71–80 of 138 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
MAGA has nothing to do with fiscal conservatism. As in Zero. Nada. Zilch. President Obama was quite fiscally conservative.
...as was Bill Clinton as well!
Republicans are in no shape or form, fiscally conservative. They are anti-tax. But they'll happily spend the seed corn on defense, or rather, on right wing socialism.
Honestly, why don't people keep their politics out of the workplace entirely? Unless you are working at a lobbying firm or whatever, work should be about work, not about being a place to discuss gun rights, abortion, or immigration.
The ultimate irony is that many conservatives will hesitate before commenting on this here, because people don't want to be on the receiving end of a torrent of downvotes.
Anyone who cares about downvotes is a shallow idiot. I can think of more serious consequences, but caring about getting greyed out on HN is not one of them.
I'll talk about emacs and vi instead of politics; what could possibly go wrong?
As a person who tries to uphold gentlemanly behavior, which boils down to trying to make people as comfortable as possible, imagine I found a vi echo chamber, perhaps a vi oriented IRC channel or web discussion board or vim editor marketing team mailing list where in excess of 99% of the people there were avid vi users.
It would be quite rude of me to discuss emacs in their little non-emacs echo chamber. Its simple politeness.
Its interesting that the original social network that being amateur radio had a variety of explicit and assumed codes along the lines of discussion will not involve political or religious topics. Also freemason lodges ban religious and political topics. Any technology that advances enough, eventually bans discussion of politics and religion or descends at absolute best into something like CB radio or graffiti or even worse, the cesspool that is twitter.
In America left wing politics is implicitly a religious belief and right wing politics is explicitly religious (generally Christian) so merely banning individually politics or religion isn't going to permit discussing the other. Also religious belief was arrived it by indoctrination and propaganda not reason or rational thought, therefore no change will occur via reason or rational thought or calm discourse. Presumably that's how the world was centuries ago, leading to the amateur radio code from the (19)10s and ancient freemasonry etc. Everything old is new again...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The problem, of course, is that there's no way to tell from outward appearances what someone believes. A good example of this is the appropriation of Satanic imagery in rock music: few of these bands are theistic or LaVeyan Satanists, most of them are just doing it to send a message. The connotation of pentagrams and upside down crosses is "watch out, I'm evil, I like evil things, etc". Conservative Christians, howev…
> That hat in particular represents (sometimes fanatical) appreciation for a man that liberals believe is doing immense harm to our nation, it's citizens and its image via racist, reactionary and backwards-looking politics. Of course, many people believed that the previous president was doing immense harm to our nation, its citizens and the world at large … but I don't think many were fired for wearing their Hope & C…
FWIW I occasionally express centrist positions at my left-leaning job, I don't get fired or reprimanded. Nor do I get reprimanded for advocating for socialism. I don't think anyone would be either for expressing conservative positions. Maybe I'm naive.
They might, however, face social sanctions or get in an awkward debate if they were arguing that two people on my team should not be allowed in this country as immigrants, or that my gay coworkers shouldn't have the same rights as everyone else. There's obviously going to be a clash of beliefs and they should recognize that. Similarly, if any of us were to make sweeping generalizations about white people, it'd be awkward for the white people on the team, and it might spur a big debate. No one likes to feel attacked, especially at work, so we learn to feel out what's allowed or what's out of bounds and then work with that.
Without a doubt, if one of my coworkers came to me and said "Look, I like working with you but you have to stop shit talking conservatives at work" I'd be more mindful of it and avoid making it awkward. I'm not sure why these men feel that they aren't able to do that.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The problem, of course, is that there's no way to tell from outward appearances what someone believes. A good example of this is the appropriation of Satanic imagery in rock music: few of these bands are theistic or LaVeyan Satanists, most of them are just doing it to send a message. The connotation of pentagrams and upside down crosses is "watch out, I'm evil, I like evil things, etc". Conservative Christians, howev…
> That hat in particular represents (sometimes fanatical) appreciation for a man that liberals believe is doing immense harm to our nation, it's citizens and its image via racist, reactionary and backwards-looking politics. Of course, many people believed that the previous president was doing immense harm to our nation, its citizens and the world at large … but I don't think many were fired for wearing their Hope & C…
http://www.businessinsider.com/voted-for-obama-youre-fired-2...
http://www.allgov.com/news/unusual-news/another-case-of-bein...
http://httpjournalsaolcomjenjer6steph.blogspot.com/2013/02/f...
https://www.salon.com/2012/11/20/8_bosses_who_screwed_their_...
http://joemygod.blogspot.com/2013/01/utah-fired-for-supporti...
Oh, and a bonus:
http://shoebat.com/2015/04/28/teacher-in-georgia-declares-to...
Honestly, why don't people keep their politics out of the workplace entirely? Unless you are working at a lobbying firm or whatever, work should be about work, not about being a place to discuss gun rights, abortion, or immigration.
Because the US is in the middle of a cold civil war that's heating up fast. Denying your enemy employment and therefore bankrupting them is remarkably effective.
Everytime I read one of these viewpoints I hear: 'I think others should be descriminated against and for that I am getting descriminated against? How dare they descriminate against my right to descriminate!'
Don't you think you are being a bigot when you prejudge all conservatives as wanting to discriminate against others?
I think everyone realizes intuitively that there is far more nuance to the world than what we type in a small comment box. I personally don't even have a sufficient vocabulary to constantly describe the nuance -- hedging every phrase in every statement just makes for muddy reading.
I've worked places (not in tech) where I was not allowed to talk about my support for Barack Obama for fear of being shouted down, mocked, or forced to listen to racist diatribes about his history. I have been on the other side of this kind of bullshit. I moved from the small, Midwestern town that harbored these people and their insane beliefs to a liberal, coastal city that "gets" me a little more. I'm happier for i…
I did that recently, moved from the Bay Area to a red state. But, what about the concept of engaging with and challenging people who have different beliefs? People don't really change their minds when you call them a racist, fire them, etc. When I am talking to a liberal who I know wont try to cause problems for me (like getting me fired), I will ask lots of questions. Why do you believe X? What facts support that op…
When I meet informed conservatives, I quietly rejoice because it's so interesting to talk to them. One of my best friends is also a "free market" type guy and we get along amazingly well, even when we talk politics. However, I haven't found many educated people who out-and-out support Donald Trump, and those I have found often express very caustic beliefs that get in the way of polite or fulfilling discussions. Hence, I just don't do it. There's a level of "coming to the center" that those people just won't do with me, so it ends up devolving into a series of fallacies that just don't need to happen.
You can't hide behind "it's just politics" forever.
Why do people voice personal political views at work? Is this a California thing?
"Managers and supervisors can now legally require their workers to participate in politics as a condition of employment. For instance, in most states, managers have the legal right to mandate worker attendance at a political rally for a favored candidate—and fire or punish workers who decline to participate."[1]
"On August 14 th 2012, GOP presidential hopeful Mitt Romney visited an Ohio coal mine to give a speech attacking the energy policies of opponent Barack Obama. A campaign stop such as this one might not seem that unusual in the midst of a heated presidential election. But this event was different, as the owners of the coal mine had told their workers that attendance at the rally would be both mandatory and unpaid." [2]
"Private employers can distribute materials that tell all their workers the company's positions on political issues. And if your boss were to send an email urging you to attend a rally for Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton this weekend, because electing his favorite candidate is 'essential for the future of the company,' legal experts say he'd be within his rights to do it." [3]
[1] http://prospect.org/article/employer-political-coercion-grow...
[2] http://scholar.harvard.edu/files/ahertel/files/empmobilpop.p...
[3] http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/ct-boss-politics-at-w...