As in, not known to you IRL.
I’ve occasionally brought it up before, but a while back in my reddit days I was in a thread where a “professional deprogrammer” had popped in and was talking about how to “deprogram” conservatives and get them to shift left in their views. It centered around restoring their sense of community and belonging with more balanced viewpoint folks IRL and away from their online echo chambers.
I asked them if they had any way to convert someone you encounter wholly online and they said that it was basically impossible, IRL you have a decent chance, but not online.
I’ve been thinking about that quite a bit, so now I’m curious if anybody here has actually gotten an online conservative to come to the dark side light side?
No. They will just shift their personality on you, usually saying “well I really hate all politicians, but I just think Trump is funny” or something dumb like that. MAGAts do not want facts. Living in crazy conspiracy world is their hobby. They can post something like “Hillary is a vampire” and all the cons in their echo chamber upvote it.
Before deleting most of my Reddit stuff, I had a good conversation with a conservative about climate change. They pulled out all the standard right wing talking points, and I tried to remain respectful as I provided sources that refuted every one. One they threw out that I hadn’t heard of at the time was “global wobbling,” which I had to look up. 10- minutes later, I responded, with sources, saying that it was yet another thing the right throws out to confuse the issue for voters, but something climate scientists are well aware of and can measure and predict. At that point, they thanked me for all the info and said they had some reading to do. That’s the best I’ve ever gotten. Don’t know if they changed their view, though.
I’d like to stay optimistic and hope they did as well, though if my own experience is any indicator, there’s equal chance they fell into the pit of “Maybe climate change is real, but it’s not that bad/it’s better for me.”
Ill be honest, thats a victory in itself. Creating a crack isnt a loss. Its progress. As small as it may be. A damn doesnt fail because of a meteor hitting it. Its a crack here, a fracture there. It adds up.
The resiliency of that mentality isnt impenetrable.
absolutely not and i imagine the same is true for leftists.
I am a lurker, mostly. I have never tried to change anyone’s opinion online that I can think of. But as a lurker, you can bet that my viewpoint might be changed by a good argument, even if it’s not directed at me. Just as it happens with religion, I’m sure there are conservatives (or leftists for that matter) on the internet that may have cracks beginning to form in their worldviews, and the right exposure on the internet can send them down a rabbit hole of questioning and considering alternatives. I suspect a major part of the reason I have gotten more and more leftist myself over time is because of exposure to good arguments on the left and much fewer on the right, plus the lack of desire from the right to partake in good faith arguments.
So what I’m saying is, your argument may not get through to the target, but there is collateral … well, not damage, but you get what I mean.
I’ve watched conservative theists unravel and admit things about themselves openly as they crash out under questioning they started by making a thread on debate forums, but they always relapsed by the next day.
I just humour people when they tell me political opinions I don’t agree with. No one ever changes their minds.
I don’t argue with conservatives online to try and change their minds. I argue with them to change the minds of people reading the argument. For every social media user that posts content, there are a thousand lurkers. I post arguments so hopefully some of those lurkers might change their mind away from nationalist authoritarianism
I argue with them to change the minds of people reading the argument.
This is why I would labour to keep arguing until either I get last word, or the interlocutor clearly runs out of good arguments. You can’t reason with people who never reason themselves into an idea to begin with. But you can convince the readers that the idea is dangerous and to keep away!
Yes, and this is generally how it works:
- Establish that you care about their perspective, and truly mean it. Most people can sniff out insincerity.
- Start asking good faith questions about their position. If their beliefs are misguided, they will begin stumbling upon the flaws on their own. It’s okay to guide them gently with the questions, but don’t try to convince of them of any particular viewpoint, and don’t tell them they are wrong either directly or indirectly. That can undo any progress you made. Just focus on encouraging them to deeply analyze logic that you recognize to be flawed.
- Only offer your perspective / opinions if you are asked directly. If you’ve done #1 and #2 well, this should start happening. I recommend understating your opinions. You don’t have to lie, but keep rants to a minimum and use soft language.
- Be consistent. No one changes their world view overnight. It takes planting seeds, watering them consistently, and waiting.
P.S. If you are doing this correctly and with an open mind, there’s actually a good chance you might change your opinions on a some things, and that’s okay (as long as they aren’t harmful). It also can show them by example that opinions are flexible and should be based on evidence, not the other way around.
If it means anything, I started my journey on lemmy as an armchair socialist who in practice was more a welfare capitalism type person. Now I’m a full on anarchist (anti-capitalist). So a steady stream of influence, especially when people make good points and it helps make sense of my suffering, has shifted my political views strongly.
(But the basis for that shift was already kind of laid out, I’ve been fascinated by anarchist critiques for a while, and one of my favourite political authors was one. But the sort of being in a community of likeminded people [lemmy] and having significant suffering at the hands of the current system that made me more strongly shift towards those views).
On the other hand. Simply having a few conversations with my vaguely left wing partner about my views has led her to go from vaguely social democrat to anarchist.
