Tarnstellung
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User ID: 553
Tarnstellung
11mo ago
Is there a clear, unambiguous definition of "inherently immoral" in an authoritative source – such as the Bible, or maybe something written by one of the great Catholic thinkers like Thomas Aquinas – or is this just begging the question?
The Catholic Church has already had U-turns of a similar magnitude. For the vast majority of its existence, the Church was in favour of capital punishment. Then, in the late 20th century, their stance suddenly flipped and now they're strongly opposed to it.
Their previous stance on capital punishment suggests that they can be flexible about Biblical interpretation if they really feel it is necessary. If they can interpret "do not kill" to mean "actually, you can kill sometimes", then why wouldn't they be able to interpret the much more ambiguous condemnations of homosexuality in the New Testament to mean that homosexuality is not prohibited in general, but only in certain circumstances? (The condemnations of homosexuality in the Old Testament don't matter because the old laws have been "fulfilled" – whatever that means – and Christians are no longer required to follow them and are permitted to eat pork, not get circumcised, wear mixed fabrics, etc.)
The "Communist Party of Britain" is a tiny Stalinist sect. The CPB should not be confused with the Communist Party of Great Britain. The CPB was formed as an offshoot of the slightly more mainstream CPGB in the 1980s when the leadership of the latter decided "hm, maybe totalitarianism and mass murder is bad". From the first paragraph of the CPB's Wikipedia article:
It is affiliated nationally to the Cuba Solidarity Campaign[10] and the Venezuela Solidarity Campaign. (...) After the fall of the Soviet Union, the party was one of two original British signatories to the Pyongyang Declaration.
The Pyongyang Declaration:
The Pyongyang Declaration, officially titled Let Us Defend and Advance the Cause of Socialism, was a statement signed by a number of political parties on 20 April 1992 that calls for the unity of the socialist camp and a vow to safeguard socialism. Representatives of 70 communist and socialist parties from 51 countries arrived in Pyongyang to celebrate Kim Il-sung's 80th birthday.
So you would side with (even vote for!) these Stalinists, North Korea apologists, wannabe mass murderers, these certified lunatics, because they said "trans bad"?
You will surely understand why your post doesn't make me more sympathetic to the anti-trans side.
Tarnstellung
1yr ago
I really don't understand the near-unanimous outrage here. Does no one believe the suffering from a psychiatric condition can be so terrible as to make the person want to die?
Another comment interpreted her two suicide attempts as calls for help or attention. If this were true, would she not have stopped short of actually killing herself in the end?
If euthanasia had been illegal, she would have just committed suicide with a different method – I mean, she clearly wanted to die – and it would have been a brief sentence or two in an article about the terrorist attack. "Shanti De Corte, who was 17 at the time of the attack, was set to testify, but committed suicide after suffering from PTSD following the bombing. She is regarded as the 33rd victim of the attack." or something to that effect.
But I know that at least some people who have survived suicide attempts have gone on to lead happy lives.
And there are others who attempted again and were successful.
Why does everyone here think they know better than the woman herself, a panel of doctors and a public prosecutor, all of whom must have known far more about the case than was shared in this one news article?
Tarnstellung
11mo ago
A dictator who murdered thousands and imprisoned and tortured tens of thousands of people is not benevolent.
Tarnstellung
11mo ago
On March 27th, A transgender shooter killed children and teachers at a Christian School, with direct political motivations.
What evidence do you have that the shooting was politically motivated? One article says:
Authorities have yet to release what was written publicly. But TBI director David Rausch did talk candidly about the contents of the manifesto at a Tennessee Sheriffs' Association meeting. Rausch said what police found isn't so much a manifesto spelling out a target but a series of rambling writings indicating no clear motive.
Investigators searched the Nashville home of the Covenant School shooter leaving with among other things — a number or handwritten journals, some videos and computer hard drives. Rausch told sheriffs that the review so far of the material finds that the killer did not write about specific political, religious or social issues. In fact, a primary focus in the journals is on idolizing those who committed prior school shootings.
She appears to have followed their lead planning for months and acted alone.
And you can tell this media outlet isn't particularly dedicated to pushing the trans agenda by the fact that they're not using the shooter's preferred pronouns. The obvious explanation is that this particular school was targeted because the shooter once attended it.
