101–110 of 124 posts
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Taking a stance does nothing in either of these scenarios except send signals to people.
So they shouldn’t extend health care benefits to an employees partners when they couldn’t legally get married? Even paying for birth control as part of a woman’s health care benefit is consider political
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I understand your viewpoint, but can't agree with you. Dismissing everything as just politics and giving every viewpoint the same validity would mean that "rape should be legal" and "raising the tax by 1%" are equally valid positions or opinions to hold. Sure, there may be people which would agree with that assessment and calling one viewpoint extreme might seem be divisive to you or ignoring that it's just politics.…
A non straw man of your first argument would be the definition of “rape.” Most people believe forced sex should be illegal. But rape also means consent, in America, so you get “statutory” rape, and Romeo and Juliet laws, and different handling of intoxication all over the world. If two people are black out drunk, can either rape the other if they ostensibly agreed while intoxicated? Does it matter the sex of the part…
I try to state that some positions are so out-there (I'm sorry for a lack of a better term) that they are extreme and not part of sane or normal (for a lack of a better term) political discourse. That doesn't mean that one shouldn't try to talk with these people or shun them. Just that pretending they are normal is dangerous. Politicians insisting 1+1 equals 3 is extreme but maybe not harmful, someone insisting Jews are not people got 6 million killed. That's why I can't agree that it's just politics, if such a position can have real dangerous and harmful implications. I hope I could make my point more clear.
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Inaction is absolutely complicity. By doing and saying nothing you're stating the issue doesn't matter enough to you to not let it continue.
That's a huge reach. People aren't entitled to have everyone else take personal risks on their behalf. That is why it is worthy of respect when people do stick their necks out for others. And yes, standing up against injustice is very often a personal risk.
Businesses are supposed to be separate entities from the individuals who own them. I don't understand why people think businesses need to be political. If that's the case then just start your own Political Action Committee.
Just remember that politics isn’t everything.
And yet, Nike's sales surged when they brought on Kaepernick > Despite Fox News and parts of the social mediasphere predicting the Swoosh’s downfall, the company claimed $163 million in earned media, a $6 billion brand value increase, and a 31% boost in sales. https://www.fastcompany.com/90399316/one-year-later-what-did...
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That's a huge reach. People aren't entitled to have everyone else take personal risks on their behalf. That is why it is worthy of respect when people do stick their necks out for others. And yes, standing up against injustice is very often a personal risk.
That's very individualistic. The reality is that we all take part in the same system whether we like it or not.
Is a person obligated to risk their own position in that system for the sake of someone else? Legally, no. In many ethical systems, also no.
You claimed that people who are not taking action are complicit. Often that is absolutely not the case. Often in fact those people are helpless, bound by their own situations.
Let's take the example of a mugging. You walk past an alley, and you see someone pointing a gun at another person. Are you obligated to intervene? Of course not. You might be able to save that person's life or defuse the situation but you also just might get killed and accomplish nothing.
Let's take another example. Workplace bullying. You witness a person who is being very aggressive to a coworker, giving insults and maybe even being physical. Do you intervene? Of course you do, right?
Now imagine you have kids. Your spouse recently lost their job, you can't afford to also lose yours. Surely you wouldn't be risking your job by speaking up about this bullying right? Except the bully is your boss. And he's good friends with the CEO. But that's what HR is for right? You make an anonymous tip to HR. And nothing happens because HR won't act on an anonymous tip. So you should talk to them in person right? But that's putting yourself at risk and boy you really can't lose your job.
Helpless. Not malicious.
If I were running a business ethically, I'd want to mute my criticism of politics, including fairly extreme ones. Partisanship is tearing the world apart. I want people with different viewpoints to interact. That's the only way to address them. If we don't work together and we don't shop together, we'll grow more polarized as a result. Democracy isn't a battle, and you win by convincing people, and not by beating the…
The problem I find is convincing Republicans to even talk and think about the consequences of something. Abortion for example, they just hardline "no". It's very exhausting.
You note below that you’re from PA/OH, presumably places where democrats are used to having their beliefs challenged and republicans aren’t. The situation is quite the opposite in for example DC. (And those folks are much more educated than the folks where you’re from, and I’d expect a higher level of meta-cognition, but alas.)
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>> Right now there is only one really extreme "side" in the U.S. I urge you to consider that this attitude is the very problem under discussion.
If we look back at my example. Would you say the same thing to the Ukrainian making that point? If not, we agree that there is a line at which politics end and extremism begins, which has nothing to do with attitude. Personally, I find it obvious that Republicans have crossed that line. Maybe they will come back, maybe not. This also doesn't mean, one shouldn't try to discuss or interact with them, but be wary of wha…
Republicans have just inherited a bunch of low-information voters in the Midwest that used to vote Democrat, and have kind of lost control of them. The one’s going on about Diebold machines and whatnot in 2004. I’ve had a bunch of weird ass conversations with Joe Rogan type democrats over the years. The lengths establishment republicans have to go to appease them are disconcerting. But Trump voters remind me a lot of the “common people” back in my home country of Bangladesh, not anything novel.
