We Still Won't Admit Why So Many People Believe the Big Lie

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

How could so many Americans believe in “the Big Lie?” We see the numbers and we shake our heads. Poll after poll shows that one third of all of us believe the 2020 election was stolen from Donald Trump. Even though the matter has been adjudicated in scores of courts. Even though not a single scintilla of evidence exists that the election was anything but fair.

Six months after the attack on the Capitol triggered by that lie, commentators, political scientists, and families around the dinner table still struggle to come to grips with perverse reality. It is natural to want to understand how we got here. The fate of our democracy turns on not just what our electorate believes but why they believe it. Why are a third of us such gullible rubes?

It’s a question serious enough that it deserves a straight answer, even if that answer makes us uncomfortable. And I warn you, dear reader, the answer will make you uncomfortable. So, if you are tender-minded or sensitive to self-criticism, or a credulous stooge yourself, this might be a good time to stop reading.

Because even the most modest amount of analysis and introspection will reveal that buying into the nonsense peddled by the former president and his clown college of cronies is not an aberration, not due to some momentary lapse on the part of the American electorate. We were raised on lies—including many lies that are much, much bigger than the big one that troubles us today.

That’s the problem. We are as a society—and by “we” I mean virtually all of us on the planet —brought up to believe howling absurdities, ridiculous impossibilities, and insupportable malarkey from our very first moments on Earth. We have massive lie-delivery systems that are the core institutions of our society. And we have created cultural barriers to even questioning those fabrications which are most deserving of skeptical scrutiny. For example, we regularly label as sacred those ideas that are least able to stand up to scrutiny. (Heck, we have folks in our society who can’t even handle the idea that the history we teach our kids might actually be based on what happened, you know, back in the past.)

-more-

https://www.yahoo.com/news/still-won-t-admit-why-091320462.html

[Girard442]

1. Step 1: Someone tries to get people to see the world in a better way.

Step 2: They get crucified.

Step 3: Their followers rehape their message so it says what they want instead of what is.

Process repeats.

[lagomorph777]

39. Step 1: somebody tells made-up stories about some guy 2,000 years ago...

Step 2: They tell us we're bad if don't believe it automatically, despite numerous inconsistencies and absurdities.
Step 3: They sweeten the deal by adding in the Easter Bunny (and candy), Santa (and candy), and the Tooth Fairy (and, ironically, candy).

[Rocknation]

2. The biggest Big Lies we tell are the Big Lies we tell ourselves

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Facing the truth that more people voted against Duh Don than for him means facing the truth that those who supported him so blindly and recklessly are losers, too. The real reason why they're not getting vaccinated is because it's tantamount to admitting that what they bet on Trump came up snake eyes -- and they would literally rather just die. They're stuck in a vicious cycle of the anger-denial-bargaining stages of the terminally ill.


Rocknation

[GeoWilliam750]

37. I have never once lied to myself!!!

With my extraordinary good looks, I have no need.

[Progressive Jones]

3. It takes very little intelligence to avoid belief in the Big Lie.

Believing the Big Lie is more a moral failing than anything else.

[Chainfire]

4. People believe what they want to believe

They are not about to let facts get in the way. What, about 30 years of right-wing hate speech on the radio? Propaganda works.

Expect the lies to get bigger and the believers to get angrier.

[Traildogbob]

7. I want to believe

I look like Brad Pitt, head to toe. But I have mirrors. And people laugh if I say it.

[Traildogbob]

8. And

If I find massive crowds that tell me I am right, guess I will hang with them and beat up those that disagree.

[Evolve Dammit]

17. Agreed.

[Evolve Dammit]

18. Agreed.

[Mr.Bill]

5. Instead of studying why some people believe the lie,

we should be studying why most of us, who have access to the same information, don't believe it. That will tell us what direction we need to proceed in.

[wnylib]

19. Good point. We could also focus on

how to defeat the lies. I don't mean persuading people to stop believing them, because that is nearly hopeless. But they make choices and decisions in elections, businesses, and public behavior that harm others. So, forget changing their minds. How do we defeat them and work around their decisions and behaviors?

[Mr.Bill]

20. It will be a long, slow process,

but we must make them societal pariahs, like we did with smokers. For instance, where I live MAGA hats are pretty much non existant. That's evidence that people are showing their dislike for them, either verbally, or maybe just expressions or body language.

