More scared for my friends in other red states since I’m cishet and look like I blend in with maga. I’ve felt isolated ever since I moved to ArKansas at the end of 2019. I have no friends in this state outside of the household. I am too scared to attempt organizing, wouldn’t even know where to look or how to approach such a thing. This whole thing is terrifying, infuriating, confusing, and exhausting, and I know it’s only going to get so very much worse.
Meh. I knew going into the election that my vote would have little to no impact on this state, but I didn’t realize a good portion of voters were just going to sit things out in the swing states, what the fuck was wrong with those people? Of course Republicans were going to vote Republican, but I thought I could count on people to turn out to save our country and vote against a dictatorship. Obviously not, and here we are.
The only possible thing working in our favor at this point is how utterly incompetent Trump and his ilk are, they’ll be just as likely to infight amongst each other as they are to destroy the government.
I just hope that Ukraine can hold out or secure some kind of semi-favorable terms for peace out of the whole thing, they’re the real ones that are getting fucked out of this whole thing. They’ve fought harder for their freedom than anybody else and we let them down.
I grew up in a progressive city in a gerrymandered-to-hell swing state. Cheeto’s first win promptly sent me into a tailspin there. I’ve moved a handful since but now find myself in MT 80 miles from the border, you know, just in case.
Red up here is different than red down there. There it was like rubbing salt in the wound, here it’s quite obviously because there aren’t enough people to know any different.
I’m nonbinary and have been laid off in Florida about it, so I no longer disclose that information professionally. It’s not the most pleasant, but hey, hiding in plain sight is a really good way to see what’s coming down the pike.
Hello fellow Montanan. I wish you well in your journey. There are more of us than you might guess but it does feel like a losing battle a lot of the time
<3
Pretty shit. Came out of the closet as trans to my parents just before the election after hiding dysphoria for nearly 20yrs (I’m 30). Unfortunately, the dysphoria has been intense enough that I’m so dissociated that I can barely function, so as you might imagine, I’m currently living with parents.
My dad’s reaction was basically, “whoever the best you is, be that you”.
My mom’s reaction was “but you’re my son… I always wanted to have a brother and you’re kinda like that”.
Meanwhile my grandparents voted for Trump after saying they wouldn’t, and are now crying about it. Literally. My grandmother was in tears.
So my mom is also dealing with that, and possibly osteoporosis, which meant she said, “it’s gonna take time to process this”.
Then last night she told me that I wasn’t allowed to start hrt until I moved out.
She refuses to let me tell her why I can barely function. She refuses to let me describe what I’m going through. She says she “can’t handle it”, that “it’s not a top priority right now”, that she’s “trying to understand” why I’ve made this “choice” while also telling me things like “but I like you the way you are” and rejecting any information I send to her because she’d rather consult her friends that she “trusts more”.
She starts to have a panic attack whenever I try to talk to her about it and God forbid I tell her that she made a mistake because then I obviously hate her guts and want her to die. She’s literally accused me of that.
It hurts like hell but I don’t know how to get out of this situation. I don’t know how long it’ll take hrt and therapy to get me on my feet all while not having a job. All this while in Texas. I’m fucking scared.
She refuses to let me tell her why I can barely function. She refuses to let me describe what I’m going through. She says she “can’t handle it”, that “it’s not a top priority right now”, that she’s “trying to understand” why I’ve made this “choice” while also telling me things like “but I like you the way you are” and rejecting any information I send to her because she’d rather consult her friends that she “trusts more”.
She starts to have a panic attack whenever I try to talk to her about it and God forbid I tell her that she made a mistake because then I obviously hate her guts and want her to die. She’s literally accused me of that.
Those paragraphs reminded me of the !raisedbynarcissists@lemmy.ml community.
Absolutely. It’s not about the transition at all, she just can’t stomach the idea of losing an inkling of control.
That’s horrible that you’re having to go through that. I honesty can’t imagine. But from one “Feathers” to another, that took a hell of a lot of courage.
I sincerely hope things get so much better for you!
Thanks. It wasn’t the reaction I was expecting, kinda the opposite. My dad’s the one who had sisters and only nieces on his side of the family, so I was expecting him to be the one with hang-ups about it. Nope, it was my mom. What I was hoping for was support for a little while longer until I felt like I could live on my own, but it sounds like that’s not gonna happen. My biggest frustration is not coming out sooner tbh. Woulda given me more time to make plans and meant that maybe I could have skipped years of feeling like a lazy, freeloading piece of shit (no, they never called me that, but that doesn’t stop me from feeling like it).
Sorry you’re going through this. But I’m proud of you for coming out!
Thanks, it really sucks. I didn’t expect the reaction I got. I kinda expected my dad to be the one who got upset while my mom was supportive, not the opposite. My dad was the one who had two sisters and only nieces on his side of the family, so I kinda expected he was gonna be the one upset by it; but he’s cool with it.
