On social issues like LGBTQ there's a generational effect, like a shifting baseline. I'm a millennial and I support gays and trans people as much as the next guy, but because I grew up with it, I'm not as sensitive to the use of gay as a casual epithet as someone younger.

If we didn't have a political system that drives people into 2 parties, there would probably be a party for blue dog democrats that's more moderate and socially conservative.

Look up Moral Foundations Theory to get a better understanding of the psychological underpinnings of political ideology.

I've met plenty of Republicans who just think that the R means a better economy. Single issue voters. Not socially conservative, live and let live, but terrified that Democrats will crash the economy somehow. Don't ask me, I don't understand it either.

And plenty of liberal Christians, which actually makes more sense.

Because people have very diverse political beliefs and don't fit neatly into two groups, but the mechanisms of our elections lead to two parties. As a result, they select one of the two parties, even if it doesn't perfectly align with their beliefs.

Stupid people, seems you've met a few

These are Cipolla's five fundamental laws of stupidity:

1. Always and inevitably, everyone underestimates the number of stupid individuals in circulation.

2. The probability that a certain person (will) be stupid is independent of any other characteristic of that person.

3. A stupid person is a person who causes losses to another person or to a group of persons while himself deriving no gain and even possibly incurring losses.

4. Non-stupid people always underestimate the damaging power of stupid individuals. In particular, non-stupid people constantly forget that at all times and places, and under any circumstances, to deal and/or associate with stupid people always turns out to be a costly mistake.

5. A stupid person is the most dangerous type of person.

Most people are social animals and will travel with any group that accepts them. No ideologies necessary.

Because political parties are brands that serve politicians. They herd people who aren't political into buckets of false choice.

Your family is like many, many families in that their politics is not even close to covered by any single party, but a single issue, typically religion (and the typical anti-abortion and anti-LGBTQ+ stance), will be what forces them to one side or another.

It's fear of the other group. If one group tells you to be afraid of the other group, the one telling you to be afraid is your friend. The enemy of my enemy is my friend.

"I don't care what he does, as long as the libtards cry!" Their focus is on negative consequences for the people they hate, not positive outcomes for themselves. That only works as long as the group is relatively comfortable, or believes they are.

"I'll tell you what's at the bottom of it. If you can convince the lowest white man he's better than the best colored man, he won't notice you're picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he'll empty his pockets for you." ~Lyndon B. Johnson

Why trust anyone in the first place? Mom and dad did, and/or everyone around them does. That hooks them in, then they fall for the same BS.

After that they belong to the group, and belonging is a powerful motivator to continue.

Lack of integrity, inconsistent or non-existent values. They just do whatever works for them at the time. My parents are the same way.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_dissonance

Americans are brainwashed fools with no spine for reality. That's why.

Because of overlapping vectors of group socialization often contradict each other. What vector a person is subjected to first usually takes precedent until a more impactful one imposes a new structure. People are often introduced to church before they are old enough to understand politics.

People very rarely reevaluate their stances without some major life event forcing them to. Instead, they take the stances already taught to them by others and look around trying to find confirmations.

It's just tribalism. Humans love it. Whether it be sports, race, religion, or politics.

Generations have been brainwashed to see a political party as their tribe, and its easy to overlook issues within your own tribe when you're focusing on beating the other one. Especially when the leaders of your tribe lie as easily as they breathe.

You've just thought about it more deeply than most of these people combined.

I'm sorry you're self aware. Drugs will help with the pain, but can make the underlying problem worse. Philosophy may seem tempting, but don't-it will make the problem worse.

Edit:
If you want a less dismissive but very tired slightly high answer: we like to think we're conscious higher beings who function on logic and imagination and individual will and all these other strong forces that emerge from within us.

And we can be. All those things are possible. They happen. But generally we're not, and whether by structural pressures confected by centuries of authoritarianism or some evolutional quirk or the fact the warming climate has been starving all our brains of oxygen for over a century; we tend to avoid thinking when possible.

So there's identity pressures and social pressures best compared to running parts of your computer's operating system off the cloud and millennia of innovation in abstraction and groupthink to keep anyone from ever having to think or form opinions for themselves.

They don't make sense. They're not trying to. They do not bend towards justice. They don't even know what that is and trying to tell them would be a kind of attack.

My mom is Cuban. She came to the US in '61. The Cubans were indoctrinated to believe that Kennedy, a Democrat, was responsible and that his party were all Socialists and that led to Communism.

This is why most Cubans believe what they do and vote GOP. It is absolutely based in ignorance.

She voted for a Democrat for the first time in 2008 and has ever since. It's better than the alternative. But I'm not going to convince a 72 year old woman in the starting stages of Alzheimer's there's a better way.

