Autistic guy here and sorry for the political rant. There is a lot of intense and horrific things happening all over the world like the recent war with Iran. But let me say this. If you voted for Trump and your friends and family cut you off because of it, then I do not feel any sympathy for you.

Especially if you have a loved one who is neurodivergent or is special needs. The amount of grief and hopelessness this administration is bringing to thousands, if not millions, of families in the USA is indefensible. Families have been torn apart because of his draconian policies towards immigration. Legal immigrants and regular tourists are being jailed because they committed a minor infraction. Education and social safety programs are being gutted, while the ultra-wealthy keep getting richer and richer.

Canada, Australia and Europe, which we have seen as friends for the previous couple decades, are moving away from the USA after Trump’s annexation threats of Canada and withdrawing from several agreements. And I don’t fault them for boycotting the USA as there are other friendlier countries to travel to and buy products from. Compared to Europe or Asia, the only good things we have going for us here are the universities and the national parks. Yet Trump and most of his cabinet want to dismantle the national park system and remove all federal funding from these universities. I’m not sad that Canadians and Europeans (and Australians) are boycotting the USA, and at this point, I would happily boycott the USA as well if I didn’t live here. I’m sad because I really enjoy talking to international people. Plus many of these cultural ties between certain states and certain provinces (like BC and the NW USA, or Quebec and the Maritimes with New England) have been severely damaged and will be very difficult to repair. What makes traveling fun for me is having fun conversations with international people from all over the world.

All of this to make the USA safer?! Really?!

Now that Roe v. Wade has ben overturned and many states are implementing harsh laws preventing women from getting abortions, the USA will very likely its own Mahsa Amini. And when that happens and another wave of nationwide protests happen, Laken Riley will really be turning in her grave when she finds out her death was used for far-right authoritarian policies to dismantle healthcare for millions of women.

Safer from school shootings and gun violence since Republicans want to ease all gun restrictions? Safer from diseases since there is an anti-vax skeptic who is the secretary of the US health and human services and wants to remove all vaccine requirements? Out of fear that vaccines cause Autism which has been debunked countless times by countless scientists? Safer from pollution now that several environmental regulations have been eased? Safer for plane travel now that majority of the FAA has been fired? Safer traveling out of the country because American citizens (who even have Global Entry) are being put into waiting rooms for hours.

You voted for him to lower the cost of groceries and gas prices?! How is $2.80 per gallon of gas expensive, unless you casually drive a large pickup truck? Due to the tariffs and now the war in Iran, gas and gadgets are going to become A LOT more expensive. People in Oklahoma are going to be in for a very nasty shock when they are suddenly paying Massachusetts prices for utilities and food in a matter of time, unless the entire world can forgive the USA at this point.

If you voted for Trump in 2016, I would still think you have a good heart, even if our political opinions are different. If you voted for Trump in 2024 after Trump proved to the entire world that he has no respect for his political opponents, the constitution and law by putting members of the entire US cabinet in danger on 6 Jan 21, then I don’t think you have a good heart and you deserve to be ostracized.

This is why I have such a heard time sympathizing with those who lost friends and family connections because they would rather die of heart failure or cancer than have a well-qualified woman be president, and instead sympathize with those that did cut off friends and family if they voted for Orange Man. I hope everyone who voted for Orange Man will financially suffer. Because we don’t have a difference in political opinions. We have a difference in morality and ethics.

  • SnarkoPolo@lemmy.world
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    Yep, it’s a classic Leopards Ate My Face. They got exactly what they voted for.

    A couple I knew in college, basically they’d been together since childhood, moved to rural Minnesota, because conservative. They were militantly anti-mask and anti-.odern medicine. They refused the COVID vaccine and the whole family got sick several times. The husband finally died, on a respirator. His wife blames Biden. Sad.

  • Shardikprime@lemmy.world
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    This is just great thinking

    think about it. the Reps can use this endlessly to justify their apparent lack of empathy towards democrats

    So under this framework, all the actions they are taking currently are fully justified, not only by themselves, but by the perceived “enemy”

    Basically you have pigeonholed yourself into a pickle placed between 2 boulders called “a rock” and “a hard place”, as you now cannot complain about anything they do as, well, that’s the framework you are spouting about

    So all is good with the world when you get shown no empathy

    After all, in your heart of hearts, you voted for this 😉

      • Shardikprime@lemmy.world
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        See! It’s marvelous! Circular reasoning all the way down!

        Then we pluck each other eyes, and teeth for good measure!

        As I said, it is just great thinking 😉

        • surewhynotlem@lemmy.world
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          I’m not sure I see refusal to collaborate with horrible people as the same as being horrible people.

          Or do you think disagreement is violence?

