‘Braver Angels’ in Vermont Want to Change Political Discourse

Submitted by pjdog603 t3_z6z2j6 in vermont

https://www.sevendaysvt.com/vermont/braver-angels-in-vermont-want-to-change-political-discourse/Content?oid=36956740&media=AMP+HTML

First three paragraphs:

“Braver Angels, a national nonprofit that seeks to unite conservatives and progressives, has a new Vermont organizer and is holding a series of workshops as it seeks to gain traction in the state.

State organizer Lincoln Earl-Centers recently held a training in Charlotte and plans more this winter in Shelburne and Barre to teach the group’s conflict resolution principles, which are based on helping people understand others’ points of view.

Earl-Centers, 38, said he took up the role last year because he’d like to help people speak in a productive manner — without lashing out, dismissing others’ views, or trying to overwhelm their opponents with information. He's participated in New England-wide virtual Braver Angels sessions over the last few years, and said the experience was a welcome antidote to what he was witnessing online and amongst friends and family.”

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alwaysmilesdeep t1_iy3t7a6 wrote

It's hard to have intellectual discourse when one side literally hangs flags outside their house saying f'ck your feelings.

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pjdog603 OP t1_iy3vyko wrote

It doesn’t seem this group attracts that type of person, and if it does, it doesn’t seem they stick around:

“‘There are some people on both ends of the political spectrum who are unable to have a civil conversation, to disagree without being disagreeable, and they pretty much self-prune,’ said Pipes, 59, a retiree who spends hours in his orchard at his home in Fairfield.”

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alwaysmilesdeep t1_iy3xxx9 wrote

In all sincerity all of my 45 years of life experience leads me to believe this will be a one sided discourse selling single sided perspectives to try and convert people to more conservative thinking.

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hideous-boy t1_iy3yk64 wrote

the article pretty much says that overtly

the whole point of this group is to bring in conservatives who feel alienated by left-leaning views. It's not to find some mythical common ground. It's to dilute any progressive view into something worthless that's palatable and unthreatening for conservatives

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alwaysmilesdeep t1_iy3yr9w wrote

And this is why I'll stay in the woods. The last thing we need is a more selfish world.

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patriarchgoldstien t1_iy4gbg2 wrote

45 years and still equating "one side" to a flag saying "fuck your feelings", still got some growing up to do I see.

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alwaysmilesdeep t1_iy4kkfb wrote

Trump had a.n 81% approval rating amongst Republicans, the other 19% were complacent with his behavior. Try all the bs you want...they are and will always be the "fuck your feelings crowd" only some are dumb enough to hang a flag about it.

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lookaflyingbuttress t1_iy3ywrx wrote

If this conservative group is "enlightened" and not MAGA cultists they wish to disassociate, then their time is much better spent talking down cultists instead of trying to split progressives from Democrats.

That is, if you and this group are honest about your goals. The fact the goal of this group is to have "discussions" with progressives (but not Democrats) is telling. Why reach across the divide to only one group, and not the largest opposition group? Nah, not even the most outlandish would think conservatives would help further their goals more than Democrats.

You're transparent.

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NowIAmThatGuy t1_iy4cd2g wrote

This person gets it. Fix your own house before you try and have conversations with others. If conservatives want to be legitimate then confront the racism and fascism in their own party. Otherwise no thank you. I realize not all conservatives are racist fascist, but it’s hard to know. So fix that and I’m happy to listen and share.

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hideous-boy t1_iy3xrr1 wrote

this is drawing the same false equivalency though

one end of the spectrum refuses to have civil conversation because the other side thinks it's entirely valid to debate their right to exist and live like everyone else.

the other end of the spectrum refuses because they actively threaten marginalized groups and are responsible for a vast majority of the domestic terrorism vs these groups

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[deleted] t1_iy41v5x wrote

[deleted]

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5teerPike t1_iy43duv wrote

See that's the problem though, one side is actually disgusting and the other is not.

Right wing extremism is the most present terrorist threat to the US. People who argue against right wing views are not storming the capitol over it.

