I suddenly noticed a striking set of similarities between MAGA Trumpturds and Apple Users. From the early days when Apple decided they would use proprietary software and hardware, their marketing always targeted a segment of the market that could afford their overpriced computers. They did innovate hardware, initially which gave their brand uniqueness in a world where everything else looked the same. So there was a feeling of belonging to a select group. Indeed that feeling among iPhone users continues today. So what's the MAGA connection? Well first let's look at Apple's design. From the start their hardware and software were purposely designed different and incompatible with other existing hardware or running other software. That's because by being different, users could not easily migrate to other PC platforms. Data (information) that users created and stored could not be transferred easily to other PCs. It was the beginning of Apples walled garden. This wall extended to all their products, down to chip sets even. Eventually what you could experience of the greater WWW became limited in their garden. Now let's compare Apple's walled garden to the Trumposphere, where people are so locked into their MAGA/Fox/Newsmax right wing jail, where no facts reside, and none are allowed in to disrupt the pro-Trumpian narrative. Let's also examine the price Apple Users pay to be part of that cult. Not only do users feel compelled to upgrade yearly, but everything costs far more than similar functioning non-apple products with better features. So to continue in the Apple cult you get ripped off, just like Trump's fans who bought his scams, bibles, watches, cyber b.s., etc., hook, line, sinker and rod, you gotta prove your loyalty daily to Apple and Trump! It's just as hard and cognitively dissonant for Apple iphone Users to migrate to Android as it is for a Trumpbot to wake up to reality. I'm not saying Apple Users are all MAGA, that's not my point. But be it naïvaté, stupidity or needing to feed ones ego. The result is the same... YOU'RE IN A FUCKING CULT! The only way to get an Apple user to convert is to show them what they're missing, that they aren't the majority, and that they are being exploited and scammed. Now do the same with MAGA, and keep it up till they break. They all need a major intervention!
I think there's something in those who form part of a cult - any group of individuals who think their group is better, more intelligent, more special or, even, that their group has some sort of extra knowledge about something. That; combined with a stick-to-your-own-kind mentality. Pretty sad, really. I recall meeting tourists who stayed here for a week in around 2010, when the tea-party was a thing. Their thing. We discussed politics both UK and US and it was enlightening for both of us though, in different ways. They were surprised that I wanted to listen to the viewpoint of other political parties and people. Well, how else could I form an opinion on who I would vote for?! They were surprised I would vote for a different party, basing my decision on policy rather than tribe. I was surprised at their answer to my question about how many people who were Democrats did they know. None was the answer. They said they might consider talking to them now (back then when returning to the US) because they had learned so much whilst here. However, they said, it would be difficult because if their friends found out, they'd be ostracised. He was more open than his wife too, more open to trying to think more broadly. He attributed that new thinking to learning what tribalism did and has done (continuing issues today), in my country and how damaging it can be. After got home, he reverted to type. So, I think, it's a thought process or mindset that draws people like that together. I expect their are many such localised insular groups all over the US and, likely, the world too. T has just pulled them into one big group that feels validated by him and his ramblings. I think it's a wave that will pass. Either when the next President isn't able to keep them together or when they realise its damaging them more than just financially at the shops but, also, when jobs start to go because there isn't the workforce to do what's required and necessary. Tariffs can only harm the people. They can make billions for those operating in the same circles as those who introduce them. And they'll get richer all the while until one day, the public will have an awakening and normal service will resume, by which time, those who made billions wont care about the hurt and harm they've caused, just like they dont care now. 'Useful idiots', that term, springs to mind. Useful enough to get those selfish, greedy morons into power but it will be those same people who are left worse off, simply because they were hard of thinking.
