Why do people buy the GOP garbage?

[noise]

For sure, propaganda and fearmongering are effective means of manipulation. But the belief system is so off, so contradictory, so absurd.

In many cases GOP supporters:

1. Don't even know why they are opposed to the Obama administration.

2. Don't seem to realize the people who have screwed them the worst are their GOP pals in D.C.

3. Have little to no recognition as to how badly they are being manipulated.

This is not a defense of the Democratic party. In fact the ease with which the GOP manipulates their supporters helps the Democratic party move further to the right.

[EFerrari]

1. Here's a comparison for you. The same right wing nuttery

the same stink tanks, the same American corporate media outlets funded by the same money routinely attack Chavez and in the same way. Fear mongering, half truths, inflated headlines, false accusations, name calling, smear by association.

Manipulations-R-Us.

I was lucky in college to have a good mass media teacher. He used to do things like show us the same story as reported by four local channels and patiently point out the spin.

Most folks would benefit from an exercise like that.

[Skittles]

2. for the record

DUers buy a lot of garbage too

[noise]

4. Here is an example of a difference

between the left and the right:

The Bush administration screwed the country with their radical right wing Shock Doctrine agenda. All it took for some GOP supporters to completely forget about the damage Bush did was the election of Obama.

OTOH many people who supported Obama and initially gave him the benefit of the doubt are now questioning his sincerity in relation to "bringing change to Washington."

[Skittles]

13. oh I know there is a difference

and the GOP just replaced bush with teabaggers as the national embarrassment

[Swamp Rat]

3. What's wrong with GOP garbage?

:D

[Loudmxr]

5. Because its REALLY GREAT garbage Mrs Presky!!!

Some people like to live in a lie and be lied to. Some people like to be unhappy and complain. It what makes them happy in some sort of weird way.

I can't figure them out but amorality has a lot to do with it. These people have no morals. That is to say what is right one minute is wrong the next.

BTW I could not help but paraphrase an old Firesign Theatre line about Mrs. Presky. I think it was Peter Bergman who said it.

[ericinne]

7. They have morals

They have morals, but they base them off of faith, not reason. A huge flaw with faith based morals, is everyone's ability to believe in things that can't be proven, only hoped or feared. Morals come from personal justification, not rationality, that's how they can not only bend the rules and apply them only when needed, but also have a cafeteria religion and have morals based on what suit their needs.

[gleaner]

15. They have beliefs ....

that does not translate into having morals. The Princeton online dictionary gives the definition of moral as follows: "S: (adj) moral (concerned with principles of right and wrong or conforming to standards of behavior and character based on those principles."

So are all religions necessarily moral? What about those churches that instruct their members to pray for Obama's death? Is that right? Can you give me a Biblical citation where God tells his followers that it is moral to pray for the death of another person?

Was David Koresh moral when he was sexually molesting children in the name of God?

Was Jim Jones moral when he ordered his followers to commit suicide in Jonestown and then had the people who were reluctant murdered? That was a religious belief, but was it right?

Was it right for the members of Charlie Manson's family to say that he was Jesus Christ and to murder in his name? It was their fervent belief but was it right?

I could go on for a long time with these, but it is late and I am very tired. I'm sure if you think about it a little bit you could come up with several yourself.

Oh, one more thing. It is not right to threaten to kill a legislators children or spit on them because they vote for legislation you do not agree with. That is criminal. It is never right, and since it is criminal I hope that the people responsible go to jail. Me, I call and send emails or letters when I disagree. It expresses my views much better and it is a lot harder to be mistaken for a barbarian that way. Do you think that the things I am talking about cannot be proven to be wrong just because they are deeply held beliefs? There is a huge difference.

[ericinne]

25. Just sayin'

I'm just saying... oh yeah, they have morals... morals that they pick and choose to have and accept. But yes, they will go against them same morals and in their minds, it's justified because of "spiritual faith".

[gleaner]

33. OK. Thanks for sayin; ....

I understand better what you meant when you posted. You are right. They have these tin foil hat ideas that they espouse unless it is inconvenient to do so. Then the ideas fall by the wayside.

They are very dangerous people though, they are in the same league as the people that form militias and hoard guns. The Federal government is always the enemy. There was one group Posse Commitatus that believed that there was no governmental authority they had to adhere to higher than the county. I don't know if they're still around or not. Probably.

By the way, I meant to say it when I first posted. Welcome to DU. ;) Good posts I'm responding to.

[upi402]

6. media, public enemy #1 n/t

[DLnyc]

8. Easier to sell people a story they want to believe.

Let's pretend America is always right, white people are meant to rule the world and the only problem is poor people that look funny getting a free ride. It's a story they WANT to believe, so it's not that hard to sell it.

I think Mark Twain had a good handle on how much people love to be lied to, provided it's lies that let them feel good or avoid feeling bad.

[pundaint]

9. It goes back to marketing 101, and science.

Sex and Fear are the two gateways to the human psyche. They are masters of fear. The Republicans also know how to frame a message, because they don't care about the message, only the power it brings. Some of us a angry at the Obama administration for adopting this deceitful manipulation too.

With the maturing of NLP, marketing scientists can, given enough media backup, manipulate a sizable portion of the population to believe anything.

So they've selected a maleable constituency, they apply science in the formulation of their memes, they employ message discipline to reinforce their science, they scare them to keep them in reaction mode, and they don't confuse people with information, rather they use labels to engender an emotional response.

