After nearly a decade of being forced to take Trump seriously, Democrats increasingly call BS on the whole charade
Sure, Donald Trump is a threat to democracy — a would-be dictator on day one who has called for terminating the U.S. Constitution so he can hold onto power even after losing a free and fair election. But while draped in the rhetoric of populism, Trump and his MAGA movement are not actually popular; the man himself has never won more votes than the person he ran against, a majority of Americans twice rejecting him and his off-putting cult of personality. That he was ever president is more or less because a few thousand swing voters in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania thought it would be fun.
President Joe Biden won in 2020 largely by promising to a return to normalcy and baseline competency. In 2024, Democrats are making a similar argument but more forcibly: They’re pointing, laughing and dismissing Trump and his circus as a total freak show to which we can’t return.
Yeah, trying to overthrow the government and create a theocratic dictatorship, run by a probable amoral atheist felon who is functionally illiterate is pretty weird. Life in general has just been weird for the past 10 years now, but I feel like a large part of it is caused by Republicans in general enabling weird shit to happen.
So my buddy and I were bored in the car yesterday and I made up a game called “let’s bet how many minutes it will take me to scan through AM radio and hear that the immigrants are invading.” I was really sad when I won in, I shit you not, less than 3 minutes. But before he got to that when I first tuned in he was going on a whole rant about being butthurt that the orange one was being called a weirdo. It really upset the guy which was just absolutely hilarious. Oh and he managed to slip a transphobic pronoun joke in the middle of the rant. Remember all of this happened within less than 3 minutes of me starting at the bottom of the AM dial.
I love in the south and the radio is a fucked up place. It’s mostly all Christian or Republican talk radio. They tell people how they should think. like some random dude on the radio has all the answers.
My experience driving thru Indiana has been about the same. And that was some 10 years ago
still don’t understand what’s wrong with being weird. republicans just hate it because their bigoted mind associate it with being different and they hate that.
The message isn’t for democrats. You insult people based on what they find insulting.
yeah that’s what i meant; they’re the ones turning it into a negative attack. the dems are just planting the seeds.
I think there’s different meanings in different contexts. You don’t want to be the “creepy weirdo” kind of weird, but then there are people who are into weird art or have weird kinks and they are great
… and this attack will be turned on us next.
Bro they’ve been calling us weird (and way worse) for decades.
promising to a return to normalcy and baseline competency.
Here’s the thing. Biden hails from an era of politics where one would absolutely get lit up by the media for breaking decorum.
It’s been a slow decline for some time, but the Republicans along with
their propaganda outletFox News have slowly changed the country’s thermostat on this over the last few decades. Much like wearing a winter parka in the summer heat, maintaining complete and total political decorum in this climate is no longer a boon, it’s a handicap. We all saw Biden take one heck of a beating, while taking the high road and never really taking the (rage) bait to hit back in quite the same way. But while that approach is performing on virtue, the optics are one of a punching bag in the eyes of many crucial voters.So tactics have been changed, and boy have they ever.
What I appreciate about this approach is that it’s actually very light-handed, considering all that could be done. It also looks downright polite compared to how much right-wing media has run with hyperbole and even outright fabrication. Yet running on the rather casual sounding observation of “old and weird” is generating actual results. It’s also refreshing to loudly point out what we were all baffled about from the get-go: “Don’t they know? I mean, they’re seeing the same stuff we are, right?”
I welcome this new shift to “bless your heart” politics.
I welcome this new shift to “bless your heart” politics.
This is the equivalent of pointing out grammatical errors in an others logically sound argument. This is not a positive development, it is a sign that things are continuing to get worse.
logically sound argument
Not even a little. Trump is wrong about what the problems are, and proposes “solutions” to the non-problems that we know will make them worse.
Plus, he’s old and weird, and he running mate might be young-ish, but double-weird instead.
Let me rephrase this.
This is like pointing out grammatical errors in both a logical/illogical argument.
You are either the person going ‘neener neener you misspelled a word’ to a person with a sound argument, or you’re stooping to the level of an idiot to defeat an idiot.
If you cannot recognize why both are bad, I am not going to explain it to you.
