Look, I get it. After the election I felt like humanity itself had completely fucked up. For a while I honestly stopped giving a shit at all about most people, even people currently struggling, because they chose their own suffering over improving their own lives. I just checked out.
But as time has gone on, and the more and more people will come to despise Trump for the cowardly tyrant that he is, the more I realise now is not the time to hold grudges. Yes, your uncle who works at the VA who voted for Trump and is now completely distraught about losing his job might have brought it on himself, but if we can see past that momentary lapse in judgement we could also turn him into a powerful ally to take the false emperor down.
Believe it or not, but Trump still relies on his political base for support. Even dictators need to appease their loyalists. If those loyalists instead wake up to the horror they’re suffering, then that dictator’s days are number and democracy will triumph once again.
I truly believe this fight isn’t just a fight about politics or personalities, but also a fight about values. We are fighting to prove love, honesty, forgiveness and acceptance and more powerful than hatred, revenge, evil and division.
You have every right to be angry at your fellow Americans. You have every right to feel betrayed. But I urge you; if you find a former Trump supporter who now sees the guy for what he is, if you find someone who made a colossal fuckip but now genuinely wants to fix their mistakes - help them. Show them the error of their ways, and guide them to pointing out who exactly is cause for their misery. Point them in the right direction. Point them to Bernie. Point them to anyone or anything that’ll show them what’s wrong, and more importantly, how to fix it.
This isn’t a left vs right issue anymore. It’s the people vs the oligarchs. Some of us may have been duped. We fucked up. But we can fix our mistakes. Together we can turn our anger towards the enemies of democracy, and together we can win.
EDIT: To add to this, this only applies to people who genuinely regret or question their vote for Trump now, even if they haven’t fully made the leap. As some people have pointed out, there is still a LOT of genuine racists / chauvinists / white nationalists etc in his base, who’ll support him no matter what. These people are ghouls and completely irrelevant to our efforts. But honestly, these people are still a minority in American society, even to this day.
There’s enough Trump supporters out there who only voted for him because their favourite streamer told them to who are now facing the loss of their jobs who can absolutely be swayed to our cause. I’m not saying we should uniformly accept anyone who voted for Trump, that would be asinine; rather, we should use discretion and plant seeds where they can be planted. Pick your battles. See what the other person is saying. And, if the moment for it feels right, we can get them on board.
EDIT EDIT: Let’s not forget the world is still dealing with collective trauma from COVID. A lot of people are still basically in a haze from lockdowns and coronavirus. I’m still not justifying their actions, but with the amount of emotional turmoil all of us have been through it’s not surprising to think some people may have gotten caught up in the hype. In fact, I genuinely believe 2024 was just a collective trauma response to 2022/23, of which we haven’t fully recovered from.
I agree, I feel like I stand alone here a lot. All the comments I read echo something along the lines of “Nope. You voted for this, so time for you to suffer.” I will never punish someone who changes their mind when they’ve acquired new evidence or information. That is literally the one type of behavior I want to reward. Adults are no different than children or dogs, lol. What I mean by that is we respond better to positive reinforcement than being beaten for our mistakes.
Originally commented by u/Madi-tude on 2025-02-24 12:40:13mejvtvgOn board with this. If we don’t start bringing the wavering ones on with open arms, our chances of saving this democracy are seriously diminished.
I know I’m guilty of yelling at them when they express that they voted for Trump and have regrets. I’m trying to work on welcoming them first, then watching as they do the work to see if they’re actually willing to help, or if they’re just mad about what happened to THEM and not willing to pitch in to help society at large. I don’t have time for any of that.
Originally commented by u/Far_Interaction_78 on 2025-02-24 13:30:18mek6mgpI’ve given up trying to convince anyone on Reddit. As far as I can tell, the Trump supporters online are to be dismissed as bots owned by either Beltway Bandits or foreign agents, and are only worthy of downvotes.
RL people, however, I can have sympathy for them because I’ve been manipulated before and raised by parents to hate a certain political party. (When I should have been raised to hate every single political party.)
Originally commented by u/IGetGuys4URMom on 2025-02-24 12:25:29mejsnlnRelevant post currently near the top of this sub. And the video itself it’s loosely based on.
I sincerely wish everyone angry with Trump voters could watch this. It didn’t erase my anger, outrage, fear or frustration. But it DID open me up to be ready to offer empathy to a lot of voters who made their choice because THEY WERE LIED TO.
Originally commented by u/TortelliniPie on 2025-02-24 12:55:15mejz40pHis cultish base will never change. Trump could take a shit on stage, smear his face in it and his cult members will still love him. They’re totally brainwashed. It’s insane.
There are people who voted for him that are not of his cult. Lifelong “I always vote republican” people, misguided rural farmers who are already getting screwed, fiscal conservatives. I’m still angry as hell at these people but I find myself agreeing with the OP. It’s going to take a lot of us to save this country. We need to band together.
Originally commented by u/RealLuxTempo on 2025-02-24 14:48:09mekn2h4Agreed completely. I have family who voted against their best interest because of the boogeyman fox has created. I think it’s a function of algorithm feed addiction and a lack of critical thinking/context loss that fueled this fear. The more people call them a nazi and that they should die or get shot, the more we affirm that narrative for them. I am so disappointed and angry that their actions brought this upon us, but what we really need to do is unite ourselves against the 1%. They managed to take control by making us fight against each other.
Originally commented by u/Amphithere_19 on 2025-02-24 14:43:26mekm1yy
