Investing massive amounts of care and interest in to fake characters and products controlled by rich strangers was really stupid
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Yeah definitely. That was the impression I got from him, too. he kept repeating, "If this was true, the truth gets legs, it would be all over the news!"
At which point I would explain that he can't trust the news and I'd show him the sources and the actual footage of stuff. We went though a laundry list of things and he was just blown away and kept asking, "Why didn't I see it on the news?!"
That's the part that made it so depressing.
As a side-note: I'm also tired of the teacher bullshit. They have it so damn good these days. They're not in any way underpaid for the shitty job that they do and the massive amount of time that they get off now. Why the hell do they "deserve appreciation" for doing their damn job, anyway? Do they go around "appreciating" the people who keep the enter infrastructure of modern society well maintained in working order through life-shortening grueling physical labor? Do they go around "appreciating" the agricultural workers who slave away for much less money putting food on our shelves? It's always the industries that are predominantly women that want "appreciation" for doing what they're paid to do.
All of my sympathy for teachers has gone completely out the window. lol
Did you start off with the Gel Man amnesia affect by any chance?
I'd be interested in the general trend of how things went if you remember. What was the key underpinning of his reality that he was relying on? It sounded like he believed that "The news is truth" and that was his first principle.
Well, he's always been a laborer and we never really touched upon an area of his own expertise; however, while I assume he'll very likely begin questioning things a little bit more now, I don't expect he'll actually remember everything we spoke about — either that or he'll use some type of sophistry to convince himself for why it's all not true. He was really flabbergasted at the things I was showing him. It's not that easy to break years of conditioning that people have come to accept as normal, especially when it's one of the pillars of who they are. I believe that's one of the reasons he sat there after we arrived asking me so many questions, going from one topic to the next, each one getting shot down.
If you're curious how it all began, then it's easy to describe. I needed a shuttle ride home because my car had a couple recalls I needed taken care of and the dealership had a free service, so I took it.
When I got in the car, I began making small talk and I mentioned that I'm tired of all the Covid shit and that the world is panicking because it's been blown out of proportion by media fearmongering. I began the conversation that way because it's a good way to get people to open up about their beliefs without explicitly asking them.
When i said that, he immediately said, "Yeah, they've been putting a lot of focus on it but at least they're not spreading misinformation like Fox News, which has been causing it to spread more."
That's all it took for me to know everything I needed to about where he sits, both socially and politically.
I immediately clarified that I meant all of the media and that CNN, MSNBC, CBS, PBS, etc., were just as egregious in their misinformation than anyone else — if not vastly more so. I said that nearly every single headline story promulgated by media the last five or six years.
From there it all flowed pretty naturally. When he asked for an example I began with the riots they hid, along with the "murders" committed by police and then worked through the list of everything else.
Gold right there, thanks fren.
I mean, it might sound pretty manipulative of me, but I've found that the best approach to getting people to open up is to find something relatable, something that isn't out of place for anyone to say and that's a pretty bland statement. After that, you then follow it up with an additional comment that people are somewhat divided upon that's not too inflammatory, but you do it in a way that makes you seem almost naive or uninformed on the topic.
It's all to gauge their reaction and response. After they take the bait, you know everything you need and can proceed with a conversation or let it drop from there.
In my case, he seemed like a nice enough guy, so I used it to further probe. The most important thing in conversations like that is making concessions. People love to be told their right — even when they're wrong. But you can almost always find something in what they say that may hold some truth. You use that to feed their ego that way it doesn't end up in an argument, but rather, slowly making them consider what you're right about. People are pretty social creatures who want to find common ground. If done properly, you can find out a lot about people.
But that's just my experience. Maybe others have different methods that work just as well.