The Best of 2015

No, you're not reading that wrong. This is the very long overdue best of two years ago that, because of the horrific life circumstances of 2016, just kept getting postponed for longer and longer. The 2016 one will becoming in a few days.

This is also only the first step in my annual update of The Best of W.A.W. Every year I list the top ten articles of the year, and the top three articles by month on top of that (not including those best ten). Well, as you can probably guess, every single one of the best ten was also it's month's best article (or maybe second place too), so that means I also have to go back and "replace" each of these with the FOURTH (and fifth) best article of the month before the entire set up is squared away for the year. I'll probably do that tomorrow.

2015 in review...

Maybe it's the fact that my numbers are so, so much higher now, but 2015 seemed a dismal year of low pageviews and a long slog just to keep from losing too much ground. Though the worst of cancer and life reorgs and moving had not yet revealed itself, many of the precursor problems had begun to show up (unknown for their true nature) by the end of the year, and The Contrarian was just learning to run rings around us if we looked away for even a moment.

Still slogging just to keep from losing too much ground is how writing goes sometimes. It's how life goes sometimes.

A few gems managed to shine through, even if they weren't as spectacular as the years before and haven't had the reception of more recent posts. So without further ado here they are:


Helping The Purple People (How Privilege Changes The Story) 
One day in the grocery store, I noticed that I wasn't being treated in the same way as another patron...

The Trope Skinny
Our evil mystery blogger drops some horrible sage advice about how to add tropes to your writing.

The Dangerous Intersection
This might be a metaphor. Maybe

A Year of Diverse Authors (Cue Literary Frenzy) 
Remember that time that the suggestion that someone could spend one year reading women OR authors of color OR LGBTQIA+ authors and the internet raged for the cis het white authors? Pepperidge Farms remembers.

15 Things A Very Cute Toddler Taught Me About Writing (Part 1)  
The best advice is sometimes the most basic.

Why Do I Hate NaNoWriMo? (FAQ)
I got really tired of answering this question every time I had anything that wasn't adulation heaped on Nano, so it went into the FAQ.

Terry Pratchett and "Real" Literature 
I'll never fully understand why anyone tries to take a crack at a popular author who they haven't even read, but here's my response to one who tried.

Controlling the Narrative: A Case Study within Baltimore 
Close attention to where the story starts, where it ends, and what language gets used can reveal a disquieting relationship between facts and truth.

On Sister Act II and How to Know if You Should Be a Writer
This favorite clip among hopeful writers is actually almost always misquoted and says something a little different than it's given credit for.

The P.C. Police! (Mailbox)
But Chris, why can't I use slurs as often as I want?  Don't you think that's totally against freeze peach?

Social Justice Bard and the Tale of the Missing Outrage

CN: sexual assault

A lot of folks are asking why there's no outrage about the four Black teens who kidnapped and tortured the mentally ill white man. Allow me to talk, privilege to privilege, to my fellow white folks for a moment who seem to be wondering where the identical response is that would echo some things they are conflating as "equally bad" (and why that is a false equivocation). Why aren't we rioting? Why aren't we taking to the streets in protest? Why aren't their major movements crying out for justice?

Here is why:

1- There IS outrage. Even from the left. You're wrong. Full stop.

2- A million outraged posts demanding that there can never possibly be ENOUGH outrage reveals, and with breathtaking transparency, the fact that the true concern isn't this poor guy, or even that he sees some particle of justice. It's not even about "enough" outrage because there is no point at which this cry would be sated, and these folks would say. "Oh okay. That last bit made it enough for me. Carry on then." Rather it belies the political expediency of advancing a particular narrative. A narrative that "they" aren't outraged enough, so clearly "they" are the problem. Generously "they" could be broadly painted to be any "white-hating hypocrites on the left"; however, even a casual read of these calls for outrage reveals that it is more accurately any people of color and especially black folks. The narrative being advanced is one in which no amount of anger from "those people" is sufficient. And thus they must (collectively, as a group) remain othered, deserving of their social mistreatment, and undeserving of any legitimacy when they cry out for their own.

3- Though basically there are no "sides" and everyone agrees that this was CLEARLY a hate crime, even if they bring up secondary points, the oppressive social power differential here existed not along racial lines but against the mentally ill. This was a travesty of ableism and is a horrible example of yet another group dehumanized by rhetoric and slurs in a way that translates directly to violence against them. And yet there has been a conspicuous silence over other mentally ill victims of violent crime when the perpetrators are white or even in THIS situation amongst those for whom it is preferable to shoe horn the incident into a racial agenda of black on white violence. The very recent lack of jail time for the white football player who raped a mentally disabled teammate in his rectum with a hanger is a perfect example.

