I went through a phase of trying to argue facts with Trump supporters in my extended network of family and friends. I finally decided it wasn’t worth it when the last of them I was in touch with went absolutely bugshit insane during COVID lockdowns, but probably the most demoralizing one was when I spent weeks going back and forth with a friend of a friend via DMs, citing research papers and statistics, only to be ultimately blown off with an admission that the guy didn’t care about any of it beyond who was going to be friendlier to the oil industry (he worked as a safety consultant for offshore operations). No amount of racism, bigotry or violence was enough to sway him away from Trump as long as his own pocket was being lined appropriately.

I briefly went back to check how he was feeling about that when WTI crude went negative in the early days of COVID, but he was just parroting the Texas lieutenant governor’s line about how grannies should feel proud to die for the economy, so I didn’t even bother razzing him about it.