Doubletree3
3mo ago
Capital investment (or deciding what and what not to invest in) is part of the optimization algorithm, which I already mentioned. The people who build the steam engines are the laborers, using machines.
Still, without labor or technology, any sort of of capital investment still doesn't do anything. You cannot obtain any non-zero-sum return on that investment without the labor or tech.
You can overcome these problems with systems other than allowing people to own property and freely enter into employment contracts but most other attempted systems have broadly done worse.
This is fair, and I think I might even agree, but doesn't really address my (admittedly narrow) point.
systematically underappreciated: it's one of the only wealth-generation mechanisms in human history that is even structurally capable of being positive-sum
This doesn't make sense to me. Maybe I'm not understanding what you mean but as far as I can figure there are two things which produce positive sum value:
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Labor (I spend my labor to grow corn which adds value that didn't exist before)
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Technology (I combine existing widgets in new ways to increase my labor productivity)
Capitalism and technology development might be synergistic but they aren't the same thing. If you take away the above two things then capitalism becomes just as zero-sum as any other system. Every market exchange is zero sum to within an epsilon. Every asset has its corresponding debt. Every privately owned object is a thing no one else can use. Etc.
No, I think what capitalism does excellently, better than any other system, is being an optimization algorithm for organizing the above two features. But an optimization algorithm needs an objective function, and I think the pro-capitalist crowd under-appreciates the possibility that this objective function can go off the rails, such that the thing capitalism is optimizing for is no longer "the common good".
Doubletree3
3mo ago
Then I congratulate you sincerely on being principled on this matter. However I still believe that this war is not being prosecuted on women's behalf, and whether or not the women of Iran will be better or worse off is a highly uncertain question. It would not be the first time America's regime-change efforts in the middle east resulted in an even more backwards/regressive Islamic rule.
It isn't, it's calling a spade a spade.
I'm confident it's a cheap rhetorical trick, because if the form of the argument were used against you, you would call it out as a low grade gotcha. "If you care about X, and Y is bad for X, then you should in all cases oppose Y and support any action whatsoever that harms Y" is obvious nonsense of the highest order. Just substitute "children" for X and imagine all of the policy positions that would result.
The alliance between Western feminist progressives and Islamic fundamentalists was always completely psychotic under any ideological framework other than "they just hate the West and don't believe any of their own bullshit
Uncharitable at best. Failure to model your opponents at worst. I think there's definitely an aspect of hypocrisy here but characterizing the situation as psychotic is not true. There are mechanisistic reasons we see this play out. It does have its own internal logic.
Rubbing their noses in it and taking the opportunity to diminish the extent that anyone takes progressive feminists seriously is points fairly scored.
Ahh. So it is just arguments as soldiers then.
Gonna have to bow out here, I don't see any further exchange between us on this topic being productive.
Doubletree3
3mo ago
Probably because it's transparently a bad faith argument. I'm guessing neither you nor trump care that much how $arbitrary_regime treats women and even if you did, would never advocate for starting military action on any nation that basis. if you did care about the women, starting a war is obviously not the most productive way to fix that, nor is there any guarantee that the women will be better off afterwards.
So this war is not about the women and your attempt to collapse the whole issue into "better or worse for women" is a cheap rhetorical trick to paint your adversaries as hypocrites for opposing it.
Then you haven't looked well enough.
Incorrect. I lurk more than I post and the motte has been in a downward turn towards low effort partisan bickering. What you are describing is few and far between. I will trust my own judgment on this.
I'm not really attempting to "rise above" anyone. Im comporting myself in manner which is well within the standards of decorum here.
When's the last time you spent any time tone policing your tribal fellows? Or are you subjecting me to a selective demand for rigor?
Kyle Rittenhouse was the guy who decided it would be a good idea to open carry at a protest, as if that would help anything. The results were predictable.
