3rd Third Spaces

mebbe redumbdent

Authoritarians who want to repeal democracy and pluralism can only do so through manipulating people. For decades, people on the center-to-left have generally outsourced educating the population to K-12 schools and public universities. But learning is something that takes place throughout our lifetimes, whether we realize it or not.

And so people who want to have economic and social justice need to educate the public about our viewpoints through all kinds of media (websites, podcasts, videos, memes, etc) and also through local organizations like service clubs and unions.

Our society has lost "third spaces" where we can come together and learn from each other, and more especially to partake in our community's collective memory. Without real progressive infrastructure, we are leaving people to be manipulated by authoritarian religion and deceptive media outlets like Fox.

Research has shown that people who are most likely to get sucked into authoritarian cults like QAnon and hardcore Trumpism are alone and isolated. Many of them gravitate toward the only people who are there. The same thing often happens with young people and gangs.

JS: What are the Democrats doing wrong? It seems to me they have no answer. Just hope that Trump, now that he has power, will implode.

MS: As of this moment, there are no funded political ecosystem projects. This absolutely must change as soon as possible.

As someone who has seen both sides of the political spectrum from the inside, it was a complete shock to me when I moved leftward that there was nothing to offset the massive rightwing media machine, which I helped build (for more about why I left the right, see this link.