Some Americans are breaking out of political echo chambers • Hacker News Board

Re: Some Americans are breaking out of political echo chambers

#631

Post by dragonwriter » Mon, Jun 14, 2021, 7:52 PM UTC

twalla wrote: post #375

takeda wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To add to it, even the Christmas tree doesn't originate from Christianity. It was just adapted from a pagan tradition. The Santa Claus image was created by commercialism. The original saint Claus is celebrating on December 6 (or 7, don't remeber exactly) and that was a priest that anonymously was donating toys to children in orphanages and later was discovered. Easter Bunny is another commercialisation of a Christian…

IIRC the pagan origins of Christian holidays and symbols have their roots in making conversion more palatable for conquered Roman subjects. Christmas and Easter replace the solstice celebrations, the Christmas tree came from placing evergreen sprigs in the home during winter and the rabbit is a fertility thing.

> IIRC the pagan origins of Christian holidays and symbols have their roots in making conversion more palatable for conquered Roman subjects.

The same is true, mutatis mutandis, of the retained (though radically transformed) Christian elements of consumerist celebrations like the modern American Christmas.

Re: Some Americans are breaking out of political echo chambers

#632

Post by anm89 » Mon, Jun 14, 2021, 7:54 PM UTC

laputan_machine wrote: post #426

slumdev wrote: post #403

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are two centrisms that can't be confused. The first kind of centrist examines each issue on its merits and arrives at a principled conclusion, regardless of how other people think about an issue. This kind of centrism is reasonable. This person can't really even be called a centrist. He's just non-partisan. The second kind of centrist looks at the existing parties to an argument and averages their viewpoints: "…

Can you give an example of the second type? I see this kind of strawman argument against centrism all the time, yet I rarely see "worst of both worlds" outcomes in a political sense

Meta comment: I'm not allowed to vote specifically on this comment. I can vote on its parent and children. Does anyone know why that might be the case?

Re: Some Americans are breaking out of political echo chambers

#633

Post by GauntletWizard » Mon, Jun 14, 2021, 7:54 PM UTC

whimsicalism wrote: post #441

rayiner wrote: post #432

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fox News has moderated a lot over the past few years, while CNN and MSNBC have moved quite a bit to the left. You see it more on cultural issues than say economic or foreign policy issues. Joy Reid, for example, just says the most outrageous falsehoods and goes completely unrebutted: https://twitter.com/wesyang/status/1403950560907300865?s=20

> Fox News has moderated a lot over the past few years I routinely read Fox News online. I do not think they have moderated over the last 2 years - there was perhaps some moderation 4 years ago, but no longer. CNN has swung leftward, I don't think MSNBC has substantially changed.

I think they mean the word "Moderated" not in the colloquial sense of removing content, but in the sense that they're opinions are not as strongly right-wing as they once were.

Re: Some Americans are breaking out of political echo chambers

#634

Post by newfriend » Mon, Jun 14, 2021, 7:54 PM UTC

myko wrote: post #74

commandlinefan wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I continue to be surprised by is how the left-leaning sources keep denying their liberal bias. Fox news more or less admits to being right-leaning, but CNN is still insisting that they're unbiased, which is almost comical. I think that somehow left-biased types really, honestly, believe they're actually considering both sides of every issue, and just coming to the conclusion that "reality has a liberal bias".

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> CNN isn't biased to the liberal or conservative viewpoint, it is biased towards clicks and views.

Bullshit. CNN is in the tank for the corporate wing of the Democratic party.

> A lot of the blame for trump gaining acceptance as a viable voting option belongs to CNN for *uncritically promoting* him and giving him coverage.

Absolute bullshit. You believe CNN was pro-Trump in 2015/2016? Every single story/show was about how terrible he is.

> a false version of reality.

I think you're the one with a false version of reality if you believe CNN was/is pro-Trump.

Re: Some Americans are breaking out of political echo chambers

#635

Post by Dma54rhs » Mon, Jun 14, 2021, 7:54 PM UTC

mseidl wrote: post #294

fancyfish wrote: post #287

The elephant in the room is that this sort of enlightened centrism, while it sounds noble, rests on several ill-formed assumptions. The first is that, by reading from both sides, they’ll balance and you’ll arrive at an enlightened center. This assumes the Overton Window is balanced, stationary, and not tilted to one side or the other. You’re beholden to the good judgement of each side to not move themselves further l…

https://www.reddit.com/r/ENLIGHTENEDCENTRISM/ For some funny times.

Why post this left wing talking point narrative here? What does it add to conversation?

Re: Some Americans are breaking out of political echo chambers

#636

Post by bobthechef » Mon, Jun 14, 2021, 7:54 PM UTC

whimsicalism wrote: post #189

AnIdiotOnTheNet wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eh, not really. Christmas may have been a product of Christianity (hijacking a pagan holiday...), but it has long since become just a western culture tradition with no particular religious significance for a lot of people. Most Christmas movies don't even mention Christ.

> it has long since become just a western culture tradition with no particular religious significance for a lot of people I think that people have a tendency to underestimate the degree of Christian influence on their way of life, and the vast majority of people who practice xmas are Christian, even if they are not weekly church attendees. I was raised in an atheist household, we definitely viewed Christmas as a reli…

> I think that people have a tendency to underestimate the degree of Christian influence on their way of life

People are like fish, they often don't know what water is. They don't realize that their views are usually defections (of defections of...) from Christianity and therefore essentially Christian heresies. In similar fashion, Christmas is first and foremost a religious holiday. The secular version is neuters and changes the original to better conform with secular expectations while trading on the energy and raison d'etre of the original in some weird way. If you think about it, the secular version drained of the original religious content is ridiculously stupid, like all those Soviet attempts to create substitutes for the originals. Call it an idol that will one day fade because Christmas is not very sustainable when cut from its life giving root for very long.

Re: Some Americans are breaking out of political echo chambers

#637

Post by asdff » Mon, Jun 14, 2021, 7:56 PM UTC

prof-dr-ir wrote: post #33

> "Until you can passionately make arguments for both sides," she says, "you don't understand the issue." I think this is the key quote. It should really be taboo to have an opinion without an understanding of how the other side argues. (Ironically the search for counterarguments would often strengthen my position because they would turn out to be quite weak. Nevertheless I think that the exercise is important.) I th…

The vast majority of people do not have the time to even research for an informed opinion. Not to mention for any hotbed issue, being able to differentiate between the actual factual reports and opinionated bullshit is next to impossible on the modern internet unless you are a domain expert who can sniff this stuff out.

Re: Some Americans are breaking out of political echo chambers

#638

Post by JAlexoid » Mon, Jun 14, 2021, 7:56 PM UTC

whimsicalism wrote: post #563

JAlexoid wrote: post #550

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Classical liberalism - complete laissez faire market, no government interference and individual wealth creation. Today's libertarians are closest to classical liberals. The term classical liberal exists specifically, because conservative liberal creates a massive ambiguity. And getting back to The Economist - they aren't conservative at all. It's a modern liberal magazine, that routinely promotes wealth redistributio…

This is a frustrating comment chain for me to read. The person you are responding to clearly is already familiar with the concept of classical liberalism, and you are responding as if they are a dunce.

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Re: Some Americans are breaking out of political echo chambers

#639

Post by x86_64Ubuntu » Mon, Jun 14, 2021, 7:56 PM UTC

anm89 wrote: post #346

fancyfish wrote: post #287

The elephant in the room is that this sort of enlightened centrism, while it sounds noble, rests on several ill-formed assumptions. The first is that, by reading from both sides, they’ll balance and you’ll arrive at an enlightened center. This assumes the Overton Window is balanced, stationary, and not tilted to one side or the other. You’re beholden to the good judgement of each side to not move themselves further l…

Attacking the center is always the craziest narrative to me. It's saying: not only is it not okay to disagree with me and be on the other side, it's also not okay to not passionately agree with my exact side. The only right way to view these complex issues is to sign your name to join my party and then hold the party line, and everything else is unethical. I can't imagine a more obnoxious political viewpoint than tha…

You mention both sides being terrible cesspools, but your concrete examples only hit out at what you deem to be progressive subreddits. One aspect of centrism is that it's generally people who either benefit from or want to maintain the status quo, without incurring the conflict that comes with stating so.

Re: Some Americans are breaking out of political echo chambers

#640

Post by rkk3 » Mon, Jun 14, 2021, 7:57 PM UTC

KittenInABox wrote: post #606

vorpalhex wrote: post #583

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"If you aren't for us, you are against us." This is a great tool for crusades and other holy wars. You can paint inconvenient bystanders who don't come over to your side as enemy combatants and justify attacking them. Also fantastic for reinforcing in-group identity, forcing group members to stay loyal or lose their entire friend group.

This doesn't actually address the parent post in that quite literally half-truths aren't truths. Of course the rhetorical implication is that only one side had those truths but that is most certainly not the argument being made here.

Except politics is based on conflicting value systems not objective truth.