Economic concerns and growing disenchantment with both parties is draining support for Trump among Gen Z young men, a key bloc of support during the 2024 election
Male Gen Z voters are breaking with Donald Trump and the Republican party at large, recent polls show, less than a year after this same cohort defied convention and made a surprise shift right, helping Trump win the 2024 election.
Taken with wider polling suggesting Democrats will lead in the midterms, the findings on young men spell serious trouble for the Republican Party in 2026.
Younger Gen Z men, those born between 2002 and 2007, may be even more anti-Trump, according to October research from YouGov and the Young Men’s Research Project, a potential sign that their time living through the social upheavals of the Covid pandemic and not being political aware during the first Trump administration may be shaping their experience.
As a Gen Z American Citizen, I was NEVER ever maga
And I’m proud to say that I’ve never been fooled, not even once.
FINALLY! And fortunately I NEVER EVER supported MAGA. In fact I don’t support fascism at all!
Not sure I can ever trust them. Seems like their brains are made of Swiss cheese.
It’s amazing to me to see how gen z acted after the neo-liberal boomers destroyed the economy and shit all over millenials. Millenials were blamed for everything. I’d have thought gen z would have gone hard left after seeing how their siblings and even in some cases parents were treated, but instead they were easily manipulated by russia and 4/8chan into stupidity. Instead we got gen z who was already fucked over by trump once to vote for him.
Every generation learns too late that old white men are not their friends and don’t have their best interests at heart. Only with gen z it mattered more than ever in history and they blew it.
easily manipulated by russia and 4/8chan
Are you sure that’s by Russia and not some further manupulation?
Not for any altruistic reasons, probably because no woman will touch them once they find out they’re a mysogynistic rapist-supporting bigot…
They can prove it by voting like it.
MAGA_IRL
Best comment in post.
Reeeee were left America steer into cOmUnISm…
/s
With the exception of maybe lgbt rights and saying that they will raise taxes on the wealthy (but not actually doing anything meaningful, lip service only) what American politician of any party supports these positions?
Also fwiw ubi ultimately is just a pittance to allow flawed power structures to be maintained. It’s a stopgap measure that keeps people like bezos and musk around but just softens their power, for now. “Give the peasants their meager wages so they’ll shut up” kind of thing. True equity means wrestling control of the means of production to workers to mitigate the power of those oligarchs for future generations, and not just until they decide UBI would be something that’s annoying to pay for
I don’t get it. Did Biden support those? Are we talking American right wing or European right wing?
It reads to me like it’s meant to take down the “the left wing in America is still right wing in most of the civilized world” assumption that’s buried within the political alignment graph.
And I think there’s also a potential disconnect where one party could be thinking “american democrats = right wing” while the other is hearing “individual leftists in america = right wing” which world be a lot more likely to elicit a response.
No one recruits for the right like the people in these comments do.
Edit: if you are going to down vote me at least explain why telling them to fuck off is a better strategy then capitalizing on this and bringing them into the fold.
I don’t understand this assertion.
Yeah, you do. Yu just don’t want to accept you are part of the problem
Edit: if you are going to down vote me at least explain why
I downvote for spelling; but not for the missing hyphen.
No one recruits for the right like the people in these comments do.
And this is a bad generalization.
I’ll believe it when I see it.
It’s just the nature of the population who will flock towards an authoritarian, they’re not making rational, thought-out choices, they’re JUST following a narrative of feelings. It could flip 180-degrees the next day and they will go with that new storyline if it validates their anger or frustration or just the need to follow a soap-opera of pundits and angry shouting people on TV.
Gen Z want a radical. Far left or far right doesn’t seem to matter. I can’t blame them for that. Most of them will still say they supported Bernie - at least the podcasters they worship do. There is room for them on the left. Dems have to start by leaving the centrist DNC bullshit behind.
I think most people want a radical.
The current system isn’t working for the majority of normal people.
They’ll vote for change every time, and never get it.
they don’t want radical. they want jobs and a stabilized cost of living. they want to feel like they have a future.
trump focused on economic issues, and got their votes. if the next democrats can push forward economic reforms that improve the economy… they will get the votes. Kamala absolutely refused to run on any agenda of economic reform and endorse Biden’s inflation economy.
I think it’s a terrible idea to run a sitting vice president as the candidate for the next election.
Since people often want change, they will ask “what will you do different?” And the VP will have to respond “Nothing” otherwise people will ask “Well, why aren’t you doing that now?”
It will be interesting to see how Vance responds to these questions if they decide to run him to take over for Trump.
Fair days wage for a fair days work IS radical in a world where 8 people hold 50% of the world’s wealth
what is a fair wage? 100K a year for bagging groceries? 50K?
That really depends on how much things cost, whether you have a social safety net, etc.
