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@ebuc
I’m not asking your opinion on abortion, I’m asking you if you truly believe that the due process clause of the 14th amendment has anything to do with abortion
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@ebuc
I didn’t mean to bring God in as a moral thing, I meant it as in imagine a scenario where you cannot lie, what do you TRULY believe. Ill ask the same of you, lie detector test with a gun to your head, do you believe that a reasonable interpretation of this clause necessitates abortion rights: “...nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.”
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@oromagi
What’s changed isn’t Texas law, which has always been fucked up, but the Supreme Court majority’s unwillingness to even stay patently unconstitutional state legislation.
Serious question, and I promise I won’t argue with you either way, but do you REALLY believe that abortion is a constitutional right? Like, imagine God Himself is asking you in your heart of hearts if you truly believe that the US constitution, which does not mention abortion whatsoever, guarantees it as a right?
This goes for everyone else in this thread too. The Roe V Wade seems completely absurd decision no matter how you feel about abortion.
“In January 1973, the Supreme Court issued a 7–2 decision ruling that the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution provides a "right to privacy" that protects a pregnant woman's right to choose whether or not to have an abortion.”
That’s…a lot of subtext. If we’re going to read abortion into this clause: “...nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.” the constitution is worth less than toilet paper. And it does increasingly seem to be worth about that
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@zedvictor4
Just clearing up some misconceptions, first Afghanistan war 2001-2020, second Afghanistan war 2020-2021
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It was a glorious victory for the US and we should celebrate it. It was another victory against the radical islamists. We only lost 4,000 men. Far less than World War 2. The war ended when President Trump and the Taliban signed a peace deal in 2020 and caused a ceasefire. Just like we wanted. It was truly peace through strength as President Donald Trump put it.
In 2021, the Second Afghanistan War began, but the US was not part of it to the exception of defending the embassy. Eventually the Taliban won, but we did not lose because were not part of this war. Being the nice country that we are, we helped some Afghans leave.
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@dfss9788
I actually had pretty good financial guidance from my parents who forced me to save a portion of any money I got from a young age and who were so allergic to debt that I grew up thinking we were way poorer than we actually were. But neither of them went to college so they had zero guidance on picking schools/majors, it was pretty much only luck that I ended up picking something that gave me good career prospects. At least where I went to school they spent twelve years saying college college college without providing any guidance on what to do when you got there
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Also what’s really interesting to me is that I know a few people who grew up upper middle class but had the type of parents who think “you’re 18, you’re on your own!” who also made really poor college and career decisions. So these people are going to have grown up upper middle class, spend much of their adult life working class, only to suddenly become upper middle class again when their parents die and they inherit their money. It’ll be really interesting to see what happens with this group in particular because I think that’s a pretty uncommon life path historically
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Some student debt makes sense, too. A college degree is an incredible asset and going like 30 grand into debt for it is 100% worth it so long as you graduate and pick a major where you can secure a job. But there are decisions ignorant and unprepared kids can make that frankly, I am not convinced should even be allowed. The financial difference between the people I know who made the right choices and those who made the wrong ones is frankly unbelievable, I know people in their mid-20s with net worths of well over a hundred thousand dollars, and other people with $80,000 in debt making $17/hr. The inequality within the millennial generation is absolutely breathtaking and I do believe some sympathy for those who made bad choices on subjects they were never provided any guidance on is in order
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I've seen too many of my peers make absolutely ruinous financial decisions. Mostly in regard to student loans, but also credit card debt, buying cars far to expensive for their incomes, paying as much for rent as they are allowed to, etc.
There are always going to be people who make poor choices, but the financial illiteracy of the average student coming out of High School (or really just Americans in general) is appalling. They don't understand compound interest, just how destructive credit card debt is or how powerful even small investments can become given enough time. They don't understand how to invest, how to save for retirement, how to budget. Most importantly, many kids coming out of High School have absolutely no idea what things cost, or what reasonable income and saving expectations are. "Sure I'll be $80,000 in debt but the starting salary in my major is $50,000. I can pay it off in a few years, tops." Uhh...no. That is a decade, if you're lucky. I know people in this EXACT situation, who very foolishly made decisions to go to college out of state for exorbitant tuition when they never would have made that choice if they understood anything about personal finance.
I am convinced that a great many of the people I know would be substantially better off if they had even a rudimentary education on finance. It's absolutely criminal that our society allows 18 year olds with no assets or income sign up for non dischargeable debt that can reach to the six figures without providing them in their TWELVE years of education the information necessary to understand that decision. These kids are the future, if you cripple them at the beginning of their adult lives, the next generation isn't going to materialize at all.
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@Double_R
You're getting piled on in this thread, and I see no reason that our conversation has to eat into either of our Saturday's, so I will let this be my final statement:
The conversation started because you claimed that only the left is interested in "reality." I responded, nah there are dumb people and dumb beliefs on both sides and whatever you think is more important is just subjective. I demonstrated components of the two most important issues to the left, racial justice and covid, where the commonly held viewpoint by leftists is *objectively* wrong. I also showed increasingly unscientific attitudes from leftists, such as wanting to censor dissent--the exact opposite of science!
I would be HIGHLY interested in a survey that asks people objective facts such as "in what years was the civil war fought, and who won", "How many planets orbit the sun?" "What is the chemical compound for water?" "what is the 13th amendment to the US constitution about?" "who was the President before George W. Bush?", etc and see who fares better. I'm genuinely not sure which "side" would do better but I don't think the results would be skewed enough to give anyone bragging rights. So much ignorance in our society
I bug you a lot on this website because I am pretty convinced (~70%) that people like you are going to win in the medium term, and will make the rules that I have to live by during the prime of my life, if not forever. But you're one of the only conventional but highly partisan leftists who is willing to talk instead of just hurl insults or repeat slogans. I'm trying to understand what I'm in for, and I really am learning. I genuinely did not even consider that you wouldn't look at evidence regarding mask mandates because an authority figure supported the mandates. The US really is becoming an authoritarian country, but nobody seems to know the rules yet.
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@Double_R
Hypothetical scenario; You are having serious chest pains. You go to 10 doctors to get looked at. 9 of them tell you that you need surgery. 1 of them tells you it’s not serious and prescribes you medication.Question: What do you think is most reasonable to believe?