I've copied a portion of an older comment I wrote, answering part of the question:

One thing which isn’t immediately apparent, even to Americans themselves, is that the large American political parties are less equivalent to individual political parties elsewhere, and are closer to “uneasy coalitions”, like those found in Europe involving multiple parties trying (and maybe failing) to form a government. That makes it harder to draw broad conclusions like “USA Democrats would be right-of-center” because progressives and “DINOs” (Democrats in name only) within the party would be left-wing or right-wing, respectively. Logically, the same applies to the Republican party, although ranging from right-wing RINOs (Republicans in name only) and “moderate Republicans”, to the far-right factions of the party, like neo-Nazis and MAGA.

That's what I wrote then, and what I'll add today is that because of the enormous variety in different parts of the USA, two members of the same national political party from different parts of the country might sit down for dinner and find they have very little common group. What appeals to them about their party might be highly local.

For example, a registered Democrat in California might be fully onboard with regards to the rule of law, as applied to immigration and unlawful detention, but might be a bit apprehensive about tax reform that would eliminate middle-class subsidies (eg SALT exclusion) because that hits very hard in a HCOL state.

Meanwhile, a registered Democrat-Farmer-Labor (the state's Democratic party) in Minnesota may be fully convinced that environmental protection is important to preserve both the planet and the nation's public lands, but wouldn't necessarily support the wholesale ban of hunting because of the rich cultural value instilled from an early age.

With the exception of vanguard political parties, I'm not aware of any political parties that strictly adhere to and enforce the party platform. That is to say, membership that mandates exsct alignment to the values of the party, and failure to do so requires expulsion or resignation. This is a rarity in American politics, because parties generally want the barrier to entry to be low. The downside is that there's no party discipline whatsoever for members that aren't in government.

In my country i follow the polical news, especially during election “races”

A i read a lot of news at my job too (we got some latest news screens etc that auto update)

I my self is a mix of various political stances in both left and right wing, but mostly left

But when i vote i always try to figure out what would be best for the country as a whole, especially in the long run. Voting for individual gains is almost always pointless…

At one point some years ago, the party that won the election had promised tax reductions etc

And when they arrived, we got like 15 dollars more paid out than we used to. Not worth it at all… gotta remember they cut some funding in other areas, to provide such tax cuts. And id rather various programs or handicap help etc is kept at a good quality or even improved than giving me a near pointless tax reduction

People are weird, that’s why

And most people think they’re « educated » because they saw some reel on TikTok (that probably comfort their own beliefs).

Having a racially diverse church does not necessarily make that group of people liberal.

There are plenty of liberals, especially the religious, that will not share their discomfort, or even disdain, of LGBTQ+ folks in public discourse. They will give performative answers, so that they can show the world that are enlightened. I’ve heard coworkers, as recently as 2 nights ago, saying homophobic or transphobic things whilst unaware that I was nearby. When I confronted one of them about it, he said “my sister is a lesbian, so what is the problem?” Guy calls himself an ally, who happened to vote for trump. I explained why calling oneself an ally is more than just a self-proscribed label, but I know it is lost on him. He is an idiot who blames those people for his problems.

Conservatives are hypocrites at heart. Those with money, and their working class useful idiots, will do and say the exact opposite of what they impose on others, as it suits them. Out of state abortions? Grindr hookups at CPAC?

Christians don’t see that those of us looking in from the outside see no such thing as liberalism in these house’s of worship. This is why it makes news when the extreme minority of church’s allow us to participate.

LGBTQ+ people are certainly capable of and demonstrate hypocrisy as well. (LGB Drop the T, WLW TERFS, bisexual erasure, racism, etc)

Being anti-Trump is not a monolith. Plenty of people dislike the man, but still stand for all of the bigoted conservative views he and his ilk have co-opted. I cannot understand why the “log cabin republicans” exist other than that they want to fit in so bad, they are happy to be one of the good ones. They think they have a seat at the table, when in reality they are pets begging for scraps. They are used by the right to point to and say “we don’t hate the gays, just the freaks that shove it in our faces.”

No different than with people of color—not a monolith. Look at how many Asian and Latino immigrants who are fervent republicans. People of color can absolutely be racists, as it is a human condition. Latino’s voted for the brutalization of their brothers and sisters, for reasons I will never understand, because those are not my lived experiences. For the many years where I hung out with VN folks, I’ve witnessed SE Asian racism against minority SE Asians, but it certainly is a very different beast than white supremacy. It ultimately is a we are better than them worldview.

All people are capable of bigotry and hypocrisy. They’ll claim to be independent while voting straight ticket only one way or the other for their entire adult life. People have voted against their interests for as long as elections have been held. If they did not, the republicans would have lost their grip on the wheel once minority groups started to grow.

We like to think in easily separate-able categories, black and white stuff (absolutely no pun on race in this case). We are also able to hold opposing viewpoints in our heads at the same time. And we are all susceptible to political messaging. It's like advertising; it wears people down.