How about: is it more than 1% of what the CEO makes?
the problem with ‘fair wage’ is ‘what things cost’ is subjective measure.
i know people who make half what i make who have more than enough, and people who make 3x what I mean who feel they are struggling because they don’t own a 3 million dollar house.
the objective facts of economics don’t have much weight when it comes to people subjective perception of their ‘needs’. and human psychology tends to adapt to whatever baseline is available. this is why the CEO making 150million doesn’t think they are wealthy, and will tell you how they are underpaid. it’s also established relative to your social peers.
I never felt that I was ‘poor’ my entire life until I went to college and was informed I was poor, because objectively, I was. But since I grew up in a town in the bottom half of the economic ladder I was never exposed to the concept of wealth.
This was always true. I want someone who works for the working man and woman. I don’t care if we become socialist, stay in capitalism, what the fuck ever other choice: we as people need to feel taken care of. Any system that ignores its people is doomed.
Just as important is explaining to people why some choices need to be made that we may not agree with. Raising the gas tax? I’m ok with it, because I already know it’s how we pay for our roads. But what about my less aware neighbor? If they simply see the rate jump, and don’t know why, it leaves the door wide open for a conspiracy schmuck to step in with a ragebait explanation.
Yeah, but you’re being reasonable. Most human beings aren’t reasonable. They are not thoughtful or pragmatic. Only a small percentage of people are well-mannered and educated enough to even understand the basics of macroeconomics and public policy that often drives it.
They are driven by raw emotion that is often entirely disproportionate to the thing it’s responding to. Like your example of someone flying into a rage over a minor tax increase. And now in 2025+, these people think they are all geniuses due to a steady diet of social media that constantly reinforces their ignorant and rage. And they block and assault anyone who dares try to dispute their rage and ignorance.
I was in thread about credit ratings yesterday and all the smart factually accurate commentary was down-voted, and all the ragebaiting ignorance conspiracy nonsense was heavily upvoted.
Sure, but at least reminding people of why at the time leadership announces a change removes a lot of ambiguity.
Definitely doesn’t solve the problem by itself, but it’s not much work to include… Presuming the law/change in question was written with a real reason in mind.
Wish the system could ignore us when it comes to the bipartisan war on drugs.
I think GenZ might just be stupid if they thought Trump had a more economic reform agenda than Harris. But yeah blame Harris for that too.
trump ran on economic issues. they weren’t stupid. they listened to what he said. they just didn’t think he was lying.
‘no tax on tips’ was resonated with a lot of young service workers. he kept hammering home how he’d stop inflation, etc.
Fair enough. You are right that “ran on” and actual policy are two different things. Pretty clear that Harris fumbled her economic messaging when it comes to what GenZ were wanting to hear I guess.
Yes, sadly a lot of folks can’t grasp that distinction and get really upset about it.
What was really interest to me was listening to post polling interviews with voters on election day. They were very consistent in why they voted for Trump. Young and old alike.
It find the whole thing just… sad because it’s so obvious but the democrats can’t seem to figure it out. Obama and Clinton won on the same issues, economics. H Clinton’s campaign was equally economically tone-deaf as Kamala. So was Kerry in '04.
US mentality is weird. Most countries we understand that a “party” stands for certain principles, and so if you don’t like the party, you vote for a different one. It makes no sense to demand that the party change to accommodate the voter, that’s not the role of a party. The role of a party is to try and change the minds of the population to support the principles of the party. A party exists to convince the masses to accommodate them, not for the masses to accommodate the party.
But Americans always vote for the same parties and always insist that the parties should violate their principles that they are very explicit about and openly declare all the time in order to accommodate the people. When the party inevitably does not do this but instead tries to explore new strategies to win over the population while adhering to their principles, Americans act surprised that the party isn’t bending to their will, but then vote for the same party again anyways.
I see this all throughout bizarre American commentary, where American leftists like Hasan will constantly call the Democrat party “stupid” for not abandoning their principles and running on an entirely different platform. But this, again, misses the whole point of a party. They are not “stupid.” They have a set of principles and want those principles to win, and it defeats the whole purpose of the party of they entirely abandoned their principles.
I mean, let’s say you live in a very racist country but have an anti-racist party, and then the anti-racist party decides to become racist to win the election. Did you really “win”? At the end of the day, the racist party still won, because you would have abandoned your principles to win, so it defeats the whole point of “winning.”
Democrats have a set of principles and want those principles to win, so naturally, as rational actors, they will not run candidates who oppose those principles while also try to push out people who infiltrate the party with ideas that oppose their principles. In any normal country, this is no problem because people understand that it just means you need to vote for a different party with different principles.
What’s even weirder is the Americans who delude themselves into believing the Democrats hold principles they literally do not. They are very open about being a neoliberal nationalist party, but I have encountered weird Americans who tell me things like Democrats all support universal healthcare / “Medicare for All” and they will argue until the cow’s come home that this is true and all evidence to the contrary is Russian propaganda.
