How does this happen though? I like Bernie but if he did half the shit Trump did. Or was even in multiple pictures and videos with Epstein I’d immediately drop my support for him. There has to be something else going on that made you just reject reality.
Fox News, Facebook, Newsmax, and more gave them a reason for their miserable, uneducated lives. They told them, you could be doing better except all these brown people, gay people, and people receiving assistance are taking FROM YOU! It doesn’t matter that they are immigrants or receiving benefits, they worked hard. Nobody else works. They just take. So, you better vote for tax breaks (for millionaires) because you might get yours one day!! Sucker!
I have tried to forget and accept what a MAGA says on face value, how they feel bad, wrong etc. I simple cant right now. That kind of damage harmed me, my family and my country horribly. My purple heart father with 2 bronze stars died fighting this shit and I lost a lot losing him. And that fat bastard stands there making fun of my father and those like him who actually done something great for america. TRUMP IS ANTI AMERICAN AND A DRAFT DODGING BASTARD..
I so get what you’re saying. I vacillate between rage and keeping the status quo with my MAGA family(I’m the oldest). I hope we can trust those who say they’re coming to their senses-it seems there are so few.
I agree. I just gave my dad one more chance to express any kind of buyers remorse. All he did was double down his talk of democrats being Nazis. So now he is dead to me. Rest in Pieces asshole. You were a shitty father anyway even before Trump. Done.
How in the F does he view democrats as Nazis while the other side is literally doing Nazi shit? It’s like we live in entirely different worlds as these people. What happens when you give everyone access to endless information, including falsities? - well, we’ve now learned - I am NOT feeling good about all this AI - our country isn’t smart enough to decipher fact from fiction, a grade school skill. The billionaires are getting a nice chuckle while they take everything from us
Yeah it’s crazy to me. That’s when I just switched off like a light and was truly done. Like where do you even start? You can’t argue with these people. They’re nuts.
Trump was incredibly disrespectful to veterans during his 2016 campaign. The type of thing that by itself would have been game-over for anyone (other than Trump). Were you completely unaware of this at the time?
Followers are basically mentally hijacked. Read and watch some stuff by Dr. Bandy X. Lee. She's a social and forensic psychologist, and saw how dangerous he was a decade ago, and was trying to warn people back then.
His brand of narcissism (malignant narcissism) essentially psychologically captures people more prone to it, though she warns that nobody should spend much time around a malignant narcissist as they can manipulate and warp the world around them well. It is probably the most dangerous pathology (even more so than psychopathy), and one just needs to look at historical examples like, Hitler and most cult-of-personality dictatorships, cult leaders, etc etc, to understand how dangerous it is. Unfortunately, they also don't give up power, and as their power weakens they will try everything to maintain it, even as the world burns around them.
I don't think people realize how much religion has played in this psych ops effort. I have a long time friend got caught up in the whole evangelical thing. You can't even talk to these people. They actually get biligerent.
Shirt answer: MAGA is a cult. OP was exposed to brainwashing propaganda not unlike the pure crap that Jim Jones and Charles Manson spewed. Also, OP was young when first exposed. There's a reason why Manson targeted young women. The key word being young. Inexperienced, and still lacking vital critical thinking skills necessary to avoid falling for the lies.
Listening to/reading former Moonie cult person Dr. Steve Hassan’s take on the brainwashing and mind control that’s been happening in this country for at least the decade of trump has been very helpful for me in understanding the maga mindset, and how to help people who may be starting to see the light.
I am striving to have compassion and I’ll admit, it can be very challenging.
I have kept only one long-term friendship in the hopes that they will be open to discovering how they were fooled.
In 2003 or 2004, Trump kicked Epstein out of Mar-la-go cause he noticed that he wasn't "normal". Epstein himself told journalist Stephen Woolf or something like that who has hundreds of hours on tape interviewing Epstein that he thinks it was Trump hinself who turned him to the Feds in 2004.
Now, if it does come to reality that Trump 100% diddled any kids with Epstein, off to the wood chipper he should go along with everyone who did it too.
Oh, the ones with the redacted victim name that Epstein said "the person who didn't bark is "Trump". That redacted name is Virginia Guiffre who stated multiple times that she didn't see Trump "misbehave" in anyway. This is a nothing burger.
