I constantly see angry mobs of people decrying “woke”, “critical race theory”, ““grooming””, and whatever other nonsense they made up this week. They march around with guns, constantly appending lib as a prefix to any word they can use to denigrate. They actively plot violence and spew hatred in the open.
You never see the inverse. There is no ConservativesofTiktok getting churches harassed into shutting down for the day or calling in threats. You don’t see cringey boomer memes on the left. And whenever I openly express those feelings, try to create that sentiment; I get shut down. Noone agrees, I’m often shamed and muted. I just don’t understand why that parity exists, it’s extremely isolating to feel so alone in this
Because they’re mostly a group of people filled with hatred. That’s what’s uniting them. And the other side less so, so they don’t act that way.
Propaganda. For decades the conservative radio hosts have been vilifying democrats constantly and most of the time for no reason at all. It has slid into television as well but they started with radio a long long time before that.
most of the time for no reason at all
Not for no reason. It’s a form of control. If you genuinely believe that the opposing party is going to bring the country to ruin, you’re a lot less likely to consider their position in politics.
Look at the affordable care act. Conservatives hated/hate it because “obamacare” was portrayed as giving free health care to the lazy poor that you have to pay for as a hard working conservative. When asked if we should repeal Obamacare, conservatives poll something crazy like 95% yes, simply because it’s a bad word they learned.
Many of those conservatives have health care through the ACA and get mad when Republicans take it away because they need it. Those same conservatives mostly aren’t even aware that what they have is literally obamacare.
It’s control all the way down.
Conservatives make politics their identity, and hate everyone that doesn’t also identify as them. Most other people realize that’s stupid, they just want a better life.
Seems everyone these days makes politics their identity, left and right. And center.
Definitely not.
“Enlightened” centrism is not the answer…
That’s because “centrist” is just what conservatives call themselves when they are too embarassed to admit they are conservatives.
Never has been, never will be.
The billionaire-owned media will continue to insist otherwise as long as we allow for billionaires to exist, though…
How many Biden hats and flags have you seen?
A table with 11 people, including a nazi, is a table with 11 nazis.
Don’t compare choosing to not sit at that table with the bullshit republicans do.
Newt Gingrich and Rush Limbaugh were largely responsible for turning politics into a team sport and convincing Conservatives that all Liberals are evil and that is a Liberal wants it, it must be bad.
Fetishization of the concept of civility. Liberals have always preferred a negative peace to even incredibly mild disruption, and that’d include hating people who want nothing more than to see the world worse for everyone. Hang out with leftists instead if you want to see people rightfully angry.
removed by mod
Because there is no mirror image.
@pjwestin@lemmy.world has given you a good description of fascist methods. They’re not available to the opponents of fascism because they are not fascists.
Fascism appeals to the worst parts of our nature. It gives permission to those feeling fear, humiliation or shame to lash out in anger and destroy the people that make them feel that way.
You can’t deploy the same tactics to make those people want to be on your side instead. If you try to shame them, they will just hate harder.
You should, of course, expose and ridicule the grifters who lead fascist movements and punching fascists is encouraged. But you need to distinguish between authoritarian leaders and the people they seek to lead.
You should not pander to the billionaire-funded leaderships (take note NYT), but you must not sneer at the people they are trying to lead (take note centrist Dems).
Why the hell do you want them on our side? Why dont you want to destroy them? Thats exactly what Im asking about, where is the hate?
Because handing election victories to fascists is a really, really bad idea.
They’ll just abandon democracy and go for force if they lose. We’re past the point of law, brawn and control are what matters rn
You think there’s going to be civil war and also, you want to maximise the numbers fighting for the fascists. Cool, cool.
Why is it you think we cant recruit the same way
deleted by creator
removed by mod
lash out in anger and destroy the people that make them feel that way
Small correction: “… destroy the people that they think make them feel that way”.
Thank you, this is a very good explanation of something I failed to mention.
A lot of the responses are correct, but there is one aspect being missed.
Liberals don’t NEED to hate conservatives. There are real problems in the world that the left is trying to remedy.
Conservatives NEED to hate the left. Modern conservatism (and some would argue all conservatism) doesn’t have any moral ideology. There is nothing they’re fighting to for. Conservative ideology is the idea that there is a group that the law should protect but not bind and a group that the law should bind but not protect. To push this, an out-group has to be created and hate is the only way to dehumanize someone enough to treat them the way conservatives treat women, minorities, LGBTQ+ etc…
Conservatives hate Liberals because conservatism doesn’t work without hate. They hate because they NEED to.
deleted by creator
Liberals are conservatives, they hate leftists.
The right wing has a long history of real repression. Think slavery, segregation, Jim Crow (simply saying it doesn’t do it justice), voter suppression, KKK, mob violence, etc. As much as I hate to realize it, they were fundamentally built on violence and hate. It’s never left them. Especially the mentality, which is “my way or violence”.
