Trump Supporters: How Can We Bridge the Gap?

Philosophy Forums Society, Government, and Economics
21

I think that discussion is just walking into the cloud without a rain coat - you are just going to get wet and still not be able to see where you are.

They want and connive to get total authority - no limits at all - absolute supremacy = socialism/communism.

In a way your first question is related to your second question.

For example -
A liberal “university” rejects discussion of any good relating to conserving constitutional mandates. That is their “bubble of belief” that they support by rejecting any dissenters. That is their “ego”. And so they spread that ego by instilling the same egocentric bias against the opposition - fanaticism (people easily triggered to reject the slightest sign of the wrong narrative - the wrong belief) - ANTIFA, BLM.

A conservative “university” can’t reject discussion without destroying its own beliefs but still weights its judgements on students - degrading or rejecting those too liberal. That is their “ego” - more tolerant but still a self-sustaining bubble of belief.

The lack of free discussion without impugning the participants is what maintains the separation of those bubbles - those egos. So that becomes a “First Amendment” issue. Interestingly the first cause of division happens to be also handled by the First Amendment (no doubt without a lack of wisdom somewhere). So that largely answers your first question but perhaps not definitively.

Socialism/Communism must at all times oppress true free speech (just look at what MSM and social media are doing). They must maintain their bubble of belief - without it they collapse. That is fine unless you propose actual democracy where truth must be allowed into the population - else the authority is not distributed and there is not an actual democracy - at best merely a pretense because the people don’t know how much they are being manipulated.

But this entire post would not be allowed in one bubble yet allowed in the other - maintaining the division.

When they claim that they want to unify is one of the only times they are actually telling the truth. They want everyone to come into their bubble with no exceptions - no division - no independent thought - total unity to allow for total control and supremacy.

When the US Constitution says “God given rights” it means merely rights that are not given by man and thus cannot be taken by man - any man (or group of men). It isn’t actually a religious statement. It is more of a rejection of the authority of men. And socialists/communists cannot tolerate that.

Trump supporters are those who see that distinction and believe (with good reason) that Mr Trump is a constitutionalist and adverse to (out right belligerently opposed to) socialist supreme authority.

Anti-Trump supporters merely hate Mr Trump due to those liberal bubbles producing mindless rejection of anything outside their bubble. Most are not concerned about a constitution or not. They just hate and don’t really know why - hypnotized from they know not where or how.

So addressing the original OP -
They must either -

  • Un-hypnotize the liberals, or
  • Convince (perhaps hypnotize) the constitutionalists into thinking that totalitarianism is better for all

The hypnotize the constitutionalists thing seems to be their aim - controlling all news media, speech, and entertainment - absorb them into the bubble, into the matrix, into the Borg - or just kill them off with a virus or something.

Controlling speech is controlling belief. Americans are now NOT ALLOWED to believe that they stole the election.

From the other side, since liberal billionaires support those liberal universities, [b]Mr Trump should substantially increase government funding to free-speech universities /b - flood them with it - not to religious conservatives necessarily but to actually provable free-speech universities.

Either way takes time. And it appears there is precious little of that.

22

Here’s where the Liberal-Left-Communists should start reconciliation:

  1. Admit to domination and complete control over MainStream Media, then break the monopolies including google, facebook, youtube, and twitter. Stop the Censorship, Blacklisting, Spiking, and DOXing. You can stop silencing your opponents, and work together to reestablish Free Speech and the First Amendment. But you won’t, so it’s a moot point.

  2. Admit to Widescale Voter Fraud. Admit that the DNC largely is responsible for cheating in order to gain power and remove President Trump. Only a fair, honest, clear election is valid. Because of the above, harassment, bullying, assaults, the Communist party disallows Americans from contesting voter fraud as it has been presented. The “No Evidence” campaign goes back to step 1. the MSM must be rebuked.

  3. Assuming you follow through on #1 and #2, you must Apologize for the Burn-Loot-Murder movement. You must admit culpability and responsibility for Domestic Terrorism unleashed across the United States. You must push for DNCommunist leaders to work it back, apologize, and fix the damages. You must allocate funds to Conservative states and Republican areas.

