There are times when I wonder just how close to reality Jung may have been. I was literally speaking about a piece of what you're talking about here with an old friend last night. And then this pops up in my feed.
What we covered might be useful to you. It definitely fits right in. We noted that conservatives, particularly, have this habit of just repeating the same bleating nonsense and even escalating it if you are polite!
But it changes if you get right in their face. You know, the kind of tactic that would have civilized people reaching for weapons. The very thing you were talking about in here. Calling out their lies (most of which are by rote) and not backing down or giving ground.
Two things that quickly become apparent when you do this: First, most of these people who will be so polemic if you let them do not believe what they're parroting. I say this because, second, instead of reacting with the righteous anger that a person who truly believed their position would, they back down. Either with some passive-aggressive nonsense, a block, or just silence.
But that's the teachable moment.
It doesn't seem like it. It shouldn't be true. Nothing in the experience of a rational person would make this seem like anything but a grinding stalemate.
But it is. This is the teachable moment. Because the lower classes, particularly in heavily conservative areas, have been conditioned to respond to orders from their masters. It's never stated that way, of course, because that's too blatant.
But think about how bosses treat employees, cops treat humans, etc. It's a blustering "sit down, shut up, and OBEY!!!" sort of interaction. Nearly always. It is designed to separate the weak from the strong, and to marginalize the strong and exploit the weak.
Their tactics can be used to reverse the programming. It's damn hard. I do still engage them, carefully.
A lot of them, I'd say the majority, are not prepared to listen even after you have delivered the rhetorical equivalent of a baseball bat to the dome. But some are. But you have to apply the cluebat first, and without apology. Until you do, they are literally incapable of hearing you.
We truly live in weird times.