Even here on Lemmy, criticizing Democrats by pointing out how they are right-wing can get you downvotes from weirdo Americans who are convinced they are a truly left-wing party. There is a huge delusion among Americans that Democrats are all secret far-left socialists who are just so incompetent that they constantly fumble the ball and mess up getting their policies across and so that’s why they never achieve the working class utopia. If you point out that there is no evidence that the overwhelming majority of Democrats even want these left-wing policies in the first place and they openly say they want the opposite, they will get very defensive and upset with you.
Liberals inventing their own political spectrum so they can pretend they arent right wingers.
Other countries have voting systems designed to support a multi-party system. Before we can have this we need something like ranked choice or STAR voting or approval voting. Otherwise if you vote for a third party right now you end up supporting the politician you like least due to the spoiler effect.
Note that reading https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spoiler_effect it kind of seems like RCV only helps reduce the impact of spoilers but does not fully eliminate it.
This is also a great article: https://effectivegov.uchicago.edu/primers/ranked-choice-voting
There’s a slight issue with this way of thinking.
Problem: The two party system is preventing us from enacting reforms
Solution: Use the two party system to enact reforms getting rid of the two party system, so we can start enact reforms.
Problem: My car won’t start.
Solution: Drive down to the mechanic and he’ll fix it so you can start driving places
Problem: Asking the king nicely hasn’t been an effective method of stopping him from taking all our grain.
Solution: Ask the king nicely to institute democracy so that you won’t have to rely on asking the king nicely to make things happen.
Y’all always remind me of the fable about the mice who all decide that it’d be much better if the cat had a bell around its neck so they could hear it coming, but then one mouse asks, “How are we gonna get the bell there? Who’s gonna tie it?” and nobody has an answer.
This was shared to me on lemmy. It helped me understand the advantages STAR voting has over RCV.
That said, RCV would still be a massive improvement over FPTP voting.
Electoral Reform Videos
First Past The Post voting (What most states use now)
Videos on alternative electoral systems
What’s the relevance? The point of my post is that you are voting for a clearly right-wing party and the expectation that they will become left-wing is irrational. The existence of a spoiler effect does not negate this reality. It is incredibly incoherent to say, “we should vote in the right-wingers because we’re afraid of the spoiler effect,” then turn around and say that the right-wingers are "stupid’ for not running left-wing candidates as a right-wing party. It makes no sense. If you think you should never vote for a left-wing party out of fear of the spoiler effect, then you are really conceding that a left-wing government is impossible in the USA under its current form, and only maybe hypothetically in the far future if we ever have a different form, maybe with RCV, would it be possible.
you rn
You are literally upset that I pointed out a giant contradiction in your worldview.
- Position A: “I want a left-wing government.”
- Position B: “I should vote for politicians who want a left-wing government.”
Yes, I hold both positions in my head simultaneously and you do not.
US mentality is weird. Most countries we understand that a “party” stands for certain principles, and so if you don’t like the party, you vote for a different one.
You’re apply logic and rules from completely different nation’s systems and calling the US’s version “weird” because it doesn’t match how other countries do it?
It makes no sense to demand that the party change to accommodate the voter, that’s not the role of a party.
Perhaps in your country it isn’t, but in the US, it is. During the convention of the party, the party chooses its “planks” for its platform. These are chosen within the party itself, and they absolutely change. You can see the 2024 Democratic party platform here if you want to. Here’s the 2020 version.. As you can see there are some large differences. The GOP used to do this same process before it was consumed by the cult of trump.
The role of a party is to try and change the minds of the population to support the principles of the party. A party exists to convince the masses to accommodate them, not for the masses to accommodate the party.
In your system perhaps. Not in the US system. It doesn’t make the US system “wrong”. Does it have shortcomings? Absolutely, all systems do. Are these various shortcomings equal to each other? That’s subjective. I personally would like more aspects of European-style politcal parties, but not everything that I see with parties there. We, as humanity, have yet to find the objectively “best” system.
What’s even weirder is the Americans who delude themselves into believing the Democrats hold principles they literally do not. They are very open about being a neoliberal nationalist party, but I have encountered weird Americans who tell me things like Democrats all support universal healthcare / “Medicare for All”
I’m losing faith in your arguments because you’re painting a picture that all members of a party share the same beliefs. Again, maybe that’s an ideal from your own country’s party system, but it isn’t in the USA. I would be surprised even in your own party if you have universal agreement on all policy positions.
There are individual Democrats that support Medicare for All. Here’s one example:
Hilary Clinton, as First Lady at the time, lead the creation of the Clinton Healthcare plan of 1993. This was absolutely a universal national healthcare plan:
“The task force was created in January 1993, but its own processes were somewhat controversial and drew litigation. Its goal was to come up with a comprehensive plan to provide universal health care for all Americans, which was to be a cornerstone of the administration’s first-term agenda.”
Does this mean that every Democrat believes in universal healthcare? Of course not. But to claim that none do, as you are, is equally untrue.
