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The moderator note on my last contribution had me stymied for a long time.
It's not untrue that "boo hiss" isn't interesting, but I have to ask: what is there to say, politically, that is worthwhile beyond "I must reproach that which is needing reproach"?
Leftist/woke ideology makes a mockery of objective fact. Wokes divide us with their identity politics. They try to force us to ignore the objective truths of male and female biology.
Either you abhor and reject that which is objectionable, or you end up in recursively epistemic quicksand spew. It has to be possible to reject outright the false lies of the woke.
And if that means 'boo hiss' is the substance of the culture war, then yes, I will boo and hiss the leftists for their brazen disregard for objective facts.
Because we have to be able to stand somewhere. Evidence, pure reason, and the American way. I'm not sure if this is a more interesting post, but I put more effort into it, and I have been thinking about it.
What is your issue with leftism beyond just gender politics? Don't lump as all together like that. History and other countries show that certain parts of the leftist agenda (worker protections, anti-trust, social welfare, environmental protections, a certain degree of rights for women) are both very popular and good for society. You can't just force certain things back in a hole: Franco tried that, Pinochet tried that, and it didn't fucking work.
Also the left is self-immolating without your "heroic stand". We haven't had an actual leftist party in power since the end of the Soviet Union in the West because the we're too busy infighting and tone policing over trivialities.
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If your entire post can be flipped to support the other side by just swapping a few key words, are you actually saying anything?
You can flip anything that way, but its correspondence to reality may change. "I know you are but what am I" is an argument that should stay in the kindergartens.
No, you definitely can't. If your priors are true and your argument follows logically from its priors, then...
/u/Tiptoe 's argument could be easily flipped because the statements
Can be easily demonstrated to be true for nearly every identity-linked ideology and the original poster made no effort to demonstrate or argue that they are particulary true for their targeted group.
And while the conversion of,
into
launders the assumption that the objective truth of A is equivalent to the objective truth of B, again-- the original poster made no effort to argue for the degree to which A should be regarded as important.
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There is a difference between, say, responding to a post about Jan 6 with "What about the BLM riots?" (or vice versa) which is annoying whataboutism, and writing a post completely devoid of argument beyond "You suck."
Responding to the latter with "No, you" or "Nuh uh" is indeed juvenile, but there isn't really much else to respond with. The point is such posts should not be written because there is nothing to engage with.
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Not really.
You're just reiterating what you said in the post you're complaining about being modded.
"Boo hiss" is not the substance of the culture war, it's just the soundtrack. Yes, we all hate our enemies. We all enjoy booing them. But if you have nothing more to say than "But, see, leftists really are that bad! They are just the worst! We should boo them!" then...
Okay. And? The people who agree with you will clap and bark like seals. The people who don't will get angry (which you also enjoy). But what is your point? That your enemies are just so bad that there isn't even any point talking about how and why they're bad?
You won't find much sympathy here for leftism. Even the most "liberal" members of the Motte (myself included) are at best the sort of heterodox classical liberal that leftists today call fascists and rightists still promise to put up against the wall with all the progressives. It's rare we have someone truly of the left who sticks around. So maybe it feels comfy for you just say "Leftists-- fucking suck! Amirite?" But that's not really what this place is for.
Talk about Trump's latest shenanigans on X or whether we should be bombing Venezuelan drug boats. Talk about housing, about demographic change, about whether we can coexist with Muslims or blacks, or whether we should try. Talk about 4X games and how woke game devs ruined your childhood. Talk about woodworking or the real estate trends and housing policies in your home town. Talk about China, or AI, or the Brown university shooting, or whether we should be sympathetic to Israel or Palestinians. Talk about science fiction novels and the latest Hugo disasters. Talk about why you're a Mormon or a Catholic or an atheist. Talk about why Indians are suddenly the bete noire of the Internet or whether the Bondi beach shooting was a repudiation or vindication of gun control laws. Talk about how hard it is to date or what's wrong with gender relations. Talk about sports or martial arts or programming or music. Talk about any damn thing in the world, even god-fucking-help-me The Jews!
These are all topics with plenty of culture war valence.
People say a lot here, every day, that is more worthwhile than that. Or at least it's worthwhile if you think there is any point to the Motte at all (and if you don't, then why are you here?)
How long have you been here? Pretty long, I'd wager. I am absolutely certain you're someone who was permabanned in the past, probably for being unable to post anything but how much you hate leftists. I'm not going to ban you for this post just like I didn't ban you for your previous one, but if you have yet to figure out what else is worthwhile to say, then why are you here? There is a lot more going in the world than "Wokes lying about stuff, and I object!"
I thought it was the tankies who were "liberals get the bullet too"? Though to be fair, I'm a rightist and I do sometimes feel the urge for À la lanterne! reading some of the news (applicable to both right and left, very online SJW/woke/progressive or regressive/far-rightist, civilian or politician).
You're only a rightist inasmuch as you're Catholic. You have historically progressive views about women's rights and you're not racist or antisemitic enough.
On the other hand... Catholic.
Sorry, you're up against the wall too.
What's that quote from Flannery O'Connor? “She could never be a saint, but she thought she could be a martyr if they killed her quick.” That's me! 😁 Up against the wall, just make it fast!
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I think there are plenty of examples of internecine purges on the far right as well. The Night of the Long Knives is probably the most obvious example.
Honestly, I suspect it's a generic hazard of being a moderate in an extremist organization.
Yeah, I think the French Revolution is the ur-example though. I'm still astounded how it went from, say, Camille Desmoulins being firebrand revolutionary to not being revolutionary enough and eaten by the same monster he had helped create.