Problem is you are pretending like the illogical argument didnt sit in office for 4 years.
No, I’m not, you’re reading into what I’ve said and think you’ve got me because you don’t understand what I’m (and by association, you’re) talking about.
I’m sorry if you cant recognize the ridiculous strawman argument you put up, I’m not going to explain it to you.
Not a strawman lil guy, you just can’t read. Actually, the only strawman placed is the one you propped up.
Fascists don’t get civil debate. They get mocked, beaten, and ignored. If you don’t understand why I call people that are involved with Project 2025 “weird”, I’m not going to explain it to you, again.
The death of civil discourse, ladies and gentleman. Propagated by people who think they’re doing the right thing. The same people who are responsible for the complete lack of civil discourse online, who would have thought?
It is, in fact, not at all the equivalent of that. Get your lab equipment tested.
I hate this messaging because I’m proudly weird. It’s a rhetorical step towards ostracizing and othering those who are different. I think this is a really bad move that can and will backfire, especially when the opponent is fascism.
Weird is just anything you aren’t used to. Kamala is “weird” to trump supporters who aren’t used to seeing women or POCs in positions of power. Compared to every president before her, she stands out as a lot weirder than Trump.
“You’re weird!” Is a really bad strategy. Queer and weird were once synonyms, and mostly still are. Don’t disenfranchise your base.
"We should choose the moral high ground against people who would exploit us taking the moral high ground. 🤡
It’s not about taking the moral high ground against them, it’s about not disenfranchising and alienating large portions of her base so she can win, and it’s about not using an attack that frankly is more applicable to her candidacy than to his.
She’s the weird one! That’s why I’m voting for her! Trump is just more of the dark side of America that has always been present. Nothing weird about him. Plenty weird and unique and novel and different about Kamala. I’m voting for the weird candidate.
Trump is just more of the dark side of America that has always been present. Nothing weird about him.
Are you fucking kidding me? Dude walked into beauty pageant dressing rooms while they were changing - that’s fucking weird
Dude wants to roll back rights for large segments of the population - that’s fucking weird
Dude talked about wanting to have sex with his daughter - that’s really fucking weird.
I could go on, but don’t pretend the demented diaper shitting fucknugget is “normal”. There’s a reason trump was so effective in 2016, because he was fucking weird and fired up a lot of the weird ass cracks of the internet without exposing his weirdness to the population at large.
America may have had a dark side, but there’s a reason it’s called ‘the dark sode’ - they’re fucking weird.
All of that behavior is problematic, but not “weird” in the context of people in power throughout American/world history.
It frankly is normal. That’s why he has such a large base. That’s why he’s dangerous. That’s why our whole country needs to face its alarmingly common dark tendencies.
She’s the weird one!
Is she really, though? I think she’s refreshingly normal. She only seems weird because we’re used to politicians who don’t laugh, who aren’t relatable. Her views are majoritarian views. Her views are views that the majority supports.
I guess it’s all relative. It’s a sad indictment of our political system that it’s “weird” to have a presidential candidate who’s a likable human being with ideas that most people can get behind.
He is weird, though. It’s a different kind of weird from mine, but still weird.
Sure, but everybody’s weird. That’s why it doesn’t work as an insult unless you are anti-diversity.
… which is precisely why it’s an excellent tactic to give pause to your average American.
Fortunately it’s being used against the anti-diversity side.
I think it’s part of a larger reframing of the conversation. You’re right, it used to be that queer and weird were synonymous, but why should it be?
Queer should be normal. Trans should be normal. Black and Brown and Asian and Native should all be normal. Fucked up right wing ideologies should not be normal.
And the only way we get there is by acting like we already are. You reframe the narrative. You move “normal” to where it should be instead of where it is. You bring all the people who used to be the “weirdos” and outsiders into the tent, and you leave the bigoted xenophobes standing outside in the rain.
Queer is the new normal. Bigot is the new weird. That’s a world I’m down for living in.
This I can almost get behind, except that “weird” has a lot of queer and diverse and non-white connotations/baggage that can’t be ignored.
A white-on-the-inside coconut may not see it immediately if she was raised in a California context. That word didn’t just fall out of a tree, and it exists within the context of all the uses that came before hers.
