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Time to Take a Stand

blog.samaltman.com

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Re: Time to Take a Stand

#651

Post by anon1385 »

zo1 wrote: post #552
stonogo wrote: post #352

You have directly caused my wife's parents to miss the birth of their first grandchild, and worse things I won't name because they would personally identify me, by electing an idiot who is terrified of fictional terrorists. You are a bad person, and I don't care whether you appreciate knowing it or not. I don't really give a shit what you think of Hillary, because she did not needlessly block my family from coming to…

I'm disappointed I'm not a citizen and couldn't vote for Trump. I wonder how opinion-widening it would be if a terrorist attack victim's family member came on here to respond to you. There are bigger things to consider other than minor inconveniences.

I wonder how much your opinions would be widened if you learned about the extent of terrorism during the troubles in Northern Ireland[1], and how that conflict was ended[2].

In many ways the Good Friday Agreement is incomprehensible to people outside Northern Ireland. How could they forgive the other side for what they did? Release prisoners that were know to be paramilitary murderers?

The cries of Trump supporters are not the cries of victims of terrorist violence. They are the cries of people who have never seen terrorism in their lives, never mind the kind of repeated and sustained terrorist attacks that threaten the entire fabric of a country.

If you want to respect the victims of terrorist attacks then you should let them speak for themselves and don't assume to know what their response would be.

You say there are bigger things, but it's peace and compassion that is the biggest thing of all. Tit for tat violence isn't something we should aim for, it's something we should aim to rise above.

[1] the graph here should put it into context: https://www.statista.com/chart/4093/people-killed-by-terrori... much all the UK deaths on that graph are related to Northern Ireland, with the exception of Lockerbie in 88 and London in 05.

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_Friday_Agreement

Re: Time to Take a Stand

#652

Post by strken »

gizmo wrote: post #163
oh_sigh wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you rather have a job and a racist in power, or no job and a person isn't racist in power? I believe you are operating on a higher level of the Maslow hierarchy of needs than many people if your primary concern is about equality, and not about food, shelter, and a job.

Minorities on average earn less, have less job security and despite this they utterly rejected Trump and his hateful platform. Trump voters also weren't the most economically desperate, those people voted Clinton. Trump did well among solidly middle class white people in rural areas. So no, Trump didn't get elected because people desperate for a job were willing to overlook his hate.

So no, Trump didn't get elected because people desperate for a job were willing to overlook his hate.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/11/08/us/politics/e...

Check out the swings in the race section. If there hadn't been a massive swing towards him from blacks and hispanics, he might not have won.

Re: Time to Take a Stand

#653

Post by smackfu »

artursapek wrote: post #156
burkaman wrote: post #16

In case anyone is still skeptical that this is really a Muslim ban and not just a blanket ban on refugees and immigrants, note that Trump has said he will give priority to Christian refugees: http://www1.cbn.com/thebrodyfile/archive/2017/01/27/brody-fi...

I was talking about this last night with my wife and she mentioned she saw some statistic showing Christians were, until now, de-prioritized and actually given refugee status at a disproportionately low rate compared to their population in the ME. I don't have a source, but thought this might be useful to bring up. It sounded like this was why he did that.

A statistic that someone else saw does seem like the kind of rationale that Trump uses.

Re: Time to Take a Stand

#654

Post by pfarnsworth »

wcummings wrote: post #285
pfarnsworth wrote: post #26

I am affected personally by this. I have extended family members from Indonesia and Malaysia in the US who are still on Green Card. Although those countries aren't affected by the ban, who knows when Trump will decide to change his mind at his whim. But the time for talk has passed. I don't think very much is going to happen because Trump is empowered by his election victory, and he won't listen to anyone. Has he eve…

>Democrats are just as bad as the Republicans. This false equivalence convinced people to vote for Trump. No way Hillary would have implemented this ban.

You are completely incorrect. Empirically, the country voted with a nearly 50/50 split between the two candidates, meaning the country felt both candidates were "just as bad". Just because you have your own personal biases doesn't actually make them right, the data does.

Re: Time to Take a Stand

#655

Post by general_ai »

scarmig wrote: post #619
010a wrote: post #613

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Both parties have had a _significant_ hand in it, dating back to GHWB and Clinton. Don't you forgot that either, lest we remember Obama as anything other than a President who liked droning brown people.

You're shifting the goalposts, from the ridiculous assertion that Democrats destabilized the Middle East to "both parties have had bad policies in the Middle East." But let's run with it. Let's say that Obama killed 5k people with drones. This is a large overestimation, but let's compare. GWB killed over half a million Iraqis for no reason, and counting. He's indirectly responsible for the rise of ISIS in a way that…

That's just with drones, and I'd say it's a very conservative number. He also funded and armed "moderate opposition" in Syria, al quaeda associted groups (Jabhat al-Nusra and others) there, and helped topple several governments. This displaced millions and killed hundreds of thousands.

Here's Hillary laughing about it: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Fgcd1ghag5Y

Re: Time to Take a Stand

#656

Post by Retra »

mark_l_watson wrote: post #622
jannotti wrote: post #584

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He was reporting a deed. You are accepting Paula Jones comments as fact of a deed, but you are not accepting Trump's own self-report of his behavior as a deed. Remember that the tape also contained him saying things like, "I can't resist beautiful, I just kiss", and "They let you get away with it". These are not abstract tasteless comments, like saying something tasteless about a woman's body. These are self-reported…

OK, fair enough about Trump. Easy for me to say since I don't like him and didn't vote for him. That said, it does seem like Bill Clinton's actions were worse. He paid a ton of money to settle the Jones lawsuit, IIRC.

Why does it even matter? Nobody is letting Bill Clinton run the country.

Re: Time to Take a Stand

#657

Post by CalChris »

mark_l_watson wrote: post #622
jannotti wrote: post #584

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He was reporting a deed. You are accepting Paula Jones comments as fact of a deed, but you are not accepting Trump's own self-report of his behavior as a deed. Remember that the tape also contained him saying things like, "I can't resist beautiful, I just kiss", and "They let you get away with it". These are not abstract tasteless comments, like saying something tasteless about a woman's body. These are self-reported…

OK, fair enough about Trump. Easy for me to say since I don't like him and didn't vote for him. That said, it does seem like Bill Clinton's actions were worse. He paid a ton of money to settle the Jones lawsuit, IIRC.

Clinton paid $850,000 without admitting liability to make a lawsuit go away. Jones' lawsuit was bankrolled by Republicans.

Equivocating what Trump bragged about with what Clinton was only accused of is a sad argument.

Re: Time to Take a Stand

#658

Post by jacobian »

idlewords wrote: post #628
_m8fo wrote: post #7

Why is that all of these posts saying to "take a stand" fail to explain the political process? I'll just quote myself here. If you want to help stop trump the most effective ways are to: 1. Call - Local congresspeople (http://www.house.gov/representatives/find/) - Senators (https://www.senate.gov/senators/contact/) - Local officials (https://www.usa.gov/elected-officials) 2. Participate - Get involved in local electi…

Right now the most important thing you can do is donate money. Consider starting here: ACLU (state offices especially) Council on American-Islamic Relations (state offices especially) National Immigration Law Center

Can you expand on why donating to state offices is more effective? And, which states?

Re: Time to Take a Stand

#659

Post by olalonde »

emehrkay wrote: post #573
olalonde wrote: post #516

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Fuck them This is the same flavor of bigotry and ignorance that leads people to believe that all immigrants or black people are dangerous criminals. Not everyone who voted for Trump supports all of his positions. Hell, it wouldn't surprise me if a good chunk of his voters disagree with the majority of his positions, such is the nature of a two-party system.

How is me saying "fuck people who voted for bigotry because it won't affect them" a "flavor" of bigotry? Are you saying that white Americans would had been okay with Obama campaigning on harsher policing for white people and their kids because he also spoke about lowering taxes or giving everyone access to healthcare? You people keep coddling these bigots or bigot-ajecent people and telling us, the people most affect…

> How is me saying "fuck people who voted for bigotry because it won't affect them" a "flavor" of bigotry?

Because you are indiscriminately labelling all Trump voters as racists.

> Are you saying that white Americans would had been okay with Obama campaigning on harsher policing for white people and their kids because he also spoke about lowering taxes or giving everyone access to healthcare?

I do believe many white Americans would still have voted for him, if they felt the alternative was worse or felt like harsher policing was a small price to pay for universal healthcare.

> You people keep coddling these bigots or bigot-ajecent people and telling us, the people most affected, to treat them with kid gloves.

In my defense, I'll probably be more affected than you (e.g. I stand to lose my visa if Trump does re-negotiate NAFTA like he said he would). I'm also what you might call an anti-nationalist and am generally in favor of free movement across borders. Still, I can see valid, non-racist, reasons people might have voted for him.

Finally, I'm not trying to coddle people who voted for Trump. I don't want you to show them good will or have sympathy for them. I just want you to be more rational about this because I'm tired of seeing Americans talk past each other. People who voted for Trump did so for a variety of reasons and while you might not convince the racists amongst them, you might still have a chance of gaining support from the rest (if you stop insulting them).

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