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We do a lot of posting here; it's fun and cathartic to discuss the insanity of current crises with like-minded goons. We talk about the merits of electoralism, or joining leftist organizations, but when push comes to shove most goons aren't full time activists. I joined my local DSA in the wake of 2016, but after going to meetings off and on for a year I lost interest because it felt like nothing was happening. It was like a more boring, less funny, offline version of cspam posting. Maybe your local groups are more active and you're doing lots of great stuff, good for you! But I suspect I'm not alone in this. In an effort to feel like I'm doing *something* productive, I've tried to gently nudge the people in my life towards radicalism, and I've found myself wanting to post about it and swap notes with others doing the same. This thread is for sharing stories, anecdotes, failures, successes, and everything in between about your attempts to radicalize people you know personally. It is not for bitching about your chud uncle who's consumed 3 hours of Fox a day for the past 15 years (we've already got that thread). It is also not for laughing at the succ-Dems in your life (the succ-thread is happy to laugh with you there). Maybe your boomer parent was big on Clinton but has become somewhat disaffected? Maybe your college friends are "just not that into politics" but broadly share your values? Lets talk about expanding the Overton window within our immediate social circle. What has worked for you, what hasn't? What kind of barriers have you encountered? edit: This OP should also include some common resources that people have found useful. Please post anything you'd like me to add here along those lines. Podcasts: The Dollop - funny deep-dives on specific topics/people in history, from Andrew Jackson to the Resnicks, they've done great recent take-downs of McCain and Bush Sr. in the wake of their deaths to push back on the mainstream narratives. Useful for shattering the aura around specific people/things. Economic Update - Digestible discussions on current events from a leftist perspective with Richard Wolff, who does a great job of keeping things accessible for normies. Citations Needed - Excellent media criticism podcast, now with it's own thread! Books: Griftopia - The most succinct-but-still-detailed breakdown of the 2008 financial crisis I've found yet. Taibbi's style is also great for keeping an otherwise dry-af topic engaging. Movies/Docs: The Big Short - normie-friendly entry point to the 2008 crisis, I've used it to open up space for further investigation by following up with the Taibbi book. Adam Curtis' work - After introducing my SO to Chapo via some best-hits including the Adam Curtis interview, she really enjoyed him and wanted to watch some of his films. We just finished Century of the Self last week and she found it pretty eye opening. My next step here is Hypernormalization. You can find most of his work on YouTube for free these days. bawfuls has issued a correction as of 22:23 on Jan 8, 2019 |
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Jan 8, 2019 21:34
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Since I'm asking you to share personal stories, I should start with some of my own. My boomer mother is a lifelong Dem and should perfectly fit the mold of staunch HRC defender. Thankfully, she grew tired of the Clintons and by 2016 was fully on board with Bernard. But she's still a (retired) boomer, and her media consumption reflects this. She watches lots of tv including MSNBC (that Rachel Maddow is very smart! She was a Rhodes Scholar and went to Stanford!), reads traditional print media (LA Times), and has that classic boomer faith in institutions. The impact of all this was most recently apparent when I was home over Christmas and we discussed politics and current events. Even though she loves Bernie and will vote for him again, she bought into the narrative that he and his people were unfairly attacking Beto. She was worried about pushing things like M4A, fight for 15, etc on a national level (despite supporting these policies herself) because it "might hurt us in red states." She was concerned with how we convince chuds to "see the light" and vote for good policy, instead of how to motivate non-voters who already agree with us to show up. Basically she's internalized the messages from traditional media that better things aren't possible, even though when we dig down into the weeds she agrees these things are vital. I tried to counter these things with a dose of reality (setting the Bernie-Beto record straight, explaining how it was coming from long-time DNC/Clinton operatives, pointing out polling on M4A and voter participation, etc), and she was receptive as she always is to my conversation. But her media habits keep her held hostage to status-quo bullshit, and that's a difficult thing to break. She's not going to get on twitter, or stop watching television. She might listen to some podcasts, but being retired she doesn't have a commute in need of filling. I can recommend books, since she reads a lot. But she also has a tendency to buy all the current succ-books, like HRC's "why it was everyone else's fault not mine" or that most recent Bob Woodward book on Trump. My ongoing efforts to radicalize my SO are probably more interesting but that'll have to wait till this thread gets rolling. bawfuls has issued a correction as of 21:37 on Jan 8, 2019 |
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Jan 8, 2019 21:34
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I got called a moral absolutist over Christmas by my family because apparently saying Obama is bad and most democrats are is holding them to a standard I wouldn't follow
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Jan 8, 2019 21:36
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I always enjoyed bringing up workplace democracy. It's a pretty untalked about concept in the modern discourse, even on the left so i get a lot of people who don't know what I mean so I can talk socialism without getting bogged down in tvnews talking points.