4- If you are outraged at how a disabled person was treated in this instance yet went to extreme pains to reconcile video evidence with how Trump wasn't mocking Serge Kovaleski, you aren't being any kind of ally to disabled folk. You are using them as a convenience for your racism.

5- Look at how very, very different this is from the situations that regularly get protested. National news coverage instead of a social media campaign that brought it to national consciousness. The mug shots are used instead of the senior portraits. The victim's physical state is blurred out in most media rather than a grisly display of bodily harm in a picture that cannot be avoided. No one is talking about how fucking good the suspects are at swimming or how they've ruined their promising lives. The media is castigating them. They were arrested almost immediately. They will likely spend their lives in prison. White folks kidnapped and tortured by groups of black folks is not a ubiquitous problem in this country as is evidenced by the complete shock. The whole situation radiates with EXACTLY the swift justice that is sorely lacking in the sorts of incidents over which protests happen. If this were the cultural and law enforcement reaction every time unarmed people of color were attacked and killed, there wouldn't be a need for such outraged protests demanding justice. The X factor is justice, and there will almost certainly be justice here. In fact, statistically speaking, no one will face harsher justice than black folk.

6- It is spectacularly clear that the agenda of the "where's the outrage" rhetoric is to delegitimize groups like Black Lives Matter that deign to voice their outrage on a social level at their mistreatment rather than quietly retreat to obscure libraries to write ever-so-diplomatic and academic papers quietly petitioning for redress from whites who will never read them. Even though the latter are protesting agents of the state getting administrative leave (read: a vacation) when they extrajudicially murder unarmed black folks. Or that black folks are stopped more, searched more, charged more, indicted more, found guilty more, and sentenced more harshly. The criminal justice double standard is what is at issue, not the fact that some cop ever had racial animus in their deep heart of hearts when they committed an atrocity. If they could get the kind of justice we've seen over this case, there wouldn't be a need for protests.

7- When folks wonder where the outrage is that must conform exactly to the narrative they want, and are using it in a sort of "Haha checkmate Black Lives Matter" way, they demonstrate a fundamental (and breathtaking) lack of understanding why there is outrage to begin with and what BLM is all about. Years on, and they still haven't even taken the time to intellectually grasp their message or to conceptually comprehend why this isn't a parallel situation. It is apparent that they still see violence that tracks along the lines of power dynamics as being random–that they still view guilt (if they see any guilt at all) as renegade bad actors. Those sorts of things DO happen, but violence that conforms to power differentials in a very clear and predictable pattern is FAR more common and receives far less justice when it does happen.

So when people (over on the "non-outraged left"–which is actually complete bullshit) treat those demanding outrage like you maybe aren't doing a good faith script flip (and believe me, this social justice bard loves him some script flipping) it's because they aren't slick. It's REALLY obvious what they're trying to do, and that they're practically orgasmic at the thought of being the victim for a change so that you have the justification to go right on ignoring movements for social equality.

Follow Writing About Writing

Interested in following Writing About Writing? Or perhaps everything I write?

If you're trying to follow Writing About Writing, it might actually be confusing to navigate all the different ways to do so. We're on several social media, but not every social medium is updated in the same way. Some media follow the blog, but others follow me as a writer. Some get every post I make, no matter how major or minor. (Many days there are two posts but one of them is relatively minor.) Some media are privy to a cycle of "reruns" where (once a day) I cycle through the popular posts of the past so that new folks can see some of the things they missed (and old fans can be reminded of treasured classics). Some get all the political posts from Social Justice Bard, and some get get only a selected few.

I also occasionally write for other venues (Ace of Geeks for example), and those who are following me as a writer, rather than JUST Writing About Writing, may prefer the media where I can share those other articles. Some social media have other signal to noise. For example, twitter gets ALL of these updates I post anywhere, including the reruns, which is great for people who don't want to miss anything but may feel too spammy for many followers, as I have no other presence on Twitter. On the other hand, if people JUST want my articles and nothing else, Twitter is perfect.

I'm not really present on any of these social media (except for Facebook). I cross post articles and very occasionally put something else up.

So what's the final word on how you should be following W.A.W.?

97 of the Earth's coolest people can't be wrong!
The real "Join this site" button is at the
bottom of this (and every) page.

