US Authoritarianism

That's such a great point.

I've been hearing this bullshit "Wait them out" message for 30+ years. There is no waiting out bad ideas and propaganda. You have to fight it with truth and activism.

I think it's still true for us. They predicted we would turn more conservative as we aged, which hasn't really happened.

I think Gen Z stands a real chance. We're the first generation where the majority of us have had the Internet from birth, or at least long enough to not remember a time without it. We're super connected all around the globe, and with more diversity in groups comes less bigotry.

Younger people are way less bigoted now then they were in my childhood (early Gen Z, barely not a millennial thank God). When I was in elementary and middle, everything not cool was called gay. Everyone called everything they didn't like gay. It was completely synonymous with bad. A couple parents in my town recently got riled up cause a kid got a days suspension for using gay as a derogatory term against a gay kid. Most young people around here will tell you that he should've gotten more. In my day the other kid would've been suspended before the asshole.

democrats are useless af when they have a majority.

get a preferential voting system so ppl can actually vote for who they want without shooting themselves in the foot.

A lot are disenfranchised by voter ID laws and weird residency requirements around college campuses. Others just don't realize the exceptional time we are in because their entire adult life has been marked by encroaching fascism and that seems normal.

Millennials tend to become more progressive as they age (probably has something to do with realizing how much inequality sucks and understanding the reason why it's happening)

Because they weren't. There was a vocal minority who was super left wing in the 60s, but the huge majority were as reactionary and conservative as they are today. Hippies weren't really representative of their generation, they are just the most iconic. Remember that Nixon not only got reelected, but reelected with a landslide.

I don't know how many people think this way, but I once heard a quote: "If in your youth, you don't vote left, you don't have a heart. If when you're older you don't vote right, you don't have a head."

I don't think that quote says anything good or true, but if there are a lot of people who think that way, well...

There's a number of reasons for this like the electoral college and voter suppression.

The electoral college basically means that all of a states votes go to the winner of that state. If you're casting a minority vote in that state it's very easy for it to not affect the outcome in any way, unlike if the winner was determined by popular vote where every vote mattered. This is also why we see presidents elected even though they receive less votes, which further undermines the system.

Then there is rampant voter suppression, usually in Republican controlled areas. There is a strong correlation between more people voting and Democrats getting elected so Republicans try to make it as difficult as possible for people to vote, especially people who are likely to vote Democrat. So they pass voter ID laws, restrict mail-in voting, close polling places and shorten polling hours. In these areas people might have to spend hours traveling to a polling place only to stand in line for more hours before they can cast their vote.

Add in that voting takes place on a work day when it should probably be a national holiday, the two party system, and other stuff and it's easy for people to feel lukewarm about voting.

While there are many parts to consider, and everyone loves to make fun of Republicans for the whole "muh freedoms" thing, ironically, I want to point out that part of truly being free is the freedom to not be required to vote or even show up.

That said, it's stupid as fuck and everyone that can should absolutely be there casting their vote.

I think it's not quite the case that people get more conservative as they age. It's that policies and goals throughout society tend to get more progressive with time – as we learn more about our needs and those of others – while personal ideologies tend to crystallize with age. When one generation solves a problem, the next generation starts looking for new problems to tackle. The trouble is that we have to do that while dragging the previous generations, kicking and screaming, towards something more broadly beneficial to society because they think they've already got it all figured out. The evolution of our understanding of the world doesn't end with our generation, no matter how much effort we put in. 🤷

But not Ohio, wtf