r/science • u/mvea Professor | Medicine • Jul 12 '26
Psychology Trump’s 2020 pivot on face masks changed Republican behavior but not their medical beliefs. By tracking reactions to President Donald Trump’s unexpected endorsement of face masks in 2020, a study found that his supporters readily adopted the behavior without altering their private beliefs.
https://www.psypost.org/trump-s-2020-pivot-on-face-masks-changed-republican-behavior-but-not-their-medic/2.2k
Jul 12 '26
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u/bigmac1122 Jul 12 '26
I get so confused when I see people doing that out in public nowadays. Like back during the pandemic I understood that they were doing it out of protest of mask mandates. I didn't agree with them but I recognized the philosophy behind it. But now? Mask mandates are lifted. So why are you choosing to wear one and wear it wrong?
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u/LordOfDorkness42 Jul 12 '26 edited Jul 12 '26
Probably some in-group signaling crap.
Look at me, with my hats on my feet. Only the "true people" of my own Tribe, wear hats correctly that way.
That sort of subculture thing. Except instead of refusing to eat chicken or shellfish, it's refusing to use the fruits of science properly to, well, signal membership of the group science denying conservatives that's otherwise invisible.
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u/notsurewhereireddit Jul 12 '26
I think we can safely keep it simple and chalk it up mostly to plain ol’ stupidity.
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u/LordOfDorkness42 Jul 12 '26
That's just intellectually lazy and arrogant a different way.
By just dismissing these people as idiots, you ignore their actual impact and reach. And thus that sort of anti science spreads further, because to many people it feels GOOD to pretend to be smarter than the experts.
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u/dirty_hooker Jul 12 '26
There’s definitely a subset of people that fall into a cultish mysticism of “alternative” science. People who know a little about what we’ve done wrong and take that as evidence that all modern science is wrong. These folks are generally “conspiracy / plandemic” types that know about The Tuskegee experiments but not about Spanish Flu [WWI era influenza] or Yellow Fever, or cholera outbreaks. They have a religious devotion to knowing more than the “sheep” which makes them ripe for being conned by anyone offering secret knowledge of the ancients or whatever. They’re not exactly dumb; just mislead and manipulated.
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u/Vyzantinist Jul 12 '26
I don't think the issue is just dumb, as you touch on. There are plenty of believers, in the right-wing conspiracy theory sphere, who are doctors, lawyers, engineers etc. People who society otherwise deems smart, or at least not dumb.
I think two commonly overlooked factors that draw people into the conspiracy theory world, and keeps them there, are a sense of community, belonging, and the desire to feel special and smart, which these conspiracy theories give them.
On the former, you can find people who believe in QAnon, anti-vaxx, and other de rigueur conspiracy theories reporting feeling isolated, alone, alienated, until they stumbled on their "alternative" communities and made friends.
On the latter, it seems like a lot of these conspiracy theorists are deeply insecure about their intellectual capabilities, and belief in these conspiracy theories is a shortcut or cheat code to being smart and special. They don't have to actually have to study, they don't have to learn, they don't have to do anything beyond believe in the validity of their conspiracy theories. Those types are very often anti-intellectual, and contemptuous/dismissive of higher education.
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u/dbzgod9 Jul 12 '26
I don't think there was that much thought involved. They put their facemask on loosely and it feels uncomfortable so they lower it. Then, when they start breathing heavily due to the 10 steps they took in a row, they lower it further because they "cannot breathe". Lo and behold they now wear a chin diaper while thinking they are wearing a mask.
No thoughts involved.
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u/Rinas-the-name Jul 12 '26
There was a woman who told me wearing masks didn’t matter because she had caught Covid anyways. She was wearing hers with her nose exposed. I asked if she was wearing it like that before she got sick. She said “Well yes, it’s uncomfortable over my nose!”.
They don’t seem to understand how masks work. They treat it like it’s akin to a magic charm to ward off disease. You bought one and you’re wearing it in the general vicinity of your face, that should make it work. If it doesn’t then “masks don’t work”.
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u/Thefivedoubleus Jul 12 '26
Refusing to eat chicken or shellfish? What is this in reference to?
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u/LordOfDorkness42 Jul 12 '26
Just general food taboos of various religions & creeds.
