At least in this post, I’m not advocating for any particular political position; I mean for this to be a more generalized discussion.
I have never understood what prompts people to attend political rallies. None of the current US political candidates 100% align with my views, but I am very confident that I made the right choice in who I voted for. That is to say, I’d consider myself a strong supporter of [name here].
To me, it feels like attending a political rally is like attending a college lecture. You have a person giving you information, but you don’t gain anything by hearing it in-person as opposed to reading it or watching a recording. If I want to learn something, it’s much more comfortable for me to read and article or watch a video in the comfort of my own home. If I want to understand what a political candidate stands for, I’d much rather watch a recording of a town-hall meeting or read something she (oops) wrote rather than taking the time to drive to a rally, get packed in with a bunch of other people, and simply stand and listen.
I understand concerts. Hearing live music sounds vastly different than listening to a recording. Same with movies; most of us don’t have an IMAX theater at home. When you’re trying to gather information, though, what’s the draw in standing outside in a crowd at listening to it in person?
Rallies were always useful before media became its current centralized technological force. Due to people skewing things, it’s still technically useful. All for the same reason it was useful for philosophers like Zeno and Jesus to have people just sit and listen. It’s the public figure equivalent of an artist archiving the step-by-step process on how they made a work of art in order to add some assurance.