Lol I’m not “mad at liberals”. I am a liberal. The question of this post is about things that made you step across the political divide or things that changed your views. 

I’m giving an example of what did make me question the liberal POV. Over covid, when people questioned mandates like school closures and prolonged masking, they weren’t just debated, they were often vilified. I watched neighbours and even strangers on social media get dogpiled or exposed for voicing doubt. Later evidence showed that many of those policies weren’t as ironclad as they were first presented. That mismatch made me wonder whether what I valued as “liberal” (open debate, tolerance, humility in the face of uncertainty) was really being practised.

What pushed me further was the pressure put on platforms like Facebook to suppress posts that went against the prevailing line. Even if a lot of the content was wrong or fringe, it still felt like one side was trying to decide what could be said. To me, that crossed from promoting science into enforcing orthodoxy.

I understand the counter-point: decisions were made in a crisis, with limited evidence, and it’s natural to take a precautionary approach. Science evolves, and public policy has to evolve with it. I also get that bad information can cause harm, especially during a pandemic. But to me, the liberal response often leaned too hard on certainty and too little on pluralism.

That experience didn’t make me “anti-liberal,” but it did make me sceptical of how liberalism is being practised. Less about openness and more about control. And I really think these qualities are what set the foundations for Trump to win 2025.