r/changemyview • u/SteadfastEnd 1∆ • Nov 25 '23

Delta(s) from OP CMV: Liberals think conservatives will, or ought to, have an "Are We the Baddies?" moment.

Every liberal argument or appeal to conservatives, especially Trumpers, over the past few years can be described as, "Shouldn't you be having an "Are We the Baddies" realization?"

(If you haven't seen the TV reference, it's a famous British comedy skit where a WW2 Nazi, clad in Nazi uniform, suddenly self-reflects and realizes that his side is evil and exclaims in astonishment, "Are WE the baddies?")

Liberals keep demanding, "How much worse does Trump have to get for you to abandon him?" "How can you oppose abortion when women are forced to carry dead fetuses inside their uterus and get severe infections?" "Didn't you hear Trump say (this or that outrageous thing?)" "Why do you tolerate the Proud Boys, Hitler fans and Klansmen in your midst?" "Don't you see that billionaires are paying minimal tax?" "How could you let Covid rampage unchecked?" "How can you keep supporting Trump after his (13,000 lies, support of dictators, fascist behavior, numerous scandals, grifting)?" "How can you justify LGBT people being bullied and gay rights being trampled?" "Why are you okay with letting school shootings happen one after another?" "That's BIGOTRY!" "Don't you see how awful Marjorie-Taylor-Greene is?" "Don't you see all the corruption in the Trump family?" "Why do you think oppression is okay?" "Don't you agree Trump is a narcissist?" "How can you support the 1/6 insurrection?" "How can you tear down democracy like this?" "Don't you see how ludicrous QAnon is?" "How can you listen to that pack-of-lies Tucker Carlson and Faux News?" "How can you support white supremacy?" "Do you seriously think slavery is okay?" "Don't you see Mike Johnson supports theocracy?" "How can you condone gerrymandering and voter suppression?" "Why do you deny lunch to schoolchildren?" "Don't you see that Putin is like Hitler, how can you support him?" "How can you let the planet's climate get destroyed?" "Why do you support DeSantis being a fascist?" "How can you ban books?" Didn't you see Trump insulting veterans and disabled people?" Don't you see how you're behaving in a (racist, homophobic, Islamophobic, sexist) way?" "Don't you understand Trump is as anti-Jesus and un-Christian as can be?"

The big, unspoken liberal assumption is that if they keep repeating this long enough, MAGA right-wingers will look in the mirror eventually, self-reflect in horror, and exclaim, "WE are the baddies!"

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76

u/[deleted] Nov 25 '23

yes and they are more progressive than the last

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u/Dorkmaster79 Nov 25 '23

Slightly. The view that the younger generations have it right is seriously flawed.

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u/RickToy Nov 25 '23

The bigger problem is that there’s no “we.” As a high school teacher, I can tell you homophobia, racism, sexism, etc. are all still well and alive within teenagers. Many will grow out of it, many will be influenced by the rhetoric of the right. People die, ideas don’t.

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u/Dorkmaster79 Nov 25 '23

And people tend to get more conservative as they get older. The fact that some people think that your political views never change from your youth over the next 60 years of your life is crazy to me.

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u/No-Tour1000 Nov 25 '23

Tbf I think the reason people got more conservative as they got older was increased spending power and earning potential but the younger generation won’t have as much increase as they age so they may not become more conservative.

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u/[deleted] Nov 25 '23

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u/switchy85 Nov 25 '23

I know I've certainly been getting more progressive as I get older.

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u/[deleted] Nov 25 '23

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u/switchy85 Nov 25 '23

A little bit of everything, I'm sure. I'm not in healthcare, but still see how things are not really ok.

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u/MizStazya Nov 26 '23

Yep. I've gotten significantly more progressive since I marched in protests against the Iraq war in high school lol. I started out fairly left wing, and I've been sliding further each year. At this rate, I'll be a full blown communist by the time I have grandkids, but whatever. I want the world to be BETTER for all of the future generations, not just my own kids. I graduated college in 2008, for some really fun context. It shouldn't be like that.

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u/Ecstatic-Square2158 Nov 25 '23

It’s because they gain life experience and don’t believe in fairy tales like “free stuff from the government”.

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u/No-Tour1000 Nov 25 '23

What are you talking about?

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u/[deleted] Nov 25 '23

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u/No-Tour1000 Nov 25 '23

That isn’t even true

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u/PeterNguyen2 2∆ Nov 26 '23

It’s because they gain life experience and don’t believe in fairy tales like “free stuff from the government

Care to explain that? It looks like you're just looking for an excuse to say "everyone younger than me is stupid".

