Trump Supporters are Flawed People

Okay, so you are saying that we do not need to engage all of the Trump supporters. Thank you. You never said that before, you just said that we needed to listen, empathize and understand the Trump supporters. Now that you have given us permission to write off a substantial portion of them, that makes it easier.

I am speaking vaguely, because I am trying to speak to the concerns of tens of millions of people, each with different concerns. In this discussion, ti is hard to be specific.

But a good job is one in which you put in an honest 40ish hours a week, and it puts roof over your heard, food on the table, supports your children, and leaves a bit left for the luxuries of life.

A good life is one in which you are not subjected to violence, oppression, or deprivation.

All that fun stuff are the luxuries that are not necessary to live, but are useful to be fulfilled. Everyone has a different definition of the fun stuff.

Because she actually had a plan, he had slogans. Her plan was superior by dint of existing. Was it indisputable the best plan possible? Probably not, but it probably was the best plan that would be politically practical.

Depends. Are strawberries the only things that anyone is buying? If so, then everyone needs to grow strawberries. If you wanna grow grapes, that’s fine, but if no one is going to buy them, then that’s not going to do you any good.

Pining over the manufacturing jobs that are not coming back short of implementing a command economy and requiring employers to hire people for outdated jobs is not useful. If you are not skilled for the jobs that are offered, then you need to learn a new skill. Part of Clinton’s plan was to fund skill retraining programs.

If the problem is that there are no jobs withing a thousand miles, then you are either asking the government to move some jobs to you, or you need to move. That I saw, I do not know if Clinton’s plan called for relocation assistance, but I think it did. If not, it is something that I would agree needed to be added.

I am in the midwest. I did not finish college. I struggled quite a bit for many years going from one job to another. When the 2008 economic collapse came, I lost pretty much everything. It was only by the skin of my teeth that I was able to keep my house. I couldn’t find a job that supported me, much less a job that I liked that supported me. Even trying to go back to college to finish my degree ended u just dumping a a crap ton of student loans on me.

I could have whined. I could have complained about how unfair it was. I could have blamed Obama, or china, or Clinton, or whomever for my woes. It was tempting.

I took another path. I made my own job. I started my own business. Was it a business that I knew and loved? Hell no, I always dreamed of owning a restaurant, instead, I own a dog grooming business. But I learned and adapted, and did a good job of it. Now I am employing myself comfortably, making more than I ever did working for others, and I have also created, at this time, 12 good paying jobs in what I like to think of as a pretty positive work environment.

That’s what I did to help to improve the country and my community. What have these trump voters done? How can I convince them that they need to buckle down and get to work. That this country was not made great by sitting back and letting others bring you jobs? That this country needed them to get off their asses and do something productive, rather than just whine that it’s not fair.

No one likes to be told their an idiot, you are correct. No one likes to be told they are wrong. No on likes to be wrong. No on like to have reality shoved in their face to demonstrate how very wrong they are.

But they ar wrongm, and if they can’t acknoledge that, they are idiots.

You said ealier that there are those that we are allowed to write off. Are the willfully ignorant among that group, or do you have aplan to reach those who refuse to listen?

Great advice, and it is possible that if every single Clinton supporter had followed it, then we may have pulled another percent or two in Clinton’s favor, and that may have been enough to win the election. Part of the problem is that now you are saying we have to police every single person on our side. If just one Clinton supporter says anything that can be construed as elitist, rude, or nasty, then your people that I am trying to reach use that one individual to blow off the entire side. I have heard on this Message board and in real life, people saying that they are not going to vote for Clinton because of something that some Clinton supporter said. So, how do I reach someone who has already been alienated by one of the other 50 million people on my side that may not have been as tactful as you suggest that every one of us be?

For those who want to burn it all down, and rebuild from the ashes, I know tow things about them.

One, they have never built anything. Are you (royal you of the people that supported trump to tear the system down) going to be beside me, laying brick on brick, or are you going to be sitting in your entitlement bubble, complaining that it’s the wrong color, ti’s not big enough, and what’s taking so long?

Two, they’ve never been in a fire. It’s sounds great to soak everything with gas, light a match and fan the flames. But what is your plan after that? Do you think that it is going to be fun to have the place burning down around your ears? Are you going to be down in the basement with me trying to get the blaze under control, and trying to help those who are trapped? Or are you going to be looking to escape the consequences of the blaze you started?

No, I didn’t say we do not need to engage all of the Trump supporters. You are proving my point, again: you are not listening.

I helpfully included what I wrote, which you quoted. Can you tell me what you got wrong?

Maybe you are not communicating/listening effectively? I, too, am getting a very mixed/vague message about how you have us handle this? I have told you previously how I have tried to empathize and listen to a company full of Trump supporters that think that Limbaugh and Hannity are news reporters. I told you directly that empathy and listening is not what they want-if you do not show agreement with the position, it you show a hint of having an opposing opinion you are classified as the “enemy”. I have said to you that your method doesn’t work at my workplace…and your “sage” advice was for me to get another job elsewhere.
Have you ever heard of the “Tommy Syndrome”? It comes from the movie “Tommy”, and it’s when a person solves a problem using a particular technique, then that person starts believing that that particular method will work for everyone else. If it doesn’t work for others, then that person, rather than believe that maybe their solution isn’t as universal as they originally thought, will instead assume that the other person just didn’t do it right(or even at all.)

As in every other post in the thread, you said that we needed to listen, empathize and understand the Trump supporter, without giving any head to what type of Trump supporter you were talking about, no, you did not make it clear. You only gave one example of blatant racism that you were willing to write off, but all other forms of ignorance and apathy you implied should be included.

