cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/19930828
this post was submitted on 22 Sep 2024
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I had a friend that voted for Brexit. When I asked him why, he said that his grandfather was able to buy a house and take care of his family on his salary. His father was able to do the same. He said, these immigrants come in and live two families to a house and are willing to work for far less. He said, I don't want that type of future for myself.
No amount of telling him that -- the people that caused this issue are also benefitting from Brexit -- could convince him.
Was weird because I wasn't an immigrant but my family was and he was cool with me.
They come so close. I understand the anger, broken promises from society at large, but then they do that little twist at the end. It's like they're about to win the race, then decide to just veer off into the stands right before getting to the finish line.
It's because their pain is very real, their struggles are very real, their feelings are very often valid, and they understand the concrete impact that it has had on them and their way of life.
They can't abstract that out and critically think about why that is the case, so they just repeat what an authority told them and is easy for them to understand.
I don't know though if it is simply a lack of education or an inherent human solipsism that is hard to break through.
It is the same the world over, even before TVs when newspapers brought the news, and before that anything written down was true because "priests and scholars definitely wouldn't lie." That is why extremely strict factual news laws have to be brought into effect with anyone caught lying bearing fines based on a percentage of their revenue to combat fascism that is based wholly on fear fabrication. The problem is, of course, policing that correctly as for example an American Trump regime would simply use those laws to say that anything they don't like is not true (they they do anyway now).
I think the last step of understanding the issue is difficult because it requires admitting that their current belief and way of life is not optimal for themselves.
Everyone or almost everyone thinks highly of their own decision skills or at least that they do their best. They believe they can make good choices and that they can either outsmart or work harder than others. The truth is that, maybe they can, but there's very little choice in how it's rewarded. The believable lie is that work is compensated fairly, and once someone has put half a life into this lie, it's difficult and soul crushing to admit that it's plain wrong. It may cause frustration and anger, which doesn't solve it. A solution isn't evident or maybe it seems out of reach, causing more frustration, causing more anger. It's a lot easier to take out anger on people than fighting a system. And especially in groups, it's easier to point at smaller minority groups, because their own group is stronger or have more votes, so it's actually doable. They get a relief for the frustration by believing that they're doing something about their issue. It won't work though. It's similar to being bullied in school and then thinking it will help to take it out on the younger kids, instead of confronting the older bully.
It takes courage to fight upwards. Having been through unionisation efforts I can assure you that people living from one paycheck to the next are absolutely not courageous.
In regards to news, it's also a lot easier to simply choose the news that keeps presenting their existing belief.
Yep, if you listen to guys like Steve Bannon talk, they sound like Marxists in their critiques of the system, up until the point where they have to identify the culprit. Instead of capitalists, they'll go and blame liberal elites, immigrants, etc.