this post was submitted on 02 Sep 2024
1007 points (98.6% liked)
Political Weirdos
753 readers
36 users here now
A community dedicated to the weirdest people involved in politics.
- Focus on weird behaviors and beliefs
- Follow Iemmy.world TOS
- Don’t be a jerk
founded 3 months ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
You're trying to blame his shift on social media and the pandemic, and you're also claiming that the same thing happened to millions of other people for the same reasons, and I just haven't seen any evidence to support that.
We can point to people acting like lunatics during the pandemic, of course, but if you want to claim that to pandemic caused them to become lunatics then you would have to look at how they behaved prior to it. And you can try to blame social media for how people see politics, but there again I don't think the facts are on your side. Most people know that things your friend posts on Facebook may or may not be true. But many people, especially middle-aged and older people, believe that there's a great deal of truth in the 24-hour news cycle that they see on television, when in reality that's been highly tailored by the major news networks to make it seem like the sky is falling.
It has been remarked for a long time that many arrogant ultra rich people end up surrounding themselves by yes men, that insulation is created by their money and power, and over time their views grow unhinged because they don't have contact with the real world or the general public. We know this happens often enough, and if I were speculating, I'd say the same thing happened here.
Look if you don't think there's any evidence to support social media and the pandemic leading to both a decline in mental health and radicalization, I don't know what to tell you. Not only have there been like a million different articles on it, but this is patently obvious to the vast majority of people who lived through the entire thing.
This isn't exclusively a middle aged man thing, a conservative thing, or even a political thing. A ton of people struggled enormously during the pandemic, sought solace in social media, and left with an extremely weird set of beliefs.
I'm sure I could find some of these sources, but I feel like I'd be trying to convince someone that the sky is blue. This is so abundantly obvious that you've either been living under an extremely large rock or are dead set on believing what you want to believe.
I really wouldn't discount social media, which he has shown an addiction to.
I've personally watched a very close friend go from a huge Obama / liberal supporter to supporting Trump, Canada's trump mini, full on climate change denial, anti vaccine stuff by going down the right wing conspiracy theory rabbit hole. All on twitter/youtube/facebook etc stuff. He doesn't watch MSM.
There's definitely a rich/yes man aspect as well, but social media echo chambers can have a huge influence.
edit: and for what it's worth, it's not worth trying to reason with him anymore, and the relationship has pretty much died during covid.