This is also why they project the left is violent. Because they are, so they assume everyone else is too. So they try to portray left groups as violent. Same with having an agenda. They have one, so they assume everyone else has one too. It’s all projection.
ROFL!!! Spend another ten minutes on Lemmy before asking this question.
It’s because being hateful has become part of the conservative identity. To be accepted as a right wing conservative you have to spew hateful garbage about something pretty much constantly. If you don’t then they think your weak, or start calling you a RINO
Okay but my point is why aren’t there nearly as many hateful liberals
Conservatives approach things very differently. They tend to blame and make excuses whereas liberals tend to treat the problem and look for solutions in models of success. For example, little Suzie gets her hand caught in the car door. A conservatives would typically blame her or her little brother. A liberal would likely treat the injury and try to set rules to prevent it from happening again.
Another example, Donald Von ShitzInPantz wears diapers. The right hates it when they can’t weasel out of a fact so they defend it, embrace it as normal even desirable instead of accepting there is a problem. If that was Biden he would be hatefully ridiculed, (blamed) to no end by conservatives.
Conservatives assume blame, (hate) is the solution. Liberals fit a solution to the problem. There is conflict because of the way they approach a problem and blame, (hate) is the conservative solution.If little Suzie got her hand caught in a car door today’s modern Republican would claim it was part of a conspiracy by foreign auto makers to destabilize the US education system.
Then someone would find out that little Suzie’s parents are Jewish and claim the whole thing is part of a satanic pedophile ring trying to undermine the good Christian values this country was founded on.
Then once any sane person in the room points out that this is all clearly bullshit they would turn on Suzie and file a lawsuit claiming that she is somehow responsible for the downfall of the US automotive industry.
Several years later after Suzie has had to move 8 times because of death threats against her family the GOP would deny any wrongdoing, claim they’ve never heard of anyone name Suzie, and call the whole thing a woke liberal conspiracy.
It’s really difficult to want everyone to be able to access food, shelter, education, and healthcare and also be hateful.
Because being inherently hateful isn’t part of the liberal identity? The terms “liberal” and “progressive” imply acceptance and inclusivity by definition?
The conservative strategy has been to polarize politics in America in order to have a very aligned power. This means that if you aren’t 100% behind them, then you are an enemy to them.
It is only through this that the GOP can both say that they are protecting individual freedoms but limiting or taking them away (of course opponents to this will be quick to point out the one and only counter point which is fighting against restrictions of the 2nd Amendment and only that), say that they are for smaller government but yet want private companies to be regulated that attempt to censor hate and misinformation (which has nothing to do with the 1st Amendment when it comes to non-government entities) yet still say that they are for businesses to operate as unrestricted as possible. They are anti-union because they are corrupt and take away accountability yet strongly support the worst of the worst of unions – the police unions. The GOP constantly cries that there’s a nanny government, yet they push laws to restrict people’s choices, censor libraries and try to tear down citizen protections. The GOP cries that this country’s deficit is out of control but when they are in power, they over spend. They complain that public schools indoctrinate but at the local and state levels attempt to indoctrinate in public schools. They talk about needing to stay in power to turn America around, yet when empowered in all three federal branches fails to pass meaningful legislation and run the government that they are overseeing and yet blame the government because they will eat each other alive for their own individual gains.
There so much more but the GOP is a party of hypocrites. Without polarization mixed with some fear mongering their party would likely cease to exist with any real power because they do not stand for the ideals that their own voting base supports.
The GOP constantly tries to create an environment of being constantly under attack and spews hate. Their voter base is simply a product of that.
Liberals are dismissive of conservatives. You can only hate people so much when you infantilize them.
The right is too angry to listen, and the left is too arrogant to listen.
This is how democracy dies.
Hey we wouldn’t be nearly as smug if these fuckers weren’t throwing their votes at a known grifter and a dog murderer. Back when it was W in charge we could actually talk about issues - now these fuckers jumped the shark.
Arrogant, interesting.
See, the issue to me is that one side comes up with real tangible solutions to problems, while the other side is busy smearing shit on the walls, getting red in the face screaming about deep state this or jew lasers that, and then people like you tell me we should engage those people and treat their ideas with respect and equal levels of severity.
See the issue here?
The right is too angry to listen, and the left is too arrogant to listen.
To listen to what?
Not to the racism and idiocy but to the underlying issues that fuel that anger.
The underlying issues that fuel that anger
Fox News and AM Radio
Those underlying issues are what left-wing people are trying to resolve already, though - wealth inequality, poor mental health, too much power in the hands of corporations and the mega-rich, removing outrage politics, etc.
I don’t disagree with what you’re saying, except maybe we should switch to show not tell. I understand that it’s not as easy as that but over the last let’s say 30 years, how much has the left really improved life for the rural population? And by comparison how much do we preach to them that they’re backwards and their world view is invalid?