Bad example, because if you have chest pains and might need surgery the threat tends to be imminent.
A closer analogy is you have a disease, and 9 out of 10 doctors recommend one treatment, while 1 doctor recommends something different. You have time to make your decision. Do you research it at all, or just go with what most doctors say?
Also Doctors deal with so many patients that they are essentially just human flow charts when it comes to any chronic disease. The consensus is right most of the time, so their advice is typically correct. But when the consensus is wrong, their advice is usually wrong too. There is a long history of bad medical decisions from a critical mass of doctors, see the opiod epidemic, lobotomies, Vioxx, etc. If you are ever hospitalized you MUST be your own advocate
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@Double_R
show me the equivalent on the left of a Donald Trump.
Well since he's among the most unique figures in American political history, having neither served in politics or the military before becoming President, I really can't. There are plenty of left wing politicians that are dishonest even by politician standards, though, Adam Schiff would be a good example. There are plenty of bombastic left wing politicians, such as "The Squad." Worry not...the Democrat establishment is incredibly grey, and they do steer the ship relatively well when it comes to reigning in the excesses of the base. You'll get your Trump before all is said and done, once millennials finally take power things are going to be very interesting
But despite his terrible personnel choices and his embarrassing antics, Trump's term of office was a peaceful and prosperous one, seeing unprecedent economic gains for the working class (https://www.federalreserve.gov/publications/files/scf20.pdf) and a steady but non chaotic drawdown of US military presence abroad, prior to the arrival of a virus that rocked the entire world. I'm happy to defend his policies if not his personality and staffing choices.
Show me the equivalent on the left of “the election was stolen”.
I already did, 2/3rds of Democrats believed that Russia changed the vote tallies in 2016.
Show me the equivalent on the left of “the president wasn’t born in the United States”.
Donald Trump being a Russian asset since 1987 is a cool conspiracy theory https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2018/07/trump-putin-russia-collusion.html
I’m not asking for things the left says that make you feel upset or facts you cherry picked that most liberals never even heard of or don’t give a crap about, I am asking for examples of issues driving left wing politics that flat out ignore reality and/or create a new one out of political convenience.
I gave you several examples, including the left being completely wrong on their assessment of COVID hospitalization risks and their assessment of police shooting demographics. COVID and Racial Justice were the two most important issues to Biden voters in 2020, and yet their understanding of these issues had incredibly serious flaws: https://www.cnn.com/election/2020/exit-polls/president/national-results Climate change is also a big issue on the left, and while they might be "right" in the sense that they believe in it, belief that the end of the human race is imminent is a common sentiment which is not true, and they are more likely to oppose the only way out of fossil fuels, nuclear power. It is far from a scientific mindset. If I'm supposed to be impressed by a group of people not understanding the potential impact of an issue and recommending the wrong policies to fight it, I'm not.
I have been unable to find statistics on it, but I would bet anything that leftists also believe that white people commit more crimes against black people than the other way around (in reality, whites are the victims 90% of the time.) The left wing narrative on race, which is dear to their hearts, is hilariously backwards.
I also showed you extremely powerful, all but overwhelming evidence that forcing children in schools to wear masks, for which the efficacy is questionable, or forcing people to wear masks outside are bad policies supported by large majorities of Democrats, but you refuse to talk about this because an authority figure disagrees. How do you like your steak, btw?
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@Greyparrot
Miss him so much. The man was an intellectual and physical giant. You’ll enjoy this clip from him: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_g1fMs51gZk
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@Greyparrot
For decades the expert consensus was against the theory of plate tectonics. Expert consensus can be wrong especially in an ongoing or politically charged situation.
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@Greyparrot
Yeah that was also in the article I sent him. The authoritarian view of knowledge is so alien to me. I understand defaulting to recommendations at first, but when there is extremely compelling evidence in the other direction you aren’t supposed to consider it?
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@Double_R
Here is another example where Republicans have views objectively closer to reality than Democrats:
26% of Republicans got the correct answer regarding covid hospitalization risk which is 1-5%, compared with 10% of Democrats. 41% of Democrats thought the risk was greater than 50% compared to 28% of republicans. as you can see, neither side did that well. There is plenty of irrationality to go around even among the party of science
Also, do you think I should face legal consequences for disagreeing with the CDC on masking toddlers?
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@Double_R
I’ve already explained this, but I’ll try it another way… all of your criticisms of the left are based on a right wingers point of view. You keep asserting issues that are no where to be found on any prominent left wing news outlet and no where to be found in any significant left wing effort regarding policy. These are issues that the right wing talks about day in and day out only because they need something, anything, to slander the other side in order to stay formidable politically.
All of your opinions are from a left wing point of view. I don’t see many republican politicians saying people shouldn’t get vaccinated and other than Trump I don’t see anyone talking about the election being stolen. Too many Republican politicians do deny climate change so I’ll grant you that one sadly, but it does seem to be fading a bit and it’s hardly a fundamental aspect of conservative advocacy, and the catastrophic narrative seen too often on the left is not exactly rational either. Both sides are chalk full of irrationality and it’s really funny how you won’t admit that. Last time the Democrats lost an election the majority also thought it was stolen…the country is just super polarized now, that’s just probably going to be the reality from now on
Also regarding climate change Democrats are twice as likely as Republicans to oppose nuclear power which is the only realistic way to get away from fissile fuels. Nobody knows anything!
“Overall, the survey found that more U.S. adults oppose increasing the number of nuclear facilities in the United States than support doing so, 45 percent to 32 percent. Republicans were more likely than Democrats to favor expanding the use of nuclear energy in the country, at 46 percent and 23 percent, respectively. Twenty-eight percent of independents backed its expansion”
The best example you’ve came up with in this entire conversation are police shootings. Yet the disparity you’re pointing to is about statistics, which both sides get wrong because almost no one pays attention to statistics on eitger side, so your comparison is already problematic.
A super majority, 80%, of conservatives got the correct answer /:
Ok, let me clarify my statement. The left generally supports censoring speech that is a threat to public safety. It doesn’t have to be someone throwing fists.
