So, to put the last article into practice, we have an interesting one. Mike Figueredo of the Humanist Report recently covered a story about Hillary Clinton, of all people, claiming that we need to focus less on trans issues to win elections. And I feel mixed on this. Figueredo came out completely against the idea, going so far to call her bigoted, but as someone who tends to think we should focus less on social issues and more on economics, I have a more nuanced take.
Hillary Clinton herself, needs to shut up. She needs to go away. And for her to come out and talk about this stuff is embarrassing. Like, in my mind, Hillary Clinton, and her brand of liberalism, is why we're in this mess. In 2016 she was the one who blew up and over emphasized identity issues at the expense of economics and tried to bully people into supporting her, only to create a backlash effect that drove Trump into power. Hillary Clinton is someone who I wish would just retire, back out of public life, and never speak about these issues again. She is an embarrassment.
However, is she right in this sense? Yes. Transgenderism affects 0.6% of the country or so. And while I morally side with trans issues, the democrats focusing on them is causing far more blowback than it's worth. So sadly, even though I think Clinton is a terrible messenger here, and even though I think she of all people should shut up after blowing 2016, I have to admit she's right.
But then, Figueredo shows the purity obsessed aspects of the far left. He calls her bigoted and a transphobe, and how she wants to "give in to fascists." This is ridiculous, and exactly the kind of rhetoric from the far left that's so alienating. As far as Clinton...is she a transphobe? maybe. I know she seemed privately not okay with homosexuality in 2016, and I called her out for that. Transgenderism could be a step too far given her methodist background and her being uncomfortable around issues with sexuality. But I want to get something straight about "giving up on trans issues."
We don't need to give up on trans issues, to not lose elections on trans issues. We just need to stop obsessing over it, stop this "YOU'RE GIVING INTO FASCISTS" talk, and to TONE THE ISSUE DOWN. I mean, sometimes progress has to happen slowly, on the down low. We can make slower, more steady progress on these issues by NOT confronting the far right directly, because doing so creates a backlash effect. If you make trans issues the hill to die on, and the country isnt behind you, you're just gonna implode the party. And let's be honest, i dont think a lot of people at the end of the day give a crap either way. You got a relative minority of the country obsessed with trans issues in trying to take away their rights, and then you got another loud shrill minority that wants to defend them at all costs and call anyone who doesn't agree a fascist or fascist enabler.
DOWNPLAY social issues. And even better, REFRAME them. The problem isnt so much being pro trans rights for the left. It's about being a bunch of insufferable blowhards about it who screams BIGOT at everyone who isnt as hardcore on the issue as them, who insists, maybe, just maybe, we not shove this stuff down everyone's throat.
It's like trevor's axiom from south park. You got person A trolling person B, and that causes person C to react and become so insufferably self righteous persons D-F can't help but rip on person C for it, and this causes persons G-J to defend person C, and it just keeps going. And as Garrison (Trump) says at the end of the clip, "gee sounds just like how I got elected". I mean...it is, basically...
So how do you stop this? You don't be person C. You don't feed the trolls. I literally said this back in 2016. You don't feed the trolls, the trolls disappear. Fascists are trolls. They push buttons, they provoke responses. They LITERALLY THRIVE on this culture war nonsense. And as I said in 2016 in that article, Hillary fed the troll. Now she's suddenly like 'gee maybe we shouldn't feed the troll", and while again, worst person to say it, she's not wrong.
And sadly, I have to say I was wrong to some extent. That post as aged like milk, as we have seen the danger of Trump not being willing to accept the results of an election, but seriously, at the same time, again, if we never gave this guy screen time or freaked out and made such a big deal about him, then maybe he wouldn't have gained support in the first place.
If we treat fascists like the idiots they are, they lose their power. They literally thrive on owning the libs. On offending the libs. On making the libs freak out. And as long as the libs are like HOW DARE YOU when they push buttons, then they're gonna continue to implode.
And that's where the left is at on the trans issue. It IS an issue that impacts only 0.6% of the population.And acting like self righteous windbags on it is only gonna polarize people against it, and us.
So what is the left to do EXACTLY? Drop the virtue signalling, stop engaging the right on the issue, shift the attention to economics, but continue working to support trans right subtlely and behind the scenes. This is an issue that it might take a while for Americans to come around on, much like the gay issue. But, much like the gay issue, americans will eventually realize "hey, this doesnt actually affect us, they deserve rights, and the republicans are stupid" and then progress will be made. I watched the environment on homosexuality change radically in my life time. I WAS a literal homophobe in the 2000s, sad to say, because I was, you know, a religious conservative. But then I read the Laramie Project in college, and I started getting gay friends, and I started shifting left on it. And then when I became an atheist I flipped MAJORLY to being 100% pro gay with no reservations. And the country seemed to follow. 2004 homosexuality was widely stagmatized, this softened a lot in the late 2000s and the real turning point came in the early-mid 2010s. Transgenderism is the same pattern. People need to educate themselves on gender dysphoria, and we might need to have some old people die off for people to come around it a bit more, but I think we could make a similar case for transgenderism and have it follow the same path, on a time lag of like 20 years. The point is, we'll get there. You just can't force it.