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Jan 8, 2019 21:55
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I think showing people the data, and explaining it, about how people are working harder but making less is really helpful. It got through to me.
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Jan 8, 2019 21:57
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Another thing I've had some success with among my friend group in recent months is pointing out the realities of climate change and how incompatible our current system is to any potential solutions. These are generally left, educated people who believe the science and find the details alarming when I force them into the conversation. So connecting the dots between "scientists say we must do X to avoid cataclysm" and "existing fossil fuel companies will not allow that under the current system" helps bring people around to a more radical consideration of What Is To Be Done about it.
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Jan 8, 2019 21:59
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spacetoaster posted:I think showing people the data, and explaining it, about how people are working harder but making less is really helpful. 
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Jan 8, 2019 22:00
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bawfuls posted:yeah this is a classic graph that many people find persuasive, though often times "hey check out this graph on my phone" is a tough sell Don't show the graph. Just talk about the fact that people are working harder/longer for less.
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Jan 8, 2019 22:03
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My father voted for Trump. He's Mexican. He works a lot with engineers (with a lot of southerners) at his city job in Los Angeles. One of the nicest, kindest, men in the world. A shirt off his back kind of guy. My mother, also Mexican leans heavily right, religious. Every single word out of my mouth is like stepping on a mine in a minefield, that I have to defuse while being shot at. The biggest most helpful thing in the world is knowing when things started, and knowing how to act confused to deflate the crazy rear end implications behind every little loving thing. " Obama Phone, oh you mean the free phone thing that started in the 80's?" mazzi Chart Czar has issued a correction as of 22:17 on Jan 8, 2019 |
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Jan 8, 2019 22:10
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I managed to unionize my work place, with the help of some other coworkers, as well as a couple other competing companies in our industry, and by the end of this year we're on track to control 60-70% of the market for our industry (consultant archaeology in Ontario). Archaeology is a mandatory government regulated industry required for development, and it can't be automated or outsourced. Collective bargaining agreements begin this winter, and I'm hella nervous about it. Not only does this mean more wages and even gaining some benefits for those of us who break our backs digging, but a unionized workforce will have more political leverage to fight against Bill 66, a bill introduced by our conservative government to essentially undo 40 years of environmental protection, including heritage management, which endangers First Nations' history and sovereignty, as well as our livelihoods. So yeah that's my story I guess, putting my money where my mouth is and my job on the line.
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Jan 8, 2019 22:11
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There was a pretty good thing I read that said something like "Look around, there is much work to be done, but capital fights to have it left undone exactly for as long as it is more profitable to forbid people from working on them, keeping willing and able workers & materials idle than letting them make the improvements that need to be made. I don't know if that was from a Eugene Debs pamphlet or something, but I have some success getting people to consider anti-capital work programs by criticizing the situations around Flint, Puerto Rico, etc. along those lines.
