So I felt like its time for this thread.
As a disclaimer . Im black , bisexual and schizophrenic
I got a bunch of friends and acquaintances. One of them…lets call him Jack.(he is white)… and me get along well enough. We only know each other online, dont even remember how we met tbh, but we go back like I think I’ve known him since 2016 or 2017 or something like that.
I know what he looks like and which state he lives in, but thats pretty much it.
Anyway, Jack and me talk almost daily, mostly about anime and gaming. He lives with his grandparents who he takes care of, has a cat he really seems to love. Also smokes a ton of weed, like daily I think. He’s older than me and I like him (platonically, as a buddy obviously).
Here’s the thing tho. He’s American. Yes, really XD
Not saying all Americans are bad or whatever, but I’m almost sure Jack’s got brainworms. Like, a lot.
Not saying hes a fascist or something. If I had to guess I’d say he’s some weird libertarian type? Like he’s said before he doesn’t like Trump and once talked about how fucked up stuff is for Black people in the US. But he’s also not into liberal politics (probably for bad reasons) and super sceptical of mainstream media… which ok, fair.
But like how the fuck do I even talk to someone like that in good faith? How do you try and push them into a healthier direction.
I’m not tryna turn him into a theory reading communist or whatever, but the lil bit of politics I have picked up from our convos seemed very conspiracy brained. It would probably be easier if he was just like, an MSNBC lib lmao.
Any input and tips welcome. I will say our daily chats help me generally speaking. It helps me with my schizophrenia to have someone to talk to on a basically daily basis. I have other friends (some which have much better politics) but they are usually pretty busy and not always available.
If possible I dont want to cut him out of my life.
One last thing. Jack does seem to think highly of me and probably values our relationship quite a bit
I’ve had some success appealing to people who are into conspiracies with the real stuff the feds have done. Anti-communist propaganda campaigns and stuff like Radio Free Asia can be good topics to ease them in.
Sometimes you can just get them talking about how they don’t trust the US govt and how anything the govt seems to want turns out bad. So maybe the things governments don’t want are actually good? Why is the US so opposed to communism? This line of thinking won’t always work, but a thoughtful person will consider these questions and if they already hate (or at least don’t trust) the US government in general…well, the most straightforward conclusion is that communism is a good thing.
This way, the person doesn’t have to understand communism at all to understand that the US opposes it for selfish reasons (everything they do is selfish)
I was basically coming here to say this. My best results with the casual-to-moderately conspiracy-brained have been with giving them real, healthier conspiracies to chew on.
"Do you trust the government about (insert whatever thing here)? Me neither, so why should I trust the biggest bunch of liars on earth about the thing they’re most scared of?’