Meet a Missouri dad who went from a ‘full-on bigot’ to fighting bathroom bans on behalf of his 16-year-old daughter: ‘When it was my child, it just flipped a switch’

“Uplifting news” that once again hilights the absolutely infuriating conservative psychology of “I give absolutely zero fucks about this topic until and unless it affects me personally”.

I am glad the dude changed his ways, don’t get me wrong, but fuck me if it isn’t depressing to consider that this behavior pattern is absolute cancer, and really hard to work constructively with on a societal scale.

Hey it's cool. I came out to my parents thinking that they would have a similar "awakening."
They didn't.
So, way to go this guy, you're better than my parents. admittedly low bar, but hey, good news is good news!
- Sorry your parents suck
- I’m not your parents and I also think you’re best being who you really are.

I've come to the conclusion that conservatives are just people whose sense of empathy is broken. Over and over I hear about conservatives who held bigoted beliefs and only changed their minds when confronted by someone they love becoming the target of other people's identical bigoted beliefs. These people just can't empathize enough to think "what if it was my child/spouse/friend?"

Or in other words, they’re selfish. Its only an issue when it affects them.
- Well, It's being selfish and lacking the forethought to muse about things that can happen to them too
Indeed, although I would say it's a more broad lack of cognitive ability. Low empathy, low intelligence and low capacity for abstract and critical thought. All of these make them easy to manipulate.
Sadly, some of them have issues so severe that they will even reject their own children.
Luckily, this father was capable of letting the love of his child overcome.
Sometimes I think that someone should start some kind of religion to help manipulate them in a way that they love their children, neighbours and love peace.
Then I think, that Jesus dude already tried, but with mixed results.
Anti-Lifers when they or their relatives need an abortion sometimes go from protest to clinic to protest.
- Yeah, those "the only justified abortion is my abortion" people are the worst of the worst.
- The Only Moral Abortion Is My Abortion
Low empathy AND low imagination

It shouldn't take until your own flesh and blood is affected to care about other people.

And part of the problem is that for so many even that isn't enough.

Yes, it shouldn’t. But when someone changes like this we need to let them own the change rather than complain it shouldn’t have taken so much to change. He admitted fault and chose his child, he finally gained perspective. No different than convicts should be forgiven after serving their time in prison, he did his time locked in his hate, and found a road out whether we feel it selfish or not.
- 100% - it's not bad that he switched, he should be embraced.
- It's a good point. However it is worth noting that conservatives are like this. Not sure how it can be used to rehabilitate them or whatever, but maybe it could be

Classic Conservative. All feelings of empathy begin and end at himself.

It didn't happen unless it happened to meeeeeee
Yeah this is not uplifting, this is just every conservative. "Oh shit, this is harming me now, we must stop it immediately."
Yeah but it sounds like he actually is growing out of the mindset.
Conservatism is simply a lack of experience. We all grew out of some shitty views, just some had their wake up call earlier and others were more isolated from experience and took more time.
Let’s be glad this dude came around at all, or his daughter might just have been another statistic at this point. He could have been another grifting chud on TikTok screeching about the librul media taking his child away through brainwashing, but he chose humanity.
Let’s stop shitting on people who were wrong when they finally come to their senses.
- Conservatism is simply a lack of experience
  also see: immaturity
  And, yes, you are right: people who used to be wrong aren't wrong anymore. We're all just really used to brow-beating our perceived enemies.

Doesn't give a shit until it personally impacts them.

Never complain about progress
- If your spouse is beating you slightly less than usual, then I guess things are looking up and there's no problem because as you say
  Never complain about progress

It was fine when it was someone else’s kid, though. You should be able to feel this outrage when it happens to anyone, anywhere. But that’s seldom how it goes.

Unfortunately we can never personally experience everyone's situation which is why empathy is important, and seems to be sorely lacking in a lot of people.

You know Lemmy has suitably replaced reddit when every 'uplifting' news story is really more of an illustration of our illustrious American hellscape.

I'll only be convinced when this exact same story is reposted in 2-3 days, and then again in 6-7 days
- And don't forget power mods!
I block one community a week to avoid depressing stuff from the status quo in the US. This one is next to go.

