One of the most touching of the #Walkaway stories
I’ve now watched a great many #WalkAway videos at YouTube. If you’re not familiar with #WalkAway, it’s a movement of people attesting to their decision to walk away from the Democratic Party and/or voting consistently liberal.
That doesn’t necessarily make them Republicans or conservatives at this point. One of the hallmarks of these stories is that the tellers all don’t end up in exactly the same place politically—so far, anyway, because the movement is rather young and most of these people had their “walk away” moments relatively recently. But portions of their stories are remarkably similar, and definite patterns emerge.
Obviously I’ve been taking a great interest in this movement. Something of the sort—something I’ve called by the much less catchy name “political change”—has occupied and fascinated me for over 15 years. I’ve also written reams about it on this blog (see categories on right sidebar), beginning in late 2004. So I plan to say a lot more about (and to) the #WalkAway movement, which is composed to a large extent of young people.
Here’s a video that I found particularly moving in the emotional sense. I’ve edited out the first six minutes or so in order to cut to the chase:
Here’s another that’s in the same vein, but far shorter.
This next one is very different, much more cerebral but still very interesting, and in this case entertaining because the speaker is pretty humorous. I’ve cued it up to start towards the middle; the first part mainly involves him saying he was a Bernie Sanders supporter in 2016. This guy had a very accelerated change experience, because everything he describes from here on occurred after Trump announced his talks with North Korea’s Kim:
The propaganda from the left says the WalkAway movement is fake and that the people in it are mostly Russian bots. Originally the WalkAway stories were just text (I believe on Facebook), but after that accusation, a lot of people have posted YouTube videos to show they’re not Russian bots.
And of course, the left probably doesn’t really expect anyone going to the website and reading the WalkAway stories to think, “Russian bots, naturally!” or watch the WalkAway videos and say, “Obviously, that’s a Russian bot!” The purpose, as with so much leftist propaganda, is to get liberals to dismiss the movement out of hand and not become curious enough to even go there and read or watch for themselves. If they were to read or watch, it might be the genesis of their own WalkAway process, and that must be prevented. Best way to prevent it is to make them believe it’s not worth the time or trouble to find out, but to just take the left’s word for it.
A lot of these change stories began with a person becoming curious and doing research for him or herself. That’s how my story began, too, so many years ago.
The Left will continue to call them bots, and add “actors” or “Republicans pretending” or some similar label (kind of like their “random person asking questions at a town hall” schtick).
However, the people on YouTube have faces and names, some have their own channels, comments from people who know them — no one can remain anonymous on the internet any more, and their sincerity can be challenged and tested.
I walked away from the Democrat party forty years ago — because they lied so much about so many things, and even if they had one or two political positions I agreed with (along with the many I did not), they set about achieving them in such reprehensible ways I couldn’t stay with them.
Not that I like the Republican party all that much, but the weighted average of positions and actions falls on their side most of the time.
I had been, all my life, someone who voted for and felt aligned with the Democrats, back to Bobby Kennedy in particular when I was young. I found Jimmy Carter’s response to Iran really wanting, to say the least, and Mondale-Ferraro seemed like a very bad ticket, and it was hard to like Dukakis… but then I liked Bill Clinton at first. It was John Kerry in 2004 who ended things for me.
And then. Obama in 2008. The Rev. Wright and Bill Ayers-Bernadine Dohrn connection, plus the successful (and ongoing) coverup of his SATs and college grades, and then the attempted “cult of personality” — I found these matters repellent, whereas all of my friends were completely unmoved.
I’ve also hated, truly hated, political correctness… which comes entirely and exclusively from the Left.
These YouTube testimonials are interesting. The first guy really should steel himself and not cry. His sincerity is admirable, however. Sure. The second guy also goes on a little too long. Less is more, to my taste. But he’s entirely correct about the Democrats’ lies.
The Democrats and their paid, trained poodles of the press constantly insult our intelligence, figuring that it doesn’t matter because so many of their target audience are ignorant and young, flat-out stupid, or simply Low-Information forever, on purpose, end of story.
Some, however, find having our intelligence insulted offensive.
