Writes John Della Volpe, in "What Democrats Can Learn From Charlie Kirk" (NYT).
"Republicans meet young men where they already spend their time; Democrats, more often, expect them to show up in formal political spaces that feel staged.... Young men... see Republicans as confident and direct, Democrats as scripted and afraid to offend. Mr. Kirk capitalized on that contrast by showing up on left-leaning campuses, taking tough questions and engaging head-on... ... Democratic politics should be made to feel organic in gaming, fitness and entrepreneurship communities.... Democrats must appear regularly on conservative podcasts and college campuses without scripts.... Democrats need to form more spaces for discussing masculinity and purpose without ideological judgment...."
I suspect that Democrat Party stalwarts can't do what Della Volpe advises because to adopt the Charlie Kirk mode of connecting and communicating would entail an overhaul of their message. I'm thinking: The Medium Is the Message.
Don't Democrats see the Charlie Kirk approach as lacking in empathy and intersectionality? To them, it's a white male doing a domination routine. Of course, you can argue that's not a fair description of Charlie. But they can't. Not without a radical transformation.
I'd like to see them try. Let them adopt Charlie's methodology and go out into crowds of young people who loathe them. Show complete respect and calm composure and go back and forth, seeking understanding and common ground before offering the Democratic Party viewpoint. Let those young people argue their own side in their own way and still patiently engage. Show love for them as human beings the entire time, regardless of whatever awfulness they display . Be rational and use words no matter how irrational and abusive they become.
Can Democratic Party speakers do that? Wouldn't it be weird?!
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94 comments:
"Can Democratic Party speakers do that?"
Nope. Not anymore.
The democrats need to return to the Clinton/JFK model of the party. The real problem for them is that the radical left has taken over the party and the true liberals like Trump and Gabbard and RFK are republicans now.
They will never be able to honestly debate until they have a platform they can own and principles they can defend.
Curious George beat me to it . And this by Althouse explains why :"Don't Democrats see the Charlie Kirk approach as lacking in empathy and intersectionality? To them, it's a white male doing a domination routine. Of course, you can argue that's not a fair description of Charlie. But they can't. Not without a radical transformation." It's early, but as yet there aren't any signs of the transformation. I saw a pull quote from an Ezra Klein piece that hints at it. Let's see if his words have any impact. I suspect they will only lead to denunciations and attempts to purge him.
Luckily they don’t have a chance of doing any of that, in their view there are not two worthy sides of issues, there is the right side of history and fascists.
That question-whether Democrats can do that--is like asking if a camel can pass through the eye of a needle. Not in this political universe at any rate. Dims will keep flogging young men until their morale improves.
"...New polling shows that young men, many of whom helped elect Donald Trump in 2024, are drifting away from the president. ..."
Hmm. So - the 'young men' that helped elect Donald Trump are moving away from him, but at the same time, they're gravitating to Charlie Kirk's conservative message, something the Progressive Democrats should harness.
Color me skeptical when the 'doesn't add up' logic is supported by 'new polling indicates'.
They can't do it because their ideology is indefensible. They need the support of gate keepers to push their message.
The Left - especially their political leaders and spokesholes - are hobbled by their fundamental stupidity. And at this point in time, that’s a very good thing.
2+ 2=5
It is interesting to watch people like AOC get rich and powerful by fooling their idiot followers.
Democratic politics should be made to feel organic
And there you have the Democratic problem, "feels organic" is not "is organic", Beyond Beef isn't beef. Astro Turf isn't grass, top down isn't bottom up.
no its evil, its a question of spiritual warfare, why we find it hard to fit it in the political frame, 17 years ago, there was a similar phenomenon, most of the same tired political class effectively drove out of politics,
Achilles said... true liberals like Trump and Gabbard and RFK are republicans now
Sad, but true. If you want to call yourself a liberal, you must first abandon all liberal principles. If you hold liberal principles, you vote Republican.
I saw a few videos on youtube where someone would go to MAGA event posing as a leftist and get treated respectfully and the people there would try to reason with them. They would then go to a leftist event posing as a Trump supporter where they would get screamed at and be vilified with no attempt to engage whatsoever.