It does help explain how they went from Republic to Empire under Napoleon, they had killed everyone who they could kill, so there was nobody left to kill off and that left a gap for the old model to return.
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Damn bro. Ouch.
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I'm here because if no one stands against the lies, then the liars will win! Actually and truly!
You're either a troll or you just have a very poor model of what a discussion forum is for. If everyone here agreed with you, there'd be nothing to discuss, and if you have something to say that not everyone agrees with, you'll have to actually defend your position, not just say "I object!" or "You lie!"
But you're not contesting any particular point I'm making, merely enacting your authority upon me rather than allowing votes to do their job.
The socially constructed nature of reality is an interesting topic. Maybe no one has engaged with it yet, but I think it's important to remind people of the fundamental truth of the lawlessness of leftist ideologies.
Stalinist Communism created a world in which an entire society was bound to believe false things on penalty of death.
The point is to repeat the truth loudly because otherwise people will forget. So perhaps it's repetitive, but because there is nothing preventing the human social organism from wandering off into complete delusional ideological pablum, it's virtuous to repeat the truth so others are reminded of it.
Leftists don't care about the truth and I don't care about being castigated for reminding people of that. Leftists will kill to get what they want and it's not that I don't respect you for trying to hold the forum to a higher standard but I will reiterate that the vicious lawlessness of the wokes will get a lot of people killed. If that's what it takes to keep the reminder up, to refresh our memory, to understand again what it is we're up against, that unholy cathedral of debased pseudointellectualism, then that's what I'll do.
Edit: If you're burned out on the culture war topics such that you're policing this as low effort, then maybe that's a you problem. In the old days of the Internet they let votes speak more rather than harping on people for expressing a vital understanding, even if it seems rote, even if it seems repetitive, even if we all more or less agree.
You aren't making any particular point.
If you just want updoots, you can post about how much you hate your outgroup.
Moderators try to keep every discussion from devolving into "I hate my outgroup!"
Sure.
You certainly haven't.
No, the problem is that you literally are not making an argument. All you're saying is "Leftists bad, we must repeat this so everyone remembers leftists are bad."
Need I remind you, leftists are allowed to post here. We don't have many, but they are around. And if they rolled in to say "We need to remind people that the right is fascist and hates puppies and rainbows. This needs to be repeated so people don't forget that the right is evil," well, they're going to get the same treatment.
Perhaps I should ask:
Is it possible to share space with people who have evil, objectively incorrect viewpoints?
It's true that I don't look at leftists as having correct or worthwhile perspectives (because they so demonstrably don't) in which case the only purpose of discussion is to make it known that there is such a thing as objective reality.
This is why when 'affirmative action' type choices are made to platform leftist voices here, it never works: their ideas simply can't stand in the free marketplace, which is why they have to turn to coercion in the first place!
If the purpose of discourse is to arrive, together, at convergent notions of objective reality in the face of the vast impulse towards fiction and willful delusion, then when do you reject that which is demonstrably evil?
It certainly is; I do that every day, in fact.
The way you deal with that is by refuting the viewpoint directly, not the viewpointer, for actual fact is an asymmetric weapon on the side of the one most aligned with it.
As for the people who reject that, well, people who embody selfishness before actual truth will still give quests in return for a reward that aligns with their interests.
(This is also why I find left vs. right framings pointless, because there's no way to split the people in each faction that are driven wholly by self-interest from the people whose self-interest aligns with improving things in that framing, and the people who deploy it against their enemies to deny that it's an aspect of themselves are typically the former type.)
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That's for you to decide. But since people who you believe have "evil, objectively incorrect viewpoints" are allowed to share space here, you will have to do so if you want to post here. And you can't just assert that they're evil and objectively incorrect. You have to actually engage with the specific things you think they are wrong about. Not just "Leftists wrong and bad about everything," which is a meaningless and uninteresting statement.
Cool. There is such a thing as objective reality. I daresay almost everyone, including leftists, agrees with that.
We allow anyone to post here, if that's what you mean. Otherwise, this is another meaningless claim.
All you're doing is talking in vague generalities.
Write something more interesting.
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In some circumstances, observably, yes. You could examine how this happens. In some circumstances, observably, no, and this could also be examined. You could dig into what the breakpoints are, where one situation devolves into the other.
Not yet. Hopefully, not soon.
Alternatively, see here.
The purpose of discourse is to arrive at the truth. But once you arrive at the truth, discourse has served its purpose, and therefore ends. This place exists to promote discourse; to the extent that your questions have been answered and you have arrived at certainty, you have no place here. This is a place of charity, and without doubts and questions, charity cannot exist.
But what common ground can you find with someone who will engage in a fascist distortion of truth in order to justify their violence?
What do I have in common with someone who believes Trump is a fascist? Such a fantastically deluded person cannot be reasoned with.
If all I do is complain at the ridiculousness of the infeasibility of talking with these people, at least I will have pointed to the problem.
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I don't hate leftists! I hate the ideology! Most leftists are innocent victims of brainworms, or people collaborating with the fascist leftists.
If you are earnestly a righty and on my partisan side: stop it. You're making us look stupid and you are convincing no one.
What I do suspect, however, is that you are trolling, and are in fact a lefty posting ostensibly righty positions and trying to get a gotcha of hypocrisy. No one is fooled. You could put what you have posted so far in a partisan mirror and nothing about its content or valence would substantially change. How do I know? Uh, righties don't use the term 'fascist' or 'brainworm' like you do, and your references to an objective truth are absent of any reference to God.
Either case does not reflect well on you.
There are nonzero people here who believe that leftist positions are merely a harmful form of parasite.
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