The case against crisis-mongering • Hacker News Board

Re: The case against crisis-mongering

#61

Post by krapp » Sat, Aug 14, 2021, 4:26 PM UTC

zzyzxxz wrote: post #51

krapp wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fascism isn't binary, it's a spectrum. Trump was closer to the "Literally Hitler" end of the scale than Biden is to the "Literally Stalin" end, but many symptoms of fascism are endemic to American culture and politics.

It's more fair to compare Presidents with George Washington than with their predecessors. I can't imagine George Washington standing in front of a church holding a bible upside-down, or advocating that people ought to put cleaning fluids into their lungs.

I see what you're trying to do, but be careful... while Trump may have cheated his employees (according to affidavits from the many lawsuits against him,) George Washington owned men as slaves.

Re: The case against crisis-mongering

#62

Post by XorNot » Sat, Aug 14, 2021, 4:26 PM UTC

gdubs wrote: post #28

The author’s point seems to be that everyone exaggerates in a direction that best serves their desired political outcome. What he misses is the obvious — he exaggerates as well, in the direction of “moderation.” His desired outcome is that we all take a moderate approach, and the rhetorical device used to get there is that ‘crises are all exaggerated.’

Your point is "people try to make compelling arguments". Well duh, but it's not an actual rebuttal.

Re: The case against crisis-mongering

#63

Post by lazyant » Sat, Aug 14, 2021, 4:30 PM UTC

Guthur wrote: post #8

Honestly it seems no one really understands what fascism actually is. What fascism used to be was ultra nationalistic, non democratic, centralised control of people's lives and the economy for the greater good of the state. And I means these to the most extreme you can possibly take these ideas, that's fascism. The word has no meaning when you throw it around against anyone with slightly conservative view points.

That describes pretty much every dictatorship or tyranny; from "right wing" ones to "communist" ones.

Words (like this one) can change their meaning in their popular use and that's fine but probably better to use better terms, especially with emotionally loaded ones.

Re: The case against crisis-mongering

#64

Post by namdnay » Sat, Aug 14, 2021, 4:32 PM UTC

tvirosi wrote: post #33

h2odragon wrote: post #21

Humans are built to survive adversity. We got so good at it, we took over the planet. Now there's lots of humans who haven't ever faced serious challenges (by previous standards of everyday survival), and they need to feel the drama and triumph humans are programmed for even without the actual life threatening events that used to prompt those feelings. So for many, there's always going to be an imminent apocalypse th…

I don't believe in this perspective. I think most people are sick of it (and would live healthier lives if they were allowed to focus more attention on their immediate surroundings) but that it keeps being refueled by profit desperate news corporations.

If they were sick of it, they wouldn’t lap it up. People like drama. If they didn’t we wouldn’t have reality TV

Re: The case against crisis-mongering

#65

Post by luffapi » Sat, Aug 14, 2021, 4:32 PM UTC

h2odragon wrote: post #21

Humans are built to survive adversity. We got so good at it, we took over the planet. Now there's lots of humans who haven't ever faced serious challenges (by previous standards of everyday survival), and they need to feel the drama and triumph humans are programmed for even without the actual life threatening events that used to prompt those feelings. So for many, there's always going to be an imminent apocalypse th…

Humans are built to progress technologically and socially. It would be weird and unnatural if people didn’t want things to improve. It doesn’t matter how bad things were in the past. Your argument is a bit like saying we shouldn’t work on new CPUs because what we have now is so much better than an abacus.

Re: The case against crisis-mongering

#66

Post by namdnay » Sat, Aug 14, 2021, 4:36 PM UTC

OrvalWintermute wrote: post #49

minikites wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is your opinion on liberals being compared to Soviet and Chinese communists?

are we talking about someone that believes in free speech, a free press, private property, the Rule of Law, opposes cancel-culture, believes in social policies, free elections, Separation of church & State, supports a progressive taxation, abhors violence as a way to change govt, and generally supports the constitution? Or, are we talking about someone that believes in controlled/regulated speech, a controlled press,…

What wrong with “law as a living construct”? So only the bill of rights is valid and we should drop the other amendments?

Re: The case against crisis-mongering

#67

Post by SavantIdiot » Sat, Aug 14, 2021, 4:38 PM UTC

I had a man in an nazi costume point a gun at me during a Portland protest.

How could I possibly be "over-exaggerating"? Do I need to be dead? Would that make the author approve of my experience?

OP can stuff his privilege. This is yet another of example of "Well, everything is fine for -ME-, why doesn't everyone else just relax since you're all the same anyway..."

Re: The case against crisis-mongering

#68

Post by tvirosi » Sat, Aug 14, 2021, 4:38 PM UTC

isoskeles wrote: post #57

tvirosi wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't believe in this perspective. I think most people are sick of it (and would live healthier lives if they were allowed to focus more attention on their immediate surroundings) but that it keeps being refueled by profit desperate news corporations.

If most people were truly sick of it, there would be no market for news corporations to exploit. People are also “allowed” to focus their attention on whatever they want. It seems like you’re saying we are powerless to ignore the news, although I am curious if you mean something else.

People are "allowed" to ignore drugs and nicotine but it's pretty hard and culture and laws help us constrain the lower bound will power you have to have in order to live a life. I'm not necessarily saying drugs and news addiction are as strong or as destructive but there should probably be some "let's act in a way that's good for the public" ideas floating around rather than pure "the free hand means it's moral" motivated greed.

Re: The case against crisis-mongering

#69

Post by filoleg » Sat, Aug 14, 2021, 4:41 PM UTC

namdnay wrote: post #64

tvirosi wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't believe in this perspective. I think most people are sick of it (and would live healthier lives if they were allowed to focus more attention on their immediate surroundings) but that it keeps being refueled by profit desperate news corporations.

If they were sick of it, they wouldn’t lap it up. People like drama. If they didn’t we wouldn’t have reality TV

Yeah, it reminds me of the anecdotal phenomenon I’ve observed, that the kind of people to say “god, i just haaate getting involved in drama in general” are the ones to be most likely to stir up that drama in the first place.

Re: The case against crisis-mongering

#70

Post by luffapi » Sat, Aug 14, 2021, 4:42 PM UTC

OrvalWintermute wrote: post #49

minikites wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is your opinion on liberals being compared to Soviet and Chinese communists?

are we talking about someone that believes in free speech, a free press, private property, the Rule of Law, opposes cancel-culture, believes in social policies, free elections, Separation of church & State, supports a progressive taxation, abhors violence as a way to change govt, and generally supports the constitution? Or, are we talking about someone that believes in controlled/regulated speech, a controlled press,…

Both your personas are oddly constructed and not really representative of a political quadrant with state-individual empowerment on the vertical access and state backed private property on the horizontal.

Free speech, reduction of private property, dissolution of centralized state and wealth redistribution are all very classic bottom left (anarchist) principles for instance.

I would think anyone below the center line vertically (so anarchists to free market libertarians) would support what you call “cancel culture” since is a powerful form of direct action.