Sure, we can reframe what behavior is acceptable vs not, but “weird” does not mean and has never meant “unacceptable”. Weird Al is generally considered to be acceptable. “That’s weird” is usually quoted as the fundamental driving statement of advances in science. Rejecting weirdness is fundamentally antithetical to progress, and carries with it baggage of rejecting solid portions of the democratic party’s base.
I think there’s more than enough specific context to how the term is being used here that I feel confident in saying the risks you’re imagining don’t really exist.
I’m openly bisexual and married to a trans woman, and also a massive nerd, and I really don’t feel threatened by this. Words can have different meanings depending on their context. Gay can mean homosexual, and gay can also mean happy. Idiot can be a term of abuse or a term of affection. Weird can be cool, or it can be creepy. Language is just like that.
I’m feeling the same way. Using “weird” to attack anyone is just shallow and mean, and isn’t going to resonate well with people that grew up being dismissed as weird. It’s a bullying tactic that politicians should be above.
There are subtleties of language that depend on context. I think most people understand that this line of attack refers to malignant weirdness as opposed to quirky or outside-the-mainstream weirdness.
For example, the GOP’s obsession with micromanaging women’s bodies is fucking weird. From context, you can probably see that I mean it is sinister, strange, and gross.
Gross! Now that’s a good second word. Creepy is another.
Trump and MAGAs are weird, creepy, and gross.
Then call him malignant. Weird is a word that has mostly positive connotations and it sounds like she’s complimenting him when quotes are taken out of context and put into a headline.
“Weird” is incredibly effective in this context because thinking of themselves as “Normal” is really, really important to right wingers, and especially to the MAGA cult. Just look at how often they use terms like “silent majority”. Being the norm, the baseline, the average, that’s essential to their understanding of who they are. Meanwhile the liberals and leftists and Democrats are the kookie weirdo freaks who want to destroy their decent, simple, God fearing way of life. That normality is exactly what they think conservatives are conserving. So the idea that their “Normal” is a myth undercuts their entire way of thinking.
Interesting perspective. My exposure to MAGA folks has tended to be from edgelords who take pride that they aren’t “normies” and that they are different from the mass of “sheeple”.
I suppose it depends on whether you associate MAGA with the alt-right or with traditional conservatives. Both are important voting blocks for trump. I don’t know many traditional conservatives that haven’t jumped on the centrist neoliberal bandwagon.
I associate a desire for “normalcy” and a rejection of those who have “weird” opinions with the aging neoliberals in my life. They often use attacks on the “weird” to resist progressive and inclusive actions that don’t fit within their neoliberal boomer mindset. The non-centrists reject normality and embrace weird and unusual ways of approaching the problems in our country, at least in my social exposure. It’s one of the ways that I’ve seen both extremes differ from the center. The difference between the left and right extremes are just the brand and direction of deviation from the crumbling and untenable centrist positions. One side celebrates weirdness and diversity, the other celebrates what they think makes them superior to normal, and therefore worthy of surviving the genocide they advocate for.
Then call him malignant
Too clinical. Sorry, but “weird” hits harder for a bigger portion of the electorate.
Weird is a word that has mostly positive connotations
Not to everyone, and not in every context.
It’s also a word stupid people are going to have to look up, and it’s easily disregarded as just being against them because they’re republicans (how they feel about Democrats) and not because their beliefs are fucking weird and creepy.
I like the weird messaging as a weird dude, because it’s pretty clear it’s being used because it makes them feel like they’re not in the in-group anymore. You can see by how badly they react how effective the message is, and changing messaging just when something starts working just makes you look incompetent or like you’re trying to sabotage your own message. The Democrats already have enough of that kind of baggage, they don’t need to shoot themselves in the foot right now…
Being weird is not an insult to us, we wear that hat with pride. But our weird behavior falls on one side of the “normalcy range”, the quirky, the funny, the confidently different, the queer side.
There is another side of “weird”, the side of creepy weird, the side of child predators, the side of tikki-torch nazis, the side of whatever the couch fuck is wrong with J.D. Vance. And they don’t wear that hat with pride, they wish they were normal or think of themselves as normal.