Follow Writing About Writing through Google (Blogger, Google Friend Connect). Google's Blogger allows you to assemble a collection of blogs you follow. Most people following the blog this way have their own blog through Blogger, but it's not necessary. (You only actually need a Google account, which many people have through gmail.)

Pros- Shows all new updates (minor and major). Updates in a timely manner. Helps me with my "membership numbers," which are a bellwether of how cooly cool daddy-O the blog is.
Cons- No reruns. No posts from other venues. Blogger usually takes a few hours to get the latest post up. Wordpress is the chic, happening blog place; Blogger is like the high school kids who eat lunch in the quad.

It's going to burn your FEED!!!
Wait...what?

R.S.S. Feed (Feedly, Feedburner) If you have an RSS reader, you may like to simply be updated by having your RSS feed updated with the text of my latest post. If you click on the Feedburner button at the bottom of the page, you can subscribe to Writing About Writing through a number of RSS readers including FeedDemon, Netvibes, My Yahoo, Shrook, Newsfire, RSSOwl and more.

Pros- Shows all new updates (major and minor). Updates instantly.
Cons-Updates instantly! (Normally that wouldn't be a problem, but I am not a good writer. Usually I post before I've managed to find and fix the biggest typos and dingfab errors I missed before I hit "Publish".) R.S.S. feed do not include reruns–even the really good reruns. No posts from other venues. Many RSS readers are JUST text, so you won't see the fabulously hilarious images. Also, if you get a little behind on your feed, it feels like the sword of Damocles.

In retrospect, I probably shouldn't punch in
the addys of all those Nigerian Princes.

E-Mail Notification At the bottom of the page there is an option to put your e-mail into a text field and subscribe to W.A.W. through e-mail notifications.  Every time I post an update, you will be sent an e-mail notification containing a link to the post. I've been told that there's even some preview text (the first 200 words or something).

Pros- Shows all new updates (minor and major). Updates right away.
Cons- No reruns. No posts from other venues. You already get ten billion e-mails a day.

G+ for the W.A.W. Page (The text there is also the link) This G+ page for Writing About Writing. Though I put an occasional image up (usually when I need to add text to an image to create a "You should be writing" macro), it is mostly there JUST for blog updates and reruns. If you want to get updates through G+, you should probably pick this page OR the one below, but not both. If you do both, it will appear in your feed as if every single link is being posted twice.

Pros- Show all new updates (minor and major). Includes reruns.
Cons- No posts from other venues. It's G+, so people will accuse you of working for Google or being woefully out of touch. They will give you tin foil hats and serve you Kool-aid.

G+ for Chris Brecheen (The text is also the link.) Above is if you want to follow the Writing About Writing page; this is if you want to follow ME as an author. If I get added by a name I don't recognize in life, I put the name in a circle called "Author Updates." I post all my reruns and posts to other venues in this circle. I don't often use G+ otherwise, though occasionally I will have a public update that would also be seen by anyone in that circle.

Pros- Major posts, but not minor ones. Reruns. Posts from other venues. Posts right away. Not much other "noise."
Cons- Occasionally you'll see a public G+ post I write. Since I post all articles, reruns, and posts from other venues here, this can seem very "spammy." People will accuse you of being a Google shill because you're on G+.

Twitter (@Chrisibrecheen) I don't use Twitter--not really. I don't really like it very much. I held in there for a while until all the retweets and replies became too much. So my tweets are ONLY cross posts of things I've written. Some people appreciate that it's a good place to get ONLY my updates; others find the "signal to noise" to be something that wouldn't make them want to follow me.

Pros- All posts. Reruns. Major posts. Minor posts. Posts from other venues. Posts right away. Not much other "noise."
Cons- I don't otherwise use Twitter. It would be JUST cross posts two or three times a day. Also misunderstandings in 140 character posts are a fact of life. Twitter pubic lice of the internet.

Facebook Page for Writing About Writing (Text is also the link) W.A.W.'s Facebook page is a whole different kettle of fish. It is, in fact, a thermo-kettle full of piranha. On my Facebook page, I actually post memes, macros, quotes, inspirational messages, videos, and try NOT TO POST TOO MUCH FROM MY BLOG. Most of the FB audience is there for the shenanigans, not the blog cross posting. Sometimes I skip posting "less popular" updates in favor of a "best of" rerun that will attract more of my FB audience.  FB's algorithm blacks out posts, even to people who want to see it in order to encourage content providers to spend money promoting themselves.