And then there are the videos of left wing protests where they outright try to intimidate anyone who is filming them. Anybody remember professor "We needs some muscle here!"
So no, they can't do that.
This is so absurd. The Democrats aka the liberal/left democrats love massive immigration, open borders, affirmative action, and BLM/Antifa. They've made white men (Jews excepted) the No. 1 villian in society and have been doing everything to screw them over for 30 years.
The amazing thing isn't that they've lost "Young men", its that any young man would vote for them.
No. That's foolish advice. Democrats aren't going to be able to win over young white men as a group. The party's base will object to that and the YWMs will realize that they are being used.
What will happen -- what usually does happen -- is that something goes wrong with the economy, and the Democrats trot out their new messiah figure. If everyone is hurting, or convinced that they are hurting, the Democrat will win.
So long as the Democrats are all about advantaging certain groups at the expense of others, the latter group aren't going to follow them. Right now there's a cynicism about government. Remember Harris's talk about making home ownership easier. Everybody recognized that it was all a boondoggle to benefit the donor groups and that nothing was going to come from it.
The turning point for the Democrats will come, when cynicism about Republicans is greater than the cynicism about government and politics in general.
"So no, they can't do that."
And why should they? They are as convinced of their moral superiority as any fanatic throughout history. People like Charlie Kirk are preventing the creation of an earthly utopia.
As a life-long Democrat who hasn't voted for a Democrat since college, I despise the D's for harvesting votes by claiming the nation is irredeemably racist and rigged against minorities. Theirs is a philosophy of defeatism - why try when 'they' won't let you win. Here, get on the bus - we'll drive you.
"...Democratic politics should be made to feel organic..."
But they are already organic dahling, through and through, organic, pre-digested and fresh from the cow, or the bull, or whatever gender of bovid ungulates your little Progressive heart desires. Have another handful: Doesn't it feel and taste organic?
They can’t do that they would need all new ideas and all new people. Besides we see what happens when they try- we get word salad.
It's said millions of times
So what's one million more
Maybe help from some rhymes
Will remind from before
Millions of men alienated
Isn't rainy or stormy
Advisedly contemplated
Because they're a fucking army
As long as they continue to believe in intersectionalism they will be stuck because they are forced to focus on who is speaking and not the what. Anyone not obeying the party line can be dismissed simply because of who they are. David Hogg got a good lesson in that.
White men are at the top of the ignore list. If you are not that then it only takes a small amount of sophistry to find a reason to dismiss you.
"Democratic politics should be made to feel organic in gaming, fitness and entrepreneurship communities...."
This is an interesting quote. I'm not a gamer myself, but I have been following news about it since Gamergate. There is an active attempt going on to make games more "inclusive." Meaning, in reality, unappealing to men. Female characters are made unattractive, woke lectures on correct feelings and behavior are everywhere, transgender characters are inserted.
As for fitness, apparently going to the gym and not being fat are now far-right behaviors. Also, its seems to be pretty common for young women to go to gyms, try to catch men looking at them, or for that matter glancing at them while waiting for a machine, and denounce them online as creeps and stalkers.
The regression analysis of data collected from dozens of focus groups show speaking from the heart has the highest correlation to high Q score. Our Monte Carlo simulations reveal the optimal strategy for Democrats is trying to fake sincerity.
It's interesting, in this context, to unpack the "bitter clingers" quote:
"You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them. And they fell through the Clinton administration, and the Bush administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not.
And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations."
The purpose of "free trade" is to minimize economic inefficiencies. You know, inefficiencies like having to pay decent wages to your workers when there are people in the rest of the world so poor that they are happy to work for wages that will put a bowl of rice and three ounces of fish on the dinner table.
The purpose of massive immigration, aside from providing Democrats with more voters, but for the people who fund the Democratic Party, the big donors, is to alter the balance of supply and demand in the labor marketplace to the disadvantage of American workers, and to the advantage of those donors. It's not just blue collar jobs, either H1-B visas are a new form of indentured servitude, you get deported if you quit, and they impact college educated Americans' wages.
So, it's not exactly irrational so oppose free trade and high immigration that the big donors who funded Obama's campaign benefit from, if you are on the receiving end of application of raw political power, like the "bitter clingers."
