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America is moving toward becoming a better version of itself

theatlantic.com

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Re: America is moving toward becoming a better version of itself

#131

Post by humanrebar »

stevenwoo wrote: post #69
justin66 wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No idea what he has to say for himself in the wsj since it's behind a paywall, but I did google him. I wasn't familiar with any of this but if this is accurate: It was Mr. Williamson’s hard-line stance on abortion — namely, that it should be treated as premeditated homicide and punished accordingly, perhaps by hanging — that generated the initial controversy over his hiring. Well, you know, his time at The Atlantic w…

It was an appalling failure to investigate his background by the man who hired him, critics rightly pointed our Williamson's equivalency of murder and abortion - which has led to many not too bright folks to actually murdering abortion providers.

Williamson was making a more pointed and subtle point. You probably missed it.

Part of the key is that Williamson is generally against the death penalty. He is regularly tongue in cheek and hyperbolic.

He is certainly against ex post facto punishment.

Re: America is moving toward becoming a better version of itself

#132

Post by humanrebar »

justin66 wrote: post #84
astine wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If someone links you to article, you can generally get through the paywall, so here is Williamson's own take on his situation: https://www.wsj.com/articles/when-the-twitter-mob-came-for-m... The short summary is that he actually does not believe that abortion should be punished by hanging as you suggest. An excerpt: "The purported reason for our “parting ways,” as Mr. Goldberg put it in his announcement, had nothing…

> The short summary is that he actually does not believe that abortion should be punished by hanging as you suggest. An excerpt: It wasn't really my suggestion, it was a quote from a larger NYT article. Sorry, I should have sited it, but it hardly seems crucial to what I was saying: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/05/business/media/kevin-will... Evidently the decision to fire him was informed by more than a single il…

He didn't say it was funny. He said it was ridicule. Getting people all worked up in their ignorance was the goal. His error was being too effective in practice.

Re: America is moving toward becoming a better version of itself

#133

Post by croon »

humanrebar wrote: post #127
croon wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's more that people are concerned that they will have to be closeted in polite society. I think there's anecdotal evidence to support that concern. See the recent New Yorker piece about Chic-Fil-A "infiltrating" NYC. Infiltrating it with what? Sandwiches? No, it's about the conservative Christian owners setting up shop in NYC. > On June 16, 2012, while on the syndicated radio talk show, The Ken Coleman Show, Chic…

Calling attention to political disagreement is fine. Using language if hatred is not. I presume, as a Christian, you would rather people learn to forgive and reconcile instead of judge and condemn. The concern of Christians is that the goal here isn't to get Chic-Fil-A to change its behavior or speech but to brand it and people in its tribe as an Enemy and as evil. It's mainstream Christianity to consider extramarita…

> Calling attention to political disagreement is fine. Using language if hatred is not. I presume, as a Christian, you would rather people learn to forgive and reconcile instead of judge and condemn.

Absolutely, though forgiveness requires remorse, as per the bible. We rarely see that.

> The concern of Christians is that the goal here isn't to get Chic-Fil-A to change its behavior or speech but to brand it and people in its tribe as an Enemy and as evil.

Let's just say we disagree on this.

> It's mainstream Christianity to consider extramarital sex as sinful. Is that hatred? No. Does it make people defensive? Sure. How do we resolve that tension? Well, hating Christians and ostracising them won't solve the problem. Unless the problem is that there are too many "out" Christians.

We disagree on this as well. Has anyone been refused service because they had sex before (or outside) marriage? I think it's an outdated view, sure, but I've also never seen it bother anyone to a real effect.

There's also a tremendous difference between the vocal "mainstream Christianity" and the non-vocal, actual, mainstream Christianity. The former being the religious propaganda arm of the christian/conservative voting block, with the Pat Robertssons, James Dobsons, etc. The latter being people holding Christian values regardless of politics, meaning it doesn't matter if it's Clintons or Trumps extramarital affairs when deciding support.

Conjecture: imagine if Obama had five kids with three different wives, and multiple reports of sexual harassment/assault as well as prostitution. Anyone reacting differently to this should inform you whether they hold Christian values at anything closer than arms length, when it's favorable.

It's very blurry in the states, because a lot of Televangelists are insane caricatures to anyone looking in from the outside, whether it be scandinavian protestants or the catholic pope. It's unclear how many people listen to those leaders, and how many don't.

Re: America is moving toward becoming a better version of itself

#134

Post by [deleted] »

justin66 wrote: post #104
zeveb wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Let's be honest, from the viewpoint of an Atlantic editor, hiring a guy who thinks it's a funny joke to make would have been as bad as hiring a guy who actually believes it. The Atlantic hired Ta-Nehisi Coates , who is far more extreme on the other side of things. It wouldn't have hurt to have someone to counterbalance him.

Te-Nehasi Coates went from being a nobody to a prominent writer during his tenure at The Atlantic. It's possible their readership would enjoy a conservative "counterbalance" of some kind in addition to the conservative contributors they currently employ, but if there's a group that's likely to be offended in a big way by jokes (or sincere, heartfelt positions) that involve hanging people, this is it. The only anomaly…

[deleted]

Re: America is moving toward becoming a better version of itself

#135

Post by krapp »

TheAdamAndChe wrote: post #9
krapp wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Also, how is the desire to maintain a common identity in your small town racist? When the desire to maintain a common identity is based on racial or ethnic identity, and that desire excludes the possibility that races or ethnicities other than your own can, or should, be a part your community, then that desire can be accurately described as racist or at best xenophobic. >Many of our country's rural trends are a push…

> When the desire to maintain a common identity is based on racial or ethnic identity... then that desire can be accurately described as racist or at best xenophobic. This would be true and understandable if immigration wasn't so incredibly skewed towards Mexicans, but it is skewed. There are over 11 million illegal immigrants in a country of 300 million, the majority of which are Mexican/Latino. That is an incredibl…

>This would be true and understandable if immigration wasn't so incredibly skewed towards Mexicans, but it is skewed.

