What we're dealing with
[ I wrote this originally as a comment on uncle_dan_nyc's LJ, but I thought it was interesting enough to post outright on mine. ]
So my super-liberal roommate's conservative parents are visiting from Richmond, VA. I was respectfully sparring with them about Afghanistan issues and things while carefully avoiding going too much into healthcare reform (although they admitted to having military healthcare all their adult lives so they had not much to say on the matter).
Then her Mom said something striking: "I firmly believe they are infiltrating the government. That's how they're trying to get at us." Even roomie's Dad looked at Mom a bit askance when she said that. I thought roomie's father was Mr. Conservative, but it turns out her Mom is the one who's been sipping the Glenn Beck juice.
Now Mom wasn't talking about black folks. She knows perfectly well I'm black and that her daughter is married to a black (Dominican) man. She was sincerely expressing the idea that "They" - the terrorists, the Taliban, all those people who want Americans to die - are doing so by slowly infiltrating the American government. I was simply floored, and of course saddened.
How do you beat down such conspiracy thoughts? You can't prove it either way, can you? Is it just a matter of time before a really crazy, disturbed person takes such ideas and makes them into a disastrous, violent reality?
So my super-liberal roommate's conservative parents are visiting from Richmond, VA. I was respectfully sparring with them about Afghanistan issues and things while carefully avoiding going too much into healthcare reform (although they admitted to having military healthcare all their adult lives so they had not much to say on the matter).
Then her Mom said something striking: "I firmly believe they are infiltrating the government. That's how they're trying to get at us." Even roomie's Dad looked at Mom a bit askance when she said that. I thought roomie's father was Mr. Conservative, but it turns out her Mom is the one who's been sipping the Glenn Beck juice.
Now Mom wasn't talking about black folks. She knows perfectly well I'm black and that her daughter is married to a black (Dominican) man. She was sincerely expressing the idea that "They" - the terrorists, the Taliban, all those people who want Americans to die - are doing so by slowly infiltrating the American government. I was simply floored, and of course saddened.
How do you beat down such conspiracy thoughts? You can't prove it either way, can you? Is it just a matter of time before a really crazy, disturbed person takes such ideas and makes them into a disastrous, violent reality?