Oddbean new post about login | logout "If they are delusional, it is not because they somehow “lose” contact with reality but because they break it off, intentionally. They have become incapable of recognizing reality because they have made themselves unwilling or unable to do so and choose to organize their reality around something else — loyalty to the leader, the bubble of 'us' versus 'them.' Factual information doesn’t matter; evidence doesn’t matter. It is a movement of people who are going crazy on purpose." #psychosis #MAGA
Seeing this always brings me back to James Baldwin: “I imagine one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with pain.” ― The Fire Next Time @f884fa2b
@bd381aa0 Thank you. Such a powerful and true observation. If the US had found a way to listen to James Baldwin and others like him, we'd be on a much more sound path to a brighter future. But no. We have chosen otherwise.
"In a chilling year-long investigation, CNN's Donnie O' Sullivan tracks the stories of Americans who have been consumed by a QAnon-rooted conspiracy theory that JFK and JFK Jr. are both still alive, are descended from Jesus Christ, and are going to take over America. Why do they believe this, and how did they get sucked into this conspiracy?" #psychosis #MAGA #QAnon #conspiracy #JFK #Trump /3 https://www.cnn.com/audio/podcasts/the-whole-story-with-anderson-cooper/episodes/983ff26a-a91f-4d21-b978-b0880110f28a
@f884fa2b When someone already believes in a magic Angry Grandfather who lives on a cloud in the sky, it's not that far to take them to even further absurdities.
@fcbf5051 And then there are people like Joe Biden and Nancy Pelosi, who are faithful Catholics and motivated by their religious belief to build a better world. And countless others including Martin Luther King, John Lewis, Stacey Abrams, Jimmy Carter, and on and on. My hat is off to those fine people whose faith compelled them to work for justice and repairing a broken world.
@f884fa2b I hear what you're saying, the only problem is that they're still imposing religious views on others - it's just that in these cases we feel the same on these issues so it works out. As far as Catholocism goes, the wreckage it has left through history can't be justified by a few folks that managed to find reinforcement on things they should have been doing anyway. I do respect your point of view - no caveats, and I'm not saying everyone who's religious is a bad person.
@fcbf5051 Where you see an unambiguous story of "wreckage," I see something much more ambiguous and complex, a story that includes Joe Biden and Nancy Pelosi, both attesting to their Catholic faith as the source of their progressive commitments. I personally think the tired old anti-Catholicism that used to prevail in a lot of cultures is not very satisfactory as a way to explain things.
@f884fa2b Especially if you consider how progressive JFK was. If you like JFK AND Trump, you're lost.
@4bc1bfc2 I'm not quite sure what you mean by your final statement. I like JFK and abhor Trump. I'm sure my memories of JFK, whose election and assassination I recall vividly, are tinged with a lot of nostalgia. But it's very hard for me to think of those two men in the same category.