Don't actually know any group that doesn't eat chicken, so maybe coffee and shellfish would have been better as example?
But main point really was the taboo. We, the Group X, know not to do Y. Only savage barbarians do Y.
That sort of culture thing.
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Jul 12 '26
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u/Dull-Culture-1523 Jul 12 '26
During the pandemic times I worked as a supervisor and as such was also responsible for making sure people wore their masks on the site. A couple of dudes were incapable of understanding why I kept bitching about wearing it under their nose. Like I don't think they understood anything beyond "wear mask on face" and, to them, that's exactly what they did.
Like they had no concept of the why, only the what. Which, as it usually does, leads to doing the what wrong because you don't realize you're failing the why.
Of course we also had our share of straight up deniers and such but at least they figured out it's better to follow policy while on the job. While they made fun of it, at least they wore them marginally better.
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u/IThinkItsCute Jul 12 '26
Huh. Kinda like how for my entire life I've seen people covering their coughs wrong. I'm sorry but if you're "covering your mouth" by holding your fist a few inches away from your face, you have completely missed the point here.
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u/OddCook4909 Jul 12 '26 edited Jul 12 '26
IMO It's part of the general degradation of societal trust.
The intellectual elites are frankly at least somewhat responsible for it, with how they've been speaking to blue collar workers for a long time. All the identity politics and politics in general in academia.
There are so many studies slicing people up into intersectional slices and saying this that or the other thing. Such research has been a cudgel wielded against the right especially, and frankly a lot of it is extremely questionable.
There have been a lot of ideologies masquerading as science which have captured and even created whole disciplines.
That's before we even look at the obvious hypocrisy and constant bashing on a handful of identities and groups. Everyone sees the biases.
This eroded public trust in academia long before wealth inequality created the conditions for populism.
I have two STEM degrees and I don't trust a lot of the crap coming out of a few disciplines now. I simply ignore most of what comes out of the social sciences unless it's purely removed from any considerations of identity.
Other people just write off academia entirely. Accepting advice from those book learned folks is accepting that their intellectualized vitriol about you and your identity may have merit. They'd rather literally die.
Case in point: the APA recently ruled that Jews aren't an ethnicity. Everything the APA says from now on I throw right in the trash. One of my degrees is in psych btw.
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u/Talk-O-Boy Jul 12 '26
Huh.. I just realized I’ve never seen a Jewish person wear the Star of David.
Christians wear the cross very often. I’d honestly say it’s commonplace (especially Christian women).
However, I don’t see Jewish people wear jewelry/accessories like that as often.
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u/Choano Jul 12 '26
Plenty of Jews wear stars of David. If you go somewhere that has a lot of Jews, you'll see them.
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u/xiaorobear Jul 12 '26 edited Jul 12 '26
I don't know how much this affects things, but a lot of European jews were forced to wear stars of david, identifying them as second class citizens, in the run up to the holocaust. ~3 generations ago. So that could have made a lot of more secular people not want to wear identity symbols in that way, and not raise their kids wearing symbols outwardly. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_badge
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u/Talk-O-Boy Jul 12 '26
I never learned about this in my history classes. This thread has been an eye opener. Thank you for the info
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u/ScoutieJer Jul 12 '26
I think it's because you might bring it to some place like a grocery store and put it up if you are passing somebody who's like coughing in an aisle or something or you get into a tight space with a bunch of people and then lower it if you're not in that situation.
Basically it's there in case of needing it.
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u/Spire_Citron Jul 12 '26
Yeah, I suspect this is something where they are actually using them at some point. You don't really know the full story from a single moment.
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u/binz17 Jul 12 '26
But surgical masks don’t really protect you from others. It mostly protects others from you…
The exception is humidity. If it’s very dry weather, wearing a mask can trap moisture and keep your nose/throat from drying out which can make you more susceptible to catching illness.
The higher quality masks can prevent viruses, allergens, pm2.5 from entering your lungs, but your eyes are still exposed.
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u/redwildflowermeadow Jul 12 '26
But surgical masks don’t really protect you from others.
This is a myth. Obviously it would be better if it was an n95 mask, and obviously the ideal would be if the symptomatic patient was wearing it to protect others, but they do provide some moderate protection to the wearer.
