How we got here - the weaponization of Hate

Wow, those poll questions are terrible, and don’t tell you anything about the respondents.

Favoring ‘properly controlled immigration’ can mean anything. And if I think the white race is under siege, of course I think ‘racism exists’.

I went to the site to check, because surely the actual questions aren’t that meaninglessly vague and they were just short-handing for their charts/Twitter?

Narrator: They were that vague.

What does it mean to be “a socialist country”? What’s “properly controlled” immigration? Interestingly (and maybe because of my views) the actual Republican views feel a lot more vague than the Democrat set.

I missed this thread the first time around and I’m glad someone bumped it.

We’re currently facing a similar political polarization in the UK. Where each side is demonizing each other. John Stewart’s speech at the Rally to Restore Sanity was excellent and seems very pertinent.

“If we amplify everything we hear nothing.”

Yeah, I support mitigating climate change, UHC or affordable/free post-secondary education just to fuck over Republicans. /s

There is a definable partisan divide over a host of issues, here’s a tiny sample. As far as immigration, that wasn’t a crisis until the grotesque policies of the trump regime turned it into one.
image
image

Or
Satisfaction With the Treatment of Women in Society
image

And of course:
image

This is really the only chart I need:

92% of those nice Republicans voted for a man who bragged about sexual assault, had (has) over a dozen women accusing him of sexual assault, ogled underage girls, shat on a gold star family, mocked disabled people, advocated violence against political opponents, ran several “businesses” that were outright scams, ran a “charity” that benefited only his family, and never said one intelligent thing on any topic ever. All of this before the election. If they believe all those nice things, why’d they vote for this guy?

I know that individual Republicans are generally nice, helpful people when you meet them in person. Most people are. But as political actors, they are cancer.

We just don’t understand these Republicans, that’s all. Why can’t we just hug it out and work together? A Naked Gun remake would feature McConnell and AOC at the end, i right before the mailman and the dog.

Exactly.

Those poll questions are horseshit. Immigration ones are particularly bad. ‘Properly controlled immigration’ can mean enforcement of current laws, particularly e-verify, and a fixing of the visa system to be more efficient, all the way to ‘round up all the brown people, and only let white Europeans immigrate’.

A white supremacist could still answer yes to the latter, doesn’t mean I misunderstand him when I say they’re a racist sack of shit, or that we both agree in wanting ‘properly controlled immigration’.

I think that is deliberate, isn’t it? The questions are “too general” because they are about evoking what you may IMAGINE your opposition believes. If you want to see the “how many Democraps want to murder your babies after they are born” surveys, they are elsewhere.

I mean let’s not get ahead of ourselves here.

If the questions are so vague as to mean anything, then the study doesn’t point out any perception gap at all. It’s meaningless.

As an example:

I answer the survey by saying ‘few Republicans favor properly controlled immigration’ because I think they’re opposed to immigration by brown people.

Republicans answer the survey by saying ‘I favor properly controlled immigration’ because they mean not by brown people.

Voila: The study says I’m wrong about what Republicans believe, but I’m not actually wrong about what they believe.

I didn’t get enough sleep last night, so now I am just confused in my brainal area. So I will try and re-read this when I am more cogent.

Shitty surveys like this just normalize the fucked up things that Republicans are doing. There are kids sleeping in fucking cages right now, dying in our custody. But you know, we all sort of want the same thing! Fuck off, Yascha. The gap between the two sides isn’t one of perception but rather one of morality.

Agreed. The notion that 20% of Republicans think racism no longer exists in the US is frankly terrifying to me. For someone to write articles saying “Yeah, but 80% of them still think it’s real!” as a way to somehow find a common ground is bizarre.

I mean, flip it around and you also got crazy views from the Democrats… like apparently 30% thinking that we should have completely open borders.

The reality is, once you get into numbers like 20% of the population? Turns out, 20% of the population IS DUMB AS SHIT. Like really, just profoundly dumb. 25% of the population has an IQ under 80.

It is however worth noting that the perception that most of you guys have of “Republicans” is in fact not likely to be true… The caricature in your head isn’t really them, any more than their caricature of you is real. (I mean, except for Armando)

You can say that but then why do they keep voting for absolute pieces of shit? Sure, Republicans can think that almost all Democrats want open borders…but how many are voting for a candidate that supports open borders? Is there even a candidate that supports that? You can’t “both sides” this when it makes no sense. Sorry, my perception of Republicans is 100% right on. I’d be happy for them to prove me wrong by not voting for known pedophiles, or white supremacists, or complete fucktard racist shitbags, but they will almost certainly disappoint me. They’re going to vote for fucking DONALD TRUMP again in 2020 and yet they’re good people?

EDIT - seriously, read this article that was just posted elsewhere about how the people that Republicans have voted for, and will KEEP voting for, have treated children, then tell me that Republicans are just the same as non-Republicans.

https://www.wnycstudios.org/story/overcrowding-unsanitary-conditions-reported-migrant-detention-centers

Also, sorry if this comes across as angry against you, I’m just frustrated at how fucked up this country has become.

“Caricatures.”

The Laffer curve.
Trickle down economics.
Trees cause pollution.
End of regulation on lead (Reagan administration, which to be fair did not happen.)
Climate change is a hoax.
Intelligent design
Treatment of immigrants.
Obama is a sekrit Muslim who wants to impose Sharia law.
Louis Gohmert
Steve King
Michelle Bachmann
Ben Carson
Roy Moore
Jim Jordan
Matt Gertz
Donald trump
There is no biodiversity crisis.


etc et al

The list while finite is fucking long.

My perceptions of actual Republicans come from…exposure to actual Republicans. Lots of them, across class and socioeconomic groups.

That’s one way of putting it. Another person might say the children are lounging in Fun Rooms and they like it so much they spend their entire lives there.

Good people on both sides!

Another way of putting it is that they are having a better time than they would be at Disneyland.

Sending them to Disneyland and having them stay at the hotels, go to the parks every day, would be cheaper.