Edit: accidentally typed out my life story. See other reply for TL;DR
Unfortunately I can give no useful insights (except: empathy, understanding, and the desire for both). I was raised Christian and reasoned my way to paganism thinking there didn’t need to be a god for miracles to exist; then to atheism when I tried to prove magic and ghosts existed as an explanation; eventually debunking and abandoning the belief in the very concept of supernatural miracles. Similarly with my political views: it seemed more to be an inevitable journey, where I started in one place and, without my core beliefs changing, drifted to another which was more aligned.
As a teen I was big into Alex Jones and conspiracy theories to the point of losing friends before it was cool (pre-maga). Unfortunately for him, I took his advice and “did my own researcher”; becoming more disillusioned with his bullshit the more I learned. For one example, there was a great analysis paper on the sorts of energies and temperatures involved in 9-11, whose models perfectly matched the real world structural damage: no thermite or lasers needed. I bought into the h1n1 vax hoax from Ventura after I had the shot and thought I’d be crippled when then turned on the signal or whatever… But I wasn’t. Same with the Fukushima disaster Alex fearmongered about; turns out we’re not in a radioactive apocalypse. Retrospectively: he had a terrible track record for predictions.
I was a diehard freedom absolutist: yell fire in crowded theatres, everyone should open-carry everywhere. I wasn’t even American but I bought into the mythos, especially as promoted by the right. However I was a fan of star trek as a kid… And I hated the very concept of monetary systems. I wanted people to live free of control, and have the best lives possible. Still do. I also never cared for the social conservatism: i was bi* and was cool with LGBT; “the government has no place in a bedroom between consenting adults”. Also no racial prejudice: all deserved freedom (humans were foreign enough to the probably-autistic me; no need for further outgroups…) A severely existential and somber perspective has always been the basis for my worldview (I was a pretty fucked up kid).
That none of that has changed… But one thing did.
Beau of the Fifth Column yt channel, now Belle of the Ranch, was where I first heard this after my change towards the left: they said they believed in “the most amount of freedom for the most people”… I had believed “the right for me to swing my fist ends at your nose”, until I realized that threatening to hit someone can have just as much a real consequence for them as actually doing it. Race doesn’t exist biologically, certainly in no form that people would recognize colloquially: but people were racialized; racism self-manifested through systemic failures and active oppression. I could no longer pretend that race didn’t exist: it absolutely did, but we made it. Trying to be blind to it would cause more harm than using it as a shortcut tool for informing various socially-caused inequalities. Understanding that taught me, vividly, the concept of a real and impactful “social construct”; a concept which I had great disdain for: “facts don’t care about your feelings”…
However, if I had to point to something, there was one catalyst… My whole life, I’ve tried to understand people. Empathy, emotions, and even ‘the self’ did not come naturally to me. I learned with great effort and (luckily, through birth) the resources to permit such efforts. The one thing that really pushed that forward was falling in love. He leaned left, but hated SJW / tumblrite stupidity leading up to the height of gamergate. We had many overlaps, and I grew exponentially in the decade since meeting him and exploring these feelings. As creator ShoeOnHead would say about Sargon of Akkad (para): “I hated SJWs because they were terrible optics; you hated them because you thought they were causing the fall of western civilization”… Turns out we were both the former as well. The divide between the alt-right, their rhetoric and growing popularity, and the things conservatives claimed to care about became more evident, and my growing awareness and knowledge of social issues was pushing me much further to the left.
Just like when I was 8 years old, I still think money is pretty fucking stupid, and people should be able to live comfortable and free. What changed is that I think some “freedoms” are actually just tragedy-of-the-commons oppression (e.g. “freedom” to discriminate based on race) and must be restricted, and not everyone needs to be packing heat to live free (not needing to is more free… an armed society is not a polite society; polite people don’t need the threat of violence, much like good people don’t need the threat of hell)
TL;DR I was predisposed to skeptical and critical thinking, learned other people had emotions, actually believed in the right’s fake freedom rhetoric, and fell in love with a cute lefty boy (unrequited but good friends)
Can you share exactly what led to the change in perspective?
