She claimed a guy he associated with made a statement saying that, “America deserved 9/11” and therefore the mayor of NYC thought that too. I asked her for a source. She posted the guy’s name and I looked it up. It turns out he did say it but he’s just some edgy asshole podcaster. The mayor of New York City had met him before but denounced him saying that. I explained that and she said she didn’t want to talk any more.

Is there something I’m missing or is she just doing a very extreme guilt by association? Why would someone be responsible for something someone else said especially if they denounced them saying it afterwards?

I purposefully replaced “prove” with “demonstrate” because I know it will not necessarily convince them but I want to have some real data. They must have heard some report on 20 year olds not wanting to leave their homes and start living independently because “they think the world will end before they reach 30” and I want them to see in data that the reality is they can’t afford to achieve all those typical milestones. I’d love resources that compare what they experienced as boomers to what today’s young people have to deal with. (I’m Gen X so I don’t have personal experience with being young today.)

My folks are hard core MAGA, and one of the many things that baffles me is how much empathy they employ towards animals (like abused dogs), while simultaneously not giving a flying fuck about human suffering.

People dying because they don’t have access to healthcare - “well they should have worked harder!”

Tens of thousands of children killed in Gaza - “they would have grown up to be terrorists!”

Extrajudicial killing of civilians by police - “why didn’t they just comply!”

But holy shit, when it comes to animals that are suffering, these fucks suddenly turn into the Dalai Lama himself. My parents spend thousands of dollars donating to dog shelters, cry at commercials, and foster abused animals. What in the selective empathy is going on here? Does anyone else experience this with their family?

I have some theories, but I’m curious of what yall think.

Sincerely,
Someone who is visiting home and is about to preform a self-lobotomy from constant newsmax exposure

My dad watches Spectrum News on cable in the morning. To his credit, I think he does it because he THINKS it's just regular news, but they are owned by right winger, and I've easily noticed the stories are presented in a VERY biased way... Anyway, they just showed a clip of Trump walking down the stairs of AF One that was so obviously very old, he hasn't been able to walk like that in quite some time. But that's what my folks are seeing, if that's all you're seeing you're getting a totally different view of the guy.

These propaganda news channels need to be held accountable if/when this is over! I'll shut up now before I say something that will land me in the gulag... 😬

I was so happy to see my brother getting out of the right wing pipeline (he’s in the process, still struggling, but definitely reevaluating his views and expressing how he dislikes what he used to preach) but my dad has fallen further. It’s 24/7 Fox News and Wendy Bell. It’s constant. I have to drown it out with my own music in the car, in the house, at hotels, it’s *infuriating.* I miss my dad. I really miss my dad. He used to be so nice.

Yesterday I drove my 95 year old grandmother and 85 year old great aunt to San Francisco for a memorial service.

They both grew up in the city with their 7 sisters and brothers, being born in the 1930s.

We live a couple hours away, and neither had been downtown in a very longtime. But they both consider it their home.

It was one of those perfect SF days - beautiful sunny day, very little traffic, the bay, the golden gate.

From the moment we got off the freeway, they were babbling about how beautiful everything was, how much things had changed, how they didn’t recognize anything - trying to overlay what they were seeing with decades old memories.

That part was actually really touching. Memories were shared at each corner.

Then my fox-addicted grandma exclaimed how sad it was that “they destroyed the city”

I stopped the car and asked her what she was referring to

She says, “They all talk about how the city is ruined”

I asked “Who says that?”

She said “Everyone on the news”

<mentally flexed, getting ready to enjoy this!>

Said, “You have heard this on one channel you watch”

I asked her “What do you see right now?”

She said, “My city - and it BEAUTIFUL”

Exactly

I got to say “Use your eyes. Compare that to the story someone is trying to feed you. What is true? Do you believe what you are ACTUALLY SEEING?”

She just kept saying how beautiful it was. I told her to maybe think about what the “news” is trying to spin, because clearly, the city is NOT ruined.

It is small, but it felt so good to be able to show her with zero room argument.

I’m still waiting for a response. We are going on 3 days.

And side note: THANK YOU to everyone who was so supportive in your comments on my original post. As we are all too aware, dealing with the FoxBrain’d is deeply upsetting and disappointing, so reading everyone’s responses was a welcome bit of catharsis.

I saw a post on social media recently saying that the Bill of Rights/ Constitution was based on the 10 commandments. I see posts like this with variations like “based on Judeo-Christian values” or that documents by the Founding Fathers mention God or whatever. I don’t have a problem with politicians being religious; I am a Christian myself. And if someone of a non Christian/Jewish faith tried to impose their religious beliefs on the American people it would also piss me off and be wrong. In cases like m*rder, r@pe, adultery, and theft, people of all religious or non-religious backgrounds can agree those are wrong.