  • PixelPilgrim@lemmings.world
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    You could do toxic positivity and say “any Trump voter can be redeemed. Realizing your errors of supporting trump and seeing how it affected people around you is a good start”

  • some_guy@lemmy.sdf.org
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    I haven’t spoken to my mother since Jan 19. She voted for this asshole (again). My partner is at risk because of my mother. I may never speak to her again. I still sent flowers on Mother’s Day, however.

    • shark_phenomenon@lemmy.worldOP
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      I lost contact with some of my closest friends in college that I knew for more than a decade because of their politics and other things happening on social media. It’s sad, but my parents and I recently moved to another city in a different state so I am forgetting that friendship already.

      • SunshineJogger@feddit.org
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        The reason why that mancreature is president is not because of what he did. He is only in power because of the fucking morons like that mother who gave him that power.

        She is not Donald Trump.

        She is worse, just like every other individual who gave such a horrible person the power to ruin the lives of millions.

        He should clearly stop sending flowers… Unless they are dead, thorny and have a snarky greetings card

          • Senal@programming.dev
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            Does the fact that the democrats are shitty politicians somehow negate the fact that trump is an incompetent manchild with apparently no checks and balances ?

            Or are they, in fact, two entirely unrelated things that can both be true ?

            An unrelated strawman is a poor distraction from you not actually addressing what is being said.

            Though i suppose if you don’t actually have anything to say on the subject a strawman is better than nothing, for a given value of “better”.

            • Rekorse@sh.itjust.works
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              Is this where I’m supposed to convince you I’m right? You won’t even talk to your mother, what chance do I have?

              • Senal@programming.dev
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                I think you have me mistaken for someone else.

                You don’t need to prove anything, and judging by the replies so far I wouldn’t expect any level of good faith discourse so no need to worry about my expectations.

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            I’m European so not any part of the flawed American two party set up.

            I just know when people have done things which are too severe in consequence to forgive from a human perspective

              • SunshineJogger@feddit.org
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                Why should I aspire to something like that? Looking at how inhuman, corrupt and incompetent the current judges in America seem to be under Trump I’m not surprised you regard it as a noteworthy profession.

                Now if we were speaking about a country where judges are actually trying to create a better country… But alas, we are talking about America where even the police is more evil and racist than helpful on average.

                • Rekorse@sh.itjust.works
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                  The average american is trying to follow their values and be good to each other. Your rhetoric is self fulfilling.

      • SmilingSolaris@lemmy.world
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        You are responsible for the actions of people you vote for. You don’t get to drop your vote and move on. If you regret it you apologize as if you yourself had done it.

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            You are advocating for policies that will literally kill innocent people, simply to indulge your hatred. Nobody is under any obligation to agree with you, or indulge your immoral beliefs or opinions.

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                Why should racist Nazis who would literally kill members of their own families for their political beliefs or their life choices, expect the luxury of love from those same family members? They chose MAGA over their own families, being shunned is the price they pay for indulging their hatred.

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                  What a fantastical scenario you’ve invented. I guess everyone has that psycho cousin who murders a minority each holiday get together. Damn these Nazis!

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            Man, we can disagree on politics all day long. But I ain’t spending my free time associating with a motherfucker who wants me and people I love dead, gone, out of sight.

            I imagine none of your friends or associates actively call for your elimination from existence. How many Nazi friends you keep around?

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                Psychopath MAGA Nazi Traitors should be shunned by all decent, moral people. You can all swim together in your scummy cesspool of hate.

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                My brother in Christ, drop the dumbassery for 5 seconds. How many friends of yours are racists against your race? How many friends you got that actively call for some part of your life that you have no control over to be made illegal? Cmon, how many you got? Mr “disagreement is good” should have a plethora of friends and family wishing you dead.

  • Treczoks@lemmy.world
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    Because we don’t have a difference in political opinions. We have a difference in morality and ethics.

    That exactly is the problem. They claim morality, but don’t have them. They claim to be faithful Christians, but Jesus himself would probably take the whip again and drive them out for so violently abuse his teachings.

    • Caveman@lemmy.world
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      I’ve heard that autism world view is more governed by values instead of which group you’re a part of. The question “describe yourself” was studied and autistic people respond with “conscientious, stubborn, eager to please, sharing and believe firmly in the pursuit of knowledge” while neurotypicals respond rather with “white Christian man from the Midwest” etc.

      Honestly, to me it’s painfully obvious what Trumps game plan was going to be and there was an example of it before where he enacted the Muslim ban, had an anti Latino sentiment, inhumane detention camps and so on.

      It seems to me that the voters didn’t feel included in the economy and they felt their way of life was slowly being removed by the Democrats so they voted for fascism. Instead of voting for the bad option they voted for worse because the bad option hadn’t been working for them so far.

      US politics is a shitshow.