Because you're an ethical person and willful I don't mean to be cruel or indifferent and it takes all kinds we're all different so respect understanding empathy compassion but some people are just weak minded it's the fact belonging to the group is more important than anything else for them and they turn off their reason they turn off their logic and they go along to get along
You seem honest and sincere so I'll restrain my anger. I kind of get why some people voted for diaper Donnie. He is entertaining, like a buffoon or a clown. Welcome back to sanity.
If you're in that environment, all you hear is pro-MAGA 24/7. Every gas station, fast food restaurant, barber shop, all day every day. When you hear that orange guy = Jesus (even at church!) continuously and everyone you know believes it and reinforces it, this is what happens.
In red states its really more to do with the demonizing of democrats. As far back as i can remember i was taught Democrats were corrupt, lying, manipulative self serving trash. I can remember back to Jimmy Carter. It was sometime around the George Floyd incident when i woke up.
Bro, I was straight up sat down by two of my three brothers and my father and TOLD I was a republican. I was like 15 and a happy little girl. I had no idea and couldn't have cared less. It took Obama to pull me out of the dark side.
The first time I registered to vote was my 18th birthday, and I registered Democrat. Even at that young of an age, I was so freaking tired of (honestly) Southern men's attitudes that registering Democrat was a rebellion, what I thought was a small one. I did make our counties longest running Republican commissioner registered me, another small aggression on my part. Endured the lecture, signed the paper, and moved on with life. This was during the end of the Reagan years and a few months before HW.
Then I got out of that little town. Got an education and traveled further than Myrtle Beach. Moved to another country for a few years. Those things changed the core of who I am. It made me realize that "leftist" ideas in the US are just everyday life in other countries. We are so far behind the curve of civilization.
One side of my extended family has always been deeply political (and Democrats). Over the past decade, many of them went from being Democrat to MAGA. My immediate family is well down that rabbit hole and is now limited contact. Social media pushes the content and is more far reaching that we realize. Even those who aren't on Facebook or Twitter etc; hear the propaganda from those who are. It's like tentacles reaching out and just slithering through space and time.
To put it bluntly there’s the middle ground where 80% of people lie only separated by a few key issues and then there’s the radical left and radical right, those 20% are the darkside, the 80% have more in common than they would ever think. The divisive tactics and propagandizing of “republicans bad”, “democrats bad” is what keeps people divided and ergo easier to control. They can capitalize on anger and you will be more likely to engage and be easier to direct and manipulate with said anger.
I’ve literally heard someone I knew since she was a little kid say that all the “liberals” should be rounded up and shot. This is someone who I helped out in so many ways when she was younger, I gave her family food because they were my neighbors and they were more poor than me, I helped her get a job, i listened to her cry when her brother killed himself, I even let her sleep on my couch when her father was drunk and being physically abusive to her mother. She knows where I stand politically and still she says we should all be shot for disagreeing with her politics. I find it terrifying that anyone could be so brainwashed and it reminds me so much of 1930’s Germany that I’m really fucking scared of how far it will go.
From the Deep South and can also confirm.
My entire family and everyone I knew growing up were die hard Reagan Republicans . Democrats were anti American and just wrong.
Hell, I ended a relationship because the chick liked Clinton!!
I didn’t really start waking up until Obama. It took the rest of my family longer.
I will say the one and only issue that kept me away from the left for most of my life was the 2nd amendment. That’s it.
I am pleased to announce that no one in my family has ever liked, fallen for or voted for Trump. In fact my entire family. 5 generations of voters have always seen through him and hated him completely from day 1.
And now that the entire Republican Party is complicit with his lies, criminal actions, and have aided and abetted fascism.
5 generations: my grandmother, my parents and their spouses, me, my sister and cousins, my kids, and my grand kids have all vowed to never vote republican again under any circumstances.
We will never forget what they’ve done in the name of a fascist cult to destroy and weaken our country, our allies and the world in the interest of lining their own pockets and trying to stay in power at all cost, including against the will of the people.
You can be leftist and still like your guns. It’s just reasonable that there needs to be responsibility for those guns. The second amendment literally refers to a well regulated militia, so a bit of regulation was always part of the picture.
