I’m never happy and it didn’t turn me into a MAGA dipshit. I don’t think I’m even an asshole most of the time or at least I try not to be.
Maybe you should blame others more, especially foreigners, liberals, and education. Your problem is that you’re not blaming the right people.
I’m never happy and just blamed everyone collectively, rather than specific groups. I’ve been around humans enough to know we’re all equally awful.
That’s so weird… with some exceptions, I’ve found most people to be pretty nice and friendly once you get to know them. I would never have said “we’re all equally awful”… I think I want to keep living in my world rather than yours.
I think the larger thing lacking is two-fold.
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Perspective. These people lack the ability to look at the world objectively and outside themselves to see the larger picture of where they fit in the world. They are unable or unwilling to comprehend anything remotely complex.
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Empathy. They are unable or unwilling to walk a step let alone a mile in anyone’s shoes but their own.
On 1, someone pointed out to me that a lot of people who are susceptible to MAGA are people who don’t know what it is to be an expert on something.
They don’t have PhDs and MDs and JDs in their social or peer groups. They assume everyone’s knowledge of complex things is as superficial and uncertain as their own; literally they do not recognize the difference between things stated as fact versus things stated as opinion. Their day-to-day practice, as far as anything complex, is to let their emotions rule; practice makes perfect.
The thing they exercise most is their amygdala, and that’s why conservatism causes an enlargement of the amygdala.
Compassion is a natural result of Empathy: those who feel as if their own a bit of other people’s emotions don’t want others to be unhappy if only because that makes them feel a bit unhappy themselves.
This also applies to positive emotions, so those with higher Empathy are more likely to want others to feel good as that makes them feel good hence their notion of A Better World also includes what’s good for other people rather than purely what’s good for they themselves.
oh, number 2 is worse than you think. I picked up on a talk show on the radio the other night with a guest author who wrote, “Toxic Empathy: How Progressives Exploit Christian Compassion”. They’re actively teaching to avoid empathy,
In Toxic Empathy, Allie Beth Stuckey argues that empathy has become a tool of manipulation by left-wing activists who bully people into believing that they must adopt progressive positions to be loving. She explores the five most heated issues through which toxic empathy is deployed: abortion, gender, sexuality, immigration, and social justice.
This is what fills the airwaves around here of which a lot of elderly and rural citizens are inundated with daily.