Down with the bugs energy

It was a confluence of things.

And to set the stage, political leanings are complex. There is a tendency (insistence, I’d even say now) to collapse a 10 dimensional notion to 1D. At the time (myself, and what conservative parties were offering) aligned on a retrospectively narrow majority of dimensions.

I’d really drank the capitalism kool aid. You work hard, you get rewarded. The role of the government is to facilitate the opportunities by putting business is a favourable position to incentivize the creation of opportunities to create jobs. Poor people don’t want to work; if the jobs are readily available it’s on them for not participating.

I’d also really drank the baseless vibe Kool aid. “Conservatives are good at economy” “Conservatives are for personal freedom”. These associations were unchallenged through my youth. You spend 20 years internalizing those “truths”, it’s nonsensical to expect to convince someone otherwise in minutes.

I grew up in a rural area. It was just accepted as truth. There were no homeless people in my sightlines. I understood their experience as much as I understood the experience of a kangaroo.

I moved to the city, and my friend group was a mixed bag politically. Nobody too far in any direction, and politics wasn’t a major topic of conversation.

I did have a gaming buddy, though, full on communist. Super smart dude. Loves Talking about politics. Usually voice chat. A few times a year he’d be in town and we could meet for lunch or something.

I think eventually I would have shifted my perspective organically as a function of just having a broadened perspective, but he was certainly the catalyst.

Things I took as true, he’d say “no” and have data to show it. We’re men of an era, so I wouldn’t say he was “nice” about it, but it was never personal attacks.

We would (and still do) argue. At length. It wasn’t an overnight thing. It was a years thing.

When I mentioned earlier about the many constituent pieces of a political leaning, those really just got dismantled one by one. Or, shifted. I still think personal freedom is important. I just now reject the idea that conservatives offer policy to support that value.

Nobody has asked, but I think the key for me was to not make it about identity. Show how your values don’t map to the political party you think you support. When I’d challenge, he would respond directly. If we were talking about… I dunno… Taxes, and he felt like I was making points that he didn’t have the greatest answers for, he wouldn’t just change the subject (but her emails!) kinda thing. He loves being right but he had the integrity to not switch gears just to “win”. That built a lot of trust.

It was probably a few years before I actually ever read any backing sources he ever provided. But eventually, I was just too curious. If he hadn’t built that trust I don’t think I ever would have.

I don’t think anyone can flip someone with an identity-based political association in a single conversation online. If the relationship is transient, there is no trust.

You gotta charge up the person’s curiosity level. I think many people can contribute to that, though.

People who trip over themselves to make broad statements about how stupid and terrible you are for how you voted reduce the curiosity. People who respectfully engage with curiosity, avoiding identity attacks raise it.

And, it’s not just me who believes this. Putin does, as well: it’s the playbook for destabilizing western democracy. His troll farms are designed to get people to just snap at eachother and write eachother off as terrible people and lost causes.

Imagine having someone tell you that despite a right leaning tendency, they still vote for Democrats.

And then you swoop in and tell them they’re a giant piece of shit.

You know that your behavior is literally what Russian troll farms are intended to cultivate as per the Muler report, right?

Don’t know if I’ve ever done it, but it was done to me.

So, it’s obviously possible.

I’m pretty amused by the mix of comments where people are offering up themselves as irrefutable evidence, while others proclaim with certainty it can’t be done. Actually a humbling perspective see people who’ve convinced themselves trying to convince others I don’t exist.

Tell me you didn’t finish reading even one complete sentence before responding, without telling me you didn’t even read one complete sentence before responding.

I’d go even one step further, which is to say he’s even dumber and more petty than you’re even giving him credit for.

He thinks expanding the physical size of a nation is a metric for success. Greenland is relatively large, (and he thinks it’s larger than it really is because he can not comprehend the reality of a Mercator projection). He knows there’s only a few tens of thousands of people there. Seems like an easy grab for a big plot of land.

He wants golden statues of himself in Gaza. He thinks the 49th parallel is an arbitrary line. The Panama canal is one of 4 presitegeous global pieces of infrastructure that his dementia addled brain can even recall.

He want big. He want thing people know. He want golden statue. He like 4 year old. He mad.

Trying to ascribe any meaning beyond that to his actions is like when people anthrpomorphise an insect as being embarrassed. We’re projecting meaning for which there just isn’t evidence to support, where there are simpler explanations to be had.

He is profoundly insecure, profoundly stupid, and profoundly petty. This provides sufficient explanation for everything he’s ever done.

Should I get a small drone (below 250 g) and practice?

Yes. Turn the hypothetical into a reality with 1 simple trick.

It’s for sure better to start imperfectly than to just dream perfectly

Special prize for blackout?

A pizza party from 12-12:30, perhaps?

Other similar polls in the timeframe put “would want to” at about 9% as well. Some are even phrased as “would vote to”.

What surprised me was the 18-34 demo who are apparently about 17% for it.

That being said, the quality of a lot of these polls aren’t great. Many aren’t random samples and come with a big disclaimer.

But, still, none have been as high as 20%. That’s crazy high as a national average. Really curious breakdown by state. The most support for joining to USA is AB and it’s still around just 13%. This suggests the most “I want to leave” state wants to join Canada much more than the most “I want to leave province” wants to join the USA.

I thought I told you to shave those sideburns!!

Yes. It’s just regurgitating whatever was in the training set.

I’m having a hard time finding the link to the poll itself…

But I suspect that the poll had distinct categories for “strongly oppose” and “oppose”.

So either the article is lumping the two responses together (which would be shitty because they explicitly say “strongly”) or it’s likely that the number of Canadians who are open to it is <20.

From previous polling I’ve seen, it was around 13% who were open to it. Not even saying they would, but merely open to the idea.

Skibidi alert

It’s possible that transient voters helped push the needle, but the “deconservativeing” of AB may also be a result of the less exciting explanation of urbanization. In general, urban populations trend “left”, and simply put, the share of the total voters (and seats) in urban areas has grown meaningfully since Klien.

Could be a lil’ of both, too.

Thanks, I had paywall remover scanning just waiting for someone to archive it

Post to remember to come back once there is a non paywall link so I can comment beyond the content of the headline

Trump is going to say it was on purpose, for some stupid reason.

Si… Ja ja ja… si!