Yesterday's Bizarre Encounter With Another GOP Racism Apologist

They're becoming more and more desperate, delusional, and pathetic (if that was even possible)

The thing that's so frustrating about conservatives is that they give you a sincere look as if all they have to do is “explain a few things,” and you’ll magically agree with them. “We’re not so different,” they say. Then they go on to make the most appallingly racist comments you can imagine.

I'm often left in shock at how casually and without any self-awareness these people reveal the complete rot in their psyche. Unfortunately, they only see the world in terms of “the flex,” and they invariably interpret your response as awe over their delusional sense of grandeur.

The gap between reality and GOP perception of reality is chasmic. They're like drivers in a vehicle with flames coming out from under the tires, and when you pull up and try to urge them to pull over, they just smile and wave at you like you're crazy.

How do you break through to people like that? How? I've been trying to figure it out all my life and I've made little to no progress.

Yesterday, I made the mistake of engaging with a profile that I should have blocked. Sometimes I'm worried that I'm a little too fast on the block button, but then something happens to show me that my instincts are actually very good. I'm sure I do occasionally block people who don't have it coming, but if all of you could see the BS I have to put up with on a daily basis, I think you'd understand my behavior.

There are some flat out awful people in the world. There are people who will calmly and deliberately look you in the eye and insist they have a right to abuse your children. The disgusting entitlement of these people makes me tremble with rage.

The worst part is that these agents of evil have often convinced themselves that they are warriors for the common good. I never understand why GOP voters rally around clearly falsified accusations that their opponents are child predators even as they ignore the factual evidence against the people to whom they show unwavering support.

The tragic part is that I think there are some among the GOP voters who actually do want to help. It's right that they're offended at the idea of child abuse. It's right that they should be enraged by any examples of suffering inflicted upon the innocent. But why then can't they realize that theirs are the actions that cause all the hardship?

They are the ones driving the car with the flames shooting out from the undercarriage. When you try to tell them to hit the brakes, they defiantly slam the accelerator and lecture you about how you need to change.

So, anyway, yesterday I posted the following on Notes:

There’s a misplaced belief in the US that we “can’t” or “shouldn’t” call out racism when we see it because we might “make things worse.”

Nonsense.

You make things worse when you stay quiet because you become an ENABLER of racism.

I've deleted the exchange that ensued, but I'll paraphrase it to the best of my ability.

A woman commented “Well, the problem is that so many things are labeled racism that actually aren't.”

That comment already sets off a bunch of red flags because it's an example of reversing aggressor and victim. These racism apologists always act like they denounce racism, but it's always with a, “yeah... but in reality I have to suffer more for it than anyone else.”

BS!

I was really tempted to block this person right then (and I should have), but instead I decided to bite on the bait.

I wrote back, “Fine, let's establish a baseline. It's racism when trump supporters hear that my infant children or my immigrant wife are speaking Spanish and they stomp over and scream 'Build the Wall!' in their faces at ear splitting volume. That's vile, racist behavior and it needs to end.”

You see, the way racism apologists get away with their repugnant beliefs is that they instinctively switch from specific scenarios to generalized terms. She wanted to argue under the umbrella concept that “some things are inappropriately labeled as racism.” Any phrase that general is difficult for a scientifically minded person to contest.

This brings me to another point that's important to keep in mind. Even though racists are by definition ignorant and wrong, they are very skilled at switching back and forth between rhetorical approaches to create an argument that “sounds” logical. To be clear, their argument is not logical at all, and they never hold themselves to their own standard.

This can be seen in how they'll latch on to specific, outlier examples when it serves their purpose, but insist on speaking in general terms when they want to obfuscate the aggressions of the individuals they support. They never discuss the thousands of instances of violence committed by white supremacist hate groups, but the relatively scarce examples of immigrants involved in anything get repeated ad nauseam.

It's confirmation bias. They don't even see the evil they do because they're only looking for the missteps of the people they've convinced themselves to hate.

So, I wanted to use this racist apologist's tactics against her and make her denounce a real world act of racism from a red hat. Her response made me block her so hard I almost broke the key off my keyboard.

She never denounced the action other than to hem and haw and putter something about how “well, maybe he was wrong, a little” but then she entreated me to think of things from his perspective. That's when she said, “Maybe he'd lost a loved one to immigrant violence, and he was reminded of that when he saw your children.”

It's at times like these when I wish we had some sort of racism analyzer tool. Like, how much racism is it possible to pack into a single sentence? How much pure evil?

This woman was trying to argue that it was acceptable for grown men to stomp over and physically assault my infant children because of the possibility that they might have been affected by a right wing manufactured tragedy that has no connection to the real world?

I imagine she was sitting there thinking she was smart when she wrote that. Meanwhile racism was oozing from her pores and eyelids, it was flowing out of her fingers, it was setting fire to the undercarriage and she had absolutely no idea. She probably thought I should thank her for “enlightening” me.

Speaking of education, here’s something that most Americans don't know: Most immigrants are more educated than the average American.

I hate to break it to you, but the average American kind of sucks.

I met my wife in Peru, she was already a professional. She had a college degree and no debt. The thing is, most Americans are so neck deep in the BS concept of American exceptionalism (which is just racism by another name) that it doesn't occur to them that immigrants have a more highly developed skillset than they do.

There’s a reason you find so many people working on H1-B visas at hospitals. But I say the word “immigrant” and Americans think “people who work in fields.”

The non-racist response to the word “immigrant” is to think “doctors, lawyers, teachers, engineers, scientists...”

We've got people coming into the US who are refugees from war torn areas because of conflicts our country created. Many of those people have developed a much better skillset than the keyboard warriors who are so dim witted that they allow dishonest right-wing media to radicalize them, and who have nothing in their favor other than a delusional belief that where they were born contributes something to the value they offer to humanity.

It doesn't. You have to work. You have to read a few books instead of burning them.

In my experience, immigrants work a lot harder than entitled, right-wing, racist Americans who celebrate their ignorance like it's an achievement.

Ignorance is the opposite.

So, no, I don't think that it's “appropriate” for a man to look at my beautiful children and allow himself to be triggered by a lie he saw on the news. I don't think it's “appropriate” for children to be assaulted period. I also think it's pretty disgusting how ignorant people can be so self-righteous and entitled about their appalling beliefs that they spray the internet with racist comments before proudly signing their name.

Blocked. Blocked. Blocked.

This kind of thing is dangerous. Their arguments are illogical, circular, and destructive. All the decent people in our society need to become more accustomed to calling out this kind of misinformed evil when we see it.

They're driving down a public road in a car with flames licking the gas tank. They don't have any right to do that. When it explodes, it's likely going to take some innocent people with it. They must be stopped.

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