It doesn't sound like he found morals. It sounds like he really realizes his heads on the chopping block and now he's scared. He was really never your friend that you were always.

I have a coworker like this....except he has gone more liberal.  Believes all the lies about Trump, giving away foreign secrets and will end up in prison.  I guess the only fortunate thing is he also believes our Gov is corrupt.....plans to retire outside the US for socialized healthcare which he STRONGLY believes in.

Strange thing is his oldest daughter is now a doctor, recently finished all her residency stuff and got a contract for over 300k a year and pretty sure sizable increases after that.  He bitches about how much her student loans cost and all that went along with it.  Thinks college should be free.  I really wonder when she gets taxed the fuck out of if she will agree with the socialized world he wants.  If the gov took over healthcare she would be making way less and we would all be taxed way more.  The gov fucks up everything it touches.  If she doesn't spend like a fool she can have her stuff paid off in probably 5 to 7 years and still bring home more than your average family.

Politically we are total opposites and unfortunately his journey in the liberal community started after 2012.  When we first started working he was "normal."  His wife changed his beliefs.  I don't bring up politics but some days he can't help himself and will ask how the hell I could vote for Trump.  I normally just ignore it but last time I told him that option was the least corrupt choice on the ballot....he got in his work vehicle and left.  He hasn't asked me since.

Oh

And you jumped straight to death camps.

You do know this isn’t a binary thing right?   Democrats and republicans.  We never will be one monolithic people,..

I only gave the facts I know about the cult his friend was in, and my opinion on welcoming him into my trust.

I know things are gonna get bad, how it gets fixed and the end result is one question I can’t answer.   Do commies win?  Do traditional Americans win?
Is there fighting?  Is there  just a slow transition to one or the other?

Who knows, but anyone who  has supported the democrats like that guy has gets what he gets.  Anyone to sacrifice their kids on the altar of progress is not someone I’m gonna trust.

I've been reading correia off and on and holt and some others who comment about the rot in the head in the sci fi writers circles for years now. At  least since sad puppies. Something is extremely rotten in denmark.

and you're burying your head in the sand by glossing over it.

It's good that your buddy has become aware about the reality of things.

On a side note, what authors/books were you recommending to him?

Same.  I walked out of college in to the real world, no job waiting for me, not high pay out there for me to join into.  My views changed then and there.  I started paying attention to what the systems that were put in place to "help" people actually did, and it just helped me understand the reality I found myself in even more.

Why bother to argue your side at all if you won’t accept  the people whose minds you change?

I did, because this started with you saying these people are beyond forgiveness.  Everybody wants genocide until it's time to do genocide things.

Oh yeah, sure man.  I should be screaming and crying and telling everyone within earshot that there's no hope and they shouldn't bother to vote.  THAT will accomplish so fucking much...

Blackpill is by definition false in that it expressly teaches that nothing good ever happens or can happen in the future.

It often masquerades as redpill.

You are about the last poster who should be on this topic ...

You're the only one suggesting genocide.

Projection.

I'm suggesting that larping about being a cul de sac resistance fighter is ridiculous.

Well, this thread is off the rails.  Lots of you seem to know my friend’s heart way better than I do.  What you’re really doing is questioning my understanding of the situation, as if I am not the one who’s been watching him grow for years. You are attacking ME, not him. I don’t appreciate it.

Some of you are very unhappy people, whose rigid black and white world view will keep you lonely in your old age.

Keep in mind my choices have had to be subtle, because I was trying to set the hook gently and start to reel him in. one author I recommended is Christopher Rufo.  Allan Bloom’s The Closing of the American Mind is essential. The Queering of the American Child, The Parasitic Mind by Gad Saad

He recommended Woke Racism by John McWhorter to me.  When I read that, I could see he was doing a lot of soul searching.  


He’s a very educated and genuinely smart guy, if not the wisest, and I have always tried to appeal to reason with him.  If what I’m seeing now is a product of his reasoning, he won’t be backsliding, because that would betray who he believes himself to be, which is a man who can learn.  IMHO he has.

I doubt he’ll find the strength to vote for Trump.

I do too. I encouraged him to vote for Kennedy, as he will be on the ballot here, and let's face it, this is Utah.

