I can’t count how many times I’ve been called a baby-killing commie by right-wingers who don’t understand the difference between pro-choice and pro-abortion, much less communism and socialism. Hell, despite worshipping at its altar, most of them don’t even understand the basic tenets of capitalism, though to be fair said ignorance is hardly surprising in a country where only 3% of universities mandate passing a basic economics class in order to graduate.
As I wrote in a previous piece, capitalism and socialism are not mutually exclusive. Quite the opposite, capitalism needs socialism in order to survive and thrive over the long haul. Attempting to explain the symbiotic relationship between the two to a Trump supporter feels bizarrely akin to trying to explain why you should look both ways before crossing the street to an irate, whiny toddler who could give a damn and thinks you’re just a “dumb poopy-head”. In other words, it’s pointless.
Pointless or not (and it is most definitely pointless) my masochist self keeps pleading with my pragmatic self to try, try again. And so I do—and I do it knowing I’ll either be dismissed as a coastal elitist who thinks I’m better than everyone else or I’ll be barraged with an unsophisticated, poopy-head level of boring, overdone name calling. (Seriously Cult 45ers… surely you must have something in your arsenal other than “libtard” and “snowflake”?)
I always try to bring my pro-socialism arguments down to a level even the rigidly dogmatic and woefully underexposed to any viewpoint not their own can understand. Nevertheless, those conversations rarely go well. They typically look something like this:
Me: “China is a communist country. I don’t want to live in a communist system.”
White Guy With Persecution Complex: "Whatever! The point is communism is like socialism and both are un-American and will never be accepted here so get used to it!”
Me: “This republic is already a socialist democracy so your statement is false.”
White Guy With Persecution Complex: "Bullshit! You’re an idiot!”
Me: “We aren’t a model one like Germany or the Scandinavian countries, but we are nevertheless a socialist democracy.”
White Guy With Persecution Complex: "You’re just stupid!”
Me: [getting irritated] “Do you support the military? Police? Firefighters? Libraries? Well probably not libraries—bad example for someone of your intellectual capacity. What about having roads to drive your ‘shit-kickin pickup truck with oversized wheels’ down?”
Me: [resists urge to point out the unlikelihood of his truck being American made] “Military, fire, and police are, in fact, socialist systems. Just like with welfare, we pay taxes to the federal government to pay for communal benefits we all rely upon to be there when needed.”
White Guy With Persecution Complex: "I don’t need welfare! Get a fucking job!”
Me: [teeth gritting] “I guarantee you at some point in your life you or one of your family members will benefit from it if you haven’t already! But people like you always—without fail—think they and their families are the exception and that everyone else is a freeloader. And you believe that because you’ve been brainwashed into believing it by the GOP. They never use the blasphemous S word (socialism) to describe the military or police because the military and police benefit the wealthy by keeping a barrier between the cockroaches—you know, you and me—and the possessions of the elite class. But the stuff that doesn’t benefit the wealthy? Those are the parts of socialism the GOP labels ‘commie’.”
White Guy With Persecution Complex: "Well I don’t want to pay for welfare!”
Me: “I don’t want to pay for military spending (read: billionaire defense contractors) but it is what it is for the moment.”
White Guy With Persecution Complex: "Stupid fucking libtard! Go back to your safe space and read a book!”
Me: [licks fangs] “Safe space? 😏 We liberals aren’t the ones trying to turn the United States into one big thumb-sucking safe space by banning Muslims because little old ladies wearing hijabs make us go pee-pee in our pants-pants!”
White Guy With Persecution Complex: "We’re not scared of old ladies! The men are the ones to worry about!”
Me: “But you claim to be the alpha males of the USA. Liberal men don’t cower in fear over Muslim men. 😨 I guess that makes you conservatives the beta males.”
White Guy With Persecution Complex: "Go fuck yourself!”
Me: “Maybe later. And then there’s the big, bad wall…”
White Guy With Persecution Complex: "You’ll thank us for that one day!”
Me: “Yeah, all those Mexican people pretending to seek a better life as they brandish a leaf blower in one hand and a rosary in the other. So scary.”
White Guy With Persecution Complex: "They also bring in drugs, libtard!”
Me: “Well you won’t have to worry about that once the wall is built. The USA will become Skull Island—cowering Americans on one side and terrifying Latinos on the other. Maybe we should fling virgins over the wall every Cinco de Mayo as an offering to the Almighty Kong—errrr—El Chapo.”
White Guy With Persecution Complex: "Whatever! You’re just talking shit because you feel triggered!”
Me: [bored and ready to move on] “Do I laugh now or later? I am untriggerable, oh triggered one.”
White Guy With Persecution Complex: "You’re triggered! Admit it! Hahahaha!!!!!”
Me: “Whatever helps you believe your micro-penis is large. You’re boring me now, window-licker. Later, delicate petal.”
Reasoning With A Member of Cult 45: Where’s The Xanax?
Remember: I never claimed those conversations went well. As much as I wish I could successfully emulate Michelle Obama, I am currently incapable of taking the high road. When they go low, I reach for the gonads and twist.
Once upon a time I could resist “going there”, but today I don’t even try. I think I am so over hearing about the woe-is-me-forgotten-white-man that I’m hard-pressed to drum up anything akin to giving a shit. There exists, after all, plenty of struggling white men who did not vote for the racist, misogynist, xenophobic, toxically divisive Trump.
Those are the men whose backs I’ll have when they need me: the ones who chose “we” over “me”, the ones who believe black lives matter, that women should own their own bodies, and who recognize the GOP’s strategy of conquering through division for what it is. As to the members of Cult 45?
Come here and have a seat. I think you’ll find the chair I provide as comforting and non-threatening as the country you gave me.
