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Our Culture of Contempt

nytimes.com

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Re: Our Culture of Contempt

#111

Post by specialist »

logicchains wrote: post #84
justin66 wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>The left, as I see it, gets and respects human vulnerability, and our need to depend on one another, and wants to build a just, equitable society where we can all fluorish. >This is what people dislike about the modern left, when it makes the assumption that the intentions of its political opponents are bad just because they disagree on methodology. The writing of the person you're responding to is so egregiously b…

Recognition of "our need to depend on one another." is not the end goal of the average left-leaning person (or at least those I know), the end goal is for nobody to suffer through poverty/neglect. The average right-leaning person would also like nobody to suffer through poverty/neglect. The right just believes that government intervention won't help poverty, and that it destroys family and community bonds via the gov…

Our local political organizations are (legally) reformed every two years. We Democrats have a ritual where we introduce ourselves and say why we're a Democrat.

Most people say something like "I believe in the greater good." Which I suppose could be warped into whatever you just described.

My answer has been "To help people help themselves and to help those who can't."

TLDR: You should probably meet some lefties, in person, before you claim to speak for them. Try meeting some righties too.

Re: Our Culture of Contempt

#112

Post by moh_maya »

FakeComments wrote: post #87
_bxg1 wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I support most of the liberal platform, but in recent years a large portion of the party's base has turned into a cesspool of hatred, cynicism, and thoughtless reactionism. We used to be the party of idealism and belief in people's basic goodness. What the hell happened?

It became more important to hate white people and what they stood for than participate in Enlightenment culture, so they happily regressed to the cultural norms of, say, the Middle East or South America. Multiculturalism and post-truth thinking was always insane nonsense, and the leftists have been drinking that koolaid for two decades, at least. To hold up cultures that cut off clitorises in the bush and burn witche…

The argument you appear to be making (as I interpret it) is equivalent to saying some members of the Freedom caucus support neo-Nazis / "alt-right", therefore all conservatives are now proponents of eugenics & "white nationalism" or some equivalently loaded term.

I mean, democrats are still white, by large majorities..so they "hate themselves"?

Such simplistic analysis of something so complicated seems.. trivialization to the point of no meaning. This just appears to be trolling for effect's sake..or venting. I know HN's guidelines suggest not attributing motive..but this appears to be such a rancorous post..

Re: Our Culture of Contempt

#113

Post by specialist »

Fellshard wrote: post #52
unclebucknasty wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where is any of that discussion even being had anymore? The once vaulted values of the right you profess have been co-opted by the singular motivating force of demonizing and owning the libs. The old guard of conservatism has been reduced to mumbling around the fringes about this thing or the other. And you do not see any such talk in close proximity to the current power center of that party. In fact, that power cent…

You have isolated the voices from the right you listen to to those that allow you to make those claims. Broaden your listening range.

Who should we be listening to?

Re: Our Culture of Contempt

#114

Post by vibrato »

pjc50 wrote: post #108
elefanten wrote: post #13

All political mud-slinging aside, all weighing and apportioning of blame withheld, the main suggestions of the article are worthwhile. 1. Don't allow yourself to slide easily or prematurely into contempt. We do it too often these days. 2. Disagree better. You can disagree, but make your case and engage in the responses. Rhetoric has a place but it's being overused.

There's a real prisoner's dilemma phenomenon going on here. If the two options are "respect" and "contempt", and one side has ramped the contempt up to 11 and won the elections, what should the other side do? I'm all for a winding-down of this process, because eventually it could escalate all the way up to violence, but like nuclear disarmament, you first . Or at least some plausible commitment to de-escalation that…

Aoc and omar are successful because they have denounced competency in the name of identity politics

Re: Our Culture of Contempt

#115

Post by rootusrootus »

logicchains wrote: post #19
aabeshou wrote: post #5

[flagged]

>The left, as I see it, gets and respects human vulnerability, and our need to depend on one another, and wants to build a just, equitable society where we can all fluorish. This is what people dislike about the modern left, when it makes the assumption that the intentions of its political opponents are bad just because they disagree on methodology. There are conservatives who genuinely want to build a just, equitabl…

Conservatives have nuanced views but 'people dislike the modern left'?