By contrast, the ideologies that have taken hold among progressive elite democrats are alarming precisely because of who has embraced those ideas. This happened at my law school, for example: https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/northwestern-univers.... These are people with influence and power who can actually change society, and we can’t vote for them or anything! They want to run a large scale experiment on American culture, and unlike some unemployed veteran, they have the resources and positions to make those changes whether they rest of us like it or not. That’s way scarier.
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Guns "Freedom of speech" to say _whatever_ on twitter etc Vaccines being good Anything that helps another person is "socialism" Not sure about a poll of 1300 people, have you tried changing a hardline Republican's mind? I dunno, I grew up in PA/OH so I have a lot of republican friends. I gave up trying to show them the other side.
Spoiler alert: I'm probably what you'd call a hard line Republican That said, yes, I've changed the minds of people with fixed ideals, many times, over several decades. Step one is to listen to them without trying to. > Guns What is the mindset that needs to be changed? Republicans, as a bloc, support the right of anybody of sound mind and character (presumptive prerequisites for being part of a potential [and hopefu…
And yet, being a Republican voter means implicitly endorsing the views of the Republican party. So maybe this chasm doesn't matter. If you vote for a person who explicitly is against climate change, LGBTQ+ rights, etc., then that says something about your own personal philosophy.
> They're pretty flexible about restricting edge cases
The RNC is most certainly not however. No matter how many kids die in school shootings, any attempt to seriously tighten up the rules is met with a chorus of "they're taking our guns!". Getting anything passed took us.. how many school shootings?
> Republicans want to not be removed from a pseudo-public forum for holding a minority opinion - surely you can empathize with that framing?
Well, that framing is pretty disingenuous. And Republicans generally support that businesses should be able to serve whoever they want. Labelling a private company's platform as a pseudo-public forum is also at odds with the general ethos of "don't let the government tell me what to do". On top of this, the general outrage about deplatforming often entirely ignores the series of platform rule-breaking that leads up to said deplatforming.. and yet then if an unarmed black person gets killed by a cop, you'll so often hear cries of "just follow the law" coming from the right side.
In short, I consistently see Republican politicians / pundits / voters completely abandon their ideals the moment it begins to personally affect them. (Note: this until-it-affects-me probably explains the party's platform about LGBTQ+ issues, racial issues, etc.)
> OK I'm beginning to think you're not being honest with your experiences
Most of my family members, as the whole, are what I would call "reasonable republicans" who generally care about the principles of small government and not interfering too much with the economy. And yet some of them too occasionally fall into the Fox News inspired trap of labeling anything related to social welfare as "socialism". It's a real thing man.
If I were running a business ethically, I'd want to mute my criticism of politics, including fairly extreme ones. Partisanship is tearing the world apart. I want people with different viewpoints to interact. That's the only way to address them. If we don't work together and we don't shop together, we'll grow more polarized as a result. Democracy isn't a battle, and you win by convincing people, and not by beating the…
I agree with you that partisanship and polarization are making it worse. However, you imply that "both sides" are just as extreme, but that isn't often the case. Let's exaggerate it to: "Russians buy sneakers too" or "Taliban are religious too" or something alike. A business saying "We want the Russian military and the Ukrainian civilians to interact, share different viewpoints and prevent partisanship" would sound r…
Your tactics don't work and lead to harm.
Let's work from your Taliban example. The extreme pressure placed on the Taliban does nothing to move them out of power, but it does lead to mass famine in Afghanistan, for people who don't deserve it. Last Week Tonight with John Oliver just did an episode. They're in power. They should have their accounts unfrozen. Aid organizations should be able to help people in Afghanistan.
Let's work from you Ukraine example. What change would you like to see? Sanctions on Russia have a few impacts:
1. They reduce Russia's ability to produce weapons
2. They isolate people from the West and make them more vulnerable to propaganda
3. They hurt 140 million people, most of whom didn't ask for the war
4. They support Putin's message that the West is out to get Russia
... and so on. When the war started, I pushed for much more military aid than was provided, but also for weaker and more targetted sanctions.
The point is that simply "taking a stance" and lashing out doesn't lead to change. There need to be tactics involved, and one needs to think through impact.
The impact of having "blue" and "red" businesses, communities, and schools is very, very negative. One side needs to take a stance on saving baby's lives, and another on women's rights. That's fine. One needs to take a stance on respecting the Bill of Rights, and the second on reducing gun violence. That's okay too. However, there are appropriate forums in which to take those stances so we don't all just end up hating each other, and so where possible, reasonable compromises can be found.