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Our Culture of Contempt

nytimes.com

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Re: Our Culture of Contempt

#71

Post by rjf72 »

towaway1138 wrote: post #3

As a lifelong liberal, I've sunk into despair at the firehose of hatred coming from the left these days. And I talk to far fewer of my old lefty friends anymore--if they've made themselves awful, I just don't want to know. I'd prefer to remember them as they were. Maybe this is just a phase, but it feels like we're going to a place from which we won't return.

I'm also in the same boat, I imagine with countless others. Trump didn't win in 2016, Clinton managed to receive 4.5 million votes fewer than Obama 2008 did. And she did that at the same time that the pool of voting age population grew by more than 20 million. [1] Quite a remarkable feat! The party has left its base far behind. Or perhaps it's the other way. Same result in either case.

In thinking about this though I realized something. Almost like clockwork there is a shifting of the zeitgeist of the nation on 20 year intervals:

- Roaring 20s

- Warring 40s

- Social movement 60s

- Huge growth 80s

- Identity politics 2000s

- ?? 2020s

You can't explain these shifts in era by a new generation alone, as would be implied by the 20 year intervals. It has to be in large part substantial chunks of the existing population also shifting their views. I'm not sure if this is a product of people changing, perhaps as they age, or maybe it's some organic factor of political competition that results in the parties changing. Again, going back to the top - I guess it doesn't really matter. It's the exact same effect and result in either case.

The point being is that I think this is 'normal', but we're the first generation to get to share and experience this sort of shift, and in such a public way, due to the internet.

[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voter_turnout_in_the_United_St...

Re: Our Culture of Contempt

#72

Post by rjf72 »

excalibur wrote: post #63
athenot wrote: post #38

The article is about how motive attribution asymmetry leads to contempt, first for the "other political side" then eventually to individuals within that other side. But I think it could go further and question why things get polarized into 2 sides. Our modern society is way more complicated and contains way more nuance than what a binary system can offer. I don't know what the answer is but I feel that political part…

> But I think it could go further and question why things get polarized into 2 sides. Our modern society is way more complicated and contains way more nuance than what a binary system can offer. It's not that great for the masses, but it's wonderful for the elite. If you can persuade the vast majority to pick a side, then you don't have to worry about engineering public opinion to your own benefit on each and every i…

I think this is probably the main point. By dividing people into two camps you help solidify your own grasp on power. Again the 2016 election is full of just so many interesting lessons. How many people voted for Clinton thinking 'Yes, this person genuinely stands for what I believe in and will make a great president!' How many people voted for her because the alternative was simply unacceptable meaning they feared 'wasting' their vote? And the exact same is true of people that voted for Trump.

Think about how 'great' an achievement that is in terms of population control. You, as a player in the entrenched powers, have managed to get people to not only participate in 'your' democracy, but to actively vote for people they don't even want in office, and to actively attack people that vote for third parties. For instance already see the (rather orchestrated) massively negative reaction against Starbucks' Howard Schultz announcing his intentions of running for the presidency as an independent. How dare you run for president unless you declare yourself one of these two parties that fewer people than ever actually identify as, and that are ever more out of touch with the population! How dare you!

Re: Our Culture of Contempt

#73

Post by justin66 »

duado wrote: post #45
paulsutter wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

None of my conservative friends believe that nonsense about Obama, and none of my democrat friends believe that Trump is a Russian spy. Both sides agree Trump is a swindly buffoon, and everyone agrees the Russians have higher standards when recruiting spies. The difference is that some of my conservative friends think it’s ok - or even funny - to have a swindly buffoon as president, and my democrat friends find this…

But the liberals think the conservatives are dumb enough to actually believe that Obama is Kenyan. And the conservatives think the liberals actually think that a guy like Trump is suitable material for a KGB asset.

> But the liberals think the conservatives are dumb enough to actually believe that Obama is Kenyan.

The Republicans elected a prominent birther so this should not be especially surprising. To look at it a little more precisely, depending on which polls you prefer, somewhere around half of them are, in your words, "dumb enough to actually believe that Obama is Kenyan:"

https://www.newsweek.com/trump-birther-obama-poll-republican... https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2016-election/poll-persiste...

Re: Our Culture of Contempt

#74

Post by maxpupmax »

tailrecursion wrote: post #28
_ikuh wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You know, you make an interesting point. I think you're referring to the same thing that the author is referring to. On the left side of the political spectrum, It's not a single phenomena though, I think you can break it down into two camps on the left: 1. older-school globalist liberals. Probably older, supported the Clintons, ect. These people seem to have traditionally looked down on the right as backward, uneduc…

> Saying "fuck that and fuck you" to anyone who supports that system is a reasonable reaction, in my opinion. Why is saying "men can't be women" considered hate speech, and "fuck you" is not. One conveys unreasoned aggression, while the other is a clumsy attempt to state objective truth.

Yup, exactly.

Re: Our Culture of Contempt

#75

Post by maxpupmax »

logicchains wrote: post #21
_ikuh wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You know, you make an interesting point. I think you're referring to the same thing that the author is referring to. On the left side of the political spectrum, It's not a single phenomena though, I think you can break it down into two camps on the left: 1. older-school globalist liberals. Probably older, supported the Clintons, ect. These people seem to have traditionally looked down on the right as backward, uneduc…

>New-school farther left. Probably younger, fans of AOC et al The Axiom of Choice is a political thing now? I'd have thought it generally has strong support among both sides of the political spectrum; in spite of their vocal presence online, constructivists are still a relatively small minority of the mathematical community.

