Why would trying to convince this person be different from convincing any other person?
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Well, you wouldn’t start by telling her it is immoral to take money from rich people in order to give it to poor people. She will probably not be sympathetic.
I would start by asking her, “are you worried about the rising prices you’re seeing at the supermarket and at the gas station?” Assuming she answers in the affirmative, I would then explain to her the Fed’s role in creating inflation and explain that they punish the poor and the savers like that in part to pay for government pork and cronies. Making her an advocate of the gold standard should be pretty easy.
I’d then have the task of explaining to her why Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid could cause a currency crisis. This involves some ability to think in the long-term on her part. She would be one of the ones hit hardest by runaway inflation.
Making her detest such programs even assuming their economic viability involves creating very strong distrust in the state. I would first try to assure her that charitable donations would step in in the absence of government; if this were not true, nobody would receive welfare checks because the people who don’t receive welfare checks greatly outnumber the people who do recieve them. This shows that at least some if not most people support these programs and would fill in with their own donations in the absence of the programs.
Next, creating distrust in the state could take a number of different routes depending on her background. I would have to talk about how the state harms economic growth which hurts her long-term standard of life and how empowering it leads to despotic tendencies evidenced by, for example, police brutality stemming from the racist War on Drugs.
It can take a very long time to change a person’s long held ideologies, so I would honestly consider this task close to impossible absent a very open-minded or malleable person.
Why should trying to convince this person be different from convincing any other person?
I would guess that when dealing with all things subjective, you would treat the person at hand, and not the “objective condition” (for lack of a better term). In the case of the “poor black woman”, those titles are apparently precious and relevant titles to the subject at hand. They matter, as they matter specifically to the person at hand.
Of course, a lot of this makes most of these things “empty sets”. I don’t really know if one political position can really say much different than any other in terms of ends.
Taking the “what’s in it for me?” route is a losing proposition. There will always be dozens of statist proposals which would promise to directly deliver more to any one particular person you are trying to convince. You immediately lose by accepting to play their (statist) game.
Everybody would benefit from a free society but the only way to show this is through explaining the whole picture and through teaching logic and economics. There are poor black women which are able to get it, and there are rich white men which are not.
You’re asking people with little education to understand logic and economics. It is not realistic. Regardless of how many statists promise anything, they will not avoid the upcoming currency crisis and runaway inflation. There is always a limit to what statists can promise. My explanation begins by showing the person how, though they may see the benefits they receive from the state, they may not realize the harm they are also receiving. That breeds mistrust, and moves the person towards libertarianism.
I think it is nearly impossible to convince her to become a libertarian until after she has improved her life. I mean, good luck with the abolish the minimum wage argument and end food stamps to someone who is truly dependent on those things. I think you must, then, focus on how to improve her particular circumstances, in which I would recommend 3 things:
Financial advice. I would personally counsel her on how best to budget her money. I’m not talking about investing or anything like that, just a budget that identifies every dollar she has.
Charity! Replace her dependence on the state with local charities. Not only provide for her, but get her involved as well.
Help guide her child. This is a longer term solution, but make sure he breaks those chains of dependence. Help him with school, help him get to sporting events, don’t let him get in with the wrong people. Perhaps she is too far gone to completely break free of state support, but show her that it is possible for each generation to improve their lot in life.
