I think it is important to remember that "cordial" isn't the same thing as liberal "civility" that they demand from you. Be honest and earnest, be willing to answer questions honestly, but you don't have concede ground for the sake of "civility."
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I struggle with this a lot online and don't know how to get better results. It seems to me that how it often goes is that if I reveal my position to be one of sympathy toward socialism or communism, and there is often an immediate and visceral resistance to it, as if I had said that I want to commit atrocities or that I live in a fantasy. I don't know how to gain ground from that.
It's possible I come off as too arrogant at times, I don't really know. I do my best to stick to a respectful line even when I'm being mocked or insulted for the position I'm taking, but it can be very difficult not to return it in kind.
I can tell with some of it that it has little to do with me as a person and everything to do with pre-existing prejudices. For example, I can recall a time where someone framed it as if I was in a position of desiring purity from others simply because of the position of support I had expressed for working class power over that of rich people. I had not even said anything specifically to this person on the matter, they just read the conversation and put me in a certain kind of box. I'm proud of myself for the restraint I showed in that particular conversation, but nevertheless, it felt like I got nowhere with anyone. It is possible I did and don't know it, but I can't judge effectiveness on speculation and that makes it very difficult to know what is working with anyone, especially considering it may take a long time for some people to come around.
Some of it may be a weakness of mine in being more information-minded than personable. I'm not the kind of person who has a "how was your fishing trip" type of relationship with lots of other people. I can be friendly, but I have trouble forming the kind of connections that would make it clear to them I'm talking from a place of respect. Many online seem primed to assume that if someone talks with a tone of authority on a subject, their desire is to "put someone in their place" and that's something I've tried hard to consciously move away from. But I still run into situations where people seem to assume that is the de facto intent, even if I'm using a plain tone of talking about information and accuracy of it.
Curious what others think on this. It is tempting to simply write a lot of people off as not worth the effort, but that doesn't raise political consciousness. I know I can't work miracles, but I don't want to keep feeling like my efforts are being wasted either (or keep dealing with little more than snideness simply for stating my position).
My way of thinking to help me be grounded, is to understand that we are not fighting the people, even the people with fascist views, we are fighting fascism, we are fighting neoliberalism and so on, the people who are seduced by that, are consequence of a very well articulated machine of our enemies, but the people ARE NOT our enemies, they might make the will of our enemy but they ARE NOT the enemy, cause we need the people.
And secondly the other thing that is important to always keep in mind, is that people are much much much more often swayed by someone that they respect and that treats them with respect, and respecting somebody even though you disagree viscerally with their ideas can be helpful. Albeit this advice is geared more towards the liberal than the fascist, for the fascist is much more dangerous to get close so we need better strategies, but the point is, if someone likes you they might listen to you more. It's a hard thing, but to be close to the people, however the people are at the moment, it's our duty, there is no dancing around it, if we do not work with the people we are not progressing, we are just keeping a circle jerk instead of moving Marxism forward.
That's a helpful reminder, thanks. If I try to put it in an analogy (metaphor?) it sounds kind of like there's this alluring light leading the people into the swamp and part of our fight is to convince them to move away from it, to recognize it for what it is, as an illusion put together to drag them under. When I think of it this way, it seems to me that a large part of the fight is dismantling imperialist propaganda first. In other words, rather than trying to prove a positive first to someone who is bent on viewing communism as evil, it may be more effective to focus on finding ways to show them what is dissonant about the things they believe in. After all, for all the accusations of communism or other expressions of anti-imperialism being "cult-like" (one of those "every accusation is a confession" things) the way some people view it as a good/evil dichotomy of "freedom" on one side and "tyranny" on the other is itself cult-like in its thinking; if you are viewed as an outsider to that, you can be vilified really easily. But there's also a lot of dissonance required to believe in that dichotomy, such as how in the US, some people will simultaneously believe the US is a bastion of democracy while also never being satisfied with who is president or being very cynical (and rightfully so) about how politicians behave.
Not that we can't do some of both, but it may be that helping people reach the point of anti-imperialism is far more important than preaching communism. Which would be in line with how, if I'm not mistaken, global efforts are more centered right now on an alliance against imperialism than an alliance in favor of socialist states (my impression is, BRICS is a core of that?).
Edit: wording
Hasan has actually said similar quite frequently and he's managed to change a lot of minds
Who is that?
Changed so many minds he managed to buy himself a trillion dollar beach house with his twitch money, what a great hero of the people
Türkiye number one!!
Fine line between being cordial and a being a grifter eh
I mean if there's a view of his you disagree with you're free to take it up with him on his channel; he talks to a lot of his detractors and this very point about him owning a house, he's actually brought that up as well multiple times. If you believe you have a valid point to make, feel free to get on his twitch and talk to him.
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Thank u for your service
o7