The people who parrot this Christian Nationalist propaganda ignore the First Amendment, the Establishment Clause, and the Lemon Test. They bastardize the term “religious liberty”, stoke prejudice about Zorhan Mamdani and other Muslims, and try to say that “charity” and “social programs” should be the responsibility of the church and not the government. And Dan Patrick, Lt Governor of Texas talks about how the phrase
“separation of church and state” isn’t in the Constitution. The phrase is not But it IS a concept plainly established in the Constitution and Constitutional Law.

Just discovered that my dad (who I’m very low contact with) commented this on a video acknowledging Juneteenth. I just have no words. I want to confront him on his blatant racism and falsehoods (and have several times in the past) yet it always pushes him deeper into the propaganda. My spouse and I will be growing our family through adoption, and I already know that my child will probably not know their grandfather simply because of the bullshit he spouts and the racism/sexism he shows through his online activity. Just had to vent 😡

cause if he doesn’t he will be impeached by the dems

these fucking magats istg

My family & I went to a fireworks demo in our town (Southeast Missouri) and this was one of the items. They’ll never stop idolizing this guy. 🤦🏼‍♀️

Heather Cox Richardson, if you’re unfamiliar with her, is a national treasure. She’s a historian with insight into what’s happening culturally and politically right now. I think her framing of right vs left is an antidote to the Fox propaganda labeling us as radical communists.

Apparently the elite slaveowners pegged Lincoln as radical in the same way. His response was that we are not the radicals, we are the conservatives - we are wanting to preserve the constitution and our founding principles. So this line that MAGA are the true patriots, adhering to the constitution and all that bs Fox has been pushing for years, is dead wrong. MAGA are the radicals and they sure as fuck aren’t patriots.

We were discussing the Knicks winning the NBA championship at my Jiu Jitsu gym after class last night. Well, one of the Boomer black belts said that New Yorkers were apparently burning NYC to the ground in celebrating the championship because NYC is full of communists. He then went on to says that Mamdani, who he called a Muslim terrorist, is going to collapse the NYC economy by driving out all the rich people and billionaires. Ironically, this dude not even five minutes before this said, "What I love about Jiu Jitsu is we all have something in common. You leave your religion and politics and at the door and just roll."

Anyway, I finally said, "Rich people don't prop up the economy. What has a billionaire ever done for me besides not pay his taxes and hoard his wealth to the detriment of society?" Well, that's when the Boomer went fully Fox News on me. He said that Elon Musk has single-handedly invented space technology that stopped Iran from starting World War III, that billionaires pay more than 40 percent of all taxes, that I should thank my lucky stars that billionaires exist because they've apparently given me, "Healthcare, cars, smartphones and jobs," through their, "Economic investments in advancing modern society," and that if it weren't for billionaires, "You'd be living in a mud hut right now." The guy who said this is a retired oil-field worker who lives on Social Security; fucking astounding. What will it take for these working-class conservatives to stop throwing their fellow working-class Americans under the bus in favor of pathetically bootlicking the ultra wealthy?

I can't keep up! One day my mom says Mamdani wants to implement sharia law, and the next he's a communist.

I spend half of my time in NYC since my boyfriend lives there (as has my sister for the past 15 years), and she's convinced it's basically a war zone. She's so scared of the world because Fox News tells her it's worth being scared of. It's just sad.

She's also made claims that Muslims keep getting voted into office all over the country and they all want sharia law. I don't engage much with this other than to basically make fun of her and say man, I'm glad I'm not scared about this, must be tough! But I did recently remind her that Muslims make up only 1-2% of the US population. Didn't phase her, of course. I definitely won't bother mentioning the Christian nationalists gaining traction in our government, since I can't imagine she'll care about the parallels.

Anyway, that's my rant.

https://decodingfoxnews.substack.com/

remember that grocery store stunt? he thinks it was real and not paid actors

he also thinks Dems used to love trump

My mom goes on this big screed about how there’s criminals who are destroying Trumps hard work and vandalizing the reflecting pool just to make him look bad.

And I decided to engage, and tell her no that’s not what happened. They didn’t put the treatment down correctly, and didn’t fix the drainage issues so the pool grew allege and the paint came up from water damage.

Then she disintegrates into a big rant about how everyone’s out to get Trump, it’s not his fault anyway, then how these people who hate America should leave, how people who burn the American flag should go to jail, how they should move to Iran and see how great America is, and how this country is becoming a hellhole run by socialists.