Watch this #Walkaway by a very decent classy lady who remembers the Kennedy years. It’s taken her a very long time to change but she has and is cleary heartbroken at what has happened to the Democrat party and at what it has revealed itself to be since the election. It’s quite touching to watch.
It’s hard for me to connect since I left years ago when the Clintons came on the scene. I couldn’t understand how the Democrat party would let itself be taken over by a pair of grifters, if not downright criminals. I would have gone to prison if I’d been accussed of as many sexual assualts and outright rapes that followed Bill around and you can bet if my wife and I had as many felonious business associates, we’d have gone to prison too.
https://youtu.be/iaalksjVd6Y
I too have taken to watching the #Walkaway videos. Mostly from Blacks who have finally realized that the Democrat position really is nothing more than a modern plantation. They’ve been taken for granted by the Democrat party for years.
The intolerance expressed by the progressives for those who dare to ask questions or express some doubts about the progressive credo resembles the intolerance of radical Islamists. It very much resembles deeply held religious faith. A democracy with several parties and a multitude of political beliefs cannot long exist without tolerance and mutual understanding. The radical progressives no longer accept the results of elections. Though they have not yet picked up arms, they have declared war on the duly elected President of the United States. They have ignored laws and constitutional principles while scheming to impeach or force the President to resign. They are blind to any entreaties that they accept the election results. All they can see is a Satanic figure who must be destroyed. It’s that old time religion on steroids. And the #Walkaway movement is exposing it.
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…I moved from Colorado to the Bay Area in California and it was there the liberal extremism became so much more apparent… It wasn’t a question, you couldn’t have a conversation with another person about what you believed.
The first guy got that right!
I am still relieved to have left San Francisco for Albuquerque. New Mexico is a blue state to be sure, but it’s not like the Bay Area.
OTOH I’m now attending UNM and I keep my mouth zipped on campus. I’m taking STEM courses. So far, politics hasn’t come up, but I won’t be taking any chances.
I must be among the minority of commenters here because I’ve always been right of center politically and I registered as a Republican as soon as I was old enough to vote. Now it may be genetic; my family (both father’s and mother’s sides) was pretty much party-line GOP, as was much of the county where I grew up. My grandmother on my mother’s side had a collection of little elephants made of everything from china to onyx to sandalwood, and she made me and my cousin little stuffed elephants when we were still in our cribs. I did begin to wonder when I was in high school whether I should read around and see whether my family’s perspective was truly my own, and I thought then (and still do) that it was.
My college classmates were generally open-minded about politics even though this was the Vietnam War era and some classmates took the antiwar side. It was not until I entered grad school (yes, it’s an Ivy school) that I encountered the kind of vitriolic hostility to even moderate Republicans that is a familiar story by now. I had two professors I could discuss politics with– one was himself a Republican and the other was my dissertation director, who felt that our shared Christian faith transcended political differences. The only political bumper sticker I ever put on my car was one that read “Republicans for J.S. Bach”– it was just off-beat enough that people laughed at it rather than messing with my car. Needless to say, I’ve pretty much stayed in the closet since the 1990s except with a few close friends who are also closeted.
As for the possibility that there is a genetic component to a person’s initial political leanings, I give you the Sentry’s song from Act II of Gilbert and Sullivan’s Iolanthe:
When all night long a chap remains
On sentry-go, to chase monotony
He exercises of his brains,
That is, assuming that he’s got any.
Though never nurtured in the lap
Of luxury, yet I admonish you,
I am an intellectual chap,
And think of things that would astonish you.
I often think it’s comical–Fal, lal, la!
How Nature always does contrive–Fal, lal, la!
That every boy and every gal
That’s born into the world alive
Is either a little Liberal
Or else a little Conservative!
Fal, lal, la!
You can hear it sung here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_b01PNYV4s&ab_channel=FriedrichLudovico [first 50 seconds are the orchestral introduction]
The indications seem to be that there won’t be a blue wave. The one way that can change is with high turnout, but given all the social stuff that’s happening (and very much including #WalkAway), I don’t see how that’s going to happen for Democrats either.
We’ll see soon enough.
There is one thing and one thing only that a tolerant society must never tolerate and that is intolerance. If intolerance is tolerated then that intolerance will crush them and destroy the tolerance that made them great.