Even here on Lemmy, criticizing Democrats by pointing out how they are right-wing can get you downvotes from weirdo Americans who are convinced they are a truly left-wing party.
You’re going to have to be more specific with an example post, because most of the downvoted posts I see close to this are “both sides are the same!” garbage. Also, I don’t believe many believe the US Democratic Party is “truly left-wing” as would be defined in, lets say, Europe.
I’m losing faith in your arguments because you’re painting a picture that all members of a party share the same beliefs.
Because y’all demand people support the entire party. “Vote blue no matter who.” Canada does not have ranked-choice voting. They don’t even do that proportional voting thing where they hand out seats based on proportion of who votes for what party. There is a third party because people just vote for that third party.
The US doesn’t have a system that prevents this, it’s just a myth used to prop up the Democrats. If you do like a very specific Democrat, that doesn’t negate voting for a third party in places where the Democrat is awful. There is nothing built-in the USA’s system that would prevent it from getting seats to a third-party, and Canada is proof of that. It’s just a myth perpetuated to rally people into “voting blue no matter who” even when the Democrat clearly does not represent your values.
Because y’all demand people support the entire party. “Vote blue no matter who.”
You’re conveniently ignoring the entire primary voting process. During the primary you vote for the specific candidate among all running for the position in the party. Policy positions, experience, temperament do vary between the candidates. This is the chance to vote for, among many, that closest resembles your own choices. After the primary however, nearly any Democratic candidate would be preferable to a GOP one to most Democratic voters. So if your own preferred primary candidate doesn’t win the ticket to the general election, it is highly probable that the one that did win would be a closer fit than the GOP candidate. The “vote blue no matter who” isn’t dogma, its usually pragmatic advice. I doubt many left leaning voters that voted trump or withheld their vote feel their assistance in getting trump into office is helping their own policy positions.
A perfect example of the primary system working pretty well is the recent New York Mayor’s race. A legacy previously elected Democratic governor ran and lost to the proudly open farthest left-leaning Democratic Socialist. That Democratic Socialist when on to win the general election for mayor of New York City.
If you do like a very specific Democrat, that doesn’t negate voting for a third party in places where the Democrat is awful. There is nothing built-in the USA’s system that would prevent it from getting seats to a third-party, and Canada is proof of that.
Third parties in the USA have historically fielded pretty weak candidates. For the 2024 Presidential election, the next most leftist candidate on the general election ballot was Jill Stein. Prior the run for President of the United States Steins highest held elected office was in 2005 she successfully won the election for one of the 7 Lexington Town Meeting seats (a small municipal office). If third party candidates want to be seriously considered, then I would recommend they start with smaller office positions to actually build a party that demonstrates is can govern.
This is the chance to vote for, among many, that closest resembles your own choices.
If you run for the Racism Party™ as a person who has an anti-racist position, do you think you will be nominated? Maybe in an incredibly fringe case, but most of the time you will not be. And then what do you do when you’re not nominated?
The “vote blue no matter who” isn’t dogma, its usually pragmatic advice.
It’s literally a dogma by definition. Saying that you would do something as a matter of principle under all possible conditions without ever considering a different strategy is a dogma.
Your “advice” is based on extremely fringe. Sure, in a country of hundreds of millions, it may happen a couple times. But what about all the rest of the times it does not? You pretend it is a “victory” that one leftist gets into a position of power where they can hardly do anything at all because they are surrounded by extreme right-wingers, then you try to sheepherd everyone in to backing the extreme right wingers that are the very same people blocking them from getting anything done.
If your position was just “you should vote for leftists if they are in the primaries, then vote for them as Democrats if they win their primaries,” I wouldn’t have an issue with that. But that’s not your position. It’s “you should vote for Democrats no matter what.” Even if they’re a genocidal fascist far-right freak who is going to do everything in their power to block an edge case like Mamdani from every making any positive change, we should apparently still support that.
After the primary however, nearly any Democratic candidate would be preferable to a GOP one to most Democratic voters.
Most should be strung upside down like Mussolini.
Third parties in the USA have historically fielded pretty weak candidates.
Okay then field strong candidates.
If third party candidates want to be seriously considered, then I would recommend they start with smaller office positions to actually build a party that demonstrates is can govern.
Would you actually vote for them if they did or just shame people for not voting blue no matter who?
It’s not that weird if only two parties stand a chance. Pick the closest one of the two and push it in your favored direction. Your comment is a long-winded way of saying that the two-party system should be abolished.
The two party system should be abolished.
Not sure why democrats are so afraid of a one party government. Just run in republican primaries and push the party in your favored direction!
Pick the closest one of the two and push it in your favored direction. Your comment is a long-winded way of saying that the two-party system should be abolished.
