Conservative media in the United States has the answer: appeal to a person’s base selfishness, repeatedly. You have to do this over the course of years, maybe even decades. But when you convince someone that they are exceptional, they see themselves as the exception. The rules don’t apply to them anymore! This kind of thinking can cross all kinds of boundaries - class boundaries, race boundaries, religious boundaries, educational boundaries.
You can convince poor people to hate other poor people, minorities to hate other minorities, immigrants to hate other immigrants, workers to hate other workers. You just have to convince your marks that they are special, they deserve their share of the pie, it’s just that everyone else is trying to steal that share of the pie. And that’s not really hard to do, it’s just time-consuming. But it does work.
I’m reminded of that meme where a businessman holding a plate of 500 cookies saying “careful, you only have 2 cookies, better not let that guy with 1 cookie take them from you!”
Conservative media in the United States has the answer: appeal to a person’s base selfishness, repeatedly. You have to do this over the course of years, maybe even decades. But when you convince someone that they are exceptional, they see themselves as the exception. The rules don’t apply to them anymore! This kind of thinking can cross all kinds of boundaries - class boundaries, race boundaries, religious boundaries, educational boundaries.
You can convince poor people to hate other poor people, minorities to hate other minorities, immigrants to hate other immigrants, workers to hate other workers. You just have to convince your marks that they are special, they deserve their share of the pie, it’s just that everyone else is trying to steal that share of the pie. And that’s not really hard to do, it’s just time-consuming. But it does work.
I’m reminded of that meme where a businessman holding a plate of 500 cookies saying “careful, you only have 2 cookies, better not let that guy with 1 cookie take them from you!”