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At the risk of tone policing, while I sympathize with the desire to treat MAGAts the way they've treated anyone outside the cult, this is a bad and self-destructive attitude
A thread. https://twitter.com/cenkuygur/status/1337822602874667008
A thread. https://twitter.com/cenkuygur/status/1337822602874667008
I want to be clear that I am NOT saying "we should take the high road because it will change minds". It probably won't.
I'm also NOT saying "we should take the high road because we have an obligation to be better than them". Fuck that noise.
I'm also NOT saying "we should take the high road because we have an obligation to be better than them". Fuck that noise.
The reason I think "om nom nom MAGA tears" is destructive is because it frames this as a matter of political valence - "us vs. them".
What's actually happening is WAAAAY more serious than that and we should treat it that way.
What's actually happening is WAAAAY more serious than that and we should treat it that way.
MAGA is not just matter of opinion where some people can reasonably disagree. MAGA is a supremacist ideology. It is ALL about boiling the world down into two groups and then doing whatever you can to inflict pain on the other group.
"MAGA tears" accedes their central belief: that all this is nothing more than contest about WHICH group holds supremacy, disguised in the LANGUAGE of principle and virtue for appearances sake.
But what is happening right now is not "red vs blue", it's "government by consent vs might makes right". MAGA is about throwing out the concept of representative government in favour of a government that rules by force.
The response to that must be consistent and it must be serious: MAGA is evil, MAGA is unjust, MAGA is an existential threat to not only America but the very concept of democracy.
So yes, while it absolutely rules that people following an evil ideology are angry because their attempts to destroy the world are failing, that is not and cannot be the 'win condition' of the fight.
The win condition is that evil is losing. That's the focus.
The win condition is that evil is losing. That's the focus.
When we allow ourselves to see this fight in their terms, we stray from that focus and enter their territory of grievance-based belligerence.
Ignore their feelings. Concentrate on making sure they lose again and again and again. Celebrate their losses, not their tears.
Ignore their feelings. Concentrate on making sure they lose again and again and again. Celebrate their losses, not their tears.
