General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Why are Republicans always such dicks? [View all]VOX
(22,976 posts)They tend to be hyper-reactive, and are stressed more easily than the average person in the face of a long-term challenge or issue. Their chosen media has drilled them with anger and fear for 50 years at least -- fear of communism, fear of socialism, fear of POC, fear of any religion other than hardcore Christianity, fear of women, fear of strangers, fear of other cultures, fear of education, fear of science, fear of change. Which is interesting, in that, with all that fear they habitually carry around inside, they fancy themselves the "tough, realistic guys." Tough, but they want to open-carry a firearm, which makes them fearful, in my book. All that 2nd Amendment-chatter is a load of horse-flop; if you can't go to the local Quick-Mart without strapping on a shooting iron, you've entered pathological territory. Same with the "deep state" absurdity.
And they're enraged about...most everything. It's like they're pissed off by having to exist. Non-issues like flag-burning or the "war on Christmas" rile them up into a frenzy. Has anyone ever known a right-winger happy about much of anything? They're always on to the next "insult" they've painfully endured, like eight years under a Kenyan president. Yet they refer to their nemeses as "snowflakes." They've got projection down to an art, and they go there every time. They cry "fraud!," when it was they who enabled the tampering. All of it has overtones of closed-off, insulated cult behavior.
As to what is actually wrong, that's for sociologists and behavioral health officials to determine. However, it does appear that most of these people are beyond salvaging. There will be no epiphany, no sudden insight. Only more fear and anger.