[wnylib]

22. Laughter works in some situations.

I used to work with a guy who believed all the RW nonsense about Obama. One day I was so tired of hearing him repeat the BS, and it sounded so ludicrous, that I burst out laughing. He was embarrassed and told a lie that he thought would be convincing to me. He said he got his info from CNN and MSNBC. I laughed even harder and said, "No you didn't." It was so ridiculous that coworkers who overheard us also started laughing.

It became too embarrassing for him to spout the bull anymore. Sometimes I would make a silly, obviously impossible "logical" conclusion based on what he said to make it even funnier. Occasionally, it even made him see how ridiculous his claims were.

[Mr.Bill]

23. I do that with people open carrying in public cases.

The look on their face is often priceless. I've only had a few chances to do that, but they didn't say a word. They just looked confused, like it was the last reaction they expected.

[wnylib]

26. It WAS the last reaction they expected.

You were supposed to cringe in fear or look on in admiring awe.

People like that, who are confused by the unexpected reaction sometimes even start thinking about why the reaction is puzzling. They might tell themselves that the other person is just not normal and brush it off. Or it might trouble them enough to figure out why they got that reaction and start questioning themselves.

[OldBaldy1701E]

33. And point

Don't forget to point when you are laughing hysterically at whatever lunacy came flying out of their mouths. I still say doing this will go farther than anything to start wearing down these idiots who cannot face the music. Laugh and point. Every time.

[Skittles]

27. we don't believe the lie because there is literally zero proof

that is not hard to figure out

what is harder to figure out why ZERO PROOF doesn't seem to matter to these fascist yahoos.....see, I think they DO know it wasn't stolen, they're just FASCISTS

[Mr.Bill]

28. The answer to that is, they think there is proof.

If you're going to have a conversation with them about this, be ready to debunk their "proof". If they say there are sworn depositions by dozens of election workers that were presented in court, (I've heard this one) you have to make them believe there is a reason the courts did not accept this evidence, and that is why even judges appointed by Trump threw it out.

Challengre their sources. Ask them where did they hear that? More often than not, their answer is "Everybody is saying that" or some such nonsense. It's sometimes a waste of time, but at least make them know you have more credible sources than they do.

[Skittles]

29. I think they know there really is no proof

they just need to act like there is so they can commence with the efforts to suppress the votes

[Mr.Bill]

31. If you can make them think that, that's a start.

And do this in front of other people. That way, even if you don't convince them, you may convince someone who wasn't so sure.

[bucolic_frolic]

6. I guess they refer to advertising, political and social control, religion, professions

Yeah they all lie at times. Fiction books, Hollywood, food, tech, medicine.

[Buckeye_Democrat]

9. The key part for me.

According to Peter Ditto, a social psychologist at the University of California, “our wishes, hopes, fears and motivations often tip the scales to make us more likely to accept something as true if it supports what we want to believe.”

I've consciously resisted believing what I'd WANT to believe for many years, if there's no evidence to support it, and it's served my brain's BS meter pretty well.

It's also why "positive thinking" seminars and books tend to sicken me.

[ShazzieB]

11. It's called confirmation bias.

And it is a powerful force indeed, and something we all should be aware of.

[I_UndergroundPanther]

14. I hate positive think too

And it's fucking scary that trained psychologists and psychiatrists and psychiatric hospitals promote this shit as therapeutic.

To me the most therapeutic thing a therapist can do is listen and accept.

My therapist tried to push that shit on me, in the 2nd session with her. I got disgusted and pissed off and she got treated to a 43 minute rant about lies.

She says nothing about positive thinking bullshit around me now because I will call her out on it and shred her fucking assumptions about it.

[Buckeye_Democrat]

24. Especially when it's treated like a magical elixir...

... for handling real problems.

Reminds me of the "serenity now" episode of Seinfeld.

[Mr.Bill]

25. I think it's Country and Western song,

but I believe in the power of positive drinking.

[jmbar2]

32. LOL

[Mopar151]

35. Iggy Pop! IIRC

[world wide wally]

10. To be honest, any candidate who ever ran for President could have done the same thing if they whined

and cried about it like the ultimate loser has. Hillary could have made a big stink, so could McCain and Romney, not to mention Al Gore. Just think about what a low-life Trump is and the same goes for his followers. I would have hated to have been on their Little League team.