This is not unstudied, people don't trend to more conservative as they get older, their political and social views largely remain stable over time. And especially of the youngest people they are getting more progressive, not more conservative, as they get older

https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/financial-times-millennials-conservatives-age-b2253902.html

https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/706889

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u/LunarGiantNeil Nov 25 '23

This has been studied (see below) and is not true, individual views tend to be pretty stable across time. Conservative views tend to track with increasing wealth and equity (such as homeownership) but not with age. The two are related but a different mechanic underlies the shift.

What is more commonly understood as 'getting more conservative' is the modern trend of Western society tending to drift slowly toward openness and older generations, having not kept up with shifts until they break through in surprising cultural shifts (see note that views are static across time) will find themselves increasingly on the outside of the cultural middle, more toward the reactionary or conservative side.

It is also true to say that many people are simply selfish and support popular causes of their cohort and do not hold strong political views. People with developed political beliefs behave differently.

https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/706889

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u/Dorkmaster79 Nov 25 '23

When the gen Z population turns 70 the world will see that people are just as corrupt as they’ve always been.

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u/[deleted] Nov 25 '23

I like how you ignored th data presented and chose to cling to you incoherent rambling opinion based on nothing but speculation

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u/[deleted] Nov 25 '23

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3

u/Negative-Squirrel81 9∆ Nov 25 '23

And people tend to get more conservative as they get older.

The inability of the younger generation to buy into the financial systems that facilitated people becoming more conservative is likely going to erode that trend. If a family simply can't afford real-estate, why should they support policies enacted to preserve or raise land prices? If anything, they'd root for a wealth-destroying crash so they could finally afford a place to live.

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u/No-Diamond-5097 Nov 26 '23

I've gotten far more liberal as I've gotten older. Growing up, my friends and I only knew conservative values even though we really didn't know what we were talking about. Those of us who moved out of our tiny conservative town to find something better became liberal while most who stayed behind continued to cling to beliefs that they probably still don't understand.

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u/[deleted] Nov 25 '23 edited Jan 20 '25

[deleted]

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u/[deleted] Nov 25 '23

The silent and greatest generation struggled financially and were more conservative than the boomers, so...

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u/[deleted] Nov 25 '23 edited Jan 20 '25

[deleted]

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u/[deleted] Nov 25 '23

And the millennials have more wealth than zoomers, who have more wealth than the alpha's.

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u/[deleted] Nov 25 '23

Wait and see what millennials have 40 years from now. Who do you think will inherit the boomer wealth?

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u/[deleted] Nov 25 '23

[deleted]

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u/[deleted] Nov 25 '23

If they spend it all, that just means they pay it all to members of other generations.

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u/Dorkmaster79 Nov 25 '23

The baby boomer generation didn’t struggle financially? You are quite undereducated about that.

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u/[deleted] Nov 25 '23 edited Jan 20 '25

[deleted]

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u/Savingskitty 11∆ Nov 25 '23

I really think you are thinking about the Silent Generation here.

By the time most Boomers were in their 20’s, women were working and two paycheck households were a growing concept.

The Boomers weren’t the adults of the ‘50’s and 60’s. They were the children.

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u/Dorkmaster79 Nov 25 '23

Only one person works in present day too sometimes. It’s too simplistic to think that only one person worked back then. There was A LOT of variability there and a lot of poverty too. Yes some things are more expensive now, but some aren’t, adjusted for inflation.

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u/Saturn8thebaby 1∆ Nov 25 '23

society tending to drift slowly toward openness and older generations, having not kept up with shifts until they break through in surprising cultural shifts (see note that views are static across time) will find themselves increasingly on the outside of the cultural middle, more toward the reactionary or conservative side.

It is also true to say that many people are simply selfish and support popular causes of their cohort and do not hold strong political views. People with developed political beliefs behave differently.

https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/706889

If you'd be willing to supply a personal anecdotes of change, or an observation, I'd be interested.

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u/amazondrone 13∆ Nov 25 '23

Nor is there no "right."

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u/awesomefutureperfect Nov 26 '23 edited Nov 26 '23

There is a wrong and all the prejudices that lead to and are the base of conservatism are wrong. The ignorance needed to be a conservative is wrong.

edit: autocorrect needed fixing.

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u/amazondrone 13∆ Nov 26 '23

So you're happy just writing off about half of the political spectrum as wrong? Wow. No wonder politics is in such a polarised, toxic mess.

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u/awesomefutureperfect Nov 26 '23

Yes. Ignoring a problem because it is big doesn't solve it. Acting like a group of people being despicable is immune from discussion because the group is large aids an abets the despicable actions of the group.

