Yeah, a few of us have been saying that recently. It’s the largest problem Democrats have right now. People are finally waking up to this.
We don’t have to sell our integrity or become shameless hacks. But we do have to fight. Because we carry a higher burden - that of being more fact-based than Republicans - we probably have to try harder and invest more than they do. It’s easier to spread a pack of lies than to tell the truth. What’s the old saying? “A lie travels halfway around the world while the truth is putting its pants on.” Republicans understand this, and they’ve built a movement on the backs of lies that are traveling around the world, while Dems are waiting for a New York Times op-ed to get its pants on and fully fact-checked…
We’ve seen that the general public isn’t responsive to facts, though. Setting aside whether that’s because the information isn’t reaching them, or deceptive framing has reached them before facts, or that they’re just not interested, what do you do?
It would be nice if this were a situation where both sides submitted a position paper and the best one wins, but that’s simply not the reality we exist in. Democrats need a different rhetorical approach.
Gee whiz, I don’t know why the strategy of telling people “you don’t actually believe in any of the principles you claim to hold, you’re actually just a racist” isn’t working. It seems like a winning move to me.
Prior to Trump, it was the more leftish view, yes. Obama mocked Romney in the 2012 presidential debates by making comments about how Romney’s anti-Russia stance was Cold-War ish and Obama had also been making comments to Russia about “I’ll have more flexibility to accommodate you after this election is over” (paraphrased.) And in general, it was the political left that was more sympathetic to Communism or the USSR during the Cold War.
Gee whiz, put a bit more effort into reading comprehension. I don’t suggest a strategy of telling voters that they’re liars.
What I do suggest is that it’s a waste of time to message certain voters as if they’re being honest about their principles. If someone claims to be a “Movement Conservative”, but support insanity like invading Greenland, it’s a fool’s errand to appeal to that person’s big-C “conservative principles”, because they’ve proven that’s not what they actually believe.
Don’t pitch the messaging toward what conservatives claim is important to them, because they’ve proven time and time again that what they claim to value is very different from what they actually value. That’s what this entire thread is about.
Same-sex marriage (SSM) is pretty much a main-stream idea, today. It wasn’t as few as 10 years ago. Even Democrats were against the idea. What happened was that the LGB community banded together and brought to light the inequities of the situation and changed public opinion. Not with a message of ‘Although we’re different than you, we have rights, too, you know,’ but with a message of ‘The government can’t control who anybody loves,’ and ‘people who share their life with the person they love should be able to share their entire life, not just who they hang out with.’
And, it worked. Not without spending significant political capital, though. With SSM being legal nationwide, more and more people were coming out. The drawback was that to cloistered uptight Christians, the impression was that we suddenly had many more homosexuals running around. Of course, this isn’t true, the number of homosexuals has pretty much been constant for most of history. But, now it was obvious whereas before you could fool yourself and pretend that you didn’t see it.
Of course, this apparent increase in the number of homosexuals had to be explained to the low-information folks. Well, it was obvious. The Democrats were grooming children to become homosexual. We have to stop this or our children will be forced to be godless sinners and would face eternal damnation in Hell. Do you want that for your children?
So, while the battle for SSM was won (manly because of the number of friends and family of Republicans were joined in SSM), the war for accepting homosexuals as equals is still being waged. Look at what it’s done to the Methodist Church, one of Christian denominations who thump the Bible the least. Split. Not because they couldn’t agree on which Hymns belong in the Hymnal, or what the Order of Worship should be on Sunday, but if the Church should treat homosexuals as being human beings.
And, to produce a bigger wedge, the idea was pushed that if homosexuals are equal, then transexuals and non-binary folks should be, as well. Obama caught a lot of flack for choosing such a diverse cabinet. Well, Biden’s cabinet is even more diverse, with more people of color, more women, and including female people of color and homosexuals. When you look at this, Trump’s choices for his cabinet are a bit easier to understand. Not only is he backing away from the diversity, but is also finding out which Senators are willing to defy his choices.
No, I agree with Babale. The Democrats have been rocking the boat with as much political capital they have. IMHO, that’s what got Trump elected. I’m just hoping that when the general public (on the right and the left) realizes the truth to Trump’s policies that they will end up deciding being woke isn’t that bad of a thing, even for a Christian.
IMHO this conflates two separate issues, that of the better economic system and that of the better government system. What the (far) left supported back in the Cold War was communism over capitalism in the debate over the better economic system, with the USSR as the champion of communism. What the right currently supports is fascism over democracy in the debate over the better government system, with Russia as the champion of fascism.
I agree with this entirely. The only reason the Trump was able to get nominated and elected was because he was able to ride the wave of choose your own reality misinformation that the right wing media has been spewing non-stop. His “genius” was the ability to shamelessly lie and the realization that it didn’t matter anymore if the emperor had no clothes so long as people wanted to believe he did.
However I also agree that it isn’t going to be easy. Lies have the advantage that they can be tailored to match they preconceived biases of the audience, and sell people a reality that is much more appealing then the one that actually exists. The problems in your life being the fault of an enemy at the gate who is so depraved as to eat peoples pets, is much more appealing than blaming it on market forces. So trying to propagandize with Truth is going to be like trying to sell oatmeal when there are nacho pizza poppers the next aisle over.
The sole advantage that the reality based community has is that if you deny it long enough eventually reality will smack you in the face. Its possible that MAGA as implemented by those who are high on their own supply will be such a disaster that all but its most ardent believers will be able to see the writing on the wall.
Good point. It’s in China’s interest to have the USA implode, or at least be so weakened that all we can do is gratefully buy whatever China has to sell (such as food).
So they’d definitely entertain offers only from the batshit/MAGA side of the political spectrum.
