Good news and bad news! Notice, I want to say that I used a lot of “reactionary” starting points and immediately pivoted into the “opposite view” while masking it under class conscious ideologue. Most of this was to ascertain where he was; make sure he wasn’t extremely racist or bigoted, etc. Plan to do more critical work with him in the future
I’ve had a talk with him and actually got somewhere with it. Apparently, despite his fierce patriotic and political display; he has never voted and doesn’t plan to. His biggest issue, well, seemingly; is immigrants.
So, we had a nice talk about the reserve army of labor. He talked a lot about how they’re literally “STEELIN OUR JERBS”. At first, I brought up “Well, who hires and pays for illegal immigration?” to set up a layer of dissonance (just to wedge in somewhere, I suppose). Next, I pivoted that into “Why do we even have worry about immigrants when our corporations are the real ones hopping the border?”. (to incite that nationalistic hog and immediately spin it into talking about how corporations have free right to go wherever but people aren’t)
He brought up a lot about how “Our governor is giving free apartments, free X and X to illeeegul immigrants!!” and in response I deescalated and brought up that even if that scenario was true; billionaires and the ruling class control entire mechanisms of our economy without even putting any work into it like hard-working “illegals” do. Immigrants are the reason our economy is able to function to which I went into “Why is it that our economy is so dependent on illegal immigration, exploiting immigrants and they’re the only ones to face punishment?”
He kinda mulled it over a bit, to which I then brought up that we are responsible for the most interventions in the world. He pipped in “Well, what is China doing right now?”. I said, unlike China, our interventions have brought complete ruin and destruction on South America or the places we visit. He was actually intrigued by the amount of interventions we had; “I had no idea about that” etc etc. I pointed out that the reason we have so many asylum seekers is because we have systematically plowed over every stable governance that disagreed with ours.
Now, the bad news is that he keeps…KEEPS trying to relate Trump to everything. “Oh, Trump doesn’t want to exploit south american countries” and it feels like if I try to be like “um, actually” he’d shut down or feel threatened. So, I rolled with it and then pointed out where he DIDN’T do things and how he affected my family. Cutting food-stamps, aid, etc.
It ended pretty much with us having a beer, talking about that and while I don’t think I’ve “broken in” yet, I feel like I’ve had him internalize some alternative ideologues and that is a great, great start. I do plan to keep working on him!
Another good news is that he apparently isn’t transphobic or homophobic; which is odd given his political proclivities. One of the things we ended off with. He pretty much just said “Well, I don’t know how I’d feel if my kids went that way but I’d still love them the same. I just don’t want “them” tryna force my kids into it” to which I responded "Children are "forced “into a lot of things. It’s up to you to give them guidance and know what is best for them and let them decide on that on their own in a point of time.”
Any advice from anyone? How do I wedge further from him bringing up Trump more? It seems like I’ve gotten him to think. A lot of the times, I’ll say one thing, he’ll get agitated and say “X and X” to which I usually sort of prime it with something he relates to and then immediately spin it into a class conscious angle. I did not agree with him on a single thing in relation to his xenophobia or egg that on.
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Honestly that’s pretty exciting and I’ve never made that kinda progress with anybody! Personally, I would mix ideological progress with becoming friends outside of politics, since there was once someone very special to me whom I tried to convert, going too far without making much personal progress (also me doing some weird things I’m not too proud of), and it ended badly.
Happy to know my input helped, and happy for you for having done something good.
As for the new issues that arose, I may have a few ideas.
When it comes to Trump, I don’t think trying to change your neighbor’s mind about Trump would be productive. Instead you can dodge the issue by trying to convince him that who the president is doesn’t matter, that the power structure of a country can never be summarized to a single individual. If he’s a fan of the “deep state” theory, then could be easily convinced of this. Like last time, avoid focusing on individuals, but rather their collective behavior. For example, a capitalist is forced to follow the rules of capitalism, lest they get out-competed and/or lose their class position. Cops, officers, judges, etc fonction similarly.
As for immigrants, you could try the “let’s stop invading, couping and sanctioning third world countries” approach. If those countries were allowed to develop independently, without IMF restructuring, civil wars, and while being able to control their natural resources, immigration would basically be a non-issue (beside environment-related ones).
One last thing, maybe discussing about planned economy could be useful. You can start with things like the military-industrial complex, which he would likely agree is a massive waste of ressources and by extension lives. That approach should be particularly effective if he’s a veteran, but even a “patriotic” Trump supporter could be swayed by this. After that you can extend your reasoning to heavy industry, transport infrastructure, etc… You can try invoking China as a competitive comparison if you think that would work. Similarly for healthcare, only mention it now if he’s likely to respond positively to it.
I’m not really proficient when it comes to LGBTQ issues, so I’m afraid I can’t help you with that.
