"Why can't you be reasonable" is utterly poisoned as a phrase, similar to "look what you made me do". It is still important to be reasonable, and it is still important to look at how people take your messaging, even in bad faith.

> they are working (hard) to try to reduce those differences, at least in those ways that matter to a great many people.

Yes.

> It isn't the progressives that are highlighting and reinforcing differences

It is very easy to misunderstand or "misunderstand" a lot of progressive tools and messaging. Insisting on pronoun checks or insisting on defining someone's race as part of a drive for racial equality by necessity highlights differences. That can feel uncomfortable to anyone. It is easy to exploit that discomfort. I'm not asking for people to stop or minimize things like identifying their pronouns. That should be normal. But ... you can't insist on it. You can't force someone else to go along with it. They have to choose to participate.

Progress happens when individuals decide that it's worth their time and effort to push for equality. If the messaging pushes more people out instead of advancing equality, then the messaging is not good.

Most political messaging is more motivating to people who are already part of the movement (no matter what movement) than to outsiders. The Progressive movement by definition needs to motivate people who are not already aligned with a particular goal.

I think a big part of that is simply thinking that it all requires a response. It doesn't. I forget people's names with abandon, ditto their preferred pronouns and I'm sure they'll correct me if I get it wrong. I have a friend who changed their name and even after a decade I will still occasionally call him by his old name, not because I don't respect him (I do, very much so) but simply because I wasn't wired to see names as dynamic but static and I always have to think of him as 'x who changed his name to y' rather than 'just y'.

The whole thing to me feels as though there are a lot of people making a fuss about absolutely nothing just so they have something to make a fuss about. To drive the divide you need that fuss, not the request to change pronouns or to try to strive for racial equality. Those make sense, and if someone really disagrees with them then they won't be able to stop society changing around them.

Which is a lot of what this is all about: people rejecting change simply because that wasn't the world they were born into and they think that it is in their power to reject change in the environment. They're living dinosaurs who will eventually be overcome by history, even if they have their occasional spasms.

> I think a big part of that is simply thinking that it all requires a response.

If anti-Progressive messaging wasn't so effective, I would agree.

> The whole thing to me feels as though there are a lot of people making a fuss about absolutely nothing just so they have something to make a fuss about.

Yes. Just look at the times that Tucker Carlson has made up something to be outraged out - Why is the Green M&M less sexy now? is a real thing this ... person has talked about.

Fox's campaign against wokeness is entirely manufactured out of thin air. CRT as a boogeyman is laughable. But the anti-Progressive messaging works. It works really well. And I think Progressives need to get beyond their immediate reaction and feeling of being attacked.

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Back to Scott Adams - he praised Donald Trump's ability to craft and control messaging. I really really hated this point of view when I first heard it. Trump is just so easy to make fun of. He's a clown. But he's also a genius. Unfortunately he's a genius at only one thing - self-promotion. If you had to identify the quality he most values in subordinates, it is that the subordinate must say good things about Trump. They may never say anything negative. That is very destructive in the the real world, because everyone makes mistakes and they need to learn and grow. Trump has not provided much evidence of learning and growth.

I should be clear - I don't support Scott Adams or his messaging, but he's not always wrong.

There is a dutch politician that took that idea and ran with it, he's promoting the most outrageous stuff, entirely made up and people lap it up.

Judging by what is happening there: Trump made up plenty of stuff as well and people lapped it up, they don't necessarily need a particular enemy to point at the audience is so gullible that if one isn't readily available it won't make a huge difference. But if one is then that's just a lubricant, something to focus all the hate on.

Finally: Scott Adams is also operating from that playbook, he's not just praising Donald Trump, he's borrowing the principle and even some of the subjects, either because he's lost the plot or because he's so cynical he doesn't care about the consequences. Either way it doesn't look good.