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Jan 8, 2019 22:11
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My wife is pretty politically apathetic but she likes women in power so I show her all of AOC's sick burns on half the known world
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Jan 8, 2019 22:12
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posting is practice
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Jan 8, 2019 22:13
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I try to avoid the "commie trigger words" that mass media indoctrinates people with. Then I usually explain labor theory of value in simple terms (it's not that complicated) and demonstrate that a basic condition of their employment is that they will never be paid what they are worth. I also point out, as was said earlier, that the workplace is not democratic whatsoever (aside from co-ops, etc.) so they have no say in what the product of their work is used for even while they spend most of their waking hours at work. People are super amenable to that as long as you don't start with "Well, Marx said..." because then all their hear is Marx and their brains switch off. I like to make it personal to them, also, as much as possible. I like to get them thinking specifically about how much profit they generate per hour of work versus what they get paid. Cooks are great for this because depending on the kitchen they can put out hundreds of dollars "worth" of food per hour while getting paid a pittance, and it is very clear and in their face (esp if they handle the food orders and see what the food costs are also). People don't like realizing they generate hundreds of dollars in profits an hour yet they struggle to make ends meet. mazzi Chart Czar posted:My father voted for Trump. He's Mexican. He works a lot with engineers (with a lot of southerners) at his city job in Los Angeles. One of the nicest kindest men in the world shirt off your back kind of guy. How would they respond if you started quoting scripture at them about taking care of the poor? Moridin920 has issued a correction as of 22:19 on Jan 8, 2019 |
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Jan 8, 2019 22:16
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Moridin920 posted:I try to avoid the "commie trigger words" that mass media indoctrinates people with. Then I usually explain labor theory of value in simple terms (it's not that complicated) and demonstrate that a basic condition of their employment is that they will never be paid what they are worth. I also point out, as was said earlier, that the workplace is not democratic whatsoever (aside from co-ops, etc.) so they have no say in what the product of their work is used for even while they spend most of their waking hours at work. I haven't done it because that is too far emotionally but here is something that could happen: "But god said to help those who help themselves. All those poor people out there don't want to do anything. They just want to be lazy." The Bible to some extent is useless because it can be used to go back and forth all day until either one person wins by understand the bigger ideas of the bible or who can quote the most scripture. Edit: Another conversation Mom "you know they are not allowed to sell any religious items at the fort." (My sister works in store at an army fort, because she is married to an army man. During the primaries she wanted Ted Cruz to win.) Me, "yeah that makes sense." Mom, "Makes sense..." (almost talks more) Me, "Yea, separation of church and state." My mom then goes silent. Edit: I want to point out that the reason we have separation of church and state is not because people want to be nice to the Jews, Muslims, Hinduism, Buddhist, Confucist, or Taoist. The reason we have separation of the church and state is because during the 1500's Catholics, Protestants and other Protestants wanted to loving murder each other. The quintessential texts about that conflict are Hamlet in fiction and the history around Mary Queen of Scots and the wars between Catholic France and Protestant England mazzi Chart Czar has issued a correction as of 22:34 on Jan 8, 2019 |
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Jan 8, 2019 22:21
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a good way to defang chud parents(if they're motivated by idiocy instead of racism) is to agree with them on how much obama and clinton fuckin suck and shift that into how socialist policies are good as long as you don't say socialism/communism by name you can usually get some agreement
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Jan 8, 2019 22:24
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Moridin920 posted:I try to avoid the "commie trigger words" that mass media indoctrinates people with. Then I usually explain labor theory of value in simple terms (it's not that complicated) and demonstrate that a basic condition of their employment is that they will never be paid what they are worth. I also point out, as was said earlier, that the workplace is not democratic whatsoever (aside from co-ops, etc.) so they have no say in what the product of their work is used for even while they spend most of their waking hours at work. This is all true. Further, I think it helps to "amplify" their own way of speaking about things that are wrong with the system. Whenever a friend or family member says something that coincides with what I want them to know, I like to give them the little verbal cookie "You know, you're absolutely right," and then question them in the right direction, like they're the one teaching me, and offering facts in the questions as appropriate. Addressing their grievences where they blame individual actors, with ones that include alternative systems explinations helps too, even if the actor in question is detestible. Actually especially in that case, because you get to go "Yes, and". Mostly it just comes down to slowly leading them to the right answer and making them think it was mostly their idea. It won't inform anyone quickly but it will inform them convicingly, and you can do it with anyone in your life you have access to that talks about anything they don't like about society or their workplace.
