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We Are Experiencing Definitional Collapse

freddiedeboer.substack.com

41–48 of 48 posts

Re: We Are Experiencing Definitional Collapse

#41
post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We’re not slaves to our basest instincts. Individually, yes, but only in a limited fashion. But with so many paths for tribalism, with each taking so much effort to bring under our conscious control, that the average person only seems to change the direction of their tribalism rather than bringing tribalism itself under control.

> in a limited fashion. With the proviso that everything human is subject to limitation, I don’t accept the same degree of determinism that you appear to accept. An only marginally curtailed tribalism doesn’t resemble English Common Law, the Bill of Rights, the Geneva Convention etc, even in their imperfect implementations. We can do better and sure as heck don’t need to backslide.

> I don’t accept the same degree of determinism that you appear to accept.

I have argued my point poorly, I think, to have left you with the sense I am throwing up my hands and saying fighting tribalism is pointless.

Probably a discussion for another day as I need to focus on work right now.

Re: We Are Experiencing Definitional Collapse

#42
post #18

It's Authoritarianism in disguise. Co-opt the symbols that are antithetical to your cause and turn them to your own. It's a tragic and pathetic point of human civilization. People gathering behind a symbol that historically represents the opposite of what they are fighting for whilst totally naive to the irony. Children who are adults but can't think for themselves like adults so they need a parental figure in the fo…

After the era of Trump and now this current era of book banning and preventing race-based topics in schools (among other things), I’m not sure how you can say the Authoritarianism comes from the left… unless you’re talking about temporary measures that were taken due to a global pandemic.

Mostly false. Missing context.

People are now stuck in hyperreality [1] with an inability to tell the difference between the simulation of reality (news, social media) and actual objective physical reality.

Hyperreality, in semiotics and postmodernism, is an inability of consciousness to distinguish reality from a simulation of reality, especially in technologically advanced postmodern societies. Hyperreality is seen as a condition in which what is real and what is fiction are seamlessly blended together so that there is no clear distinction between where one ends and the other begins.

Consume a diverse set of news media. If your watching a corporate news network you're most certainly being lied to more than you'd believe.

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperreality

Re: We Are Experiencing Definitional Collapse

#44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, are we even experiencing the same world? Democrats are in favour of giving the government lockdown power because of a flu with sub 1% mortality rate, promote cancel culture, promote racial discrimination ("positive discrimination") and limits freedom of speech ("hate speech"). 20 years ago I was often debating against republicans who were against gay marriage and cannabis legalisation. Oh, how the tables have tu…

I would say the Democrats were making it up if the USA were the only country experiencing this pandemic. Unfortunately, I think Trump was lying when he called it the Democrat hoax virus and it would disappear two weeks after Biden was elected.

> I think Trump was lying when he called it the Democrat hoax virus

Trump never said that: https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/campaign-press-rel...

Re: We Are Experiencing Definitional Collapse

#46
post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

After the era of Trump and now this current era of book banning and preventing race-based topics in schools (among other things), I’m not sure how you can say the Authoritarianism comes from the left… unless you’re talking about temporary measures that were taken due to a global pandemic.

Mostly false. Missing context. People are now stuck in hyperreality [1] with an inability to tell the difference between the simulation of reality (news, social media) and actual objective physical reality. Hyperreality, in semiotics and postmodernism, is an inability of consciousness to distinguish reality from a simulation of reality, especially in technologically advanced postmodern societies. Hyperreality is seen…

I’m not sure how that relates to this at all? If you think anything I wrote is untrue then point out which specific items.

Re: We Are Experiencing Definitional Collapse

#47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would say the Democrats were making it up if the USA were the only country experiencing this pandemic. Unfortunately, I think Trump was lying when he called it the Democrat hoax virus and it would disappear two weeks after Biden was elected.

> I think Trump was lying when he called it the Democrat hoax virus Trump never said that: https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/campaign-press-rel...

Well he did say “this is their new hoax” (at 7:30 in this speech: https://youtu.be/H2BO_2bnx3k).

And yeah, he wasn’t talking about the virus itself, but about how the democrats were turning it into a big issue… which of course they turned out to be right about. This is the same speech where he bragged that there were no American deaths, and now there are over a million.

Re: We Are Experiencing Definitional Collapse

#48
post #35
post #5

This article smells like cynicism pretending to be self-congratulating intelligence. Painting whole swathes of groups to be all the same ("Liberals cheer the FBI and CIA, call for limitless censorship, and insist on blind faith in tech giants and pharmaceutical companies. Conservatives have cast off Christianity, their north star, the orienting principle of all they believed, discarding it offhandedly like a gum wrap…

Perfectly put. Without the reductionism the whole article falls apart.

Is not the point of the article that people tend to be extremely reductionisty though?
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