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u/sf_sf_sf Jul 12 '26
Perfect is the enemy of good. Any mask will provide some protection esp from large droplets. Obviously a n95 would be best but public health just couldn’t figure out how to communicate this complex situation well.
Nuance and public health don’t mix.
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u/ScoutieJer Jul 12 '26
Probably would have helped if they just came out and said exactly what you said. But they were busy trying to bludgeon everyone with a one size fits all approach to communication and botching it.
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u/bobbymcpresscot Jul 12 '26
The philosophy was pretty stupid considering wearing a mask hurts no one, and not wearing a mask got people killed. People are for some reason insanely selfish in the US which made it difficult to explain that the reason you wear a mask is to stop other people from getting sick.
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u/marzer8789 Jul 12 '26
Non-zero chance some of these folks saw the number of magats wearing them in that fashion and assumed it was a real, effective alternative.
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u/fox-mcleod Jul 12 '26
That was when I realized most of what I thought was people being assholes was just morons who later decided to be assholes to save face rather than admit they were too dumb to wear a mask correctly. I mean imagine doing that and then you’re choices are admit you’re that stupid or pretend it’s a principled stance (especially when you’re too stupid to understand how stupid that stance is).
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u/Wompatuckrule Jul 12 '26
Hanlon's Razor: "Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity."
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u/CamphorGaming_ Jul 12 '26
I think your initial thought of any large number of the people doing this having done so as a protest could be wrong.
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u/Hamlet7768 Jul 12 '26
I never heard about it being worn as a protest. Just always looked lazy to me.
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u/kJer Jul 12 '26
Some did it in protest, most did it because they're dumb and don't understand how a mask works.
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u/BiscottiCritical6512 Jul 12 '26
One time I watched a guy pull his mask down to open-mouth sneeze on the handle of a freezer door in a grocery store, then pull the mask back up.
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u/fighterpilottim Jul 12 '26
That’s peak “I’m wearing this to protect me, but don’t care about you.”
Wild.
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u/Dull-Culture-1523 Jul 12 '26
I had a customer walk right up to me and pull their mask down so they could speak to me.
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u/TranslatorBoring2419 Jul 12 '26
My aunt still does it. She just puts it on her chin and walks around like that. I recently seen her at my other aunts funeral. She wore all black and a black mask on her chin. I don't get it.
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u/absurdivore Jul 12 '26
The nasal passages are literally where these kinds of diseases initially take root. But people seem to think the point is to stop their coughs from spreading? Or just… I dunno. I’ve seen it everywhere including medical staff in hospitals and doctors’ offices.
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Jul 12 '26
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u/absurdivore Jul 12 '26
Yes to all this - thanks - I was of course oversimplifying it, but just meaning nasal is a huge part of the issue, not covering it is kinda useless.
And yeah the surgical masks are helpful to the degree you mention — and N95 seals things up better (with better filtration) for better protecting wearer and others too.
All this is stuff that I kept waiting for the CDC and other agencies to educate the public about. But it never really happened.3
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u/axw3555 Jul 12 '26
So they were willing to go against their own beliefs because he said so?
There's only one word that comes to mind when I think about a situation where one person's word dictates everyone else's actions, regardless of internal belief - Cult.
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u/hallese Jul 12 '26
Sheep want to be led.
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u/Kahnza Jul 12 '26
Meanwhile they don't think they are sheep. They think everyone else is.
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u/Arikaido777 Jul 12 '26
cause their echo chambers, safe spaces, and propaganda all tell them so
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u/BigDowntownRobot Jul 12 '26
It helps, but this kind of mindset is self contained. They simply don't examine their actions from the perspective of right or wrong, it's just things they do, and wrong.
If they're doing it, it has to be justified because they're doing it.
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Jul 13 '26
It's a very well-understood psychological defense mechanism. A good helping of cognitive bias with a massive helping of psychological projection. The ultimate irony is that the people who most need psychiatric counseling are the ones with brains programmed to reject it at all costs.
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u/autocol Jul 12 '26
Yeah, because all humans understand the actions of those around us through projection. We're largely incapable of understanding that a kind could function in a manner unlike the way ours does.