Edit: can this "both sides" guy ensure an environment where I won't be called slurs, or worse, for being queer & Jewish?

Can they explain how it's valid to call me a gr**mer just for being non binary? Despite the fact that this is just plain libel/ slander?

After the ensuing conversation I'm going to assume the answer to my questions is a No.

Edit 2: it won't let me respond to another comment, so I'll just add it here

Racism, sexism, anti semetism, and hating LGBT people is disgusting.

And asking me "do you think you will win anyone over" is assuming I haven't ever tried being nice. I have. It doesn't work when the other person says "fuck your feelings".

Oh and these aren't teams. This isn't some game to me. Personal politics fall on a spectrum, and I just don't believe in the "both sides" horseshoe fallacy. Many people I know who aren't disgusting have views I don't agree with, and I have thoughtful, kind conversations with them nonetheless. It helps a lot when the core beliefs of the person you disagree with don't involve dehumanizing myself or others.

Links added. Facts cited.

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[deleted] t1_iy45tkv wrote

[deleted]

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you_give_me_coupon t1_iy90di5 wrote

> See that's the problem though, one side is actually disgusting and the other is not.

Without getting into whether or not you're right - let's say you are - what's your intent here? Do you think you will win anyone over to your team by calling them disgusting? Or is that not the point, and this is aimed at your own team?

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InThreeWordsTheySaid t1_iy40sht wrote

If it's a group that doesn't attract or keep around the loud and willfully ignorant contingent of conservatives steering their party toward religious fundamentalism, white supremacy and baseless conspiracy theories, then it already failed to achieve it's objective. We already know there are self-proclaimed moderates and independents who think we should all "just get along." They are useless.

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EstablishmentHappy38 t1_iy7umtm wrote

It actually does, Dan Pipes, the organizer, is far right in many ways.... He just doesn't like Trump (probably because Trump isn't effective, not because he says anything far right).

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brothermuffin t1_iy4av2j wrote

So how would you like we handle it, then? Wait around doing nothing until there’s a goddamned civil war? These people aren’t your enemy, they’re your countrymen. Fathers, brothers, FAMILY. Stop painting them like they’re all regularly in the streets committing acts of terror. 99% of them are benign and merely victims of an infectious cult like ideological phenomenon. We’ve been, as a species, resorting to violence to solve ideological disputes for… forever! Fuck me for celebrating trying something NEW

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alwaysmilesdeep t1_iy4l7qv wrote

Unfortunately I think the US has to crumble to be re-built. I feel we are all standing outside of a propane tank on fire asking how we can stop it...we can't, it's time to seek cover.

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triptopdropblop t1_iy51i6z wrote

Go outside. Talk to your neighbors. The word is not as bad as your screens are telling you

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alwaysmilesdeep t1_iy52sun wrote

I live in the woods and work to co-opertism. My focus is how to survive regardless of what happens in the rest of the world. My freezer is full and my concerns are little

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Jessica_T t1_iybsnpw wrote

Yep. I'm not going to try to reach out to the people who want me dead for being a disabled trans lesbian. If I wasn't white and was an immigrant I'd be their ultimate nightmare.

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Live-Vermicelli-8771 t1_iy7prex wrote

Lmao you could be talking about either side. Your own bias is what makes it obvious to you😂😂

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alwaysmilesdeep t1_iy7q1ut wrote

I have yet to see a liberal hang a "fuck your feelings" flag on their vehicle.

But keep hating those co-exsist subaru's...Cleary it's getting you all the farm girls.

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lookaflyingbuttress t1_iy3xgf8 wrote

Conservatives, huh? Didn't they all go for Trump, who just recently had dinner with outwardly-fascist Nick Fuentes?

Nah, this group is just trying to peel progressives away from Democrats in attempt to split votes. We progressives are a bit smarter than that.

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5teerPike t1_iy42qtv wrote

When the other side is saying "you will not replace us" I don't think the problem is merely being dismissive of each other's views.

Edit: I corrected the quote, but it's still anti semetic

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hideous-boy t1_iy46x3e wrote

but we should be striving for a compromise between basic human decency and genocide! /s

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5teerPike t1_iy47zbz wrote

It seems like a "decency for me but not for thee" if I'm being asked to tolerate someone who thinks I'm a lizard with a Lazer.