Tl;dr of Obama's quote: "Put some ice on it."
Gamergate is a cultural hinge, and refusing to understand it because it offends your priors is going to leave you mystified.
The ancient warrior poet Ice Cube once said, "any day you don't have to use your AK is a good day."
Sound wisdom. Best keep it that way.
IMHO, the problem the Democratic Party faces is inherent and ineradicable.
The Democrats embody progressivism. The essential characteristic of progressivism is that it consists of progressives, who think progressive thoughts. By definition progressive thoughts are good and true.
How do we know those progressive thoughts are good and true? Because progressives think them.
The circularity of progressivism therefore must always view disagreement as the product of malevolence, stupidity, or ignorance.
For a progressive to be wrong would be to completely invalidate progressivism.
Democrats won't do what Della Volpe is proposing because too much of their brand and identity is based on their belief that they are superior to the rest of us mere mortals. To have to engage with those they've always looked down on to shore up that belief is beyond the pale.
those of us, who were tea party then, maga now, well we do not accept the vaporous creeds, of the so called light bringer,
obama was always a bitter shallow little man, I dubbed him
Alinski's sorcerers apprentice, he was not his own man, but he could read the script with some skill
"we get word salad."
Because they can't express their true motivations, we normies wouldn't like it. Just like they can't say "We don't like compromising with the Russians and the Chinese, we would rather just boss them around, and good hearted people with normal morality won't respond to this message, so we have to tell them something that will feed into their morality, and we can use it to control them: 'Putin and Xi are evil!'"
Mainstream/majority Republicans vilify the extremists to their right.
Extremist Democrats vilify the mainstream/majority Democrats to their right.
Heading to an 80/20 voting community.
Unless something extraordinarily negative happens in the next 13-months, the Democrats will be trimmed in the midterms. If things go well, it could be a full haircut. The problem with the Democrats is their playbook is to accentuate the negative and eliminate the positive and messing around with Mr In-between
He was Johnny Bravo, there because he fit the suit…It’s A classic Brady Bunch reference, about on par intellectually with the man…
we do not forget, how instead of lowering the temperature in 2020, he poured more gasoline on the fire, kyle rittenhouse was one of the few that were brave enough to save people from the inferno he ignited, then his shambling puppet laid bare their ridiculous priorities, that by 2024, his and his consorts screams didn't prevail, Charlie had little to do with that, as did Scott Pressler,
Serious question for anyone who can enlighten me: Did the fascists of 1920s Europe do what Ann is asking? Did they engage with people on a reasoned, intellectual basis in an effort to explain their ideas and win over skeptics? My general sense is that they did NOT do that, but instead focused on recruiting violent misfits and psychopaths and gaining power through bullying and intimidation.
I thought he was the Hawaiian idol the Bradys found on their vacation,
"economic displacement that keeps stability out of reach"
And that is the driver to lower birth rates. Historically, in the modern world, birth rates follow economic growth and stability.
"People had to be able to ‘afford’ to marry and have children. When economic conditions changed dramatically and called for a huge burst of extra labour, in other words with the early labour-intensive phase of the industrial revolution, then the age at marriage dropped and a larger proportion of the population married. Population grew rapidly as jobs became available."
--Invention of the Modern World, Alan Macfarlane
In recent times, this was a factor in the Baby Boom as the income growth for the bottom 90% increased from 1945 to 1973. There was a slight increase back to close to, but still below, replacement level 1990-2008 when the information economy was growing and the disruption of those trained for the manufacturing economy was aging out of the statistics.
"Democratic politics should be made to feel organic…"
LOL. That's the kind of thing you're not supposed to say out loud.
Democrats need to form more spaces for discussing masculinity and purpose
Purpose.
Debate and outreach styles aside, young men have had their purpose (fatherhood*) taken away, and the result is exactly what one would expect.
* Once it was decided fathers were optional when it came the wellbeing of children and society, the concept withered on the vine. Young women, even the poorest, always have motherhood to turn to for purpose.
"Let them adopt Charlie's methodology and go out into crowds of young people who loathe them. Show complete respect and calm composure and go back and forth, seeking understanding and common ground before offering the Democratic Party viewpoint."
