I have a friend whose dad went so far down the Q cult that he started believing shit like "Hitler wasn't that bad of a guy". It's really sad.
this post was submitted on 10 Oct 2025
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"Was Hitler a fascist?"
"no"
"How about Mussolini?"
"no"
Fuckin' brilliant.
It bugs me that he laughs at his parents instead of talking to them. It's clear that his dad doesn't know what a fascist is. His only reference is his cult leader saying that opposing fascism is wrong (which is fucking insane). It feels like the next logical question after his dad denying that Mussolini was a fascist would be to ask who is a fascist, and if he can't answer that, ask why we even have the word fascist if there never has been one. His dad is on camera and participating, but I assume when pressed like this he's likely to just leave. If that happens, he's not leaving because he was insulted or laughed at, he's leaving because he's frustrated that he can't reconcile a simple logical question with his understanding of the situation. Where it goes from there is all on the dad, but I have to believe that some degree of people live inside their bubble and have never been forced to consider that they're being lied to. All that being said, you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it stop voting against its own interests.
This is part of a long and ongoing conversation. His dad turns into an actual cry baby every time he's challenged directly. The new approach is rhetoric.
Mental illness and narcissism hiding behind political ideology.
I think it's more ignorance, lack of critical thinking and forced ideology more than anything. I think these folks are good willed but lacking all those things (except ignorance, but not in a bad way).
Edit: and I think all three are exploited by the party they vote for.
Ignorance leads to easy brainwashing, but there's also unreflected anger and the far right's invitation to project it into anything they point at. I guess one could call that some sort of mental illness, but that's too broad a statement when the video goes into much more detail.
This video echos plenty in our families lives. Sometimes it's hard to have a meaningful conversation with the now brainwashed boomer.
My wife's stepdad exhibits this oppositional defiant behavior stuff and he just believes everything on FOX. I see it in the 5 year olds around where I live who have helicopter parents and the children just do the opposite to what they know is right.
I think with many boomers there’s not enough neuro-plasticity in their brains to get them to think rationally, including certain "free world" leaders.
Various TikTok clips.
- Are you against fascism
- No, I'm for Republican
🤣 The whole conversation goes like that. Answering No when you sense that answering Yes would be against the doctrine, and vice versa. Without thinking.
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so far the biggest disconnect is about 16 min in where she says that even her own mother would've disapproved of most of the things MAGA stands for. That is the actual brainwashing in action.
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or the gay Republican who says he doesn't want to be associated with all this LGBTQ stuff.
People using Tiktok calling other people braindead. I agree with the sentiment but they're not really making this point from a position of strength.
Maybe take out the Tiktok part?
Tiktok literally radicalised me against Israel. I had to uninstall the app because all it would show me is dead Palestinians.
So idk about this take.