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Some Americans are breaking out of political echo chambers

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Re: Some Americans are breaking out of political echo chambers

#751

Post by dragonwriter »

api wrote: post #743
NaturalPhallacy wrote: post #561

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Censorship means state power is deployed to silence speech, and that is not (at least in the USA) happening much. >cen·sor (sĕn′sər) >1. A person authorized to examine books, films, or other material and *to remove or suppress what is considered morally, politically, or otherwise objectionable.* Being authorized by twitter to do it on twitter is still censorship. A simple non-political example: censor bars on nudit…

That makes censorship a basically meaningless concept, since any exercise of one's property rights to deny a soap box to anyone now counts as censorship. It makes access to privately owned media an entitlement. Censorship historically means the initiation of force by the state (in the form of bans, fines, arrests, etc.) to suppress speech. There's very little of that in the USA outside certain well known areas like c…

> Censorship historically means the initiation of force by the state

No, it doesn't, it historically means action by any locus of institutional power to control speech (and, before and directly inspiring that, specifically the review by particular officials of the Roman Catholic Church in the process of pre-publication review of material to assure it was free of doctrinal error.)

Re: Some Americans are breaking out of political echo chambers

#752

Post by MarkMarine »

Loughla wrote: post #229
MarkMarine wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I struggle to understand why you need to read “sides” for news articles. Are you just referring to opinion pieces?

Are you serious? Most mainstream sources have hard left or right slant. How do you not see that?

Oh I see it, I just don’t want it and I think reading both sides gives you worse galaxy brain than reading none.

Re: Some Americans are breaking out of political echo chambers

#753

Post by I-M-S »

ghostpepper wrote: post #740
crazygringo wrote: post #684

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I lived in Brazil for many years and read the local news closely. Whenever the Economist published an article on Brazilian politics, it was generally far superior and far more insightful than anything in the local press. Which genuinely surprised me. Remember -- most local news sources, whether in the US or Brazil, aren't nuanced at all. They're surface-level and sensationalistic. But while Brazil has a home-grown ne…

For what it's worth, I find the same is true of Canada. We have some decent news organizations but whenever there is an Economist article about Canada, I find the insights a bit deeper and the context more complete.

Interesting, I am often find nonplussed by their cover of Canadian stories, especially by what they choose to cover - "buttergate" and dearth of some obscure condiment Asians use in Vancouver come to mind as recent examples.

I find The Globe & Mail and MacLeans quite solid when it comes to news coverage.

Re: Some Americans are breaking out of political echo chambers

#754

Post by bart_spoon »

sandyarmstrong wrote: post #124

> I would be shocked if 60+% of American film characters are identifiably Christian How often do you see Christmas used as a plot device? Or a church used as a setting? Or a priest character? I would be shocked if context didn't imply that > 95% of American film characters are Christian.

Certainly not in 60+% of films. And since when is Christmas only celebrated by Christians in the West? It became fully commercialized and secularized decades ago. Its even a major holiday in Japan these days, where less than 1% of the population is Christian.

Re: Some Americans are breaking out of political echo chambers

#755

Post by prepend »

antiterra wrote: post #212
prepend wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Trump was cancelled by the election, so that makes sense. People vote for lots of reasons so assuming that a voter supports every single issue is simplistic.

Imagine people not being impressed with arguments like “I don’t agree with his attempted oppression of a vulnerable group of citizens, but I sure do like his position on immigration/tariffs/capital gains tax.”

I’m not sure your point as that’s exactly what people do. I have a neighbor who is gay and voted for Trump because of gun rights. People are really diverse and it takes lots of particulars to find out why people do stuff.

It’s not a good idea to “cancel” people based on a single characteristic.

Re: Some Americans are breaking out of political echo chambers

#756

Post by prepend »

selimthegrim wrote: post #322
prepend wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In general, I agree with you, but in the case of Atlanta and Fulton county that narrative is in conflict with repeated poor management. Lots of cities have incorporated over the past 20 years and ended up with better services and lower taxes. Part of that is due to siphoning off funds that would help worse off, but most is just due to more efficient management. I used to not support the idea of reforming Milton count…

Didn't Marta extensions get voted down by those same suburban counties?

