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Words matter.
Always use simple direct language.
- Help the poor
- Healthcare for everyone
- Good treatment at work.
Don't use complex words.
Fox News: "Write that down. WRITE THAT DOWN!"
this post was submitted on 03 Jul 2025
393 points (99.7% liked)
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because welfare has been propagandized as used by "lazy and homeless, and poors, and blacks" its usually based on racism as well, the true welfare queens are Conservative voters.
Ah, ~40% of Americans are complete fucking morons, that sounds about right.
~40% of Americans also read and write at an elementary school level or worse, but I'm sure that's just a coincidence.
... I think we've found the mythical 'independent, median voter'.
54% of Americans read at below a grade 6 level.
Welfare is may litterally just mean 'moocher' to an American who has been drowned in propaganda their whole life.
Ah, ~40% of Americans are complete fucking morons, that sounds about right.
You're leaving out the 29% who are against it no matter what you call it.
Those are evil people, who do not want to help other people. But this 40% are the people who would do the correct thing but they are convinced it's bad and vote against their interest
thevoidzero basically captured my response, but yeah.
A total fucking moron is a person who is literally too stupid to understand anything going on around them at anything but the most basic level of abstraction.
They have no ability for critical analysis, very little independent thought going on beyond what immediately and directly affects them, personally.
That isn't to say they can't learn. Its just that they can't really 'think'.
'The mark of an educated man is the ability to honestly entertain a thought they do not believe in.'
They can't do that, that would be very difficult snd confusing for them, cause them immense discomfort.
Functionally too stupid to be responsible members of a modern democracy, easily tricked by propoganda... essentially amoral, because they cannot formulate nor adhere to any kind of consistent, intentional moral framework.
...
The 29% below... well, they may or may not be relatively stupid, but they at least have a consistent belief, albeit an evil one... this shows they have an above elementary capability for abstraction and consistentcy.
Which unfortunately also means that only about 30% of people are, at worst, well intentioned, but could also possibly be stupid, though not as stupid as our glorious 40% in the middle that is easily swayed by rhetoric, phrasing, emotional manipulation, "vibes", etc.
People are emotional creatures.
Someone was joking in another thread, but maybe we should seriously consider just taking socialism and calling it, like, americanism.
Yeah if you want to pitch socialism to people who don't know what it is, just describe its parts as individual policies. Don't actually use the word "socialism" - that makes the rednecks scurred >_>
And if you do say socialism, say it along with something they like that isn't scurry. For example, "socialism, like the fire department".
Yup, look at the overwhelming support citizens have for the Affordable Care Act... but haaaaaaaaaaaate Obamacare.
They got me! I have to admit, "welfare" leaves a bad taste in my mouth where "helping the poor" sounds fair enough. I grew up under Reagan, heard the bullshit, know it's bullshit, I get it.
And you know damned well what those words really mean. Welfare = black, poor people = whites. (That's from a GenX perspective.)
So weird. As a Scandinavian, "welfare" to me means schools, healthcare, elderly care, sick pay, paid parental leave etc., paid for by the shared burden of taxes for the benefit of everyone.
It is a word with entirely positive connotations for me.
To me the negative connotation of "welfare" is, Kafkaesque bureaucracy used to gate access. Actually being on it feels more like you are playing a fucked up game than receiving assistance.
People acting like gaming welfare is easy. Fuck me, it's a full-time job getting anything at all.
For example: Been thinking about trying to get some food stamps. Wife works, I'm unemployed, maybe get a little of the tax money back from when I was making bank? Maybe get a pittance of unemployment? I can scarcely imagine navigating all the bullshit if I wasn't technically capable. Kafkaesque bureaucracy indeed.
I got fired from a job, rather unjustly, and attempted to file for unemployment.
It made no sense, I could not navigate my states website (which didn’t want to play well with Linux anyway), so I gave up. Which is the point.
One time an employer fired me and refused to pay me after discovering I was trans, and it literally took 6 months to get that check. The system is designed to fuck people.
I hear this, and also some flavor of people gaming the system.
I don't like that I hear these things. But something definitely weaseled its way in.
Welfare = black, poor people = whites.
Ding ding ding! We have a winner.
One of many lasting “gifts” of Reagan.
We’ve got to get all those ~~welfare queens~~ 25 year old males playing video games back to work! They’re getting a free ride that they don’t deserve. People only have value when they are working!