The only way to defeat this would be for the Democrats to devise some principles, have them be good, and then act on them. But their NLP is so good, We buy into some of their shit. Like Obama dissing his own party's platform as being too liberal. He is wrong - nothing is too liberal for People, and only People vote. The only risk the Democrats have is not being so liberal that their policies would be easily understood by the stupids as good for them too.

For instance if you told the stupids and the rest of America that they would never see another medical bill, but that the tax rates of the 70's would be returned, it would be easy to explain how better off they would be. Trying to explain forced buys from insurance companies, not so much.

[old mark]

10. I have just come from a site that referred to Obama as trash, and

that threatened violence against all Democrats/Liberals/Leftista, and called them stupid and blind.

I have little patience with anyone who seeks to justify anything the right does as having to do with "morals" or "religion". I think the RWers should all be in prison somewhere, till they are all dead - it would be the best thing we could do for the world.


mark

[opihimoimoi]

11. I n their Realm....there are no Heros other than white....a form of HomoPhobia...Old World Thinking

[FrenchieCat]

12. People buy Gop Garbage because that's what our media sells.

[eShirl]

14. because frightened people react on a gut level, rather than on reason

which makes them easier to manipulate

[Hubert Flottz]

16. It's very cheap!

Like the shit from China was at first, until they put the competition out of business.

[ngant17]

17. rightwing lunacy is everywhere

recently my mother's friend dropped by and handed her a sheet of rightwing garbage that came off the internet, but she didn't seem to recognize it as such. It was some blabber about Chavez and his rifle factory in Venezuela (the AK-47 factory, old news from a year ago).

I told her why she is going to be so worried about the mass-production of assault rifles in the jungles of South America. There are hundreds of companies which make assault rifles here, they are being manufactured here in the US (Remington, Smith and Wesson, ect.). What's good for the goose is good for the gander.

But if you are against assault weapons on principle, the US is a good place to start.

I did not think she understood that South America has been invaded by US troops many times, and coups have made to happen with US support. It might seem justifiable to have some means of self-defense against foreign aggression by the people in Venezuela.

Sometime history is hard to grasp?

[NecklyTyler]

18. Stupid is as stupid does

People who think that they are smart but do dumb things are still stupid

[DailyGrind51]

19. That's "What's Wrong with Kansas?"

[hobbit709]

20. As the bumper sticker said

"Vote Republican, It's Easier Than Thinking"

[KharmaTrain]

21. It Feels So Good...

Misery loves company and the rushpublicans have preyed on the most miserable for years. They've "built" their power on the backs of others...on hatred and selfishness. It's a party that sees self interest as a virtue and that its easier to live in a world of sound bites and platitudes than to deal with serious issues or have any sense of responsibility and compassion.

The GOOP has also mastered the art of making its coven feel discriminated against...to create a comfy parallel universe where all the problems on the world are created by others (specifically "libruls") and that all issues are black and white...all or nothing. It's a simple way to live as you never have to deal with the consequences, you can always blame others and when you're attacked then the persecution complex kicks in. The sheep who eat this stuff pay no mind as the grass is always there to graze on.

[OneGrassRoot]

22. Ignorance is bliss. n/t

[sendero]

23. People want a scapegoat..

... for the fact that they aren't millionaires like they thought they would be, or maybe now even that they cannot support their kids like they thought they could.

While our economic morass is 90% Republican-caused, the Repukes are much better at assigning blame than the Dems are. There are still morons that think the CRA had something to do with this, for a perfect example of total idiocy.

I've been saying since I got here in 2002 that the Dem's main problem is their inability or unwillingness to use harsh rhetoric. You may not LIKE harsh rhetoric, but IT WORKS.

[Orsino]

24. Because it tells them to go on doing what they want to do.

Consume, pollute and judge.

[OnionPatch]

26. Bingo!

My friends and I had a discussion and came to that conclusion, too.

They don't have to worry about global warming or pollution because those don't exist.
They don't have to care about poverty and injustice, because people who suffer from those problems are all either lazy, ungodly or of an inferior race.

This list can go on, we came up with a pretty long one. It seems the only thing they do care or worry about is that liberals will take over and force them to act like they care.

[HopeHoops]

27. Because they're fucking morons.

[maynard]

28. Sheep

They are sheep....it is easier to trust and follow someone rather than to do their own research.

[kctim]

29. For one thing

you wrongly lump them all together.
Most know why they are opposed to the Obama administration and their beliefs on issues differ from yours so they have a different take than you on whether they have been "screwed" or "manipulated."

I think the whole thing boils down to one's personal beliefs:
Some people believe government should take in order to give and some believe government should only run government and leave them alone.

[FarLeftFist]

30. It's all tied to religion and fear.

[4_TN_TITANS]

31. There are simply fundamental differences in how right

and left brains are wired.

[Echo In Light]

32. Brainwashed populace. People 'busy' w/careers don't want to take time to understand their govt..

... and how Power works...so they latch onto M$M LARGE PRINT rhetoric, and this is coupled with a sense of familiarity since many are surrounded by others in their sphere of immediacy/influence who likewise are in the same boat, receive their cultural directives/propaganda from similar corporate 'news' sources, and from there, as people are wont to do, prefer to cast themselves as actually knowing shit from shinola ... which is also how the conspiracy theories are non-existent meme gets so much mileage; it's easier to side w/a disinformed, perceived majority than it is to take the time to research how and what the US govt actually is, and represents, and be deemed 'crazy' for doing so by one's peers/family.