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whaletacochamp t1_iu4xk0w wrote

Reply to comment by cohray2212 in Ukrainian soldier with vermontese maple syrup and pancakes by kievit4ukraine

Yeah, /r/burlington has a whole slew of issues, /r/vermont hasn't been as bad but does seem to be heading that way.

And you're right - the amount of people I know with absurd political beliefs in VT is wild. IDK if they don't vote or what but you're right, outside of the more populated areas you will especially find folks with VERY interesting political beliefs.

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cohray2212 t1_iu4yj0n wrote

I like to call them "politically challenged" because so many people are normal until you hit a trigger word or topic that Fox News has Manchurian Candidated them on.

You could basically skirt a normal topic like the fact that kids should be given healthcare and food and they're totally normal. "Of course sick kids deserve to be healthy and fed" they will say. And then you bring up school lunches or the cost of insulin and their faces steel over and they get grouchy. Then the canned responses come about Canadian wait times, welfare queens etc.

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whaletacochamp t1_iu51duz wrote

Yup. Makes it pretty easy to navigate if you are even slightly politically engaged/informed. Generally I already know before talking to them if they are this type. And as Im sure you know, there's no point in debating those topics with them. Especially if you have any sort of relationship with the person.

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cohray2212 t1_iu53g8e wrote

Absolutely. It's a cult, they need to be deprogrammed. No debate or discourse is going to snap them out of it. It takes a professional.

My mom is one of these people. In the early 2000s it was Oprah and magnets that cure cancer that western medicine doesn't want us to know about, "toxins" and an obsession with organic food. Now it's Trump, Covid is the flu, and the vaccine is evil.

We can talk about "western medicine is inherently flawed because of the for-profit system" and we can say other countries could seek cures where there's less incentive here. We can even talk about the flaws that insurance has where there's never an incentive to cut costs because higher costs means booming business for insurance. As soon as we talk about socialized medicine it's back to square one after a few canned responses about freedom of choice and wait time propaganda and how an imaginary 50% of all money earned in Canada is taxed toward health care.

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whaletacochamp t1_iu5clem wrote

Ugh, I’m sorry someone so close to you is like that.

My dad definitely has the potential to be like that but has tended more toward the liberal side of things. He will watch Fox News for the sole purposes of screaming at rhe TV for a few hours. I’m honestly amazed he didn’t have a heart attack during the Trump administration.

The funny thing is that sometimes he will pull out a SUPER ignorant and conservative point of view on something. I don’t get it lol.

I really think a lot of it comes from the older generation just taking what society feeds them on their TV channels of choice. I can’t even tell you the last time I watched cable news - instead I read a variety of mostly unbiased news sources that I seek out myself, or read stuff from a number of maybe biased sources and create my own understanding based on all the facts. Our folks are basically “they said it on TV so it has to be true!”

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random_vermonter t1_iu5v12v wrote

My dad is the same way. He'll watch CNN and then switch to Fox and sometimes he'll say a liberal talking point and other times, a conservative one. He's confusing. I think he enjoys the theatrics of it.

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whaletacochamp t1_iu5w9f1 wrote

Yeah that’s pretty much it. And a lot of it comes down to “politicians are all horrible!” Which is totally fair.

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