It's pretty wild. There were a few years in the early 2000s where I listened to a lot of talk radio on my commute. I had not yet stumbled upon things like streams/downloads of the Howard Stern show, or the world of podcasts. So I got to hear a bunch of the scary republican talking points back then.

That was about a decade before the dictator projection discussed in the meme, and what sticks out in my memory that is super relevant today?

"Activist judges!"

"Legislating from the bench!"

[–] minorkeys@lemmy.world 1 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (1 children)

It occured to me, having never listened to rightwing media, that it may not always be projection, but the narrative they've been convinced of by their media. Propaganda has worked it's magic.over decades to convince conservatives to believe a story that supports their leadership in doing what they always wanted. Like the pizza after shit, right wing media convinced them the democrats were evil, doing horrible shit. They've deeply and effectively demonized the left to the point of conservatives being willing to do violent and barbaric things to the left. They would believe the left has already been doing everything they now support doing.

[–] Zink@programming.dev 2 points 3 weeks ago

it may not always be projection, but the narrative they've been convinced of by their media

You are absolutely correct for the vast majority of ordinary conservatives, in my experience anyway.

They don't care about finding the best cause or even about being correct. They need to feel outraged and persecuted, so once that's fed to them they latch on.