Excellent response, and you pose the question:
“The big question for us is, will we welcome them or not?”
I definitely would. I’m not a purist, and have been chastised for my less than purist leanings here on the Freep.
I have, too. I am very conservative in my own opinion. I will vote for the most conservative candidate running, even if there is no Republican to vote for and one of the Democrats is just a little to the right of the other(s).
Why, you may ask. I have lived most of my life in towns that vote 85/15 for the liberal over the conservative, or for the Dem. over the Repub.
Phil Scott, Republican governor of Vermont, is far to the left of my family, but I happily vote for him because he vetoes crazy progressive policies (unless they override him).
If I was a purist, I could not live in this beautiful state, period. When I was a kid, Republicans almost always won in Vermont. Conservatives such as Barry Goldwater did not win. Vermont will never be a conservative state, but I believe the GOP will begin to rally here in the not-too-distant future.
That’s likely because, as a “Goth Industrial New Wave weirdo” who knows about Bobby Steele, you don’t live in an echo chamber.
When I worked in NYC, I saw how easily people could get sucked in to liberalism. Manhattan is a island and many people don’t go “offshore.” They are generally affluent, think everyone spends $4,500 for an apartment, prefer museums to the range, and think organized religion is stupid. If they DO get off the island, it’s to the Hamptons. However, they tend to have a wide exposure to many people from all walks of life (though they discriminate as their DNC talking points demand).
At the same time, many on our side suffer the same fate but outside of the city. They made an ok living, live in a moderate home, go shooting with friends from church, and rarely go to the city. Their chief exposure to minorities is on the news or the local Chinese restaurant or their record collection.
Of course, I’m stereotyping.
But not by much.
Being in a punk or goth or jazz scene really opens your eyes. You see more people from all over the social and racial strata, find most of them are very similar to yourself, and at their core are a little scared and really want to be accepted. The -isms tend to fall away, and we accept our fellow losers as kin.
To be sure, as I’ve said before, no race has a monopoly on stupid or laziness or bigotry. I’ve met bad dudes across the racial spectrum. That said, the person who came to me in honesty and openness could be a lib, but we could find common ground. Indeed, the very fact that I turned out to NOT be a foaming hater MAY be enough to start a small red-pilling.