PA Cat on August 18, 2018 at 10:38 pm at 10:38 pm said:
I must be among the minority of commenters here because I’ve always been right of center politically and I registered as a Republican as soon as I was old enough to vote.
* * *
When I was in grade school in the sixties, I remember standing on the street with my mother handing out GOP campaign swag; I never questioned that our family was Republican (I only toyed with the Dem party in college, because — college).
However, as I grew older, I noticed that my mother talked as favorably of Democrats as she did Republicans, and was kind of “mixed” platform-wise (probably a closet libertarian with a high tolerance for progressive “good intentions”).
She supported local Dems who she knew personally, and she admired Kennedy & even LBJ — because even though he was a crook, he “stayed bought;” hated Nixon and detested John McCain (I’m with her on those); voted for Obama because “it was time.”
So I asked her one day, why — since she sometimes seemed to prefer the D policies and personnel (public unions excepted) — why was she publicly supporting R’s back in the day?
Her answer was that Texas was then effectively a one-party Democrat state (since Reconstruction); she thought that was wrong; and so she supported Republicans until they had evened up the playing field.
She always called ’em like she saw ’em.
NOTE TO NEO: I just got the 405 thing that Geoffrey reported on another thread.
Went back a page, hit “post comment” again, and it came through just fine the second time.
Weird.
Is Zuckerburg monitoring your comment thread?
PS Mother was a total fan of Sarah Palin, but she still voted for Obama.
Holy Cow!
Watched several of the very heartfelt Walkaway videos, especially those put up by Blacks, and it seems to me that the Democrats are in serious trouble.
It appears that their lack of any platform other than “destroy Trump” and their transparently phony Russian collusion schtik, their constant 24/7 negativity, their political correctness, their identity politics and their deliberate attempts to Balkanize this country, their advocacy of open borders and of MS-13, no less, the immediate shaming of anyone who dares to deviate from the Democrat party line, the vitriol, the Democrat’s rabid hatred and the violence they have encouraged and—when it has occurred—condoned, their increasingly transparent lies, their advocacy of harassment of their opponents in their everyday lives, their very clearly demonstrated intolerance, have all combined to create some sort of tipping point among many former Democratic voters, and the Walkaway moment is the result.
To make matters worse for the Democrats, we know just how powerful a movement like this—made possible by social media—can be, and how it could grow exponentially.
If I were them going into the mid-terms I’d be afraid, very afraid of their carefully cultivated plantation just hemorrhaging former Democrat voters; runaway slaves—both black and white—and lots of them.
To Quote Martin Luther King, “Free at last, Free at last, Thank God almighty we are free at last.”
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The Democrats are apparently out of ideas.
Their new slogan, “Forward Together,” seems like it was lifted from some dreary Commie Socialist realism propaganda poster of happy workers and peasants from the old U.S.S.R., or from Mao’s “Great Leap Forward,” and we all know how well that turned out.
Cuomo’s recent statement about how “American was never that great”–since walked back, explained away, etc.–hasn’t helped either.
Everyone, just be sure to vote in the upcoming general election. Even though I live in deep blue Illinois I’ll vote.
While it might not affect the outcome at least they’ll know that others exist who believe differently.
Not doing Facebook or any of the so-called “social” media, I was unaware of the Walkaway movement until now. I humbly agree with Neo and with all the commenters, especially Snow On Pine. We are in great danger as a nation with a Constitution of remarkable wisdom which the Progs have done their level best to undo since Woodrow Wilson, which is 100 years now!
The problem in a nutshell as I see it is that the Left is always collectivist by instinct or nature, marching in unison with deviation not allowed, doing “Sieg Heil” or singing the Communist “Internationale”, while conservatives, treasuring individuality, cannot do this. That is why the first video speaker, the gay Buddhist white guy, feels better in CO than in SF.
But it will come to blows, because Leftists will not yield to reason and fair-mindedness. I rather welcome that because it will be akin to ridding a house of the vermin therein.
The public policy, the economic and social positions of the Democrat Party have been pulled so far to the Left that I think that this has also been a major factor in generating the Walkaway movement.