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Trajikbpm t1_iy3wgf0 wrote

I love when people say oh it's just a difference of opinion yet one side is shooting up crowds of people on the daily and if they're not they're definitely encouraging it.

When it was drunk uncle Joe at Thanksgiving it was different but this has escalated to severe brain rot and life threatening nonsense.

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mouse_data t1_iy5c19i wrote

Remember when a Bernie supporter shot actual congressmen?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congressional_baseball_shooting

Hodgkinson's attack was "an act of terrorism... fueled by rage against Republican legislators"

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Intelligent-Hunt7557 t1_iy69hi4 wrote

Remember when all the Dems made jokes about it after it happened and used it for their campaigns? Oh wait…hunh…maybe there’s a difference between a wayward individual and encouraging stochastic terrorism.

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vtmtct t1_iy47ujg wrote

What should be done about conservatives with whom you disagree?

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Trajikbpm t1_iy486i7 wrote

Honestly I have no clue at this point. I'm more into trying to get progressive bills passed to help all of us including conservatives so we have a better quality of life.

Meanwhile they want to take mine...

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Trajikbpm t1_iy49arl wrote

I've argued with you before youre an idiot and I thought I had you blocked.

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[deleted] t1_iy43h4a wrote

I love & support my daughter who is a lesbian. Republicans hate her, want her to be denied equal rights, say she's going to burn in hell, imply my wife & I somehow "groomed" her, call her sick & twisted, and demand their hateful bigoted churches continue to benefit from not paying taxes.

I mean, good luck, but this feels like a huge waste of energy.

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thebadpixel t1_iy4v5ar wrote

I too am the father of a gay daughter. It sickens me that she has to even hear the filth that conservatives spew about this. It’s none of their business, and my family’s freedom and happiness are infinitely more important than their misguided “beliefs”.

The “meet in the middle” point between hating gay people and not hating gay people isn’t “only hate on odd days of the week”, it’s “don’t hate gay people”.

Edit: autocorrect likes changing gay to gray, which is somehow sad.

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[deleted] t1_iy5taby wrote

If by groomed they mean I beg her to clean her damn bedroom, yup I’m a groomer lol. Christ. Why should I extend my hand to those who want to cut it off? They should change their hearts, I’m not moving a muscle.

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thebadpixel t1_iy62h6x wrote

I have two. One has a room that I’ve threatened to call 1-800-GOT-JUNK on because it was unsafe for human habitation. The other (the one who is gay) has a room that could be featured in Better Homes & Gardens. Sisters… always an adventure.

And, I’m right there with you. They need to change, or die off and let the youngsters fix all of this.

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ElDub73 t1_iy6alxg wrote

MAGAs are worried about gay and trans people “infecting” their kids, which is nonsense, and think that measures to stop actual infections are serious abridgments of civil rights.

How do you reason with that?

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MYrobouros t1_iy40orh wrote

This feels it's awfully similar to those Vermonters who just want "good government".

Also, not to be a VT exceptionalist, but why in God's name would I want a national organization to "help" with discourse in VT? This is like, practically the one place I can be friends with a conservative and he'll leave me alone except about local issues.

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5teerPike t1_iy43qnc wrote

My experience with local conservatives is that they're fine with censoring drag queen story hour at a local library because the performers need "better vetting", meanwhile they had nothing to say for the actual pedophile caught at the local school. . . . .

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MYrobouros t1_iy46zot wrote

Yeah but that's a problem with local centrists too in my experience. Like, committed Dems are all of a sudden very tut-tut about speaking up for drag queens. My point being, there's already discourse, I guess, and I have a hard time believing it'll be better because some cooler heads just-asking-questions people show up.

But you're right. There's a narrow lane for cooperation and it becomes a tight rope for social issues (and impossible for good faith work on sex crimes.)

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5teerPike t1_iy48kjz wrote

Those are centrist Dems and theyre really more right of center for that.

