I totally understand how easy and comforting it is to dismiss Them as something entirely different, but They really aren't. They're just as human as we are, certainly with a very different mindset, but with the same spectrum of thoughts and feelings. I certainly can't dismiss these people being genuinely invested in this issue, even if I would disagree with virtually everything else they say.
It's like MTG's recent talk of Gaza, which a lot on the left have dismissed as Performative Pandering without the slightest consideration she might have some spark of care…it reminds me of a Pratchett quote I try to remember when I feel inclined to simply dismiss the opposition as Them:
You had to cling to this sort of image, because if you didn't then you might have to face the fact that bad things happened because ordinary people, the kind who brushed the dog and told their children bedtime stories, were capable of then going out and doing horrible things to other ordinary people. It was much easier to blame it on Them. It was bleakly depressing to think that They were Us. If it was Them, then nothing was anyone's fault. If it was us, what did that make Me? After all, I'm one of Us. I must be. I've certainly never thought of myself as one of Them. No one ever thinks of themselves as one of Them. We're always one of Us. It's Them that do the bad things.
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