No Stupid Questions

I don't have any big answers, but just a small piece of advice: Don't shame people for asking questions when they just want to learn.

I would think that's the perfect opportunity to educate someone, but so many people will just down-vote a naive question and move on without explanation, which is even more confusing.

I'm speaking from my own experience. I still tend to be neutral on a lot of things so far, but my brain is kinda... unusual. I think most people might gradually feel pushed away, "othered", etc. and eventually lean in the opposite political direction than you might want.

TL;DR: If you want people on your side, stop pushing them away. And maybe ask others on your side to stop too.

What you've described is every complaint I've had with centrists and neocons in the democratic party. I don't really know where the progressive part comes in.

Bernie did amazing with men to the point where "bernie bros" were being mocked in media, so has Mamdani in NY in polls.

If anything, I would argue that the Democratic party should be more populist and progressive. Focusing on things that pull up everybody, because everyone is struggling right now.

Maybe stop labeling them the “enemy” with posts like these?

for most they are very disconnected from reality, just what they see on the internet, being more so raised by it then even their parents. And social media is very good at targeting those more vunrable people becuse social media thrives off of discord

Man it's like the majority of people here don't have 'regular guy' friends.

The way to get to regular dudes, is to make them feel fucking included. Yes, diversity is fucking awesome. Yes, having women in leadership roles is fucking awesome. But for your average guy... who do they have to look up to on the left side of things? In the news? In congress? Who is on the national stage for these things? Who is talking to those people?

There isn't anyone. There are tons of people talking to other groups of people, but there has been flat out no courting of the white dude demographic outside of White Dudes for Harris (which was brilliant but came too late).

Speak to the issues these guys are facing. Talk about dating. Talk about career struggles. Talk about feeling alone, and feeling vulnerable. And then, talk about solution based problem-solving for these things.

Why do you think the right wing latched onto guys who do the whole personal betterment thing? It's the same shit that white supremacist groups do. They'll get you with things that anyone can agree with like 'Hey man if you work hard you'll succeed. I fucking believe in you when no one else will.' Then they go into the right wing bullshit because now they have you at an emotional level.

There is no online left presence doing these things, and there are multiple right wing people doing this shit.

Make a left wing Joe Rogan, and bro-dudes will watch that shit like shit on velcro. But it has to be a dude-bro talking to them. It can't be Rachel Maddow or AOC, it has to be someone who comes from that background.

The elimination of ghost jobs, for a start. If you have to jump through hoops for a job that doesn't exist, that instills a strong distrust in society. People need money to make headway in their life, and shit like ghost jobs corrode the feeling of hope.

Once you cannot feel love for living anymore, that is a great deal of space in one's heart to be filled with hatred.

the universalizing ideology of feminism for men is incoherent

and if you react with anger to someone, me, stating this fact, that feminism is and ought to be for women, you're part of the problem, shut up.

feminism is full of lessons on how feminism helps women, men should read feminists

but it's stupid to expect feminism/feminists to advocate for men's issues

and it's insulting to ask men to believe that all they have to do is be good feminists and they'll get what they need.

if you're a man and you want to write about how actually all men need to do is understand patriarchy, seriously shut the fuck up.

if you're a woman and you want to write about how actually feminism is good for men, seriously shut the fuck up:

stop centering a tool for helping women, feminism, stop centering women, when men is the topic. do you understand? can you understand? the topic is men.

I think a big part of the issues end up being economic. Things are obviously not great for a vast majority of middle and lower income people. You spend all day working your 1-3 jobs and in the background there's all the culture war battles going on.

Few regular people have the mental space to even engage with the nuance required to navigate some progressive talking points when they can barely keep a roof over their heads. Toxic masculinity just turns into masculinity = toxic. You've lost these people, even if there's an actually good message in there.

The Right is amazing at drawing a direct line between, "These are the problems we know you're having" and "This is exactly what you can do about it today". And for the Right, they actually deliver results. Do the kids turn into insufferable dickheads? Sure. But does the rhetoric sometimes get them what they want? Yeah, it does.

Where does the Left even come close? Almost everything is a delayed effect. Protest for a good cause? Wait to see if the politics catch up. Be nice to people? Great start, but that doesn't help these guys get people-skills to have good platonic and romantic relationships. Be more open emotionally? What happens when your friends don't accept that from you?

The Left is full of high risk, upfront demands from people who aren't already affiliated with potentially little to no reward. Granted, the desired outcome is a better and more just society. But like, carrots and sticks people. You need something that regular people can get behind besides just ideology. Especially when mainstream media has a lock on those that are tuned out of progressive spaces and every now and then see something leak through from the culture war.

We need an actual vision for the future. Not a list of things we don't like about the present, but what do we see people doing one day. If you don't have a place for any group of people in your society, they will be indifferent if it burns. You can't build a progressive future without having an actual, honest to God idea of what opportunities you can provide to legitimately everyone. If your best plan is, "Conservatives get with the program or rot in hell", don't be surprised when they take you down with them.

Young adults needs stronger world frameworks that don't feel forced on them.

IMO that's a virtue system!

I've been a Stoic for over 20 years now and managed to convert dozens of people to progressive thought just by discussing virtues that are inherit to human nature (justice, courage, wisdom, temperance). People like abstract virtues because they're easy to incorporate to their personal world models with very little friction and friction is the real thought killer.

Most people are truth seeking but can be very slow learners and some really rebel against strong friction so there's a need for more abstract approaches like - using "colorblind" instead of arguing race, using "cosmopolitan" when argueing geopolitics, using "secular" when arguing religion etc etc. Every other argument can follow afterwards.

This is the way.