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PaperclipPerfector  7mo ago (text post)   3259 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for October 20, 2024

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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What is the point of politics if it no longer tracks with civility?

I've touched on this before, but it makes no logical sense for people to accept uncivil words and behavior from politicians when we expect civil words and behavior in most other areas of society. And why should anyone participate in politics unless and until we establish a baseline?

And why should anyone participate in politics unless and until we establish a baseline?

You may be not interested in politics, but politics is interested in you. If you ignore the politicians completely, you still will very much have to deal with consequences of their actions, and these consequences, with our currently insanely regulated and government-infested world, would still define huge part of your life. If you don't participate at all, they'd just be freer to do whatever they want, without even the microscopic hypocritical lip service to your interests they have to pay now.

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A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

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