Without these 3 conditions met, there is no moving “forward” together.

23

Realistically,

There will be no bridge. You already burned it and we will not rebuild. You have your truth; we have Our Truth.

You have been “Fact Checked”.

24

Honestly I don’t care because i am talking about you specifically

25

You have some gall to steal a US election for Presidency, which is treasonous by the way, and then talk about peace.

Why should half of this country believe anything you have to say, ever again? Answer, no reason, you’ve already exposed yourselves.

26

Half of this country is quickly waking up to the fact that US Constitution, Bill of Rights, Due Process, Free Speech, Honest Elections, etc. all mean nothing to our opposition. Because half of America is not American. They are Communists. They have no problem burning an American flag. We saw this all throughout 2020 when their Brownshirt Thugs, BLM, Antifa, did this brazenly on video, and the MSM backed them up.

27

It’s very apparent that peace and negotiation are not possible.

United States needs a Divorce, and to split the country in half.

No other solution is feasible or worth considering.

28

let me qualify this
you started a discussion about bridging the gap
with a mentality of division
you propose that the sides unite against some common enemy
in my opinion that is the wrong approach
because that is not a bridging of the gap
that is a deflection of the gap
the fact still stands that you want to rise up against someone
and i can tell you for a fact that the right and the left will never agree about who or what that someone is
and then when i pointed this out to you
once again you deflected
by saying that the other guys do it too

so my point is not even about the differences
or about politics
it’s about your way of thinking
and about the nature of discussing in good faith

you are not going to get anywhere in a discussion about bridging the gap
until you turn it backward, into yourself
it’s not going to be about who did you wrong
that you need to rise against them
and it’s not going to be about what the other guy does that is wrong
but about what you do
and taking responsibility
taking blame
acknowledging your part in the reason why things have gone wrong

once you succeed in doing that in discussion
you take that same new mindset also to your life
and reflect on what your part of the blame is
for things not being the way you want them to be
instead of deflecting it to someone else
and then you will begin to realize
that the right and the left don’t matter so much anymore
only what you do matters
only how you live

that’s what comes with freedom
responsibility for the outcome of your life
being the owner of your destiny
means you don’t get to deflect blame to someone else
this is my issue with the people on the left
not their genuine yet misguided desire to provide better conditions for the poor
but the fact that it comes from a place of bitter indignation
for having been treated unfairly
so give it a try
stop assigning blame
and take some

29

Hi phone. My last post was an attempt to get this conversation back on track, but I’ll address this now and not again; not because I wouldn’t mind discussing, but rather because your point has little to do with the conversation.

Clearly, Trump supporters perceive there is a great divide between their position and that of their opponents. Clearly, those who oppose Trump perceive there is a divide. You are claiming there is, in fact, no divide; that even the idea that there is any systemic force that keeps the poor in poverty, or the rich wealthy. You say it as if it is a novel idea, as if those who claim there are systemic factors that hobble an individual’s economic or professional mobility are blind to some more universal truth, that systems cannot produce inequities that are evident in our society today.

This is a false dichotomy. One can, in fact, take responsibility for ones’ life, as well as recognizing the systemic pressures that affect our freedoms (i.e. alcohol / marijuana prohibition). I take no issue with those who choose to live out their lives within the walls and structures erected by the society or culture one is born into: but I also recognize as essential those who point those walls out, or remove some of those hurdles to make life easier for future generations. Isaiah Berlin wrote an essay on liberty that influenced my thoughts greatly on this. I won’t expand on it more here, but you can read more about it if you’d like, I think it’s a fascinating subject:

plato.stanford.edu/entries/libe … #TwoConLib

30

Pedro, thx for your reply. I suppose there is a less abrasive way to put that, but isn’t it fair to say that you also think I have been duped in some ways? I think there is a critical difference here in what you’re saying about safe space. It’s not that I don’t want to hear other viewpoints, or create an echo-chamber; rather, I disagree with the conclusions provided to many Americans for why, it seems, quality of life has degraded over the past several decades. I am happy to listen and discuss. I wouldn’t consider that the same thing as a “safe space.”