No, I am saying that “pick the closest one of the two and push it in your favored direction” makes zero sense. It is like voting for the Racism Party™ and expecting them to run anti-racism candidates, or that you will “push” the Racism Party™ to be anti-racist. That isn’t gong to happen. The Racism Party™ would exist to push racism, it would exist to convince you to support its platform and vote for it.
The internet exists these days. We can all pull up videos going back decades to back when they were black-and-white of people talking about the needs of “pushing Democrats to the left” and yet generations later they are still a right-wing jingoist genocidal party. There is an old saying, “the definition of insanity is dong the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” The same strategy is used for decades with everyone insisting that it’s the only strategy that can ever work yet it never works.
How much longer do we have to wait before this strategy works? Will Democrats become a left-wing party election, the election after, the one after that? I guarantee you that everyone will listen to you as they do every election cycle and your strategy will continue to be the one used again, again, and again. So I am just curious in how long you think it will take for your strategy to bear fruits.
My sister (F 22) voted for Trump over taxes, Haitian and Venezuelan immigrants. She is 1st gen, born of 2 immigrants who also voted for Trump. Every time I present new evidence of how bad Trump is, she pulls ChatGPT and “debunks my lies” with nicely crafted confirmation bias prompts. If you all know how to get through to GenZers, I am listening.
Any 22 year old who’s upset about taxes is very very clearly being manipulated
Everyone should be upset how this country has lies to its citizens for decades on the premise of it can’t “afford” free healthcare and education. It is not a generational problem, but a societal one.
Yet half this country joyfully would wallow in their own shit if it means their neighbor suffers just the same as they are.
Considering the lack of value we’re getting in return for these taxes, nah I’m pretty sure everybody should be upset about taxes. Other, better countries may pay more in taxes, but after accounting for the healthcare and worker rights that the taxes get them, they end up with more time and more money than most Americans.
I met a local politician who, in my red area, just seemed like he was dancing around labeling himself a Democrat. The office was for basically money management in the area, and he was talking about optimizing the use of tax funds. I made it clear that I don’t really mind paying this tax rate, and I would even pay more, but only if it starts getting used on shit that matters like building another school because ours are getting overcrowded, and the area is growing whether we prepare or not. I said that even if I only cared about my own finances, that’s an investment that supports growth which would raise my property value, and it would attract new businesses to serve that growing population. Just plan for it so that it doesn’t grow out of control and become a shit hole with stupid intersection infrastructure and urban sprawl.
We need to stop electing Republicans - the people who siphon away and steal our tax dollars
I kinda hate the premise that young age automatically makes you stupid or your opinions a result of manipulation. Someone in their 60s can be just as stupid as a 22yo, and a 22yo is also capable of having nuanced thoughts about politics and taxation. “Young=naive” is a bad trap to fall into when evaluating political opinions and feeds into the old adage about people becoming conservative as they get older.
I think this person is just stupid on their own, regardless of their age.
My friend, when I was 22 I didn’t make enough to pay taxes. You’re getting downvoted because you’re defensive, aggro, and misunderstanding the premise.
Very few people on Lemmy believe you’re actually stupid because you’re young. Often times just uninformed and, per your example, impulsive. “Young=naive” tends to be a regressive position. I think you’ll find Lemmy is typically a progressive website. Most of us left reddit over ideological/enshitification differences not because we were too radically right. .ml is among the exceptions.
Anyway the premise isn’t 22 year olds are too dumb to worry about taxes.
Instead the premise is that you’re too poor to worry about taxes. That’s not to say you can’t or shouldn’t but you likely won’t have anything worth taxing at that age. If you do have things worth taxing that young you either have inherited well, I’m sorry for your loss, or you are offspring of the 1%-0.0001% and were born with a silver spoon. Otherwise you’re the lowest on the totem pole and it’s been proven throughout the millennials growing up that you’re not going to get ahead if the status quo remains as it is. In theory you should be looking for the most radical change because you’ll see the greatest benefit over your lifetime.
Anyway my friend, chill, touch grass and have a lovely day.
And when it comes time to worry about taxes worth less about how much you’re paying and instead what you’re getting out of it. Paying taxes is pretty sweet when you get stuff in return like healthcare, schools, parks, places to get out and do things that don’t cost money, transit investment, bridges that don’t fall down. Taxes only such when you can’t see the impact it has in your life…like this moment in history right now where the rich own the government and want more money from us to improve their lives.
I think this is a more nuanced take on the situation. I would agree that folks who are directly impacted by an issue are more likely to be impacted by it. Original comment seemed too absolutist too me.
I think there are 22yo who can be impacted by the issue of taxes while being poor (Though they may end up on the other side of the argument). For example, issues of food stamps and medicare-for-all affect all ages. A 22yo might have a strong opinion in favor of taxation for these purposes. A conservative making an ad hominem argument on the basis of age in this case (e.g., that they are simply being manipulated by the radical left) would be clearly incorrect.
