Discussion isn’t a purpose, it is a method to achieve a purpose. My purpose of the forums is to get other’s perspectives, digest them, and optionally incorporate them into my own perspective. Someone with a minority viewpoint has a lot more potential to gain than their opposite.
As a liberal I’m constantly on the lookout reasoned perspectives that are counter to my own. Liberal or conservative: The point isn’t to change minds; it is to change your own.
At least with the MAGA types I have personal relationships with, they usually just drop the subject which is something they won’t do if I actually take their points of view seriously by trying to use things like reason, empathy, and compassion to argue against their points. They don’t like it when you don’t take them seriously. But of course, in the grand scheme of things, we really do need take them seriously. They’re the equivalent of a toddler waiving a pistol around.
The problem is, no matter what you do, the toddler will be mad if you take their pistol and will resist giving it to you no matter what you say.
I’ve taken a slow approach to the few MAGA I know. I will never, ever convince them to put down the gun in one conversation. I just need to carefully lean in on them and hope it will trickle through eventually.
I have no evidence that this will work but I am out of other ideas.
For those online (read: I do not know them), I have no problem offending them.
When my viewpoint is the majority (of the people I have access to anyway) hearing others repeat what I think is of little value to me. Hearing from those with viewpoints that I don’t generally hear OTOH is the valuable new to me perspective.
OTOH when I am a minority view I’ve heard the majority perspectives already. I’m not hearing anything new or different that I haven’t heard before.
To the OP - I agree. I don’t think Demoncrats or that crap would be useful or appreciated here, even if it was allowed, and neither should MAGAts outside of The Pit. I want to have a place that facilitates mutually respectful exchange of opinions even when we in reality hold each other in contempt.
Nope – not just you. In my head, “MAGAts” rhymes with “knots” (common American ‘short o’ pronunciation). Kind of like “muh-KNOTS” but with a different consonant in the middle.
If Biden was okay calling on people as “MAGA Republicans” in a pejorative way during an address to the nation (which I believe he did more than once), it should be fine here I would hope.
I agree with you @Johnny_Bravo. It’s an indication of low intellectual thinking, much like Trump himself. If name calling is the best you got…move along.
There was considerable discussion during the beginning of this thread on this - go back and read it yourself. You are welcome to your personal belief of whatever you like, but at least you’ll be aware that the vast majority of people who use “MAGAt” are doing so as a “maggot” reference.
“MAGAt”, a derogatory term used for supporters of U.S. President Donald Trump, named for his slogan Make America Great Again] (MAGA); the term is a homophone of “maggot”
After reading this thread, I think it’s not as obvious as it was in my mind to think that. But once it’s pointed out Magat is certainly a homophone of maggot (or intended to be) whether you agree it’s a derogatory/dehumanizing word or not.
Yeah. Like I said early in the thread, I did not make that connection as I was pronouncing it differently in my head, but it is clearly and obviously referencing/wordplaying on “maggot.”