It’s exactly as you say, the working class should be an easy win for us on policy, but it hasn’t turned out that way.
You can just say “well they’re stupid that’s what you get” or you can ask yourself why aren’t we getting these people on board while some greasy billionaire can?
You can just say “well they’re stupid that’s what you get” or you can ask yourself why aren’t we getting these people on board while some greasy billionaire can?
I don’t necessarily like to just dismiss people as stupid, but a lack of education and the ability to understand complex issues is both a big issue for these people and a reason why the greasy billionaires can get them on board. Convincing someone that them paying some of their money into a union will actually result in better working conditions and more money for them - rather than just being poorer - is a lot harder and takes more understanding on their part than someone convincing them there’s less money to go around because there are more immigrants, for instance.
On top of that, people like to be able to absolve themselves of personal responsibility if they are given the option to. That’s not exclusive to right-wing people, but when that’s coupled with people wanting simple “explanations” because they don’t understand more complex systems with all their consequences, knock-on effects, etc, it makes it easy for right-wing politicians and media to offer simple scapegoats and get people on board.
To use the immigrants example again: not only is it not your average right-wing voter’s fault in any way - it’s the immigrants’ fault - but also, they don’t personally need to do anything to fix the issue, they just need to let the right-wing politicians get into power and it’ll all be solved for them. It’s all very comforting for them - much more so than being told it’s going to take ten years and some work on their part to improve things.
The ACTUAL left (unlike the arrogant center right to right wing corporate stooges in control of the Dem party falsely claiming to be on the left) SHARE that same anger.
We just don’t blame minorities, secularism, the concept of objective knowledge and a lack of bigotry for what is clearly the fault of mainly rich and powerful white conservative and centrist people.
To add to this, the opposite of love is not hate, but ignore.
Giving your energy and attention to hating something typically means that they occupy enough mental real estate in your day to day life that you feel the need to broadcast it on a regular basis.
The liberals I know tend to spend the majority of their free time focusing on improving themselves and the world around them rather than simply target blame somewhere else.
I’m going to take a somewhat different tack to describing this.
There are many ways to motivate large groups of people. You’ve likely seen this a lot and not really noticed or paid attention to it. Some examples are tribalism (“Hey! They’re not one of us!”), nationalism (“Those dirty foreign people!”), religion (“Do what I say and go to heaven!”), money (“Do this and I’ll give you something valuable”), etc.
One of the best motivators is fear. (“Do this or I/they will do something you really don’t like”).
Political groups need something to motivate large groups of people. When done well, they appeal to the better sides of humanity. When done by the lazy, the dumb and the craven, they go with the simple one: fear.
That’s what Conservatism has been hammering for a while now. They don’t really have a way to appeal to people’s better sides, primarily because their platform isn’t to make humanity better off. They platform is to make a few people better off to the detriment of everyone else. So they try tribalism (“Those brown people are trying to take your money!”), nationalism (“Those foreigners are taking your jobs!”), religion (“Those non-Christians are trying to install sharia law!”), etc. The most effective one is still fear. So getting their followers scared and angry is the best way to motivate them, get them to stop thinking rationally and build moats that will isolate them from people that might talk them down.
This is used to motivate people to vote in certain ways, as well as motivate them to watch advertisements. In other words: power and money.
Why arent you afraid of them though, they really will do actual terrible things
Hating people never leads to logical outcomes. I’d rather accept that they’ve been somewhat brainwashed and battle against it, than hate my neighbour.
There have been a couple studies about the actual brain differences between people on the left and their less developed progress stopping conservative (my editorializing of the situation) people. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/conservative-and-liberal-brains-might-have-some-real-differences/
Are you afraid of them or do you hate them? Those seem like two independent opinions to me, but I’m wondering if you’re conflating them.
I’m afraid of them and I don’t hate them.
I hate them because i have to constantly be afraid of them.
I can both understand and relate to being afraid of them. As you wrote, they do real damage and they seem intent on doing more and they seem to feel it’s their mission to do so. From what I can tell, they have been programmed to see the very concept of progressive thinking as evil. Fearing them seems sensible, because being aware of the threat makes it easier to defend against it or protect oneself from it.
But how exactly does it improve your life to hate them?
It doesn’t improve it. You could argue it makes it worse since I often face social rejection from the left for it…for some inexplicable reason. But I don’t simply choose to hate or not hate something, the same way one does not simply chose their sexuality or gender or race or emotions.
I relate to your position. You are wrong. You absolutely do choose to hate or not hate. This lies entirely within your control.
I used to have the impulse to hate them, but I don’t any more.
On the list you cite, emotions is the one thing you choose, even though it might not feel that way right now. I don’t expect you to believe me. I will cite Lisa Feldman Barrett and the book How Emotions are Made and you can decide whether you want to explore or not.
Either way, peace.
deleted by creator
Everyone is misrepresented in the two-party system.