Bitter.
So very bitter.

Pros- Lots of other fun stuff going on. Sticks to "best posts." Most reruns. Most posts from other venues.
Cons- Lots of other stuff going on. (Not a good place if you just want the updates or if you want all the updates.) Major posts. Not minor ones. FB algorithm prevents page followers from seeing every post so some W.A.W. posts will get lost. Skips less popular posts in favor of popular reruns. Not a good place to get all the updates. Enjoying anything on FB requires a shower with steel wool and industrial cleanser. Facebook is the antichrist.

Tumblr (Text is also the link) I joined Tumblr after Facebook's latest round of content throttling that basically ensures that about one quarter of one percent of my Facebook followers see any given post. Tumblr doesn't try to decide what I want to see or what my followers want to see and it doesn't hold their eyeballs hostage to try and squeeze money out of me. Mostly, Tumblr isn't run by a bunch of greedy assholes with dollar signs in their eyes.  And yet.....I'm absolutely terrible at updating over there. I don't post as many macros on Tumblr as I do on Facebook because I don't have to post once an hour in order to be noticed once a day.

However, Tumblr is a place where it's impossible to compartmentalize, so you have to put up with some of my "Social Justice Bard stuff." And as I can't handle adminning a FB page and a Tumblr page at the same time, I only rarely put anything on Tumblr that isn't a cross post.

Pros- Only main posts. Very few reruns (only the uberbest). Some funny macros. Feminist crap (if you like that stuff).
Cons- Only major, major posts. No "minor" posts. Occasional reruns. Feminist crap (if you don't like that kind of stuff). Very sporadic posting. Basically I suck at sticking with more than one social medium.

Facebook for Chris Brecheen (The text is also the link) I welcome readers to follow me on Facebook, but the updates there get mixed in with a lot of other stuff about my personal life and the things that interest me, some of which (as you may have noticed) include social justice and struggles for equality. I can be a little.....intense. I also test balloon a lot of ideas through my wall before polishing them up for the blog (or not), so you'll see some ideas in their proto-post stage. You might want to dig back a few posts and decide if the stuff I yell at clouds about is right for you. Please send me a quick private message if you friend me there. I deal with a hundred sunglasses selling randos a month. If you just want to follow (not friend), 99% of my updates are public.

Pros- All posts. You're more likely to see posts than on Writing About Writing's FB page.
Cons- I go up to 11.  Lots of posts. Facebook is still the devil.

Worst Page Turner: Nominations and Seconds Needed

What is the worst book that you just couldn't put down?  

Did you hate to love it or just love to hate it? These are the books we know are literary cotton candy, but we can't stop going for one more mouthful anyway.

First of all, the nominations accelerated to ludicrous speed within seconds of announcing the poll's subject, so while we are happy to get a few more nominations, what we really need are for people to go through and second (and third) the titles they'd really like to see on the poll. I'm not going to take anything without a second, and depending on the number of nominations, maybe not without a third. (I may not be able to avoid doing a quick semifinal round, but I'm going to try.)

Rules are on the original page if you have questions.

Please please please put any new nominations on the comments of the original page. It'll make my life so much easier when I make the poll to have all the nominations in one place.

The Narrative of The Unheard Rural White Voter

Getty
Image description: Angry white trump voters

Shortly after the election, the left wing was assaulted with the narrative that the election was lost because white rural voters from middle America aren't "heard." Those liberal coastal elites hadn't built enough bridges and their identity politics had finally gone too damned far. Ignored were the huge swaths of largely progressive voters who sat the election out, those disenfranchised by voter registration laws in numbers enough to have flipped swing states, and even the calculated torpedoing of Clinton's campaign by Comey and the Russians.

This narrative shouted from rooftops of every quarter is kind of a perfect macrocosm of white privilege. It's every white person in the comments section or on a Facebook thread talking over people of color or having to have the last word made manifest on a cultural scale.

White middle American voters ARE heard–there is almost no demographic more represented in the media. They ARE understood. They ARE adulated by Republicans and courted by Democrats even though yoking their anger is a Faustian deal for either party. Their economic concerns ARE shared by most of the country. They ARE the demographic most focused upon, most talked about talked about, most debated with, and most wooed.

But being heard...understood...sought. That's not enough.

