He’s fundamentally incompetent… I don’t know how to make that more obvious than it is. It’s not like other Republicans don’t think so… so if they’re missing that, there may be no help there until they have to suffer his more outrageous excesses personally.
The troublesome thing about facts is that they aren’t conditional. Your parents sound like they need them to come in a certain package, but that package is a worldview, and if the worldview is flawed, the facts won’t fit. I understand what you’re trying to do, but it’s putting the cart before the horse.
I think the mistake here is thinking that everyone is reasonable, has a conscience, AND can be convinced to take food off their own plate. I don’t see it happening.
If you’ve been asked why you don’t support Trump, that’s one thing. If you’ve been asked then maybe you have a chance to use the language of the question to bring the answer home.
But if nobody has asked and you feel compelled to convince people who just don’t seem to get it… thats not likely an accident, it’s not likely an oversight. People can understand anything they choose to, and can ignore absolutely anything they don’t want to see - until it tries to take food off their plate.
If it seems like I am trying to demoralize you I apologize, but there is no good to come from seeking accountability from the unaccountable, and talking human politics with a real supporter of Trump is unlikely to yield change on their part. You cannot reason someone into seeing people differently than they do. Why is it in their best interest to consider, or even listen? What’s at stake for them?
People seem to be replying OT. It’s a writeup of grievances, not propaganda for a political manifesto.
Having said that, the question is moot, the entire political process is exactly a writeup of grievances. Let me illustrate in bullet point format.
Democrat concern.
Republican reaction.
Environmental concerns.
Your environmental concerns are unfounded.
Women’s rights.
Your concern for Women’s rights is unfounded.
Erratic behaviour of President.
We love that behaviour, your concern is unfounded.
Any concern.
Your concern is unfounded.
And that’s being polite. You can write up the usual suspects but Keyzer Soze is still going to slip away unnoticed during the inevitable horse and pony show that immediately dominates any conversation on the matter for everyone concerned.
That’s the reality of current political interaction.
One side feels it has legitimate concerns, the other begs to differ.
But, by all means please, write up a polite bullet point list with notes and let us know what the reaction is. Maybe we’ll be surprised.
How this has played out every time I have tried it:
Facts presented
Cognitive dissonance generated
Emotional reaction to cognitive dissonance seeks target
I’m still standing there
Bob’s your uncle
Arguing against someones faith is at best a waste of time, and at worst a desire to rip someones security blanket away. People of faith must come to their own crossroads with a charlatan, and there is no reasoning them towards it. Not that I’ve experienced.
Clear & Palatable Goals
I think it’s critical for anyone who has Republicans that they love who are reflexively supporting Trump to focus on corruption and alternatives that will truly address corruption. Make it clear that you aren’t arguing that Hillary should have won. Make it clear that you aren’t trying to convince them to vote Democrat, or even take the Libertarian baby step away from the ledge. Just that you want them to acknowledge the Trump is clearly not the answer to our collective problems, and is in fact, making them worse.
Common Ground
I think you’re right on target to point out that political corruption is the common ground that the left and the right have. Common ground is step one in working with any belligerent party. I actually do believe that if a person’s number one concern was this, I can see how potential Bernie voters genuinely became Trump voters, however foolish that may be on other levels. The fundamental difference is that Republicans think that governmental agencies are inherently corrupt, and that businesses are vulnerable innocents being seduced or coerced into corruption by a greedy domineering government. Democrats see business interests as seducing, infiltrating and corrupting government officials, all the while weakening anti-corruption laws to further dominate the process. In the end though, we agree that governmental power + business interests without rules tends toward corruption.