They can't do this as the Democratic party is dominated by those from the ideological conformity side of academia. The professors and their disciples, and the NEA, would revolt if Democrats hosted open dialogue events. Open dialogue is just marketing for most universities in the 21st century.
"Then the next question is, well, what do you do once you receive the answer? And the answer is, well, if you can think then you use internal speech to dissect the answer, which is what you do, for example, you encourage your students to do if they're writing an essay. You know, they lay out a proposition and then you hope they can take the proposition apart. And essentially if they are, what they're doing is they're transforming themselves into avatars, speaking avatars of two different viewpoints. So you have the speaker for the proposition and then you have the critic, and maybe you lay out the dialogue between them. And that constitutes the body of the essay. And you have to be bloody sophisticated to manage that, because it means that you have to divide yourself in some sense into two avatars that are oppositional. And then you have to allow yourself to be the battle space between them. That, and people have to be trained to do that. That's what universities are supposed to do. It's really hard. What people generally do instead of that is talk to other people. And that's how they organize themselves, by talking to other people."
---Jordan Peterson 'The Importance of Being Ethical', Uncommon Knowledge podcast
Do not think it is possible. Agree it should.
NYT author "Democrats must appear regularly on conservative podcasts and college campuses without scripts.... Democrats need to form more spaces for discussing masculinity and purpose without ideological judgment...."
2016--> forward - years and years of top-down lies and hate thru the likes of toxic MSNBC have ruined these people.
Nothing like the present, democrats and leftists!
Way to.........ummmmm....."reach out"......to men to find out why they are abandoning your dumb$h1+ platform....:
https://www.loudounnow.com/news/education/loudoun-schools-face-federal-lawsuit-over-boys-suspensions/article_3eb14a54-751c-40dc-a64a-668c77ef62f9.html
"Democratic politics should be made to feel organic"
Volpe almost got there but crashed and burned right there. "Let be be the finale of seem" might be beyond today's Dems.
They should hire Howard for advice on how to be a Democrat without insulting every man whose vote you want. Of course, his advice doesn't shovel vast tranches of wealth, gained from favorable government decisions, into the Scrooge McDuck style treasure vaults of their "donor base."
In any case, it is still good advice the Democratic Party won't take and probably can't take even if they wanted to.
"Democrats need to form more spaces for discussing masculinity and purpose without ideological judgment...."
Or they could just call you racist. Easier and more fun.
Again, they insist this is a messaging problem. It is so far past that. The train long ago left Messaging Station and has been sitting idle at Bellum Depot for years.
One way tickets, all aboard.
"without scripts..."
See my comment on "word salad." If your whole sales pitch is based on cryptic little phrases that sound good as long as you don't unpack them, like "defund the police," how are you going to maintain it under extended questioning. Why didn't Kamala go on Joe Rogan?
What Democrat viewpoint would they present?
Go on Joe Rogen's show, and explain why men should be able to compete as women and beat them up.
Go to a nerd convention, and explain why girlbosses and race swaps actually improved Tolkien, Star Wars and the MCU.
Go to Small Town, USA, and explain how the community is thriving with the addition of a large influx of non-English speaking immigrants from the poorest countries in the hemisphere.
Go to a Christian church, and explain why it's good to be put on an FBI watch list.
Go to a PTA meeting, and explain why schools need to protect children by not telling parents what their kid's name is.
DNC, start by not hating America, then get some policies that are good for America.
…Democratic politics should be made to feel organic in gaming, fitness and entrepreneurship communities...
Does the writer even understand the words that he uses and how this demonstrates the feminization of democrat party thought?
If you want to maintain social cohesion in a small tribe that faces daily dangers and the constant threat of starvation you make sure everyone who stays in the cave feels like things are okay.
If you are the provider that leaves the cave and the tribe depends on you bringing back food to live you make sure things are okay.
When leadership of a nation makes sure things are ok things work out better than when leadership focuses on whether or not people feel ok about it.