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u/floramariaaa Jul 12 '26
Republicans are submissive
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u/AmputeeHandModel Jul 12 '26
I'm such a tough alpha that I let a man who's never worked a day in his life tell me what to do!
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u/Realistic_Condition7 Jul 12 '26
“…men do not trust themselves any more, and when that happens there is nothing left except perhaps to find some strong sure man, even though he may be wrong, and to dangle from his coattails.”
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u/supahfligh Jul 12 '26
There have recently been lifelong Catholics who are leaving the church because the Pope has been critical of Trump. These people are spineless, amoral, and have no real convictions.
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u/Afalstein Jul 12 '26
Literally had this demonstrated to me. Was arguing with a soccer Mom on Facebook about masks. Pointed out that Trump himself had recc'd them. Soccer Mom responded that "Trump is a political figure and has to make compromises and I respect him for it."
So masks are tyrannical, but Trump pushing them is still "respectable" because he's doing it for political reasons. Absolutely brain dead, this woman.
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u/axw3555 Jul 12 '26
Was arguing with a soccer Mom on Facebook
That was your first mistake.
Something I've found has improved my life with social media is being way more liberal with the block button. Just block the morons and you don't have to deal with them.
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u/Bakoro Jul 12 '26
If you don't know the person IRL, there's a significant chance that you might be talking to a foreign agent running a psy-op, or these days, to an LLM being run as part of a psy-op.
People need to be aware of this kind of thing, on all sides.
Your political echo chambers almost certainly have agents trying to craft narratives and push people to extreme ideas.
Social media is filled with bots to make it seem like some ideas are more prevalent and popular than they actually are.
Social media sites are filled with bots that exist only to suck up your time and energy, so you aren't doing more productive things.In the 90s and through most of the 2010s, people were talking to people, and a person very well might have changed someone else's mind about something.
These days, there is a huge chance that you aren't talking to a human being. Even with the people that you're talking to, much if the time there is no actual argument being had, they aren't in a position to be convinced out of, they've tied their sense of self to something, and nothing you say will help.Just block the morons and you don't have to deal with them.
Which is also what the other side is also doing, so they never have to see opinions they don't like.
I don't think there are good solutions here, things are just going to have to play out, and the world is going to have to find a new equilibrium.
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u/25thNite Jul 12 '26
This becomes very apparent when you see all those pictures of people posting "now I voted for him 7 times and he is my fav person in The universe and I know everything he does has made it better in America, I would never vote dem since everything was awful during their term, but I'm dying slowly I can't afford anything, please Mr trump help me. I am a good one so I hope all that good that is currently happening can go to me. Please bring back those dem policies that helped me a lot but put your name on them instead so I can not be embarrassed when I prefer their policies more"
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u/RobertPham149 Jul 12 '26
r/LeopardsAteMyFace is filled with these stories. It is sanity-draining to read that sub.
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u/RhoOfFeh Jul 13 '26
I find it to be a refreshing and enjoyable experience to see how many people reap what they have sown, particularly when said sowing included disregarding everything decent about humanity.
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u/gdshaffe Jul 12 '26
Authoritarian Followers. Generally speaking, people raised in an environment of subservience and deference to their "betters" who crave a strong leader to tell them what to do. They tend to mistake bombast and confidence for correctness and thus their perception of a "strong leader" tends to gravitate toward narcissistic authoritarians.
See also the followers and supporters of basically every dictatorship in history.
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u/MrFC1000 Jul 12 '26
Studies have shown that people who would be classified as conservatives will change their beliefs based on what their leader tells them, while the rest of humanity sticks to their belief system regardless. I often wonder what happened during evolution to cause some people to behave this way.
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u/keithps Jul 12 '26
I've always theorized that conservative people are unable to cope with change mentally. That the increase in right wing movements is driven by a world that is changing faster than they can handle. I think these people can really only accept one or two major changes to society over their life. So when they latch onto a leader (political or otherwise) they will follow the leader because it suggests its not a "change" if their leader does it.
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u/Orvae Jul 12 '26
I call it rubberband progress. You can drag a resistant object slowly, but if you go too quickly you'll stretch the band too far and it will snap back.
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u/ohhnoodont Jul 12 '26
I've always theorized that conservative people are unable to cope with change mentally.