To the ones who hate us, who can’t stand our confident weirdness, and to the ones who are on the wrong side of weirdness, it’s an insult. That’s why we can be proudly weird, while they start foaming at the mouth at the mere implication that they might not be “normal”. That’s why this attack lands, they are the anti-queer, the anti-weird and pointing out that Trump behaves outside the accepted range of “normal” behavior (just in the opposite direction of our weird) is an effective attack.
You’re weird. I’m weird. We both know that weird is where it’s at, and the worst thing either of us could aspire to be is “normal”.
This strategy is about rattling folks whose identity is still external rather than internal. Introspection surrounding the idea of “weirdness” is the goal.
The expectation to conform to a set of principles foisted upon you by superiors is the idea that we’re fighting against. The people who support that way of thinking want wealth consolidation, conformity, and all others in cages. Weird is a dang battle cry in the face of something so oppressively ordinary.
Yes, “creepy” would have been way more accurate to describe these guys anyway.
I can get behind that. Total creeps.
Hey! Some of us proudly identify as creepy over here!
Sorry, I forgot about Radiohead.
They’re going for laughter, not disgust. Authoritarians hate being laughed at.
I somewhat agree with you, which is why I refer to them as old convicted felon and couch fucker. It doesn’t have a great ring to it but seems accurate
Sorry but linking it to “queer” is just completely ridiculous. Nobody is calling them queer and nobody is hearing them being called weird as being called queer.
Weird and queer are clear synonyms.
No matter what, it’s making fun of someone for being different and diverse.
It’s functionally extremely similar, the only difference is that some parts of the lgbt community have claimed queer as their own.
Language matters.
If you think calling those freaks weird is somehow an insult to gay people, that’s your problem because that’s fucking idiotic. Sorry but there’s really nothing else to say.
I’m weird as shit. My life is a freak show and a fail whale working together to make a fail-ipolis.
And I’m fucking goofy.
Though I’m not trying to lead a nation with it. So I take no offense with this.
fail whale
I wonder what the fail whale would think of Elon
It would be weird to get offended on that guy’s behalf.
First they came for sociopaths, then powerhungry hypocrites
And I did not speak out because fuck those guys
Being ok with being weird is not a common trait among conservatives.
Hah. The squares are the weird ones now.
I feel that my guy
Laughter is a great weapon, as even the Irish Bards of old knew. And the plus point is that it is true, they are old and weird. They want to go round inspecting children’s genitals…definitely weird. They rather mothers die than get medical treatment in an event of a dangerous pregnancy. Likewise, they think child marriages are OK. They think forcing women to have babies is OK but passing laws to help those babies live is not. They want to go back in time and roll back all the progress society has made in being kinder, fairer and more inclusive. They love conspiracies and think they have special secret knowledge . There is so much more,I hope someone turns it all into a catchy song that goes viral.
All of the creepy weirdos in the donnie cinematic universe are just so vile and disgusting and so ripe for mockery. Let’s see: Bannon, Stone, Gorka, Miller… (and many more I’m forgetting right now) all of them are freaks that no normal person would want to associate with. All of them have designs on America and Americans that are just creepy.
Don’t forget the Mooch!
They’re lucky that the worst thing they’ve been pinned with so far is “this dude looks like he’d fuck a sofa” when most of these people look like they’d happily make a lamp out of you if they liked your pores.
I hope they go far beyond the couch fuckin’. All of those creepy weirdos around donnie, and that boost donnie, and many that vote for donnie, have very, very creepy and weird ideas about what they want to do to other Americans. They have a very creepy and weird idea of what America stands for - they want an Xtian Caliphate here in America. The couch fuckin’ isn’t even close to the worst of it - what JD did or does in the privacy of his own home with his furniture is no business of mine (even if it it’s hilarious).