He started that evil welfare queen idea back in California. It gained traction there so he continued to use it on the national side.
I'm glad Reagan's dead
“Death tax” energy.
"Think of how stupid the average person is, then realize that half of them are stupider than that." - George Carlin
I heard a working theory that we have too many humans on the planet. Some of them were supposed to be reincarnated as ferrets or insects but came back as humans instead. These are the people who are now in charge.
I don't think it's hyperbole to say that modern medicine has saved the life of too many idiots who went on to have idiot children. It's hard to have that conversation without people assuming you're venturing into eugenics but it is a real thing.
Propaganda works
I’ve always said that if you really wanted communism or socialism to take off in the states you’re gonna have to call it something else
I also don’t use cis because the machine has already made that a thing people don’t want to be called
I don’t mind being called a cis male, but I’m secure in my sexuality and manhood. Conservatives not so much.
This one gets it. The key takeaway should be that humans are very fallible and propaganda works alarmingly well.
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The timeline is this. The 1950s boomed and created the middle class. Why? FDR decided subsidizing the American people, instead of the robber Baron class, was the way. This subsidy approach to the working class had never happened before in American history.
A middle class cannot happen organically in a capitalist society. It requires government subsidy.
The 50s were built on the backs of women, forcibly ejecting them from workplaces to be housewives, and excluded people who were not white. But the American middle class was born due to these subsidies.
And so it went.
Then, in the 80s. The concept of the evil welfare queen was touted on the national level, and our government decided subsidizing corporate instead of a middle class was the way.
This doesn’t happen overnight, but they begin chipping away at subsidies for Middle Class America and flip those subsidies to corporate America. The belief is, or at least the sales pitch is, subsidizing corporate America is more fiscally efficient than subsidizing the middle class and will ultimately benefit everyone to create a booming, thriving nation.
And so it goes for 40 yrs. Both parties, in tandem.
The chipping away to go back to the subsidizing of a middle class started in the oddest of places. 2020. After the massive destruction of the middle class, and abject proof of how disastrous to the working class subsidizing corporate America is, absolutely squeezing everyone making less than $300k/yr, by the numbers, it was that old man’s admin that tried to shift back on the disaster. Infrastructure, junk fees, internet as an essential utility, student loan forgiveness, etc
The breadth of the problem cannot be fixed in 4 yrs. Or even 8 yrs. Consider how long it took from the 80s to truly feel the oppressive shift of the subsidy change. (I’m old. I mark ~2012-2014 when things started to feel squeezed.)
Also note that you can’t mention Reagan or trickle down economics in this or you lose people.
Could FDR have done what he did without what Theodire Roosevelt did? Teddy has his faults but I feel he built the groundwork that FDR could build on. Granted it had diminished between them, but he faught for the inheritance tax and income tax to become a thing rather than just Tariffs. Tariffs were what were used at the time and created the "Robber Barons" that the Heritage foundation is trying to re-establish.
This is not my area. I’ve simply consumed a lot of Heather Cox Richardson. She’s a Harvard educated American History professor. Posts on YT. Not very popular last check.
It’s calm, historical perspective which I rather enjoy.
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Kinda like ACA/Obamacare.
I'm of the opinion Americans want help and want to help others, but get lost in political rhetoric and a culture war designed to ensure no one gets anything.
Our old babysitter lost her insurance and was suffering. Ex-wife suggested the ACA, showed her how to apply.
"Thank you so much! At least it isn't that damned Obamacare!"
These people exist, millions of them. And most Americans can't fucking read and understand a novel.
As an old friend of mine once had a habit of saying in a sing song voice:
Read a book, read a book, read a motherfucking book!
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Having briefed a number of senior American bureaucrats and military officers I find it best to use:
- words of one syllable or less.
- no more than three primary colours.
- no numbers larger than 5.
Americans are one of the most gullible populations on Earth. Russians are worse...but Americans are not far behind.
Russians may actually be less gullible. Read an interesting article on the subject of Russian propaganda. They know it's bullshit, always have. The government lies, and that's life. Twist is, they view Western media as exactly the same level of propaganda.
tl;dr: Most Americans can't seem to apply critical thinking. Russians don't bother.
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Nah the usa is worse. Russia is a dictatorship, it is risky for your life and family to oppose putin
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