There's a lot of liberal window dressing in Vermont that's for sure. The "just asking questions" crowd can't take it when people question them.

It becomes a tight rope on the social, and the fiscal does affect the social, and one crowd is just burning the rope while the center is saying they're fine if the left gets burned because at least we all let the right bring matches.

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MYrobouros t1_iy5aatt wrote

I also feel that, often enough, the voters are left of the select board or the boards of various municipal institutions here, which is deeply frustrating. Or, not even always specifically left, so much as just further out. Like, I don't know that it's a lefty position to think that 3 acre minimum lots are bad/good policy, or what have you. And then you wonder why you get low voter turnout, and the answer has to be tied up in e.g. zoning and/or cannabis red tape.

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5teerPike t1_iy5b1uu wrote

Absolutely, I also dislike that there are select board positions that are unelected as well. So we have to wait for them or resign or be stuck changing absolutely nothing.

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MYrobouros t1_iy5wk2j wrote

I guess the good news is, have you seen the model zoning guide that the State made with the Congress for the New Urbanism? It's only passingly relevant to this thread but I think it's an excellent document.

https://www.cnu.org/vermont

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Albert_NE t1_iy48pob wrote

This is just a tactic to erode the progressive majorities in New England.

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boyyhowdy t1_iy4rdn0 wrote

This is actually a great idea. Conservatives can learn about environmental and labor protections, and liberals can learn about Jewish space lasers and adrenochrome.

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roborob11 t1_iy4h1rp wrote

FDR said that “the real safeguard of democracy … is education”.

The “both sides” in this case is one being educated and the other proudly ignorant.

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Kixeliz t1_iy4ilx5 wrote

And then you realize why right wingers are so dead set on gutting the public education system. All starts to make sense.

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Maleficent_Rope_7844 t1_iy7trjr wrote

Probably why this group is concerned with people being "overwhelmed with information" in political discourse. Facts can be overwhelming to the uneducated, I suppose.

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ReasonableLiving5958 t1_iy4o8vy wrote

Nah. This isn't some utopia where they can be reasoned with. The 30 percent or so of Vermonters who still vote for this shit, particularly after all the shit the conservative party did from 2020 until now (not even mentioning the horrid shit they did before that), are not intellectually capable of political discourse.

Any level minded conservative left that shit behind after 2020, if not before. My uncle, for example, who has voted Republican literary his whole life, bounced hard out of that shit after Trump was voted in and he hasn't looked back since.

They don't care about discourse. They only care about their team winning because Fox News told them too. They are racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic white supremacists who probably couldn't locate Vermont on a map.

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jsudarskyvt t1_iy42p09 wrote

Unless people can agree on the facts there is no chance of carrying on a meaningful conversation. I have seen few conservatives/republicans capable of understanding the difference between the facts and their opinions.

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zonitronic t1_iy4mqtd wrote

"Fascist Fuckwits Fake Feelings For Finding Friends"

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Responsible_Heart365 t1_iy4ut3z wrote

Intellectually underemployed trumpanzees are not capable of rational discourse, thought or behavior. This is a fool’s errand destined to be consigned to the trash heap of history like all things Neville Chamberlain and his idealistic and naive ilk. Marginalizing republiKKKlans (as has so effectively been done this election) so everyone can benefit from bettering legislation is the only reasonable course. It’s like a recent article in Vermont Digger said: the Vermont “Republican” “party” is “just people yelling and screaming things.” It is more a collection of simian feces-fingers. Look at what the Franklin county imbeciles voted for “Sheriff.” Now the town council - themselves all republiKKKan - is moving to impeach it. I rest my case.

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Intelligent-Hunt7557 t1_iy5fg98 wrote

As nearly everyone here suspects, if their leadership is any indication the good faith in this organization/activity runs shallow and the intellectual dishonesty runs deep. White supremacy repackaged as WTFery. Why not encourage anyone left of center to spin their wheels?

True confirmation of how stupid and awful this exercise should be: Dan Pipes’ Letter to the Editor where his big selling point for convincing whites to celebrate Juneteenth is that we whites were responsible for liberation because “slaves [sic] couldn’t free themselves”?!?!