I also think, as more of a moral argument, you shouldn’t need to be directly impacted by something in order to support/oppose it. I am not on food stamps but I absolutely think we should have them (or perhaps “upgrade” it to UBI to avoid nonsense on what poor people are allowed to buy).
In any case, dismissing someone as simply being manipulated is not a good approach in general. It could be a good approach when we are specifically talking about the person overselling on confirmation bias from ChatGPT, but it is a poor way to change minds as a general tactic.
Is there any particular language I should adjust to avoid being “aggro”? I did say that I hated their argument. And I did call them hostile after their last sarcastic response to me trying to extend an olive branch.
Is that going too far? “Touch grass” is about the same level, I would think, but I’ve been wrong before and I’ll be wrong again.
There was no premise of anyone is stupid or not - I simply mean that early twenties voters are by and large concerned with social issues since they very likely don’t ow property yet. So to me, this feels like Faux russian news leading kids around with a hate carrot on a fascism stick
I suppose I did simplify your argument.
I’ll restate, then: it’s erroneous to say that any young person/22yo with a strong opinion on taxes is being manipulated. Although life experience may prevent naivete in some cases, I think it’s incorrect to make a bold assertion like that because older folks are capable of being manipulated and younger folks are capable of being discerning and having the critical thinking skills to avoid manipulation.
I would also take issue with your follow up on whether owning property impacts whether or not someone’s opinions on economic issues are well defined. I don’t think people need to be personally invested in an issue to have a nuanced opinion on it, though it can certainly help (and you definitely want to consider interested parties when it comes to property tax- i.e., before a city raises property taxes, they should take into consideration property owners with fixed incomes, who do tend to be 60+)
I get that you were just making a short comment and didn’t intend to go deep into the weeds on it, but I find these kinds of assumptions dangerous.
You did simplify, correct. I wouldn’t call it an accurate simplification, either. Thanks for clarifying that your assumption was out of turn
If you enter into debates with weak ad hominem arguments about someone’s age, you aren’t going to change minds and you will be steamrolled by anyone with an understanding of the topic.
Skimming your recent posts, I don’t think our political views are particularly different, so it’s in both of our interests if you are using the best arguments possible on these topics. This was not an attack on you as a person, so your hostile response is unnecessary.
Or is financially independent. Are you assuming this Trump supporter is in college?
my dude, you have a sister who is going to chatgpt for facts, Id feel that she’s in a lot more trouble than being a trump supporter.
have the AI cite it sources for the claims it makes, and read through those sources. ask the AI what information it used in the source to come up with its statement.
using chatGPT in this way is like how I used Wikipedia growing up: just pull up an article on something, check out what citations an article had, and walk it backwards from there
When searching something online, I already many times came across AI written articles being quite high. So now it’s possible LLM will just cite another LLM which got its content from an LLM written response on Reddit.
These ChatGPT articles are ruining the internet, it’s almost all I can find now when searching for information.
I ask a question in google and then get sent to a website which has a novel about why my question is a good question and then gives the simplest 5 outcomes/solutions (i.e. did you turn it off and on again?) with zero photos or diagrams or anything and it’s just a giant waste of my time.
I only need to open a webpage for like 5 seconds before I know it is going to be worthless.
Is there a way to blacklist a web domain from ever popping up in your Google search results again?
Does the paid chat gpt actually cite?
The free one (which most people are using), when asked how much an aircraft carrier costs just links to the main page of CNBC and the department of defense.
I further prompted and it gave me 404s
It does a mix of hallucination and self-correction once you tell it to search the web to actually find out current information. And even then, you don’t have a good chance of having truly accurate information. It really does take work.
not sure if only the paid gpt actually cites, but anyone thats trying to show someone else how inefficient LLMs are with data should be able to come to the conclusion the output is untrustworthy if you’re getting 404 errors after asking to cite, in my opinion
The problem is it “cites” things by inserting obscured hyperlinks that people see and never click but assume there is a “source”
I guess we found the answer to how the original person i was replying to can validate anything thats generated by an LLM: looking up sources that an LLM claims to use
You can’t help morons unfortunately.
My father is Gen 1 of immigrant parents. His parents HATED Trump. Yet he voted for Trump all three times.
I have a GenZ sister-in-law that uses ChatGPT for relationship advice. Like copies and pastes responses from men into ChatGPT and asks what they’re “really saying” or “what their intentions are”, instead of you know, JUST ASKING THE PERSON OUTRIGHT.
We’re fucked
Have you considered debunking her with nicely crafted confirmation bias prompts. It could also show her that chatGPT can be wrong?