We already have exceptions for free speech when it comes to inciting or threatening violence, slander/libel, or threats to public safety, yelling “fire” in a crowded theater being the classic example. And we have had these for an extremely long time, so the leftist move towards censorship is coming from something new. Do you really think the government should be banning debates over lockdowns, the efficacy of certain kinds of masks, or the origin of the virus? That’s science lol
No one on the left gives a cramp crap about Antifa and the left overwhelming disproves of the violence we saw at the summer rallies last year, but like everyone else on the right you just tie it to “the left” and then claim the left is for violence.
Support for political violence is about the same among both sides (https://www.statista.com/chart/23124/political-violence/) and the left has more institutional power so antifa/leftist agitators gets away with a lot more than the equivalent on the right. That’s a topic for another day though. My point is that no side is innocent, contrary to what you claim
Because I’m not interested in being dragged down the rabbit hole of a debate that neither of us knows anything about. You keep saying that the science on masking shows it doesn’t work. That’s really funny because doctors and scientists seem to overwhelmingly disagree with you. The CDC and the FDA disagree with you
If you aren’t willing to be exposed to new information you are on the wrong website. The evidence is robust enough to be conclusive when it comes to outdoor mask mandates or masking toddlers. I couldn’t care less who agrees or disagrees, if you can present evidence that isn’t “so and so says so” I’ll be willing to consider it and possibly change my mind
My first question to you is why do you believe the authors of your articles know better than them?
Because I’ve read the information from both sides and one side clearly has the evidence that is far more compelling. Is your position as someone who claims the mantle of striving for truth really that I need to shut the fuck up and listen to what I’m told, if an authority figure says something it’s automatically right? Please.
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@coal
There's a big military tradition in my family. My father served in the military, and my male cousins on that side were in Afghanistan and Iraq. Both of my moms brothers and all three of her stepbrothers served during Vietnam, some seeing service there and others stateside. My grandfather was a Navy Hospital Corpsman in WWII and Vietnam, and his father served in WWI, where he was wounded. As a kid I was so incredibly proud of this, and I always intended to join the military. I ended up taking a different path, but until the last year or so I always felt some regret. But not now. Not after seeing fuckwits like "General" Milley, seeing how poorly this country is led, and just the complete and utter contempt that the ruling class has for the people.
There are a lot of people in your friends shoes, who are just biding their time until they can take their pensions. Things are definitely going to get a lot worse before they get better, and I really worry about the future when I think who in their right mind would lay down their life for a country that doesn't respect them. Just bleak.
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@coal
Completely agree. We're both old enough to not only have served in that war, but to have completed a tour and then have the war not even be over. I have some family members that served in Afghanistan and Iraq. I don't know what, if anything, they expected to happen at the end but definitely not this. I read this was the deadliest day for the US military in a decade...and this was attempting to leave
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Biden obviously failed to plan for a very obvious possibility, that the official government would rapidly fall, so some of the chaos and bloodshed is obviously on him. Leaving was absolutely the right call, though. The Taliban is calling the shots because there was a war, and they won. It's their country now. Are you really up for round two? Because I'm not. Let's cut our losses and go.
Can you imagine your son being one of the last casualties in Afghanistan? I bet at least one of those 13 dead was in diapers or not even born when 9/11 happened. Hard to explain how thoroughly our ruling class has failed us
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@Greyparrot
I really hope that all of this leads to much needed reform in the school system. I’ve been against the American schooling system ever since I was a kid who realized I wasn’t really learning much other than how to regurgitate things on an exam. One of the most depressing statistics I’ve seen is that, to my surprise, teen suicide went DOWN in 2020. And no, it isn’t because people like lockdowns. School is just that traumatic for some people. Teen suicide rates also crash during the summer months and during Christmas break, in the dead of winter
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@Reece101
I have a personal anecdote about this as well. One of my best friends who is a very moderate conservative is currently getting his PhD in physics, but at this point he is highly likely to drop out and return to industry. Why? Because he just wants to study the hard sciences, but there is incredibly intense social pressure to declare fealty to liberalism. He’s said it is incredibly clear that people like him aren’t wanted there. Just one anecdote but there’s lots of evidence of how conservative academics are discriminated against, never given jobs, or socially ostracized. Why are academics so left leaning? Well, when you drive out anyone else…
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@Double_R
This is a classic fallacy of composition. Just because you can identify flaws in both sides that are of the same category doesn’t make both sides the same, and if that’s how you insist on defining “the same” then it’s a useless term. That’s like arguing that the candy bar thief and the bank robber are the same because they both steal.Again, none of your examples are comparable. None of them are driving left wing politics, and none of them would be defended any prominent left wing politician or left wing media figure. That is not even close to being the case regarding the examples I gave.
You're just asserting they aren't comparable lol. Why not? We've both given cases where there is an objective reality and one party seems to be on the wrong side of it. The "difference" just comes from how an individual values certain things. Narratives on police violence/racial justice and COVID-19 are very important to the left right now?? You're just kinda flailing here.
Censorship has absolutely nothing to do with science, and both issues here are just flat out caricatures. The left isn’t trying to censor “opposing viewpoints”, it’s trying to censor speech that leads to violence. Unfortunately, that type of speech is becoming prominent on the right. But again, nothing to do with science.
The poll said nothing about violence, it talked about "misinformation" which....can mean anything. I mean, social media companies were banning people for talking about the possibility that COVID leaked from a lab, when we now know that this is a distinct possibility /: I don't like government censorship myself, and it worries me that 2/3rds of the party that is highly likely to win long term wants to suppress speech it doesn't like
It's absolutely wild to me that you can attribute political violence as coming exclusively or overwhelmingly from the right after a half decade of antifa violence against Trump supporters and the deadliest wave of riots in half a century last summer. No group is perfect--people are people.
Also, censorship has EVERYTHING to do with science. The scientific method REQUIRES challenge and dissent, no group that thinks people need to stfu and listen to what they are told can claim the mantle of science lol
Forget the rest of the evidence, those three facts alone meet any reasonable definition of collusion. Republicans love to pretend there was no collision by relying on a cartoonish interpretation whereby the only sufficient evidence would be a recording of Trump sitting down with Putin taking direct orders.
