It was fine when it was someone else’s kid, though. You should be able to feel this outrage when it happens to anyone, anywhere. But that’s seldom how it goes.
It's great that he turned around, but holy shit is it still weird. Reminds me off when russians protested the war when they were already a year in and everyone applauded them. All their signs and chants said that they don't want more russian soldiers to die
Lots of people saying this isn’t uplifting enough. If this was my dad, I’d feel a lot more than just uplifted.
The more people who come around to reason, the more people will be exposed by proxy to a healthy perspective. This is absolutely uplifting, even if it’s tragic we are in this place to begin with.
Honestly that some are capable is uplifting…just not in the way you’re thinking.
I got lucky, my family never cared about me being anything specific so my social transition was the dream of minor annoyances while they had to overwrite a lifetime of conditioning of what they called me… But I have other trans friends who are clinging to the bricks by their nails because their parents think they are possessed by demons or “Don’t want to deepen their mental illness by playing along” So many parents demand absolute piety and there is something inside us damaged irreparably when they withhold their love.
I get to be strong because I am cherished by my people. To see people weakened for the lack of something I am given so freely is to know that I am not just lucky. It is to know exactly how much I owe to circumstance. Many of those who starve for acceptance see people like this and while the bitter see the nearsightedness… The dreamer dreams that it is possible one day it could happen to them because people who actually changed when it is their kid are rarer than you could hope.
Yeah but if you think about it, at the local level isn’t that how you want your politicians to work? They experience something that bothers them, and instead of just grumbling about it they go into politics to get elected and change it?
I mean if our politicians worked that way (driven by a single personal desire and hence the relative percentage of votes reflects how much the population wants each desire to influence policy), that’d be quite the improvement!
No, politicians especially need to have enough awareness of the world around them to represent people that they are not.
People only understanding something once it happens to them personally is immature and closed-minded, and leads directly to where we are (in the US) with the highest bodies in the land being a bunch of puppets to money and influence.
It’s the Marie Antoinette effect. Even though the quote is likely apocryphal, the point behind it is that she was so unaware of the people’s level of starvation that she genuinely thought that eating brioche (“cake”) was a viable alternative for bread, which they did not have.
You do not want politicians like that.
Oh, people working 40 hours a week can’t afford rent and food? Why don’t they just eat less and get a second job?
They will likely never experience many of the problems that the general population does.
How is this uplifting news? Same old story, they hate until it effects them, then suddenly “things are different”. Yes this is slightly better than him always being a bigot, but honestly, f*** this guys lack of sympathy to start with.
Exactly, people somehow expect this to be fixed overall without each individual having to change, which they’ll naturally do one-by-one. Utopian ideas are nice, but it’s a bit very unrealistic to expect everyone to wake up at the exactly same UTC time suddenly and no longer be bigots. That’s not how this changes. It changes one by one.
And sometimes it seems to go further than that. They want them to be changed retroactively it seems. Once a bigot, always a bigot seems to be the prevalent outlook. It’s paramount to recognize that this line of thinking ultimately comes from personal bitterness. That bitterness is valid and an expected emotional response to the hate that is constantly spewed by bigots. However, we need to embrace redemption more if we want to encourage personal change.
Unfortunately we can never personally experience everyone’s situation which is why empathy is important, and seems to be sorely lacking in a lot of people.
If your first instinct is to condemn this man for what he used to believe I would urge you to think about how we would ever go about affecting change without people like this who believe one thing, then see the error of their ways and change their mind. Sometimes a hypocrite is nothing more than a man in the process of changing.
The problem is more why he changed his view: it affected him. There are people who change their views because they’re curious and empathetic and finally get the time to look into an issue and see how it affects other people. Those are the people that deserve praise for changing their views, even if they used to be conservative shitbags.
I’m not advocating for praising him, but everyone is vilifying him for coming around to a different point of view. He’s growing as a person. Maybe not in the altruistic way that you’d like, but it’s still growth. If we stay up on our high horses insisting everyone do the right thing just because it’s the right thing and for no other reason then we’re going to be waiting a very, very long time for change.
I understand where you’re coming from but you need to think of this situation as someone who broke free of cult brainwashing. As someone who was raised conservative evangelical Christian, I can tell you it absolutely is. I felt guilt from not trying to convert people. I was told people different than me were going to hell to burn for an eternity from a young age. Manipulation tactics were used for me to believe in miracles and that the world is in a holy war against satan. Then the sentiment was retold over and over for close to two decades. It took a similar incompatibility as the man in the article for me to finally see that maybe different ideals and viewpoints weren’t evil after all.
He didn’t “see that different ideals and viewpoints weren’t evil”. His own child was affected so it was him that was affected.
He never thought or cared about others outside his own family. That’s why we aren’t congratulating him. He still hasn’t demonstrated any empathy for others.
In this case he changed his viewpoints for very selfish reasons, 100% agree. The point I’m trying to make is someone like this typically doesn’t exist in a vacuum. There’s an entire support group to reinforce and validate the bigotry and ignorance of their beliefs. Even if it’s for selfish reasons, changing a viewpoint like this can be a catalyst for even bigger change and personal growth down the line, and it doesn’t happen overnight. Also it’s not entirely selfish, many fathers would have disowned their daughter when they came out as trans and remained as close minded bigots. This sort of change should be celebrated.
Refraining from being an asshole doesn’t make someone a good person. It’s the bare minimum for being a normal non-hateful person. It’s good for his personal journey and his family, but I don’t have to fete and applaud him.
Well, growing up around the people I did, seeing any amount of change in someone like this gives me hope. And he’s doing much more than “not being an asshole”. Please at least read the article.
Yeah, yeah. He’s an “advocate for change” or something. But only for things that affect him. What are his opinions on whether the 2020 election was “stolen”, or God forbid his opinions on black people?
I don’t know, it wasn’t stated in the article. Do you actually know the answers to these questions or are you jumping to conclusions that fit your own personal bias?
Then the sentiment was retold over and over for close to two decades.
This reminds of a salient question I encountered. I wish I could remember the author and book to quote directly but here’s my best approximation of their meaning:
Why is it that you need to go to church every week and study the same book over and over to understand god’s message? Once you learn 1+1=2 you’re done, no need to read the same thing over and over.
“Uplifting news” that once again hilights the absolutely infuriating conservative psychology of “I give absolutely zero fucks about this topic until and unless it affects me personally”.
I am glad the dude changed his ways, don’t get me wrong, but fuck me if it isn’t depressing to consider that this behavior pattern is absolute cancer, and really hard to work constructively with on a societal scale.
I agree, but I think it’s more than just not liking something. There’s an active component to it, like if through your hatred of mayo you were trying to ban its use on sandwiches and in sauces.
Yeah but it sounds like he actually is growing out of the mindset.
Conservatism is simply a lack of experience. We all grew out of some shitty views, just some had their wake up call earlier and others were more isolated from experience and took more time.
Let’s be glad this dude came around at all, or his daughter might just have been another statistic at this point. He could have been another grifting chud on TikTok screeching about the librul media taking his child away through brainwashing, but he chose humanity.
Let’s stop shitting on people who were wrong when they finally come to their senses.
Yes, it shouldn’t. But when someone changes like this we need to let them own the change rather than complain it shouldn’t have taken so much to change. He admitted fault and chose his child, he finally gained perspective. No different than convicts should be forgiven after serving their time in prison, he did his time locked in his hate, and found a road out whether we feel it selfish or not.
It’s a good point. However it is worth noting that conservatives are like this. Not sure how it can be used to rehabilitate them or whatever, but maybe it could be
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