How is this uplifting news? Same old story, they hate until it effects them, then suddenly "things are different". Yes this is slightly better than him always being a bigot, but honestly, f*** this guys lack of sympathy to start with.

This is exactly how politicians work. It's not an issue until it effects them personally, then the law gets changed.

This isn't uplifting news, this is orphan crushing machine

Yeah but if you think about it, at the local level isn't that how you want your politicians to work? They experience something that bothers them, and instead of just grumbling about it they go into politics to get elected and change it?
I mean if our politicians worked that way (driven by a single personal desire and hence the relative percentage of votes reflects how much the population wants each desire to influence policy), that'd be quite the improvement!
- No, politicians especially need to have enough awareness of the world around them to represent people that they are not.
  People only understanding something once it happens to them personally is immature and closed-minded, and leads directly to where we are (in the US) with the highest bodies in the land being a bunch of puppets to money and influence.
- What if they never experience it?
  It's the Marie Antoinette effect. Even though the quote is likely apocryphal, the point behind it is that she was so unaware of the people's level of starvation that she genuinely thought that eating brioche ("cake") was a viable alternative for bread, which they did not have.
  You do not want politicians like that.
  Oh, people working 40 hours a week can't afford rent and food? Why don't they just eat less and get a second job?
  They will likely never experience many of the problems that the general population does.

It's always until it effects them personally.

Sometimes it isn’t. Many of us are disowned
- Oh I know all too well.
What's the saying? Better late than never?

If your first instinct is to condemn this man for what he used to believe I would urge you to think about how we would ever go about affecting change without people like this who believe one thing, then see the error of their ways and change their mind. Sometimes a hypocrite is nothing more than a man in the process of changing.

The problem is more why he changed his view: it affected him. There are people who change their views because they're curious and empathetic and finally get the time to look into an issue and see how it affects other people. Those are the people that deserve praise for changing their views, even if they used to be conservative shitbags.
- I understand where you're coming from but you need to think of this situation as someone who broke free of cult brainwashing. As someone who was raised conservative evangelical Christian, I can tell you it absolutely is. I felt guilt from not trying to convert people. I was told people different than me were going to hell to burn for an eternity from a young age. Manipulation tactics were used for me to believe in miracles and that the world is in a holy war against satan. Then the sentiment was retold over and over for close to two decades. It took a similar incompatibility as the man in the article for me to finally see that maybe different ideals and viewpoints weren't evil after all.
- I'm not advocating for praising him, but everyone is vilifying him for coming around to a different point of view. He's growing as a person. Maybe not in the altruistic way that you'd like, but it's still growth. If we stay up on our high horses insisting everyone do the right thing just because it's the right thing and for no other reason then we're going to be waiting a very, very long time for change.
  Take the fucking win and move on.

“Uplifting”

So uplifting that literally every top level comment is negative.

parenting hypocrisy. people shouldn't need an offspring to have a working brain.

Lots of people saying this isn't uplifting enough. If this was my dad, I'd feel a lot more than just uplifted.

The more people who come around to reason, the more people will be exposed by proxy to a healthy perspective. This is absolutely uplifting, even if it's tragic we are in this place to begin with.

Pretty fucking sad that it takes personal impact for any of these assholes to experience empathy.

Honestly that some are capable is uplifting...just not in the way you're thinking.
I got lucky, my family never cared about me being anything specific so my social transition was the dream of minor annoyances while they had to overwrite a lifetime of conditioning of what they called me... But I have other trans friends who are clinging to the bricks by their nails because their parents think they are possessed by demons or "Don't want to deepen their mental illness by playing along" So many parents demand absolute piety and there is something inside us damaged irreparably when they withhold their love.
I get to be strong because I am cherished by my people. To see people weakened for the lack of something I am given so freely is to know that I am not just lucky. It is to know exactly how much I owe to circumstance. Many of those who starve for acceptance see people like this and while the bitter see the nearsightedness... The dreamer dreams that it is possible one day it could happen to them because people who actually changed when it is their kid are rarer than you could hope.