I’ve noticed that talking to people that some common tropes seem to come up when topics like socialism come up.

Basically I hear a lot of defense of capitalism that boils down to capitalism is good because “I personally benefit”. As well as “I’ve heard bad things about socialism”, ie taxes are too high in countries with good healthcare and social programs.

I wanted to know if other people have these issues come up in conversation and if people more well spoken than me have a way of getting through the road blocks and have some easy starting points for discussing things with people.

I feel like propaganda and fear mongering have placed a divide that make talking about things harder

  • enkers@sh.itjust.works
    1·
    3 months ago

    I’ve noticed a pattern with this sort of thing, that when people are complicit in systems that they benefit from, they’ll put forward arguments they don’t really believe in because they’re obligated to by their own cognitive dissonance. I was first introduced to a term for this pattern of behavior by PhilosophyTube: a phantasm.

    It’s a way of organizing feelings, selective observations and misrepresentations. A way of intepreting the world that also does things to the person using it.

    Okay, that’s a bit vague. The video essay goes on to provide some cohesive examples, but if I could try to summarize it:

    A phantasm is a self propagating system of incoherent beliefs that a person generates to willingly deceive themselves about their own complicity in systemic oppression of others in order to alleviate cognitive dissonance and maintain the belief that they are a “good” person.

    I’ve seen this behavior most notably in alt-right, anti-vax, and conspiracy theorist types, but I’ve also seen it a lot with anti-vegans.

    One of the main symptoms of this self deception is to blindly parrot bad arguments that perpetuate their own deception, even when they don’t believe their own arguments are coherent.

    I think, sometimes, depending on the severity of the phantasm, this behavior can also be a search for a refutation. Part of them might want to reject the phantasm, and given sufficiently well gounded arguments and/or evidence, some people are capable of rejecting the phantasm.

    In any case, I think there’s a lot more going on psychologically than simple willful bad faith. Phantasms are incredibly hard to dislodge when people are emotionally invested in maintaining them, and I don’t have a good answer about the correct approach, or even if there is any sort of generalized right way. It may well be that every single instance requires a unique solution.

  • Joshi@aussie.zone
    0·
    3 months ago

    The idea that capitalism and liberal representative (I refuse to use the word democratic) government are the only viable option are so ingrained. It makes it difficult to engage anyone in serious discussion of alternatives.

    What I do is point out injustice when you come across it and suggest a socialist solution. Don’t mention socialism, talk about unions, worker ownership, workplace democracy, social housing, structural injustice.

    If you get pushback I will say something like “I feel like our political system is so focused on capitalist solutions that often good sensible policies don’t get considered”

    With people you interact with frequently this approach will usually, over time, result in them no longer thinking you’re a crackpot and often soften them up for a more detailed discussion in which you can discuss revolutionary change.

    This is the best I have been able to do. Interested to see other responses.