The Epitomized Deplorable

A republican family member shared this post this morning. It is a dime a dozen example of nearly fact-free propaganda of course, but what motivates the creator to disseminate this kind of crap piqued my interest slightly. After some looking around (I don't think it qualified as research) I have a tentative conclusion, this is the face of the enemy. Mike Macey is a deplorable but he is the epitome of the term, an absolutely indispensable servant of would-be dictators world wide.

Feds Seize 19,888 Fake State Driver Licenses (Made in China) in Chicago O'Hare Airport - ALL Registered to Vote -- ALL Demorats!

Posted by Mike Macey on Wednesday, August 26, 2020

As I scanned through Macey's profile, which in typical boomer fashion is completely public and why I'm not blotting out the name, what struck me was not how devoted he is to republicanism but that he is a volunteer.  Macey seems to take time out of his busy schedule as a travel guide in Colorado to create content for the authoritarian movement. Clicking "share" on a post or story on social media is about the lowest level of political hobbyism you can get but writing a paragraph or two several times a day is a little more involved. 

The post above has been shared 63,000 times at the time of writing. It is a relatively simple formula, take an event, plug it into the authoritarian talking points, and release it into the wild. This story was reported by fox news, go figure, with just a hint that these fake licenses might possibly be used to illegally vote by mail and volunteer fanatics like Mike picked it up and ran with it. So if there are 63,000 reprogrammable meatbags at the base of this pyramid and fox news at the top, in the middle are the slightly sentient volunteer fanatics who tune and twist the talking points of the day and reinforce the prejudices of those meatbags. 

Republicans have been running this low-level insurgency campaign against mail-in voting for months now, it usually takes the form of "if you can do X, then you can vote in person" which is a derivative of "you need a driver's license to do X,Y, and Z so why shouldn't you need one to vote." The funny thing is that the first comment on Macey's post was the Snopes.com post reporting that yes, Chinese made fake IDs have been seized all year long totaling 19,888 but finding no evidence that these could be used to vote illegally. And that was shouted down as "fake news" by several replies. 

The onus is on the one making the assertion to provide evidence, not the other way around. This is the difference between intelligent people and reprogrammable meatbags. The polarization between the two, and the latter is why we have a problem, is the biggest threat to democracy. While the next level of the pyramid all the way up to fox news monetizes the propaganda that they throw out to the meatbags, the system is dependent on that last layer before the bottom to humanize the lies and dress up assertions as facts not to be questioned. That is why Mike Macey is the epitomized deplorable, his pro bono work supporting authoritarianism is essential to manufacturing consent from the mass of people who would otherwise be politically inert. 

One example of taking assertions that support right wing prejudices and manufacturing them into facts is found here:

The socialist forces are so busy making noise with propaganda and spreading violence that they have no idea MAGA is 150 million strong now. We are everywhere! 😎🇺🇸

Posted by Mike Macey on Monday, September 7, 2020

What do you think Mike would say if you ask him to define "socialism"? Propaganda in the right-wing authoritarian follower's mind is that which does not support my world view, and violence is the pain in the authoritarian's fist after a democrat viciously hurled their face into it. I have no doubt that the deplorables are everywhere (Mike is a Missouri native, they spread) but where would a number like 150 million come from? Well, researchers of authoritarian followers such as Robert Altemeyer have found that high RWAFs want more than anything to be normal or average. So, instead of changing their views to actually be more like normal, average Americans the epitomized deplorable simply invents a majority of magas so as to relieve the anxiety RWAFs feel. 

The other half of the term deplorable for republicans is irredeemable, they will never change. No matter how much you try to work with them, no matter how much you nurse them along to meet perfectly normal democrats and try to find common ground. The moment you walk away a guy like Mike will be back in front of fox news in five minutes to find the comfortable blanket of hate that sustains him. So don't waste time on the committed deplorable, they are like the pigeon that shits on the checkerboard and struts around like it won, and nothing will change that.