    • _AutumnMoon_@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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      The people today who claim to be followers of Christ are the same people who 2000 years ago would be shouting “crucify him!”

  • FlashMobOfOne@lemmy.world
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    LOL

    “Well-qualified woman”

    There are no qualifications for president, and if there were, neither Trump nor Harris would be suitable candidates. What kind of doofus looks at 25% unemployment and tells people to ‘just be joyful’ for three months of a campaign and says they won’t change anything, again in full knowledge of Americans’ impoverishment and Biden’s unpopularity? (Not to mention her wet fart of a primary campaign in 2020.)

    But if you want a woman with half a chance of winning, AOC is literally filling football stadiums in red states right now.

    I have sympathy for them. Most Americans didn’t vote for Donald out of ideological concerns. They voted Donald because they’ve gotten progressively poorer for four years while Joe Biden did nothing meaningful to help them.

    • Possibly linux@lemmy.zip
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      I think people are taking the my way or the highway approach to politics. You are suppose to have an extreme view one way or the other and everyone who disagrees is evil.

      I think it is the shortcomings of the current political climate

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          I don’t think it was designed that way. It is just how it works out now that the US is more than a bunch of 18th century farmers and craftsmen

    • CancerMancer@sh.itjust.works
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      Americans are being lied to all day, every day, by complicit corporate media backing an ever more corrupt establishment. This is not exclusive to Republicans by any stretch of the imagination: remember all the people clamouring against the “Bernie Bros”? I’m sure some of the people taking this extreme position against Republican voters were also bashing Bernie Bros and saying “it’s her turn”.

      Where did that get you people, huh? Sanders and AOC extend an olive branch and fill up stadiums, while you continue to try to drive even more wedges between us. “He will not divide us”? You were right, because OP and people like OP are all too happy to drive the wedge in on their own. Trump is not the thing you’re fighting against, he’s effectively what you’re fighting for. Go ahead, keep driving people away to the right and see what happens.

      • FlashMobOfOne@lemmy.world
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        Absolutely.

        Beating fascism means fighting side-by-side with people you don’t like, just as when America allied with Russia.

  • JeeBaiChow@lemmy.world
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    There are those who chose to hedge for clout - sit it out in smug virtue, while avoiding accountability for allowing him into office.

      • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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        I mean, we can go back farther than that. Carter reappointing Paul Volcker and deregulating the airlines + oil/gas anti-gouging laws really fucked us.

        • OrteilGenou@lemmy.world
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          I mean, I feel like Reagan was a watershed moment but if you go Carter you might get all the way back to Teddy R

          • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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            Reaganism was definitely a new kind of politics, in the sense that he was the bellweather of the next generation of the GOP (and Dems tailing after).

            But if we’re just looking for an excuse to yell at people for how they voted, I can’t think of maybe half a dozen Presidents undeserving of that response.

    • FlashMobOfOne@lemmy.world
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      Every single day.

      The 99% who always vote partisan have gaslit themselves into believing some incredibly silly things.

  • Steve@communick.news
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    Then it sounds like you have an absolutely normal amount of empathy as an American.
    Which I should add is incredibly low, and my greatest shame of being an American myself.

    If you can’t feel bad for people who don’t know they’re victims of what may be the longest and most expensive con this nation has ever known, I don’t know what else to say.

    • snooggums@lemmy.world
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      If you can’t feel bad for people who don’t know they’re victims of what may be the longest and most expensive con this nation has ever known, I don’t know what else to say.

      I don’t feel bad for them because it required willful ignorance, hatred of others, and refusing to acknowledge his first term in office to ‘fall for it’.

      Fuck 'em. Hope they suffer more than the people who are suffering because of their choices.

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        This con has been decades in the making. It’s not just Rump specifically.

        They’ve been getting groomed since before Regan.

        • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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          Quite literally since birth.

          You watch neighbors grow up and mature thinking we’ll all reach some kind of educated, experienced consensus. But I’ve got people I’ve known since middle school who are so sheep dipped in propaganda they can’t tell up from down. And I know more than a few others who have put up with Eric Adams and Andrew Cuomo and that assortment of liberal sleeze so long they can’t tell the difference between parties.

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          I’ve been around for decades and it was always an obvious con.

          They love Nazis and Russia. Fuck 'em.

      • And009@lemmynsfw.com
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        It’s just what it looks like. Go in collect psychological evidence and the problem is surely a much bigger misdirection.

    • And009@lemmynsfw.com
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      From the outside it looks to be a deep rooted issue. I don’t think it’s the grooming, rather a lack of shared cause.

      Trump is bringing you together unlike anything.

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            I hope that’s true, but there’s no real evidence in the news. While it’s amazing and inspirational how many people stood up to protest, that doesn’t imply any political conversions. In fact it could indicate further divisiveness