Dude even Mueller said there was no collusion lol. But more importantly, you didn't read the article, which detailed several false statements from a prominent dem politician on the subject. Politicians are scum no matter what party
So in your view, following the CDC’s guidelines in the middle of a pandemic is the same as getting your health advice Tucker Carlson. Ok bro.
I have no idea what Tucker Carlson has said about outdoor mask mandates or forcing toddlers and small children to wear masks for eight hours a day, but if he is against those policies and the CDC is for them then yeah his advice would be better because those policies are objectively wrong. I gave you two really short articles that absolutely blow any arguments for them out of the water and you haven't said a single thing against them. Recall that majorities of democrats, the party of science, support both of those things
Never said I was perfect either, but I can tell you what matters to me and what my core principals are about. I despise tribalism and strive to rid myself of it anywhere I find it. I do that by focusing on logic first and building everything on top of that.
What are your core principles? What is your vision for America?
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@Greyparrot
The counter argument will always be that ~300 deaths out of 20 million kids is too much of a risk to allow 20 million kids to run around unmasked.If 20 million masks can save 10 kids a year, then it's worth it!
Covid safetyism. However I don’t think the average person is aware of the statistics on just how little the virus effects children. Honestly we got extremely lucky with this one, a super flu probably would’ve ripped through children
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@RationalMadman
Yeah exactly. It’s a power move, something that comes from a severely distorted sexuality
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@Double_R
I have criticized the left many times on this site including in prior conversations with you, and in my last reply to you I clarified that no one is arguing the left is perfect. You are having a whole conversation in your head.This conversation is about whether both sides are equal. I’m explaining why they are not. Saying one side is worse than the other does not = the other side is perfect.
Your OP in this thread was, and I quote: "Exactly, because the left cares about reality, which is what science sets out to understand." I pointed out, well here is a facet where the left is hilariously wrong about an objective reality, many over estimating police shootings by a factor of 40-400x what actually happens. You counter with three things where large numbers of Republicans have objectively incorrect viewpoints (climate change, vaccines, and the 2020 election being rigged.) I said yep, those are totally irrational and btw, 2/3rds of Dems thought the 2016 election was rigged by the Russians, and Democrats are more likely to oppose the settled science regarding masking children and outdoor mask mandates. I also pointed out some deep flaws in the thinking of the party of science, such as the belief that anyone who has an opposite opinion needs to be censored, or that a burly, hairy, deep voiced, tall human being with a penis and testicles can be a woman.
Even on issues where the left or the right is "correct" irrationality still abounds. For example, I believe in climate change but it is likely that many leftists are wrong on the science of what is going to happen, and the severity. For example, 39% of Americans believe that climate change will lead to human extinction, and while I couldn't find the partisan breakdown, no doubt democrats are heavily represented in that 39% https://thehill.com/business-a-lobbying/340884-poll-39-percent-think-its-likely-climate-change-will-cause-human . I believe that the right is correct in their inclination to distrust organizations such as the CDC or the Biden administration, but I think their advice on the vaccine is correct.
The only think I see coming out of this conversation is evidence that they ARE the same, that irrationality, partisan blindness, and wishful thinking predominates among human beings of all stripes. You can say the right is "worse"--obviously you feel that way, or else you would be on the right. That's fine. What isn't fine is the super smug high horse, "oh, we're the party of SCIENCE!" Uh-huh.
The 2016 example would compare except for one huge problem… not one prominent voice on the left is claiming Russia messed with the vote tallies. This is is nothing more than misunderstandings of ignorant people who don’t follow politics closely and only read headlines. If any prominent Democrat or any prominent mainstream news host made this claim they would be immediately called out by the rest of their colleagues. That’s not remotely the case in the right.
I mean, prominent Democrats spent years proclaiming that Donald Trump's campaign colluded with Russia when they knew in reality that this did not happen: https://www.wsj.com/articles/all-the-adam-schiff-transcripts-11589326164
No party is immune to dishonesty
Regarding masking in schools, you need to take your issue up with the CDC and the FDA. Again, this is not a comparable example. Even if they are wrong about this, we’re talking about whether both sides are equal in their disregard for inconvenient realities. You cannot seriously claim someone who is listening to the CDC is on par with someone who gets their vaccine information from Facebook.
It's the same because both of those things are wrong. I don't really care where the source of the misinformation comes from, the result is the same. The CDC, for what it's worth, would tell you never to eat a medium rare steak. Their job is to be incredibly over cautious.
As far as the outdoor masking mandate, do you have any current examples of this other than one governor in one state?
Sure, an outright majority of Democrats reject the CDC guidance that wearing a mask outdoor is not necessary: https://thehill.com/hilltv/what-americas-thinking/553414-poll-plurality-voters-say-everyone-should-continue-to-wear
The life experience I was referring to was that of black people who grow up in black neighborhoods. The reason I brought that up was to emphasize that unlike you or I, their positions on these highly charged issues isn’t a product of googling statistics on their phone or computer. Black people don’t put exclamation points on videos of police violence because it suits their political ideology, they do it because it is what they have been telling us is happening in their neighborhoods for decades. That doesn’t mean they are right and everyone else wrong, it’s just a very different thing than claiming the entire scientific industry is in on a hoax because you read it somewhere on Brietbart.
Sorry but unless you have strong evidence that the statistics are wrong, they are infinitely more valuable than "lived experience." Data > anecdote, always, always, always, ALWAYS. Nobody who denies this can claim to be the "party of science"
Do you have that much trouble understanding the left that you cannot find any other way to explain its prevalence other than through emotional attachment?My political beliefs aren’t based on gratitude or trauma. I have no emotional vestment in the Democratic Party or the left nor do I regard it at all within my sense of identity. I align more with the left because the left is more aligned with reality. Show me I’m wrong and I will change my position. Is that simple.
Come on, now. We all have some irrationality in us. Don't pretend you aren't tribalistic, we all are. If it helps, we can talk about this privately. I really am asking the question in good faith. Trying to conclusively determine the origin of political affiliation is a subject I've been trying to crack for over a year now
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@Double_R
Then you have a serious bias problem.
