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How can we break our addiction to contempt?

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Re: How can we break our addiction to contempt?

#161

Post by maccolgan »

newbie789 wrote: post #82

>…He has come to believe there is only one weapon that can defeat our extreme political polarization: love. Oh my, what a silly way to pitch a possible reader on your book. There is a (VERY conservative) town in my state where every single employee of the local department of transportation has quit over the vaccine mandate. Now the former employees and their conservative allies are gleefully posting about how “the li…

If I am to believe that "every single employee of the local department of transportation" are somehow right in a (counterfactual?) different timeline, what are they really supposed to do? Take the vaccine for a greater cause and their worst dreams turn true?

It's not the employees that are destroying the aforementioned rural town, it's the DOT doing blatantly undemocratic things that their employees won't approve.

Re: How can we break our addiction to contempt?

#162

Post by musicale »

coldtea wrote: post #92
tombert wrote: post #20

At some level I will be a permanent victim of movies and media, and as such there are absolutely politicians that I hate, but I've been trying to acknowledge to myself that, generally speaking, most of their voters mean well [1], even if they are voting for politicians that I think are disgusting. As such, I've tried to not "hate" them, even if I don't particularly like a good chunk of them either. [1] Though I have…

> but I've been trying to acknowledge to myself that, generally speaking, most of their voters mean well [1], even if they are voting for politicians that I think are disgusting. Some remedies: (1) Actually talk to those voters and get to know them at a human level, don't just group them as an undefined mass of "people who vote badly". (2) Try a mental game where you imagine your side has the wrong arguments or is ta…

> (2) Note that the Wall is established on land (TX, NM, FL, AZ, CA) stolen from the very country its people tries to keep out. It's even in the names of the states, all Spanish. Who are you fooling?

Well without the Gadsden purchase, Yuma and Tucson would still be in Mexico.

I appreciate when institutions (such as universities) ceremonially acknowledge the indigenous people whose land they occupy and never intend to return or pay rent on (often while running their own housing and office rental businesses on top of it.)

Re: How can we break our addiction to contempt?

#163

Post by rufus_foreman »

md8z wrote: post #106
etherael wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isnt this argument predicated on the supposition that the only reason they are opposed to coercive experimental gene therapy is because they want to "own the libs?" I mean, maybe that's right but it seems unlikely when there are other much more obvious things to explain the reasons for the actions in question. That they then post hoc express schadenfreude for the party who they perceive to be responsible for the situ…

I'm not sure if you're saying this is your opinion, but just to be clear: Vaccine mandates are not coercive, the vaccine is not experimental, and vaccines in general are not gene therapy. To elaborate: You can consider work vaccine mandates to be similar to any other job requirement. The COVID vaccines have received a huge amount of studies and trials. And "gene therapy" usually refers to use of things like CRISPR-Ca…

>> mandates are not coercive

Wait, hold on. That's an actual argument you are making and not satire?

"Mandates are not coercive", that's a thought that actually went through your head and you thought, "Hmm, that sounds like a reasonable argument"?

Re: How can we break our addiction to contempt?

#164

Post by iammisc »

eropple wrote: post #160
DFHippie wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Portland decided to encourage blacks to get vaccinated by putting ads of black drag queens up. This is called nutpicking. You claim this example is representative (and you claim you have adequately represented who did what for what purpose). I claim it is confirmation bias. We could settle this with statistics. > The left screamed for years about Trump's manner of speech (not his content, simple the manner). For ex…

> the right assumes that the positions people on the left take are insincere "virtue signaling" because they can't believe someone would sincerely hold these positions. The left knows that arguing policy with statistics, studies, and appeals to claimed national values isn't going to work with most of the right, but they don't really have a better strategy. This is one of the more beautifully succinct ways I know of t…

As a former liberal, I'm not rending anything. I just no longer buy the prevailing liberal narratives.

Only extremists describe those they disagree with as immoral people. I would never think that of my liberal friends or family. Misguided? Yes. Misinformed? Sometimes. Evil? Not any more than anyone else. It's the last point most leftists fail to understand in their zealotry.

Re: How can we break our addiction to contempt?

#165

Post by iammisc »

CalChris wrote: post #159
iammisc wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You start off with a premise that is not immediately obvious. You claim right-wing news outlets are jeopardizing the 'foundation of US democracy', but most right wingers would counter that democracy is not the foundational value of the United States, but rather, individual rights, that even democracy is subservient to the rights of the individual. For example, no matter how many people would vote for such an ability,…

I don't disagree with your description of right wingers saying that individual rights are foundational rather than democracy. I will point out that neoconservatives just spent $6T trying to export democracy to Iraq and Afghanistan rather than individual rights. Indeed, there is no second amendment in the Iraq constitution which we wrote.