2020: you have your facts and I have my facts
2025: you have your prompts and I have my prompts
Ask her to read the links from her ChatGPT queries with you. Do it together. Show her how ChatGPT is confidently and convincingly lying to her. And each time she comes back with another result from a biased prompt, do it again. Eventually she’ll at least stop trying to convince you that ChatGPT knows all, out of embarrassment.
tell your sister that she’s a fucking dumbass for thinking a chatbot is a source, tell her that all a chatbot does is aggregate data on the internet, and that if she doesn’t smarten the fuck up then she’s going to be a failed unhappy outcast in life that is hated by successful people and shunned by her family
if she doesn’t smarten the fuck up then she’s going to be a failed unhappy outcast in life that is hated by successful people and shunned by her family
Shit, I’m already all these things. I wonder what would happen if I used AI.
Ask what it would take to convince her.
She will probably require something which is just not practically possible.
If her assertion is not falsifiable, then its based on faith. You can’t argue with that.
edit: I’ve thought about this a little bit more and realised that this approach won’t work with something nebulous like “my sister supports the Trump presidency”. It’s a good tactic with specific beliefs like “the Earth is flat”. Subjective statements like “Trump is the best president” are subjective statements of opinion.
This is a bit disingenuous. Convincing me that Trump is not an idiot would also require something that is not practically possible (namely him not being a total imbecile).
If it were true that Trump is not an idiot then evidence of that would be practically possible.
I think it’s implied to ask for what it would take to convince you if it were true. If you witnessed trump in a non prepared debate making salient points, clever logic and such, you figure he wasn’t actually an idiot, right?
What does she actually know about?
Doesn’t matter what it is, literally any topic that she knows about, even if it’s the Kardashians.
One day ask her a question about it, then ask whatever chatbot she trusts, if they’re not the same, tell her she’s wrong and if she doesn’t believe you to ask her AI.
A big reason people think AI is smart, is they never ask it about something they know.
That sounds basic, but it means they never notice when any of their questions get a wrong answer.
Getting them to ask it about topics they know about, means they get to see how it can fail, and how a small initial error it makes can be extrapolated to the point everything else is bullshit.
Once they learn it’s not always right, they’re less likely to blindly trust it. That leads to them double checking some things, seeing it’s bullshitting more, and then double checking it more.
You need to replace the AI feedback loop with the rage loop. It ain’t hard to get a conservative there, get them to the point they’re asking chatbots questions they already know the answer too, just to see it get it wrong.
Ethics aside, if we don’t manipulate the idiots, someone else is going to do it.
Best one I’ve found recently was the top article on DDG search for “peacock mantis shrimp cleanup crew”.
The Peacock Mantis Shrimp is a valued clean‑up‑crew addition sold in‑store here in Columbus, Ohio. It acts as a scavenger and algae picker, keeps substrate clean, helping reduce maintenance and improve water quality. Stock 1–2 per 5 gal in a balanced reef or fish‑only system for best results. Difficulty: Easy. Offer varied empty shells. Drip‑acclimate and maintain stable salinity for long‑term health.
There are so many problems with this but I’ll start with the one that made me search for a cleanup crew for a mantis shrimp:
- they are aggressive and deadly to just about anything other than some damselfish
- minimun tank size is 20 gallons, putting one in a 5 gallon would be terrible for everyone and stoclong 1-2 per 5 gallons would be a bloodbath
- they are not scavengers or detrivores and do not eat algae
- they do not clean the substrate other than to kick it all over the place when making a burrow
born of 2 immigrants who also voted for Trump
Ho boy, I wonder how they’re feeling now with ICE running wild.
No problem. According to their bubble, that only happens to the bad people that didn’t follow the rules. Every single one deserved it in their view.
I’ve spoken to Trump supporters who are themselves illegal immigrants (overstayed visa). They don’t see the problem.
From another who has 1st gen relatives who literally entered illegally and who also voted Trump, the following are some reasons in no particular order. They fully believed he would only deport “the bad ones.” They STILL voted for him despite one part of the family who is still not fully citizens.
They still don’t believe non-criminals are being kidnapped, they still think he’s a good businessman, and still think he’s a great president.
The propaganda power of “reality” television is quite strong, apparently.
Or when they start trying to denaturalize everyone not sufficiently white based on quotas set by that dickhead Stephen Miller…
You have two choices:
Put her down or call ICE.
The former is more humane, but the latter would be a lot funnier.
But seriously, I would just disconnect, or at most, I would ask her to have the chatbot provides sources and then ask her to pull them up.
If her learning that it’s making up sources doesn’t get through to her, I wouldn’t try anymore. Just accept that she’s either going to have to come through it on her own, or she’ll just progressively get worse and worse, and you’ll have to decide if you want to stick around for that, I wouldn’t.
Ah yes, call ICE on the immigrants “wokely”
Some liberals enjoy the idea of ICE being called on an immigrant that supported Trump or MAGA. America is such a police state that having a paramilitary presence in its cities is not consistently a problem for either side of the political spectrum there.
