@hex@kolektiva.social2026-02-28 10:20:01
As salty as I am about it, there's also another way to think about this. For anyone who still has connections to folks on the right (which is perhaps unlikely for anyone on this server, I digress), the cult that has consumed them thrives on isolation and grievance.
The words "you were right" have the potential to cut through the programming and open up an opportunity for reconnection. The modern conspiratorial cult of the Right has been built partially around people who were told they were wrong or were crazy. In the vast majority of cases, they were wrong and even when they were right they completely misunderstood why, but we'll skip that for now. Liberals making fun of them (even the times when they definitely earned it) has pushed them further and further into their ideological hole.
The thing about those words, "you were right," in this context is that the way they offer reconnection also requires them to take one little step of betraying their ideology to accept them. So they must choose between maintaining allegiance to a pedophile or finally getting to feel superior after years of living in an illusion of persecution.
Under the ideology of the Right, admitting one is wrong is a weakness. It is admitting defeat. They have to "own the libs" by saying things, things that they know aren't true, in order to feel dominant. But these things are often so absurd that they end up being made fun of, feeling even more weak and pathetic, reinforcing their fear and alienation.
Offering what they're looking for can offer a way out, but only if they're willing to start to recognize the thing they've supported for what it is.
And they were right about some things. They were right that Bill Gates was a terrible person. I've had plenty of liberals defend him based on his philanthropy washing, but he's awful and always has been. The Epstein links make that blatant. They intuitively recognized him and didn't trust him, even if they were wildly off base about *how and why* he shouldn't be trusted... Even if their correct mistrust was leveraged into one of the most destructive conspiracy theories ever (vaccine denial and COVID vaccine avoidance).
They were right about Bill Clinton. He was always shady as fuck. Sure, the people who attacked him at the time turned out to be even more shady but that's not the point right now. He was connected to Epstein and that was always creepy as fuck.
And the Epstein thing was an open secret that liberals ignored for a long time. It was seen as some weird thing that right wing nutjobs believed about the Clintons. But it was true. Not all of it, and there has always been an antisemitic element to the right wing interpretation or Epstein stuff, but his whole pedophile conspiracy was always kind of real.
The whole "Illuminati"/deep state thing is a vast oversimplification, an attempt to make comprehensible an incredibly complex set of interlocking and emergent behaviors. But Epstein did very much want to remake the world, to create a new world order, and he absolutely played a part in it.
The Right wing nutjobs talked about global authoritarianism, Blackhawks flying over American cities, masked men with guns disarming and executing legal gun owners in the streets. That's all happening right now.
The "FEMA concentration camps" are not actually that far off. ICE and FEMA are sister agencies, both under DHS. I'd be more than happy to call that one "close enough" in order to hear some MAGA admit that ICE is, in fact, building concentration camps.
There was always a huge millennialist element to these things. They tended to be connected to "the antichrist." It was absurd, especially for me as someone who no longer identifies as a Christian. But I'll even acquiess that to a degree. The "the number of the Beast" is 666. That's just the sum of the Hebrew spelling of "Nero." Revelations focuses a lot on Nero coming back to life after his death. His death that involved a head wound, thus the line from Revelation 13:3:
> And I saw one of his heads as if it had been mortally wounded, and his deadly wound was healed. And all the world marveled and followed the beast.
The parallels between Trump and Nero are easy to draw, and Trump's ear wound feels pretty on-the-nose for this. I don't believe in "prophecy" in this way. I think that there are patterns, and useful patterns can become encoded in beleif systems. But I will, again, happily call this one "close enough" for anyone on that side willing to also acknowledge it. I'm happy to meet on that common ground, because anyone who accepts it must recognize that their duty is to fight against it.
A lot of these correct nuggets are embedded in a framework of religious extremism and antisemitism. The vast majority of the beliefs holding these together are wildly wrong and incredibly toxic. But by giving some room to feel validated, listened to, understood, can give some room to admit things that were wrong.
Cult de-programming starts with an opening. People have to talk through their own thoughts, hear their own inconsistencies. Guiding questions can help them untangle these things for themselves. And it all starts by having enough room to feel safe, to not feel cornered, to not feel stupid. Admitting mistakes means being vulnerable, and the MAGA cult is built on fear. It's built on exploiting vulnerability and locking it away.