I think the lesson is change is possible, it’s just a slow series of events that add up. Usually there isn’t one thing that straight up switches a person.
You went from water up to your waist to water up to your chest.
This post is asking about people who aren’t in the water at all and have a visceral reaction to the mere suggestion that they even look at water, let alone go in it.
That’s super unique because most people that are anarchists are anarcho-capitalists and that’s generally what people mean by ancap.
Anarchy sort of implies Capitalism.
Not really at all. Look up anarchism on wikipedia. This is the first paragraph:
Anarchism is a political philosophy and movement that seeks to abolish all institutions that perpetuate authority, coercion, or hierarchy, primarily targeting the state and capitalism.[1] Anarchism advocates for the replacement of the state with stateless societies and voluntary free associations. A historically left-wing movement, anarchism is usually described as the libertarian wing of the socialist movement (libertarian socialism).
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anarchism
“Anarcho-Capitalism” is a rather recent name for a sort of ideology that most anarchists would instead call “stateless capitalism”
Feel free to disagree but in my own experience observing people any tipe of radical thought is usually a mental health issue. You can’t treat mental health through comments.
Psychotherapists treat mental health through comments.
You can try with me if you want. I guess what is it that you want to ask or say ?
I was raised super conservative, and the two biggest steps on my journey to the left were Jon Stewart Bernie Sanders
Jon got my attention by pointing out the hypocrisy that did in fact exist on both sides. It gave me a space to exist where I wasn’t just called a wrong dumb redneck and dismissed, but felt like he was actually trying to meet me where I was. That allowed me to let my guard down and actually listen to what he was saying.
Bernie Sanders came along in 2016 at a point where I would’ve called myself a centrist and basically did the same thing. Non judgmentally gave me a space to exist, listed some topics I cared about, then gave me a cause for them.
People don’t like being told they’re wrong. You cannot debate someone out of believing what they believe. What you can do is ask them questions. Get them to consider why they believe what they believe, and eventually they may start seeing contradictions and change their mind on their own.
I’ve had small success with my aunt by focusing on her love of children, explaining how many are dying under the needlessly cruel boot of Israel
From what I have figured out:
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They need to already respect you in some way, this does not work on random strangers unless you are a top tier communicator or public figure
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You need to identify the levers, for my aunt it is babies in danger. It will be different for different people, you need to do your homework
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INFINITE PATIENCE and consistently reiterating your own genuine respect for them (this can be hard, you may need to dig deep), you need to show them that they aren’t your enemy and that they have been lied to by people they have trusted for nefarious purposes
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Play on the rights inherent distrust for the elite, Muskrat and co ARE the elite! Look at what he’s doing to medicare!
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It will take many, many sessions and you CANNOT falter or get impatient or it gives them an excuse to dismiss everything before
It’s not easy, it takes time and effort, though it is doable
I’ve failed at #3 on multiple people IRL. It’s so hard arguing with a brick wall…
And I’ve had a lot more setbacks than successes, my aunt isn’t the only one I’ve been working on but she’s the only one to make progress.
Don’t give up! There is a hopeful future at the end of all of this if we can just get 10% of them to understand
Yea, IRL it’s possible, but it’s much got damn work. I’m doing this rn for some family members, and it’s been a few years and I think I’m starting to make a breakthrough on one.
I’ve needed to stoop to some “drastic” measures though, like manipulating their favored corporate social media algorithms away from the alt-right bubbles or drastically artificially slowing down certain places like Facebook so that it’s “painful to use”
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I’m in the middle of pulling a chat friend out of his programming. His only real problem was being raised in Texas by a Good Ol Boy single father, and once he got out from under his dad’s wing, he started to realize that what he was taught simply isn’t lining up with reality.
He started out as an incel, but now he’s in therapy and has a girlfriend.
I think of it less as ‘converting’ and more just holding his hand while he figures out that his dad’s advice was complete horseshit. It takes forever, and not everybody has the spoons to pull it off, but I do, so I will.
a man of high logic, far easier to convert than majority of them.
Your bias is showing. Intelligence isn’t necessary to be left wing. Change is hard for everyone and requires emotional intelligence, not IQ.
No it isn’t & I didn’t say anything about IQ.
He said
he started to realize that what he was taught simply isn’t lining up with reality.
to realize this is a man of high logic
Please could you define what you understand by “high logic”?
Personally, I’m only familiar with “higher-order logic” as defined in maths. So for me, someone with “high logic” has the ability to interconnect and solve complex problems, which is one of the key skills measured by IQ tests.
Realising your beliefs and reality do not align doesn’t require complex logical reasoning, so for me the statement you quoted doesn’t mean high logic.
yea that’s the joke
It’s not online but at my usual bar I often get into arguments with a monarchist guy and a free-market/deregulation dude. They often tell me they’ll someday manage to make me “take the red pill”. It’s kind of annoying for them to disregard my views like that. That’s why I don’t actively try to change theirs.