If the dems can abandon the Jews, possibly their most loyal and generous constituency, in favor of the Hamas loving progressive left, they certainly aren't going to give a flying fuck about winning over white college boys.
thats not how they roll
I am just curious, Country Lawyer, how many Jewish Americans you know personally. Some Democrats are moving way from Likud and Netanyahu because their Jewish base is moving that way and supporting him is a liability with Jewish voters. They have sympathy for Israelis, sure, but not Netanyahu. Just like Labor in the UK, Jewish organizations have been co-opted at the top, and are having a hard time ordering the rank and file about:
https://thehill.com/opinion/campaign/5486687-influential-jewish-political-groups-are-way-out-of-step-with-american-jews/
"Influential groups lack influence" is another way to frame the headline.
this seems to be a pattern not only in the UK but in other parts of Eurabia, France, Belgium actually had an islamist party of Turkish Derivation,
"If the dems can abandon the Jews, possibly their most loyal and generous constituency, in favor of the Hamas loving progressive left, they certainly aren't going to give a flying fuck about winning over white college boys."
LOL - what color is the sky in your world?
There's zero evidence the Democrats have "abandoned the Jews". Jews are the biggest financial supporters of the D party, and the leader of the senate D's is Chuck Schumer. Almost every media outlet is owned or run by a Jew, and said Jews are almost all D's. The ADL is defending the D's not attacking them.
I Guess "the D's hate Israel " is some odd talking point.
Since the shooting, I've watched a number of Charlie Kirk videos. What's remarkable was not his debating skills. They were formidable, but I saw some who scored points against him. What was impressive was the courteous and good humored way with which he stood his ground. He was an advertisement for the virtues and principles he preached. His death was the stuff of pity and terror, and he's not so much a martyr as a tragic hero.
of course he is a martyr because of his faith, and the way he pursued his calling
Can Democratic Party speakers do that?
No, but there are no external forces acting on them to prevent it, leaving the very obvious answer to "why not?" highly visible, at least to any impartial observer: their own internal rules prevent anyone from doing outreach to any group or individual considered "right wing." It is forbidden. The right are irredeemable. Right?
That this group of "right wingers" who are off-limits to outreach now includes super-liberal Bari Weiss, the liberal icon RFK Jr. and a woman who got more votes in the last DNC primary than Kamala named Tulsi Gabbard. If they can't talk to these liberals how the hell can they talk to us?
[needed editing for clarity]
Bernie, AOC, the CBC have transformed the Dems as Trump has transformed the GOP. The GOP isn’t the douche-bag country club, open borders, endless wars crew anymore. Some of them still try but are old and ineffective. Clinton & Obama have zero pull in the Dem party anymore. The Pelosis and Schumer can still raise money but can’t contain the Socialists who have taken over the Dem Party. The next decade is JD Vance and AOC.
Dogma and Pony Show,
Based primarily on a book called "Death of Democracy", my impression is that Germany in the 20's and 30's was a very different place from the USA today. ANTFIA seems to be an attempt to recreate the Brown Shirts, but our courts are not corrupt enough, and our country and population are magnitudes larger than Germany's then.
I think the Nazi playbook would be of limited value in America today.
it's important to remember; when a leftie wishes you DEAD..
it's NOT because they hate you; it's because they disagree with you
AOC is a joke. She doesn't even give a crap about her own district. Why some enterprising young center-right person cannot figure out how to oust her - is beyond me.
Yes this does stick out like true Democrat thinking: "...should be made to feel organic..."
IOW they are not FAKING IT well enough to fool us. This is just more of the "change our messaging" bullshit because they will never change their authoritarian commie impulses. That's why they let commies like Mandami run in THEIR primaries.
"Hey let's make the socialists run in their own lane."
"No enemies to the left."
I dig how tampon Tim is like "totally organic" in his words and body movements.
Kamala too. Probably the most organic candidate the dems have ever fielded. Her appeal was very organic back in CA. No one used organs like Kamala did!
Most of those millions of persuadable young men are Joe Rogans. At least they think like Joe. Others think like Charlie Kirk. Some a little of both and whoever else doesn't try to sell them bullshit.
The Dems still can't figure out how they lost Joe Rogan.
He's their enemy now.
Fake masculinity is a very hard sell.
