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1yr ago
As someone who grew up in a quietly conservative area, I was still completely surrounded by politics. Like you said, political jeers somehow found its way into everything - even when we had a traditional thanksgiving dinner, there would inevitably be a few comments about how liberals viewed thanksgiving. I'm now on the left and find the same thing - people and politics are often inseparable. I think this is especially prevalent in America and I don't know if it's possible to avoid it entirely.
Here's how I make it work. I realized that I don't really care what people believe - I care about why people believe it. I'm firmly on the left but have always had an aversion to the hyper-woke crowd as many of us do. It was hard for me because I often partially supported their ideas but could just never fully get behind them or anything that they say. This was confusing because I knew plenty of lefties in my own life that expressed similar views (or sometime more extreme) yet I would agree or be ok with them. Finally, I realized that my primary aversion to the hyper-woke was their poor arguments and dogmatic attitude. This aversion also explains my dislike of other political groups that express similar characteristics.
Once I figured this out, I started to be more selective - If my parents (smart people but misinformed politically) make anti-left comments at thanksgiving dinner, I just ignore it because I know that they don't have great support for their beliefs anyway. Same goes for some of my more woke friends. I only engage, care, or listen to people who's beliefs I consider to be well supported. My friends are much more politically diverse now because even if I don't agree with their conclusions I can at least respect how they got there. Just my two cents.
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1yr ago
Women (and many men) often experience threats more vividly than I do, being by nature much more concerned about physical security and much less confident in their ability to deal with a situation.
OP, this is the answer you're looking for. Like most things in life, men harassing women isn't what we think it is. It could be a man staring for longer than necessary but never making eye contact. It could be a man moving to sit a few seats closer to the girl. It could be an offhand physical compliment that would only put up blinders while riding in a confined space with a stranger.
It's hard for us men to put ourselves in the place of woman. Best I can offer is to think of every man as a 6'10'' jacked football player who wants to fuck you. I wouldn't be thrilled to sit alone in a metal tube next to Aaron Donald after he tells me that he likes my shirt and gives me a wink lol.
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1yr ago
Just to be clear - the entire contents of the bag are worth over $2K while the suitcase is only worth $295 brand new. It would really shock me that someone in this position would a) risk a government job for petty theft B) steal a non-collectible, relatively inexpensive suitcase. What's the max you could even resell a used $300 suitcase for?
Obviously this story is really weird. But life is crazy enough that something like this could happen and at this point it was likely a mistake.
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1yr ago
What exactly makes them a freak?
Also, why would you say that went out of their way to hire Brinton? They have dual masters' degrees in nuclear engineering from MIT & plenty of relevent work experience. I'd say they earned their position. Is that not enough for the deputy assistant secretary of Spent Fuel and Waste Disposition in the Office of Nuclear Energy?
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1yr ago
I'm going to keep it real with you. You say that you're cognizant of your own biases and that you're even positively disposed towards women. You also say that a diverse cast of women have almost exclusively given you the same answer to your question for years.
Why would you think that they might not be telling the truth? I'm not saying that people can't lie, but you, like most of us, have consistently heard the same answer to the same question with little variance. I find it odd that you would question their answer so much as to write a long internet post about it. I understand that you personally have never experienced said phenomenon. But given that you're of an above average intelligence, there are probably hundreds of things you believe without having personally experienced them. Granted, you came to this discussion with an open mind and i credit you with that.
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1yr ago
I never said they weren't an outlier? But 'freak' and 'outlier' are two completely different things with completely different social connotations, especially when talking about a person.
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1yr ago
Is there any legal liability in him selling products based on a lie? I'm sure there were plenty of people who were convinced that his lifestyle was what he said it was and purchased products on that (very legitimate) assumption. I have no idea.
