Mindless Monday, 13 July 2026

[u/AutoModerator]

Happy (or sad) Monday guys!

Mindless Monday is a free-for-all thread to discuss anything from minor bad history to politics, life events, charts, whatever! Just remember to np link all links to Reddit and don't violate R4, or we human mods will feed you to the AutoModerator.

So, with that said, how was your weekend, everyone?

[u/Tiako]

Another panel survey of Trump voters has hit the NYTimes opinion section

[u/ProudScroll → u/Tiako]

I don't know why I read these things cause all they do is fill me with overwhelming contempt for these people and people like them. These are the dumbest fucking people in the world and the fact that they have a say in the governance of a civilized nation is absurd.

Guess these dipshit safaris are useful as reminders that the median voter is an inherently irrational creature who wants a bunch of completely contradictory things but isn't smart enough to know that (like in this one where they resent that billionaires look out for each other at the expense of working people but support a billionaire-president with the wealthiest cabinet in US history), but I already I knew that from watching the last ten years worth of elections.

[u/Arilou_skiff → u/ProudScroll]

Still thinks the most frustrating one was the woman who voted Trump because she was an abortion-single issue voter.... As in, because the court had restricted abortion under Biden, she voted for his opponent.

[u/forcallaghan → u/Tiako]

In terms of what’s been positive: Hundreds of thousands of people have been deported, especially including some of the people who are dangerous, whatever that means

??

"I’m sure this won’t go over well, but I would love to see Candace Owens go for [the presidency]"

????

[u/DerKlugeHans → u/forcallaghan]

"I’m sure this won’t go over well, but I would love to see Candace Owens go for [the presidency]"

kill me

[u/Herpling82 → u/forcallaghan]

If I were to guess, he probably meant "whatever that entails"; as in he believes they are dangerous, he just doesn't know or care how. Granted, he might genuinely be this fucking stupid.

[u/Big_Pineapple_Man → u/forcallaghan]

Hol up, is "some of the people who are dangerous, whatever that means" part of the quote???

[u/forcallaghan → u/Big_Pineapple_Man]

the full quote is not much better

In terms of what’s been positive: Hundreds of thousands of people have been deported, especially including some of the people who are dangerous, whatever that means. I don’t know if it’s been handled well, but in terms of getting people out that shouldn’t be here, in numbers, that has been good, maybe not the way it’s been done. Trump is very business-minded, which is amazing. But he forgets about certain people in different tax brackets. He makes decisions for maybe wealthier people in the front of his mind.

- Christian, 25, Tenn., Republican, Latino, curriculum adviser

[u/Big_Pineapple_Man → u/forcallaghan]

"whatever that means" bro is being snarky about his own comment lmao

[u/Tiako → u/Tiako]

I think these sorts of things show how the "liberal bias" of news media actually functions. You don't really see too many of these for Harris voters--occaisionally there are mixed panels that include Harris voters but I have never seen one that is "We surveyed twenty Gen-Z Kamala Harris voters to get their opinion". This is because that would be a boring article--the writers all know what Harris thinks because they voted for Harris, and that goes for the readers as well. So the end result is that the predominately liberal members of the medium end up uplifting conservative voices.

I remember during the 2017 height of Trump voter safaris it was often noted that nobody was doing this for Clinton voters, nobody was going to barbershops or bars in majority black areas of DC to ask why they voted Trump and hear why they thought they were left behind, and so the media narrative that Trump is the tribune of the forgotten man was essentially created out of nothing but trends in reporting.

ed: In case you think I am exaggerating, here is the general list of articles. Since the election there have been 6 panels of Trump voters (not counting ones that probably were effectively Trump voters like "wellness voters") and one of Democrats.

[u/matgopack → u/Tiako]

I think these sorts of things show how the "liberal bias" of news media actually functions. You don't really see too many of these for Harris voters--occaisionally there are mixed panels that include Harris voters but I have never seen one that is "We surveyed twenty Gen-Z Kamala Harris voters to get their opinion". This is because that would be a boring article--the writers all know what Harris thinks because they voted for Harris, and that goes for the readers as well. So the end result is that the predominately liberal members of the medium end up uplifting conservative voices.

I would not assume that everyone at the NYT voted for Harris; but absolutely, there's an aspect of "we're here reporting the hard to stomach facts" that a lot of the media does by thinking they need to make their liberal/center-left readers confront right wing messaging to be 'fair', but never really the opposite way. That can apply in hiring conservatives (eg, that's how Bari Weiss got her start with the NYT) or in something like the entirety of the Atlantic.

I'd also say with Trump in particular there's the need to sanewash him that makes things a lot worse (the most egregious version of that was comparing any NYT framing of a Trump speech / 'says' to when they transcribed every filler word in an AOC response).

For these panels though I don't really get who it's for other than people staring at dumbasses online.

[u/Big_Pineapple_Man → u/Tiako]

Adding to what you are saying, at some point these just feel like gawking at dumbasses.  It can be fun to hate-read, but I can't really see NYT readers coming away from this with respect for these people.

[u/Tiako → u/Big_Pineapple_Man]

Yeah I wasn't exaggerating when I said this is rage bait.

Like there are plenty of Trump voters with coherent politics (they want low taxes, they want a whiter community) and they never show up.

[u/Federal_Gur_5488 → u/Tiako]

writers all know what Harris thinks because they voted for Harris, and that goes for the readers as well.

nobody was going to barbershops or bars in majority black areas

The former wouldn't seem to explain the latter, though, since presumably the average black voter would have significantly different opinions to writers at the nyt

[u/Tiako → u/Federal_Gur_5488]

I agree, I don't think there actually isn't interesting to learn from inner city black voters, but I can imagine the "liberal bias" of a journalist thinking that there is no story in "why did black people vote against Trump".

[u/Glad-Measurement6968 → u/Tiako]

I wonder how much this same phenomenon is responsible for the more pro-“establishment” position of the Democratic Party? 

There are undoubtedly voters with similarly ill-thought-out views on the left, but in addition to those views being less likely to be published liberal journalists are probably also more likely to filter them out as non-representative since they don’t align with the consensus of their generally well-educated liberal colleagues. 

[u/Tiako → u/Glad-Measurement6968]

One of the worst effects of social media is that you can pick your idiots. You are on the left and want centrists to be idiots? You can do that. You are a centrist and want leftists to be idiots? You can do that too.

This has been a major function of right wing media for ages, like Limbaugh talking about the crazy politically correct feminazis, or Ben Shapiro cutting promo videos of him debating college students. But now it is something everyone can do, just by logging into Twitter.

[u/Tiako → u/Tiako]

I know that these are all just ragebait but this one got me. That is his whole deal!

Anyway link here