> First, realize that simply pointing out to people how they are mistaken won't change much.

That lesson took me embarrassingly long to learn, but it's a good one.

I haven't given much thought to pattern-matching a loophole as a strategy, but your observation is key: people are willing to make exceptions, you just have to figure out how to get them to make an exception for you.

How to do that? Virtue signal. Watch other people for ideas. You won't have to watch long, people love to virtue signal and do it all the time. Validate their VS to score some quick points, swallow the small amount of bile that it brings to the back of your throat, and then pick something politically adjacent but not so directly similar as to compete/threaten. Those constraints are pretty loose, they should leave you with a wide field of possibilities to choose from. Pick the least unpalatable and you're set.

Your approach increases the problem's scale. I've found the exact opposite, that by carefully confiding in friends about my non-conformity often brings out their relieved agreement and binds us together much strongly. In these times it is important to start making a mental list of who behaves like a human and who behaves like cattle.