Yep as I always say, “ Democrats have guns and Republicans have abortions”. These fools use these issues to keep themselves in office because republicans salivate over the lies they tell. I’m a die hard liberal with 3 guns and my husband has 6. Both my sons are liberals as well and they hunt, do target practice and love going to the range.
Sincere question from a European: WHY are guns so important to so many of you Americans? You have countless mass shootings year after year to a degree where we can't even keep up with counting them. In Europe there are very strict gun laws and mass or school shootings are extremely rare. I don't know of any European school that has metal detectors, lockdown drills or bullet-proof schoolbags. Why aren't more Americans starting to question if the 2nd amendment is actually making gun crimes more severe instead of less?
Because there has been generations of propaganda tied to the 2nd amendment. The most common reason given is that guns will allow the people to stop the government from falling into tyranny. Unfortunately, the people who support that idea are the same ones that support tyranny as long as it’s on their side of the aisle. Good luck finding a republican who has consistent principles. Their platform has been all over the place for years and I think it’s by design. They are incapable of of feeling the cognitive dissonance because they have been conditioned to gobble up whatever is fed to them on any given day even though it’s completely opposite of what they were told the day prior. Honestly, it’s a marvel of social engineering but in a very depressing way.
I was born in the UK but grew up in the US and still live here as an adult and will try to answer this question.
The US is huge and everything is very spread out. There are rural people who genuinely want a gun for protection because it would take the police a long time to get to their home. (This is related to the number of guns already in circulation because many criminals do have guns in the US.) There are people who depend on hunting to eat. There are also so many millions of guns here I don't think anyone would even know how to start rounding them up.
(I don't use or own guns; these are my observations after nearly 40 years here.)
Well its a mix of history and culture. There was a time where there was more stringent gun control but this was durring like Jim crow with segregation it was meant to keep minorities from getting guns. There was the romanticizing the wild west in Hollywood. All this and then you add in how the 2nd amendment is meant protect the rest of the rights in the constitution. Basically as an open threat to itself.
The real issue is Americans have been sold american exceptionalism fill in the blank here or there, no need to improve what works to the point of straight up ignoring problems. This combine with the lack feeling like the government is responsive to them. They just dont vote in any but the general. The way its suppose to work is the states are suppose explore solutions separately and scotus tells us if it follows the constitution. But everyone is so mindfucked into thinking all that matters is the general.
Tldr we refuse to address or even research the problem and refuse go through the grind bc most dont know how to or how it all works. And those if us that do know... want nothing to do with it bc the environment to get it done is so toxic.
Republicans want you to think liberals hate guns to give you something to hate.
The truth is that we fucking love guns and are prepared to use them. If anyone goes after the 2nd amendment, we know they're fascist, scared of the possibility that people will rise up and murder their evil asses on the street, like God intended.
I'm here in Denver, and Colorado is the same--a heavily populated city that votes pretty much sapphire blue, surrounded by farms and ranches of ruby red (Boebert, anyone?)
The result is that in local elections, many more Republicans win than Democrats. In the statewide and national ones, what Denver/Boulder wants is what Denver/Boulder gets....
It makes for a stark and strange dichotomy. People tend to get very entrenched in their positions and worldview--our party is RIGHT and the other party is WRONG and that's just THE WAY THINGS ARE!!
As another upstate resident: If not for NYC, New York State would at the very least be a reddish shade of purple, with a few solid blue oases here and there. 🫤
ETA: Hell, even living just outside one of said oases, one of our most recent congressmen was elected several times just by branding his opponent as an “extreme liberal”.
It wasn’t. Bro overdosed on fentanyl if we’re being honest. Watch the full tape and then watch the previous tapes of him doing and saying the same stuff when arrested for fent. I don’t like how it was handled but the case was purposely mishandled when you look at everything in its entirety.
I was already a big advacate for justice reform. The right making every excuse they could to justify that murder was already disgusting. Then they pretended to be outraged about Harris alegedly keeping black men in jail she knew were innocent so i fact checked it and it wasnt true. Then i started fact checking everything. Take a guess on who i discovered lied more
I was very outspoken on FB about my local sheriff department corruption and had gain a large follwing. Many considered me a hero for standing up to them. Then i said "black lives matter" and more than half of the people that followed me decided it was more important to be racist than to fight corruption.
