Yeah, I'm in a very blue place with very good friends and family in this bubble who never said much about the riots, and I always assumed they were perfectly aware but it was simply uncomfortable to their politics. I made the mistake of bringing this up once when one of these friends went apeshit over 1/6 and demanded I answer for my sup…
Yeah, I'm in a very blue place with very good friends and family in this bubble who never said much about the riots, and I always assumed they were perfectly aware but it was simply uncomfortable to their politics. I made the mistake of bringing this up once when one of these friends went apeshit over 1/6 and demanded I answer for my support of Trump (which they assumed and I never mentioned). I asked to know why they had never said a single solitary word about the better part of a year of riots with dozens of deaths and billions of dollars in damage and...wow. The response confirmed that we are operating in different realities.
It's super frustrating. I wasn't a Trump supporter, and the first whiff I had of Antifa was when I went to the anti-Trump rally the weekend after he was elected. There was a festive atmosphere in downtown Phoenix, basic Starbucks moms pushing strollers around. I was myself in this camp, and went with my wife and kid. But in the midst of this there was a bunch of black-clothed weirdos marching in formation with weapons, who I would later figure out were part of the local Antifa group. It was just wild to me that for months when you could go on Twitter every night and see the new videos of fires etc. from downtown Portland, and then I'd visit Facebook and see all my nice suburban associates arguing sharing memes about how Antifa doesn't exist. It has all just been very very weird.
The Andy Ngo videos were a huge red pill. Even if that's not what you're referring to, it's basically the same stuff. I'd reluctantly click over every night and just be floored by what I was seeing in Portland. I sent the link to a friend once and he tried to just send me stuff debunking Andy Ngo and accusing him of this or that. It's liked dude, I'm sending you raw video...I don't give a damn about the account. You're sending me high school snark as a rebuttal. These people won't even trust their own eyes.
Yes, I'm sure we were watching the same videos. What made me crazy was when I'd have conversations with people who would say things like, "Well, I'd rather look at NPR than just social media, because then it's gone through some level of fact-checking," but the very problem was that much of the information that was being documented every evening was not being presented in a neutral tone, and it was pretty questionable whether it was being independently checked either. I was reading Twitter, and the NPR reporters were reading Twitter, and then I was having conversations with people who just wanted to only take as fact those events that the NPR reporters had elected to pass on to their listeners.
Yep, when the gate keepers of knowledge aren't on your side it's maddening. Reality isn't that difficult to figure out if you're still sane. I recently had the insight that there are really two types of people: those with goals and those with principles. The people with principles often don't even realize they have principles or don't have them consciously in mind, but they're there regardless. Those with goals but not principles will always be "the ends justify the means" types. This seems to be an eternal war between the two cognitions. If you only have goals, there's really no level of depravity or delusion or gaslighting you won't sink to in order to achieve some end. Or maybe I'm just drinking too much gin lately.
You are absolutely right about the two different types of people. That's something I've noticed a lot more in the past few years and have been trying to figure out what differs between people and the way they act. I could never figure it out until I read this comment, thank you so much.
Really interesting comment. As someone who falls very clearly on the "having principles" side – you are right, I know I have them but often I am not even sure what they are! And, yes, you are also correct: the goal people, if they have to, will do whatever it takes however-so-necessary to "get there". I find them to be somewhat irritating yet effective in good times, and downright scary in bad times.
Yeah, I'm in a very blue place with very good friends and family in this bubble who never said much about the riots, and I always assumed they were perfectly aware but it was simply uncomfortable to their politics. I made the mistake of bringing this up once when one of these friends went apeshit over 1/6 and demanded I answer for my support of Trump (which they assumed and I never mentioned). I asked to know why they had never said a single solitary word about the better part of a year of riots with dozens of deaths and billions of dollars in damage and...wow. The response confirmed that we are operating in different realities.
It's super frustrating. I wasn't a Trump supporter, and the first whiff I had of Antifa was when I went to the anti-Trump rally the weekend after he was elected. There was a festive atmosphere in downtown Phoenix, basic Starbucks moms pushing strollers around. I was myself in this camp, and went with my wife and kid. But in the midst of this there was a bunch of black-clothed weirdos marching in formation with weapons, who I would later figure out were part of the local Antifa group. It was just wild to me that for months when you could go on Twitter every night and see the new videos of fires etc. from downtown Portland, and then I'd visit Facebook and see all my nice suburban associates arguing sharing memes about how Antifa doesn't exist. It has all just been very very weird.
The Andy Ngo videos were a huge red pill. Even if that's not what you're referring to, it's basically the same stuff. I'd reluctantly click over every night and just be floored by what I was seeing in Portland. I sent the link to a friend once and he tried to just send me stuff debunking Andy Ngo and accusing him of this or that. It's liked dude, I'm sending you raw video...I don't give a damn about the account. You're sending me high school snark as a rebuttal. These people won't even trust their own eyes.
Yes, I'm sure we were watching the same videos. What made me crazy was when I'd have conversations with people who would say things like, "Well, I'd rather look at NPR than just social media, because then it's gone through some level of fact-checking," but the very problem was that much of the information that was being documented every evening was not being presented in a neutral tone, and it was pretty questionable whether it was being independently checked either. I was reading Twitter, and the NPR reporters were reading Twitter, and then I was having conversations with people who just wanted to only take as fact those events that the NPR reporters had elected to pass on to their listeners.
Yep, when the gate keepers of knowledge aren't on your side it's maddening. Reality isn't that difficult to figure out if you're still sane. I recently had the insight that there are really two types of people: those with goals and those with principles. The people with principles often don't even realize they have principles or don't have them consciously in mind, but they're there regardless. Those with goals but not principles will always be "the ends justify the means" types. This seems to be an eternal war between the two cognitions. If you only have goals, there's really no level of depravity or delusion or gaslighting you won't sink to in order to achieve some end. Or maybe I'm just drinking too much gin lately.
You are absolutely right about the two different types of people. That's something I've noticed a lot more in the past few years and have been trying to figure out what differs between people and the way they act. I could never figure it out until I read this comment, thank you so much.
Really interesting comment. As someone who falls very clearly on the "having principles" side – you are right, I know I have them but often I am not even sure what they are! And, yes, you are also correct: the goal people, if they have to, will do whatever it takes however-so-necessary to "get there". I find them to be somewhat irritating yet effective in good times, and downright scary in bad times.