The other user who replied first nailed it, at least nailed the starting point. Just listen.

This is harder than it sounds, because they will spout off some really, really wrong ideas and wrong takes that will make steam shoot out your ears. Everything inside you will want to correct them. This is the point where you HAVE to reign in your desire to use your brain and try to bring them up to your level, because you can’t. Not if they deny basic facts about reality like evolution or that race doesn’t come with intrinsic values or that science can prove facts, or they say that trans people are literal devils and all these ideas you will immediately identify as wrong or even dangerous. You will desperately want to “fix” that problem, but if you try that first they will close all mental doors on you.

I would suggest that many do this unconsciously even as a “litmus test” of sorts to see if you’re going to attack their identity. We are progressive/intellectual so we have to understand that “being a dumbass” is a valid identity if that’s what matters to someone, so we have to give them that space to carve out their rebellion against order and logic. At least for now. As soon as you invalidate someone’s identity they will never see you as anything other than a threat, and if you’ve ever raised dogs, you will know that a scared dog acts very aggressive, not usually cowering or hiding. They bark, they try to escalate the situation, they bristle and act tougher than they are.

So the biggest challenge to everyone who wants to change these people will be to listen to them without trying to fix their broken worldview. You have to let them be them for a while and just ask them questions. Ask them questions about how they feel about things, and what they want for themselves, their loved-ones, etc.

A great magic happens as you give a simple mind a safe place to talk. I’ve done this over and over. They will start letting down guards pretty fast when you prove you’re not going to “hurt” them in some way by challenging their beliefs. They will start showing you their uncertainty, their fears, their vulnerabilities. They will start leaving cracks open for you to explore and ask deeper questions.

See, all that shit they think they believe, the spiel they gave about immigrants or gay people, they don’t cling to these values because they’re well-thought out, logistical philosophies that they’ve studied, it’s just emotional venting with a narrative that was supplied to them. They are equally capable of shifting 180-degrees because that’s how emotions work. You just have to make it safe for them to do so.

In fact, I would say this is your “win condition” by itself, just to get them to feel safe to talk to you. You have to abandon any expectations that you’re going to make their eyes open wide and go “Wow, I’ve been so wrong!” No, your best hope is to change how they feel about one small thing at a time.

I used to “flip” incels this way, and I am currently “one of the good ones” to several older, set-in right-wingers who will seek me out to get my takes on issues or ideas despite knowing that I’m on the other side of their ideology, because it makes them feel good and feel smart to have someone who they can safely get a second opinion from. Imagine if your parents were actually non-judgemental and you could have brought home any new, challenging idea to debate comfortably around the dinner table. Everyone would have wanted that growing up. You can be that environment to someone.

Imagine if every right-wing dumbass out there knew “one of the good ones.” Imagine if several million people were exposed to just one person who proves an exception to their emotional rule that your side is the “enemy.” This is how you topple mountains, not by butting heads against it, but by carving out cracks in the base.