I know for a fact he's not voting Harris. He called her a "Trojan Horse."

What I found out last night was the degree to which he's become red pilled. I think he's been hiding it from me for fear I was gonna rub it in his face, or say I told you so. Nothing could be further from the truth. Now I just want to talk with him more. I think it's still wise to take it slow, and let him feel out the situation. I'm eager to hear what he says about Kennedy's speech.

I will say this, I think if there's one issue that for him besides man-hating, that flat out pushed him over the edge it's the trans issue. He said to me last night: "They're asking me to ignore reality, and I'm done doing it." I was literally speechless for a minute after he said that.

Regardless of the unbridled cynicism here on good ole arfcom, this is a rare bit of great and welcome news for me in what has otherwise been a shitty summer.

Let us know if you are looking for decent content on anything to pass along and you've come up dry.

Man-hating got his goat and yet ,,still don't like Trump .no particular reason mentioned.

ok

Never intended to argue

Just noted my opinion , and some logic

I really don’t care what he does

Starts with socialism here in the last couple hundred years( what his friend supported)

Then gun confiscation (what his friends old friends supported)

I have said neither

Demonize one side(another democrat play)

I’ve said neither

I’ll tell you if I want them dead, they sure have wanted the other party dead though

So have fun thinking I want genocide(which wiping out the other political party wouldn’t be since they aren’t a race or an ethnicity)

And catchy

Everybody wants genocide until it's time to do genocide things.

Sounds funny when said like that

Vote harder then

Both of my SILs were raving lefties. One started changing about 5-6 years ago, and has gone from a looney New Yorker to a right-winger raising chickens on an acreage in Tennessee. The other has been slower to come around, but 2020 and everything since has started to open her eyes.

I’m a larper for telling someone not to trust a hard  left democrat?  Cause I won’t forgive the people that want me dead
Eat shit dude

From death canp maker to larper in an cul de sac

What are u smoking?

We’ll take all we can get. If my commie daughter turned around, my jaw would be on the floor. I don’t see that happening. The hate is strong in that one. 🙁

It’s ok,  if you change your mind and agree with me on things, I’ll accept you.

But you’re right, I don’t argue much, because I find it pointless.  Most people aren’t really very open to learning.  Case in point.

Give up harder.  I'm sure that'll work.

He finally recovered from that week at Band Camp

They’re none so blind as those that cannot see.

If you are young, and not liberal, you have no heart.

If you are old, and not conservative, you have no brain.

On videos, I've seen North Korean escapees, who usually inched out at immediate threat to life, still regard the Kims as parental figures. In my readings of Solzhenitsyn, he recalls many sentenced to slow-die in gulags who still thought of Stalin as a sort of god. (They often mumbled about their sentence just being a big mistake and if Uncle Joe knew, he'd pluck them right out)

Those are examples of how deeply ingrained self denial can be with the thoroughly indoctrinated.

Arguing on the internet is stupid
I did learn this on here a while ago
Last time I’ll comment on someone doing something stupid

You still have hope
Good luck with that

As opposed to what?  Not voting?  Telling all my acquaintances not to vote?  
Good luck with that.  It's a self-fulfilling prophecy.

I agree with you.  Ive never seen anyone on arfcom (the only social media I have) change their mind.  People mostly like to hear themselves talk.  They justify it as “I’m not doing it change the mind of the person I’m arguing with, but rather the silent readers”.  Hint:  the silent readers aren’t changing their minds either.  They’re just laughing at the two dumbasses wasting their time arguing.

Where did ops friend “ denounce “ his previous, die hard lefty beliefs as “ wrong “ ? Because I didn’t see that. I saw ops friend upset / mad that his lefty beliefs were not going the way he thought they should, not that he thought they were “ wrong “ in general, just a item or two he didn’t agree with anymore now that it wasn’t working out like he expected.



( For the record, I hope ops friend eventually becomes a red white and blue, flag waving, patriotic, red blooded conservative. )

That old WW2 line:

"First, they came for the Jews and i said nothing. Then they came for the...."

Over 70 % of American either eagerly  jumped in line to volunteer for rushed, unvetted, experimental medical products or were reluctantly coerced into lining up with arm out. A good portion of those were militant about everyone being injected. Even to the point of having the reluctants jailed or even murdered.