On April 1st, LESS THAN A WEEK LATER, the Bud Light-Mulvaney partnership drops. (...) It was an EXTREME "insult to injury" moment. AB was inadvertently(???) sending the message "We do not give a shit that you, our main customer demographic, was just targeted for a politically motivated attack and we will in fact implicitly celebrate the shooter with this marketing campaign that basically claims your favored beer brand for the blue tribe."
Are trans people collectively guilty for a shooting committed by one trans person? And if they are, how long do they have to wait after the shooting before they can go out in public again without this being a provocation? How long does everyone else have to wait before it becomes acceptable to associate with trans people again?
In effect all of the powers that be ignored the victims of the shooting, provided some cover to the shooter, and essentially turned the entire thing into an opportunity to advance transgender issues.
The Wikipedia article on the shooting says:
In response to the shooting, U.S. President Joe Biden said, "We have to do more to stop gun violence. It's ripping our communities apart, ripping the soul of this nation, ripping at the very soul of the nation... we have to do more to protect our schools, so they aren't turned into prisons."[7] He ordered flags on all federal buildings to be flown at half-staff.[21][57] Tennessee state representative Bob Freeman, a Democrat from Nashville, called for gun reforms in the wake of the shooting.[58]
On March 30, thousands of protestors gathered at the Tennessee State Capitol to call for stricter gun control laws.[59][60] Some children held signs saying "I'm nine" in reference to the age of the children shot.[61] Within the chamber of the capitol, three state representatives, Justin Jones, Justin Pearson, and Gloria Johnson led the public gallery in chants of "no more silence", "we have to do better", and "gun reform now", demanding that lawmakers strengthen gun laws. This protest delayed a hearing on a bill which would expand gun access.[62][58] The next day the state legislature passed a law allowing private schools to hire school resource officers from police departments to help prevent shootings, effective immediately.[63]
The president ordering that flags on all federal buildings be flown at half-staff is certainly not ignoring the victims. It seems that they reacted the same way they react to other school shootings. Every remotely notable left-wing figure that publicly reacted to the shooting condemned it and called for more gun control. No one decided that guns and school shootings are fine now because sometimes a member of the ingroup will be shooting at the outgroup.
What controversial environmental decisions has the EU made? What Mr Kraut is probably complaining about is the increased cost of electricity in his country, which is entirely caused by his government's moronic decision to shut down perfectly safe nuclear powerplants before their intended shutdown date out of an irrational fear of nuclear energy. (Is that right, @Southkraut?) Last I heard, the EU was actually considering classifying nuclear energy as "green".
One EU policy I do object to is the promotion of "organic" agriculture, including occult agriculture, but I have literally never seen anyone else complain about this.
Edit: And this bullshit is also largely due to Germany, just look up a map of "biodynamic" agriculture by country. Beware Germans bearing ambitious plans to reshape the world.
I think that's a trend that's common with environmental regulations. Whether it's CFL bulbs, paper straws, gas stoves or low flow toilets, consumers get stuck with an inferior substitute and the alleged crisis never seems to actually get solved.
Lest someone conclude that environmental regulation never works and only serves to make people's lives worse without addressing the actual problem:
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CFC refrigerants are banned, the ozone layer is recovering, and modern fridges are perfectly fine.
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Leaded petrol is banned, lead is no longer being constantly spewed in people's faces, and modern petrol cars are perfectly fine.
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SO2 and NOx emissions are restricted, acid rain has been greatly reduced, and modern vehicles are perfectly fine.
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DDT is banned, bird populations have recovered, and food production is perfectly fine.
These aren't just random examples – these four were some of the biggest environmental problems of the 20th century, and they have all been solved with minimal harm to consumers. (The others were nuclear energy (which wasn't a problem at all, the only problem with nuclear powerplants is that we don't build enough of them) and anthropogenic climate change (which hasn't been solved because no laws that would actually solve it have been enacted).)
Regulators were overeager to promote CFLs which ended up not being very good, but in time LED technology was developed and incandescent lightbulbs have now been completely phased out in favour of much more efficient lighting, so the original goal has in fact been achieved. LED lighting is still not a perfect substitute due to colour problems, but this is a technical problem that will be solved eventually.
