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There is an old saying: One becomes more conservative the more one has to conserve.
I voted against Reagan in 1970, I vote for McGovern in 1972 and Carter in 1976. I moved towards the republican party after that. Had good jobs over that period, btw.
Now that I'm retired, maybe it is habit. But I have no doubt that my political beliefs are not hard wired, but the result of life experience.
It's not too hard if you do not adhere to the notion that all of life's problems can and must be solved by the exercise of political power. There's no reason in principle those who believe climate change is a problem cannot compromise among and then act themselves.
So everyone is free to pump as much CO2 into the air as they want, and anyone who doesn't like it can clean it up?
I don't think that's a solution... especially since CO2 is in the atmosphere for 100s of years and it's pretty much impossible to remove it without absolutely enormous technological developments.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Patricius Maximus
Evolution vs. creationism is a scientific rather than a political question, and only intersects with schools; devolution of power can make it easier for each political unit to achieve sufficient consensus on which to teach, and information/education efforts apart from school should be able to successfully combat creationism in the public mind assuming it is false (schoolchildren aren't isolated in school for their whole lives; they do have access to other information).
All you're really doing is creating a superstitious segment of the population who is not only scientifically illiterate, but also harbors a deep paranoia regarding the 'liberal' establishment that is trying to tell them they're wrong.
And at what point do you say 'you can't teach this?'. Before or after they start teaching white supremacy and bomb-making?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Patricius Maximus
As for homosexuality being an abomination, that doesn't need to be within the sphere of political power in the first place; short of violence, people and churches can sanction homosexuality as they see fit.
Which means all marriage is equal and gay marriage should be recognized by the state. I would tend to agree, but I'm not sure you can convince others.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Patricius Maximus
As for all taxation being theft, that one is actually easy; you can easily accept a tax cut in exchange for their acquiescence to some other policy proposal.
What sort of policy proposal would make up for the enormous loss of funds that would render the government too toothless and weak to ever enforce it?
I think the core of a lot of the political disagreement today is in the collectivist vs individualist debate. I would think that a significant portion is based upon your born with personality type, and the other part is due to upbringing and life experience.
This, right here, might be the simplest scale one can judge their own ideology upon.
The further "left" or collectivist you are, the more problems you will believe can and must be solved by government and only government.
The further "right" or individualist you are, the fewer problems you will believe can and must be solved by government and only government.
It really does boil all the way down to that central belief - how much faith do you put in government being able and required to solve life's problems.
Collectivism is about serving the common good, not the government.
If the government doesn't reflect the common good, then collectivists oppose the government.
Leftists can be individualists as well-- egalitarianism doesn't necessarily change who a person is or reject what they have to contribute, it simply rewards a person's contributions differently (eg: intrinsic vs extrinsic rewards; respect, honor and appreciation vs material wealth).
Egalitarianism also provides opportunities to people who wouldn't have them under a more stratified society... since class (and all of the trappings that force people into classes) are a non-issue, the individual isn't discouraged or injured by their socioeconomic standing and is more likely to develop into a productive, well-adjusted individual whose contribution is valued by society, and who feels the psychological benefits of that value. They are also given countless opportunities to develop themselves, and are encouraged to do so.
One of the biggest problems with having discussions like these is people tend to assume that all of these terms fit into one of two all-encompassing categories. They don't.
Some people are definitely not doing much more than routing for their team, but I have noticed you didn't bring up a single example of a political issue where compromise would solve all of our problems. It's really hard to compromise when people believe manmade climate change doesn't exist/isn't a problem, think evolution and creationism are scientific equals, think homosexuality is an abomination, consider all taxation theft, etc.
I suppose being nice to each other might help to keep discussions more civil and possibly prevent them from devolving into trollfests. But when you have threads that are not much more than rehashes of the same liberal plot to take over the world, destroy freedom and cause the apocalypse, there's not really a lot of room for agreement. I truly do think that some people on this board think that liberals are less than human... and the point is always to make fun, not to actually understand.
If you think we should ban these types of threads so that the grown-ups can talk, I'm all for it, but I would expect this forum's membership would decline rapidly if that occurred.
And even if you did bring political discussion back to reality, it definitely won't cause people to suddenly agree. Even the most dedicated academics and intellectuals can't agree on certain concepts, and you suddenly think that people of different intellects and backgrounds will suddenly come together and figure things out on a messageboard?
Then there are issues where people really don't have enough information to make the proper call, or aren't intelligent or educated enough to make the proper decision... and they're not willing to defer to people who are-- mostly because they don't trust them. And then there is the fact that a lot of people can't figure out why their arguments are fallacies, and accuse other people of fallacies when they don't even understand what the fallacy is, or who simply change the topic as soon as they're wrong.