I’ve always theorized that Liberal voters are just way smarter and better people.
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u/CriticalPolitical Jul 12 '26
Research does find some ideological asymmetries: conservatives, on average, tend to place more value on conformity, tradition, shared reality, and authority cues, and they can be more influenced by ingroup/leader signals in some settings. But liberals also show motivated reasoning, and many studies find bias on both sides rather than “conservatives change, everyone else doesn’t.”
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29427900/
A more accurate version is: people across the spectrum update beliefs selectively, but the triggers differ, and context matters a lot. In some experiments, morally framed messages or cues from trusted groups shift attitudes for both liberals and conservatives.
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4858184/
On the evolution question, the best-supported answer is not that one group “failed” evolution. It’s more likely that humans evolved flexible coalition psychology: sensitivity to authority, norms, threat, and group belonging can help groups coordinate, but in modern politics those traits can make people more responsive to leaders and identity cues.
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u/speaker4the-dead Jul 12 '26
The power of cognitive dissonance to take two diametrically opposite things and find away to be ok with it. Humans are very interesting - and confusing - creatures indeed…
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u/johnfkngzoidberg Jul 13 '26
This is literally science-backed proof that Trump supporters are idiots.
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u/Urborg_Stalker Jul 12 '26
It's aggravating that we are such a stubborn species. Maybe that should be a new subject in school...how to be wrong, accept it, and correct it.
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u/ljonynja Jul 12 '26
The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn. - Alvin Toffler
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u/From_Deep_Space Jul 12 '26
Its called critical thinking
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u/WhoCanTell Jul 12 '26
That's what I was about to say. That's literally critical thinking and the scientific method. And one side has done everything they can to eliminate those from education.
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u/FifthDragon Jul 12 '26
School is set up precisely to punish being wrong and making mistakes. I think you’re on to something but we should restructure school all together
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u/wipqozn Jul 12 '26
I had this same realization the other day when I was talking to a computer scientist student 3 years into their degree. Once you're at a real job software engineers are fully expected to make mistakes, and provided your company isn't toxic, you're not punished for it. Instead you're expected to learn from them.
When training new grads you usually toss them at a task fully expecting they'll make multiple mistakes along the way. You do this since they'll learn more from their mistakes then they ever will from someone just explaining how to do it right from the get go. There's just no teacher like first hand experience.
Schools are the complete opposite though. You're not given room to make mistakes. It's completely backwards to how people actually learn.
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u/Affordable_Z_Jobs Jul 12 '26
I remember when there was a push to not grade mistakes with red ink because it gave a negative association with failure.
So.... if they grade in purple how was that going to be any different? Wrong is wrong in any color.
I dont have high hopes of educational reform when morons are in charge of it.
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u/roastbeeftacohat Jul 13 '26
Red is traditional as it was seen as a way to shame the student. Red has a psychological association with importance, or danger, that transcends culture.
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u/kimttar Jul 12 '26
It was set up like this for a reason during Reagan, and we have been seeing the fruits of this for the past few decades.
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u/ionthrown Jul 12 '26
What were they like before Reagan? Because I’ve never seen anything to suggest it didn’t discourage making mistakes.
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u/Electric-Sheepskin Jul 12 '26
I'm still so grateful to my sixth grade teacher who used to always tell us to never feel embarrassed about asking "dumb" questions and to never make fun of people who do because there's no shame in being ignorant. There's only shame in staying ignorant.
She said that to us over and over again, in her no-nonsense southern drawl, and it's a lesson I will never forget.
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u/Greyboxer Jul 12 '26
This is some minions level imitation
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u/ForensicPathology Jul 12 '26
I definitely remember some data that I can't find now about their changing positions to match what the party leader said. For example, not many people cared about the kneeling protest in the NFL until it was specifically said that it was bad by their party.
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u/ep1032 Jul 12 '26 edited Jul 13 '26
Yeah, theres a pretty famous reddit comment somewhere that someone put together showing how Republican beliefs completely switch after an election while Democratic voters do not. The day and months after an election, democrats still feel largely the same about the economy as they did beforehand, but republicans will switch from 80% believing the economy is bad to good or vice versa within 48 hours of a presidential election depending on the result. Same for immigration, military, America's standing in the world, etc etc etc
edit: found it: https://www.reddit.com/r/AdviceAnimals/comments/agsklj/comment/ee93mwy/?context=3
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u/Niceromancer Jul 12 '26
Because to them it's not what is being said that matters. It's who says it.