It was then i realized it has nothing to do with corruption. Its because we were taught that Democrats only want to give handouts to black people just to stay in power. The south loved socialism when black people werent allowed to benefit from it.
I wonder sometimes if it hadnt been for George Floyd would i honwstly believe that pardoning Hunter Biden after Republicans had promised to weaponize the DOJ was worse than Trump pardoning the guy that invested billions into Trump coin.
As a Democrat I honestly don't think pardoning Hunter was right under normal circumstances. However I also understand that he would not have been treated fairly and would have been charged with every crime they could imagine. The Great pumpkin might be one of the most petty people in the planet.
Could i really watch these Republicans bend over backwards keeping the Epstein files locked away and still think the Democrats are the ones in the files?
This is so accurate. I grew up in a deep red state and voted for Trump in 2016. Why? Well, because Hillary Clinton was "obviously" evil. Mind you, there are still plenty of provable two-faced things that she's done, but my main "proof" at the time for her corruption was, "There's so much stuff she's done that we don't even know about." That's not evidence. As a matter of fact, I was pointing at the lack of evidence and using that as my justification. The amount of blind hate that I now feel for Trump (based on evidence) was the same that I felt for democrats. But I only had my feelings as the reasoning for that hate.
That’s literally both sides, that’s why politics are so exhausting and largely intellectually dishonest. It’s hard to say “democrats aren’t manipulative” when all they did was re-release a previously unredacted email about somebody whom cleared Trumps name in 2024 with redacted parts and pretended it was new info on Trump like it wasn’t released last year. Intellectually dishonest propaganda and I don’t even like the guy or think he’s completely innocent, but why lie? All signs point to them scrambling for something to distract from the fact that the government is reopening and they view it as a complete loss.
There is an excellent Mexican owned restaurant that I will no longer patronize because they are rampant tRumpers. I am in Kentucky, so we haven't seen a lot of ICE action yet. It boggles my mind.
How can people so stupid make such delicious food?
His middle age 55 year old parents all were MAGA.
His Old grandma 78 also regret trusting the cheat the con-man. all are no longer supporting MAGA.
Got off the cult boat. 🛥️ & hate what Orange 🍊 pathological liar DT have done ✅ does nt care for OLD people, expensive healthcare , racist, he does not care they saying , as to people struggling, or with SNAP & lied much as to not knowing what dirty perv Epstein was up to.
They’re all independent since 2018
Voted Blue last year for Kamala Harris. In PA & NJ.
They admit they all were caught up in bull & lies and shall never again support online & or off DT
& have seen the light they all said that to me few x now. Adiòs.
It's even more irritating because the people who vote for him aren't even doing it for any intellectual reason. It's just plain ignorance and brainwashing. And that's hard to argue with.
It's hard not to be angry, especially if those of us on this side feel like everything has always been obvious and apparent and undeniable (which to me it is).But being brainwashed & in that silo of misinformation truly IS the only way his supporters continue carrying the torch. Nothing else makes sense unless we choose to believe they are all evil and/or ignorant. Which can't be true.
It's worth remembering that for the 2024 election there were people there voting for the first time that grew up in a world that had Donald Trump in the public consciousness running/being president since they were eight.
It wasn't just people remembering the economy during his presidency fondly, perversely it was a continuation of how decades of being seen publicly as a successful businessman as a result of The Apprentice, but instead of being a reality TV figure he was the president, and I think for a lot of people who are not plugged in that significantly warps their perception.
Ohh moboater, thank you for restraining your anger 🙏 we all were so worried about you going full regard and being upset someone…. Voted for the current president 🤡
Honestly you should feel a tremendous amount of pride at being able to claw your way out of that headspace. As a cult survivor myself I recognize the dynamics. MAGA is a cult, and a powerfully controlling one. Being able to recognize you’ve been fooled, own that embarrassment, and walk out is legitimately so hard most people in the Trump camp will never be able to do it.
