“Knowledge is power. That’s why they don’t want you to have any.” I suspect that a big factor is making their own kid’s private school education look better by destroying the public school system. How big a factor anti-desegregationst “private academies” that were set up throughout the South in response to Brown v. Board od education were in the destruction of public education is another important question.
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“I’m just using your logic against you.” Well, there’s the problem - she’s not using logic, she just using racism.
Yeah, that would be nice, but I don’t think we’d ever see it - they just segue right into another subject and refuse to acknowledge what just happened. At best you could expect a deflection: “Well, that doesn’t matter.” (About something they were just making a big deal about.)
Nah. Obama’s ultimately not an American because he’s not white. They’re white, therefore they can’t not be American. Still, maybe we can force them.
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First of all, where the heck was Obama during 9-11? Why wasn’t Obama, who became president in 2009, taking charge behind his desk in the Oval Office when the planes hit the Twin Towers? “I’d like to get to the bottom of that,” one gentleman sporting a mad MAGA hat told the Daily Show 's Jordan Klepper.
I have no words. All the people who say that Republicans aren’t actually stupid, just the victims of our lousy education system, please explain this. I’m pretty sure our education system, bad though it is, still teaches kindergarten-level stuff like what years are and how to count. And that human memory, as terribly unreliable as THAT is, should be able to recall who was president on 9/11 for every US resident who lived through those years.
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… I’ll chip in for that bar tab as well, and I’m the person that wouldn’t (normally) wish cancer on their worst enemy after seeing it claim family.
for the Orange Idiot, I’ll make an exception.
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I see a lot of sheds. Not a sharp tool to be found in any of 'em.
Still, an abundance of tools, however unsharp.
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Ah the Dunning–Kruger effect.
It’s one of my favourite (albeit maybe not real) theories mainly for the commonly used graph which I can’t figure out how to insert for the life of me…
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in a way, it’s not the beliefs that have trapped them. it’s the community of lies and the practice of sharing those lies.
when you give them a simple answer, it isn’t understandable because that’s an end to conversation not a beginning.
what they crave are “answers” that careen towards the next “answer”. they’re addicted to the outrage, the looney talk amongst themselves, the sharing of the next ridiculous meme. so it’s never about facts, it’s about the number of people around them, doing the same things, who are also addicted
with normal addiction, changing your community can help change your habits to help break the cycle. don’t know how it all stops for qamaga
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Oh, you mean “engagement.”
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It always comes back to Obama. Their love of Trump is merely an extension of their hatred of Obama, for Trump is the anti-Obama.
Now, if only we could figure out what it is about Obama that they hate so much…
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Well, and add to that that the seductive lie is more appealing than the harsh truth…
Believing the lie (or at least convincing yourself you do) would either require remarkable strength of character to be the lone voice in the crowd, or if you can gather a community of people around you spouting the same ridiculous bullshit, it becomes so much easier to believe.
Sound like anything else that regularly causes social damage by decrying science and opposing social progress?
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If you can convince people to believe in an invisible sky god who does nothing for them, they will believe anything.
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Here’s something that might be of interest to this discussion:
It’s long (42 minutes), but it’s an interesting way of looking at the process of indoctrination (and it can always be watched sped-up.)
I worry about an uncle of mine; from comments he’s made, I think the Internet communities he hangs out in might be pulling him rightward. But I have no idea what I can do about it.
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Reminded me of this 1966 button I saw at the Smithsonian …
And this poster by Yolanda Lopez (also at the Smithsonian American Art Musem temporarily)
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I worry about my husband. He’s a well educated liberal, but emotionally reactive. Every American flag was put up by a GD Trumper. He’ll say the same about every pickup driver, every speeder, every non vaccinated person. Something’s got a squeeze on his brain.
.
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And the sheer hate.
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Mr. Linkey isn’t that bad, but can tend towards that kind of emotional reactivity. It was getting kind of bad for a little while a couple years ago and I constantly and steadily reeled him back in by comparing his attitude to the same thing we find so frustrating from others. It seems to have stuck.
And…I drive a pick up and am def no Trumper! I just do a lot of landscaping and woodworking around the house and it makes sense. Good luck! 
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I’m going to assume that the gentleman in question knew damn well that what he was saying didn’t make any sense.
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Hey yeah! And where was Obama in 1939?! Why didn’t he stop hitler? How come Obama didn’t catch jack the ripper either? What a fraud!
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