Voting booths are secret places where people can admit how they really feel without feeling judged. Trump won the popular vote because he appealed to a lot of people who didn’t wear MAGA hats, or walk around in garbage bags.
The sad thing is that this isn’t really a shock to the rest of the world. There’s a reason why, for decades, Americans going on backpacking trips have put Canadian flags on their gear.
The only saving grace here is that it might not be that most Americans are cruel, racist, sexist, classist, etc. It might just be that they’re incredibly dumb. I’ve listened to a lot of interviews of Trump supporters and the vast majority are idiots. They believe in crazy conspiracies. They say they love Trump’s policies then can’t name any of them. They can’t accept that he actually legitimately lost all his legal cases. They regurgitate things they’ve heard, but clearly haven’t even spent a second thinking about, because they go blank as soon as they’re asked to elaborate on anything.
And, if the problem is really that they’re morons, it may not be their fault. For some reason, the US obsession with free speech and free markets means that Internet companies can keep feeding people bullshit that makes them angry, which keeps them engaged, which keeps the ad dollars flowing. US TV networks can tell absurd lies under the guise of news, and they’re apparently immune from being sued for doing it. “Concerned parents” funded by lobbying groups can fuck up the education system so that kids never learn anything that might make them feel bad. The US is allowed to have a government funded state media network that delivers factual video, audio and written news and information around the world. But, most Americans have never heard of it because it’s not allowed to compete with the for-profit media in the country itself.
I dunno, maybe the world can save the US. The fact is, Europe does occasionally have strong influence in the US. Americans have to deal with cookie banners because of a GDPR law that doesn’t apply in the US. Maybe if the EU took on the US tech monopolies it would actually affect the way Americans are brainwashed. But, unfortunately, I have serious doubts about whether the US can dig itself out of the hole it’s in. Right now it looks like the hole is just getting deeper and deeper.
Voting booths are secret places where people can admit how they really feel without feeling judged. Trump won the popular vote because he appealed to a lot of people who didn’t wear MAGA hats, or walk around in garbage bags.
The sad thing is that this isn’t really a shock to the rest of the world. There’s a reason why, for decades, Americans going on backpacking trips have put Canadian flags on their gear.
The only saving grace here is that it might not be that most Americans are cruel, racist, sexist, classist, etc. It might just be that they’re incredibly dumb. I’ve listened to a lot of interviews of Trump supporters and the vast majority are idiots. They believe in crazy conspiracies. They say they love Trump’s policies then can’t name any of them. They can’t accept that he actually legitimately lost all his legal cases. They regurgitate things they’ve heard, but clearly haven’t even spent a second thinking about, because they go blank as soon as they’re asked to elaborate on anything.
And, if the problem is really that they’re morons, it may not be their fault. For some reason, the US obsession with free speech and free markets means that Internet companies can keep feeding people bullshit that makes them angry, which keeps them engaged, which keeps the ad dollars flowing. US TV networks can tell absurd lies under the guise of news, and they’re apparently immune from being sued for doing it. “Concerned parents” funded by lobbying groups can fuck up the education system so that kids never learn anything that might make them feel bad. The US is allowed to have a government funded state media network that delivers factual video, audio and written news and information around the world. But, most Americans have never heard of it because it’s not allowed to compete with the for-profit media in the country itself.
I dunno, maybe the world can save the US. The fact is, Europe does occasionally have strong influence in the US. Americans have to deal with cookie banners because of a GDPR law that doesn’t apply in the US. Maybe if the EU took on the US tech monopolies it would actually affect the way Americans are brainwashed. But, unfortunately, I have serious doubts about whether the US can dig itself out of the hole it’s in. Right now it looks like the hole is just getting deeper and deeper.