They can’t do that because that would take away the whole purpose of being a Democrat which is to feel morally and intellectually superior. And they have to have a designated group that they feel superior to.
How do they unvilify the villains they’ve gotten their tribe so worked up about?
"The Dems still can't figure out how they lost Joe Rogan."
Don't forget P-Nut the squirrel.
You can't talk about what drives young men or even older ones without including the pursuit of women. It's number one, at least for young men, and hangs in there for quite a long time, but I mostly agree with the rest. As a young man sometimes so broke I was homeless, I never ever expected to stay poor. Despite having no degree, no marketable skills, no family wealth or even support, I always expected to own a home and be rich at some point. Pure optimism or just how I thought it worked if you aimed for it and didn't get anyone pregnant. I thought that's what America is. You just win if you try. I didn't think it was automatic, but I thought nothing could stop you. Is that idea gone now?
Ahhh, P-Nut! Forgot about that ugly episode. That struck a nerve. It seems like some people want to kill anything that brings joy.
What I have found. The first instinct in a democrat/leftist is to punish, demean and trivialize. The first instinct of all the classic liberals/conservatives I've ever met has been. "How can we fix this?", "How can we make this better without taking away something from somebody."
Charlie Kirk went into hostile territory such as colleges and engaged in open debate. He didn't throw invective at those who disagreed with him. He offered a future of hope based on religion, marriage, and raising a family. Modern Democrats can't even fake that message because it goes again everything the radicals believe. Killing Charlie Kirk silenced him but not his message. The reactions to his murder further exposed those whose messages were based on love and those who reveled in hate. Anyone who celebrates the murder of someone they hate because of the things he said is a shit person.
The midterm elections are a little over a year away. I sincerely hope the Democrats are soundly defeated, and by that, I mean a defeat of Biblical proportions - national, state, and local. If they are, the murder of Charlie Kirk will play a big part in that defeat. My hope is that if the defeat is bad enough, then whomever the Democrats have that isn't clinically insane will wrest control of the party from the radicals. We actually need sane adults in charge of both political parties.
"Democratic politics should be made to feel organic" They keep trying to simulate authenticity. It is a failing strategy.
They can be authentic, it's just that it repels most people when they are.
Bob Boyd said, "They can’t do that because that would take away the whole purpose of being a Democrat which is to feel morally and intellectually superior. And they have to have a designated grou that they feel superior to."
Spot on. Status games über alles. And you know which demo is A) exceedingly (d)emocratic and B) craves status games and C) whose many member's "first instinct is to punish, demean and trivialize"?
Women.
Women are about messaging.
Women run focus groups.
Women care about public relations.
Women ARE public relations.
Women care deeply about status.
Women trivialize men and each other.
Social pressure is the female weapon par excellence.
Men don't need a 'focus group' when American women need a fucking electron microscope.
"They can be authentic, it's just that it repels most people when they are."
Bill Cosby: I said to a guy, "Tell me, what is it about cocaine that makes it so wonderful," and he said, "Because it intensifies your personality." I said, "Yes, but what if you're an asshole?"
Fetterman might. There are also probably someone in the Democrat side. But they would have to give up some of their bull**** to do it. And they really can’t do it en masse.
A large number of Americans have proven that they simply are irredeemable. They will not rethink, self-evaluate, or accept that they were wrong about anything despite being so over and over for years now, and I think even a trouncing at the ballot box won't fix them. They are going to be a huge pain in the ass until the devil completes their contract. I expect more will resort to violence. The question is what of the millions who vote reliably Democrat if the insane wing continues to take over their party? Do they just not show up, still vote Dem., or actually climb over that fence and save their country? I have no idea which.
Prof: "Show complete respect and calm composure and go back and forth, seeking understanding and common ground before offering the Democratic Party viewpoint."
You know who can do that, or at least could, at the height of his faculties? And I hate putting his name in the same graf as Charlie's (z''l): Bill Clinton. I wonder if Kirk (pbuh) even got some of his debating style from watching Clinton.
Sharpton can also do it, when he doesn't have marching orders to spout nonsense. Joe Scarborough can, when he's on his meds (or off - I don't know if he takes meds to make himself a D, and reverts to R when he's off them, or vice versa).