What they want is the discourse completely centered on them. It can't be about everyone's economics. It has to be about THEIR economics, and the solutions must benefit only them. (Raising the minimum wage would help everyone–even urban poor. No, it has to be a low-skill factory, but with GOOD [yet non-union] jobs, planted in their backyard despite the myriad economic reasons that is no longer feasible.) Their regional financial solvency has to take precedence over fixing an increasingly broken disparity of wealth in our country.

It's not enough to hear and understand them. We have to ignore everyone else. We have to disregard the "identity politics" of others–of groups pushed to the margins who deign to point out that the world is not yet equal despite the insistence that we're past all that and that we've come far enough.

It's not enough that we're saturated in their point of view and can often articulate it as well as they can. They don't ever want to have to hear words like "privilege" or "feminism" again.

It's not enough to recognize that their actions were not purely motivated by some caricature extreme of racism. Those who point out that their actions have hurt other groups must be utterly silenced. They want their support of bigotry to be above reproach–they don't even want their feelings to be hurt with unkind labels–because they were just making sure they got theirs at any cost and that's fundamentally different than hating, which is what the slightest criticism of them obviously is.

It's not enough to have empathy towards them. You have to also hate and lose empathy for those fucking liberal coastal elites.

If you don't AGREE with them, you clearly haven't heard them. The idea that someone could hear and understand them but still disagree hasn't truly occurred to them. So if you demonstrate anything other than full capitulation to their viewpoint, they'll say it again. And again. And again....

They want contrition. They want to DOMINATE the narrative. They want hegemony. Like the white person in the thread, they go on and on and on endlessly repeating that they just want to be heard (even though they were well understood by the first comment), and trying to gaslight–in this case the entire country–into believing that something isn't racist just because they say it isn't and that nothing could be more important than their own political concerns–that even their feelings about being labeled bigots are far more important than the actual harm they chose to have visited on others.

They don't want to lose their privilege.

2 MILLION!! (Thank You)

I've got an awful lot of writing that is half formed, and less time to solidify it into actual posts while I'm visiting my mom, but I wanted to pause for a moment and thank everyone for getting me to the next major milestone.

I knew we'd hit two million this year, but honestly, I thought it would be March or April. I didn't think it would be within the first month, never mind the first week. The success of The Narrative of Normalization (already the number two article of all time) and the even stranger success of my FB page's comment policy (which is number three of all time) vaulted us over the two million mark as day seven was wrapping up. I mean I can't get 95% of my FB page to read ANYTHING that isn't a pun on a macro, but suddenly....bam.

Two million!  TWO MILLION!! That's the population of Houston (which, strangely enough, is close to where I am visiting my mom).

And as always, my thoughts turn to all of you. I literally couldn't do it without all of you. Thank you all so much for reading and helping this scrappy, two-bit blog start to scrape out a little dream shaped space in my world. And I will keep writing as hard as I can and try to get us even faster to three.

The Narrative of Normalization

Come see the full comic at:
http://jensorensen.com/2016/11/15/donald-trump-election-win-reactions-cartoon/

If you are still trying to convince yourself that a Trump presidency will not be that bad, here is (some of) the cognitive dissonance that exists within that narrative of normalization:

• That a presidential nominee who you praised for not being a typical politician (one who goes back on their promises) will go back on their promises.....but only the ones you don't like (like cutting YOUR government support or maybe that Muslim registry that DID sound kind of scary). The ones you liked he'll do. Absolutely.
• That nearly every person who has either lived through or studied Hitler's rise to power suddenly, all at once, decided to become melodramatic and overwrought. For no reason.
• That he says what he means and you like that. Except for the stuff that you swear you weren't okay with him saying. You're not a racist or anything. That was just bluster. But the stuff you agree with wasn't just bluster; it was totally sincere. You are able to tell exactly which things are bluster and exactly which things he has high integrity about.
• That a guy who lies almost every time his mouth is open was totally telling the truth to you. Totally. And sure he lies all the time, but he's right about all the stuff you agree with him about. Yep.
• That a presidential nominee who bragged during nationally televised debates about scamming freelance workers and spent twenty-five million to settle a fraud lawsuit can be trusted to know exactly where the water's edge of "conflict of interest" is between his personal investments and US interests and doesn't need the slightest oversight.
• That a presidential nominee who bragged during nationally televised debates about scamming freelance workers and spent twenty-five million to settle a fraud lawsuit totally wasn't saying anything he had to to win so he could defraud YOU.
• That these appointments aren't terrifying at all. Breathtaking cronyism in a historically uneducated and inexperienced cabinet with a bent towards white supremacy and anti-LGBTQ+ policy is only alarming because everyone on the left is a sore loser.
• That Republican paranoia about shit that Obama never said he would do (like taking away your guns) was justified, but our fear of explicit campaign promises is blowing things out of proportion.
• That Russia hasn't ever done anything enemy-ish, is absolutely blameless, would never do such a thing, and you should mock everyone who thinks otherwise. Even those seventeen U.S. intelligence agencies. Because what did they ever do.
• That nothing bad ever happened when a president decided not to pay attention to an intelligence report. *cough9/11cough*
• That your vote was all about economics. Not even a teensie weensie bit about race or bigotry. (Even though those "identity politics PC folks" sure had it coming!) Despite the fact that Trump's tax plan very clearly spelled out that your taxes would be (and will be) going up unless you are a business or in the top 1%. But let's go with the economy. Absolutely.
• That intelligence agencies are somehow only trustworthy if they are accusing Hillary Clinton of a crime.
• That someone who has called American citizens of the opposition party his "enemies" in a taunt that a twelve year old 4channer would find petulant egged on by a mainstream constituency that is delighted at how much pain and suffering "those fucking coastal elites" are about to endure is somehow going to heal the divisions of our country.
• That the party that once used "pinko commie" as an insult to the left to insinuate that they were in league with Russia is now darned cool with those guys and their curious blend of anti-LGBT, one party, imperialistic oppression.
• That after enduring eight years of birther crap, racism, faux lynchings, literal burning effigies, the rhetoric of taking the country "back," watching the Tea party rise as a Koch brothers astroturf movement involving a bunch of white dudes in revolutionary war costumes calling the administration of a right leaning Democrat (with an infuriating penchant for compromise) "tyranny," as well as an unprecedented obstructionism at every single level of government, liberals should just "get over it" because "He won."
• That the REAL problem is that a group who is trying to get everyone the same rights, achieve equality, listen to others' lived experiences, and empower those pushed to the margins of our society is lacking empathy. If only we'd learn to build a bridge.
• That in a country where the status quo is already violently unjust towards certain people, an administration that has openly voiced hostility towards these people will make things better.
• That a head of state who chooses not only to ignore a foreign attack by our enemies, but also mocks the sitting president who retaliated with sanctions....then turns around and PRAISES the foreign head of state who almost certainly attacked us....  That THAT guy is going to keep US interests safe.
• That a dude who didn't realize his tweet calling for a boycott of Apple was going to reveal that it had come from an iPhone somehow knows more about hacking than 17 U.S. intelligence communities and a host of private analysts.
• That a guy who brags about grabbing women by the pussy isn't sexist and it totally wasn't even a little sexist to go ahead and vote to make him the most powerful person on Earth.
• Repeat the last point for racism, xenophobia, ableism and every shitty bigoted thing he has said or done. But it totally isn't even a little bigoted that all this stuff wasn't a deal breaker, and liberals are just being "hateful" to suggest it.
• That "the least racist person you'll ever meet" appointed a white supremacist to a new White House position.
• That a person with an ego so frail that they take to twitter at the slightest criticism (be it from SNL portrayals or a Broadway musical with the audacity to hope that all US citizens would gain equal protection) is going to be an effective diplomat, and totally won't have a nuclear power rattling its saber at him before he's even sworn in.
• That negative three million votes is a "mandate."
• That the problem with a widely diverse groups struggling against the bigotry of cis het white male lawmakers to enact policy that will not target and possibly help marginalized groups is that we are "elites."
• That diverse coalitions of folks coming together in big cities where they all are exposed to other points of view are the ones living in an ideological bubble and the group that was 86% white voters needs a bridge built to them.
• That nuclear proliferation is a big competition and Trump can "win."
• That the guy who not only has been conspicuously silent about the shocking uptick in hate crimes but has also demanded a list of the federal employees involved in combatting the rise of extremist groups (but won't say why) isn't going to be as bad for minorities as he's being painted, and all "those people" are just making mountains out of molehills.
• That being cheered on by Nazis is not an inauspicious sign.
• That calling Obama racial slurs and racist epithets are just free speech, but pointing out when Trump is lying with facts should be cracked down on because it's so hateful.
• That someone who hates taxing the rich and hates unions and hates regulations and hates bipartisan cooperation isn't talking about the social hegemony of cis het white men when he wistfully looks to the past while invoking a promise to make America "great again."
• That it's too late to admit you've made a mistake and join us in our every effort to #RESIST

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