Baby and the Bathwater
When making the case that Trump is not the answer, I think potential issues are also ones where he’s throwing out things they may support, in order to get at things they disagree with. Highlight his ham-fisted, corrupt approach to probelms. Many people are able to deny Climate Change. It’s concrete to the scientific community, but it’s no “hole in the ozone layer” or Cuyahoga River Fire in terms of immediacy or optics. So, an approach of “But Trump is stripping away all environmental protections, including dumping coal debris into rivers” which is some clown-car, old-school style environmental harm of the kind that conservative environmentalists, like hunting groups, can get behind protesting and preventing. The argument here is: “Couldn’t we find someone with a more informed, less corrupt approach to balancing the interests of business and natural resources.” Throwing contraception out with abortion rights fits this model, as does throwing out unemployment protections with the boogeyman of cash assistance. Even Republicans have made a similar arguments to their base about the Muslim ban “like the sentiment, but this was a crazy way to do it…”
Trump is the embodiment of corruption, and has shown himself to be extremely ham-fisted with policy. I get that people thought (for some crazy reason) that he would be the one to end corruption, but instead all he’s done is to go about removing the laws that would define his activities as corruption. Problem solved!
I’m so overwhelmed by all the news, and am a generally scatterbrained person, I can’t start to summarize in a clear and organized way, but the examples of his naked, greedy, self-interested corruption are all there. This seems like it would have to be the wedge. Perhaps once that’s set, and you’ve established that your arguments are a good faith effort to find a common solution, other cracks may begin to appear.
I think I can help with this. I’d be happy to work on a draft.
One writeup I saw recently that a pro-Trump friend shared I think might be a good starting point. It spent a lot of time talking about her background as a kind of Strong Southern Lady. In this particular post she was making the point that ladies like her grandma and aunt were git-er-done types and would never be seen walking around in a vagina hat.
So, okay, she was on the other side of the fence, but I think I might start from, “I was raised to believe…” and talk about the beliefs that are similar to what people currently hold, but then talk about how you transformed and list some facts that made a difference for you. Like, "I was raised to believe that we take care of ourselves and never accept a hand out from the government, but when my sister was on welfare, I saw this (insert story here) and then I started researching it and I learned (insert facts here).
Yay southern strategy and courting evangelicals. /s
The weird thing about my family, and I want to say this about a lot of other Trumosters, is they sound more racist the further away a group is. Mexicans? Worthless job stealing illegals. Family’s friends with a Mexican family (Mexican/white to boot so interracial kids.) Again talk of how mooching black people are, we babysat a black kid for years off of one of my stepdadcs coworkers who they still hold in high regard as a genuinely good person. Sadly the one exposure they had to gsy/lesbian personally was a drug addict who my little brother thought he got pregnant having a lesbian mom who was… Antagonistic.
With Disability my family might have more perspective than most given there’s not just me, but my twin (full time care,) my sister (adopted, full time care plus seizure prone,) and mom’s older sister (full time care.) They see the need for help for the disables. Yet there is disagreement on if the elderly that has families deserve help or if their families should take the burden.
They see the past as some Walton’s esque slice of perfection we must retreat into. Never mind both my parents are old enough to hopefully realize that sort of ‘everyone helping eachother and we never had a lot but by gosh we were happy with what we had’ mentality is a myth.
Here’s my problem with that, though: I was one of those people (there are millions of us) who was always nice, always conciliatory, always took the high road, kept my mouth shut, lied for them if that’s what it took to make sure THEY continued to feel good about themselves, didn’t show my horror at their egregious hatred of human and civil rights for anyone who wasn’t exactly like them, didn’t point out how hypocritical their opinions were with regard to the timbers in their own eyes…and over time they have continued to treat me (and those others) as lesser human beings and gleefully voted for further and further bigotry, xenophobia, and fascism.
You’re telling me it’s my job to continue rolling over to let them kick me, because somehow I’m at fault for expressing (in private) any problem I have with their treatment of me (and millions of other people).
It’s not my job. It never was my job, and yet I’ve been doing it for free for years. I don’t owe them any more of my consideration. And you don’t have any standing for telling me that I do.
I would find it odd if they weren’t. It does seem like a lot of people voted for him because they didn’t like Hilary or because of the abortion issue. I posted this video without comment yesterday, but I guess I should have been clearer:
We often see the other side as this uniform and incorrigible group, when they really aren’t. There are people who are against abortion, but want women to be safe. Some people don’t like big government, but they do want to make things better for disadvantaged people. Liberals and Muslims may unite over civil liberties, while Muslims and Evangelicals may unite over religious liberties. The point is that people are complex and acting like they are enthusiastic proponents of everything that their party stands for blinds us to possible alliances.