I’d love to pretend I have a tried and true method, but statistically I’ve hit more walls than bridges. The thing that works more often than others is finding something they care about that’s easily falsifiable and honing in on that. Do that a few times in a row and hopefully they see that they don’t actually know what they’re talking about because their politicians don’t want them to. One of the easiest for me has been to really explain the gun show loophole. Guns seem to be pretty important to people I interact with, even if they don’t own any. They really have no idea what gun laws are. One of the other more recent things is Hegseths changes and the Trump ballroom. Depending on how tech bro they are and how willing or able you are to keep them on topic, DOGE isn’t too bad, but it can get off track fast. If she’s spiteful, the new Trump accounts might be worth bringing up. It’s really not a bad idea, but that’s HER taxes going to a bunch of babies.
Ghost her, go no contact, on moral grounds.
Sorry, you support a criminal fascist pedophile warmonger.
Thats bad.
You’re bad.
Bye!
… Its really not that complicated.
You can make it complicated and go into ostracization as a means of effectint social change, of cutting someone off being a very costly form of socially signalling how serious you are about this…
But its really not that complicated.
I wish I were as strong as you. I love my hater family, and care about them. A terrible weakness, I know…
Hah, well, given how frequently mine has directly ruined my life, betrayed me, and more recently, attempted to kill me, I guess I’ll take that as a compliment.
Yeah, it would be a terrible weakness if I still loved or attempted to have any contact with a bunch of dysfunctional, violent, abusive narcissists.
There’s a difference between ‘haters’ and ‘have directly tried to destroy you, multiple times’.
And thats just how fascists ultimately act, the behavior they ultimately enable against their outgroup, or, as in this and every other ‘leopards ate my face’ type story… themselves, their ingroup, their own family.
But hey I guess if your family is just ‘fascist-lite’, then I’m sure they’d never do anything to hurt you, right?
Because theae morally bankrupt people, well, they love you, so its fine.
Spoiler: If they’re actually fascists, they hate you and they want you to die.
If they got into it as a fad, they’re too stupid to be trusted with any complex task, and will be that stupid again.
Call ICE on her.
/s
Who cares.
They will change their minds again.
Vote.
voting got us here. now what. The next election may as well be fascist vs probably not a fascist
I think you’ll find that a large segment of the population did not in fact vote.
Pretty much this. Anyone dumb enough to fall for this shit once, will fall for it again.
I was repulican christian in highschool, when Trump got elected and my church went MAGA, I started to ask a lot more questions. The scariest part about becoming woke is learning how much deception we’re constantly fed and taking the step to say enough is enough.
People might be stupid, but they’re mostly ignorant.
So the women are beyond help!
Anti-Trump doesn’t mean pro-democrat.
Good, we hate the establishment Dems too. Last thing we need is people flocking to the dems before the midterms, we need to empty that jug out and fill it with new people.
It’s still crazy how many people want to write them off as lost causes already.
Those little idiots are going to be voting for decades, it’s insane to stop trying to bring them around.
I genuinely can’t fathom how folks mad at gen Z voters don’t understand that their anger toward gen Z voters was equally manufactured as those gen Z voters support for Trump was.
How fucking stupid.
Meh.
I 100% get being mad at really any random voting demographic.
Like, pick a group. I got a bone to pick with them.
My issue is people who fall for the oligarchs propaganda that want us to fight along their carefully manufactured battle lines instead uniting against the oligarchs like we need to.
It’s why I’m such a broken record about wealth inequality. It’s the one thing that resonates with over 99% of Americans, it’s the obvious choice to use to unite the people against the oligarchs, and why they constantly have to manufacture other shit.
We solve that, and no one’s pushing all the other shit as distractions, so it solves most of our issues at once.
4 years under a progressive with support of the House and Senate and we wouldn’t even recognize America, and I mean that in a good way.
And if you don’t 100% get why fascism is here, revisit what you responded to I guess.
Its all fucking stupid. Kids were memed into voting for a felon for president because the kids were stupid.
The kids were stupid because the schools are underfunded and the parents are overworked trying to keep a roof over their heads. All as a result of Republican policy (but they’d never tell you that).
Millennials at least had parents that were doing decent on 1-2 full-time jobs. Those who had all their parents working were latchkey kids before the social-media era.
So now, we have a generation of kids, who are now adults, who got a shit education and no critical reasoning skills at all. They were raised by screens and babysat by Zuckerberg.
Now they are idolizing the absolute worst people on the world. Between the constant dopamine drip from short-form videos and social media, the shit education (and the online finishing school thanks to COVID), and being raised by gen X and the early millennials…who are somewhat naive to how much the world has actually changed since their childhoods while also being pissed off about being fucked by boomers.
What’s really scary is how the fuck we recover from that. It’s basically brainwashing on a generational level. An entire generation largely made up of thoughtless drones that puppet whatever they read from the biggest/wealthiest pop-star and/or chauvinist cumstains on the internet.
And now, basically all of the legacy media (even the local news) is owned by the same clique of shitty billionaires, riding on Trump’s cock hoping to feel Putin’s thrusts.
We are beyond fucked, my friend.
