

You’re still arguing past the point though. What does the internet do for most of these people that local radio and TV technically hasn’t or couldn’t?
Nothing. That’s my point. They have access to other news sources. They choose the ones that they like to hear.
Also possibility of access is drastically different from actually having access.
Nowadays, ~95% of the country has internet access - in actuality, not ‘could get it if they wanted’.
Further, people can and often do still live without owning a computer or accessing the internet.
Some 5% in this country. I somehow doubt they’re the majority of conservatives in this country. I, in fact, would go so far as to doubt that they’re significant politically at all.
Right now many of these people are struggling with the biggest case of cognitive dissonance they’ve ever had. It’s the perfect time to strike. And plant the concept that they’re being lied to, by all their local broadcasters. The evidence is there, they’re seeing it. We could talk to them about it like adults.
That’s the line that I’ve been hearing for at least 20 fucking years now. It didn’t work when Iraq was proven to be based on lies, it didn’t work when Obamacare fearmongering was proven to be based on lies, it didn’t work when Trump’s entire first administration was proven to be built on lies. It didn’t work with COVID - it didn’t work with antivaxxing, it hasn’t worked with jack fucking shit.
We’ve tried talking to them like adults. Again and again and again. “One more time” is the motto of the fucking Dem Party on this issue, and that’s been failing for 30 years.
Maybe “We just need to sit down and have a talk with literal Nazis” isn’t the winning strategy it sounds like.
Or we could accuse them of things they aren’t doing.
Bruh, every accusation I’ve leveled thus far is absolutely things they are doing.
Gloat and ridicule them for internet points. Causing them to retreat and double down, being just as bad as they are. Letting the oligarchs continue to divide us and win.
Maybe validating the ones simping for the oligarchs isn’t actually fighting “The oligarchs continue to divide us and win”, but actually strengthening their hand? Just a thought.
My citation for… the fact that people with the entire internet at their fingertips must, necessarily, choose right-wing sources in order to receive right-wing sources, and are not constrained by the availability of other sources, since the internet has a vast selection of sources to choose from, and right-wing media constraints a la cable or satellite don’t play into it?
… are you being serious right now?
90% by broadband subscription in 2021, 96% by usage in 2024
Oh, cool, so what will asspatting those experiencing cognitive dissonance do?
Oh, it reminds them that there are no consequences for believing things that make them feel good? And it signals to others that there are no consequences to believing in things which make them feel good, no matter how terrible those things are?
You seem to think that, after a decade of open fascism, there are reachable ones left.
The fucking Cheneys are out of the cult. The Cheneys. The. Fucking. Cheneys. Romney and McCain (Rest in Peace/Piss) are RINOs to most in the party. There are literal golden idols set up to Trump.
The number of ‘reachable’ ones left are very small, and live in a fucking hole in the ground. And attempting to reach them by normalizing the vast majority of conservatives with polite discourse about how it’s okay that they were wrong and they can still change will create more unreachable converts with normalization of fascism, far more than any number of the 5%> that you find who were really just ignorant, and not feigning ignorance to fit their ideological urges.