Hilarious. I'm the one willing to say that there's lot of dumb beliefs held by people on my "side" while you are not willing to make the same admission. But I'm the biased one
I gave you three examples where there is no debate within the industry of experts or first hand handlers about the reality of the situation and yet the right wing has just ignored all of that and created their own reality instead.
2/3rds of Democrats believed that Russia tampered the vote tallies in 2016, something there is no debate on by election experts: experts: https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/whoever-convinced-most-democrats-that-putin-hacked-the-election-tallies-is-doing-putins-bidding
2/3rds of Democrats want government censorship, something that the vast majority of legal scholars recognize is a violation of the first amendment: https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2021/08/18/more-americans-now-say-government-should-take-steps-to-restrict-false-information-online-than-in-2018/%3famp=1
As demonstrated, large percentages of democrats hold blatantly false beliefs on things such as police shootings, or believing that little girls should be given testosterone supplements
The mask stuff is only still an issue because a lot of people are still in panic mode, but I 100% guarantee you that once the dust settles SCIENCE isn't going to look back on many of the restrictions fondly. There is a growing body of evidence that non medical masks are almost entirely useless:
"A quantitative measure of apparent exhalation filtration efficiency is provided based on experimental data assimilation to a simplified model. The results demonstrate that the apparent exhalation filtration efficiency is significantly lower than the ideal filtration efficiency of the mask material. Nevertheless, high-efficiency masks, such as the KN95, still offer substantially higher apparent filtration efficiencies (60% and 46% for R95 and KN95 masks, respectively) than the more commonly used cloth (10%) and surgical masks (12%), and therefore are still the recommended choice in mitigating airborne disease transmission indoors. The results also suggest that, while higher ventilation capacities are required to fully mitigate aerosol build-up, even relatively low air-change rates (2 h−12 h−1) lead to lower aerosol build-up compared to the best performing mask in an unventilated space." https://aip.scitation.org/doi/10.1063/5.0057100
The evidence against masking children in schools is robust enough to be conclusive: https://polimath.substack.com/p/the-case-against-masks-in-schools
The evidence against outdoor masks mandates is also robust enough to be conclusive. This is not a debate, this is a scientific reality. "That benchmark “seems to be a huge exaggeration,” as Dr. Muge Cevik, a virologist at the University of St. Andrews, said. In truth, the share of transmission that has occurred outdoors seems to be below 1 percent and may be below 0.1 percent, multiple epidemiologists told me. The rare outdoor transmission that has happened almost all seems to have involved crowded places or close conversation." https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/11/briefing/outdoor-covid-transmission-cdc-number.html
And not for nothing, but much of it is about lived personal experiences you will never know anything about.
I'm curious about your lived experience. Why ARE you so partisan? A lot of your posts remind me of the kind of thing I'll see on the politics subreddit but, to your credit, you will actually engage with people in polite discussion. What do you love about the left so much? Did the democratic party lift your family out of poverty? Were you treated badly by kids coming from Republican families growing up? Were Trump's antics the last straw for you? What is it?
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You’re really on fire today lol. For the same reason there are animal abuse laws. Killing an animal to eat is a just act so long as they are treated well during their lives (unfortunately a great many are not. But that’s a different topic)
Wanting to have sex with an animal is abuse for the sake of abuse. You don’t need sexual gratification, people do need to eat. But more than that if someone wants to have sex with animals they are a disgusting reprobate. I couldn’t care less if the dog “consents” someone who can’t control their sexual urges to the point that they want to lower themselves in such a way isn’t fit to be around the rest of us. Just go hire a prostitute ffs
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Oooh advocating giving pre pubescent children who are mentally ill hormone blockers and hormones for the opposite sex is another good one I just thought of. Like I said, anyone who thinks their “side” is right about everything is just a hack who is being dishonest even to themselves. The two “sides” are just about the broadest coalitions imaginable, there’s tons of dumb shit that slips in to try and widen the umbrella. It’s just a matter of what you prioritize
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The only one I’ll somewhat defend is the election one, I’ve done enough research to think that voter fraud wasn’t what did it (but mail in voting is a disaster) but the way that the results were reported looked sketchy as hell. 2/3rds of Dems believed that Russia changed the vote count to allow Trump to win in 2016: https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/whoever-convinced-most-democrats-that-putin-hacked-the-election-tallies-is-doing-putins-bidding%3f_amp=true
Like I said…both sides have enough irrationality to go around
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@Double_R
There is no equivalent to this on the left. The closest you can find is the issue with policing statistics, but this is no where near the same level of nuttery.
I mean the entire identity politics narrative that large portions of the left bases their worldview upon is completely wrong. As early as 1994 it was conclusively demonstrated in The Bell Curve that once IQ is controlled for all racial gaps between whites and blacks go away. That’s just one example. I also mentioned the outdoor mask mandate, but another example could be forcing children to wear masks that don’t even work eight hours a day or just COVID security theater in general which is heavily correlated with left leaning politics. Of course as we’ve discussed before the right has it’s own issues on the other end of that spectrum ;)
We can also talk about the increasing authoritarian bent of the modern left wing ideology. Two thirds of Democrats want government censorship, up from 40% three years ago: https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2021/08/18/more-americans-now-say-government-should-take-steps-to-restrict-false-information-online-than-in-2018/%3famp=1
Or we can talk about how activist DA’s in places like Portland have enabled a crime wave due to their extreme political beliefs: https://mtracey.substack.com/p/media-activists-do-not-care-about For example large parts of California do not enforce laws against shop lifting, public defecation
, etc
I could go on and on. I grant you all of your points about the ideas where a lot of Republicans are wrong. I see no need to defend any of those. I think both sides are about equally wrong, Republican economics are pretty much objectively wrong while the leftist social policies inevitably lead to disaster.
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In 2019, there were ~27 unarmed black men killed by police. Among people who identified as liberal or very liberal, nearly half of respondents thought that over 1,000 unarmed black people were killed (over 5% thought that 10,000+ were killed) over 80% of conservatives correctly guessed that the number is between 10 and 100.