[jmbar2]

12. They really don't believe the lies - it's a tactic to wear down "the libs".

The Big Lie is oppositional strategy against "liberals".

The far right and evangelical Christian movements have been using strategic, knowing lies for many years now to create an "us vs. them" separation into opposing groups. They made it acceptable, and even "cool" to adopt the ridiculous positions offered by their leaders as a way to overwhelm the opposition, and to create group cohesion amongst their own. And it works. We have no idea how to fight back against it.

The strategy was perfected by the Russians, and is known as the Firehose of Falsehoods". It has been adopted by the far right and religious right here because it works so well. They may not have consciously known about the Russian method exactly, but somewhere along the line, they embraced the strategy.

https://www.rand.org/pubs/perspectives/PE198.html

Some of the rubes may truly believe some of the stuff. But most of them are voicing the lies with a wink.

We need to understand lying as a deliberate strategy in order to counter it.

[wnylib]

21. One way to fight against it is

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to recognize that their belief and promotion of lies serves an emotional need and purpose for them. So, listen and look for the emotion/psychology behind the lies and address that when dealing with them or talking to them instead of trying to "reason" with them.

"Why does that upset you so much?"
"Who hurt you so badly in your life?"
"How do you live with so much hate?"

[jmbar2]

30. Very good point

I always like to ask them, "Which country outside of the US is closest to what you want in our government? What model do you propose?"

I doubt that any of them can come up with a better alternative. Sometimes it opens up a good conversation. We must keep talking to them and reaching out.

[wnylib]

34. I'm less interested in reaching out to them

than I am in bursting their false security bubble of lies hatred. Once that bubble bursts and they become human, they stop messing up other people's lives and start sorting out their own.

[unblock]

13. This is some really fascinating bullshit normalizing treatment of the big lie

Ok, yes, it's perfectly valid and interesting to note that somethings are generally subjected to skeptical, objective analysis while others are accepted as a matter of faith or commonly accepted simplifications, myths, or even lies.

And yes, "the big lie" is believed in part because we have systems set up to allow belief in these other lies and the myths and so on.


That's all fascinating. But completely misses the problem. The problem how the hell is it that we as a society chose to give the big lie the second treatment instead of the first? Why on earth didn't and doesn't the media always report on it as a complete fabrication? Why is the media not reporting that this is not normal? Why not say that this is the sort of thing that usually gets the scientific treatment and it's an abuse of social norms to give it the acceptable myth treatment?


That's the problem. Not that acceptable myths exist. But that this is even being considered as one of them.

[peppertree]

15. Wishful/magical thinking

It's what shameless politicians - like today's Republicans - always rely on.

[Thunderbeast]

16. There are cornerstone principles of the lies

1. It confirms their ignorant racism.

2. It confirms their ignorant misogyny.

3. It confirms their ignorant religious biases.

4. It creates a delusional belief that they have been unfairly prevented from realizing their entitled wealth by people unlike themselves.

5. It counters their long-held inferiority complex.

If you are an unskilled person with few realistic avenues to attain the lifestyles seen on TV, you DO hold on to your guns and your Bibles and blame the libruls!

[Mopar151]

36. They think it makes them look smart!

Their idea of smart? Regan

[traitorsgalore]

38. 100+ years of corporate and government propaganda

It's what our predatory capitalism is built on. The lies are easy for most democrats and progressives to see, we're open-minded, educated and willing to learn, to see the big picture. Qanut racist repubs are easily brainwashed as they don't have open minds capable of rational thought processes, they suffer from pathologically low self-esteem due to all kinds of republican cultural behaviors such as hating educated people. That low self-esteem is why the sick fucks enjoy seeing others suffer too.

The big lie believers need mental health help, something that will never happen until universal healthcare is enacted in the U.S.. Propaganda is here to stay and it targets those too stupid to recognize it. Until "conservative" culture embraces education, it's doomed.

As for this article, it's not Americans that believe the big lie, it's mentally-ill and traitorous repubs that WANT to believe it.

[MustLoveBeagles]

40. K&R