I hate that cushion pushin’ is the only thing that seems to be sticking though. It’s like everyone is saying, “corrupt and criminal” should be enough to disqualify them all forever, but it’s not landing. The only thing that has landed so far is the much less important “this guy looks like he’d seduce the futon” and it’s a fascinating example of the counterintuitive nature of psychology. People are apparently fine with a racist, sexist, criminal dictator as long as he doesn’t sex the sectional, but it just goes to show that while everyone thinks they’re rational beings, every decision - and I do mean every decision - is an emotional one. If it weren’t the case, then surely “fomented an insurrection at the Capitol building” would bear a lot more weight than “misinterpreted the loveseat”.
Its nice reading someone else see’s things the same
The thing is, the Republicans have wanted all of those things for the last four decades and have passed numerous laws and while it is good to see people catching on, what the hell took so long?
Finding just the right language, I guess. Hillary’s “basket of deplorables” was too mean. Republicans can be as mean as they want, but Democrats can’t, and a woman definitely can’t. “Weird” gets the point across without being too mean.
It’s a bullshit game, but there it is.
There’s two sides to that.
Some of them are like tucker Carlson or Boris Johnson. They look ridiculous on purpose so that’s what people talk about instead of the horrendous shit they’re advocating for.
So by all means laugh at them, it hurts their follower count. But don’t outright dismiss them.
They might be stupid and weird that doesn’t make them less dangerous
Oh, they are dangerous alright because they consider themselves righteous and having God and “Tradition” on their side. People who consider themselves righteous have no doubts that everything the do ,regardless how vicious, is meant to be by God. So all logic goes out the window. I think not all are like that, but they are a huge useful pool of people who can be used and manipulated with ease. Just like a cult, none of the decisions their leaders make are questioned.
I think the point is that they are all old, weird, and dangerous. Vance isn’t old, but he is weird and dangerous.
And let’s be clear, this is a different kind of weird. I’m weird, but I’m weird because I like kids shows, make bad jokes, and pick at my fingernails.
They’re weird because they like to fuck kids and underage teens (a surprisingly large portion, anyway), make decisions that hurt the people they want giving them money and support, and want to pick which immigrants are the “bad” ones.
I’d call them weird like you would the ultra fundamentalist Christian old guys that go to college campuses and yell at people. It’s not weird in a good way. It’s just fucking strange. Like something is legitimately wrong with them.
Boris really mastered that technique. That hair of his.
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If you have any questions or comments about me, you can make a post to LW Support lemmy community.Yep. Watching the Republican cult of personality be exposed this way has given me genuine hope for the future.
It’s been ten years since that freak started remaking the Republican party in his own image. Ten years since his face and voice started dominating the news cycle for no good reason (and lots of bad ones). Ten years of his clown show.
But now, at long last, I have hope that it will finally end. That the name “Donald Trump” will fade from our political vocabulary, and be spoken in shame and disgust when spoken at all.
That the name “Donald Trump” will fade from our political vocabulary, and be spoken in shame and disgust when spoken at all.
Don’t forget the part where all the Republicans pretend they never really supported him in the first place.
This.
Never let anyone who identifies as or admits to voting republican get away with this. Always remind them they had a convicted criminal rapist pussy grabber who stole from from a kids cancer charity running the show. Not just a candidate, he ran the whole clown show.
Doesn’t matter if it’s an uncle, dad, mom, grandpa or grandma; always be relentless with this message and have no room for sympathy or forgiveness. Be the bigger person? Time to ‘heal’? No, no, no. These people wanted to destroy America and you have to throw that into their face relentlessly.
Sure, have a family dinner or some party with family and friends but the moment politics comes up, you hammer this message home and tell them the discussion on politics is over because they have been proven not to be trusted at all when politics is involved. Uncle Bob want to talk fishing lures? Sure, no problem. Uncle Bob wants to talk politics in any way, shape or form? Be very, very fucking brutal in cutting the traitors of and shut them down. They have lost any and all admission to discuss (or, in my opinion, be part of) politics.
Doesn’t matter if it’s an uncle, dad, mom, grandpa or grandma; always be relentless with this message and have no room for sympathy or forgiveness.
Uh, no. It’s not popular to admit this, but being nice is much more persuasive with people who already like you. If you go nuts on them, they will just think you are crazy.
If you say “I think trump is too old and crazy / weird” they will listen. If they ask “Do you like trump?” just say “no” and laugh at the very idea of voting for him. That’s why “He’s weird” is working.