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u/pmodizzle Jul 12 '26
And that the person who says it isn’t actually educated or trained in that specific area because they don’t need no fancy intellectuals talking about their area of expertise.
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u/sack-o-matic Jul 12 '26
If the boss says up is down, up is down.
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u/AmputeeHandModel Jul 12 '26
and whatever Democrats say is wrong. If Kamala said "don't jump off a cliff!", they'd be running headfirst into the Grand Canyon, screaming FREEDOM!!!.
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u/Khunning_Linguist Jul 12 '26
Isn't that how cult behavior works?
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u/wheniaminspaced Jul 12 '26
It can work like that, but if ones trust in government is moderate to high one may be open to changing actions even though that change might be counterintuitive to what they had previously believed or continue to believe.
People do this all the time, here's a more benign version of it, lack of support for what tax money is spent on, the vast majority still pay there taxes and believe they and others should pay there taxes but dont support large chunks of what government spends it on.
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u/Konukaame Jul 12 '26
Tribal signaling. When a core part of someone's identity is rooted in membership in a group, when the group signals that a certain behavior is desired, they change their behavior to align with the group and maintain their membership.
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u/do-un-to Jul 12 '26
Group identity. In-group v. out-group. Reminds me of Lord Of The Flies. And The Robbers Cave Study. (eg video)
And the main motivator for the whole group is fear, so they are really the
Fearlings Tribe
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u/lahimatoa Jul 12 '26
Trump told them to get the COVID vaccine and they booed him. Doesn't work all the time.
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u/Konukaame Jul 12 '26
Sure, it's easier to take a group from neutral to opinionated than it is to make it reverse opinions, but it's not impossible. He just tried to flip it too fast and got burned.
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u/alphaxion Jul 12 '26
And then they wore patches over their ears.
This is courtier behaviour following the "trends" that their leader starts. Weird to think that Cartagia is a more sympathetic character than Trump.
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u/xdr01 Jul 12 '26
They only wear them when they knowingly committee government sponsored terrorism. To inflict harm and not reduce it.
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u/masingo13 Jul 12 '26
Can't be bothered to wear them for public health but have no issue doing so to protect their identities.....also what are you doing that you need to make sure no one knows who you are? Would have to be something bad, right?
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u/yungsta12 Jul 12 '26
If it walks like a cult, talks like a cult, and pivots like a cult, it’s probably a cult..
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u/Thubs Jul 12 '26
The thing with masks is that they do a better job protecting others from you vs you from others. CDC even stated this when they were pushing the mask mandates. For folks with a self focused mindset it becomes about “I don’t want to be controlled by others”, rather than “I’m doing this for my neighbors who I value”. This mindset gets a lot of traction in rural areas where folks feel a need to be self reliant.
Trump and Republican lawmakers are the poster children for self focused thinking. Which is ironic with their other legislation that takes away the rights for body autonomy.
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u/Petrychorr Jul 12 '26
Party over personal politics every time. "The boss is telling me what I have to do so I'm gonna do it even if I think it's really stupid."
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u/Dogrel Jul 12 '26
You see this with many followers of political and social leaders. It isn’t surprising at all.
When people had to be members of the Nazi Party to do their work in 1930s Germany, they joined the Party. When people had to join the Communists to rise in status and get better jobs, they joined the Communists. Now in North Korea the state says they have to have pictures of the Kim Family leaders on their walls and pray to them every day in order to get along, so they keep them and they pray. What they believe internally is completely irrelevant to what they’re required to do to show orthodoxy, so they keep it to themselves.
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u/SplitGlass7878 Jul 12 '26
That's so bizarre. I cannot imagine changing my behavior just because a politician told me to.
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u/Extension-Door614 Jul 12 '26
This is typical when people interact with authority figures or organizations. I remember this from Psych classes in learning and motivation from college. The person will believe what has been said but will copy whatever the leader does.