You would have to set up some really hard restrictions on commenting in order to produce a valid debate, but I can only imagine how many people would be upset over that, how busy the mods would be, and how hard it would be to get people to understand that their posts are being deleted because they're fallacious and not because they're so full of truth that they pose a threat to an evil establishment.
It feels good to be charitable and assume that everyone is equal and their opinion is valid, but it's not the truth. Another poster claimed 80% of people supported the Iraq war-- a perfect example of why democracy isn't always a good idea and why people don't always know what's best for them. Of course, it doesn't mean political leaders always know what's best either-- largely because people vote for ideology instead of intelligence or how informed someone is.
Arguments like the one you're making always seem to devolve into 'everyone who has power is bad, everyone who doesn't is good, and all disagreement is merely a product of the bad people corrupting the good'. It's the classic third party position... when someone has little or no power, they can be content to criticize the decisions of the people who do, and when it goes wrong claim that their solution would have been much much better. When times are tough (or perceived as such), people are tempted towards more extreme options... it doesn't mean the extreme options are realistic or deserve equal consideration.
I understand what you are saying, and share your frustrations with many posts I read, some are just plain stupid. Unfortunately, CD seems to be increasingly a place for the most brainwashed to share their hardline, everything is black and white with no in between views. Some people will never be reasoned with, and are best ignored.
There are also some people who have strong beliefs, and reasons for those beliefs. I am certainly not saying we are all going to hold hands, sing kumbaya, suddenly agree on everything, and then all our problems will be solved. I do find if I can put myself in their shoes, and try to understand where they are coming from, even when I disagree lines of communication can be opened. This tends to apply more to the real world than CD, which seems to becoming more and more of an echo chamber.
My main reason for the initial post was about the people who have blindly jumped on the partisan bandwagon, and view politics as a team sport, R=good, D=bad, or vice versa, and with ridiculous ideas based on conservative/liberal hyperbole instead of any actual understanding. I have seen a lot more posters who are unquestionably partisan, and I see our media, AND our politicians encouraging such views. People have to fight against this, it is keeping America stuck. Our representatives are no longer being questioned, they simply have a bunch of followers who blindly support everything they do, even though they are consistently putting the needs of big money above the average people. This has to stop if we are to demand our representatives work for us.
Collectivism is about serving the common good, not the government.
If the government doesn't reflect the common good, then collectivists oppose the government.
Leftists can be individualists as well-- egalitarianism doesn't necessarily change who a person is or reject what they have to contribute, it simply rewards a person's contributions differently (eg: intrinsic vs extrinsic rewards; respect, honor and appreciation vs material wealth).
Egalitarianism also provides opportunities to people who wouldn't have them under a more stratified society... since class (and all of the trappings that force people into classes) are a non-issue, the individual isn't discouraged or injured by their socioeconomic standing and is more likely to develop into a productive, well-adjusted individual whose contribution is valued by society, and who feels the psychological benefits of that value. They are also given countless opportunities to develop themselves, and are encouraged to do so.
One of the biggest problems with having discussions like these is people tend to assume that all of these terms fit into one of two all-encompassing categories. They don't.
In terms of economic thoughts the collectivist/inidiviualist paradigm holds. The more individualist you are, the less willing you will be to redistribute and you will be more reliant on individual contracts. The more collectivist you are, you will be less tolerable of inequalities and the more reliant on social contracts you will be.
Some people are definitely not doing much more than routing for their team, but I have noticed you didn't bring up a single example of a political issue where compromise would solve all of our problems. It's really hard to compromise when people believe manmade climate change doesn't exist/isn't a problem, think evolution and creationism are scientific equals, think homosexuality is an abomination, consider all taxation theft, etc.
I suppose being nice to each other might help to keep discussions more civil and possibly prevent them from devolving into trollfests. But when you have threads that are not much more than rehashes of the same liberal plot to take over the world, destroy freedom and cause the apocalypse, there's not really a lot of room for agreement. I truly do think that some people on this board think that liberals are less than human... and the point is always to make fun, not to actually understand.
If you think we should ban these types of threads so that the grown-ups can talk, I'm all for it, but I would expect this forum's membership would decline rapidly if that occurred.
And even if you did bring political discussion back to reality, it definitely won't cause people to suddenly agree. Even the most dedicated academics and intellectuals can't agree on certain concepts, and you suddenly think that people of different intellects and backgrounds will suddenly come together and figure things out on a messageboard?
