Reminds me of Ex-Christian.net and similar …
Part of me wants to dumb-shame the lot of them but as a former fundagelical I understand how alternate realities shut down rational judgment and short-circuit doubt.
Do you think these people are just excusing being assholes or should there be a dignified way to leave MAGA without a lot of performative contrition?
Personally I want MAGA gutted any which way it can be accomplished.
Identity crisis + cognitive dissonance = a real son of a bitch.
Good luck navigating out of it, ex-MAGA. A cult can hold on like a bird of prey.
Anyone who was alive in the 1980’s and yet thought Trump would be a good choice is beyond reach; imo. I can excuse/forgive young people who didn’t know who he was.
I guess my basic concern is that it’s critically important that people who are truly guilty of complicity or support of Trump must experience consequences such that they will never dare to do that again (or if they are literally beyond reach, that they will never be free to even try).
This is, for me, non-negotiable when it comes to everyone actually part of the Trump regime, especially but not only the high-level ones.
But it has to happen in some form to the rank-and-file, too.
I realize this can backfire, as happened with Germany when we overplayed the punishments / restrictions meted out after WW I. It set the stage for Hitler.
But there’s a balance to be had here someplace.
Maybe what we need to see is akin to the cultural shame that created a zero-tolerance, “never again” mentality in Germany that lasted for fully three generations. Quite probably that’s all one can hope for.
But a “nevermind, glad you saw the light” approach, IDK.
I feel that an awful lot of these folks are not “good folk” like portrayed on the linked site, but are only “seeing the light” because they voted for Trump to hurt others (“own the libs”, “destroy wokeness”, “make America a Christian nation”, get rid of “the gays”, fix the “border problem”, etc) but now it is hurting THEM.
I also feel that most of their vaunted righteousness / holiness / morality is bullshit.
I am not feeling particularly charitable toward Maga. I would like to see some accountability and plan to take it on a case by case basis of how I feel about former Trump supporters. Not a few appear to be rats fleeing a sinking ship. Some seem mad at Trump because they don’t think he went far enough to install their personal brand of bigotry or religion. I get that vibe from Tucker Carlson. I use to not take people like him seriously, but it’s clear now that the most inappropriate people can actually end up being elected President and I have a creepy feeling he’s thinking about it.
I feel no charity at all!
I blame everyone who voted for trump in the last three elections for the debacle we’re stuck in. I blame Reagan for starting this ball rolling. I blame people who did not vote for Hillary or Kamala (because any vote that went elsewhere helped trump). I blame the robber barons who paid for it all. I blame Congress for not doing a fucking thing about any of this. I blame trump’s handlers (his cabinet) for enabling him. I blame the press for being chicken shits, afraid of reporting facts because they might get spanked. I blame so many social media personalities for pushing maga as the country’s savior. I blame scotus for their refusal to adhere to the constitution. I blame lazy people for not voting. I blame the electoral college for electing trump the first time.
There are likely more. I’m profoundly angry. So. Profoundly. Angry.
Oh yeah. If we don’t do anything, then this becomes the new normal. If we extract punishment, we look vindictive. It is a Catch-22.
My policy is 40 (I just decided). If you are over 40 (as of today), you don’t get a pass for your involvement.
Under 40; if you tell me you didn’t know what you were doing; then OK. I don’t have to suspend disbelief to accept that.
These people see everything in terms of grievance and offense Trumpism is basically driven by a desire for vengeance, so I’m not concerned with how we’d look. I guarantee we will look like vindictive punishers; we are already demonized anyway. My whole childhood I was trained not to rock the boat lest we offend someone, for exactly that reason: they’re all a bunch of thin-skinned losers who think everything is about them, so they take everything personally. Without exception. So we can be relieved of that concern entirely. It isn’t relevant.
I think we just have to be clear about what they have done, what the exact harm is, and what the restitution is. It has to be driven less by a desire to “punish” than to see justice done.
We also have to be, I think, clear that we are not restoring some imagined National Greatness, but having a reckoning with what has never BEEN great about this country. Its denial of its own shadow. Its celebration of white privilege. Stuff like that.
What WOULD make this country great is the stuff these fuckers are always bellowing about: DEI, wokeness, immigrants. These aren’t dirty words. They are the way out of the thicket.
As James O’Brien would say, “compassion for the conned, contempt for the conman”… that doesn’t get the US (and the rest of the world) out of the situation we’re in right now and it certainly doesn’t address my concerns about democracy in general and how bad actors have learned to manipulate it.
UK Atheist
I think they are still suffering from the same racism, misogyny and entitled grievance they have always suffered. Just because they picked the wrong transactional prick doesn’t give them a pass on any of this.
My fear is turning them into martyrs.
Politics in America is now just performative governance. There hasn’t been a surplus of profiles in courage for most of the 250 years America has been around, and now populism and monetization of the process has polluted said process to an anoxic cesspool.
This strikes me as a support group for those experiencing ego death after attaching their toxic agenda to a con man who played them for their fear and prejudice. They all loved the transactional part when their exceptionalism was embraced at the expense of everyone else…but now that they feel the pain they want a hug and a hot chocolate.
I have two words for these people…and they’re not “let’s dance”…