Actually I misread the graph a little. Liberals did significantly better than very liberals, with around 60% getting the correct answer—but still around 40% thought the number was 1000+, and their estimate on % of police deaths who are black was only slightly better than very liberals. The point is that both sides have their fair share of irrational beliefs and behaviors, if you can’t see that after 2020 where everyone went batshit crazy you’re being a hack. The only reason I consider myself on the right is because the stuff I think the left gets wrong is way way more important to me…no idea why that is
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@RationalMadman
It can’t be forced though. Tying democracy to an invading foreign power is insanity. If Afghanistan becomes a democracy it has to come from the people themselves
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@SkepticalOne
@Double_R
Reality has a well known liberal bias - Stephen Colbert
Exactly, because the left cares about reality, which is what science sets out to understand.
In 2019, there were ~27 unarmed black men killed by police. Among people who identified as liberal or very liberal, nearly half of respondents thought that over 1,000 unarmed black people were killed (over 5% thought that 10,000+ were killed) over 80% of conservatives correctly guessed that the number is between 10 and 100.
Liberals and very liberals thought that around 60% of people killed by the police were black, while conservatives thought it was around 40%. In reality, the number is 25%.
Meanwhile the governor of Oregon just implemented an outdoor mask mandate, which is completely unscientific.
Both sides have things they are irrational about, and if you pay attention with an open mind they occur in predictable ways. It’s actually pretty interesting, I’m trying to come up with a theory for what drives political affiliation but I’m kind of stumped at this point.
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@Reece101
It totally depends on the field:
“New data show that, in certain medical fields, large majorities of physicians tend to share the political leanings of their colleagues, and a study suggests ideology could affect some treatment recommendations. In surgery, anesthesiology and urology, for example, around two-thirds of doctors who have registered a political affiliation are Republicans. In infectious disease medicine, psychiatry and pediatrics, more than two-thirds are Democrats”
I know that engineers tend to lean right while academics lean left. Generally I’ve found that rightists are more interested in things, whereas leftists are more interested in ideas. Figuring out why is complicated and would be extremely fascinating if done in good faith, which I don’t think was the point of this thread lol. I wish people would just understand that people have fundamentally different worldviews, and it isn’t because the other side is stupid it’s basically just a personality facet
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@oromagi
It's true that the withdraw, after two decades, was always going to be challenging and probably would've resulted in a lot of negative press no matter who was in charge. I'm actually inclined to defend Biden on this, because I'm a firm opponent of these kinds of wars and after 20 years the divorce is always going to be messy. However it is also clear that the administration was caught completely unaware and did not expect the Afghan government to fold so quickly. But, by summer it was quite obvious which way the wind was blowing: https://twitter.com/AFP/status/1428173822046334981
I don't understand how any rational mind could look at that map and not clearly see the dominos starting to fall. Biden said on July 8th that the government of Afghanistan was not going to fall, but by that time the Taliban was spreading incredibly rapidly. The plan didn't anticipate the obvious happening: the Taliban takeover. When Kabul fell, workers at the embassy were frantically shredding classified documents. Why were they still there? Billions of dollars worth of military equipment was left behind. Certainly this was inevitable to some extent but there was no attempt to get any of it out, or destroy it. The administration was not at all prepared for the evacuations, and people have been stashed in hangers with insufficient (https://nypost.com/2021/08/24/afghan-evacuees-surrounded-by-feces-rats-in-overcrowded-qatar-airbase/). It is so beyond obvious that they didn't have a contingency plan for what happened
The only reason there haven't been US deaths is due to the decisions of the Taliban, not due to the actions of the US government. Stopping evacuations would be comically easy at this point, all it would take would be a few shots fired into the crowd outside the airport, and a few unfortunate souls being strung up along the major roads to put an immediate stop to it.
On top of all that, I'm sure you can agree that from a PR perspective it has been a complete and utter disaster.
If we had moved much earlier, we'd be on the hook for taking on a lot more refugees. If we had moved much later, we wouldn't have been able to evac the highly trained and capable refugees we want.
Interesting take. I can't say I disagree but I'm so used to leftists wanting to pack this country with as many people as possible no matter what the circumstance. However given what you've seen, are you really so confident on the vetting process? I would bet that a lot of extremely unsavory characters are slipping through the cracks and will shortly be in the country.
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@oromagi
How many times does the government need to beg US citizens to leave an active warzone before it stops getting characterized as "abandonment" of those who refuse to leave?
I would guess that most of those US citizens have dual citizenship with the US and Afghanistan or some nearby country, and just don't want to leave. However given the giant clusterfuck that the withdraw became there are probably a few contractors and various oddballs mixed up in the drama
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@949havoc
Actually leaving Afghanistan was a rare act of political courage, and I didn't know Biden had it in him. The last two Presidents vowed to leave, but both failed to do so. The idea of building a liberal democracy out of Afghanistan was absurd on its face and in a sane world would've gotten anyone who suggested such a thing laughed out of the room. He gets an A for effort...but an F for execution. I have no idea what they were thinking as it has been obvious for months now that the Taliban was going to win, but there seemed to be absolutely zero plan for getting equipment and people out. The negative press he's getting on this is completely justified
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@SkepticalOne
Disagree. It says we honor our promises; we take care of those who risk their lives for us. Besides, I'm certain if a translator wanted to go to another country besides the US we could make that happen too.
First off, what promise? I don't remember any promise to grant citizenship to people the military paid to translate and do other services. Secondly, you really aren't answering the question of why it's preferable to bring them *here* specifically. I am NOT saying leave them behind. But why resettle in a place so culturally alien and so far away? How does that make any sense? The annual cost of resettling a refugee in the United States is about 60x what it costs in the Middle East: https://cis.org/Report/High-Cost-Resettling-Middle-Eastern-Refugees
If we're being honest the motivation to disallow Afgan refugees to the US is fear. Those objectors are happy to benefit from people risking their lives, but not at the expense of having them among us because that *might* risk our culture... a culture known to be a melting pot of cultures. Its fear speaking to the mindset of *our* culture being more important than *their* lives.