So you can be a true believer of whatever Christian church and support a man in the White House who couldn't be much more from your professed ideals if he tried. You can also think abortion is murder and support killing children in Iran. You can believe in civil rights and still want no Arab looking neighbors. We are full of contradictions.

The US suffers also from only having one more mainline party than North Korea or the PRC. If you look at other countries that are democracies, you'll find half a dozen parties vying for power. It offers more tents to assemble under, whereas in the US most people end up under one of two and arrange themselves with the inconsistencies between their own values and those of the party consensus more easily than in France, just as one example, where Macron launched his own new party before he became president. (Just for balance: 2+ party democracies can also still be shit at the end of the day but they offer more choices.)

Because the fountain of evil in modern democracy is the first past the post electoral system. The natural outcome of FPTP is a 2 party system that can be as dysfunctional as possible yet still garner roughly half the votes. Any third party that fields candidates with more favorable manifesto will just split the vote, effectively giving the vote to the opposing party. This means that in FPTP you're incentivised to vote for the least worst party rather than the party that most aligns to your views.

Here's a playlist all about electoral systems: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLej2SlXPEd37YwwEY7mm0WyZ8cfB1TxXa

They are falling for the lies.

Republicans lie that they are pro-life, but really they are pro-birth. If the babies don't grow up christian, they are worthless. They don't care about all life, they care about life that serves them. They view children as disposable and they simply have more to replace those they've lost. It's unacceptable.

However, here's what confuses me: almost every single one of the anti-Trump members—outside of me and maybe two other people—was extremely homophobic and transphobic. They were also all strongly pro-life. They hated abortion and viewed it as "murder." One kid in the church literally said, "Gay people deserve to be hurt."

I mean, for starters have you tried asking? As for my guess, probably because they have other political positions that push them towards democrats. Sticking to social issues, "fuck racism and the gays" is a coherent position one can take, and if they hate racism more than they hate gay people then they'll lean democrat. And then you have economic issues; supporting better social welfare, environmental regulation or public transport automatically will essentially lock them with the DNC. There are more variables affecting someone's political affiliation than how they feel about gay people. If I like my neighbors and person X wants to fuck over my neighbors I'll be inclined to hate X's guts irrespective of what else we agree on.

Well the first issue here is that your characterisation of both the left and the right is off from the actual values they represent. For instance the Republican party is actually surprisingly progressive when it comes to the gays (One of Trump and Vance's biggest funders is Peter Theil a gay man) see Charlie Kirk.

The democratic party has only recently changed its position on gay marriage open borders etc. See Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton.

Historically many black people have voted Democrat because that is just what they have done and Obama played into this and secured this trend for a while longer.

Black people in america have always been quite homophobic as a demographic. This is why /pol made the Swastika black and brown when they redesigned the pride flag. They thought it would be funny to associate black people with gay people on the new flag.

Given all this people have opinions for various things and they value each of these things differently. They will thus logically vote for whoever best aligned with what they believe putting more weight towards those that support things they believe strongly. Their is of course some tribalism factor of I've always voted x thus I will continue voting x but logic will supersede this for a majority of people given their tribe becomes extreme enough.

This is why free speech in the philosophical sense is so important. It allows people to discuss their ideas and allows the best one to win in the marketplace of ideas.

There's some different race related history stuff in the US, but this sort of thing doesn't just happen in your church. Typically, Southern churches don't really like queer people, doesn't matter if they're black churches or white churches. White churchgoing Christians also have an added element of racism. Because the white Christians also tend to be racist, they're more likely to like Reagan and the Republican party that's existed since then. Black people tended to vote for the Republican party for decades after the Civil War because it was the party that Abraham Lincoln was part of. Partially due to the New Deal's programs, many black people switched to the Democratic party and stuck with it, likely due to social programs that help many members of the community, such as food stamps. There's plenty of other examples of people within the Democratic party that don't like certain parts of its platform, such as many Catholics and abortion rights. It's also pretty easy to find queer people that are racist as fuck. People being part of one minority group has less bearing on their biases as one might hope. Hopefully none of this is horribly wrong.

So they held very socially conservative views, yet they didn't support the Republican Party and hated Trump. Why is that? Why would someone hate MAGA while basically agreeing with many of the same social positions?

Because Trump is a horrible human being. He raped his wife. He was friends with Epstein. He lies, steals, and extorts people. Believing in the traditional social order is different from believing people should hold no values at all, which is what Trump does. You can reverse it for LGBT Republicans- they can support the social order without holding any moral values.

I don't get it either, I really don't.

because we are better than them.

people like having a team to root for and be a part of and to beat the other guy

Both parties try to be all things to all people, so the Republican party tries to show itself as accepting to the "good" gays etc., and the Democratics have kept the Hyde Amendment so the more pro life people can be all like, "At least my money isn't being used for it".

I think people also vote in line with their family and friends and may have just been supporting a party their whole life so as either the party or the person changes, they just keep voting that way.