Then there are issues where people really don't have enough information to make the proper call, or aren't intelligent or educated enough to make the proper decision... and they're not willing to defer to people who are-- mostly because they don't trust them. And then there is the fact that a lot of people can't figure out why their arguments are fallacies, and accuse other people of fallacies when they don't even understand what the fallacy is, or who simply change the topic as soon as they're wrong.
You would have to set up some really hard restrictions on commenting in order to produce a valid debate, but I can only imagine how many people would be upset over that, how busy the mods would be, and how hard it would be to get people to understand that their posts are being deleted because they're fallacious and not because they're so full of truth that they pose a threat to an evil establishment.
It feels good to be charitable and assume that everyone is equal and their opinion is valid, but it's not the truth. Another poster claimed 80% of people supported the Iraq war-- a perfect example of why democracy isn't always a good idea and why people don't always know what's best for them. Of course, it doesn't mean political leaders always know what's best either-- largely because people vote for ideology instead of intelligence or how informed someone is.
Arguments like the one you're making always seem to devolve into 'everyone who has power is bad, everyone who doesn't is good, and all disagreement is merely a product of the bad people corrupting the good'. It's the classic third party position... when someone has little or no power, they can be content to criticize the decisions of the people who do, and when it goes wrong claim that their solution would have been much much better. When times are tough (or perceived as such), people are tempted towards more extreme options... it doesn't mean the extreme options are realistic or deserve equal consideration.
As for their humor, even most of their own ideological kindred can't relate to it; that's one reason why their ratings are so extremely low.
The political landscape shifts and evolves constantly; the political spectrum of just 40 or 50 years doesn't match well with today's, and the political spectrum of a century ago is very different from our own time's. The specific viewpoints and ideologies that dominate our politics today didn't always exist and they won't always exist, either. Certain political inclinations do appear to be influenced by personality and/or genetic traits, but these can take a wide variety of forms, not just the ones we are accustomed to today.
It's not too hard if you do not adhere to the notion that all of life's problems can and must be solved by the exercise of political power. There's no reason in principle those who believe climate change is a problem cannot compromise among and then act themselves. Evolution vs. creationism is a scientific rather than a political question, and only intersects with schools; devolution of power can make it easier for each political unit to achieve sufficient consensus on which to teach, and information/education efforts apart from school should be able to successfully combat creationism in the public mind assuming it is false (schoolchildren aren't isolated in school for their whole lives; they do have access to other information). As for homosexuality being an abomination, that doesn't need to be within the sphere of political power in the first place; short of violence, people and churches can sanction homosexuality as they see fit. As for all taxation being theft, that one is actually easy; you can easily accept a tax cut in exchange for their acquiescence to some other policy proposal.
Now, whether any given person with those views would be willing to make such a compromise is another question, but creating a compromise or exchange that would conceivably be satisfactory isn't what I'd call "really hard". In order to compromise to act how one wants to, there must be an already-existing consensus that shares one's views; without that it cannot happen within the political sphere, and demonstrates why the political sphere should be (and historically often has been) circumscribed. After all, you being able to act without consensus might sound fine and dandy, but what about your opponents gaining the same power? That approaches the same answer from a different angle.
As for compromising, good political compromise is a proposition that all the negotiating parties view as a net positive; if a compromise will not do good, one should not agree to it. Indeed, if one side views the compromise as a net negative, they won't agree to it, nor would they have any reason to do so.
Great points made. I had to read it over a few times but I get it. Well thought out.
If you don't mind, let me dumb it down a bit. Many of you are well beyond my abilities and have given some really good insight that I will go on to further internalize. But I want to turn it down a notch and get more into the collective thought process.
Let's specifically take the hillary clinton issue. There are some reasonable questions. However, many on the right, keeping in mind the political point scoring, seem to be asking some reasonable questions. Some taking it further than others. But then you have the left, not all, but many of the same contributors and hosts, seem to take this "there is nothing to see here, let's all go home" approach. But these people take this approach with many other topics as they are frequent contributors and hosts on all the media outlets such as James Carvelle.
So where does this come from? Diane Feinstein even said Hillary should speak out. Is it deliberate to protect their party or is it engrained? Some hosts even brought up the fact that many of this isn't spin but rather facts.
People have to fight against this, it is keeping America stuck. Our representatives are no longer being questioned, they simply have a bunch of followers who blindly support everything they do, even though they are consistently putting the needs of big money above the average people. This has to stop if we are to demand our representatives work for us.
And this is a very interesting point. BUT, they obviously have their own beliefs and present their own arguments regarding whichever topic. So these points come from a certain place and I am not totally sure it is a case of being brainwashed. You have some rather competent people blindly following.
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