this post was submitted on 24 Feb 2025
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Asklemmy
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I believe that the vast majority of people are inherently good, and that tribalism and political divisiveness are some of the biggest issues we have to face.
Political differences arise mostly from different values, fears, education (or lack thereof), etc, but most people if you get to know them believe what they do because they believe it is genuinely good. But increasingly politics is focused on vilifying others, instead of trying to understand each other.
How do we tackle those problems you mentioned?
The reason I ask is I support your view here, but recently I’ve been downvoted a lot for having the opinion that I don’t blame people still using Twitter as I believe, like you, that most people are good people and can be reasoned out of what we believe are the wrong beliefs and that staying in those places to converse with them is better than Twitter becoming a right wing place and us chilling here in left wing ideology but at the end of that nobody learns anything they didn’t already know.
The hardest challenge in changing someone’s beliefs is that people don’t want to admit they were wrong or lied to or used or whatever and this makes it challenging if we can’t take our ego out of the equation.
Anecdotal proof that people can change is a YouTuber called JimmyTheGiant and he has mentioned several times how he went down the alt right pipeline but started to question things and now makes left leaning content.
Genuine question, why do you need to change peoples beliefs? Idk I find that 95% of people are pleasant to talk to and share your views with if you just speak with them nicely and try to understand their POV. And that applies to people who I vehemently disagree with.
I wouldn’t say I need to, but more I would like to.
If people are voting against their own interests because they have been lied to then don’t we owe it people to try and get them to see how the world works?
If people are hating on immigrants and poor people rather than the class system that is extracting all the wealth from areas then surely having more people onside makes it easier to change the system.
I agree that most people are good people and maybe just misinformed or have had their frustrations weaponised against them.
Have you heard of Daryl Davis? Black dude who convicted KKK members to quit just by being friends with them. I think empathy might be the key, I.e. its hard to be homophobic if your friend is gay.
That's the energy I like to approach discourse with. Its harder online but it is possible.
I have heard of him actually, well I didn’t know his name but I’ve heard about him.
Exactly my point. You can’t expect people to change on their own and it’s on us to try and make the world a better place, as per our morals.
What's your political creed?
I would describe myself as fairly left, but I'm not the most educated on accurate political terminology