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  • 92% thought Trump won, 4 % Harris and 4% unsure.

    Time and time again it appears the Trump cult members can’t accept reality at all.

    The web is full of videos titled "Trump/Peterson/Shapiro/Asshole-of-choice destroys woke libtard". Watch them and you see said "destroyer" actually embarrassing themselves with their argument and behaviour. A significant chunk of humanity has no idea how to construct a logical argument or even listen to one, seeing debate as a cage fight, not a discussion.

    One of the more frustrating aspects of trying to talk to somebody like that is trying to do reasonable things like establishing common ground, only to see the sheer confusion on their face. They're wondering what kind of point you're trying to score, when that's the opposite of what you're trying to do.

  • You're right, but the loss of the ability to discuss things across an ideological divide is not restricted to the alt-right (although that type of "X destroys libtard" video does seem to be). We seem to have to have lost sight of the fact that point of a discussion is to uncover truth and convince other people. That requires actually putting yourself in other people's shoes and recognising that "Reasonable people with good intentions can still disagree over matters of substance." There's no point in just restating arguments that are perfectly logical but that only hold if you already have the worldview that you already have.

  • In theory this is great, but when one side is out and out lying: intelligent design, climate science isn’t true, WMDs in Iraq, Covid is a hoax, performative cruelty to vulnerable people will fix society…discussion as if the other side has a point is conceding and validation of fantasy

  • You're right, but the loss of the ability to discuss things across an ideological divide is not restricted to the alt-right

    True, and I wasn't saying so either, just using examples relevant to the context. There are plenty of people out there who share some of my views (just not on intellectual debate) who I'd hate to have arguing a case I agree with.

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