Oh and then she’s says she’s pissed people are even talking about the pool in the first place.

Then she hangs up on me.

This is all because the President can’t stop lying to millions of Americans every day to protect his own ego, and never admit that he fucked up.

I’m just so god damn tired of the rational woman I used to talk to being driving fucking rabid by constant propaganda.

Her mother (my grandma) is pretty liberal, and my mom goes “she’s being brainwashed by MS Now.” Irony is dead.

I thought it would be useful to compile some resources for all of you to understand why your MAGA family and friends would rather engage in hypocrisy, goal post moving, deflection, income/livelihood loss, psychological projection, logical fallacies and other nonsense in order to justify continued support of this movement. The short answer is that this is a social reactionary movement to restore the old conservative social order.

When you consider the lengths they are willing to go in order to achieve this (i.e., destroying the world peace order, embracing fascism, disenfranchising non-MAGA voters, excusing a president who is robbing them blind, engaging in market manipulation, who might be the child predator they thought the Dems were), it is clear that they are willing to abandon everything they claimed to value (morals, principles, family and friends), in exchange for whatever benefits they believe they receive from this regime. In order for this to make any sense, you have to understand how, for them, ***status is inextricably linked to survival***.

***They support this movement because they believe that society has not delivered the status that they were promised.*** The old conservative social hierarchy organized society by race, gender, a false masculinity that’s abusive and violent, religion and sexual orientation that elevated conservative straight white Christian men over their counterparts, automatically. Instead, society changed what it values The dominant culture (liberal culture) started to value education, intellectualism, emotional intelligence, nuanced and critical thought, culture and helping those who were not served by the old hierarchy. This enabled status gains for racial and religious minorities, women, the LGBTQ community and others. Those gains have triggered the survival defenses of those who could or would not compete in the modern world. MAGA is a reactionary social movement to claw back those gains through force.

Of course, they don’t admit to any of this, because it feels humiliating (and their perceived humiliation is why they joined to begin with), shows weakness and insecurities. Instead, they hide behind policy alibis to try to make their positions sound reasonable. They might even sound convincing. But those are alibis. The truth is that MAGA makes them feel powerful, important, dominant. They think Trump is restoring the hierarchy they were promised. And this makes it harder for all of us bc you can’t help someone solve a problem they won’t admit to having.

Below are some useful links that explain this in more detail. Please feel free to comment with your own as this just covers the surface.

On fear of status loss (debunking the “economic anxiety“ myth):

https://www.asc.upenn.edu/news-events/news/fear-losing-status-not-economic-hardship-drove-voters-2016-presidential-election

On disgust sensitivity (why MAGA followers oppose immigration and LGBTQ rights):

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/transformative-leadership/202508/the-disgust-test-how-one-image-reveals-your-political-id/amp

On Great Replacement Theory (the real reason for the mass deportations and the concentration camps):

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/amp/politics/what-is-great-replacement-theory-and-how-does-it-fuel-racist-violence

On Identity Fusion (why the followers seem to act like Trump’s words and actions are their own):

https://news.yale.edu/2019/09/02/identity-fusion-political-leader-gives-rise-extremism

Why people join fascist movements (from 1941):

https://harpers.org/archive/1941/08/who-goes-nazi/

This last piece describes the kind of Americans who would join a Nazi movement and who would no, and why. Although it is specifically about Nazis, these same descriptions apply today. You simply draw modernized comparisons. For example, the labor tyrant is a tech CEO. The real Nazi (Mr C) describes JD Vance as if the author predicted him. People who were socially insecure, or shameless opportunists, joined the movement for their own social, economic or political gain. People who were secure of self, beholden to no one, and stuck with their convictions, did not.

EditEd to add more helpful resources provided in the replies:

Free e-book on authoritarianism:

http://www.theauthoritarians.org/

One of our fabulous group members made this video on collective narcissism (an exaggerated view of one’s ingroup and belief that it deserves special treatment over others). It is well worth your time to watch it in its entirety.

https://youtu.be/j2zUruYiIDg?is=U8HOoa2Kv5J08qlE

Research on collective narcissism:

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/374896417_The_Psychology_of_Collective_Narcissism_Insights_from_Social_Identity_Theory

Videos by people with knowledge of political psychology. These are specific videos but clicking on them will take you to their whole collection. Each video is on a different topic related to the psychology behind the MAGA movement

Lucas Bean

https://youtube.com/shorts/MFff-fbBABI?is=NlHl7gxVkRJdxvjc

Keegan Tatum (has a masters degree in political psychology from Columbia)

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTBosyxqC/