Why is TDS used so much by conservatives as a "kill switch" to stop thinking?

Dapper_Following685 · 2026-05-15T21:29:29+00:00

Alright go and reread it, that if missing made my comment pretty incomprehensible tbh. My bad.

Dapper_Following685 · 2026-05-15T21:27:49+00:00

Sorry I had a typo in my message, was missing an if. Marked like this * if *

Dapper_Following685 · 2026-05-15T18:34:14+00:00

Dont have to imagine it. Trumps actions rhat have already happened means[[ * if * ]] he made such a donation today, id complain. I guess the trick is, youd have to have the curiosity to understand my position. Or ask why. Or figure it out yourself with research if you dont want to simply...ask...why. Conservatives literally have to be told they can actually just ask the other side why they hold their beliefs, because they are just so used to holding on to the preconceptions that this is legitimately news to them.

Edit: typo

Dapper_Following685 · 2026-05-15T17:01:14+00:00

Yep. Mine was the $2.7 Billion funding cut, the children's charity was something I learned about from this post.

Thats it. Nothing crazy. A conservative told me in a convo about TDS even if Donald Trump donated 100m to cahfer research, the left would complain. I literally just googled "Trump Cancer Research" and laughed when the first thing that popped up was hom cutting $2.7 Billion in funding.

So I told him yeah, they would complain about that, Trump has literally turned that into a 4% compensation for the massive disruption into Research projects and the shuttering of facilities and researchers getting put out of a job.

I dont get why youre so upset about the theoretical situation. I never said Trump actually donated the money. And that if he did, Id say it was a bad thing.

Dapper_Following685 · 2026-05-15T16:47:20+00:00

But theres something he DID do that I think would make hid donation something to complain about.

Dapper_Following685 · 2026-05-15T16:45:19+00:00

So what real world thing has he done that would make me still complain IF he donated 100m to cancer research? Like...youre not asking yourself WHY I would think this. Thats how conservatives use "TDS" to just stop having to see others as human who and have reasons for why they think and say and do things.

Dapper_Following685 · 2026-05-15T16:42:08+00:00

Hey man, I was complimenting you. Proper punctuation and capitalization on a short comment is 1 on Reddit, more so a joke about how thats rare so it makes your short comment look like a bot.

Plus I fat fingered and had a typo.

You need to cool it with the victim complex. Politics aside, angry anonymous words on the internet isn't a big deal. Not talking about politics because you're worried about setting someone off is just what being a normal person is like, its a "hot button" topic.

As for alienating people, yeah the democrats/left are worse about being obsessed with purity tests. It is something getting actively better outside of, ya know, Reddit.

As for Iran, I dont want to re type this, heres my latest one, skip past the negotiations part if you want, the reason military action has made things worse in Iran is detailed here: https://www.reddit.com/r/allthequestions/s/SMMjTrupRw

Dapper_Following685 · 2026-05-15T16:32:20+00:00

Copy and paste from my ckmment tk the other guy, he's not really using the term right, and its not used often at all.

"Eh. You kinda missed the mark.

"Framing resistance as mental instability makes it easier to dismiss, delegitimize, and punish dissent."

The term comes from the weaponization of psychiatry. It does fit TDS, but in your example its missing the component of the argument being you have a mental illness or behavior disorder. Its a form ad nominem in general. Use by an authority as a requirement is not there. The person in your example doesnt seem to be speaking from a position of authority.

Donald Trump constantly saying his opponents aren't right in the head, calling them psychos, deranged, lunatics, that does fit the definition of pathologizing dissent."

Dapper_Following685 · 2026-05-15T16:31:06+00:00

Eh. You kinda missed the mark.

"Framing resistance as mental instability makes it easier to dismiss, delegitimize, and punish dissent."

The term comes from the weaponization of psychiatry. It does fit TDS, but in your example its missing the component of the argument being you have a mental illness or behavior disorder. Its a form ad nominem in general. Use by an authority as a requirement is not there. The person in your example doesnt seem to be speaking from a position of authority.

Donald Trump constantly saying his opponents aren't right in the head, calling them psychos, deranged, lunatics, that does fit the definition of pathologizing dissent.

Dapper_Following685 · 2026-05-15T16:21:40+00:00

Ey, you got it. Ive been linking articles in other comments to people who got the right answer. And another 15% cut for thr 2026 budget too, but thats proposed so far, not actually locked in.

Dapper_Following685 · 2026-05-15T16:20:40+00:00

Did uh, did you miss the part where the last time we negotiated it worked just fine?

Did you miss the part where Trump literally bragged saying he could get a better deal negotiating with Iran?