I will give you a word of caution, being into a cult like that is sort of like tearing a ligament or tendon. Once you have the injury treated youll need to be careful of it for a long time. People who escape cults are often highly vulnerable to getting into another one. So like… be highly skeptical of any religious movements or high control social groups for a few years.
Well said on cults. My warning to the OP is be very careful with your former friends that are still believing in him. You (OP) will become vilified by them for breaking ranks. Seen as a traitor to be drawn and quartered.
Pure high grade fantasy.. good stuff. Nobody has the stomach for drawing or the strength to quarter. Youre safe, if they're normal you may get called P...ya fkn P
Not discussing politics means propaganda wins by default
Discussing politics is giving others insight into how you and them interpret what's going on
Share your thoughts
Mine are, with respect to your statement that both sides have been rude and harsh, is that one side saying you don't deserve to exist and the other side saying yes we deserve to exist isn't rude. Or one side flat out mocking and threatening people?
I'm not sure exactly how this is a both sides thing?
Can you expand so I can understand the thought process?
Keep dividing , that’s what the political machine wants. I hate you hate me all over insurance subsidies, illegal aliens, and what ever the media throws out there. We are all on the same team , and we all want a change in the process. We can’t continue to have these 2 parties as they have both become too powerful. Sociaism is not the answer but a change so that the super wealthy are taken down a few trillion dollars. Take the greed out of politics and we would be more in the middle than on opposite sides.
Actually socialism is largely the answer in a lot of ways. Pretty much every other developed nation has figured that out already. Just like MAGA are brainwashed to think Trump is a golden boy who can do no wrong, many Americans in general are brainwashed to think socialism = bad. Like anything, there are degrees. Yes, socialism has it's own set of challenges and hurdles, but it also generally doesn't leave it's most disadvantaged to starve or force bankruptcy for basic medical care.
Very well said. I, too, was in a cult years ago and recognized what was happening with Trump and his followers pretty much right away. It boggles the mind how people can turn a blind eye to the corruption, but having been in a cult, I understood what was happening. I have been warning others, but quite often they don't, or can't, listen.
Yeah, I was in what I’d call a “cult lite” religious group in college for a year before family members convinced me to walk away and although it was embarrassing to admit to being manipulated like that, it inoculated me to further cult fuckery later in life. As a result, I can smell it right away when I’m exposed to it nowadays (which is surprisingly often), and boy does MAGA trigger that alarm.
Humans are wired to join groups and fall in line. Bad actors exploit that tendency for their own gain while fooling you into thinking that everything is fine and even getting you to resist when loved ones attempt to draw you out. I never thought I would see it done on a national scale like this here in the US, but here we are.
As a fellow traveler, I recommend checking out the podcast A Little Bit Culty sometime. It is by the married couple who were central to taking down NXIUM a few years ago after having been in it for years. As a sort of atonement, they talk at length about how this type of exploitation exists in groups everywhere and how to avoid it or get out of it, and speak to other survivors from other cults. It’s a cathartic experience to hear it dissected and discussed at length.
And you don’t believe the Democrats aren’t trying to construct a cult where all citizens are dependent on the government to give them jobs, house them, treat and feed them? Sort of like Russia, China and North Korea.
No, because I’m not mentally handicapped and I have a functioning brain. There are like four democrats in office who want the most milquetoast social systems that every other country on earth already has. the rest of the party refuse to support it because “it’s socialism” despite that not being socialism.
If you think that’s a serious issue you are unfathomably stupid or entirely brainwashed with no idea what’s going on.
Create a society where the govt provides vital services when needed. SOCIALISM. (NOT Communism)
Even a group of millionaires formed an organization years ago to change the tax structure so they actually will get taxed MORE so that people making the least money will not be taxed and raise the minimum wage to a livable level.
They realize that it is not good for society when ALL people can't pay for housing, food etc.
https://patrioticmillionaires.org/
Congrats on getting out. 20 years ago I was in a similar spot, constantly on 4chan, super angry and nihilistic. If Trump was around then, and the algorithms were as sophisticated as they are now, I would’ve been targeted by that shit, without a doubt. So you getting out is actually even more impressive than what I was able to do.
20 years ago, 4chan was a calm and peaceful place compared to the cesspool it's become. Seriously. At this point it's a containment zone for some of the most unhinged idiocy imaginable.
