In my experience, people don’t like to be on the wrong side of an issue. When confronted with evidence, people with reactionary ideas tend to get very angry and go bad faith. I guess that would be the cognitive dissonance playing out. I think we’ve all seen many a lib get ultra shitty when clear facts are ruining their ideology.

So here’s my history:

Around 2020ish and the protests after the George Floyd murder, many BIPOC activists were calling out the bullshit of white and/or men amongst the liberal and left crowds. For a small amount of time, maybe two months, I played around with the ideas of stupidpol and class determinism. I was probably butthurt for being silenced, which doesn’t actually really happen anyways. The funny thing was that as COVID went on, it was a masterclass in how terrible white/male progressives are. Also Hexbear became big as lockdowns happened, and my thinking has changed to “white guys fucking suck, and if a marginalised person argues with you, you’re better off just shutting the fuck up”.

I gotta go way back in time to find the previous instance. When I was maybe 13, before the internet was a thing, I just to get really damn upset at my older sister calling out her brothers’ sexism. It was a long ass time ago, but I remember feeling red hot angry at feminists. If 4chan or TikTok existed, it would probably channel me into shitty manoshpere ideals. Thankfully I was mostly occupied with WarCraft2 missions and Sim City. It’s far too long ago to remember who was right.

Unrelated to what happened in my teen years, but I’m sad to report that my sister is now an insufferable lib.

    • BeamBrain [he/him]@hexbear.net
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      22 hours ago

      Same sadness My personal journey went as follows:

      1. “Yes, it’s a mental illness, but people with mental illnesses deserve effective, compassionate care”
      2. “Oh, it turns out that research consistently shows that the only effective treatment is validation of their professed gender identity”
      3. “Also it turns out dysphoria can get really, really bad”
      4. “State-funded SRS for anyone who wants it”
      • ButtBidet [he/him]@hexbear.netOP
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        22 hours ago

        “Oh, it turns out that research consistently shows that the only effective treatment is validation of their professed gender identity”

        I’m constantly frustrated how tens of millions of people can have opinions that can be changed with a minute of Googling.