Get over your smugness – you aren’t smarter, they aren’t dumber and doing what is best for America isn’t about crushing those who disagree with you. If you need to crush others, get that that’s about your ego and your fear. See your therapist immediately.
Recent times have shown over and over how difficult it is to have a reasonable exchange of ideas when people are impassioned or scared. We humans incrementally lose our ability to be rational as emotion creeps into our brains and effectively dumbs us down. All of us.
The 20% of Americans on the far right have made up their minds. No amount of persuasion, no list of brilliantly articulated facts and no charming approaches will be so compelling that they will change their views. And it’s exactly the same for the 20% of Americans on the far left. So, arm-twisting any of those folks is an exercise in frustration for you and it annoys everyone else.
What remains is the middle 60% of Americans. These are folks who are politically disaffected to the point that they don’t even want to look at the issues that will impact them significantly. They’re weary of being told self-serving political fantasies, they are right in thinking that the screamers never listen to them and they are sick of the political bickering and demonizing that solves nothing for Americans but instead is designed to produce power bases for bickering politicians. That is to say, elections are decided by people who don’t want to hear your political views and would rather you just went away.
So, if you want to persuade others to agree with you, start with a little humility and compassion. And your offering facts instead of fantasies would be most refreshing.
Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler
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