This is all in the same county, Fulton, and the northern part has voted to extend multiple times. The current Marta line stops about 8 miles from the top of the county.

Even other counties, Gwinnett and Cobb have recently voted to extend but that’s sort of a separate point.

My complaint was that Fulton county sales taxes support Marta, but Marta service does not extend all the way through the county.

Re: Some Americans are breaking out of political echo chambers

#757

Post by myfavoritedog »

slowhand09 wrote: post #620
watwut wrote: post #564

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The middle between truth and lie is a lie. The middle between torture and fredom is less bad torture. I could continue, but that is the point.

That sounds like a great philosophy. Who gets to decide what is truth and what is a lie? Case in point. The Pulse Nightclub shooting 5 years ago. Proven the shooter chose it because of lax security compared to other places he considered. He didn't know it was LGBTQ+. It was about Syria, Afganistan, and other middle eastern wars to him. Now it is hailed as persecution of the LGBTQ+ community - a target. Who is doing t…

The fact that you're being downvoted by stating simple truths that go against the accepted MSM narrative just shows how bad the problem is.

And HN is supposed to be where the more informed crowd hangs out.

One quibble, though. It wasn't inauguration day. It was on 1/6, the day they were to certify the vote in Congress.

Re: Some Americans are breaking out of political echo chambers

#758

Post by krapp »

slowhand09 wrote: post #746
krapp wrote: post #728

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Proven the shooter chose it because of lax security compared to other places he considered. He didn't know it was LGBTQ+. It was about Syria, Afganistan, and other middle eastern wars to him. How? By whom? Why should we trust you or your sources? Your thesis is that no one can be trusted to decide what is truth and what is a lie... then you follow up with several "facts" which clearly share a common ideological bias…

On June 12, 2016, Mateen spent just over three hours in PULSE from the time he began slaughtering innocent people at roughly 2:00 a.m. until he was killed by a SWAT team at roughly 5:00 a.m. During that time, he repeatedly spoke to his captives about his motive, did the same with the police with whom he was negotiating, and discussed his cause with local media which he had called from inside the club. Mateen was rema…

Ok. I'm not even claiming you're wrong, but again, if we can't trust anyone to determine what truth is, why should we believe you?

How can you prove you're right without invoking exactly the same sources of truth that are being discredited as untrustworthy due to their biases?

Once you play the "Who controls the truth?" card, it applies as much to you as anyone else. That argument becomes infinite and recursive when the implication is that no one can be trusted. Otherwise, the implication is that only certain sources of truth can't be trusted - which itself is simply a statement of bias. Just tell us which side you're on, in that case.

Re: Some Americans are breaking out of political echo chambers

#759

Post by eyelovewe »

It seems to me that culture war posturing is one thing, a deliberate source of divisive power that some milk for outrage.

It seems to me that there are some issues with a clear right and wrong: the climate emergency. We essentially cannot overreact, we should be doing 309% of what we are currently doing to go zero carbon. In such a case as the “real world outside our society” id involved, it would seem that there are objectively right and wrong courses of action, in addition to many complex calculi that can have mixed value even if implemented with purely good faith and intentions. (Aka actual error)

It would seem that legions of conservative and prudent scientists from diverse fields are to be considered “political radicals” for merely telling the truth.

Re: Some Americans are breaking out of political echo chambers

#760

Post by renewiltord »

JAlexoid wrote: post #320
renewiltord wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, dude, that’s what it means to have a defacto state religion: it becomes the default thing. A classic characteristic of state religions is that even those who do not believe will institutionally practise. So, for instance, even Buddhists in Jordan must not eat in public during Ramadan. Considering everything I was told about America, I was surprised to see that it is a Christian nation (I expected it to not be b…

> Buddhists in Jordan must not eat in public during Ramadan That is very different! Buddhists in Jordan a legally barred from doing so, whereas there's no law demanding that you actually celebrate Christmas.

There is a law that Federal government workers must not work during Christmas, however. You are legally barred from having employees who report in to you come in on Christmas. If you’re a Muslim, Hindu, or Buddhist you will be given Christmas to celebrate. Come on, this is blatantly non-separation-of-church-and-state.

It’s not anything that upsets me but observationally it is so obvious. M

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