WTAF? So Pipes is okay with just minimizing and/or denying the Civil War participation of freedmen? Wow. Sounds about white.

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ElDub73 t1_iy6a3oq wrote

I mean he could start in, say, Texas and work his way to Vermont.

Vermont politics aren’t causing the country or the world problems.

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IndigoHG t1_iy510r1 wrote

No thank you.

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triptopdropblop t1_iy4uwoc wrote

All of these comments prove something like this is needed while also proving that it probably won’t succeed. I wish you all the best.

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Intelligent-Hunt7557 t1_iy5d58g wrote

The good faith of BA is like your opinion on ‘Antifa’- empty and meaningless. If you wanted a civil discourse you wouldn’t need to construct bogeymen.

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SuperSaiyan2012 t1_iy75s8e wrote

Right when I have lost faith in Nonpartisanship ways to unite parties together, something rolls around and tells me “Hey, there is still hope in this world”. Best of luck to them.

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CowHuman7223 t1_iy5kc0t wrote

Any conservative that shows up for that, is not really a conservative.

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Vermonter623 t1_iy5sarj wrote

Wokism is to the left what magaism is to the right. Unfortunately each side keeps trying to out edgelord each other with provocative acts. It forces people to pick a side based on reaction. It does nothing but further the divide. It definitely helps the people in power keep us divided by making us think that the other side is after something we can’t seem to live without. They continue to exploit us day in and day out

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Intelligent-Hunt7557 t1_iy6abso wrote

Yes, neonazis on one side, sensitive caring people on the other, BOTH SIDES!

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Vermonter623 t1_iy7uvtz wrote

Yes. I’ve seen low expectations racism and white knight racism from liberals. That’s still racism.

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alwaysmilesdeep t1_iy89w4d wrote

There is no wokism...it's a made up boogeyman term...

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Beardly_Smith t1_iy4g962 wrote

Never thought I'd see people complaining about civil discourse.

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alwaysmilesdeep t1_iy89nod wrote

If true discourse was the goal, no one would be complaining about it.

This will consist of one sided arguments

"We use guns to protect ourselves, if we didn't have them we couldn't protect be safe" "the democrats just want to take our safety" "don't you want to be safe?"

If the goal was actual discourse all would be invited, not just progressives

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vtmtct t1_iy46n02 wrote

Too sensible and civil for tribalist Reddit I see. Kudos to those who want to find a way across the great divide

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RoyalIndependence500 t1_iy497vr wrote

As a gay man I have a question for you. Do you mean we should be looking for common ground with people who want to deny my family rights? That I should try to find the “goodness” in people who would rather I didn’t exist? At the end of the day, we all have to take a stand. Of my neighbor flies a Trump flag, they are telling me they either are, or support, a bigot. I have no intention of validating their beliefs.

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vtmtct t1_iy4beir wrote

Civil discourse is and has always been the only alternative to violence if you want to keep society together. So if you want to avoid that, then I suggest you humbly accept that some people will never agree with you on everything. Bad ideas should be met with a stronger argument and overtime attitudes change. You should look into a man named Daryl Davis, he is practically a modern day saint.

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alwaysmilesdeep t1_iy4njoz wrote

Its not they disagree. No one cares if you disagree. They literally want to make it illegal to be gay...jail/prison/mental health/institutions. They don't care that members of their cult are shooting up gay clubs...killing innocent people.

Personally I don't like people with porsches....I'm not gonna condone killing them though, nor do I plan to imprison or punish them.

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vtmtct t1_iy4oiun wrote

Narratives are not always what they seem.

That’s a tangent from my original point but wanted to clear up the misinformation in your comment. Have you looked up Daryl Davis? There is your answer

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alwaysmilesdeep t1_iy4ort2 wrote

Yes that's already been disproven by his social media and crowds he associates with.

This is an attempt to get the hate crime removed and distort the narrative

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vtmtct t1_iy4pcld wrote

No it has not…google it and find me a fact check then. By the way, the whole philosophy is that you self identify so how exactly would anyone but that person prove otherwise?

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