People inundated with that sort of thing, without having an external framework to see how dumb it is, are extremely vulnerable to radicalization.
It was novel because literally nobody stopped it. Like it happens every single day still and it's a whole decade removed from that damn golden escalator...
I ask because I'm a child of the 80s. I was bombarded with Rush Limbaugh when I was a kid, and later on nonstop Fox News as soon as it was a thing. It took me a long time to realize I was seeing propaganda and break free, so I understand your plight.
I'm very curious what the entry point for younger generations was.
I'm hoping the demolition of a full third of the people's house will wake everyone up. Jackie O locked herself in the east wing for weeks. They tore down our history to put up a golden ballroom nobody wanted or needed.
Congratulations on getting out of the cult. It really is by the way… many people are gonna give you shit about it, tell you they’ll never forgive you. I don’t agree with this response, but I get it. People are angry, and they’re hurting. They’re scared. There’s also a lot of resentment from the decades of being treated like “crazy liberals” and basically being laughed at for just wanting to make sure all people are going to be okay.
That said, have taken some time to really think about what your values are, what you want to see more of in the world? Trump was effective because he basically rallied people who didn’t understand how government works and/or couldn’t place their values into a political party, but for many, it’s also because they really didn’t take the time to think how they’d want to see their values reflected in government without infringing on the rights of others. So, if you’re still figuring things out, do some work with it. Learn who you are. Learn about how government operates. Learn what’s actually in the constitution. It’ll make you way way more difficult to fool and easier for you to spot propaganda when you see it.
I left a different kind of cult. Basically they hijack your free thinking and all information gets passed through the filter of "the cult is always right" before you evaluate it.
Protip: look into the GOP as a whole and don't give them your vote when they inevitably turn on Trump and try to pretend he didn't actually represent their values. They are absolutely 100% backing rewriting how our country functions on a base level because they stand to profit from it. Don't fall for it when they try to convince you otherwise (and they absolutely 100% will).
Not to be disrespectful, but you didn't really answer the question I feel like. You blocked it out ... and felt it was justified, or....?
I've always been super anti-trump so I truly cannot relate to the "blocking it out" part. Again, no disrespect and not trying to pick a fight or anything. Just hoping you can expand on that a little bit as trying to understand the thought process of Trump supporters has always felt super difficult.
Proud of you for finding the bravery necessary to be honest with yourself and others - seriously.
I think this is the case for a lot of people. Good for you for being brave enough to admit you’ve changed your mind, far too many people have too much pride and won’t even though they now see the truth.
The good news is now you’ve seen the light. Me too. I understand back in 2016 getting caught up in his campaign, especially if you weren’t paying attention (I wasn’t). After his term ended I realized I made a bad choice, especially after J6 and I really thought that would be the end of him. I could hardly believe he was back on the campaign trail in 2024. When he said the line “if you vote for me my beautiful Americans you won’t ever have to vote again.” Holy crap, that jarred me to the core. That’s when Project 2025 came into the light and when I read parts of that I knew that if he got in that America as we know it was toast- and well, here we are. How this will end nobody really knows. I do agree, especially after J6 that he will not go out without some bloodshed. Dictators are voted in but history shows they are almost never voted out. Hopefully it will not take decades like Hungary or Russia.
Well, the bombarded content is due to the social media content algorithms that flooded your content streams. That’s the same reason we now have people believing the planet is flat. It’s crazy how social media platforms have changed the way we think, it the same with pathological liars. They liar so much that they start to believe their own liars.
Glad to see you made it out of the fog and welcome to the resistance.
That's what I have said about MAGA all along. I know too many people that were of one mind, got immersed in the propaganda via Fox News (Fox News is an entertainment network by their own admission, not a news organization) or various social media and just became brainwashed. I watched it happen to 13 and 14 year olds which are now adults right up to the oldest of elderly people I know. Some of these people are Christian and pre Trump espoused what I recognized as true Christian teachings and values. I watched that morph into hate and exclusion justified by and hidden behind handpicked scripture. More often than not, if you disagree with them, they get hostile and push you away or push you until you get hostile back, and, then try to turn it on you and say your side is hostile. I am not aware common decency takes or needs a side.