I think one of the big things that can be done is to find these links or possible areas of agreement or alliance. Sister Joan Chittister’s words come to mind:
I think in many cases your morality is deeply lacking if all you want is a child born, but not a child fed, not a child educated, not a child housed. That’s not pro-life, that’s pro-birth.
Sister Chichester is against abortion as a choice or form of birth control, but thinks it should be available if the woman and her doctor see it as the only option. She points out that killing is not considered an absolute wrong in conflict situations or other cases. Sometimes it’s like the trolley problem and you have to weigh the benefits of direct action against inaction leading to greater harm. There are probably quite a few people who could support her position and statistics show that most people do not think in absolute pro-choice or pro-life terms. It looks like many religious conservatives put a lot of emphasis on abortion as a motivator, so this is a key point. Christianity has been against abortion and infanticide since the early church, and Christians have been outspoken in their support of rights for disadvantaged people on many occasions. Progressives may not align with them on everything or even most things, but they are no more natural enemies than Muslims and progressives are. In both cases it’s possible to acknowledge that there are a number of significant disagreements, but we can disagree from a position that recognises the things that unite us.
Part of the point is deciding who you talk with and how you frame your arguments. As @LDoBe pointed out, the package of policies that progressives want actually leads to fewer, earlier and safer abortions. However, it is often framed as if it would be possible to eliminate it without causing significant harm. There’s the idea that you cannot allow the government to be involved in killing, but this is already happening:
Some may be completely opposed to drone strikes, others might see it as more complex, especially if they think it leads to less harm in the long term. Sister Chichester’s quote also points out that we are morally responsible for our inaction as well as for our actions. Abortion is presented as an absolute wrong, but even if you’re strongly against it it isn’t as simple as that.
I also commented yesterday that the current polarisation can be a sort of triangulation strategy to stop progress from happening and divide people who actually have many shared interests. In many ways I think refusing to view the world in those terms is the only way forward; but another one is accepting the messiness of people’s views. This will be an issue that people will disagree on for a long time, but encouraging both conservatives and progressives to stop seeing this issue as non-negotiable (in the sense that conservatives can be against abortion and still support a pro-choice candidate based on overall agreement, and progressives can see this as fundamental to women’s rights, but still accept support from people who disagree on this issue).
I’m not sure if it’s possible to find arguments against Trump’s actions that his supporters will give serious consideration to. If Trump’s own past statements on the evils of Executive Orders or how the Electoral College is a disaster for Democracy are dismissively brushed away then why would they listen to anything I have to say on the subject?
I’m tall,so I have to prop my monitors up on books at work. Under my monitors are all my textbooks from my favorite class in college “Welfare States in Comparison.” That class blew my mind wide open as to what a comprehensive, intentional and effective welfare state is, as opposed to a collection of hodgepodge “safety nets.” Systems like single-payer, for a relevant example, are an improvement in the system of healthcare at it’s root, not just a subsidy for those who can’t.
Social Programs vs. Charity
In that class we talked a lot of charity vs. welfare, and by extension private charitable / non-profit vs. Government welfare and social programs. Conservatives’ feeling that government assistance should step in only if a family can’t provide is related to this idea. It’s built on a framing of sickness, disability and need, generally, as a job for charity, whether it be from the family, the church, or other charity, because those organizations “care” about the person. To them, the uncaring state is the opposite, and seeks to remove the family from the equation and replace it. I don’t think we’re going to be able to obliterate this divide, but I think that we can chip away at the framing that a strong, well-planned welfare state undermines families’ responsibility to take care of their own. An effective social program should actually make it easier for families to take care of their own by making the systems they have to interact with and access more efficient and more robust.
You Can’t Pick your family…
I personally think the idea that people should get assistance only if their families can’t provide ignores how truly horrible some people’s families are, and what an unfair, luck-of-the-draw situation a sick person in the care of an abusive family faces. If your family is resistant to the idea that country of birth is luck of the draw and shouldn’t determine one’s financial future, this will be another tough one, but perhaps an angle to consider.
