Here is E. M. Cadwaladr writing at American Thinker:
1) — Abandon all hope.
If you decide to argue with a millennial about the merits of his or her cause, you should approach the task with either the patience of a saint, confident that your rewards are already waiting for you in heaven — or with the steely determination of a kamikaze plunging to his doom. Going into the discussion with some hope of immediate personal success is nothing but an exercise in masochism. We human beings are thick-headed, stubborn creatures under the best of circumstances. Young regressives are much worse. They mix the youthful certainty that they are the smartest and coolest people ever born with an ideology that tells them that a government that wants to legislate all aspects of human behavior will somehow make them free. Give up hope. It will only hurt you. You may make a dent in a young regressive’s ideological armor — probably only dawning on them years later, when your sage advice is dimly remembered — but more likely your irritable leftist puppy will have to be beaten down by the hard realities of the world for a decade or two. Even then, they will probably not credit any change of heart to your efforts when their own wisdom is their usual candidate for praise. Still, do not be deterred by the apparent futility of your task. Go forth and fight the dragon simply because it needs fighting. Go happily. If you do succeed in changing a regressive’s mind, you can count it as a miracle and move immediately to the short list for beatification.
2) — Know thy enemy.
Your opponent did not come out of the womb the self-righteous, virtue-signaling monster that you see before you now. It was nurture, not nature, that made this odd, androgynous creation with its multicolored hair. A young regressive is invariably the product of one of those political indoctrination centers liberals call schools. The poor creature didn’t ask to go there at age five. The unfortunate beasts were marched in innocently enough with smiling faces and receptive minds. They have all been drilled to act and think as they do. All kids want to please their friends, and what you are asking them to believe would probably make them outcasts in the ultra-cool, multicultural, experimental communities in which they imagine they live. In the battle between coolness and coherence, coolness almost always wins. The young regressive may score of certain social standing for simply shouting you down. “Educating you,” in regressive parlance. Try not to take it personally.
Read more: American Thinker
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