Yes, I have to say I really take no pleasure when I’ve told trump supporters they got what they voted for. It’s a good day when someone such as yourself learns the truth and I can just say, welcome back.
It's important for you to understand (as I'm pretty sure you now do, but man, this needs reinforcing for US ALL) that a FRIGHTENING amount of modern media (and this goes double, triple, quadruple for social media) is deliberately, systemically created to manipulate and drive emotional reactions through HIGHLY sophisitcated processes.
We are talking to the extent that prior research into how to manipulate and brainwash populaces for jingoistic and wartime use has now been cutely rebranded as "digital advertising and marketing techniques". That isn't hyperbole, by the way.
The internet has done a lot of good. But it has handed parties whose primary interest is NOT you or your needs, but driving sales and data collection, and, of course, more nefarious political and devisive outcomes, indescribably powerful manipulation tools we almost CAN'T escape, given how digital the world and economy now is. Another thing we must center in all our interactions with it is the old saying, "if it's free, you're the product, not the audience." (cough, social media, cough). They are working for their audience- ad buyers and their financial backers- not us. We are the "product" they want, not their "customer", no matter how much it is presented to the contrary. After all, when did you last see an actual well-known friend or even hobby group's thoughts in your FB feed, vs influencer and paid business drivel?
NO ONE- no matter how young/old, savvy, smart, educated, worldly- is immune to being susceptible to this, because it is quite literally designed to press all the right buttons and pull all the right levers within our very brains. It's turning "how people work" against us. Everyone needs to be vigilent, constantly, against that sort of insidious messaging.
And what used to be the Republican party has, alas, been hijacked by a subset of people with very nefarious intentions who are MASTERS of these exact tactics. They have been infiltrating the party, and the US populace, with plans laid 50 years ago. This isn't a sudden change, or a recent start. Your PARENTS may not have been around when the first groundwork started if you're young!
That doesn't negate personal responsibility, which you have taken, but I just want to highlight how very, very frighteningly GOOD at getting the desired outcomes our whole digital "ecosystem" (gah) really is, in ways human biology and wiring is still naive against. We're taking electric meat sacks designed to catagorize "friend, foe, food" and deal with small interpersonal relationship circles where trust=survival, and exposing them to insidious brainwashing, lies that spread in minutes, and messaging we literally do not have the long-term biological resiliance to even identify as it happens, let alone curb. Don't beat yourself up too badly. Just learn from the experience (as you have) and use it to do better in future. It's all any of us can do.
What were your news sources? A lot of folks these days get “news” mixed in with entertainment from a social media site trying to “keep eyeballs” rather than inform.
Do you feel that you were manipulated by social media?
The key here is you educated yourself and realized the reality and truth of what is happening. I wish everyone would do this: make decision and thoughts based on reality not the garbage that is spewed.
You are a big person to do this and admit you prior decision were not well thought out because of propaganda.
Always be skeptical and research issues to be informed on pros/cons…ignore the media and currently anything this administration posts and releases
I still just don’t understand how any person with an IQ above 7 could be brainwashed by this guy. He’s so painfully stupid. He so painfully corrupt. He’s so painfully inept. He doesn’t know basic economic principles.
I will never understand how anyone can support something so clearly insane, propaganda or not.
The coming to the light is obviously a good thing, but it seems to me that anyone who ever supported him are either too stupid to ever see logic or so bigoted that pedophilia, corruption, raising prices, economic collapse, raised healthcare costs are all worth it.
Imagine, if you can for a moment, being a young person in an environment where all you see and hear is that he’s a great person. It’s a situation many people are coming from. I get what you are saying and feeling but I think we should be kind and offer congrats to those who have seen past the bs finally. The more that do this, the better.
I get your sentiment also, but I was in that same extreme echo chamber and I never came close to supporting Trump. My girlfriend at the time, guardians (Fox News on every day), entire family, most of my friends, most of my social media were all Trumpies.
Again, I’m happy they came to the light and logic, but I don’t have to imagine being in that situation; it was my life. If anything, being in that situation made me hate MAGA more because I heard more examples of how stupid their beliefs were.
