Watching someone you care about slip into conservatism can be heartbreaking. Few phrases strike fear into your heart and sadness into your soul like âIâm voting for [Trump or Carson] in 2016.â I canât even compare that phrase to anything else. âWe canât eat at that restaurant, Iâm a vegan nowâ is pretty bad, and so is the phrase âI donât know why so many people hated the Entourage movie, I thought it was great.â But neither is as horrific as a loved one saying âThat Ted Cruz, I tell ya, heâll be a great President.â
But you donât need to suffer with this heartbreaking loss of family and friends. You donât need to sleep with one eye open, fearing your significant other will wake up the next morning wearing a âMake America Great Againâ cap that you never even saw them purchase. Conservative disorder is a harrowing mental disease, but there are tell-tale warning signs that you can watch out for, and with some TLC, an intellectual intervention, and a dash of luck, you might just save your loved one from the terribleness of becoming a conservative.
Here are ten warning signs to look out for:
They Canât Name A Single Thing About President Obama That They Agree With
Not everyone approves of President Barack Obama, but most Americans can name at least five to ten things heâs done that theyâre legitimately happy about, if not a lot more. But to a conservative, everything in politics is binary; itâs either 100% true or 100% false, A or B, with no space for gray. So if someone tells you they disapprove of every single thing Obama has done in office, thatâs about as obvious a warning sign as youâll likely encounter.
They Confuse Socialism, Communism, Marxism, And/Or Fascism
One of the earliest warning signs of conservative disorder is on full display when your loved one mixes up the definitions of socialism, communism, Marxism, and/or fascism, a sign that manifests in their use of any or all of these four terms as an insult heaved at a political figure, or progressive ideology as a whole. And speaking of getting confused about factsâŠ
They Suddenly Consider Themselves To Be Historians, But They Really, Definitely Arenât
If your loved one begins unexpectedly misquoting Thomas Jefferson and Ronald Reagan, or misquotes Adolf Hitler while drawing a line between him and either Barack Obama, Bernie Sanders, or Hillary Clinton, youâre witnessing an easily-detected warning sign that theyâre becoming a conservative. The more horrendously they mangle historical references, or interpret them in the wrong context, or start doing this in volume, the worse their conservative disorder is becoming.
Mentioning Or Seeing Vladimir Putin Causes Sexual Arousal
Conservatives have an inexplicable affection for Vladimir Putin, so show your loved one this image of Vladimir Putin, half-naked and riding a horse. Are they getting an erection? Is their crotch getting damp? Are they breathing heavier, or licking their lips, or asking something akin to âbreak me off a piece of that genocidal maniacâ or maybe âdictator? More like dicktastic!â? These are all late-stage warning signs that your loved one is suffering with conservatism.
They Always Side Against Black People
Bring up some of the countless incidents involving race in the past several years. Mention names like Trayvon Martin, Freddie Gray, Michael Brown, or Eric Garner, and gauge their reaction. If they seem to always side with whoever isnât black in each story, or they needlessly politicize the story, or they immediately start talking about âreverse-racism,â those are truly bad signs.
Israel Is The Best Place On Earth
Are they referring to Israel as âAmericaâs greatest ally?â Do they wish Benjamin Netanyahu was Americaâs president? Are they claiming that Netanyahu speaks on behalf of every single Israeli, even though he only has a 29% approval rating in his own country (thatâs way, way lower than Barack Obama has in the US, by the way)? If thatâs the case, youâd best just cut your losses and find someone new to care about.
They Miss âThe Deciderâ
Theyâve apparently forgotten how terrible George W. Bush was, and want to convince you that he was a better president, somehow, than President Obama is today. Most Americans are very, very happy that Bush is not longer our president, but conservatives? Theyâll refer to him as the next Ronald Reagan in ten yearsâ time.
They Think All Muslims Are Terrorists
Youâre unable to bring up inspiring, positive Muslim figures â people like the incredible Malala Yousafzai â without them immediately bringing up 9/11 or ISIS, or questioning your patriotism. You canât bring up the massive refugee crisis in the Middle East without them making nonsensical statements about all of the refugees being males sent by ISIS to destroy Western civilization as we know it.
They Struggle Pronouncing Certain Key Phrases
Some words become difficult to say for your loved one, without their tone turning vitriolic and the word itself becoming slurred. âObamaâ becomes âObammer,â âBenghaziâ becomes âBern-gerzi,â and Bernie Sanders becomes âthat socialist asshole.â
Numbers No Longer Matter
They no longer care to measure President Obama using the same metrics weâve measured every other president in history withâbecause when you do, it becomes pretty obvious that Barack Obama has been an all-around good president. Unemployment is at one of its lowest points in the past fifty years, but your loved one says that number doesnât matter, and they present you with the âreal unemploymentâ rate, claiming 90-something million Americans are unemployed. But donât mention to them that you can only hit that number when you count children not old enough to work yet, prisoners, and full-time students⊠that will just cause their conservative disorder to flare up even worse.