Why the past 10 years of American life have been uniquely stupid • Hacker News Board

Re: Why the past 10 years of American life have been uniquely stupid

#501

Post by random314 » Sat, Apr 16, 2022, 6:54 AM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #331

michaelmrose wrote: post #325

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Issues trivial enough for your opponent to disarm by ceding them without society harming consequences make poor wedges. A maximally appropriate wedge is one in which you take a harmful extremist view and present it as righteous without dealing with the results of actually fully getting your way. Abortion has been a great example for decades. Taking away millions of woman's right to choose what to do with their own bo…

> Abortion has been a great example for decades. Taking away millions of woman's right to choose what to do with their own bodies in order to save what are almost entirely insensate lumps of cells I used to believe this too because of America’s awful science education. It wasn’t until I went to the ultrasound appointments for my first kid that I realized how incorrect that was. A 13 week fetus, which under Roe can be…

> But more to the point: if abortion is a manufactured wedge issue, why do people in California care so much about what laws people in Mississippi choose to govern themselves?

Rephrasing - if X is a manufactured wedge issue then why is it a wedge issue? I think you manufactured an unintended tautology!

Re: Why the past 10 years of American life have been uniquely stupid

#502

Post by vt85 » Mon, Apr 18, 2022, 7:24 AM UTC

don_esteban wrote: post #366

luciusdomitius wrote: post #347

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Look. It is a very simple question. The township has a 1 promile property tax. I never pay it and refuse to leave my property. What happens next? You guys wrote 5 walls of text just dodging the easiest question on Earth.

You never leave your property and live a happy life in solitude there until you die of boredom or starvation. Everybody is happy to not have to interact with you anymore. Now stop bringing up absurd examples. Just living in a state exposes you to state violence, e.g. for not obeying the (tax) law. If you wanted a realistic example of non-violent society, there are only few, mostly small remote tribes in deep jungle.…

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Re: Why the past 10 years of American life have been uniquely stupid

#503

Post by da39a3ee » Mon, Apr 18, 2022, 8:17 PM UTC

suction wrote: post #496

da39a3ee wrote: post #387

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Has Germany seen the same rise in young people adopting strongly entrenched positions on racial identity politics and not tolerating a diversity of opinion? E.g are undergraduates trying to ban speakers they disagree with? Can a person under the age of 40 voice agreement with a traditional feminist like JK Rowling without being socially and professionally ostracized?

I have no idea what you are talking about. You sound a bit crazy, to be honest.

You're not familiar with the rise of "cancel culture" in the UK, USA, and Canada, and its association with "progressive" left-wing politics? I would love to not be familiar with that! Where do you live?

Re: Why the past 10 years of American life have been uniquely stupid

#504

Post by da39a3ee » Mon, Apr 18, 2022, 8:18 PM UTC

suction wrote: post #497

da39a3ee wrote: post #448

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not appropriate to downvote this. It was simply a question. A good-faith, politely-made, relevant, question. Please answer it or otherwise contribute substantively if you wish to participate in the subthread. (Don't bother telling me it's against site guidelines to question downvotes; I know that. Just downvote this if you feel the need. The reason I am breaking the site guidelines in this instance is that I sus…

Point out where the good faith was :-D

By "good faith" I mean that I was genuinely and sincerely curious about whether cancel culture etc was more or less common in Germany than in anglophone countries such as UK, USA and Canada. What do you mean by "good faith"?