The responses you got to this on twitter gave me a good chuckle. TDS is alive and well and people are afraid to leave the herd.
Discussion
Ha -- a couple of those. And a lot of the libs — the people I know well — almost certainly have me on mute. But got a couple good responses and a DM too. I think a lot of people badly want to jump off this sinking ship.
Most seem to be terrified of showing any dissent or disagreement with their side in public. Very much cult-like behaviour, because of the irrational reactions they are likely to receive from their peers.
I spent the weekend interacting with some normies and it kind of floored me how lost so many still are. Completely uninformed, only know what the media tells them, zero intellectual curiosity in most of them, and worst of all they are uninterested in examining anything outside the norm, while having almost understanding of the things they believe.
*almost no understanding
Have had that same experience *many* times. Smart, otherwise engaged people just with zero interest in sense-making about what’s going on. But that same herd-drift mentality can be used IMO, if you persuade them the worm has turned and they’re on a sinking ship. Can’t argue facts directly, more just pointing out a few obvious things they already know.
Any breakthrough discussions tend to be from the people I would place on the lower end of the bell curve, rather than the types that are 'too smart for their own good'.
Some examples, and bear in mind this is in the UK:
"I don't know any of her policies, but Kamala seems like the obvious choice."
"So you support Trump?"
"I don't do Bitcoin mate, only stocks" said with a smug look.
🤣
heard all those things, but also got into with a guy who was emotional and upset when I told him I was “considering” voting for Trump.
But as we talked, I challenged a lot of his beliefs about climate change, etc. And my wife told me by the end he looked shaken like he had gotten beaten up in a fight. And I was nice about it, but the cognitive dissonance apparently took a toll.
I have no idea if it had a lasting impact, but I planted a seed. Thing about the guy (was British) was that he was a sensible and anti-authoritarian type of person which is why he was able to have the discussion. And there are a lot of those types who were liberal because they thought that was being for the underdog and don’t realize they’re now for the authoritarians.
I probably need to refine my approach, admittedly. I try to make it fairly light-hearted but I struggle to get through to the types of people who are stuck in their mainstream bubbles. I'm not really trying to convince people of my thinking, but have conversations outside of the typical shit people converse about. I'm okay with being an outlier and all the ignorant ridicule that comes with it.