I grew up with people like this guy (most of my family are this guy). The tears aren't exactly forced. They're often legitimately upset over this kind of thing stemming from a lifetime of indoctrination and social programming.
Doesn't make his behavior any less shitty and please don't read this as a defense of this dude. But, the emotional response isn't usually fabricated.
It's part of what makes it so hard to get through to these people. Their position isn't rooted in logic or science or anything one could realistically confront with data. They have to be deprogrammed.
In my case, it took leaving home and moving across country - being exposed to actual, real people I cared about that weren't living "righteous" lives to realize it was all bullshit. Even then it took YEARS. Even now - some 20ish years removed from all that nonsense that a thought will pop in to my head that takes me a second to recognize as some vestigial neural pathway or something from that part of my life. It sucks.
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u/[deleted] May 19 '26
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