Of course, all those men are ten to forty years too old to fill the role of lefty Kirk (z''l) analogue.
There are hundreds of young black men being taught this kind of discussion in HBCUs, and a lot of them will go into Dem politics, but they're also being taught and conditioned not to use these techniques outside the Circle of Trust. CC, JSM
It appears to me that a basic tenet of the current core leadership of the Democrat party is that men who operate in any way like men have for thousands of years are definitionally bad. Women are naturally superior and should be allowed to run everything. This is not a message men will be very responsive to and the ones that are responsive are either manipulative sociopaths or weird deviants or both. Men look for a person calling them to be men. To provide and protect but to be respected not discarded on a whim.
Why can't some leftist just step up and do what Charlie Kirk did?
If we accept that Haidt was correct when he observed that conservatives tend to view leftists as misinformed, while leftists see conservatives as evil, then their dilemna becomes clearer.
To a leftist, engaging in public debate with conservatives means giving legitimacy to and platforming those who are evil. You risk virulent, righteous attacks from your own side for consorting with the enemy. Just ask Bill Maher, who dared to sit down with Trump for dinner.
Why bother debating people who are ... well, deplorable?
Martin said, "It appears to me that a basic tenet of the current core leadership of the Democrat party is that...Women are naturally superior and should be allowed to run everything."
If that were true, they wouldn't need so much help.
"Democrats need to form more spaces for discussing masculinity and purpose without ideological judgment...."
Those would be the unsafe spaces.
Bill Clinton was expertly crafted product. Of course he was amenable to being crafted and much closer to the intended product that today's Democrats are. He had advisors telling him how to appeal to the average Americans and, he had his 50s childhood to draw from when he played his role. It seems like most Democrats since then are appealing only to the party's new base and are advised by people who are of that base. They don't know how to appeal to those outside the party.
The problem for Democrats isn't the messengers though. It's the message. People see how things were under Biden and they laugh at Democrat rhetoric and promises. Eventually, though, people will forget. They'll find things to blame Republicans for, and the Democrats will have an opening again. Heaven help us!
A guy with effective charisma was Kamalas paramour (or client, whatever it was), Willie Brown. He perfected the "loveable scoundrel" messaging. This, plus being black, got him past his obvious corruption. A very clever (and funny) man, he was too lazy to put much effort into higher office, which was just as well. Later in life, with nothing to gain or lose anymore, he would sometimes tell the truth, as he saw it anyway.
Young men are not put on this earth to be scapegoats, serfs, or subjects; nor does their value inhere in their ability to obey. They are born to be heroes.
When that birthright is stolen from them--whether out of spite and malice or for some noble-sounding reason like 'equity,' 'safety,' 'reparation' 'harmony,' 'peace'-- some young men may be more inspired to overcome the higher odds; others will be disheartened and withdraw. But in a few, the scorn, rejection, constraint, and abuse they receive will twist and corrupt their natural heroism. These become the villains.
Howard said...
Unless something extraordinarily negative happens in the next 13-months, the Democrats will be trimmed in the midterms. If things go well, it could be a full haircut. The problem with the Democrats is their playbook is to accentuate the negative and eliminate the positive and messing around with Mr In-between
I don't think it will be that smooth.
I expect them to pull the plug on the national debt soon.
Google "sod off swampy" to see how the left's interactions with normals goes.
"Democratic politics should be made to feel organic"
So a cargo cult, then?
Military service provides stability for young men. And some economic stability, and discipline training, and civics training, and a sense of belonging. Just a suggestion, young folks.
Howard obviously did not get the whole picture from watching YouTube clips of Mr In-Between. I strongly suggest binging the whole series, it is a very well written characterization of a (mostly) good man doing (mostly) good things as best he is able.
As for leftists using words rather than violence to accomplish their goals, the only problem I see is that their re-education camps will be empty without the use of force. After I say to a leftist, "Your way does not work. It never has worked. Throughout history you way has been tried again and again, and uniformly overwhelmed by the reality of economics and the abuse of power bamong its proponents, and there is nothing in your way to overcome those two obstacles in the path to achieving your way.
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