You might think thats justified behavior given the circumstances but so do most people who escalate. It's not very convincing in and of itself. If there's a thing that makes the left "the baddies" and the right not, it can't be because only the left ever "creates situations that cause escalation" because that's false.
However low you think the MAGA-right is, you are at eye level.
I'd agree to be less contemptuous if I saw anyone take their own side to task in this area.
Doubletree3
4mo ago
No, The 2nd amendment folks support Trump because they inhabitant the same object level political space. Thats it. In reality, the right's tendency to power-worshipping and love of armed agents of the state (LEO) means that the 2nd amendment types are as likely to be fighting on the side of the tyrants as against them.
Doubletree3
4mo ago
The protestors (from “our” point of view) want violence and want shootings, because they perceive this as a win condition. We’re quite simply not going to give them the win anymore.
Is this a typo? ICE just killed a man. Seems like, if that's what they want, then you did in, fact, just give it to them.
"ICE needs to stop deporting illegal immigrants from Minnesota because some protestors are getting hurt"
No I don't think that's really the logic at all. The logic is that they perceive some injustice and protesting is the only tool in many of these people's toolbox.
Are actively going out of their way to create situations that can cause escalation. That makes them, in my opinion which is shared by others with similar worldviews, the baddies
Note that you will not hear the right say this about Kyle Rittenhouse, Proud Boys, the guys who killed Ahmaud Arbery, George Zimmerman, the deploymentment of national guard units for transparently political purposes, or any of Trump's intentionally inflammatory rhetoric over the last decade.
Thanks for the additional insight on the MAGA-right. It mostly demonstrates an inability to model the worldview of your opponents ("they want death and violence" lol), and a lack of objective standards for conduct.
This is just condoning being low agency and having low commitment to objectivity.
Im generally sympathetic to people with low agency but let's not act like it righteous in any way
Doubletree3
4mo ago
Seems like pretty much a fact that much of the anti-immigrant right wants America to be a nation of whites, or at least a white majority. NYTreader said as much explicitly elsewhere in the thread.
So I don't know what point you're making. Also lots of ice agents probably are dumb yeah.
Doubletree3
8mo ago
He made statements to police indicating that he attacked the pelosis because they were Democrats and he believed they stole the election from trump.
Doubletree3
8mo ago
Thanks for doing the legwork here. Too often political discussion proceeds purely on narrative/subjective grounds and so the effort to at least attempt to inject some objectivity is greatly appreciated!
The fundamental problem is that most modern right wing violence is an accident of ideology committed by a fringe with little support. Condemnations are widespread, the people engaging it have been mostly grossly mentally ill, no leading figures are calling for it, no mainstream institutions are calling for it or supporting it (at least up until current events).
The claim here is obviously false. There is plenty of institutonal and cultural support for violence among the right. Take, for example, conservative fascination with firearms as a political tool. Or greater suport for state sanctioned killing to achieve policy goals, like the death penalty. And, while this is less true now but was certainly true in the very recent past that conservatives were very likey to prioritize violence as a solution to foreign policy as well ("turn the whole country to glass").
The acceptance of violence, or the tendency to see the use physical force as a acceptable or effective solution to problems, seems to be so pervasive among the right that it has become "baked in" to the point where it doesn't even register, like a fish in water.
I am not claiming that the left does not have problems with violence, it clearly does (especially and perhaps exclusively the woke illiberal left), but this thing I keep seeing where conservatives are casting themselves as constitutionally cherubic peaceniks against the bloodthirsty violent and demonic left is just flatly wrong.
Doubletree3
8mo ago
Yeah, sure, that's the motte. The Bailey is shooting effigies of democratic politicians, brandishing firearms at unarmed leftist protesters, and posting up open carry at polling places.
Conservatives are more than happy to use firearms as a political intimidating tactic.
Doubletree3
8mo ago
I understand where you're coming from. Though realistically these people celebrating, it's all performative, for all except 1e-6% of them.