I think there are many voters in the U.S. who have interests that align with President Trump: those who are pro-life (from an anti-abortion perspective); those who are for de-regulation, lower taxes, and essentially less red tape to generate more profits. I think (and correct me if I’m wrong here) there are a large number of Americans who believe a large contributor to disappearing opportunity and rising financial inequity relates to swaths of illegal immigrants who take low-skill or entry-level labor and eat up taxpayer dollars to educate and maintain the health of these illegal individuals. These last two are the issues I think folks like my cousin, who is not religious, and who does not believe in “trickle-down economics,” but were told by politicians that these were the reason for degradation of life in America, got wrong.

But, as I mentioned in my grand return post, I do NOT think my family are “racists” or hateful as many accuse Trump supporters of being; rather, I think they believed a false line of argumentation, one that is a distraction to avoid placing blame where it belongs. And here, I am trying to see whether that is something we can reconcile one way or another through conversation.

31

Something is wrong with my system where i don’t see the quote button, so forgive the use of the marks.

“I suppose there is a less abrasive way to put that,”

Why not skip it altogether? Watering down a dismissal, or euphimizing it, doesn’t change what it is. Doesn’t change that you are presenting yourself as the owner of truth, and this gap bridging discussion as contingent on us waking up to the reality you see.

The only real way to bridge a gap, would be to open an actual discussion, with people who have views you disagree with, yet you do not dismiss as wrong. Then points can be exchanged and compromises reached.

32

Pedro, by definition if somebody has a view I disagree with, then I believe them to be wrong, I don’t think there’s any way around that.

33

Well yes I mean, you can consider their views legitimate, them capable of having their own views without being “duped,” even if you don’t agree with them.

And I even believe that a lot of what you disagree with is not something that you have established through earnest conversation, but through derivation from strange communist theory. Like that we are all “racist.” You are ascribing that to us. Just one example. But the main point is the one above.

You seem to have a stance that precludes actual conversation.

34

I’m trying to understand the difference between what I have communicated thus far, and something like this:

So to me, the above resembles having a stance that precludes actual conversation. Is your claim here that the stance I am communicating in this thread identical to urwrong’s stance? If so, I fear it may be my communication style that is yet another divide I will need to figure out how to bridge. :frowning:

35

Well you are the one that expressed an interest in bridging the gap. Not Urwrong.

Was it genuine?

36

And the reason I ask if it was genuine is that you didn’t address any of my points.

37

“yet another divide I will need to figure out how to bridge.”

You cannot build a bridge without help from someone on the other shore. It is not up to you alone.

Do you understand this?

38

It is absolutely genuine, but again I have concerns about my communication style when that isn’t apparent.

Or perhaps you are skeptical because of the enormous amounts of hate you have inevitably already received on this forum (even though I have just returned, I can see users have been fighting like an old married couple in here).

I am interesting in bridging the gap because I think the challenges we will continue to face in America will require a concerted effort, at least by the majority of Americans, to overcome. I am interested in bridging the gap because I tire of hearing the disparaging remarks lobbed at Trump supporters (which in another sense is a way of somebody saying to me personally, chinga tu madre, or Yo Mama!, since my wonderful mother voted and supports Trump), inevitably damaging the likelihood for reconciliation or mutual understanding. It also appears to me that many on the left not only dismiss Trump supporters’ views, but then go on to conclude that if the reasons for Trump voters’ discontent is wrong, then it invalidates the angst and genuine disregard those voters feel, a legitimate complaint of neglect, even if (in my opinion) misdiagnosed.

I would hope, from an ardent Trump supporter / voter’s perspective, that my angst and discontents with various facets of the system are also genuine, even if misguided, and that compassion is the solution to such a problem, not violence.

(Edited for yomama addition.)

39

I’m hoping you aren’t correct, but I worry you are.

Selfishly, I’d rather going about my miserable existence without being forced or obligated to take up arms against anybody, much less my fellow countryman.

40

Then answer my posts when addressing me, and not Urwrong’s.