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Jan 8, 2019 22:25
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basically the killer is to get the thought of "why does my boss make more than me" to stick
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Jan 8, 2019 22:26
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Remember to child lock fox news and MSNBC if you don't already
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Jan 8, 2019 22:26
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the bible is a pro feudalism book, please dont rely on it to criticize capitalism
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Jan 8, 2019 22:28
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i no longer talk to anyone in my family, because they all revealed themselves to be CHUDs after Trump won and my extended family can't seem to resist the urge to drop racial slurs in front of my minority girlfriend my holidays have been way more enjoyable
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Jan 8, 2019 22:29
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B B posted:i no longer talk to anyone in my family, because they all revealed themselves to be CHUDs after Trump won and my extended family can't seem to resist the urge to drop racial slurs in front of my minority girlfriend
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Jan 8, 2019 22:30
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Yinlock posted:basically the killer is to get the thought of "why does my boss make more than me" to stick One of my friends I've been trying to get through to seriously held the opinion "because they are better at making money" which there was a lot to unpack there and I still don't think I've been successful with that person. They're liberal though so I've been going the "Look at Trump" route, trying to draw comparisons between him and buisness leaders.
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Jan 8, 2019 22:30
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My dad is a huge trumpy build the wall chud but he's also on board with nationalizing Prudhoe Bay, the mining industry and like 90% of GND and eco-socialism. It's weird, but arguments can take some interesting directions when he's down with some insanely commie stuff as long as you don't use the few trigger words that sets them off.
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Jan 8, 2019 22:31
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Jon Joe posted:One of my friends I've been trying to get through to seriously held the opinion "because they are better at making money" which there was a lot to unpack there and I still don't think I've been successful with that person. They're liberal though so I've been going the "Look at Trump" route, trying to draw comparisons between him and buisness leaders. make them expand on that, ask how exactly they're better at making money, what do they do specifically
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Jan 8, 2019 22:33
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Jose posted:Remember to child lock fox news and MSNBC if you don't already My dad doesn't watch fox news, but his co-workers do, and he listens to conservative radio on the way home. My major project is to talk about the local area news. To kind of cut away from that weird conservative national message. Also to be more positive. A lot of this stuff stems for fear. The news will tell you ever day about who was shot and killed. (Despite the fact crime peaked in 1993), but nobody is going to make a report about the over 300,000,000 us citizens who woke up, went to work, came home and watched tv. Every 40 seconds a person dies, not from being shot or a heroin over dose but heart problems. That's the biggest killer.
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Jan 8, 2019 22:43
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The biggest problem I face though is whenever someone who eventually comes around to "things need to change" asks "how?" and it's really hard to give a good answer. It's complicated and they always seem to then want some grand vision of transformation AND method to get there, but then if you give those they'll reject it 100% of the time because it doesn't fit their own theories and you've just re-enacted leftist splits on the personal scale, except in this case they realize you're a commie while they go back to being a liberal, but sadder. Mostly I've just tried being honest that it's complicated and we can only hold onto the truth and share it, making changes where we can, which doesn't satisify them but at least keeps them along.
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Jan 8, 2019 22:47
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i force them to read settlers at gun point, and when they don't immediately agree with the premise, I call them racist and part of the labor aristocracy
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Jan 8, 2019 22:47
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At Thanksgiving my in laws went from belting out some Fox News talking points about AOC and Stacey Abrams straight into praising Antifa for driving the Neo Nazis out of their town and I thought I had a stroke. She had heard from one of the Hispanic women who run a local business she frequents about how Antifa came in before the Nazis planned to march and asked her what they could do to help keep her family safe and keep her property from getting damaged. Tribalism can twist your brain into strange shapes and things get a bit weird when you are told that a group of people are bad in abstract by the media you consume but the people from that group you interact with everyday has been slotted into your lizard brain as Your People. I think from my step mom in law's perspective the Hispanic family were already One of Us and Antifa chasing off the Nazis gave her brain the narrative that they are just some good folk kicking out some out-of-towners looking to cause trouble. So I guess the moral of this story is to act locally.