Neoconservatives are not a meaningful cohort in the gop at this point. The nomination of Trump was the end of that chapter.

I think most people agree that Afghanistan And Iraq was a terrible idea. At least all the young conservatives do.

And I honestly think we shouldn't read too much into foreign policy. Both parties are happy to support all kinds of regimes that follow all kinds of anti democratic or anti individual rights ideologies, so long as it's in their perceived best interest of America.

Re: How can we break our addiction to contempt?

#166

Post by md8z »

rufus_foreman wrote: post #163
md8z wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure if you're saying this is your opinion, but just to be clear: Vaccine mandates are not coercive, the vaccine is not experimental, and vaccines in general are not gene therapy. To elaborate: You can consider work vaccine mandates to be similar to any other job requirement. The COVID vaccines have received a huge amount of studies and trials. And "gene therapy" usually refers to use of things like CRISPR-Ca…

>> mandates are not coercive Wait, hold on. That's an actual argument you are making and not satire? "Mandates are not coercive", that's a thought that actually went through your head and you thought, "Hmm, that sounds like a reasonable argument"?

Please read my follow up responses where I explain it further. Also your comment doesn't really have anything substantial in it that I can respond to, you may want to note these parts of the HN guidelines:

"Be kind. Don't be snarky. Have curious conversation; don't cross-examine. Please don't fulminate. Please don't sneer, including at the rest of the community."

"Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith."

Re: How can we break our addiction to contempt?

#167

Post by rufus_foreman »

md8z wrote: post #166
rufus_foreman wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> mandates are not coercive Wait, hold on. That's an actual argument you are making and not satire? "Mandates are not coercive", that's a thought that actually went through your head and you thought, "Hmm, that sounds like a reasonable argument"?

Please read my follow up responses where I explain it further. Also your comment doesn't really have anything substantial in it that I can respond to, you may want to note these parts of the HN guidelines: "Be kind. Don't be snarky. Have curious conversation; don't cross-examine. Please don't fulminate. Please don't sneer, including at the rest of the community." "Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretat…

The strongest plausible interpretation of "mandates are not coercive" is very weak.

Re: How can we break our addiction to contempt?

#168

Post by md8z »

rufus_foreman wrote: post #167
md8z wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please read my follow up responses where I explain it further. Also your comment doesn't really have anything substantial in it that I can respond to, you may want to note these parts of the HN guidelines: "Be kind. Don't be snarky. Have curious conversation; don't cross-examine. Please don't fulminate. Please don't sneer, including at the rest of the community." "Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretat…

The strongest plausible interpretation of "mandates are not coercive" is very weak.

Please see my explanations in the follow up responses where I give a stronger interpretation, thanks. Best of luck.

Re: How can we break our addiction to contempt?

#169

Post by etherael »

md8z wrote: post #106
etherael wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isnt this argument predicated on the supposition that the only reason they are opposed to coercive experimental gene therapy is because they want to "own the libs?" I mean, maybe that's right but it seems unlikely when there are other much more obvious things to explain the reasons for the actions in question. That they then post hoc express schadenfreude for the party who they perceive to be responsible for the situ…

I'm not sure if you're saying this is your opinion, but just to be clear: Vaccine mandates are not coercive, the vaccine is not experimental, and vaccines in general are not gene therapy. To elaborate: You can consider work vaccine mandates to be similar to any other job requirement. The COVID vaccines have received a huge amount of studies and trials. And "gene therapy" usually refers to use of things like CRISPR-Ca…

It's not my opinion, it's a fact that;

Mandates are coercive by definition, that's the entire point of them, putting whatever magical word in front of them you like doesn't change that.

The medication to which the "Vaccine mandates" refer is not the same as traditional inactivated virus vaccines, and before this whole fiasco started, was always referred to as what it actually is which is gene therapy.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4817894/

It doesn't matter how great or how well tested these things are, or how reasonable it is to take them, and that I will acknowledge goes into the realm of opinion and given how polluted that discussion is with political barracking yeah I'm not interested in having it at all, the simple underlying fact that they are actually coercive experimental gene therapy is exactly that, pure fact, not opinion at all.

Re: How can we break our addiction to contempt?

#170

Post by [deleted] »

JasonCannon wrote: post #151
the_optimist wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fomenting hatred is so lame.

You'll notice at no point am I saying to hate white men. At all. In fact I'm saying that despite people having valid reasons to not trust white men, we should still stand for them and watch out for their interests to. Which in fact, is the complete opposite of fomenting hatred.

[deleted]
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