Political Advice

Insulting their intelligence and shoving them into a corner via "not giving them a platform" will only make things worse for you. If you think your opponent is evil, and that giving them a platform will allow them to convert people in some nefarious manner, then somewhere along your train of thought something needs to be reconsidered.

Seek out more varied news sources and apply critical thinking to the information given. Here is a handy tool for background checking your sources: https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/ Yes it takes effort. Effort isn't a bad thing.

An electoral vote swings one way, but the issues being voted on swing another. This confuses people because they've been lead to believe anyone who votes Red or Blue thinks a certain way.

Normal, responsible people don't make the news. Rioters and terrorists do. Understand and consider that you have no idea how the vast majority of people you see out and about in the world will vote. You can guess based on given factors, but it is rare you'll have enough info to know for sure. Even in the videos you see, scrutinize what is visible, consider what isn't. Understand that 30 seconds of 480p vertical footage still won't give you all the facts.

If you find yourself wishing "The Other Guys could read and take this advice, or that any of this is obvious and only a fool wouldn't follow them, understand that simply having these thoughts doesn't exempt you. It's very easy to excuse one's own actions because you know you have all the facts. But then, that's exactly what They think, too. So, someone here has to be mistaken, right? Chances are, due to the complexities of life and especially of politics, you're probably mistaken in some ways, but not in others. Take a mental step back, consider each of the above points, apply them to your own actions, and go from there.

Thank you to anyone who read through all of these. It's not much, but it's a lot more than folks here are used to. Thank you for your up and down votes, thank you for your comments, and thank you for any private messages I might receive. Honestly 140 characters is terrible for responding to something like this, but we can only be creative with our solutions.