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1yr ago
It's quite a long story (and I can go into more detail if you want). Overall, I realized that certain beliefs I held weren't as supported as I was led to believe by conservatives. I attended a conservative Christian college but had two left-leaning professors in particular & a few new left-leaning friends who broke me out of my conservative bubble and challenged my previous beliefs. Growing up I was taught that issues like racism & sexism were issues of the past (and totally blown out of proportion by virtue signaling woke libtards). This new group of people gave me a different story via personal anecdotes (from my new friends) & substantial research (from my professors). Over the course of four years and lots of debating, I came to the conclusion that the biggest pillar of my ring-wing belief (namely the idea of merit, aka 'you can do anything as long as you work hard' & the inverse "If you're struggling it's primarily your fault") wasn't as absolute as I thought it was.
Trust me, I was not looking to turn to the left in the slightest. I mean, who wants to be associated with woke feminists (or worse, liberals)? Of course, I don't agree with everything the woke crowd believes nor do I have many positive things to say about Biden & other libs. But overall I'm now firmly planted somewhere on the left because the right just didn't have sufficient support for the biggest issues. Feel free to ask any other questions but that's the basic story for me.
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1yr ago
I used to think like you so I know that I'm not going to convince you in a comment.
This kind of thing reminds me of the kid in my class who used to make stuff up for attention constantly.
But this is still very interesting to me - one of the reasons I changed my mind on this is because I saw people in my own life (real people) come out and it made me question this reasoning. These were people that I knew for decades, people who didn't need attention, and often people who came out at a great expense (their families kicked them out, etc). I knew them well enough to know that they weren't just totally bullshitting me.
I think it's naive to think that people will go to a conversion camp for two years all for.... attention? It doesn't really follow that older LGBT people in their fifties are still doing it for the attention either. So why do you think that this is primarily attention related? If it was simply a personal choice you could turn off and on, why risk getting kicked out of your home or being discriminated against in a job interview?
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1yr ago
The worst part is that this doesn't even need to be nefarious - We've all seen so many scams ourselves that I can only imagine what these bigger companies are dealing with. Phone numbers are really the only other way to reliably check someone's ID or real existence without resorting to other measures (and even then phone numbers are getting worse and worse when it comes to security).
It really is a slow fade. It's too late to boycott and we've become so reliant on these stupid technologies that boycotts just hurt us in the end. Ggs, hopefully the metaverse will be better.
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1yr ago
Conditional on being right about 2), no. If I’m wrong and Mx. Brinton was unable to control perverted urges...yeah, I guess.
Let's assume the worst: They stole the bag for sexual reasons.
Given that this single person's actions moves the needle for how you'll trust, hire, or promote other members of Brinton's group:
Does a story of a man repeatedly abusing and eventually murdering their young child move the needle for how you'll trust, hire, or promote other men?
Does the story of Sandy Hook move the needle for how you'll trust, hire, or promote other white men?
Does the story of Pittsburg Synagogue shooting move the needle for how you'll trust, hire, or promote other people with right ring beliefs?
Considering that all of these stories are far worse than the worst thing Brinton might have done, I'd hope that you'd have the same response.
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1yr ago
I agree. This also seemed to successfully take some steam out of this story. He stopped the momentum and I'm sure that a large portion of people have forgotten about this. If it does pop up again, it'll be even easier to convince his audience that this is fake news Russiagate stuff again.
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1yr ago
That's what grinds my gears; the smug assumption that the only reason anyone could possibly object to such race-swapping is because they're a horrible racist.
People assume that there's some sort of racial issue behind the Ariel situation because: A) the scenario is so inconsequential and B) the arguments against it are either weak or slippery-slope assumptions. This doesn't mean that anyone who is anti Ariel is racist, but it does leave the door open to wonder why anyone would be so vehemently against this move.
And would your Facebook friend who is so eager to change things up for the sake of diversity be happy to recast Mulan so that a Black woman could get the lead role? And if that's different, how is it different?
Most Disney princesses are white, including Ariel. Mulan isn't. Disney is (openly) pro-diversity, so it makes sense that Disney would want an Asian princess too.
If they're going to recast Ariel, then every cast member should be Black for internal consistency and coherence.
There aren't any rules or reasons as to why the recasting of one character should lead to the recasting of all characters.
Can your Facebook friend explain to me why new Black Ariel is still a redhead, and not having her own ordinary beautiful natural hair?
Why does Ariel's hair have anything to do with race of the character? Moreover, Ariel's red hair was one of the characters' defining features in comparison to the other princesses of the time.
