I’ve been a Trump supporter since the start, but here in Sweden it carries a social stigma to be vocal about it, and even more so now. Now you are evil, incomprehensibly evil to even say something positive about the man.
Luckily for me I don’t care, I’m self employed and lazy.
For a while I was hesitant to argue with people, because I figured I must have missed some facts, or that my facts were twisted and easily proven wrong. Over time I’ve come to realise that I have facts and they have feelings.
Anytime I let the arguments be about feelings I will lose, anytime I let the argument be about my facts, I will lose, because people just won’t belive me. So how do I win?
The argument must be about their facts.
Example: ”Trump is always lying.” I ask which lie bothers you the most? If it’s a normie with a brain, they go: It’s not a specific lie, it’s that there are som many. And they link to Washington Post. But I won’t let them of the hook, surely with som many lies, there must be one that have really affected you? There isn’t of course.
If the normie lacks a brain, they will say Trump lied about attendance at his inauguration. Why is that important to you I ask. It isn’t, but it is to him. But it’s not Trump harping on about it. It’s the media.
Example: ”Trump really messed up with everything.” I ask, what thing that he did worries you the most? Mostly they say Corona response. Which is ridicolous since I live in Sweden and our government did far less than Trump and still do, but again I ask for specifics. What should he have done? Of course they don’t know.
Example: ”Biden is a much better president.” I inform them about the Executive orders and how damaging they are, so there must be something I missed, I say, which of Biden’s policies do you think will be best?
They don’t even know he has policies. No media here is talking about anything Biden has done, they are still treading water fantasising about what Trump will do next.
But remember the goal is not to win the argument, most likely there won’t even be an argument. The goal is to plant a seed, hopefully a thought will be nourished enough to grow.
The person you argue with may not even be ready, but someone reading it will. If you want to win people over I belive it is important to not lose your cool. Be factual not hurtful.
It’s easier to sympathise with nice people.
For the longest time, I couldn't figure out what made some people 'normies'. Then it occurred to me that, just like in your post, they're people who absolutely refuse to research anything. Even after it's proven to them that WAPO and the NYT are lying, they still continue to outsource their thinking to the MSM.
THIS!!!!!!
My sister, brother-in-law, and brother all fall into this category. They just spout that they hate Trump and bring up CNN talking points but have zero actual knowledge to back any of it up. They just parrot back what they have been told.
There is a reason Trump said the media is the biggest enemy. It's true. If the media was honest, the world would have woken up to all of this a long time ago.
"Normie" is a few significant overlapping character traits.
Midwittery, they're 95-110 IQ and spend half their calories each day trying to cover for this with paper qualifications and suchlike.
Agreeableness, most people by design are agreeable, the people who lead are disagreeable, it makes zero sense from an evolutionary perspective for your tribe to have nothing but people like Trump as members because it would lose to the tribe next door who had 10 leaders and 990 normies to one extent or another.
Cowardice, most people are scared of the society they live in, at present it still pays to be more scared of BLM torching your business than "Q" people torching your premises. When given a chance to reflect on how that's bad they'll knee jerk to "safety" and conform.
Nothing to be done about midwits, things that have worked for me in the past is saying:
Agreeableness goes hand in hand with relevant authority figures, most people's authority figures these days are cancerous fucks from Hollywood, fathers and community leaders have been removed and replaced with the state and kid fiddlers. Try to point people towards Bill Burr and Chapelle, they're not going to risk treating you as an authority to be "agreeable" with because it's too socially dangerous. They are allowed to laugh at "based" comedy.
For cowardice, just call them cowards, naming cowards is half the batlle, they know that's what they are and the pain of someone overtly pointing it out will leave a lasting burning that hopefully pushes them to think about it. It's a well understood in political science that "FEAR" and "othering" people are primary movers, people simply respond more to that than anything else. It's easy to be divisive with this so don't be a dick but pointing out it requires absolutely zero bravery to support George Floyd in the right context can get cogs turning.
Planting seeds as in "Don't you think orange man might be not bad?" etc will be put in the bin immediately.
Problem is there's so many news sources they can just fall back on. Wapo and NYT lying? how about...
See where I'm going? There's just so much fake news sources that even if you disprove one news company another dozen are there to back them up. Its exhausting trying to disprove them.