But that's what the left tries to do. They have to FORCE it. They have to circlejerk about pronouns, and scream that everyone who doesnt like them is a bigot, and the more they try to morally police conformity on the issue, the more they lose fence sitters to the right. And that's how fascism wins and gains power in the first place.
This might not be what the SJWs wanna hear. But, that's what needs to happen. Young people support trans people, old people don't, and some middle aged people are in between. I know people myself who are totally pro gay but think transgenderism is weird. I try to SOFTLY nudge them in the right direction, not screaming they're a bigot about it, but you know, try to educate them on it. Have an actual productive discussion without confronting them.
Because no one likes the guy who screams they're a bigot for not being pure. All that does is lose you friends. And that means that they start hanging out with like minded people. And hello, alt right pipeline. Oops. Yeah. It's like when you condense all the people with crappy views into a single political party while the other one insists on purity, you get....exactly what you get now. You force people to take a side, and as it turns out they might choose the other one out of spite.
Honestly, the modern left is a disaster on this. They'd rather scream BIGOT at anyone who isnt pure, rather than recognizing their humanity, and trying to actually work to educate people. Everyone isnt going to be perfect on social issues, and sometimes it takes years to actually get people to shift and change their minds. But I believe most people are decent people and assuming there isn't a driving force that keeps them that way, like religion or an actual alt right political ideology, most will soften with time.
Because at the end of the day, most people dont really care. They're only taking a side because the left forces them to take a side, and that causes them to take the wrong side.
I keep saying it, if you want to derail fascism, it needs to happen by depolarizing people away from social issues. As long as social issues are THE hill to die on, then we'll get exactly what we get. A stuck up left obsessed with moral purity and driving people away for not being as moral as they are, and a right wing that only lives and thrives on the tears of liberals.
Despite my comments on trump not respecting democracy in the above article aging poorly, I still think the core message is accurate. What really drove trump to power was moral outrage. The fact that he made the liberals freak out and cry. And now they're pushing arguments about the left being "groomers." You wanna know how to win this one? Just point out how many pedos are on the right. Like this freaking guy did. You gotta fight fire with fire and make the right look freaking stupid. You gotta take the moral high ground from under them. You dont do that by being a self righteous jerk. You do that by being like "who me bro? I just wanna let kids be who they wanna be, you're the ones who seem obsessed with diddling kids." And then you leave the country to decide from there. I assume when you're not screaming that anyone who isn't as pure as you as a bigot, that people will be more responsive.
After all, we literally had these issues back in the 2000s too. Wanna know how we handled it? not by getting in peoples' faces about it and making them look like POSes for not caring for it. We make comedy skits like this one by Lewis Black lampooning the right for obsessing over social issues, and actually making a parody out of their actual logic. Clearly there are no gay banditos who wanna screw each other in the butt in front of your kids. Unless you take them to a rammstein concert and they happen to play "buck dich". To be fair there are equally offensive concert tricks by them involving straight people too.
Really, you make the right look stupid, and people stop supporting the right. You be self righteous blow hards screaming that everyone is a bigot and all of the sudden right wingers swell in support. Take it from an ex right winger like myself.
Another way to get people on the side of trans issues, is to package them with more important issues Americans do care about. Like economics. You give people an economic platform to rally around, and I think a lot of people will soften away from social issues. Will most americans really vote for someone who goes against their economic interests to focus on social issues? Well, maybe some do if social issues are salient and people feel comfortable economically (much like in the 1960s), but in a modern environment? I doubt it. As I see it, trumpism originated as a cry for help. The dems failed to address the economic concerns people had so people voted for the loud mouth racist who promised to bring back the jobs. Everything just happened to snowball from there and that's how we got where we are. And while some of those voters likely cant be saved, we can start minimizing and reversing the damage by not engaging the american public in ways that polarizes them against us.
Sometimes I swear the left has a death wish in this country. They seem to make the worst, most suicidal, and easily avoidable mistakes as possible. And that's why we're at where we're at.
Again, not a fan of clinton, and i even BLAME her for this mess in the first place, but she kinda has a point on this.
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