An old hippy friend of mine just told me he's now an O'Reilly fan

[upi402]

I'm so depressed. He was a peace activist and a vegetarian for decades. But they got him!

He started going to church, then he started watching Fox. Tonight he told me he really likes O'Reily, "but sometimes he's kind of a blowhard", he said.

How can this happen to a rational, kind person? He was never religious and always spiritual. Then he started with church and now has fallen off the edge of flat earth.

I just don't understand this at all. It's like cancer or something. How is this spreading after all the BS in recent years?

:banghead: :nuke: :wtf:

[tinfoil tiaras]

1. Sick.

I'm so sorry. Even the soldiers say that O'Reilly's coverage of the war is "blatantly one-sided" and "way oversimplfied" (it was on Countdown Monday night). I dont know how it feels to loose a friend to the "dark-side", but I send my best wishes to you :D

[Erika]

2. Mid life crisis? n/t

[Kingshakabobo]

3. Could be. I wonder if he purchased a Corvette? nt

[T Town Jake]

9. What's wrong with owning a Corvette?

(n/t)

[Webster Green]

19. Nothing.....as long as its not one of those '70s models...

}(

[NRaleighLiberal]

4. It's hard to know why some people are vulnerable to this sort of thing -

insecure? lonely? easily led? disenfranchised? likes structure? I know that when I was young (and a hippie), many of my friends said "wait till you get older, get a job, make a bit of money - you will turn conservative" - which I never understood, and obviously, it never happened - still a hippie at heart, as left as they come...

[Graybeard]

5. Check for a large pod-like plant...

...in his basement. "YOU'RE NEXT!" AAAAAHHHHGGGGG!!!

[SharonAnn]

32. With 2 of my friends it was early signs of Alzheimers, though we didn't

know that at first. Just this sudden puzzling obsession with right-wing talk show hosts on TV and radio. Out of character for both of them.

Thinking it through later, I realized that perhaps they were losing the ability for more complex thinking, nuances, etc. and grabbed onto these because they "simple to understand". Issues were black and white, good and bad, us vs them, etc. They could feel comfortable "understanding" the issues when presented this way.

I now have an uncle who's now 80, who's becoming obsessed with right-wing talk show hosts now. Of course, he's always been conservative, but this is a new level.

[LoveMyCali]

6. Rampant drugs

during the sixties? :shrug:

You did say he was a hippie. :hippie:

[Bucky]

17. Ha! If he'd just said "no" like Nancy Reagan told him to...

For some the Hippie movement was about opening your mind up to create a better world. For others it was about the self indulgence of cheap drugs and easy sex. Most right wingers need a healthy dose of drugs and (probably coerced) sex just to unwind after a hard day of wagging their moralistic fingers at the people whose lives are destroyed by their policies.

[GreenPartyVoter]

7. Get him to watch TDS, Colbert, and Countdown STAT!

[turbo_satan]

8. Vegetarians can develop severe Vitamin B12 deficiency...

... which can lead to all kinds of neurological problems and loss of mental acuity. Or maybe he ate some bad 'shrooms or smoked too much dope.

[durrrty libby]

10. Probably senility. The brain shrinks n/t

[upi402]

Maybe so, he's had hormone tretment for protate cancer too.

Maybe getting older and the harsh chemicals and hormone treatment combines to ruin a beautiful guy...

[durrrty libby]

14. That is sad. Maybe you can save him from becoming

angry and bitter

Falling into the O'liely trap is not good for his health

[upi402]

22. I moved out of the woods

that we lived in for a dozen years. We're a good distance apart now.
I've never once been able to convert a conservative, when trying to 'save' them (apt term). They just condescend to me and I eventually get toxic people out of my life. Accepting people's differences and faults is cool, but conservatives seem sick to me now.

[Leopolds Ghost]

35. Tell him he should go to a different church.

Seriously. Most of the "born again" and "hippie churches" were right wing John Burch cult-like entities started for the sole purpose of twisting the youthful idealism of religiously uncommitted baby boomers who were righteously indignant with the state of the world. Helps explain the growth of the religious right thereafter.

Then you have the so-called "charismatic" churches that look down on anyone who is not "born again" (a doctrine ironically invented as an alternative to baptism by radical, anti-government 17th century protestant pacifists.) All too often these "charismatic" churches have become fronts for race and class "solidarity" (read: separatism) in an economically beleaguered community. How unchristian. The chief value most of them espouse is getting ahead in the world, because you have to be a smooth talking businessman to succeed, the way the Baptist churches are set up financially.

[buff2]

11. It's the devil in a Jesus disguise

I really think the O'reillys and the limpballs in this country are possessed and they are VERY GOOD at recruiting.The devil is very powerful and the repukes do his work.I am so thankful I'm not one of them. :scared:

[Leopolds Ghost]

36. Silver people on the shoreline n/t

[Marr]

12. Let me take a guess. He's either working two jobs or he's got one

crap job with a bitch of a commute. He doesn't have alot of friends around, and church is his week's social highlight.