Re: Our Culture of Contempt

#116

Post by timthorn »

justin66 wrote: post #81
logicchains wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The left, as I see it, gets and respects human vulnerability, and our need to depend on one another, and wants to build a just, equitable society where we can all fluorish. This is what people dislike about the modern left, when it makes the assumption that the intentions of its political opponents are bad just because they disagree on methodology. There are conservatives who genuinely want to build a just, equitabl…

>>The left, as I see it, gets and respects human vulnerability, and our need to depend on one another, and wants to build a just, equitable society where we can all fluorish. >This is what people dislike about the modern left, when it makes the assumption that the intentions of its political opponents are bad just because they disagree on methodology. The writing of the person you're responding to is so egregiously b…

As Thatcher went on to write in her autobiography: "they never quoted the rest. I went on to say: There are individual men and women, and there are families. And no government can do anything except through people, and people must look to themselves first. It’s our duty to look after ourselves and then to look after our neighbour. My meaning, clear at the time but subsequently distorted beyond recognition, was that society was not an abstraction, separate from the men and women who composed it, but a living structure of individuals, families, neighbours and voluntary associations."

Re: Our Culture of Contempt

#117

Post by RugnirViking »

DanBC wrote: post #105
RugnirViking wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Twitter is a weird site. It's got a core of extremely active users who are almost entirely people who are famous or journalists. I'm at university - probably the place where the concentration of twitter users is likely to be highest, and hardly anybody I know has an account or if they do, doesn't use it for anything except occasionally reading something they got linked to. It's almost like a kind of echo chamber for…

> There just aren't the opinions of suburban moms on twitter. Surburban moms are also nurses, doctors, teachers, engineers, programmers, etc etc, and all of these groups are active on Twitter. But if you want a community of mums who are there as mums you could look at #netmums and #mumsnet. Here's one example: https://twitter.com/search?q=%23netmums&src=typd > There aren't plumbers on twitter. There are plumbers on T…

It's a good point, but I do suspect that if I were to look into it the kinds of people you mention: "nurses, doctors, teachers, engineers, programmers" who are on twitter would actually turn out to have their own blogs or have written a book read by an audience, and would be thought leaders in their field and such folk. Your average member of those classes are likely not regular users of twitter.

Twitter just doesn't work if people don't care what you say - you have to already be a celebrity, with an opinion that 'matters' to people.

" Twitter doesn't do a good job of surfacing different communities" Yes, but what I am getting at here is that they are communities in the sense of several important people in the field who all know each other

and thats it.

There simply aren't many 'average' people using twitter regularly, at least in the sense of writing thoughts and/or having conversations.

"using Twitter is sometimes a useful way to get customer support. "

Yes, thats what I was saying. I think it should not be this way - at least, the actual dedicated customer support of the company should be at least as effective as tweeting at them.

Re: Our Culture of Contempt

#118

Post by unclebucknasty »

Fellshard wrote: post #52
unclebucknasty wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where is any of that discussion even being had anymore? The once vaulted values of the right you profess have been co-opted by the singular motivating force of demonizing and owning the libs. The old guard of conservatism has been reduced to mumbling around the fringes about this thing or the other. And you do not see any such talk in close proximity to the current power center of that party. In fact, that power cent…

You have isolated the voices from the right you listen to to those that allow you to make those claims. Broaden your listening range.

I haven't isolated them. They have the bullhorn.

Re: Our Culture of Contempt

#119

Post by FakeComments »

moh_maya wrote: post #112
FakeComments wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It became more important to hate white people and what they stood for than participate in Enlightenment culture, so they happily regressed to the cultural norms of, say, the Middle East or South America. Multiculturalism and post-truth thinking was always insane nonsense, and the leftists have been drinking that koolaid for two decades, at least. To hold up cultures that cut off clitorises in the bush and burn witche…

The argument you appear to be making (as I interpret it) is equivalent to saying some members of the Freedom caucus support neo-Nazis / "alt-right", therefore all conservatives are now proponents of eugenics & "white nationalism" or some equivalently loaded term. I mean, democrats are still white, by large majorities..so they "hate themselves"? Such simplistic analysis of something so complicated seems.. trivializati…

[flagged]

Re: Our Culture of Contempt

#120

Post by unclebucknasty »

int_19h wrote: post #92
unclebucknasty wrote: post #10

Yes, "both sides" lie incessantly, embrace dictators, attack our norms and institutions, engage in voter suppression, and deploy bots and trolls to engage in earnest, non-contemptuous discussion (including right here on this thread).

This is kind of an amusing list, because you clearly meant it sardonically, but it's literally true. Embrace dictators - check; remember Obama rushing to Saudi Arabia? Attack our norms and institutions - check; Dems are talking about killing the filibuster in the Senate for good right now, and of course they were the first to start the process of dismantling it back when they removed it for non-SC judicial appointmen…

These what-aboutism arguments are so disingenuous that they are the product of either bad faith or a pathological measure of rationalization.

Whatever the reason, such facile rants are now the go-to technique--an entreaty to engage in a tit-for-tat, ignoring context and degree, thus normalizing awful behavior.

But I won't do it. I think you are well-aware of the difference in degree and of who is clearly and presently wielding power in a manner that runs roughshod over our norms, values and institutions.

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