It also blew me away to hear that my grandparents voted for Trump after years of talking about how much they regretted voting for him in 2016 and how they’d never vote for him again. Guess I’m never coming out to them; not that I was totally expecting to due to their age, but it’ll be fun coming up with a reason why moving out means I’m forced to move across the country and possibly never come back (at least probably not while they’re still living).
Once you are moved out, and across the country, the song Cat’s in the Cradle, by Harry Chapin gives you the perfect believable excuse. I’d love to come visit, and I will once work isn’t riding me so much. We’ll get together then.
I love that song… It’s just so sad. The kid wants to spend time with his dad but can’t because his dad’s always busy, and then the dad wants to spend time with his kid but can’t because his child’s all grown up and is busy now.
I will say it took me awhile to wrap my head around my kid being a son not a daughter. My concept of womanhood is quite broad, I really and truly did not see it coming, just thought she was dykey , for lack of a better word, still doesn’t seem distressed at all either but that may be because all the kids at school just accept kids are whatever gender they say, it’s no big deal to them, and siblings all immediately supportive. I didn’t lay my trouble adapting on them, it’s not his problem, it’s mine - just saying you have known a long time but she has not, she will adjust.
Congrats on coming out!
My wife’s mom still insists on deadnaming her over a decade after her transition, and refuses to recognize her gender. Sucks because she could be in our lives but instead just gets a phone call at Christmas, and I’ve never even talked to her. Some parents just make that choice, sucks that your mom is one of them.
I’m hoping she’ll eventually come around. In the meantime though, I’m getting to try and figure out how to get on my feet long enough to move out.
Feeling depressed, trapped, and abandoned. Going through the motions, trying to come to terms that I won’t be a dad because the wife doesn’t want to risk a pregnancy under the conditions, and I won’t be a homeowner because no ones coming to help build houses or stop corporate real estate. I won’t start a business because I can’t risk losing healthcare, and will need every dollar I can hang on to. Settling for serfdom. You know, usual shit.
How are you.
I feel you…I still can’t believe this country is so … ignorant of the consequences of this. It’s over
Had to soak last week’s shirts due to anxiety sweats but this week will probably be lighter on the poor things. So, slightly worse than usual.
We’ll see if I go back to the mental hospital but I don’t foresee it happening unless work gets really bad again.
I’ve already internalized that this country is populated by shitty, hateful people. Trump winning again just confirms what I already knew.
Meh. I want to try to move to Minnesota some day. Seems like a nice place. They have laws preventing employers from firing people over non psychoactive thc drug tests, that’s worth doing even if the higher paying jobs are otherwise abusive and shitty. I have 2 degrees in tech.
The twin cities are great but 45 miles out in any direction and you’re in the land of pickup trucks and Trump flags. Or Wisconsin.
duluth is ok, too, but the range has lost its political magic over the years.
the other college towns like mankato, moorhead, st cloud, bemidji are a lot redder than one would think they’d be, unlike some nearby college towns in wisconsin (eau claire, la crosse, superior. menomonie being an exception to those–it’s dunn gone red lately)
Aside from the Wisconsin part, that describes most cities.
I don’t argue with people, I slowly explain to them what Republicans lawmakers are doing. Try as hard as possible not to be conescending.
I explain how Biden and Obama are better at convicting and deporting, why Trump’s cruelty is so innefficient.
I explain that Trump said he had nothing to do with project 2025 and now Matt Walsh and Fox News are explaining their plans which coincidentally align with project 2025.
I explain the Trump Tax Plan, which is identical to last time, how it raised everybody’s taxes below a certain amount.
Sometimes they tell me “but that Harris was an idjet” and I explain how she wanted to bring back child tax credits and vowed to never raise taxes on anyone below 400k annual earnings. They ask “well she didnt say that during the CNN Interview or debates!” and I direct them to her website where every single policy is laid out clearly.
Many of them do not understand the ramifications of the situation they have caused. They are completely unaware of the consequences of their actions, expect life to go on as if their side just won at sports without any impact on the real world. It is easy to ignore and be ignored if thats what you want to do in a red state.
When people try to threaten me I can be very intimidating as a result of my natural physique. Fear is something I will die before showing any of these people. They respect strength, the simple fools, it can get you far in their world.
That’s how I do.
Trump’s cruelty is so innefficient
the cruelty is the point. he “hurts the right people”
Rigjt but thats contradictory. They claim to want to do something about supposed “hordes of criminal illegals” but at the same time they shift resources away from them and instead detain women, the elderly, and children.
The cognitive dissonance is also the point…
Try as hard as possible not to be conescending.
Feel free to be condescending, they are too stupid to understand anyway.