Nobody is objecting to "let's do a new movie about a black mermaid" if they can write a good story and hey, maybe there are even folk tales and legends about black mermaids, who knows? But this isn't about 'let's give little Black girls a character they can identify with, so they can dress up as Ariel for Hallowe'en', it's about wringing every last penny out of their property by re-tooling it to get another extension of marketability.
The functional difference between "let's do a new movie about a black mermaid" and "let's do a remake about a black mermaid" are quite inconsequential. Both versions exist, and given that we're talking about a children's character, both characters existing has no real ramifications for practical life.
Look, I hate the shameless antics of Disney as much as anyone, but is that really what this discussion is about? What does Ariel's red hair have to do with Disney's endless greed? And did this penny-wringing really start with Ariel? More importantly, if the Ariel was white, would this still be an example of Disney's greed?
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1yr ago
This isn't about choice, it's about an action by an individual leading to a stereotype of an entire group. They could be talking about the type of person to wear a suit to a party for all I care.
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1yr ago
fetish for pretend bestiality while giving interviews about their appointments to the department of energy.
Can you link this interview? I'm not familiar with it and I wasn't able to find it
The whole kink lifestyle is weird enough, you don’t have to go on TV talking about it.
What kink lifestyle are you referring to? Is it in the same interview as above?
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1yr ago
You're right in that using this word usually applies to adult authority figures and sexual situations. The issue isn't the definition, it's how loosely the word is thrown around.
Even in this thread, any adult that engages in any conversation about sexuality or gender identity = groomer. That's the issue. We need to have a higher standard of proof when throwing that word around in situations where it is incredibly unlikely to happen.
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1yr ago
Meanwhile we've damaged two deeper principles: keeping politics out of where it doesn't belong, and actually meaning it when we said that we wanted race not to matter.
These are your principles though, not intrinsic principles. I personally think media is a great way to talk about politics and historically it's been a common practice (think of older novels with political messages, etc). Regardless, most media is political even when it's not explicit. You can make an argument that politics doesn't belong in movies but it's just an argument, not a deeper societal principle.
Along the same lines, 'not wanting race to matter' is fully loaded as well. I'm not sure where you stand on this issue, but there's plenty of proponents on either side of this debate. It's hardly a deeper principle.
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1yr ago
While registering, I indicated I was male. I was immediately shown what I can only describe as "anti-feminist" videos
I've had the exact same experience across all platforms (Tik tok, youtube, & instagram mainly). I used to be right wing but have solidly been on the left more several years now. Whenever I start any new account or social media I'm always bombarded with classic man-oriented 'right wing-ish' content (Peterson debunking feminists, gym bro complaining about girls, Shapiro clips, etc). Even now, after having these accounts for years, I'll still get random suggestions for this content.
What's even funnier is that if I watch a man-adjacent video (non-political workout vids or a video about guns) my algorithms get fucked up for weeks. I really do have to wonder if the right-wing influencers have a crazy high budget in comparison to the left. At this point they have to know my stats well enough to know that I'm not interested in those videos but they keep pushing. I admire the effort.
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1yr ago
What an odd conflation of highly identifiable niche/deviant behavior and uselessly broad identity categories.
Can you clarify why you don't think these examples are relatable? Specifically with men and sexual abuse - men are significantly more likely to commit sexual crimes and a large amount of them do so. We're talking men of all shapes and sizes. If this rare incident changes your perception of an entire group than surely the rather commonplace sexual crime committed by men should do the same?
I think it's reasonable to suspect that the coworker is simply trying to deflect from the swastika tattoos, yes?
This hypothetical isn't relevant. Swastika tatoos are historically and contextually related to violence and a highly specific type of person. It's impossible to compare that sort of history and baggage with something like a subset of the LGBT community.
To reiterate, these sorts of events are not as common as you think they are. These stories do get happily promoted by the media when they do happen because that's the society we live in. We aren't writing headline stories about yet another father molesting his daughter.
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1yr ago
Thank you. So what is your point with this? People are freaks if they talk about their kinks to an audience who wants to hear about it? Are you saying that the government shouldn't hire people who talk about their personal life?