Yep. Gonna be big “I was part of the civilian resistance” post-WW2 vibes in the aftermath of all this.
I’m prepared to remind every smug boomer I know until the day they die, and I relish in the opportunity.
Yep. I look forward to that day, but we need to remind them of the truth when they try to pull that.
Just like the origins of the “tea party”, just like how they called themselves “teabaggers” (no matter how much they insist now that it never happened), just like they swooned over both W and Romney, but pretended they “didn’t know her” when W’s war on Iraq was obvious to even the lowest of low-info that it was a clusterfuck, and when Romney lost to the Blah guy.
The Republican Party eagerly embraced him. They wanted this.
This needs to be repeated over and over. Remind everyone when Trump is gone. He isn’t the threat people, he is a threat.
The seeds of his “movement” were planted by 4chan and other terminally online far right trolls long before he ever took the reins. It’s been brewing since the mid-to-late-2000s but was mostly contained to their own corners of the net. Until one day it wasn’t. Some people recognized it as just controversial bigoted/racist humor, others took it seriously and turned it into a lifestyle, and gave birth to the alt right.
My impression is that Something Awful was largely filled by people who saw the problems with 4chan “humor” and wanted nothing to do with it. But I could be misremembering.
When reactionaries tell you to stop something it’s because it is effective.
If they cry and foam at the mouth you should go even harder.
They’re a minority of weirdos and should be reminded of such at every opportunity.
I might even go as far as calling them dumb.
Great! Now do all of the GOP congress and senate.
I’ve always prided myself on being weird…how can ‘weird’ be such an insult? I’m going to have to test this out on a couple conservatives before I believe this.
There’s “wear an animal costume to the nightclub” weird and there’s “have 23 kids, homeschooled all of them, and cover up the oldest son’s molestation accusations all while being the most self righteous bigots in Arkansas” weird. Now, Trump doesn’t have nearly that many kids, but he’s definitely closer to the latter than the former.
You said it at the end there. Conservative means status quo. Which is not weird.
That’s the dictionary definition perhaps, but not what they’re pushing for. Conservatives talk about small government etc, but really it’s about rewarding the ingroups and punishing the outgroups.
They want to revert reproductive rights, with the government tracking periods and investigating women’s bodies. That’s weird af. They love the police state and mass surveillance, recording people’s messages and web activities is hugely creepy. It’s weird if a person snoops on you like that, and it’s weird if the government does it. They care way too much about what’s between your legs and which gender you sleep with, again, weird.
Edit: also just to add there is good weird and bad weird. Good weird is being yourself despite what the mainstream does, bad weird is forcing your viewpoints on others
Im glad they finally found something that sticks but sometimes I wish Kendrick just came out one time to call Trump a certified pedophile. Id laugh so hard I’d piss myself and possibly even someone else.
“they not like us” [photo of Trump and Clinton with Epstein]
Y’all know the story of Hitler coming into power? Right?
Trump is not a normal opponent who one should (or can) engage in a high-minded debate about tariffs and industrial policy. He’s a clown: scary, but often sad and ultimately a joke.
This is exactly what most German people thought about Hitler, and why they thought he could never come to power. Fascism is weird, but also weirdly appealing to a very determined and violent subset of people, and they’ll do what it takes to coerce others to go along. You’re right we shouldn’t be too confident that sanity will naturally win.
This is exactly what most German people thought about Hitler, and why they thought he could never come to power.
I mean, I bring up Hitler, but this is also exactly what people thought about Trump first time around too.
Fascism is weird, but also weirdly appealing to a very determined and violent subset of people
Some people crave a King. They want to be ruled. That’s the structure that makes sense to their brain.
I don’t know who thinks “weird” is some kind of effective attack. IMO just happens to coincide with the wave of feel-good associated with Biden stepping aside and Harris stepping up. Personally I find it pretty lame. stick with dishing back what the republicans threw at Biden - trump is old, he can’t form coherent sentences, question his health, and show everyone he wants a hereditary dictatorship that subjugates women and fellates the ultra wealthy so the US can be just another shitty kleptocracy.