The only way for Dems to win was to increase turnout and they didn’t pull that off. There was zero chance of peeling off Republican voters.
Terrible, no-good take. It’s because of this attitude, totally ungrounded in the political science, that outside the USA we now have to put up with your bad decisions, once again.
Sorry to be so crude but this really p*sses me off. Your side is now losing in almost every single demographic group, the trend is as clear as day. If it were to follow your terrible advice (which fortunately it won’t) the Democrats would be permanently out of power and the USA would become a de-facto one-party state. You can’t pretend that these people don’t exist or that they’re subhuman. You have to sully your virtue and talk to them and find some compromises. If not for yourself then for the sake of the rest of us.
If anything, Democrats would do better. Trump didn’t give a fuck, was a huge asshole, and won.
If Democrats were fair in their vicious scathing of what’s terrible about Republican policies, and used it as a tool in telling the truth clearly, they’d do great.
Maybe once there’s no nazis, civil will work.
Bruh just flat out no. The reason we lost is 100% the opposite of that. The reason we lost is because biden and harris both tried to be more moderate to attract republicans. Instead of actually doing anything useful and fixing the world, they both focused on sucking off netanyahu instead of free healthcare and ubi.
They failed the base that elected them and tried to court the enemy. Courting republicans is a waste of time unless your goal is to make things worse. The only way to deal with these fucking vegetables is to treat them like theyre in the past. Ignore republican talking points. Cringe when your republican cousin talks. If you see a trump flag, stop, point and laugh.
Shame these fucks and make sure they understand that they will no longer be taken seriously. The adults are talking and MAGA has chosen to sit at the little kids table.
Fucking shun every single one of them. They no longer are part of our society
I’ll try a different tack. Because after all, we seem to want the same result.
In my analysis (which, as someone who follows this pretty closely, I maintain is much better supported by the evidence than yours), I have to suck it up and talk to people I don’t like and maybe even accept policies I don’t like.
In yours, you get to feel great about being in the right, with no need to question any of your prejudices much less make any compromises.
If you were a neutral observer watching this conversation, who would you believe?
But thats the thing. There are no neutral observers. I dont remember if you said you were european or if that was someone else, but living here its pretty obvious to everyone that there arent any undecideds. Were not trying to convince someone who knows nothing about it, because there isnt anyone who knows nothing about it. Even if there was, at this point youd have to be an uneducated as a maga voter to hold that opinion, so my point still stands. If you are not willing to make an effort to educate yourself, you do not deserve to be taken seriously by anyone that is actually working towards a solution.
Compromises are how we got here, id rather not allow our party to shift even farther to the right. In fact, that literally makes the problem worse because instead of one person arguing for attrocities, we have one person arguing for attrocities and one person saying “well, we should at least hear them out”
Edit: questioning myself is how i got to these beliefs, but maybe you are right. Maybe i should reconsider whether to seriously engage with people that want to hang me for not being white, and i should try to convince those that want to execute my aunt for being trans that maybe thats not the way to go.
This is called a counsel of despair. Or nihilism. With this attitude you are going to achieve precisely nothing - or, rather, you are going to make things worse by ceding control of your government to your avowed enemies.
In a democracy, there is no way forward except compromise. And the alternative to democracy is even worse. Much worse.
There is clearly some miscommunication here. You seem to be under the idea that I have given up, or surrendered. Its quite to the contrary. You are proposing that we court evil in the hopes of making progress. That has been the democrat mission for over a decade now. We are in a worse position than we ever could have imagined a decade ago. That policy has failed, hands down. There is no arguing that, it is an absolute failure. You cannot be more appealing to a republican than a republican. Compromise is tangent. When your opponent is arguing for the abolishment of abortion with no exceptions, what can you possibly gain for compromising with them? You are seriously going to give an inch to people to literally just want to make women suffer? Who want to instill religion into our government and schools? Who wants to deport members of our community and entire families back into countries where they will be killed within a year? Youre arguing for compromise as if this isnt life and death from a stance that has been tested and failed. SO MANY people have already died due to these policies of giving ground to republicans.
Republicans pull in a consistent number of votes every election because they have the hateful moron brigade as a consistent voting bloc. Dems win when there is higher turnout because they motivate people to show up, and lose when there is lower turnout, but they sure as shit aren’t appealing to the hate brigade.
Trying to be reasonable and polite with Republicans like Liz Cheney is what took the wind out of the sails of the Harris campaign. They did the fucking appease everyone bland bullshit and lost. That is what you are saying is the right thing to do.
Your theory is just a theory, and a weak one. The evidence suggests that the election was mainly just a backlash against inflation and immigration, as has happened across the world to parties of all stripes. Not much could have been done to avert the outcome. But it is also clear that a bunch of voters were pissed off by what they perceived as Democrat excesses on cultural issues, and apparently many of those people were in swing states.