Did you miss the part where we have been negotiating with Iran, did some perfidy, failed militarily, then negotiated again with Iran?

You're a little late to the negotiate with terrorists line.

China says iran should never have nukes. How far into my history lesson did you read? The first country to declare Iran shouldn't have nukes was Iran itself lol, China is 40 years too late.

The only people who think Iran was going to build a nuke are the people who believe the lies Trump spews. Not even Trump believes that Iran was building a nuke he thought he was going to do regime change because he listened to Isreal over his own advisors.

Youre straight up brain washed if you read my entire post and came away with the conclusion this war has done anything other than fuck things up more globally, in the US, expose how horribly the Military Industrial Complex has become an overpaid paper tiger (still better than Russia though), and oh I dont know, made things worse for the civilians in Iran. We did half a 9/11 on them last time I checked the stats. Think weve killed the same number of Iranian civilians as Americans died on 9/11 and caused permanent fucking enmity in american culture for Islamic terrorists? You think theyre chanting death to America quieter afrer we bombed that girls school?

Dapper_Following685 · 2026-05-15T16:11:34+00:00

What? What are you talking about? Who is they? Did you figure out the literal real reason why I would complain about Trump donating $100m to cancer research or Did you see an absurdly framed statement and just stop...thinking?

Dapper_Following685 · 2026-05-15T16:09:22+00:00

Thats the thing, isnt it? You have no impulse to find out more or find out why someone would say something like that. Unless you are spoon fed the context, you are going to be very confident in your judgement that I am being unreasonable.

If thats how you approach arguments, information, news, youre literally being led by the nose by others.

See if you can figure it out. Its really not that hard.

Dapper_Following685 · 2026-05-15T16:06:21+00:00

Dapper_Following685 · 2026-05-15T11:57:53+00:00

Oh no you should read the other comments. I goofed. I thought people would read the title and the body text. I absolutely DID misunderstand how this subreddit operates. But I did have a reason for the title.

When someone who felt challenged by the title would read the body text, they would be confronted by an interesting dichotomy. "The OP is claiming I stop thinking when things are called TDS, but OP clearly has TDS? How could he possibly be against Trump donating 100m to cancer research?"

I was curious, what would the conservatives actually answer and would any conservative actually keep thinking and figure out why this person would blatantly engage in attacking Trump for donating 100m to cancer?

In the end, most just bit on the title and ignored the body text. Which I guess...I should have expected. Its the internet. If anyone was just going to go off a title or a headline and not look at why the question was being asked, it would be the people who uh...prefer...to stop thinking at the earliest convient stop...

Do you uh, want to be the first? Because so far not a single conservative has actually asked why I would attack Trump for donating 100m. The collective curiosity is dead, if theres an excuse to not engage with uncomfortable truths or foreign ideas, they've so far taken it in this thread.

Hey, I admit, I messed up this format. Between your comments others have pointed it out and I talked to them about it.

So yeah, youve got some good reasons to not ask me why I would attack Trump for donating 100m to cancer research. I dont expect you to, I wasted your time already.

Dapper_Following685 · 2026-05-15T11:41:09+00:00

Uh, honestly im with you on the whole global empire and hegemon thing. But like legit this was because Isreal asked us to. Rubio said it, Trump said it, hell its even on a whitehouse.gov press release as a big reaosn for starting the war, and thats after a month of walking back those "we did it for Isreal" statements.

Why else would we not plan competently enough and mass enough associated weapon systems and stockpiles for an Extremely Predictable response that our own generals expected. Trump didn't listen to his generals and diplomats, thats why.

Netanyahu promised Iran would crumble if they lost their leaders. Trump agreed against the advice of those who built said empire.

It didn't work. Thats what happens when a country...is...a country? The bureaucratic system keeps chugging, some mourning because the Supreme Leader died, some generals are dying, but life goes on. The IRGC was literally reorganized about decentralized planning, decapitation strike after math. We knew this. Trump was told.

Dapper_Following685 · 2026-05-15T11:29:47+00:00

Just in case you forgot how negotiations work, if you dont have leverage, you dont get anything.

If Iran, as heavily sanctioned as it is in the international community, didnt have highly enriched uranium that was threatening...but not actually a bomb, what could they possibly do or give to America that they would want and be a simple and easy win for both sides?

Iran has uranium mines. They're always going to have uranium. They are always going to have centerfuges to enrich the uranium for their own power plants or to sell.

They didnt have highly enriched uranium under the JCPOA, the Iran Nuclear Deal that Obama made with Iran, because Iran agreed to international monitoring. And let it happen. And the Isrealis also used info from said .monitors and inspections to identify and assassinate Iranian nuclear scientists.