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Jan 8, 2019 22:53
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Iron Twinkie posted:At Thanksgiving my in laws went from belting out some Fox News talking points about AOC and Stacey Abrams straight into praising Antifa for driving the Neo Nazis out of their town and I thought I had a stroke. She had heard from one of the Hispanic women who run a local business she frequents about how Antifa came in before the Nazis planned to march and asked her what they could do to help keep her family safe and keep her property from getting damaged. Tribalism can twist your brain into strange shapes and things get a bit weird when you are told that a group of people are bad in abstract by the media you consume but the people from that group you interact with everyday has been slotted into your lizard brain as Your People. I think from my step mom in law's perspective the Hispanic family were already One of Us and Antifa chasing off the Nazis gave her brain the narrative that they are just some good folk kicking out some out-of-towners looking to cause trouble. personal interaction is generally the cure for racism, which is why the right loves segregation so much
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Jan 8, 2019 22:57
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also gj antifa
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Jan 8, 2019 22:57
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A friend of mine has gone from aggressively centrist to anarcho-communist in the span of a year.. Once people agree with the labor theory of value a lot of the tenants of socialism just fall into place intuitively. I feel like it's really useful to combat the mainstream understanding of the employer-employee relationship. The owner isn't a "job creator" or taking any sort of real risk. Pointing out that the owner of a company is just a glorified landlord renting out their otherwise idle property to workers seems to open a lot of eyes.
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Jan 8, 2019 23:01
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bawfuls posted:yeah this is a classic graph that many people find persuasive, though often times "hey check out this graph on my phone" is a tough sell Computers.jpg
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Jan 8, 2019 23:03
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Yinlock posted:personal interaction is generally the cure for racism, which is why the right loves segregation so much
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Jan 8, 2019 23:10
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 Yinlock posted:a good way to defang chud parents(if they're motivated by idiocy instead of racism) is to agree with them on how much obama and clinton fuckin suck and shift that into how socialist policies are good  Moridin920 has issued a correction as of 23:54 on Jan 8, 2019 |
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Jan 8, 2019 23:48
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I told my mother she should vote for Berenald Sanders instead of Donal Trump and she slapped me and took away my chickie tendies.
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Jan 8, 2019 23:56
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The Archaic posted:I managed to unionize my work place, with the help of some other coworkers, as well as a couple other competing companies in our industry, and by the end of this year we're on track to control 60-70% of the market for our industry (consultant archaeology in Ontario). Archaeology is a mandatory government regulated industry required for development, and it can't be automated or outsourced. Collective bargaining agreements begin this winter, and I'm hella nervous about it. This is awesome. I was starting to connect the dots at my last job and talk abstractly about unionizing. A surprising number (but by no means all) of my coworkers were encouraging me to do it. Then the company went under and we all got canned. It wouldn't have changed anything but I feel like it was a missed learning opportunity. Moridin920 posted:I try to avoid the "commie trigger words" that mass media indoctrinates people with. Then I usually explain labor theory of value in simple terms (it's not that complicated) and demonstrate that a basic condition of their employment is that they will never be paid what they are worth. I also point out, as was said earlier, that the workplace is not democratic whatsoever (aside from co-ops, etc.) so they have no say in what the product of their work is used for even while they spend most of their waking hours at work. Totally agreed, I believe the technical term is "prolix."  Yinlock posted:a good way to defang chud parents(if they're motivated by idiocy instead of racism) is to agree with them on how much obama and clinton fuckin suck and shift that into how socialist policies are good Yeah this is like the cheat code to start a conversation with Republican voters. It really seems to bypass a lot of defenses when you co-opt the "team language" to talk leftist thoughts.
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Jan 9, 2019 00:13
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im real fortunate that almost all of my close family members who have any sort of political consciousness whatsoever beyond what their pastor tells them openly poo poo on republicans any chance they get and generally distrust white democrats/liberals they usually have generally good views on specific injustices, but they don’t really apply their beliefs to a broader political framework or actually try to get involved, so i’ve just tried to hip them to things that i know speak to their specific interests and concerns (like my former-firefighter uncle who rides hard for unions) and use that as a jumping-off point. it’s worked pretty well and it’s taught me a lot. wouldn’t be surprised if there’s someone in my family who voted for trump but luckily they’d be disowned and maybe beaten for admitting it
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Jan 9, 2019 00:15
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i just pointed out to my libertarian friend that capitalism has killed more than communism and he's shut up about politics so that's a victory
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Jan 9, 2019 00:21
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As a not white - I don't have to worry about chud family members and it rules not being able to relate to people going home for Thanksgiving or whatever and getting in fights with their parents about politics.
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Jan 9, 2019 00:22
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