Despite several decades of Leftist indoctrination by and in our school systems, I still don’t think that “Socialism”—and let’s call it what it really is, what lies concealed beneath the “Socialism” wrapper, even the “Democratic Socialism” wrapper—i.e. “Communism”—is something that most Americans—including many Democrat voters—will go for.
The examples of Socialism/Communism’s failure have just been too stark, and the body count just been too high—the old U.S.S.R., China, Cuba and, now, Venezuela—to be covered up.
Then, of course, we have to include in that list Germany and the Nazis. The NAZI acronym, after all, short for “der Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiters Partei” — in English translation: the National Socialist German Workers’ Party.
And what is one of the chief features of Communism–the government’s ownership and direction of the “means of production.”
Well, as Von Mises has pointed out, in Nazi Germany, while the means of production were still supposedly in private hands after the Nazi’s took over, in reality the Nazi’s were the de facto owners, since they called all the shots —what to produce, at what price, and who to sell it to—not the—in effect—pushed out of control, off to the side, and pensioned off official “Owners.”
I note news reports in the last couple of days about far Left Senator Elizabeth Warren introducing her “Accountable Capitalism Act,” legislation that would require that all U.S. companies making a billon or more dollars annually have to get a government granted “corporate charter,” a license, in order to do business in this country.
What is this but the first step of an effort by the far Left—once they get back in charge of government again—to bend the “means of production” to their ideology, in reality, to take over the “means of production.”
I’m not watching a lot of these videos…I have a built in resistance to YouTube exhibitionism and it’s twin sibling voyeurism.
BUT…I listened to part of that first man’s story because Neo’s a reliable guide and she suggested there’s something there. I feel sad for him…mainly because he strikes me as terribly naive…and desperately emotionally needy. How long did it take him to even use the self-descriptor “gay man?”
I’m glad he’s feeling emotionally safer within the more conservative ranks of folks and from what I hear, there are enough #walkaways just like him that the Ds ought to be concerned. But so far, he strikes me as still being tuned to the “identity politics” wavelength…and that’s a fragile connection wherever he rests along the way.
He’d be welcome at my house for dinner. Seems a decent young man and heck, we can all use another friend.
“The Left will continue to call them bots, and add “actors” or “Republicans pretending” or some similar label…”
Yes, and by so doing they prove the point that they are intolerant and hateful.
I found the first video very moving. I live in the solid blue enclave of eastern Massachusetts thus am surrounded by liberals, the Left, and progressives. I’ve learned over time to keep my opinions on politics and government to myself, not because I’m unwilling to fight but because doing so is pointless. These folks don’t listen and are not open to different opinions and ideas. My friends and family know this about me and fortunately do not do what the person in the video described that his friends did.
Good for him, I wish him well.
It’s pretty uncanny.
As other people have quite often pointed out, every time those on the Left launch some charge against their opponents—accuse them of thinking some supposedly evil thought, or doing this or that bad thing—you can be pretty confident that this is pure “projection,” and that whatever supposedly “evil” thought those on the Left accuse their opponents of thinking, it is those on the Left who are actually thinking those malicious, evil thoughts, and whatever bad things those on the Left accuse others of doing, it’s pretty certain that the ones who are actually doing those bad things are those on the Left.
I wartched the videos in this article which led me to watch a good many other #WalkAway videos. One thing which strikes me is how very aware and informed the #WalkAway posters are. How steady and reasonable they are. How thoughtful. The #WalkAway movement may not be huge (yet?), but the people the left and the Democrats have lost were their best and brightest.
Perhaps a realignment is taking place. As those who are part of the Walk-Away movement move center right along with a segment of blue collar working class, at the same time what the AP calls “Forgotten Republicans” move center left. If you think people like John Kasich and Jeff Flake don’t represent legitimate views within the Republican Party, then maybe they don’t and are coming to realize it. Take a look at the list of Republican congressmen who are not running for reelection.