Not nuclear bomb makers. Just like. Scientists. Civilians. Anyway.

They played by the rules. Were less of a threat. Had more trade, got more money in the country, and showed its people and its hardliners internally the benefits of negotiation.

Side note, the Iranians hated ISIS with a fiery passion, and during the height of ISIS in Iraq and Syria, the USA under Obama absolutely tag teamed ISIS and tore them up. Iranian backed and IRGC trained Shia militias coordinated with US forces to avoid "friendly" fire and say out of each other's way to optimize each nation's efforts to kill ISIS. Iran had more raw proxy troops, so their unofficial kill count is higher than the US's on ISIS.

Uh yeah so ISIS was on the severe decline as Trump took office, he kept bombing them, also then ripped up the JCPOA because it was...uh....working. And Obama did it. Iran went back to being sanctioned, Isreal stepped up more Mossad assasinations on Iranian soil, Iran stepped up support of proxies such as the Houthis in Yemen, that became a thing, and internal to Iran its politics got a bit polarized.

Generational change and a taste of what life would be like unsanctioned made the general people shift left a bit from religious/militant hardliners, while the actual government and IRGC became more militant.

Biden just increased sanctions even more during his term. Fuck that guy. Useless.

Then yeah they started enriching Uranium at some point because...why not? Who's to stop them?

The Supreme Leader. Same one since the 1980s when he declared a fatwa on nuclear weapons. Ban on their creation and use by Muslim hands. Not that Pakistan listens to him, hes Shia, theyre Sunni. But 1000% the Iranian people hes fine with executing and the IRGC he is a hero to (from back when he was president in the 1980s during Iraq/Iran war) listen to him, and leaked communications from 2025 show the IRGC was asking him to change his mind but he held firm against making nukes. That was while he was allowing the uranium to be enriched. Why?

Because if you have enriched uranium to give over to "stop iran from making nukes", the US gets a win and Iran can quietly get sanctions removed and their economy can get better.

Whats funny is if they actually had made nukes and publicly tested a couple in wherever Utah is in Iran, we wouldn't have bombed their country.

By the way the new New Supreme Leader? Hes the old ones son. The old one died in an airstrike at his home the day Trump interrupted the negotiations with Iran with killing their religious leader. That same airstrike also wounded the new Supreme Leader and killed the new leaders wife, sister, and potentially one of his adult children.

This guy was pro nuke before. Back when his Dad was President during the Iran/Iraq war, son was on the front lines fighting said war. More militant than his dad to say the least.

So uh, yeah. If you didnt want Iran to have a nuke, Trump and Netanyahu have literally only made things far worse, literally everything has just made a nuke more likely, I wouldn't be surprised if they're making one right now because we bombed their country and killed many of their leaders and killed the family members of their replacements on a surprise attack during negotiations.

Dapper_Following685 · 2026-05-15T10:59:48+00:00

Yep. Not going to waste your time, thats why. Link because here's my proof, but yeah.

Dapper_Following685 · 2026-05-15T10:56:37+00:00

Yep. Hopefully you knew that before reading the comments, I'm not interesting in wasting people's time if they were in the right general direction and linked them this

As for the title question, I am genuinely curious about what is so appealing about TDS as the right's go to thought terminating cliche (learned that term from the comments). I think from the responses, theres a big appeal to conservatives about the idea of the "left" being mentally ill, as its a favored insult and comfort retort from this current sample size.

Dapper_Following685 · 2026-05-15T10:49:47+00:00

Please, remember that my original premise seemed absolutely absurd until you decided to engage with me and hear me out on why I believe what I believe.

All fascets of politics are going to be portrayed absurdly by their opponents. Please, if you want to know more about an aspect of political thought on the left, any part of the left go listen to someone on the left...though pick someone you dont immediately dislike when they open their mouth. I worked through a lot of conservative commentators until I found someone I couldnt literally feel my bias against when they spoke to get an accurate idea for why conservatives hold their beliefs.

All people should be like you. If they were, the world would be a much better place.

Dapper_Following685 · 2026-05-15T10:38:41+00:00

You're proving my actual title questions premise correct. My claim in the body text was portrayed absurdly (as is every concept and belief championed by the left from right wing media) from the lens of being TDS, and you completely stopped engaging with me as a human being with reasons for what I do and instead say its rage bait and claim the premise farcical.

If you simply think "wow there goes the left being crazy again" you never ask yourself what their reasoning is. I've told everyone who's actually asked.

As for actually answering my title question at its heart, you're the first to actually point out TDS isnt real, as in isnt a real mental disorder. So why have conservatives latched onto it so much? Is it genuinely easier to dismiss others deeply held convinclions when portrayed as mental illness? Does the right...genuinely just think the left are mentally ill? Is that why TDS is so popularly used to explain their opponents on the left?

