Donald Trump and his supporters' conspiracy theories are embarrassing

The United States is a country that's long been held to high standards. Immigrants immigrate here because they believe it's the world's best country, where politicians are free from corruption and the president has the highest level of integrity possible.

Trump has created a divisive, hostile environment for both politicians and ordinary citizens. It's a shame to know that so many far-right extremists are still out there and will continue to be emboldened by him after his presidency. They feel emboldened to create and spread lies as they see fit. When things don't go their way or fit their narrative, they feel like it's normal and acceptable to start believing in lies and spreading these lies.

I feel sorry for the many immigrants who had to witness this. I know many of them supported Trump, but it's likely they just didn't know any better.

Quote from hopemin

trump is bad, but i feel like it's always been bad. like yeah he certainly made a lot of things worse and increased tensions within the country, but it's not like he created racism and racism is going to go away now that he left office. immigrants who come here thinking it's this idyllic paradise will still be disappointed.

Yeah, I agree. I feel like the hostile, racist, intolerant attitudes have always been there; they just got emboldened to be put on public display due to Trump's rhetoric. I just hope that the younger generations will be more sensible and united than this.

Quote from harambelives

You know the what worst part is? It's not like a vocal minority or an overrepresented set of followers, it's more or more less half the country that have those set of qualities. When he won it was a huge wake up call about what Americans are really like but over the past 4 years of lies, fights, failures and just overall absurdity of Trumps reign not only did he increase the number of votes he had the 2nd most number of votes in America history. The fuck?! After all the chaos he was more popular than ever, you'd think people would look back and say no more of this shit but no, bring it on more like

When someone like that was close to winning again even after fucking things up it's no longer a wave or trend, it represents what the country is actually like and that is a really scary thought. Americans are some of the most messed up people in the world

I'm going to be honest. I gave him the benefit of the doubt. I thought maybe this guy had the country and people's best interests at heart, but was just horrible at presenting himself. However, it became apparent that he's an absolute egotistical clown based on how he responds to people who disagree with him. He completely disrespected John McCain, an American hero and one of the good guys in the Republican Party.

Trump was also obsessed with getting rid of everything that Obama created, including things that made perfect sense for us to have. Obama started an agency designated to handling pandemics. We surely could have benefitted from that, but Trump got rid of it. Instead, how did respond to COVID-19? Complete negligence and lack of preparation. Trump downplayed the pandemic, made fun of wearing masks, and lied to us by saying COVID-19 was not a big issue. This led to so many more infections (and worse), but he didn't bother to care one bit. He only cared about winning reelection and spreading lies about so-called "election fraud." His followers ate it up, portrayed the pandemic as something Democrats/liberals used against Trump, continued to deny the seriousness of COVID-19, and decided to fight for a cause they made up in their heads.

Now we're in the situation we're in. COVID-19 should have been our biggest priority since the beginning, but it never was that under Trump's presidency. I have a lot of hope for Biden.

Quote from harambelives

That's my point. In your example trump fucked up the covid response massively, everyone could see it. Hell in the beginning he called it a freaking hoax. Going into elections held during said fucked up pandemic you'd think the voting pubic would see how shit the situation became and at least think about who they're really voting for. Nope. Still super loyal to the man who didn't give a shit about them.

Biden likely will handle it better but at end of the day if almost half the voters saw the poor handling, along with trump's other "achievements" though his term and still thought he was a good candidate then like I said America is messed up. Simply switching pres isn't going to fix it at all

Absolutely agreed. Even months ago, I'd been saying that this isn't strictly a Trump issue. It's an American issue. The fact that people would rather feed their own egos instead of working collectively to overcome the pandemic says it all. I'd go as to say there are people on both sides of the political spectrum who refuse to take this seriously. There are many liberal/leftist folks who go out and party during these times as well. You can take a look at social media influencers to see.

This is a huge deal, and it's way more than just keeping ourselves safe. It's about keeping those around us safe. I feel like many in this country have this selfish, overly individualistic mindset. When they hear that they'd survive if they're young, fit, and have no underlying health conditions, they just stop being concerned about it, neglecting those around them who might really be affected. Then, they'd say it's "oppressive" for us to take collective action to solve an issue that requires collectivism.

It's a shame, really. They don't realize how childish they sound complaining about their perceived freedoms being taken away.

Quote from 4NIA4

This is a brilliant observation I see it the same way. It is hard to fault them, I have the same mindset. Damned getting used to having individual Rights during a Public crisis. It is a very selfish situation.

This is where the difference between East and West comes into play. Western societies have much more of an individualistic mindset, and that's great in some ways. People should absolutely take pride in their unique qualities and features, what makes them the people they are. However, there's a point at which people can go overboard. This occurs when they only think about themselves, neglecting the effects of their actions on others. Sometimes we see people behaving differently just to be different and going against the rules just to go against rules. There's an ego problem going on.

In eastern societies, it's more commonplace to take collective action for the greater good of society. People are more willing to sacrifice a bit of their personal comfort if it means the community as a whole can benefit. Of course, there have been anti-maskers in Asian countries as well, but these are basically outliers. In the West, conformity is often stigmatized as being sheep, but I really think it's about time for people to grow up and realize there comes a time when we all have to work together instead of just thinking about ourselves.

Sometimes I feel like those of us in first-world countries are bored out of our minds, so we resort to believing strange conspiracy theories just to look cool or stand out.