This isn't equivalent to wishing ill will on someone who was factually an illegal immigrant
theres a difference, but it's not huge. It's a crime to be here illegally but not such a crime that they deserve to be shipped off to a supermax prison, probably sodomized, etc.
Doubletree3
9mo ago
Yeah I clicked over to the "popular" feed on reddit, but, same thing? Maybe I am in a weird filter bubble
Doubletree3
9mo ago
Interesting. I don't doubt you but I don't use blue sky. My reddit feed is not filled with anything I'd call celebrating. Many sarcastic "thoughts and prayers", and many pointing out supposed ironies about his stance on gun control, lots of " this is a bad for the country".
I'm not saying these people don't exist. I'm saying two things:
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The conservative fascination with politic violence goes far deeper than just a few "right wing extremist" accounts. This is just what the whole 2A/tree of liberty stuff is about. I
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we are in this (bad) place because of a runaway tribal culture war dynamic. Highly emotive statements that are not measured or specific in their claims oftenmake this problem worse, not better, and so anyone who wants the temperature to decrease should be careful about how they frame their posts.
Especially today, when I can engage with literally any left-leaning website on its own terms and see tons of justifications of this attack, and a sickening glee for it.
I have personally observed many sickening statements concerning, for example, Kilmar Garcia, coming from conservatives. what would your point be exactly?
As much as I denounce Kirk's murder, especially if it was politically motivated, and denounce any celebration my tribe is engaging in, I have a hard time with the pearl clutching going on in conservative circles about this, and especially statement like "The American left has been fomenting violent radicalism ceaselessly for more than a decade."
For the right, it seems that the acceptance of political violence as a potential solution is just baked in. Many on the right love their guns, and they love to make ""implications"" or even more outright statements that they are willing to use their guns against "tyrants". But if you spend 5 minutes around these types you will see that their definition of "tyranny" is not far from "a liberal policy I don't like". This has been a key pillar of conservative politics going back far more than a decade.
I can rest easier knowing that these things generally stay at the level of fantasy. But it IS a consistent conservative fantasy. If we are comparing like to like, liberals "celebrating" by making bluesky posts and conservatives making gun memes about "the tree of liberty", "ten cent solutions", "kill em all and let God sort em out", or shooting targets with Hillary's face on them, do not strike me as having significantly different moral valence.
Doubletree3
9mo ago
All bluesky is now alight in celebration of the murder
I doubt /all/ of them are. I have seen many calls for lowering temperatures, denouncing it, etc. meanwhile I have seen several highly popular right wing facebook groups that seem positively giddy that this might give them some excuse to kill leftists.
It is clear that your purpose in making that statement is political rather than factual.
Doubletree3
9mo ago
The dude was definitely a right winger who was deep into qanon style conspiracies.
He could have also been crazy, the two are not mutually exclusive.
Doubletree3
9mo ago
I don't think there was any indication the attacker was a conservative who hated them for being liberal.
I think you should go back and reacquaint yourself of the details of this case because there is ample evidence that he was both a right winger and targeted the Pelosis because they were Democrats.
DePape answers, "Absolutely." He grows increasingly angry and emotional, claiming that Nancy Pelosi and other Democrats committed crimes to steal the election from Donald Trump. Then, Depape says, "I was going to hold her hostage and get her to tell the truth. If she didn't tell the truth, I'd break her kneecaps."
Doubletree3
9mo ago
The difference with Christians is indeed that I've never heard an individual Christian sincerely deny allegiance to the Pope one minute and then affirm it when it suits them
I don't know about that particular example but it is common, and I have personally experienced, individual Christians picking and choosing different parts of the Bible to reference according to their instrumental needs. I have not noticed any tendency towards strong logical consistency in Christians vs any other group.
Sure I can. The factory is an artifact of prior people's value added labor and technology. In your view "Capital" would seem to be simply an accounting method for tracking the accumulated value-add of those two forces.
Oh no! Wrongthink!
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