, and pointed out all of the things wrong with the video (the number of white NRA Trump Voters who liked the video shoulda been the first clue that it's disingenuous bullshit).

he's always been conservative-ish but he's a young Christian male in his 20s, a lot of us grow out of that. but he got a job as a 911 dispatcher and it's clouding his vision a bit. he hasn't posted one thing regarding George Floyd since it happens, just whataboutism and "hey remember this cop that died".

trying to reach this dude (and I know about 7 others will swoop in after I did - it's early in the morning yet). but don't have my hopes up.

I've thought about doing this on territory closer to where they are. Eg framing it more in terms they might recognize ("do the police have too much power?", "is there any oversight of these guys at all?", "it worries me that a government institution has so much power and weaponry", "they seem so careless, I'm not sure we should reward recurring failures with taxpayer money").

Seeing where they might be any possible inroad at all, but given authoritarian leanings this might be equally fruitless

As an aside I was looking at something on a screenshare with my cousin and my mother (nothing to do with any of this). And I realized my cousin was completely unable to take in new information on the screen when it changed (my mother saw in an instant)

Not only that but was almost on edge, panicked, defensive about it (not to a significant degree but it was there). The intake of information was too much, too quick, to the level of being rejected or dismissed, the original information much preferred

I used an anecdote about a time when i wrecked my car in a one car accident driving drunk, the cop knew i was drunk, but instead of making me take a field sobriety test and arresting ne, showed compassion and let me off the hook and just made me tow my car home. The cop was black.

I asked him to imagine a role reversal and how he thinks that would have gone.

(I should have been arrested tbrr)

xp what sort of information do you mean?

It wasn't anything political, it was just some family stuff. The point was that even with apolitical stuff there was still a form of resistance, "I don't want to hear it". This wasn't anything stressful in the slightest, but a struggle to deal with changed or new information. It wasn't that new new information was bad it was that something had changed and it had caused some form of disorientation

I think its part of why he never asks anything, because that could lead to new information rather than affirmation. And why every exchange is, at base, combative

My boyfriend has been sharing video after video of cop violence against protestors on Facebook and my conservative mom went from “why are they rioting?” to “fuck the police.”

— Jami Miller ✏️📰 (@pixieonmoon) June 4, 2020

point in the comments here thats peoples exodus from facebook has left relatives unguarded

Interesting idea although the original allure of Facebook for most was surely not as a way to keep in touch with relatives particularly.

Anvil: how old is your cousin? I don’t want to diagnose anyone over ilx, but it sounds like some kind of learning disability.

point in the comments here thats peoples exodus from facebook has left relatives unguarded

lol maybe they should form watch groups

That Candace Owens vid is really getting around.

Calling It Now: CRENSHAW/OWENS 2024

Can’t help but parse RW as Richard Wagner every time.

That video is so fuckin' infuriating. She says two minutes in that no other race, especially not white people, praises their lowest common denominator. Ignoring how terrible it is to call Floyd a lowest common denominator, HAVE YOU FORGOTTEN AMMON BUNDY OR THE ARMED MILITIAS AT THE COURTHOUSE THREE WEEKS AGO

I don’t want to diagnose anyone over ilx, but it sounds like some kind of learning disability.

Definitely not a learning disabilities! But someone who holds views very tightly and doesn't do well with change. Part of why anything even perceived as a challenge is met with high levels of defensiveness

I added my trump-loving extended family (well two of them anyway) back on FB with the explicit mission of countering them every time they posted shit that is fake and after a week it already feels like a lost cause. My aunt will post "racism is wrong" one day and follow it with "blacks kill the most blacks! blue lives matter!" shit the next. Uncle disgusted by Obama daring to say the police need meaningful reforms. I wrote a screed that is even-tempered and insightful in response and got nowhere with him, though someone else agreed with me on the reforms I suggested.

after a week it already feels like a lost cause

Shockah.

That said, this kind of work takes years, assuming you really want to go down that route.

gotta try incepting them

AN IDEA IS LIKE A VIRUS

there were def times in the past four years where my mom (who has decided she didn't like to talk about politics) was trending this way, influenced mainly by the catholic church, but she seems to have gotten straight; she posted Tamika Mallory speaking in NYC two days ago.

xp to akm - Extracting concessions to reasonableness from your older relatives is probably not going to happen. Old dogs usually keep to their old tricks. But projecting a reasonable voice in their direction may do some unseen good as it moves past your aunt and uncle and into the FBosphere beyond them.

True. I'm also spending a fair amount of time just reporting fake news to FB. I've seen at least a few things they've posted disappear.

after a week it already feels like a lost cause

fb is effective because of the relentless repetition. Also words can't compete with video. I think posting or sending one video of police brutality only tagged "this is weird" or "they shouldnt step on the little guy" and nothing else is the only way to reach some of these people. if they respond, then something like "i dont know, seems like they got too much power to me". There's enough clips of it happening to white people if you think that might be more effective

Also

"don't forget, the government wants to control you and oppress you. they don't just come in suits, they can also come in military grade vehicles with rubber bullets. Don't let that teargas and those helmets fool you, they're not on your side, they're just as dangerous as the man in the suit"

and for the TooFarGones "has Gates been arrested yet? suspicious, no? How do we know some of those rubber bullets are bullets at all? they could easily be microchipped vaccines, the police have total power and no oversight, what better method than distributing them to large numbers of people in a way that raises no suspicion whatsoever. the police aren't on your side, they are vaccinating people in plain sight wake up sheeple"

A Facebook friend messaged me that Candace Owens video. Considered a lengthy rebuttal, opted for “I already know what Trump mouthpieces have to say.” Should I have done more?