More generally: “just turn out the base” is usually a losing strategy in democratic politics. For a simple reason: the cost of turning out your own base is that your will fire up the opposing base and turn them out too. To be sure of winning an election in democracy, you will need to get your hands dirty and persuade people. In practice that will mean tacking towards the center and making compromises.
Found the DNC strategist.
I’m European who votes green. I want the Democrats to win because that is better for the world. If only you did too.
I voted for Harris as a way to vote against Trump and Republicans like I do every fucking election despite Dems constsntly shooting themselves in the foot every election where Obama didn’t run. You know, the two elections where they promoted actual hope and progressive change instead of pandering to the fucking centrists and did extremely well and the only time I actually wanted them to win.
Of course the Republicans obstructed the shit out of that attempt at change and the country learned nothing.
About 8 years ago, I moved from the red state I was born to a progressive city. I let my daughter serve her first year of school there then said oh hell no and got the fuck out.
Just remember rule number 1: Get hired first, then move
Most of all, lonely. My situation is rough. I’m a trans woman (some passing privilege), almost 40, and staying with center-right family in East Texas because I haven’t been able to work in two years due to mental illness. I have a very difficult time making and keep friends and the family I’m staying with doesn’t understand why I’m upset, doesn’t care, and think I’m overreacting (They are superficially supportive about me being trans, but also voted for this). I was going to therapy for a while, but I had to discontinue it because I couldn’t afford it any more. The only thing keeping me going is that for the last few years I’ve been able to feel more comfortable in my own skin, thanks to HRT.
I really don’t want to go through whatever the Republicans have in store for trans people in red states alone. The thing I am most afraid of is them banning HRT for adults (it’s already banned for kids). I’ve been on e since 2018. If everything were going great for me losing access to my medication would be a horrifying and soul crushing ordeal, I doubt I’ll survive it with how my life is now.
This last week I’ve been almost completely non-functional. I’ve been alternating between uncontrollable sobbing, hours long panic attacks, furious rage, and making half-crazed, poorly thought out Lemmy and Reddit comments.
tl;dr: not great.
sends hugs
DFW area here. Shit sucks. At least it’s pretty blue here.
It’s aight.
I knew which color my state went. It aint gonna change soon.
Pretty much the same as before the election. Life moves on.
It’s easy to say that from a position of privilege. Unfortunately for a large chunk of the population, life is not the same.
I’m not accusing you of anything, you had no control over who you were born as. Just explaining as a reminder.
Definitely a good reminder!
Not to mention, it’s easy to say that before Inauguration Day. None of Trump’s tyranny has had a chance to happen yet.
You’ll find out soon enough how well we’re “moving on”
It’s just kind of interesting to be asking the red states about this. Red states were already living in that kind of environment. I feel like it’s the blue states that people should be asking this question to. I live in a red state. I hate the politics here but life isn’t too much different than when I lived in a blue state. I am privileged to be cis tho, so I’d imagine if I were trans I would be terrified. I mean, I’m still a bit scared, but I am a bit of a lucky individual.
Planning on teaching the young folks in the friend group how to garden and preserve food, how to make simple medications, how to defend themselves. And I’m also planning to leave as soon as I get my bachelor degree to pursue a research PhD in another country. I’m in ecology and conservation, there’s no future for me here.
That sounds very productive, wishing you luck in your pursuits
As someone studying engineering and also looking for a way out, what all options have you looked into? Immigration seems to be both expensive and competitive in most places, and those are two things I don’t know that I’m prepared for.
My advisor got her PhD in England, so I’ve been trying to get her help in navigating this. I specifically want to do a research PhD, so that narrows my choices a little. Something I don’t see mentioned much is networking. I’ve read a few studies that I can see myself doing, so I’m going to reach out to those researchers because my undergraduate research compliments their research.
There’s an exchange program called Erasmus that will provide a monthly living allowance. I saw another one that offered help with employment after completing the degree but I can’t find it now. That might have been university-specific.
make simple medications
Really interested in this. Care to elaborate or share any sources on the matter?
A lot of our medications come from plants originally, and there are a lot of plants where I live with medicinal value. Willow is probably the best known because aspirin comes from it, and is very common in my area. The main thing will be teaching them which local plants have medicinal use, how to properly identify the plant (I have a dissecting microscope and a few identification books), and how to properly extract the compound that they want.
Steam distillation is a really common method for extracting essential oils, and it’s easy to do. Menthol can be extracted from mint this way.
Some of this is what I’ve learned in uni, but you can get somewhere by looking up the remedy you need in Google scholar with the scientific name of the plant you want to use. USDA plants has really good identification characteristics, so you don’t accidentally pick a toxic copy cat.
Awesome