That's what happened to a couple of my friends. You get so busy just trying to live, that you don't have time for anything else, like reading or researching news stories. You feel angry all the time, because you feel like you're being cheated somehow. Then you see a guy like Bill O'Reilly or Rush Limbaugh who tells you you're right to feel the way you do, and he'll even tell you who's to blame. Liberals.

And there you are. Suddenly there's something to direct your anger at. There's a sort of order to the world again. And there's a good excuse for all your life's failures. None of it was really *your* fault- it was the liberals.

[upi402]

18. LOL, that's me not him!

He's retired, good union pension. Lives on many acres of waterfront. Maybe he's pissed cuz he has to tote so many salmon?

I'm the candle burning on both ends one, and sometimes I'm PO'd. But I don't know if it's from the Republican mess or a hectic life. When I slow down I'll think about it...:silly:

[Marr]

20. Haha!

Oops- :D

Well, what can I say? You'd better watch out, bro- the last two people I knew in that position are wearing frigging "Club Gitmo" t-shirts now. Well, I'm in the same spot, actually- so I guess it's not necessarily terminal.

[JHB]

44. Maybe his inner "cranky old coot" is finally coming out...

Did he ever say exactly what he did like about O'Really?

[Terri S]

13. uh oh...

sounds like there's a dire need for some anti-cult intervention here..

[leesa]

15. I do not know what it is about this "new" Christianity that makes people so damned

mean. They 'accept Christ as their Savior' and all of a sudden their hearts are black as the ace of spades. What the hell happens?

[southerncrone]

29. Amen to that!

You'd think they were the savior themselves. They get real high & mighty, too. I've asked some of them with their holier-than-thou attitudes, if that is really the "Christian" way & they looked at me like they didn't know WTF I was talking about. These "new Christian" churches are nothing but cults or country clubs, or both. A place for the weak & pitiful to be bolstered up and feel like somebody by fellow unthinking losers who are also trying to keep up with the Jones'.:nuke:

[Stardust]

30. Welcome to DU!

[southerncrone]

31. Thanks for the welcome

Glad to be w/the like-minded!

[SammyWinstonJack]

34. Self righteous with absolutely no reason too be.

[Bucky]

16. If he has sons, ask him if he'll encourage them to enlist.

[Leopolds Ghost]

37. "i'm a Libertarian", he'll say, as he smokes another salmon.

"I believe in a strong defense, but nobody can tell me or my kids what to do with their own lives. If their path leads them to creative pursuits, why waste their youth in the military? Let the people who want to serve, serve."

That's what he'll probably say, being a Bobo (Bourgeois Bohemian) apparently.

[Cetacea]

21. knowing how you feel

I was amazed and sickened to find how many people I considered "enlightened" if you will, had voted for Reagan and Bush. And it certainly has gotten worse.

[upi402]

23. Me too Artiechoke

They're not mean to hang with, and very smart in terms of memory and assimilating input. Just not real questioners nor conceptualizers. They get the propaganda input ingrained deeply it seems.

It's impossible to reason with them after they start buying it too.

[Cetacea]

24. The power of televisiion

and the current media is probably the culprit. So many people are working so hard to make ends meet and when they have a few moments to relax in front of the telly they are bombarded with so much crap. Add some Rush to the commute home, and it's hard to escape the "group think."
It's all very sad.

[upi402]

25. hammer meet nailhead n/t

[Cetacea]

26. yah.

I gotta go. Hope you had a good Halloween. It certainly has been an interesting one in politics.
Cheers

[southerncrone]

27. Mind control

I've come up with no other explanation for these types of personality disorders except mind control.
Those churches & subliminal messages on Fox. I know they say they aren't there, but it's too strange.
My brother is the same way--took a 180 after joining a church & is a Fox addict. :crazy:

[Jcrowley]

28. That is not your friend- beware

[Jed Dilligan]

33. Sounds like the old Reagan trick worked on him

Cons love to make you think they are the rebel against the "librul" establishment.

[B Calm]

38. Sounds like he took way too many drugs in his youth.

[NNN0LHI]

39. I personally know some Jesus freaks who got that way after taking acid

Thats a fact. Sounds like we have another one.

Don

[conscious evolution]

40. That damned brown acid

It's evil I tell you!

[BoneDaddy]

41. People change

often times the most radical merely flip the coin to the other extreme. It is called reaction formation. Look how many self described "partiers" become holy than thou born agains...they have no sense of balance. We shed many skins in this life.

[spanone]

42. There were a lot of stupid hippies too.

[Name removed]

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