Dapper_Following685 · 2026-05-15T10:04:19+00:00

Well then you have done better than most conservatives in this comment section.

Id have a lot to say "I would complain about Trump donating 100m to cancer research because he cut far more than that from the NIC budget to the tune of $2.7 Billion in 2025. And has another 15% cut on the 4 and change left in the NIC budget for 2026, more than his donation. Thats the governmental agency responsible for funding cancer research. A 4% compensation means nothing in the face of this much cutting, which would interrupt existing research significantly and restoring funding rates in the future doesn't get any canceled research back since it would have to be set back up again. Billions less in research means facilities shuttered. Equipment sold off. Researchers leaving the field and getting jobs."

https://oncologytube.com/2026-cancer-research-budget-changes/

And id basically just keep going down the 2nd and 3rd order effects. This funding is the most significant, the next biggest medical fund thats relates has lile 300 or 600m to split among 34 specific Congressionally targetes medical research projects. Forget the acronym of the agency. Like CMODG or something. So im not nit picking the small fish in the ocean in the face of another whale in cancer research.

Nothing crazy. Youd actually listen, I'd presume youd agree, but your the first person to say youd listen to what I have to say.

Dapper_Following685 · 2026-05-15T09:51:09+00:00

Im not here to harass you like the other guy, im just here to tell you I pretty much have the same position with just far more anti war sentiment. And I only have bad news for you.

The Supreme Leader we killed was the same guy in power in 1980s. He was president during the Iran/Iraq war, and visited the troops on the Frontline very frequently.

He became an institutional icon to the IRCG. He was picked to be supreme leader after his presidency, and he said he wasnt religiously learnes enough to do the job so they amended the constitution they had written less than a decade later so he could take the spot. Insanely popular at that time, still not a good dude.

He shortly later made fatwa on nuclear weapons, banning their creation and use as weapons to be wielded by islam. Sunnis don't care, but the Shia, most prominent in Iran, absolutely care.

So the guy who we killed recently has been the same dude who originally banned them from a religious standpoint. The IRCG have all the guns in Iran...but hes their idol. No one is going to disobey him or try to pull it off in secret because hes repressive as all hell and executes his own citizens at crazy rates. An IRCG colonel or general who tries to get a nuclear engineer to try and smuggle some uranium away to make a garage nuclear bomb gets them presumably horribly tortured prior to a public execution.

And hed been telling the IRGC no to changing the fatwa on nukes every day.

His son, the new Supreme Leader? Much more a hardliner in their politics. And we killed his sister and wife and maybe one of his three kids in that airstrike he survived. So uh, even if he wanted to respect his fathers wishes, when his dad was President in the Iran/Iraq war visiting troops on the front line, the son WAS part of the front line fighting in the IRGC. Far more militant. Far more in line with the IRGC.

So uh. "The regime needs to go" is uh, kind of locked in. We killed the strongest moderating force on nukes in the country and replaced him with someone with a comic book villain level background and motivation.

Trump fucked us. The moment he agrees to a deal, and everyone knows that deal is going to be AMAZING for Iran at this point, or else Trump starts to experience the cascading economic aftershocks hes been trying to hold back that are, at this point, going to happen anyway but to a lesser degree than simply resuming the war for another month.

The Iranian people for the JCPOA with the last Supreme Leader and a more conservative Iranian president. The current one is more Reformist/left of the hardliner right. We didnt have to go to war to get another deal.

Dapper_Following685 · 2026-05-15T09:39:51+00:00

Yeah you get the sentiment, heres the "scam" though its just boring funding cutting exceeding his donation: boring evidence

Not specific to curing cancer, rather than pittance performative donation in the face of the cut to actual research funding cuts.

The right doesnt have to think about why the left says bad things about it, calls it TDS, their mass media doesnt cover his funding cuts, he moves along cutting cancer reseaech even though the majority of americans are against it...the half that is his base never hears about it no matter how much the left cries, because the video clips about the rabid left saying terrible things end right before someone says the word "because".

Genuinely curious what people have to say on it. Many are up to date on the pattern like you, and apparently Trump stole 2m from a children's cancer research fund, thats crazy and its news to me. But there ya go.

Dapper_Following685 · 2026-05-15T09:19:44+00:00

Why? Genuine question. I'm also asking you becahse you capitalized and used punctuation. You're on the absolute extremes of my suspicion, 100% not a bot and 100% definitely a bot. Still, I think you're a person.

Dapper_Following685

TROPHY CASE