I find myself somewhat in the predicament of the Walk-Aways, but on the other side. Those ideological positions built into the conservative movement, like free trade and fiscal discipline, are not part of the new Trump party. Listening to a tape of Milton Friedman on the subject only confirms this.
http://www.aei.org/publication/some-timeless-wisdom-about-free-trade-and-protectionism-from-milton-friedman-in-1978/
I’m not sure those people in the Walk-Away movement are joining forces with Trump as much as they are simply leaving the regimentation and group think of the left. Some of us, from both political sides, are moving away.
Trying to stem the hemorrhage of Democrat voters, Leftists have sought to minimize and de-legitimize the Walkaway movement by accusing the Russians of ginning up and/or artificially inflating the Walkaway movement, and/or said that those who put their Walkaway stories upon the Internet are not actual voters but paid actors.
So prevalent are these charges by the Left that I note that many preface their Walkaway videos by saying that they have not been manipulated by the Russians to say what they are saying, and that they are not paid actors reading some script.
In line with my Leftist “projection” comment above, I view these charges by the Left as clues to what the Left, itself, has actually been thinking and doing.
Thus, perhaps the Left has itself been very knowingly getting a little Russian help, or has, itself, been getting paid actors to go on the Internet, to impersonate actual voters, and to talk up the Democrat Party and it’s agenda.
Those on the Left have thought it and done these things, so they assume that their opponents have also thought and done them as well.
…moving away, from parties that have left us.
The #WalkAway movement, if it can be called a movement, is relatively small. This is an old variant on a theme, but if #WalkAway were on the right, there’d be news features on the subject on ABCNBCCBSCNNPBSMSNBC every night for weeks.
(And then they scratch their heads and stroke their beards, earnestly wondering why the right-leaning candidate generally does better in actual elections than does the left-leaning candidate, when compared to results of their exhaustive polling.)
You being interested in political change stories is not all that surprising, Neo.
If they were to read or watch, it might be the genesis of their own WalkAway process, and that must be prevented. Best way to prevent it is to make them believe it’s not worth the time or trouble to find out, but to just take the left’s word for it.
A lot of these change stories began with a person becoming curious and doing research for him or herself.
Too bad not nearly as many people do that for the scientific consensus. They still accept what they are told. It is very easy to dismiss something as a conspiracy theory in order to avoid having to consider it. Because by considering it, they might begin to see the truth.
Those on the Left have thought it and done these things, so they assume that their opponents have also thought and done them as well.
Correct.
or from Mao’s “Great Leap Forward,” and we all know how well that turned out.
Turned out pretty well for Mao and the Commie inner circle. That was kind of the point.
The intolerance of the Dem PC-bullies is terrible — much like the intolerance and defamation which Hitler’s Nazis told each other about the Jews. And like the KKK Democrats told about blacks.
I voted for Jimmy Carter — last Dem I voted for. Then went Libertarian, now am a Republican.
Trump supports Free Trade — he’s pushing changes to current non-free, anti-US managed trade. Trump haters hate that.
Trump has no fiscal discipline, but neither do the popular Democrats. I’d much rather have bigger deficits due to lower taxes, rather than huge deficits due to excess, market distorting spending (like on Solyndra and other Dem-donating, and Dem-supported boondoggles).
Notice how little there is criticism by Dems about the deficit, far far more about the tax cuts. Because the Dems want as much or more deficit.
Reps who want Reps to try entitlement reform before the Dems say it is a problem are asking to lose. Sorry to say this. No reform of entitlements until Dems are ready to reform. Otherwise the Reps lose and Dems in power sure won’t reform.
I’m so very glad some are walkingAway, wish it was more.
MJR–How can we know how big the Walkaway movement really is, or whether, or how fast it might be growing?
Moreover, for every person who has the courage to, or the exhibitionistic thrill of putting their Walkaway video up on the Internet, there may be ten more who don’t.
I wouldn’t discount, either, the fact that there is even a Walkaway movement being able to plant the seed of doubt in a lot of people, who may eventually also Walkaway; effective memes can infect a whole population, and rather quickly.
I’m glad he’s feeling emotionally safer within the more conservative ranks of folks and from what I hear, there are enough #walkaways just like him that the Ds ought to be concerned.
The emotionally weakened people were those that couldn’t handle me using Trum for DJT. That’s what emotional safety means.
