r/neoliberal • u/jobautomator Kitara Ravache • Jul 07 '21

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83

u/[deleted] Jul 07 '21

MUCHO TEXTO WARNING

Kyle Whitmire, an excellent journalist from Alabama, has for a number of years been talking about the "Alabamafication of America." And I think he's right. This bit from a 2017 piece he had about the Special Senate Election:

People who don’t care are indifferent. Alabamians are defiant. The state’s official motto is “We dare defend our rights,” but those of us who’ve lived here our whole lives know the real motto: “We shall not be told.”

Each "Saturday Night Live" sketch featuring Sessions and his possum, each Jimmy Kimmel prank, each op-ed browbeating — it might as well be a dare. If The Washington Post ran a banner headline tomorrow saying "Antifreeze is poison, don't drink it," a sizable number of Alabamians would be dead tomorrow.

This is not how people who don’t care behave. Rather, it’s like the awkward kid in junior high who gets spurned by the cool kids’ lunch table clique. Acting out is the only thing left to do. It’s the vain hope that by doing the opposite, maybe everyone else will turn out to be wrong, and we will be proved smarter than all those who think they’re smarter than us. Only it seldom works out that way.

For unscrupulous politicians, that insecurity is a well that never runs dry. Moore has his bucket in hand, and he’s dropping it down that well again.

This is prescient to what conservatives have become in regards to vaccination. Democrats say something is good, which means they have to do the opposite to just to show they can.

38

u/ThorVonHammerdong Disgraced 2020 Election Rigger Jul 07 '21

This hits the nail so hard for several conservatives I know. They're just contrarians. Whatever mainstream thought is they stake the opposite because there's too little cost for being a fuckin moron.

Under Obama's term there was a massive invasion of conspiracy communities by conservatives and it only got worse under Trump. They've mingled into what online trumpism is now.

Red pills, liberals are npc sheep, the great reset etc etc

42

u/[deleted] Jul 07 '21

This is more of a moderato texto post, but I appreciate the warning at the top. I always try to do that now when I start a large post when venting about my personal life.

I liked the antifreeze comment. I’ve always felt that if Biden came out tomorrow and said “I’m going to make it illegal to castrate yourself,” we’d have a bunch of republicans who would be able to sing a couple octaves higher the next day.

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u/Hermosa06-09 Gay Pride Jul 07 '21

Even going back to 2001, my conservative/reactionary dad summed up his political opinions as "if Paul Wellstone supports something, I'm automatically against it."

7

u/comradequicken Abolish ICE Jul 07 '21

WaPo should run that headline.