Edit: accidentally typed out my life story. See other reply for TL;DR
Unfortunately I can give no useful insights (except: empathy, understanding, and the desire for both). I was raised Christian and reasoned my way to paganism thinking there didn’t need to be a god for miracles to exist; then to atheism when I tried to prove magic and ghosts existed as an explanation; eventually debunking and abandoning the belief in the very concept of supernatural miracles. Similarly with my political views: it seemed more to be an inevitable journey, where I started in one place and, without my core beliefs changing, drifted to another which was more aligned.
As a teen I was big into Alex Jones and conspiracy theories to the point of losing friends before it was cool (pre-maga). Unfortunately for him, I took his advice and “did my own researcher”; becoming more disillusioned with his bullshit the more I learned. For one example, there was a great analysis paper on the sorts of energies and temperatures involved in 9-11, whose models perfectly matched the real world structural damage: no thermite or lasers needed. I bought into the h1n1 vax hoax from Ventura after I had the shot and thought I’d be crippled when then turned on the signal or whatever… But I wasn’t. Same with the Fukushima disaster Alex fearmongered about; turns out we’re not in a radioactive apocalypse. Retrospectively: he had a terrible track record for predictions.
I was a diehard freedom absolutist: yell fire in crowded theatres, everyone should open-carry everywhere. I wasn’t even American but I bought into the mythos, especially as promoted by the right. However I was a fan of star trek as a kid… And I hated the very concept of monetary systems. I wanted people to live free of control, and have the best lives possible. Still do. I also never cared for the social conservatism: i was bi* and was cool with LGBT; “the government has no place in a bedroom between consenting adults”. Also no racial prejudice: all deserved freedom (humans were foreign enough to the probably-autistic me; no need for further outgroups…) A severely existential and somber perspective has always been the basis for my worldview (I was a pretty fucked up kid).
That none of that has changed… But one thing did.
Beau of the Fifth Column yt channel, now Belle of the Ranch, was where I first heard this after my change towards the left: they said they believed in “the most amount of freedom for the most people”… I had believed “the right for me to swing my fist ends at your nose”, until I realized that threatening to hit someone can have just as much a real consequence for them as actually doing it. Race doesn’t exist biologically, certainly in no form that people would recognize colloquially: but people were racialized; racism self-manifested through systemic failures and active oppression. I could no longer pretend that race didn’t exist: it absolutely did, but we made it. Trying to be blind to it would cause more harm than using it as a shortcut tool for informing various socially-caused inequalities. Understanding that taught me, vividly, the concept of a real and impactful “social construct”; a concept which I had great disdain for: “facts don’t care about your feelings”…
However, if I had to point to something, there was one catalyst… My whole life, I’ve tried to understand people. Empathy, emotions, and even ‘the self’ did not come naturally to me. I learned with great effort and (luckily, through birth) the resources to permit such efforts. The one thing that really pushed that forward was falling in love. He leaned left, but hated SJW / tumblrite stupidity leading up to the height of gamergate. We had many overlaps, and I grew exponentially in the decade since meeting him and exploring these feelings. As creator ShoeOnHead would say about Sargon of Akkad (para): “I hated SJWs because they were terrible optics; you hated them because you thought they were causing the fall of western civilization”… Turns out we were both the former as well. The divide between the alt-right, their rhetoric and growing popularity, and the things conservatives claimed to care about became more evident, and my growing awareness and knowledge of social issues was pushing me much further to the left.
Just like when I was 8 years old, I still think money is pretty fucking stupid, and people should be able to live comfortable and free. What changed is that I think some “freedoms” are actually just tragedy-of-the-commons oppression (e.g. “freedom” to discriminate based on race) and must be restricted, and not everyone needs to be packing heat to live free (not needing to is more free… an armed society is not a polite society; polite people don’t need the threat of violence, much like good people don’t need the threat of hell)
TL;DR I was predisposed to skeptical and critical thinking, learned other people had emotions, actually believed in the right’s fake freedom rhetoric, and fell in love with a cute lefty boy (unrequited but good friends)
Also MAGA really exposed the ugliness
me too, buddy