They have to ignore what bothers them emotionally since they don’t have a reason they can write down, even to deceive themselves.
The intolerance of the Dem PC-bullies is terrible
The intolerance started from individuals wearing masks and then losing control emotionally. After they deceived themselves, deceiving the nation became feasible.
The line that really resonated with me in the short video is this, “once you see, you can’t unsee” That’s exactly how I feel. There is no way I could ever support the left again. I wasn’t a hard core lefty anyway, but once I realized that the media only showed what fit their agenda, any trust I had in them evaporated.
Trump supports Free Trade.
Trump can and does say almost anything. Contradictions are his specialty. Since January of this year he’s imposed a number of protective tariffs on a variety of goods. They add up to billions of dollars with more threatened. In the process he’s caused a backlash on our exports to the point that he’s having to subsidize soybean farmers with $12 billion from all of us. Other industries suffering from his policies may not have the pull to get bailed out. The farmers in California don’t, apparently because it’s a blue state.
About 20% of the table grape crop has been exported to China. The harvest has started and it’s my understanding that between the retaliatory tariffs and ICE raids, a significant percentage will rot on the vines. The almond industry is in worse shape.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/chinese-tariffs-hit-u-s-almond-exports-1532793600
All of this hit the farming industry in my state without warning. After pulling out of a 5 year drought, spending millions on deepening wells, bearing ever tightening state eco and water regulations, the staged increase in minimum wage to $15 p/hour, trial attorney instigated pesticide lawsuits, and the flight of farm help to the far reaches, they have this thrown at them.
Nice going Trump. Like Walter Duranty, that old apologist for Stalin said, you can’t make an omelette without breaking a few eggs. The irony is that these farmers have been staunch Republican supporters.
Snow on Pine on August 19, 2018 at 8:08 pm:
“MJR–How can we know how big the Walkaway movement really is, or whether, or how fast it might be growing?”
We cannot know exactly how big or how fast (shades of Werner Heisenberg?); your point is well taken.
But I will say/type this. Many more people are apolitical than political. Many more people have jobs and families and don’t care to muck around in the . . . well, *muck*. Many people — more than are open to ideas emanating from the dark side (sarcasm) — really don’t want to be bothered. And then there are those who are fascinated by whatever Kim Kardashian was seen wearing today. In that sense, I surmise, not based on any research but on my observations of people, that those open to #WalkingAway are still relatively small. But given how close is the left-right divide in USA, the #WalkAway crowd may indeed be sufficient to make a difference. In that sense, Snow on Pine, you are right.
“Moreover, for every person who has the courage to, or the exhibitionistic thrill of putting their Walkaway video up on the Internet, there may be ten more who don’t.”
Y’know, I don’t doubt that, in the sense that there may be ten more, or twenty more, or only two more. We just don’t know.
“I wouldn’t discount, either, the fact that there is even a Walkaway movement being able to plant the seed of doubt in a lot of people, who may eventually also Walkaway; effective memes can infect a whole population, and rather quickly.”
Yes again. Seeds may be being planted, and we don’t know how many may take root and bring forth fruit, however long it takes, and how many may fall by the wayside.
That’s a biblical reference, by the way — here’s our Sunday School lesson for today, based on KJV Matthew 13:3-9.
3 And he [Jesus] spake many things unto them in parables, saying, Behold, a sower went forth to sow;
4 And when he sowed, some seeds fell by the way side, and the fowls came and devoured them up:
5 Some fell upon stony places, where they had not much earth: and forthwith they sprung up, because they had no deepness of earth:
6 And when the sun was up, they were scorched; and because they had no root, they withered away.
7 And some fell among thorns; and the thorns sprung up, and choked them:
8 But other fell into good ground, and brought forth fruit, some an hundredfold, some sixtyfold, some thirtyfold.
9 Who hath ears to hear, let him hear.
I think it is timely drag Humpty Dumpty up the stairs from the cellar of collective wisdom again. Eggs are fragile and sometimes whole eras and the worldviews that go with them are too – and collapse very quickly. Think of the suddenness of Ceausescu’s collapse. Richard Fernandez of the Belmont Club calls it a preference cascade. It is slower in an actual Democracy like ours – we haven’t been bussed into ‘Revolution Square’ to cheer Hillary for 25 years – but we have had a gutfull. Not only are the claims of the left increasingly preposterous, they are corrupt to boot. As several of you have pointed out there is a great deal of projection by the left accusing the right of what it is up to itself. That this young gay man experienced no hateful comments from the right is exactly to the point. So whatever preference cascade is actually occurring which will effect the election is not getting a lot of pushback by people on the right behaving badly. I’m sure such people exist, but it is hard not to respect people who have had the courage to come out twice – even if you don’t like them. Then, of course, there is Candice Owens, but as Glenn Reynolds says,: “Don’t get cocky”.
John Guilfoyle, I think that’s part of what makes that video so moving (and painful). He is truly horrified at what he has discovered. The group he belonged to is no longer available to him, and he hasn’t found another group — his experiment showed that Trump voters are more likely to be nice to him, but it’s not a group he can understand or identify with. He is slowly grasping that treating people as individuals is what really matters, but it seems that is still an abstraction. The next step, one hopes, will be to fully embrace his identity as an *individual* but he seems to be at the very beginning of that. He clearly needs emotional support right now. He is grieving something he never thought he would lose. That is extremely difficult.
Comments are giving a double time-stamp!
As a south shore guy, my first reaction to most of these is “dawn breaks o’er Marblehead”.
Want to see an atom bomb of a Walkaway video, look at this one I found at https://www.liveleak.com/view?t=Crz4E_1531056542
Not one of the rough, cinema verite, everyday people produced Walkaway videos. This one is extremely well done, and it looks like it was written and delivered by professionals.
Whoever produced it, I think it might be very effective.
Meanwhile–just to show how well “Socialism” (that the far left Democrats now seem so drawn towards) is performing–in real life, in practice and on the ground–in Socialist/Communist Venezuela, “President” Madura has just announced that he will raise the corporate tax rate, increase the minimum wage by 3,000% (to the equivalent of U.S. $30 dollars per month) while, simultaneously, he is going to devalue their national currency, the Bolivar, by a reported 94-96%, as inflation in Venezuela is headed steeply upward, towards one million percent, amid massive shortages of basic medical supplies, toilet paper, rice, coffee, corn and other basic necessities.
Said former taxi driver Maduro in the speech announcing these measures, “I want the country to recover and I have the formula. Trust me,”
I almost wanted to cry along with that gay guy in the green shirt. All I can offer, and I don’t know if this makes it better or worse, is that he didn’t lose 500 friends, they were not his friends in the first place. Friends don’t sever relationships over a switch between Democrat and Republican. They were never going to be there for him in a real time of need. They were at most casual acquaintances.
I joined the walkaway facebook page after first reading about the movement a couple of months ago. The stories were moving and encouraging. Eventually I posted my own story about events starting in the late ‘80s that led to walking away in 1993 after Clinton criminality exploded on the national scene.
There’s a strong sense of growing community on the page, which seems a very hopeful sign for our nation’s future health. And I doubt one could read more than half a dozen stories without recognizing the visceral response of many former partisan Dems to the post-Trump hatefest playing 24/7 across the land.
No wonder the left’s Ministry of Propaganda is working hard to demonize, denigrate, and dismiss #walkaway!
Snow on Pine,
That video has been effective. It’s the original #walkaway video featuring the founder of the movement, Brandon Straka, and has encouraged thousands of others who question leftist orthodoxy to come out of the closet.
I think his movement will prove increasingly attractive to young people who like to imagine themselves as rebels but fear social ostracism if they dare to resist groupthink.
The Progressive Left is a cult……. always has been.
Some people are waking up to that.
MHJ: “he didn’t lose 500 friends, they were not his friends in the first place.”
Bingo! That is exactly right. That they would be willing to drop him because of his “political thinking” means they wouldn’t be there when/if he really needed them.
I watched several more videos today.
Saw some very powerful stories, and (as with the first one in this post) there were only positive comments as far as I read them.