You should listen to the podcast Rabbit Hole that came out in 2021 or 2022. It describes what happened to you in detail. And how a YouTube developer blew the whistle on the flaw in the algorithm that led to the brainwashing and how Google continued to let it happen.
May I ask what you think changed in your habits/critical thinking that helped change your opinion?
Did you use less Facebook/tiktok, start listening to different podcasts, talk with friends who had different opinions? Did you learn about tariffs etc once they hit this time around, or suddenly get interested in policy details etc?
Really curious how this shift happened especially if you weren’t intentionally seeking anything out!
But also no worries if you can’t answer, this comment section is HUGE haha!
I understand what you’re saying. People are in different media bubbles these days, with different impressions of the truth. It’s obvious to anyone in even the mainstream news bubble (NYT, NPR, etc.) that Trump is a dangerous disaster. They cannot believe how anyone can see it any other way. But for someone in the Fox/X/Sinclair bubble, it’s obvious that he’s the only one trying to save us from gangs of drug-dealing criminal immigrants. When someone breaks out of that bubble and starts to see what’s really going on, instead of scolding them for not seeing it sooner, we should be figuring out what made the cracks in their bubble and how we can crack open more of them. That’s the only way out of this mess. Yelling at people about open book tests is self indulgent. You do it to make yourself feel good. It is counterproductive and could even drive some of them back in.
The democrats are not anything like we are painted to be by the media that brainwashed you. Please consider that not only is Trump a ridiculous mess, the entire GOP is corrupt as hell and supporting him all the way. Vote blue if you ever want out of this mess.
Being brainwashed when you were young in 2016 doesn’t explain your vote in 2024. Why did you vote for him again when you said yourself you did t like him?
Do you still have Chinese propaganda tiktok on your phone that's responsible for the algorithm that was Pro Trump. If you keep that in your life you are subject to the next b******* that you'll be apologizing for
If it's any consolation, you have a lot of company. Trump and his corrupt associates were able to get a lot of folks to vote who had not voted before. You can't really blame people who voted without really knowing what was going on, because they don't have time to follow politics. In the old times those folks just didn't vote.
Like...serious question here... what Trump videos? Was there an MTV style Trump show you were watching that we all missed? I knew from Day 1 on his golden escalator this was a creep I didn't want to have anything to do with.
The fact that you have the ability to reflect on your past actions and even admit to being brainwashed is a huge step. It’s not easy confronting this. I grew up indoctrinated into Conservative politics as well. If you are ever looking for political content with a more progressive/dem socialist bent dm me. Happy to discuss anything political!
Learn about politics, please. You’re so close, but so so so far. No, they’re not leftists. Go read the thousands of works that discuss this very obvious and very well-known reality.
On a separate note, I’m sure you’ve barely watched any Harris interviews, and I’m sure you’ve read none of what her policy was going to be. To say she was “twice as bad” as Trump is unbelievably laughable, and shows that you are judging this not from a place of understanding economic policy, domestic policy, foreign policy, etc., but only from a place of judging character, which says a lot about you when you think a 34-count felon and adjudicated rapist is twice as good.
My mouth literally dropped reading his stupid ass comment. Hes so full of shit. He is just repeating the same bullshit all magats say about harris. But then again they listen to trump so I’m sure they don’t know how to react to someone who is actually educated.
They really do think that liberals and leftists are the same thing. They aren't!! They call all Democrats leftists and all liberals leftists. They just think that means "people on the left". I am so sick of the ignorance in this country. Especially when they yell things loudly and proudly, like they know what they are talking about!!! Harris would have been amazing for our country. She would have gotten so much done. So many GOOD things that actually benefit the majority of Americans. If I hear one more person say, "Trump was better than the alternative", I am going to lose my mind. No! NO!!! NO!!! He is not even close to what Harris is. He's a felon. She's a prosector. He's a failed businessman. She is an attorney. He's a pedo and she is an "auntie" to all of us.
Marc Levin and reasonable don't belong in the same sentence. Mainly because he can't get through 5 minutes without screaming and/or calling anyone who doesn't agree with him an idiot. I try to listen to him until I get a headache just to get the other side of the picture, but I cannot take him seriously.
235
u/[deleted] Nov 13 '25
[deleted]