Political Memes

Yeah. Ask them if they care though. They’re not hiding their hypocrisy. They’re proud of it.

Gerrymandering only exists because we don't do proportional representation.

I'd love a system where you vote for a party first to gauge how many of the party will hold office and then a vote for who represents them.

But I suspect both Republicans and Democrats would reject this because it disrupts their status quo.

It has basically become my personal crusade to try to explain this to people.

When you attack them on inconsistency or being hypocritical it's essentially telling a child that their emotions are wrong and that santa isn't real. You don't make progress, they will consider whatever you say to be "propaganda from the enemy." They're bothered by it in the fact that you're trying to shit on their sacred beliefs but it just makes them dismiss whatever you have to say even harder.

I've done this a lot and learned the best way to actually get through to a conservative stuck in their rut is to just ask them questions about their problems and listen to them. Seriously, that's all. They almost do all the rest themselves much of the time. They desperately want approval, and if they start thinking you want to hear what they have to say, they will start wanting your respect, and then they will want your approval, and then they will want to please you.

Your challenge here is you're not going to get the outcome you want, and again, it's like wanting vindication and retribution against a small child, they won't understand it enough to give you that satisfaction, meanwhile if we can just connect their emotional states to better outcomes in politics we can actually make the world better. You just have to be the adult in the room and you have to give them something nobody else in their lives gives them, which a chance to be heard.

You can take the place of their projected paternal fantasies and start influencing their feelings if you just give them that space.

We have a huge problem right now which is binary thinking, almost worse on the left than the right. At least the emotional conservatives can change their views if their feelings change. The left broadly needs to start trying new tactics instead of butting heads. Clickbait and sensational youtube bullshit has made us think that every interaction has to be a bitter fight.

Of course this doesn't apply to deeply online, performative bullshit like going into 4chan or something and thinking you can flip people in /r/pol, I am talking about physical space, in interactions with family members and friends and acquaintances. And if you don't have a social life, work on that too.

I know they have no shame. But I use it as a litmus test to see what kind of idiot I'm dealing with. If they can't see the hypocrisy, they're an idiot whose opinions should be ignored and actions should be countered.