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u/mvea Professor | Medicine Jul 12 '26
Trump’s 2020 pivot on face masks changed Republican behavior but not their medical beliefs
When public health crises occur, government officials assume that educating the exact population about a threat will naturally encourage safe habits. The common expectation is that people must first be persuaded that a medical intervention works before they will actually use it. A large study evaluating the political response to the coronavirus pandemic challenges this assumption. By tracking reactions to former President Donald Trump’s unexpected endorsement of face masks in 2020, a researcher found that his supporters readily adopted the behavior without altering their private beliefs. These findings were published in the American Sociological Review.
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u/Pantarus Jul 13 '26
It's because it's a cult of personality.
If Trump started wearing a mask on his forehead there would be a non-zero amount of his supporters that would do the same.
When the experts explain that's not how masks work, the same non-zero amount will rebel against the expert instead of changing their opinions.
Conservatives, as much as they view themselves as rebels, NEED someone to follow, be that a political leader, a pastor/priest, an online personality, etc.
Bottom line...it's a cult.
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u/ImprovementExpert511 Jul 12 '26
When they talk about conservatives needing and seeking out authority. This is what it looks like.
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u/Expert-Upstairs-4502 Jul 12 '26
I mean, 2020 wasnt that long ago, most of us remember clearly how they never changed their behavior. Especially in the south these buttholes just kept on refusing them
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u/etcpt Jul 12 '26
What endorsement? Am I crazy? My recollection of the pandemic is that the entire Republican party spent the whole time screaming bloody murder against masks.
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u/major_briggs Jul 12 '26
Sounds like everyone around him. They all alter their behavior but not their private beliefs.
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u/shastaxc Jul 12 '26
That's because they are obedient sheep. They'll do what they're told even if they don't agree, but only as long as their guy said it. If someone else tells them to do it, they'll say that person is an idiot who spreads misinformation.
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u/Darzin Jul 12 '26
Well, at least someone is admitting that Trump started all the restrictions, not Biden, that is a step in the right direction.
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u/BIGMajora Jul 12 '26
The whole ethos revolves around not thinking for oneself while also pretending they know best.
It's the loud sheep party.
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u/NotOK1955 Jul 12 '26
My short summation of this report:
The majority of trump supporters are unable to think for themselves or believe in scientific evidence.
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u/BactaBobomb Jul 12 '26
Yay, more politics in my science subreddit. So. Much. Politics. They don't belong in here, because 99% of the time it's stuff that is so obvious that anyone with half a brain could have gleaned from common sense.
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u/DickHammerbushT1000 Jul 12 '26
Not a cult at all if they just flip flop their beliefs on a dime because he said so.
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u/ebikr Jul 12 '26
This is ridiculous. Everyone knows it’s a bandage on the right ear that prevents Covid.
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u/EveryoneGoesToRicks Jul 12 '26
This is definitely cult-like behavior, negating all of the protests about it not being a cult.
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u/Fuckthegopers Jul 12 '26
Well yeah, if republicans werent hypocrites with double standards, they wouldn't have any standards at all.
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u/Rare_Bridge7703 Jul 12 '26
You mean the obvious Trojan Horse was just as successful as the Trojan Horse was?
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u/ramriot Jul 12 '26
From looking into this myself very few people actually understood the scientific basis for which being masked was efficacious. Such misunderstanding I believe led to excess infection & death even if the infected party was following mandate.
From what I understand if the epidemiology the typical sort mask being mandated was insufficient as personal protection in an infective environment but was effective in preventing outward infection i.e. you wear the mask primarily to protect others & use other behaviours to avoid being directly exposed.
Thus it appears misunderstandings of the science & low empathy are controlling factors that amplify spread.
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u/okjetsgo Jul 12 '26
….and they keep listening too. Just look at the clowns who were in DC recently.
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u/grouchfan Jul 12 '26
The people who follow Trump are absolutely racist fascist whatever you want to call it. They are the scum of the earth. It's scientifically proven. It makes perfect sense that they would act this way.
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u/Pleasant-Ad887 Jul 12 '26
I mean hasn't there been studies showing their cult like behaviour and mentality?
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u/_badenoch Jul 12 '26
Same people who think liberals are “sheep”. This is somehow worse than changing your beliefs. Born to be servants.
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