December 26, 2013

Do Conservatives *really* think Liberals are 'incurable'...?

(First, I have to give you the disclaimer before you all freak out and think I am a troll. I have been a liberal hippie my whole life and have actually asked my own father to leave my home for spewing Glenn Beckkk's rants...BUT I have a sinful guilty pleasure, and it is reading the conspiracy forums. Well, I soon realized that while the woowoo stuff is entertaining, most of the people there are truly bigoted, RW Christian, Obama haters and worse... So while I don't pretend to be one of them or post there, I just avoid the obvious threads that scream HATE! and stick to the freaky-deaky stuff about the comets, mayan calendar etc... Like I said, it is a guilty pleasure )


Anyway - so I popped in there this evening and there was this discussion, obviously spurred by family gatherings, about "is it possible to reform a Liberal?"
The responses were shocking to me, I guess I am more naieve than I thought. They basically see us as purely emotional, fact-avoiding freaks, moochers & freeloaders, who have no hope to change and who will narc out conservatives (to whom I have NO idea).

Now I have seen us discussing similar ideas here sometimes... but NO WAY have I seen the pure vitriol that I do from the other side of the coin. These people scare me. They really DO equate liberalism w/socialism & communism and think we are severely dangerous in turn.

I guess my question is...how the heck do we get past the polarity? And how in the heck do you guys deal with extremeism in your families or circles of friends? ... aren't we liberals the more tolerant of the two sides??

I don't want to pollute DU with the link, but I will provide it if you guys think it adds to the discussion...