Fear can be rational. Given the experience that Europe has had with refugees from Afghanistan and other places of similar cultural backgrounds, concern over the potential consequences of bringing hundreds of thousands of Aghans here is completely justified. https://nationalinterest.org/feature/ive-worked-refugees-decades-europes-afghan-crime-wave-mind-21506 I'm happy to admit that I'm worried about the potential consequences, especially considering that, while I am sure many are good people, the US worked with some of the absolute worst people on Earth to try and defeat the Taliban: https://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/21/world/asia/us-soldiers-told-to-ignore-afghan-allies-abuse-of-boys.html
Also I was NOT happy to "benefit" (how, lol) from these people risking their lives. I wholeheartedly applaud Biden for getting out of Afghanistan, something the last two Presidents promised to do but failed to deliver on.
"Hubris of the secular, western mind". Gtfo with that projection.
No projection. I believe that groups of humans are different from each other in deep and profound ways, that cannot be washed away easily. It is because of my belief in these differences that I can predict the inevitable cultural clash that would result in resettling Afghan refugees here, when we could avoid said clash entirely through settling them in a culturally similar area. The secular liberal project believes that there are no deep and profound differences between groups of humans, that everywhere would be a secular, liberal democracy with a libertine culture if only the constraints holding them back were removed. It is because of this delusion that they spent over two decades trying and failing to build a liberal democracy over there, and also why they believe there will be no issues in resettlement.
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@drlebronski
the people going onto the planes very obviously want to leave afghanistan if they are going into the planes....should we just leave them to suffer in a fascist authoritarian government filled with murders? heck people even tries to sit on the wing of the plane while it went to launch.
Absolutely not. But I don’t see a reason why they should be settled in a secular, liberal democracy with incredibly alien cultural values instead of somewhere they would be more comfortable.
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@Lemming
A sense of responsibility, due to power and actions taken.
What responsibility to move them here, specifically, when Afghanistan is a strong contender for least similar culture on Earth to the USA? It will lead to nothing but trouble.
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Because of the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, people are now clamoring to bring Afghan translators and others who assisted the US military during the war back to the states. But why? I would agree that these people should not be left to die, but there is a sensible middle ground everyone seems to be ignoring, which is to resettle them in countries more culturally compatible with their values. There are certainly Islamic countries willing to take them in, especially if the United States greases the skids for a tiny portion of the overall cost of this suicidal war.
Really the issue exposes the hubris of the secular, Western mind that believes everyone in the world would be just like us, if only they were enlightened enough! Even the Afghans willing to work with the United States are not compatible with the country at all. According to Pew, 99% of people in Afghanistan want Sharia law to be the law of the land. 61% say this should also apply to non-Muslims. 85% want to implement stoning as a punishment for adultery, and 79% support the death penalty for apostasy. There is absolutely no reason they should be brought here instead of settled in countries more compatible to their values. If they are brought here the culture shock will be a bad thing for both sides.
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@Theweakeredge
I'm saying it likely happens to be true based on the body of surrounding facts.
- A. Black people are empirically over-policed and overrepresented in the numbers, their homes and neighborhoods are segregated and specifically targeted
- B. White people make up the largest population in the USA
- C. We tend to see the most crime by the largest population
- D. Therefore it is reasonable to conclude that white people do the most crime
Though it wouldn't be the "exact opposite" even if you were right, it'd be that they don't do the most crime, they certainly don't do the least - even taking your sources into account. The problem here is that you are relying on sources which are literally the ones doing the seggregating, of course you would find overrepresentations amongst minorities.
Overpolicing might be a plausible explanation if the differences in black and white violent crime rates were, say, 10%. Or 20%. But what I have been trying to demonstrate to you is that the differences are far too vast for this to be a realistic explanation. The rate of violent crime among black people is over three times as high as it is for white people. White people are underrepresented in violent crime arrests compared to their population (46% of arrests, 60% of the population), .76x whereas black people are over represented by around 2.5x (13% of pop, 33% of violent arrests.) https://bjs.ojp.gov/content/pub/pdf/revcoa18.pdf So the disparity in violent crime arrests is 3.3x, or 330% (2.5/.76). The numbers for murders are even worse, as we have already gone through. If overpolicing is the cause (more like underpolicing of white areas) there should be thousands and thousands of unreported homicide victims. Not plausible. You have argued that this is because the police just let "white dudes" off because they are racist--even though the victims would be overwhelmingly white. However, this does not track with the way people of any race interact with the world. I know you think white supremacy is deeply ingrained in our culture, even among minorities, but to pay hundreds of thousands of extra dollars to live in white suburban areas where the rate of violent crime is higher? Man, that is some serious white supremacy. It also does not align with the National Crime Victimization Survey, which interviews victims of crime about the characteristics of their assailants and finds numbers in line with what the official statistics suggest. So people are so white supremacist that they actually lie to defend the honor of the white race after being raped or beaten by a white guy, and pin it on black people. You also do not explain why we do not see the same disparity in crime rates among Hispanic or Asian people. Come on, dude.
Speaking of the national crime victimization survey.... There could in fact be a small degree of truth to the overpolicing argument, at least for minor crimes. According to my source:
"An examination of offenders’ characteristics, as
reported by victims in the NCVS, provides information
on racial and ethnic disparities beyond an arrestee
and population-based comparison. Based on the 2018
NCVS and UCR, black people accounted for 29% of
violent-crime offenders and 35% of violent-crime
offenders in incidents reported to police, compared to
33% of all persons arrested for violent crimes (table 2).
(See Methodology for differences in how violent crimes
are measured in the NCVS and UCR.) At the same time, white offenders were underrepresented
among persons arrested for nonfatal violent crimes
(46%) relative to their representation among offenders
identified by victims in the NCVS (52%). When limited
to offenders in incidents reported to police, white
people were found to be arrested proportionate to their
criminal involvement (48%). Hispanic offenders were
overrepresented among persons arrested for nonfatal
violent crimes (18%) relative to their representation
among violent offenders (14% of all violent offenders
and 13% of violent offenders in incidents reported to
police). However, victims were unable to determine
if the offender was Hispanic in 9% of single-offender incidents and 12% of multiple-offender incidents,
which may have resulted in some underestimates of
Hispanic offenders’ involvement in violent crime (not
shown in tables). Among the most serious incidents of violent crime
(rape or sexual assault, robbery, and aggravated
assault), there were no statistically significant
differences by race between offenders identified in the
NCVS and persons arrested per the UCR (table 3).