De-programming takes a long time. It's not easy. It takes patience. But every person who comes out does so with a powerful perspective, a deep understanding, that can be turned back against it. The best people at getting people out of cults are former members. Some of the most dedicated antifa are former fascists who understood their mistakes and dedicate their lives to fixing them.
@barijaona@mastodon.mg2026-01-28 23:54:45
@publicvoit@graz.social2026-01-28 14:22:12
2012 kaufte ich etwas Gold. Nicht zur Spekulation sondern als langfristigen Notgroschen, weil Gold eigentlich noch nie wertlos war.
Damals sagte man mir, dass das keine gute Idee ist, weil ich damit Geld verlieren werde im Vergleich zu anderen Investitionen.
Spaßhalber habe ich mir mal meinen inflationsbereinigten(!) Gewinn ausgerechnet und kam auf 256 Prozent. Also mehr als das Zweieinhalbfache. 😎
Nun, da hab' ich nun doch recht guten Gewinn im Schließfach liegen ...<…
@heiseonline@social.heise.de2026-03-27 17:33:00
@cdarwin@c.im2026-01-28 03:57:54
A federal judge in Minnesota heard arguments Monday
in a lawsuit filed by city and state officials to halt Trump’s deployment of thousands of federal immigration agents to Minnesota.
“The federal government cannot coerce us into doing it their way,” says Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison,
who is part of the group that brought the lawsuit.
As the Trump administration continues to obstruct local investigations into the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti by …
@oekologisch_unterwegs@mastodon.online2026-03-29 12:35:13
Das #Leckerli zum Probieren:
Ein klassischer gedeckter #Apfelkuchen, der jedes Herz höher schlagen lässt. 🍏🍰
Auf einen #Mürbeteig als Basis kommt eine Füllung aus Äpfeln und
@memeorandum@universeodon.com2026-01-29 19:10:48
Libs of TikTok is doxxing teachers and nurses who support Alex Pretti or oppose ICE, trying to get them fired (Olivia Little/Media Matters for America)
https://www.mediamatters.org/libs-tiktok/libs-tiktok-doxxing-teachers-and-nurses-who-support-alex-pretti-or-oppose-ice-trying
http://www.memeorandum.com/260129/p90#a260129p90
@digitalnaiv@mastodon.social2026-03-29 09:39:49
Mein Online-Weinhändler#3: Belvini – Fundgrube, wenn ich einen bestimmten Wein suche
Nun also mein dritter Onlinehändler, den ich aus meiner Perspektive kurz vorstellen möchte. Zuvor eine kleine Bemerkung. Das hier sind rein subjektive, nach meiner Meinung getätigte Einschätzungen der entsprechenden Onlineshops. Die Bewertung der Weinauswahl ist ganz sicher subjektiv. Dazu bin ich zu wenig Experte. Auch mein Urteil über den jeweiligen Marketingansatz ist…
@kubikpixel@chaos.social2026-01-29 06:45:07
»Wie Google und Apple mit verbotenen Nackt-Apps immer noch Geld verdienen:
Grok löste mit erstellten Bikini-Bildern weltweit Entrüstung aus. Aber in den offiziellen App-Stores gibt es zahlreiche weitere Tools.«
Was mich daran nervt, ist das Google & Co. ihre Verantwortung nicht real annehmen und zu viel allas gut reden. Dies ist nicht das erste mal als sie sich bei App-Kritik sich offiziell empört und verbessert hingaben.
🤨
@cdarwin@c.im2026-01-28 01:58:31
Trump kept up his hard-edge attacks on immigrants -- lines that got the loudest cheers of the night.
At one point, he raised the specter of immigrants who may
“blow up our shopping centers, blow up our farms, kill people.”
❌He also falsely portrayed the vast majority of those detained by ICE in Minnesota and elsewhere as hardened criminals -- asserting that once those people were removed, crime would be nearly eliminated.
On Capitol Hill Tuesday, 🔥the top three House…