Appreciate the non sequitur, but not really funny.

Re: Our Culture of Contempt

#77

Post by rjf72 »

tiredyam wrote: post #69
noobermin wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Keeping it real, you're reading way too much into what they're saying.

No he isn’t. I agree with him that there is something interesting about the fact that he refers to democrats specifically and conservatives generally. It gives us some insight into his/her bias. It exemplifies some of the broad strokes that are being painted. All conservatives think X because all conservatives, whether fiscally or socially, have the same beliefs. Their anecdata is also highly questionable and present…

I read it in quite the opposite way! I think it's implicitly referencing that 'republican' is a clearing house of views as opposed to actually representing any specific view. As an example libertarians and religious types generally have relatively little in common, yet both tend to vote republican. And this is because the party works to give them each something they value. So, for instance, I imagine that the vast majority of libertarians are pro-choice, yet the party chooses pro-life as a platform to offer something to the religious types. And indeed it turns out even though pro-life is the party platform, only 44% [1] of 'those that vote republican' would support overturning Roe v Wade. So the platform doesn't necessarily represent the individual.

By contrast democratic ideology is becoming increasingly authoritarian in that there's extremely little tolerance for views outside the party line. You'll generally find something like 85%+ support for the party line on most any 'hot' issue. By contrast, you'll find much more diversity in 'republican' views. For instance 'gun control' is supposed to be a black and white division, yet you find 31% [2] of republicans support stronger gun laws and only 13% would support less strict. By contrast, and as usual, you find a whopping 87% of democrats supporting stricter gun control and what measures as less than statistical noise (3%) in support of less strict gun control.

So there isn't really any such thing as a 'republican.' I think 'conservative' also does not necessarily apply ubiquitously, but it's somewhat reasonable. By contrast there is very much a thing as a 'democrat' and the vast majority of people that vote for that party are indeed 'democrats'.

[1] - https://thinkprogress.org/pro-choice-america-majority-d89630...

[2] - https://news.gallup.com/poll/243797/six-americans-support-st...

Re: Our Culture of Contempt

#78

Post by justin66 »

archgoon wrote: post #42
towaway1138 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the uptick in politically motivated violence on the right I haven't looked closely, but it seems like the preponderance of such violence has been coming from the left these days (ignoring people with obvious mental health problems). Charlottesville is the obvious exception, but clearly overbalanced by the guy that attempted to assassinate a bunch of Congressmen at that ball game. Are there lots of examples I'm miss…

Pittsburgh massacre. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/27/us/active-shooter-pittsbu... Also, the bombs sent to a number of democrats, funders of democrats, and Trump critics: https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2018/10/25/bomb-timeli... That said, individual events aren't particularly helpful, the media might be omitting major events (or more likely, a lot of smaller ones). So you can refer to this study by the Cato…

> That said, individual events aren't particularly helpful, the media might be omitting major events (or more likely, a lot of smaller ones).

I recall that the media did not label the Knoxville UU Church Shooter a right-wing terrorist in spite of the fact that he wrote an actual political manifesto prior to the shooting which reads - and I mean this literally - like a dumb guy quoting Ann Coulter:

https://web.archive.org/web/20090327071401/http://web.knoxne...

Re: Our Culture of Contempt

#79

Post by DyslexicAtheist »

DyslexicAtheist wrote: post #44
tailrecursion wrote: post #23

Ben Shapiro acts respectfully when answering students and debating BLM or other persons. I've seen so many instances of bad behavior on the part of his conversation partner, yet Ben remains cool and professional. The worst I remember is that instance where he refused to use a pronoun on Television. If I recall the trans person in that situation behaved very badly. Jordan Peterson remains cool, even with interviewers…

> Jordan Peterson remains cool, even with interviewers that treat him badly. I had no idea about Jordan Peterson until his name popped up in the pronoun controversy. Being sick of all the bickering in this space I never watched it until I stumbled over some old lectures of him on addiction last week. Some of the best content I've ever come across to understand human psychology. His dissection of Pinocchio¹ is absolut…

[flagged]

Re: Our Culture of Contempt

#80

Post by rjf72 »

malandrew wrote: post #37

I chalk a lot of this up to the fact that journalism is no longer such a great career and increasingly a precarious career choice due to layoffs. This leads those in our society with the largest megaphones to increasingly spout discontent because they feel discontent. I bet you that if journalism suddenly provided a comfortable and safe living, that within 5 years the entire attitude of the country would change just…

I don't think it's the journalists in and of themselves. Journalists do not have much power. An individual on here posted about being contacted by the NYT to write an "opinion" piece based on a comment he wrote related to cryptocurrencies. [1] He followed up and eventually did publish the piece. I'm going to avoid commenting on that other than to say that the NYT forced him to endorse opinions he did not hold in an article that was supposed to have been written by him. It's best to read the exact examples than my probably biased tl/dr. And that sort of stuff is what they do to one-off writers. Imagine what they do to (and whom they recruit) for their regular staff! The journalists are just mouthpieces for the executive team.

I think the problem is that the media is dying, but they've found that in the mean time provoking and agitating for a 'culture war' is sending profits skyrocketing. So you don't need to change the media, but you need to change people that eat this nonsense up. Unfortunately, that's probably impossible.

[1] - https://www.rosshartshorn.net/stuffrossthinksabout/nyt_opini...

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