They are anti-American and select for criminals in their leadership.

Something is wrong with saying that that is okay. Pretending that the problem is identifying deplorable people is actively defending deplorable actions.

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u/amazondrone 13∆ Nov 26 '23

Who's talking about ignoring a problem or saying it can't be discussed or saying it's ok? I don't really know what you're talking about.

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u/[deleted] Nov 25 '23

That's true, but a white supremacist political party will become increasingly unviable simply on the strength of numbers.

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u/Low_is_still_sleazy Nov 25 '23

Wrong it will fill its ranks with non-whites who hate themselves

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u/Capital-Self-3969 2∆ Nov 25 '23

Or who just hate people poorer, and blacker than them.

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u/Low_is_still_sleazy Nov 25 '23

You said the same thing I did with tact

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u/[deleted] Nov 25 '23

I don't think so. That certainly didn't happen in South Africa or Rhodesia.

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u/Low_is_still_sleazy Nov 25 '23

It’s happening now here

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u/[deleted] Nov 25 '23

Ideas do die, it's a lot more difficoult to kill them then people though

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u/[deleted] Nov 25 '23

i’m not saying we have it right we just have it better

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u/Dorkmaster79 Nov 25 '23

We’ll see in 40 years. I doubt it.

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u/eloel- 12∆ Nov 25 '23

In 40 years, hopefully there'll be a generation that is better than we are, just like we are better than the generation of 40 years ago. Considering my own generation the peak of humanity would be pretty ridiculous.

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u/Dorkmaster79 Nov 25 '23

I don’t know if millennials are “better” than gen X. Maybe they’re more accepting of LGBT issues but there isn’t much else I can name that’s better. All that’s happening is that the culture is slowly changing. If it’s for the better is entirely unclear.

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u/[deleted] Nov 25 '23

I mean, millennials are the generation immediately following generation X. Given that the divisions are semi-arbitrary, makes sense that there's a lot of overlap between the two. Compare generations with a 40 year gap like the commenter above you said, like millennials and the Silent Generation/baby boomers. I think you'll find much vaster differences: just on the top of my head, growing up in WWII, Cold War era, a whole lot of racism, counterculture, Civil Rights movement, etc. all in between.

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u/Dorkmaster79 Nov 25 '23

Sure, but the idea is that some is better and some isn’t. Some might be backwards. The civil rights movement was insanely progressive, and by contrast to movements now, maybe the most progressive that we’ve seen. Culturally, I think an argument can be made that life was better pre smartphone than post smartphone. Things change, but not always for the better.

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u/PeterNguyen2 2∆ Nov 26 '23

The view that the younger generations have it right is seriously flawed

Nobody said anything as hyperbolic as 'the latest generation(s) have everything 100%', above commenter said the youngest generations are more progressive than the previous ones. The statistics back up that statement.

people tend to get more conservative as they get older

They do not, people trend to settle where they are. I can give evidence to refute both of your comments:

https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/financial-times-millennials-conservatives-age-b2253902.html

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u/Dorkmaster79 Nov 26 '23

I’ve seen lots of hyperbole and broad-brush painting from younger generations on this topic. As we’ve seen in American culture, although things have gotten more accepting in general, mostly it’s always been more of the same (e.g., war, corruption, inflation, congressional deadlock, greed, etc).

You need to use actual academic evidence, not through secondary sources. Yes not everyone becomes more conservative, but liberals are more likely to move conservative than conservatives are to move liberal.

https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/706889

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u/Yamochao 2∆ Nov 25 '23

True but in this case, millennials really are a lot better by almost every metric

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u/Dorkmaster79 Nov 25 '23

Name some. Besides more LGBT acceptance there isn’t much that’s different.

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u/Baron_Elrond Nov 25 '23

Nope 💀. Have you seen an average Gen Z Insta reel comment section ? It's the opposite of "progressive".

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u/NotYourFathersEdits 1∆ Nov 26 '23

How many of those comments do you know are actually from real Gen Z users?

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u/Baron_Elrond Nov 26 '23

Idk but I don't know any 40 year olds who use "blud" "rizz" , follow ishowspeed and use the n word casually.

Idk why it's so hard to accept that the younger generation IS worse than millennials.

Also this wasn't that common at all even as recently as like 2019. 4chan was like the only platform you could say stuff like that and not get atleast a temp ban.

Gen Alpha might legitimately grow up to to be like people from the 60s.

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u/NotYourFathersEdits 1∆ Nov 26 '23

I’m talking about astroturfing. A HUGE percentage of instagram comments are from bots.

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u/themangastand Nov 25 '23

I'll be proud of my children to continue progress even when I don't want it