And people's views on race don't map neatly to a purely genetic definition, nor do their views of ethnicity map to geographic boundaries. It's not at all unbelievable that Americans would see Mexicans as a different race.

>I find it funny how you blame white people for the hate, then blame them for the redefinition of culture and community around race and ethnicity... right after blaming white people for some perceived degradation of our country...

I'm assuming this is supposed to discredit my comment somehow, but I don't know how it would, nor do I really care.

I don't blame white people for that redefinition. I blame the alt-right and white supremacist movements for seeing an opportunity to spin widespread anger (among lower class people of various races and ethnic groups) with the effects of globalization and automation into a revolution to maintain and protect white culture.

And I've simply seen too many arguments around this issue since the last election cycle began (funny how it seems to have sprung fully formed and fully clothed from the breast of the Trump campaign, huh) and too many articles framing the modern populist movement as an issue of white racial identity and fear of the loss of white cultural and political majority, and seen that view defended many times, to believe for a second that the confusion in your prior comment was genuine, unless you've been living under a rock for the last few years.

Re: America is moving toward becoming a better version of itself

#136

Post by wool_gather »

mantas wrote: post #75
TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many of the problems the US faces are genuinely caused by immigration, and how many would change if immigration ended? That's the crux of the matter. Factually, in the UK virtually none of our social and economic problems have been caused by immigration. When you look into the facts, unaffordable housing, a creaking health service, street violence, and job losses are all effects of policy, not specific groups of…

Immigrants do put pressure on housing and health services though. As well as directly causing job losses by dumping wages. Of course, a magical policy may have stopped those issues. But taking in a lot of immigrants and not changing policies accordingly is what causes havoc.

> directly causing job losses by dumping wages

Largely a myth, according to fairly recent research.

https://www.brookings.edu/blog/jobs/2012/05/04/what-immigrat...

Re: America is moving toward becoming a better version of itself

#137

Post by needToSay »

Clubber wrote: post #66
montyf wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're absolutely right, but HN users don't realize that most of America exists outside of their ideological bubble. > For example, if child of meth heads grows up to be president, he's yet another privileged white president, not an outsider who overcame adversity. It's racism and nothing else. Thing is, it's OK to be racist nowadays, as long as you're a liberal. Edit: to the guy quoting the dictionary below me, this…

Again, not racism. It's being stereotypical. Dictionary definition: >prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against someone of a different race based on the belief that one's own race is superior.

> Again, not racism. It's being stereotypical.

> Dictionary definition:

> >prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against someone of a different race based on the belief that one's own race is superior.

Fuck off nigger

Re: America is moving toward becoming a better version of itself

#138

Post by exelius »

humanrebar wrote: post #120
virtuexru wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think Americans are totally done with identity politics based on race, gender, religion, sexuality, etc. As someone who's living in New York I'd have to say you couldn't be further from the truth. But then again I guess it depends what part of the country you are in.

Agreed. For example: https://www.newyorker.com/culture/annals-of-gastronomy/chick...

I’m saying to step outside the “constant outrage” bubble that is the media and out into the actual real world people inhabit.

If I walked in to a Chick-fil-a in Manhattan, would I be aware of any controversy?

Re: America is moving toward becoming a better version of itself

#139

Post by briandear »

kadenshep wrote: post #106
briandear wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Louis Farrakhan. Joy Reid. Hillary Clinton (who once famously called young black males ‘predators.’) Joe Biden, who called Barrack Obama a “clean, articulate” black candidate in contrast to the implied “uncleanliness” of one of the first black presidential candidates, Jesse Jackson. Then there is the soft bigotry of low expectations that’s famous among the left: “oh, these people are of a certain. race, so we don’t e…

>Louis Farrakhan. Joy Reid. Hillary Clinton These people were called out (or continue to be called out) for their actions and words, and unlike their counter parts on the right had the intelligence to correct for it. Whether you believe it to be sincere is kind of irrelevant, so I'm just going to stave off that talking point right there. Notable "leftist" institutions like the SPLC track such statements and view poin…

Decades? Because decades ago, people like Robert Byrd, one of Hillary Clinton’s mentors was a leader of the Ku Klux Klan. Democrats took up civil rights because it was politically expedient to do so. But they have been far from leaders when it comes to civil rights. Martin Luther King, Jr was a Republican. The Democrat party has used black people. Look at the recent history. How many black congressmen were given committee chairmanships when Democrats controlled Congress? How many black people have ever had significant party leadership positions other than Obama?

And what economic policies are racist in the US? If you admit that there are racist economic policies, then you are admitting that black people are somehow a homogenous group — which is itself racist. Black people aren’t different from white people, suggesting that they need special economic consideration is insulting.

Poor people isn’t analogous with black people, despite what Democrats would have you think.

Re: America is moving toward becoming a better version of itself

#140

Post by briandear »

wilsonnb wrote: post #109
briandear wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Opioid addiction is because opioids make you feel really good and they are really addictive and they had a tendency to be overprescribed. Blaming the economy for opioids is like blaming airplanes for AIDS. As far as the wasteland heartland, I am not sure if Texas is included in the heartland, but the Texas economy is one of the biggest in the world — about as large as the GDP of Canada and larger than that of South K…

What media outlets do you recommend that we look to for a more accurate assessment?

The local papers of the regions in question. Certainly not elitist echo-chambers like the Atlantic — a publication that preaches diversity but fires their only conservative writer before he spent five minutes working for them.

But coastal publications trying to write about the heartland is as absurd as a small town Texas paper writing about Brooklyn.

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