White and black people were arrested proportionate
to their involvement in serious nonfatal violent crime
overall and proportionate to their involvement in
serious nonfatal violent crime reported to police."
So there you go. Most of this is probably explained by people reporting an offender as racially white, but having no idea of hispanic origin. But it is plausible that a small amount of the gap is explained by a lower police presence in cushy white areas, which results in some of the smaller number of crimes there slipping through the cracks. Does this come anywhere close to explaining a 330% difference in crime rates? Nope.
I'm trying to prove that well.... shouldn't you be letting people take account of their own responsibilities?? I'm trying to prove how stupid your arguments are, how you continously try to sweep systemic issues - its funny how fast you run to systemic answers whenever white people are the ones involved.
I don't think I have talked about "systemic racism" relating to white people. Any examples? I certainly wouldn't excuse any violent crime committed by white people, or try to pin it on someone else.
Frankly I'm done discussing anything with you, you've already shown your true colors, but before I go I'll give one last little piece of advice - do some introspection about your own thought-process.
You can leave if you want, but don't think for even a moment that it is because you won the exchange. You haven't even cited a single piece of evidence. As for my "true colors", whatever. I'm a little defensive, sure. I'm white. My wife is white. My children will be white. I'm not going to apologize for refuting nonsense about the group that I am a part of, through no choice of my own.
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@Theweakeredge
Its merely a false racist perception, the point was to introduce a perspective that's unique, and happens to be true.
A “false racist perception” that “happens to be true.” Okay. Myself and multiple other people demonstrated to you the objective statistics that show your “false racist perception” is indeed false, and all you had to say in response was that the police let “white dudes” off for thousands of murders a year. No evidence was provided even though you’ve had ample opportunity to do so. Defend your initial claim that white people are “the most dangerous” people or admit you are wrong and apologize for making a racist lie.
In trends we tend to see that crimes go hand in hand with their population typically, hence what started studies into over-policing and such.
Come on. Show me the study showing a correlation between white population and violent crime rate. You’ll find the reality is the EXACT OPPOSITE
Go ahead and have fun being dumb, I'll fun being actually intellectually honest.
If you were so intellectually honest you wouldn’t knowingly be making false statements. The numbers are easily accessible and have been provided to you, and you have to be smart enough to know that your handwaving assertions haven’t come even close to disproving the crime statistics we have.
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@Theweakeredge
Jesus you didn't follow a single argument, lmao. I wasn't saying that white people DID commit those crimes, I was going through a hypothetical using your assertions hence, "Let's do your math", I was saying, IF white people murdered an extra 8,000 people, and those homicides weren't ever discovered, THEN it would still not impact the statistics as you seem to believe.
Nope. This conversation started because you slandered white people as being the most violent/dangerous group of people. I showed you the statistics about how that is objectively incorrect. You’ve never had a single argument in favor of the proposition that white people have a higher violent crime rate than reported, and certainly not an argument that the white violent crime rate is the highest in the country. 8,000 additional murders unreported wouldn’t bring white people even close to the homicide rate of black people as I already showed you, the number is more akin to 50-60,000. However the idea that thousands of murders would go unreported in the USA is simply laughable.
You’re used to being able to get away with insulting white people and getting no pushback (some white supremacist society, eh?) so when you do you just flail around lol. Go ahead and defend your initial point. Find me the numbers showing that white people have the highest rate of violent crime.
No, you see, I don't respect you when you blatantly engage in an intellectually dishonest manner, such as, I don't know - admitting that you cherry pick and not seeing the problem with it.
It blows my mind that you think using a source for its numbers or to ascertain a certain historical fact but disregarding it’s commentary is “cherry picking.” What an authoritarian view of knowledge. Why ever read anything beyond an abstract or a headline in that case? Don’t take away exactly what the authors want you to? Cherry picking! Intellectual dishonesty! Please.
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@Mesmer
If your race on average has: lower I.Q., lower impulse control, greater likelihood to have debilitating genes (for civilizations) like the MAO-A 'warrior gene', you're going to have worse modern societies on average. We can see this when we look at countries with majority Africans and the bottom of worldwide HDI index is full of African countries List of countries by Human Development Index - Wikipedia . Mexico does way better, but it's still middling at #74. The top 30 countries are majority White, Asian or Jewish.
I don't want to go so far as to say that, but a highly successful and technological African or Amerindian society would definitely look different than a Western or Eastern one. The arc of history is long and we don't know how things will shake out in the end, but expecting perfect equality in all things is just ridiculous--groups of people are different. I also don't know how much of the IQ gap is environmental or cultural, what can be ameliorated in the near future with gene therapies, etc. PhD theses could be written about this stuff.
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@Double_R
Q1: Do you believe white people are largely responsible for the racial disparity within our society
No
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@Mesmer
That’s crazy because sprinting is basically pure physicality, and people of African descent but from all cultural backgrounds (Africa, Britain, United States, Caribbean) dominate the sport. I know we agree on this but it’s just so laughable that it needs to be said
I would be behind the “don’t talk about it” position if our political culture wasn’t enthusiastically pointing out every single metric of inequality as proof of racism and scapegoating white people as the culprit. There’s a reason that in such a “systemically racist” country Asian people do extremely well (even though they *actually* face extremely well documented discrimination in university admissions and probably job hirings.) Culture has a lot to do with it, but pretending like the tens of thousands of years of different selective pressures resulting in different cognitive abilities has nothing to do with it is just crazy
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@Theweakeredge
Sure bud
“Philadelphia, PA is on pace for a record-breaking year of homicides, after coming just one shy of the all-time record in 2020. As of April 29, homicides are up 36% year-over-year.
- Portland, OR is on pace for a record-breaking year of homicides, after recording the highest total in 26 years in 2020. In the first quarter of 2021, homicides increased year-over-year by 733%. (Yes, you read that right.)
- Columbus, OH is on pace for another record-breaking year of homicides, after breaking its all-time record in 2020. Homicides have already doubledin April year-over-year.
- Albuquerque, NM is on pace for a record-breaking year of homicides, which are up 79% in April year-over-year.
- Indianapolis, IN is on pace for another record-breaking year of homicides, after breaking its all-time record in 2020. Homicides are up 33%in April year-over-year.”
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