These are especially good. I have transcribed from the video when I thought the person’s story was particularly representative of the Movement, or if there was a unique personal angle.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tqYRcnII6o4
This is one of the best videos I have seen so far (speed 1.5) – 9:53 minutes
redpilled princess
Published on Jul 19, 2018
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It took forever for me to finally decide to make my #walkaway video but I felt it necessary to share, not only my story, but the story of my incredible grandfather, a 93 year old Union Democrat who decided to walkaway. I wanted to illustrate for people that the people who voted for Trump were not Nazis at all but were instead, in many cases, the very people who voluntarily decided to fight Hitler himself.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U1x80Tr0_ds
“Here’s my story…..I’m ready to WalkAway.” Lynzee
My rough transcription:
She is a gay Catholic woman who hid what she was after being bullied in school; marriage fell apart, so came out, and her conservative Catholic friends were okay with it; joined the gay community; out of place as a conservative. “Stepped out of one closet into another one” – married the only other conservative lesbian in her community. Attacking me personally, condoning hate and violence against me. Transgender friend (lesbian to male) and supported him, but felt I can’t be honest with him. Never felt that kind of animosity in the conservative community; don’t care if I lose friends, I can’t do it anymore.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oG6JqmdIubA
#WalkAway Campaign Official YouTube
Published on Jul 12, 2018
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[Kristal is a moderator on the #WalkAway FB]
“Please excuse my nervousness. I hate being on camera and public speaking. It was Brandon’s call for videos, along with all of y’all inspiring stories and the courage and bravery you’ve shown, that gave me the courage to try to make a video. That and I’m one of y’alls moderators and I, especially, should have had one up LOL In my story I talk about the moments that eventually really start making me look at the Democratic Party-my experience with welfare benefits, but I neglected to make it clear that it was the research into that— how the Democratic Party encourages single motherhood and dependency on the welfare state and being a victim because of your identity, that really opened my eyes. I’m sorry I’m such a rambler.
This movement has given me so much hope and faith for the future. I don’t know if I ever would have had the courage to tell people that I voted for Trump or moved away from the Democratic Party if it wasn’t for all you guys!!! #WalkAway. To a united America—where we can have actual discourse and discussion and try to find compromise or at least respectfully agree to disagree. Also, no worries, I did not name my ex, not fully, I left out his last name on purpose. Lol Edit:I’ve gotten a few personal messages and a couple comments on the thread.
Yes, I am a mom of 5. I know I have a recent cover pic with all of us in it on my FB page if you need to verify that. My kids range in age: oldest is 21, then 16, 9, 8 and 4. I was really hesitant to do my WalkAway story because it involved welfare and I know it can be a touchy subject for some. There are genuine people who need it. I also know it’s being used to encourage people to stay on it and even abuse it….and it was because of the latter that I felt I needed to share my story. I don’t judge those who are on it and need it. That’s what it is there for. My family used it for a couple of months. I just wanted to point out some of the problems within it.” Kristal
My transcription:
Testified that they wanted to get off welfare but the caseworker tried to get them to stay on it, because “it’s free” – but it isn’t free, the taxpayers pay for it, and they didn’t need it. Took months to get them to actually close the account, and caseworker said that she had never in 30-plus years had anyone close out before they had to (this couple had almost a year left before having to be renewed).
Didn’t vote for Obama because he was as smarmy and charming as her snake-charmer ex-boyfriend (not black). Lots more about the things she found out during his administration. Not a NeverTrumper, but he was icky, liked Ben Carson. Not voting for Bernie, not for socialism even if you throw democratic in front of it. People getting wild, bizarre. Could not vote for Hillary, corrupt, evil; held nose and voted for Trump. And the world went insane. Had good debates along the way, but couldn’t do that anymore, afraid, until this Walkaway came along. In Arkansas (on the border).
You are as oppressed as you allow yourself to be; never believed that a black or Hispanic was anything less than a white person; moved to conservative because that really isn’t the liberal platform; support individuals, economy. Not a Republican but a conservative, because there are extremes, but they are the most welcoming, inclusive and diverse.
Take a look at this very powerful #WalkAway video by a very thoughtful and articulate man who lived under Polish Communism, as he enumerates the correspondences between what he experienced in Poland and the ideology and behavior of the Left in this country today.
See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uHjYsxtcK30