The one piece of advice that always holds up when trying to inform and convert those around us is simply to hit them where they live. AES just isn't that, not to mention they've probably been propagandised so much since birth they think China, DPR Korea etc are hellholes in the same way they think the earth revolves around the sun. It takes a lot of effort on their part to realise just because the circle peg goes in the square hole doesn't mean that's where it belongs.

I sympathise with you. I've got old school militant socialists spewing BBC garbage about AES. Best I've managed with those old farts is to get them to think we agreed on a middle ground when they just misunderstood (even plain old misheard) something I said and call it a day. It's quite exhausting.