Tarnstellung
1yr ago
This is not about the shooter's feelings. Calling a Black criminal "nigger" is offensive to all Black people because it denigrates the Black criminal for being Black, not for being a criminal. Likewise, misgendering a transgender criminal is offensive to all trans people because it denigrates the trans criminal for being trans, not for being a criminal.
Tarnstellung
1yr ago
Yes, informing people about it is probably not a good idea. It would be weird even if she wasn't staying with him, if they were just meeting in an office or something.
Tarnstellung
1yr ago
It's worse in the very trivial way that it leaves a whole lot of the population fighting dice that are incapable of rolling in their favor. Yes, it actually feels quite bad to know that you automatically lose any tiebreaker no matter what for something you have no control over to fight a disparity you had no hand in.
I thought of this, but given that these situations are very rare, I don't think it really matters that much.
Besides, if the "marginalized" groups really do face a disadvantage, then they themselves may "feel quite bad" about their their own chances. If members of both the overrepresented and underrepresented groups adjust their beliefs rationally, the total amount of "feeling quite bad" should remain the same (that is, of course, an enormous if). It really is just levelling the playing field, unlike quotas or double standards.
and of course there is the other factor which is that I have literally zero faith that the people making these choices are actually not rounding everything down as to what counts for qualifications for people with my phenotype and rounding everything up for qualifications that count for people like Brinton before they declare that several candidates are of equal qualifications. I have seen the faces of this kind of person when they see an unrepresented minority in a prestigious position.
The current ideology does support affirmative action beyond what I consider justified, but they are pretty explicit about this. They're not pretending to only use identity as a tiebreaker and then secretly adjusting twice. If (another tremendous if) the belief that affirmative action is only justified in the narrow circumstances outlined above became widespread, I would expect people to implement it fairly.
I will admit that, given the magnitude of the ifs, this is mostly an intellectual exercise. Maybe I would be better off just supporting total identity-blindness, lest narrow affirmative action slip down the slope into wokeism. Not that it matters much, given that the world is already well past that point.
Tarnstellung
1yr ago
Would someone who steals a couple of suitcases generally receive a prison sentence?
Should someone who steals a couple of suitcases – in general – receive a prison sentence? Maybe if it was a repeat offence, but for the first conviction, it seems excessive.
Tarnstellung
1yr ago
Haven't they already made extremely strong Starcraft and Dota AIs?
Tarnstellung
1yr ago
I agree with you for the most part, I'm just curious: why is your hypothetical rich liberal douchebag Jewish?
Tarnstellung
10mo ago
"Eugenics" in the popular imagination means Nazis executing people with disabilities. Embryo selection is "eugenics" in a strict dictionary definition sense, but not "eugenics" as most people understand it.
Tarnstellung
1yr ago
The assumptions are:
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The marginalized groups really are marginalized. In your example, this would mean you have a significantly larger amount of money than me.
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We're looking at this dispassionately, from behind a veil of ignorance. Of course the group that benefits from inequality would support inequality. I usually cringe at this saying because it's so frequently abused by the left, but it does apply in this case: when you’re accustomed to privilege, equality feels like oppression.
Tarnstellung
1yr ago
I was going to say that candidate 2's poor hygiene makes him less qualified, in the broad sense, but then you did it for me! Our disagreement here seems to be on how bad not bathing is as compared to wearing unconventional clothing.
I think the convention that men mustn't wear dresses is arbitrary and pointless and a man should be allowed to wear a dress if he so wishes. Very dress-like garments have been normal for men to wear in many cultures, so there is nothing inherently wrong with it. Even if you consider it ugly, that's just a personal preference; I consider leather jackets ugly, yet I don't think this justifies discrimination against people who like wearing them. Brinton is only inconveniencing people if they let themselves be inconvenienced, like a wokeist who chooses to be offended at everything.
Poor hygiene, however, should not be socially accepted, in my opinion. Of course that depends on what "poor hygiene" is: someone may say that, yes, poor hygiene should be unacceptable but only bathing once a month isn't poor hygiene. For the purpose of this discussion, I am using "poor hygiene" to refer specifically to what candidate 2 is doing.