Now, maybe I did miss another example that you made, I read this stuff at work in between quite a number of other much more important activities, so while I have been following this thread, I may have missed it. I glanced back through and did not see it. Would you mind pointing it out?

I agree that maybe a more friendly empathetic message and campaign may have earned a couple of extra point, maybe even clenching the win, but you seem to think that it is not just a very small minority of trump supporters that are reachable, but the majority.

I do not think so. They are not equipped or willing to learn about policy nuance and to deal with the kind of effort that is needed in order to achieve their goals. They just want someone to hand it to them. They complain about the jobs that they have available to them. I may complain too. But they are not looking to work to fix their situation, they are looking for someone else to come in and fix it for them.

Trying to talk them into hard work is the job that is ahead of us. I don’t think many of them can be reached that way.

WRT the minimum wage, those people are WRONG, as a matter of objective fact. Disagreement with that is NOT legitimate.

Probably not. But any answer they do give will be an ignorant one.

Good point. We’ll need to work up some dog whistles so the stupid deplorables don’t figure it out when we’re calling them that…

The OP is spot on. Trump supporters are nothing but human trash, every single one of them, no ifs, ands or buts.

Edicts not working so well?

What Snowboarder Bo is saying is not hard to understand. If you want people to listen you have to have a dialogue not a holier than thou derisive lecture.

Let’s do a for example. Those clowns in Portland smashing stuff up with bats are MAD! And they think Love trumps hAte! Right? Ok. Who are they going to convince?

They going to convince those who agree with them? They don’t need convincing. They like smashing.

They going to convince those who strongly agree with Trump? No.

What about everyone in the middle? Well, stinky, unemployed anarchists smashing stuff up doesn’t play well to middle America.

So it’s not just the message. It’s how it’s conveyed.

Sure. I had hoped, since you quoted me and then I duplicated that layout, that it would be as obvious to you as it was to me, but lemme try again with helpful bolding:

Do you see how you directly contradicted and appeared to ignore what I wrote?

I didn’t say you don’t have to engage all of the Trump supporters. Indeed, I said that I cannot know who can be reached without engaging them first.

We’re ostensibly on the same side here, but because my message is different than yours, it appears you didn’t really bother to read and understand what I wrote.

Think about how that looks. It looks shitty to me, and I know we’re on the same side. Think about someone that already suspects you disagree wth them or someone that knows you do; what kind of impression is that going to give? Couple that with body language and inflection, and I doubt you’d have a real dialogue going anymore.

Of course it’s a small minority, compared to the whole. Do you really think that 50% of the country is racist? Everywhere you go, if it’s you and 1 other person in a store, at a restaurant, on a bus, sharing a cab… do you assume that other person is a racist? :confused:

Derisive views and derisive language. Wanna see some more of it?

“Blacks are lazy and want everything handed to them.”

“Mexicans just come here for the free welfare benefits.”

Do you think you can make the statements you made and they aren’t bigoted because you are talking about white people and you yourself are a white person? :confused:

More of the same, dude. This is just more of the same.

I don’t know if this has been shared before on this site but it is a spirited take on what many have been saying with how to influence others. Again, I was called a racist from practically my very first day on these boards by the left for suggesting that people’s opinions may not actually be what the left arrogantly assumes them to be. They didn’t even know my opinion but it didn’t stop the ridiculous attacks. Even from mods “posting as posters.” But anyways here’s the link.

Jonathan Pie on the counter-productivity of reflexive accusations of bigotry. President Trump: How & Why... - YouTube

Sounds a bit like a foul mouthed octopus.

Linked to twice already in this thread, by Duke of Rat in post #125 and by Bricker in post #233.

It is an excellent commentary, IMO, and since those were both on other pages, I think it’s fine to have it featured again.

Yep, every one of 60 million of them. 60 million.

I want you to record this OP on some sort of audible medium, then listen to it…I mean really listen to it…then try to figure out how the fuck you lost the election, you pretentious fuck…oops, this isn’t the Pit, I take that back.

Been there.
Done that(for many years).
IT DIDN"T FUCKING WORK.
At no time did I call them names, lecture them or do any of the fucking things you keep saying we shouldn’t do because at my place of work it would have been dangerous to do so. If I tried to do anything except agree with them,
IT DIDN"T FUCKING WORK.
This is beginning to sound like the apocryphal tech support person who’s first response, no matter what you say is going on, is “Have you tried turning it off then turning it back on again?”

One big demographic of Trump supporters think that many other demographics who want to convince them are at best mentally ill, and at worst not even equal human beings. If we listen to them enough to determine that they are one of those, THEN can we start the condemnation?

If not, is it a fair question to point at the other demo and ask if this is something they support?

Well, it *would *be a change to be the one asking “why don’t you condemn this fellow member of your (political wing/religion/ethnicity/social movement)?” as opposed to being the one of whom it is being demanded…

Don’t know if that’s really something to be sought.

My only interactions with you have been here, where (in my view) you behaved differently than you describe yourself behaving at work.

My question to you is: do you agree?

I ask because I see two general possibilities. If you were to say something like, “I acted here on the SDMB just like I did at work,” then I’d suggest that your perception of your own behavior was not a good indicator of how you came across to others – despite your intentions, you didn’t come across as attempting to understand or empathize.

But if you say something like, “Yes, of course I know I acted differently here,” then I cannot draw that conclusion.

What’s your goal?

Is it to develop a list of acceptable candidates for condemnation?