I've been seeing a worrying number of these people on Lemmy lately, sharing enlightened takes including but not limited to "voting for Biden is tantamount to fascism" and "the concept of an assigned gender, or even an assigned name, at birth is transphobic" and none of them seem to be interested in reading more than the first sentence of any of my comments before writing a reply.
More often than not they reply with a concern I addressed in the comment they're replying to, without any explanation of why my argument was invalid. Some of them cannot even state their own position, instead simply repeatedly calling mine oppressive in some way.
It occurred to me just now that these interactions reminded me of nothing so much as an evangelical Christian I got into an argument with on Matrix a while ago, in which I met him 95% of the way, conceded that God might well be real and that being trans was sinful and tried to convince him not to tell that to every trans person he passed, and failed. I am 100% convinced he was trolling -- in retrospect I'm pretty sure I could've built a municipal transport system by letting people ride on top of his goalposts (that's what I get for picking a fight with a Christian at 2AM) -- and the only reason I'm not convinced these leftists on Lemmy are trolls is the sheer fucking number of them.
I made this post and what felt like half the responses fell into this category. Am I going insane?
The right wing has spent generations embedding themselves into corridors of power, from the local school board up to and including the supreme court.
A huge number of the left wing typically don't even vote. So then when the left do get energized but it's not enough to stem the tide or accomplish too much, because they didn't invest in the long game... then they start this hyper-ideological, cultural revolution style thinking. It's exhausting.
Folks, your opponents put in the effort while you just showed up for the test.
I've voted in every election since 2004. I've campaigned for folks running from City Council to Senate and donated well into the tens of thousands of dollars.
I know quite a few people more left wing than me who go farther. Salting workplaces to help organize unions. Spending 100s of hours on pro bono legal fights for the wrongfully convicted. Weekends at food banks. Months overseas providing medical aid. Lifetimes caring for adults with Downs Syndrome and children with Leukemia.
None of them get the kind of media exposure or political representation or government assistance as your LibsOfTikTok smear campaign or JD Vance book club.
"Why won't leftists just vote harder?" is the most divorced from reality sentiment. Just painfully disconnected from the real world.