Tarnstellung
1yr ago
Is there an explanation anywhere, for the uninitiated, why leftists like codes of conduct so much? What does introducing a code of conduct accomplish?
Tarnstellung
2mo ago
As a final note, in a sane society these remote Middle-Eastern squabbles should not have been a major issue in the domestic politics of various Western countries. But we are now well past that point in Europe.
The UK chose to get involved in this particular conflict a hundred years ago. Don't blame this on Muslim immigrants.
Tarnstellung
11mo ago
Hitler, a man once arrested for gay prostitution
Citation needed. Wikipedia says there was "no evidence that he engaged in homosexual behaviour". The article cites some allegations, all of which are apparently discredited.
Tarnstellung
11mo ago
Why do you believe modern architecture sucks?
Edit: And as the other person said, if nuclear fuel can't be produced domestically, only a small amount needs to be imported due to its immense energy density. I recall a comment, probably on Reddit, from someone who lived close to both a coal powerplant and a nuclear powerplant. He noted how trainloads of coal were arriving constantly, while the nuclear plant only received minimal traffic.
Tarnstellung
1yr ago
I would be worried about violence if I got into an altercation with Buck Angel.
Tarnstellung
9mo ago
Off the top of my head there was the Loudoun County affair. Of course the trans activists went on to declare that the rapist wasn't really trans, it was just a guy in a dress... which I guess they didn't really think through.
Apparently the rapist didn't identify as trans. I think it's fair to say that someone who identifies with their gender at birth is not trans. I don't think this is a no-true-Scotsman, as @jkf claims (I assume you are both referring to the same case).
More importantly, however, he didn't enter the bathroom to find a random person to assault – he already knew the victim and had had consensual sex with her in that bathroom previously, and the meeting that resulted in the assault was also pre-arranged:
But this week, during a juvenile court hearing, a fuller picture of Smith’s daughter’s ordeal emerged. She suffered something atrocious. It had nothing at all to do, however, with trans bathroom policies. Instead, like many women and girls, she was a victim of relationship violence.
Smith’s daughter testified that she’d previously had two consensual sexual encounters with her attacker in the school bathroom. On the day of her assault, they’d agreed to meet up again. “The evidence was that the girl chose that bathroom, but her intent was to talk to him, not to engage in sexual relations,” Biberaj, whose office prosecuted the case, told me. The boy, however, expected sex and refused to accept the girl’s refusal. As the The Washington Post reported, she testified, “He flipped me over. I was on the ground and couldn’t move and he sexually assaulted me.”
The boy was indeed wearing a skirt, but that skirt didn’t authorize him to use the girls’ bathroom. As Amanda Terkel reported in HuffPost, the school district’s trans-inclusive bathroom policies were approved only in August, more than two months after the assault. This was not, said Biberaj, someone “identifying as transgender and going into the girls’ bathroom under the guise of that.”
So this is nothing like what anti-trans activists claimed would happen.
That already sets you against the current batch of trans activists, which demand self-ID.
Yes, but it also sets me against the current batch of anti-trans activists, who claim all trans people are just perverts and none of their claims should be taken seriously. I think there should be some standards to prevent people identifying as trans in bad faith, but no one on the anti-trans side is arguing this. They're all saying that all claims of being trans are illegitimate.
That said, there hasn't been a valid argument provided for putting trans people in the opposite-sex facilities.
If I understand correctly, you're asking why trans women should be put in women's prisons and trans men in men's prisons. Beyond the arguments that it makes them feel better when their gender is affirmed, there's a case to be made that a trans woman who passes well is in real danger in a men's prison. A passing trans man in a women's prison is not as endangered, but the women there would probably be uncomfortable with his presence.
Tarnstellung
11mo ago
I don't see the mechanism by which it would make you more physically attractive. If your intention is to tell women you did this, I expect it would only make you less attractive. They would think you are either crazy or lying.
Do you believe that a primary goal of the EU/NATO is to fill all European countries with non-White immigrants? Do you actually think the EU/NATO strongly object to the fact that the population of Russia is mostly ethnic Russians, and that the population of Poland is almost entirely ethnic Poles?
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