I wasted 6 hours arguing with a libertarian. But I did succeed in arguing him into submission, where he started accepting that his worldview is wrong. His only defense of himself is that “I haven’t read anything about objectivism, I think they might prove property rights and markets there…”
I should probably get a real life.
This may come off a little “doomer”, and I don’t mean it to, but I think we at a point right now where there’s really not that many reachable people left in the west. I’ve noticed over the years that the mean age of actual leftists in the west seems to remain about my age for all the time I’ve been a leftist. I think we had a surge at a particular point in time when I was around 22 and most of the new “leftists” post that are actually just Succs.
I’ve sorta just
since cuz I don’t think the material base to form an actual socialist movement exists in most of the west right now, so I don’t waste time trying to convert anyone because the best I can make them is a vaushite. Now, I’m actually MORE optimistic for the future now on a global level but I’ve accepted there’s not gonna be any socialism in my backyard.
I don’t think that I have really fully turned this person around, and I am not advocating people do the same. I think this guys beliefs being so incoherent means that there is a very slim chance he reconsiders things. I am just acknowledging that I wasted 6 hours and trying to hope that it wasn’t totally wasted.
I think that’s the opposite conclusion you should come to. If his ideology is an incoherent mess, that’s more a sign that he has no interest is forming a coherent ideology and just wants politics to validate his vibes about the world. He will likely always be incoherent because he has no interest in coherence. If anything I’ve seen more success changing people who could actually articulate some sensible logic to their misguided beliefs, it shows they have some actual interest in logic.