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1yr ago
As someone who has done a lot of "red" hobbies both past and present, I find plenty of politics in these groups. It's especially prevalent in activities that are current political issues (e.g. guns/shooting). obviously your mileage may vary but that's my experience and it's only gotten worse in the current political climate.
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1yr ago
You're assuming that family is typically a loving, healthy experience. You're also assuming that a healthy family is more important than a healthy individual. I also kind of feel like you're making kids responsible for how their families treat them rather than a split responsibility.
Let's flip the script here. It's 2200 and pink haired feminists have completed their takeover. While some groups tolerate straightness, the majority of people think that being straight is wrong and possible even harmful to society as a whole.
Would you tell a straight kid to stop meeting with the straights rights group at school to avoid conflict with their family? Would you tell the kid that even though they might actually be straight, living that lifestyle might result in their family rejecting them and to just put up with it? Would you tell their school to stop teaching less-popular sexual identities?
Of course not! You'd call their family and tell them to stop letting their child's sexuality determine how well they treat their kid. You'd tell them to stop acting as though their kid is gay when they're clearly not. Put some responsibility on them - they're the adults, they need to figure out how to love the child they created and are responsible for regardless of their sexuality.
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1yr ago
Yes, he is a sexual deviant.
Just to be clear, this is just your opinion. I'd like to hear more about why you think they're a sexual deviant with more reasons than 'I disagree'.
And I’m totally comfortable saying the government shouldn’t hire people who talk about how awesome it is to have sex with animals.
I'm not familiar with them ever advocating for sex with actual animals, rather just some sort of creative role-playing. Otherwise we'd be in jail when girls call us daddy in bed. Regardless, I'm still interested to hear exactly why you think this sort of role play is so bad as to justify the government knowing about it.
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1yr ago
I can agree with your overall thought process but I think this would be a huge step to start with. I think you can get the best of both worlds by slightly changing up your plan. Instead of a blind 15% trust, what if the CBAs included mandatory finance classes or even mandatory financial advisor for each franchise to offer their players? I don't think these athletes are stupid or incapable of being better with their money - I think they're uninformed & rich surrounded by a bunch of other uninformed rich people. Providing mandatory classes or free financial services could be a great way for players to keep possession of their money but learn lifelong lessons about how they should take care of it.
If you care I'll offer the leftist perspective on this. Of course this story is bigger than usual due to Brinton's identity. But Brinton isn't to blame for their outsized persona. I think Brinton's personal life adequately sums up how they came to be the person they are today.
Backstory:
Brinton grew up with homophobic parents who sent him to a conversion camp for two years after he came out. These camps are notorious for being both ineffective (clearly lol) and inhumane. Brinton's experience was so bad that they contemplated suicide while at the camp. Once out of the camp, Brinton was motivated to prevent others from having their same experience and started a successful political campaign to end conversion camps nationwide. After, they earned graduate degrees at MIT and starting working for several liberal think-tanks. The Biden administration then offered them a position which Brinton accepted. Despite having high-value degrees & work experience, Brinton received criticism for being a diversity hire. Then the suitcase incident happened.
Here's how Brinton's life would have gone if we lived in a Leftist Utopia™️:
Brinton grew up with supportive parents. After graduating high school, Brinton earned graduate degrees in nuclear science from MIT. They then worked with liberal think-tanks until they were offered a mid-tier government job in the area of their degree & work experience. Then the suitcase incident happened
Looking at the two stories, it's clear that Brinton's real life story is heavily influenced by their identity. Their entire childhood and pre-college experience would have been very different if they were straight or if society accepted them as-is. I'm seeing a lot of people talk about how Brinton is at fault for the extra attention due to their appearance & persona. But that's not Brinton's fault (unless you believe that Brinton is just making it up). The attention that's been given to Brinton is mostly negative - people questioning their credentials, calling them a diversity grad, a freak, etc.
If any other mid tier government employee took the wrong bag from the airport and claimed it was an honest mistake, it would only make the news AFTER a guilty verdict was reached (if guilty). Instead, this has become a major story because of Brinton's identity.
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