Long story. So bear with me but I think it's interesting.
I'm from Australia. So who the fuck cares about US politics right?
Well back in 2016 the media had me. I was a headline reader and would commonly say to people the likes of "Imagine if Trump wins! How fucked would the world be".
One day a guy from work sort of red pilled me in a weird way... He was a Pakistani and he told me "Who cares... We're not from the US. And they deserve it". It made me laugh (sorry pedes).
Now obviously he had an axe to grind from a Pakistani point of view but he sort of burst my bubble. Why the fuck would I care or stress being from Australia about Trump being president. I never cared before. That's when I realised the media had fucked me.
Anyway a couple of months later some barrister friend (had been having dinner once a week every week for several years) started ranting to me at dinner about Trump being president ending the world. I thought I could maybe help him and calm him down. Try and make him see that it doesn't matter that much. Long story short... We have never caught up socially since then. I've got lots of friends. And he was sort of a "single" friend and I'd just met my wife so while I was disappointed... It didn't stress me too much but it was an eye opener.
Anyway started becoming a Trump fan. Bet on him winning. He won but I learned for years to just shut up about it because people still really hate him here. And basically buy into the fact that anyone who likes him (or even doesn't hate him) is a racist degenerate.
Earlier this year lost another friend. Called her up during Covid to make sure she was alright because she is at high risk (cancer survivor). She started ranting about how fucking stupid Trump was. I backed off and was like "yeah he's got a hard job and who knows what the right decision is" and tried to be non chalant. She basically pushed me until she called me a "fucking idiot" and I told her that I'm not here to listen to her bullshit and to fuck off. She was a little bit of a "pity" friend of mine so was happy to fuck her off at this point.
Anyway feel I almost lost another friend lately. He's a good one who I don't want to lose.
Hes a smart guy. Professional, very educated and wealthy. He HATES Trump. But basically acts like he doesn't care.
So he'll send me "Trump is shit" articles or videos and then when I argue back he's like... "Ah I don't really care". But you know he does. At one point I basically confronted him about his attitude and said that his attitude was confrontational but it's not worth ruining our friendship. He backed down and apologised but I can tell he still HATES Trump and a part of that hates projects onto me.
It's crazy that the media machine is so powerful. That people in Australia lose friends over it.
Imagine being in the US and losing a friend over who the Prime Minister of Germany is.
Happened to me too, My sis and my best friend both hate Trump.
When my Sister said she hated Trump, I was like why? She couldn't answer me in detail, just started spouting the headlines. I was like okay if you're not intelligent enough to do your research or understand what's happening I will be very disappointed. Since she respects me and of course loves me she took my words seriously and did her research and started liking Trump.
As for my friend I just told him I will whack his face if he keeps spouting MSM nonsense. Lol, he is a Leftard American, I keep mocking the feminists and the democrats every time we speak, he can't counter my points. Made him promise that he will do his research, fingers crossed.
One of my best friends has considerable dislike towards Trump. He sees Trump being nationalist and anti illegal-immigration as good things. But then he swallows most MSM's "orange man bad" headlines and loses his mind when I'm instantly skeptical over MSM articles. He says that I'm biased with news, and that I accept stuff that criticizes Left without question.
I kept asking him a question which he kept ignoring and I had to ask around five times before he finally answered it. I asked "If I was making statements to you that often, or most of the time proved to be lies, would you be skeptical towards stuff I say?". He finally gave a positive answer. His arguments in favor of MSM include "it's reputable news outlet, why would they lie?".
It's saddening how MSM meddles with people's brains.
I also believe that part of their inability to break free from the leftist anti-Trump narrative is due to the fact that it would pretty much shatter so much of the framework of their reality. That they can't trust the news, that Hollywood is full of propaganda, that they've been completely convinced about all sorts of lies not only about Trump, but about their whole ideas of how the world around them operates behind the scenes.
Not to mention their main sources of entertainment should no longer be trusted, and now they're thinking well wtf else do we do for fun! I was given the red-pill gradually over the last 3 or so years from a ton of guys I follow on YouTube, like Owen Benjamin, Gavin Mcinnis, Stefan Molyneux, and they mostly started out as comedy channels that slowly inserted major red pills and truth bombs as they uncovered it for themselves - and we all kind of woke up alongside each other!
I think its asking a lot of your average person to completely wake up from the brainwashing, and to collapse their basic model of the entire system. I think what makes it difficult for those of us like you and I to convince them is due to the fact that we're so far removed from the lies and programming. Instead of saying its ALL RIGHT FUCKING HERE, JUST LOOK! It's hard for us to sympathize with the fact that it took us a long gradual approach in getting to the point that we are now.
Well said
It's really sad, part of me thinks it's the system of education that's failing a lot of ppl.
I had an American professor who was hell-bent on driving the value of critical thinking into us, we need more professors like that in the system.
Teach and promote critical thinking in the students for the love of God.
Completely agree on critical thinking