For the past eight years, maybe longer, I’ve had this idea I think a lot of people shared. That idea was that Trump supporters or Fox News conservatives, or whoever, were being duped. They were voting for and believing the things they did because they were being lied to and had bad information.
I’ve heard this referred to as coddling, but I like the term infantilizing better. By that I mean, they’ve been treated like children who didn’t know any better. I’m done with that. I’m ready to treat these people like adults. Adults that have access to the same information everyone else does and who have made a choice to support the heinous things and repugnant individuals they do.
I’m not going to assume they’re stupid or being tricked. Even if they were, I don’t care anymore. I’m going to treat them like adult humans who have the capacity to make their own decisions and be judged on them. I’m going to believe them when they say horrible things, repeat conspiracy theories, or degrade others.
n the past, I’ve thought (and maybe still do) that a lot of Trump voters know they’re talking bullshit. They don’t expect to be taken seriously. Or maybe they do believe it, but they’re so used to being treated with kid gloves, they think they can get away with it. Fuck them. I don’t care. They said it. I’m going to believe them.
They heard Trump say “we will root out the communists, Marxists, fascists, and the radical left thugs that live like vermin within the confines of our country,” and say that immigrants were poisoning the blood of our country, and didn’t have enough of a problem with it to support someone else.
I’m going to respect my fellow Americans enough to take their words and actions at face value. I’m going to judge them in the same way I would anyone else who said or believed those things.
Collin Donnell 