Smoke on that in the event of even more dire control pressures were applied.

The best meme i saw covering this during the Covid disruptions read:

"If you ever wondered which side you would have been on in late 1930's Germany, well, now you know."

He just shared this with me.

I gotta go give him a hug.

One of my best friends since childhood was Democrat/Liberal for years.. even helped the Obama campaign in NV. Flash forward and he's red pilled and voting Republican. 2020 was an awakening for many intelligent, logic driven people on the left.

This sounds like your friend too. Give it time, you don't need to do anything because he's been connecting the dots on his own.

I said that because of how people react to your posts where you use language like a relativist. That stuff (rightly) drives people away.

There were people who still believed in the personality cult of stalin after the wall fell.

Some never ever get out of that stuff.

Yeah, I've heard that part where Solzhenitsyn talks about how pointless it was to argue with the true believers in the camps and prisons.

People who roll over when things are easy and no to low cost ...

...

Well, things have a habit of getting to be higher cost.

There ... that's the way.

I don’t mind.  I’m not going to pretend to believe things I don’t to make friends online.  

I know it’s hard for you to accept, but I do genuinely believe in relativism to a degree.  

Perhaps I’m not a true relativist, but I find that many paths lead to the same destination.  Since I’m mostly guided by libertarian ideals, I have a problem when the left and the right try to force people  (often through actual force) down a single set path.  

What you perceive as relativism may be “leave people alone, they will get there on their own, even if by taking a different path than you might”.  To the extent there are universal truths, they are reached through all directions.

OP’s friend is an example.  He seems to have been redpilled, even if through a much longer and very different path than most on here.

A lot of older people, who were democrats or independents have really seen the light in the last few weeks.  The words of RFK have struck home with many

I think this may be a significant moment in US politics, more so than many realise right now, Robert F Kennedy August, 2024 - never truer words - "As you know, I left that party in October because it had departed so dramatically from the core values that I grew up with. It had become the party of war, censorship, corruption, big pharma, big tech, big AG, and big money. "  

"When it abandoned democracy by canceling the primary to conceal the cognitive decline of the sitting president, I left the party to run as an independent. The mainstream of American politics and journalism derided my decision."

"In an honest system I believe that I would have won the election. In the system that my father and uncle thrived in. A system with open debates, with fair primaries and with a truly independent media untainted by government propaganda and censorship, and a system of nonpartisan courts, and election boards, everything would be different."

"In the name of saving democracy, a Democratic Party set itself to dismantle it."

"My uncle and my father both relished debate. They prided themselves on their capacity to go toe to toe with any opponent in a battle of ideas. They would be astonished to learn of a Democratic Party presidential nominee who, like Vice President Harris, has not appeared in a single interview or an unscripted encounter with voters for 35 days. This is profoundly undemocratic."

"What alarms me is the resort to censorship, media control, and weaponization of the federal agencies. When a U.S. president colludes with, or outright coerces, media companies to censor political speech, it’s an attack on our most sacred right of free expression. And that’s the very right upon which all of our other constitutional rights rest. "

"But we are aligned with each other on other key issues, like ending of forever wars, ending the childhood disease epidemics, securing the border, protecting freedom of speech, unraveling the corporate capture of our regulatory agencies, and getting the U.S. intelligence agencies out of the business of propagandizing and censoring and surveilling Americans and interfering with our elections. Following my first discussion with President Trump, I tried unsuccessfully to open similar discussions with Vice President Harris. Vice President Harris declined to meet or even to speak with me."  

This is leadership.  This is someone knowingly sacrificing himself for the greater good.  I suspect this will resonate with many older Americans, who still believe in a United States, one people, united under one flag.

I like a lot of what he says, and really want to like him.  

He may actually be the best of the lot, setting aside some of his wackadoodle conspiracy theories.  Not that it matters, he won’t be elected.

Sounds like me twenty years ago. Good for him.

Oh look, another one.  "Don't bother voting, we've already lost, the fix is in."

I've always considered him a fringe player with a chequered past - but that speech was excellent, on point, accurate and it will come at a terrible cost for him personally.  That came from somewhere deep within him and I think it will resonate with a lot of people.  Every Democrat should read it and then hang their heads in shame at the destruction they have caused.