Weaponized Ideology: The Rural American War

I spend a lot of time highlighting how many Trump voters from rural areas have come to their senses. They are vocalizing their mistake. They are publicly displaying support for the resistance.

Most often I’m met with “well, let them suffer. They got what they voted for,” or “well, FAFO.”

Like… ok… but what does that mentality do for us? How does that help anyone? Sure, they can suffer… and so will everyone else.

I have said from day one that this war will be fought and won in rural America. The urban centers do not need convincing. Support for Trump in densely populated cities is few and far between. We are exposed to the diversity we are advocating for. Rural America is not.

I was born in Minneapolis but I grew up in a small town in central Minnesota about an hour and a half north of the cities. I spent my formidable years in this setting. If I have any roots at all, they are rural in nature. I understand the mentality. I understand the isolation and the lack of access to information.

Rural America exists in a silo where the sound waves of Fox News and Newsmax ricochet off the county lines back into the collective conscience. There’s no way out… no way in.

To make matters worse, we have social media giants manipulating the algorithms. People generally see what already aligns with their views and can opt out of exposure to views they do not like. Many people opted out of or “hid” left-leaning posts long before the Trump regime began its assault on our country. Our constant barrage of resistance posts does not reach the feeds of those who need to see it most.

Furthermore, it should be no secret that these tech bros are clearly on the fascist side of history. Right-wing propaganda equals money in their pockets. The more people who blindly support this regime, the better off these tech bros are. It’s all about that money, hunny.

For those of us still connected to our rural communities, we see this play out in real time. I know which side people are on based on whose content I see most frequently and what their posts contain. I also know when Facebook is working to frame a scandal because my feed becomes inundated with right-wing bullshit from people and pages I do not and would not follow.

I catch this because I engage with social media from a critical perspective. Many people do not. And when right-wing content is all you’ve been exposed to for the last 10 years, it is highly unlikely you’d consider the greater purpose behind the message you’re fed. You simply read it, accept it and scroll along.

Which is why it is such an earth-shattering development for ANYONE in rural America to shift course after 10 years and 3 elections of supporting Trump.

Truly, think about that for a moment. Trump’s base—the folks who have voted for him three times, who overlooked all the vile bullshit that man has said and done, who stood behind him after he incited an insurrection—are now not just telling themselves they were wrong, they are actively vocalizing that they recognize their mistake. They are liking posts aligning with the resistance. They are posting anti-fascist content.

I don’t care who you are, that is not an easy thing to do. These folks are not acting impulsively. These are not easily persuaded individuals, and they certainly are not the type who humble themselves regularly. Yet here they are admitting that their entire belief system they held for a decade—one that was spoon fed to them all day everyday by a media ecosystem designed to brainwash them—was wrong.

THEY are the ones whose position is most likely to influence a deeper shift in the rest of rural America. If they change their views, those around them are more likely to question their own position as well.

And we’re going to respond to this massive ideological shift by telling them to fuck off and suffer? Really?

I get it. We’re frustrated. We’re grieving our “democracy” (if we ever actually had one… I beg to differ, but I’ve already written about that). We want someone or something to blame. The Trump voters are an easy target. This is their fault after all… right?

But they did not create the system that produced the MAGA movement. They did not create the information silo funded by billionaires to warp their own worldview. They did not ask to be born and raised in a homogenized environment nor have they had access to the lived experience that would expose them to any other way of life. Couple that with the media that blames their suffering on the existence of diversity and urban centers and you got yourself one hell of a divide.

Like it or not, that’s not the average Trump voter’s fault. That is a finely-tuned system designed to divide the populace to serve the wealthy. The Trump voters are the current scapegoat for that system, and every time we reject them out of anger we become complicit in perpetuating the system’s agenda.

It is our civic duty to create a society we want to live in. You cannot write off rural America as a wash. It clearly is not. The ideological framework that has been systematically ingrained in rural America is a clear threat to our survival. Telling rural Americans who come to their senses to kick rocks turns them away from progress and back towards fascism. Not a damn soul wants to join a cause where they are ridiculed, ostracized and demonized. An eye for an eye does not build our coalition. Rather, it reinforces the iron cage that has clanked down around us.

It’s time to move beyond our selfish desire for vengeance. The first couple years under an authoritarian regime matter. This is when the propaganda takes hold. This is the optimal time to counter fascist ideology.

The work of healing our nation consists of shifting ideology where it matters most. You do not need to convince your urban brothers and sisters that this is not how we want to live. They already know. Instead, we must focus our efforts on rural spaces. This is where the shift will happen… or not. This is where we unify… or not.

As I’ve mentioned, it will be those who change course—the ones known for supporting Trump in the past but who presently oppose him—who will have the greatest impact. We NEED these folks. They ARE the catalyst for change.

For those of us with ties to rural America, this is OUR work to do. This is OUR time to show up. We cannot afford to waste these precious months in spiteful rage. It’s time to do the work.

Perhaps the next time you protest you can show up in your hometown where the divide is present like an open wound gushing blood from the heart of our nation. If you want to have an impact, you have to get uncomfortable. If you are truly interested in building a better society, you have to start at the source of the pain. It is much easier to battle an ideological war than it will be to fight a real one. Act accordingly.

Go forth and fight like hell. We have a country to save.