I’ve Got My Own Problems
The third aspect of the charity/family vs welfare state is the idea that families already struggling shouldn’t have to support some lazy stranger, who could support themselves if they tried. The only answer to this, I think, is the “one innocent man/ten guilty men” argument. If a true improvement in the system of social services across the board would end up supporting some “undeserving” people, while helping all the “deserving people,” is it worth sticking with a shittier system for everyone, just to make sure some “undeserving” people don’t accidentally get their hands on it? How much better would the system have to be to make this chance worth it? What form would it have to take to make this chance worth it? The “you agree we should pay taxes for roads, though!” is a pretty tired cliche, but applied to this case, I see the issue of social programs as analogous to “would you pay for shittier roads, just so poor people wouldn’t have a smooth ride?”
Social Service Compromise
There was an article a while back on the Guardian about a woman being considered for a Trump post who was the daughter of a very left-wing immigrant family. She, as a healthcare consultant to republican state legislators, was the author of incredibly punitive welfare restrictions in some very red states, including very harsh and invasive needs testing for cash assistance and onerous volunteering requirements for unemployment. She’s generally presented as an enemy to social welfare causes, I felt the same way during the first part of the article. Toward the end they noted, however, that she had gotten states to adopt social programs that they wouldn’t have otherwise, by adding these provisions. I walked away from the article thinking she may be more clever than the rest of us. She may have just found a way to give the reddest states their first taste of social welfare, and at least give them a chance to see that things could work in their state.
Look I am disabled. However I have enough I can do that I wouldn’t mind taking volunteer hours SO LONG AS IT IS SOMETHING PRODUCTIVE I CAN DO. Not ‘oh Billy Blindboy needs to do something we’ll have him do something useless a few hours a week.’ Fuck that. The reason I have been job centric is because I want people to not see me as a parasite leeching off of my family (they insist I help out by doing home things. Technically true but given my opinion holds no weight or ideas given merit…) Plus I see that as a chance to normalize the disabled socially. Part of why my social skills have atrophied to nothing is the fact I am in this cocoon and never leave it. It also is why I am very… Aggressively not happy with family. They are all I see most times. It’s like cabin fever.
So as long as the ‘required’ work is something matched to a person’s ability. Do with a minimum of oversight? I’m all for having volunteer hours… Assuming a way is given to get to and from said thing.
Can you keep writing? What you were talking felt awesome to read.
Are you unable to leave the house physically, or mentally?
Start slowly. Go outside into the yard for 5 minutes today. Make it 10 minutes tomorrow. By the end of a week, see if you can make it to the end of the block. You’re not going to be doing major political volunteer work overnight; you have to start flexing your muscles in preparation.
You need to break this sense that you can’t do anything. Most people with disabilities are able to do a lot of things, usually after figuring out how to do them differently.
Remember, a sizeable portion of people on this forum – and on this thread, even – also have disabilities. We’re not lecturing you, we’re offering advice from a position of knowledge.
The big one my parents and their circles seem to have are protest related. There are others but as a bit of a rundown in questions they might ask.
Why are people going out to protest in the streets?
Why do these protesters dress so poorly?
If it was so bad for republicans to block what they saw as poor for america choices Obama wanted. Make why is it suddenly OK to turn around and do the same to trump?
What’s the big deal about trump’s comment about america not having clean hands?
What is the problem with trump wishing to tighten immigration control and have a temporary restriction from countries that are currently antagonistic to the united states?
Why do you defend the affordable care act when it is neither affordable nor does it really provide care needed?
Why does it matter if [official name] does not know the department they are head of, shouldn’t it be a case of someone that understands how to delicate and then surround themselves with experts instead of someone attempting to micromanage?
Younger people are acting resentful of trump giving a firm and authoritative attempt at giving america direction. Why?
I don’t know if these are their questions but it seems to be what I keep hearing them discuss amongst themselves or lob at my head.
