評価の高い 200 件のコメント全て表示する 499

[–]TheSpaceWhale 90 ポイント91 ポイント  (73子コメント)

Anti-GMO fear mongering. Out of all the endlessly problematic aspects of the global food system, y'all picked the one thing that actually doesn't have strong evidence of being harmful to rally against.

[–]Ferociousaurus 44 ポイント45 ポイント  (1子コメント)

In fact, it's worse than rallying around getting rid of something that isn't really harmful -- there's quite strong evidence that it's rallying around getting rid of something that could be almost incalculably useful.

[–]PlushgunMusic[S] 26 ポイント27 ポイント  (0子コメント)

But the gluten. WHAT ABOUT THE GLUTEN.

[–]yellowmadgey 36 ポイント37 ポイント  (17子コメント)

I tend to associate Anti-GMO fear mongers with Anti-Vax fear mongers. It's a pity Anti-GMO is given any more patience than Anti-Vax is

[–]Heidegger 2 ポイント3 ポイント  (16子コメント)

What about the intellectual property rights angle? What about seed diversity?

[–]piyochama 13 ポイント14 ポイント  (2子コメント)

IP on biological research has existed for quite some time now. I'm not really sure what is new about this.

[–]Heidegger 0 ポイント1 ポイント  (1子コメント)

What's new is the scale and competitiveness. Even if it isn't a new problem; it is a problem that applies to GMOs.

You wouldn't say "so what people are dying of ebola; people have been dying of infectious diseases for millenia."

[–]piyochama 3 ポイント4 ポイント  (0子コメント)

What's new is the scale and competitiveness.

Is it now? Corporation entities and corporate ownership of IP has existed for a long time now.

[–]PrettyIceCube 9 ポイント10 ポイント  (9子コメント)

piyochama is correct. Before GMO was used selectively breed strains were being treated as intellectual property.

[–]Heidegger 2 ポイント3 ポイント  (8子コメント)

Before GMO was used selectively breed strains were being treated as intellectual property.

They most certainly were not.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biological_patents_in_the_United_States

And even if they were, claiming that the problem isn't unique to GMOs does not imply the problem doesn't apply to GMOs. It is precisely their utility that makes their being subject to IP law such a big problem. Perhaps you should look into the business practices surrounding "Round-Up Ready" crops in the US.

[–]PrettyIceCube 5 ポイント6 ポイント  (7子コメント)

The United States has been patenting chemical compositions based upon human products for over 100 years. The first patent for a human product was granted on March 20, 1906

Your own source literally refutes your claim.

[–]yellowmadgey 2 ポイント3 ポイント  (2子コメント)

What about the intellectual property rights angle?

I have no problem with IP reform. I'm in software, we have IP issues in software too. But thankfully you don't find people who are 'anti software' because of it.

What about seed diversity?

Biodiversity isn't a GMO problem, and GMO hasn't exacerbated it. As long as people can select the 'best' seeds, people will select the best seeds. If GMO disappeared tomorrow, people would continue to select the same small subsection of the best seeds.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_Revolution#Biodiversity

A couple of additional points:

Most of those arguing against GM crops don't have an insight into modern farming.

To those who argue "farmers can't save seeds": Modern farmers don't save seeds. It's far too much effort for far too little reward. Seed is bought, crops are raised, more seed is bought, etc.

To those who argue it affects poor farmers: I find this to argument to be full of unchecked first world privilege. I grew up in Zimbabwe, and better seed allows farmers to make more money/raise themselves out of poverty. The 'plight of the poor farmer' is solely being pushed by those in rich countries.

[–]Heidegger 4 ポイント5 ポイント  (1子コメント)

Yeah I'm a software engineer too. I'm aware software patents are a huge problem that constrain the general usage of new technologies in favor of patent holders in that industry as well.

The spread of Green Revolution agriculture affected both agricultural biodiversity (or agrodiversity) and wild biodiversity.[41] There is little disagreement that the Green Revolution acted to reduce agricultural biodiversity, as it relied on just a few high-yield varieties of each crop.

And you said:

Biodiversity isn't a GMO problem, and GMO hasn't exacerbated it.

...

This has led to concerns about the susceptibility of a food supply to pathogens that cannot be controlled by agrochemicals, as well as the permanent loss of many valuable genetic traits bred into traditional varieties over thousands of years. To address these concerns, massive seed banks such as Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research’s (CGIAR) International Plant Genetic Resources Institute (now Bioversity International) have been established (see Svalbard Global Seed Vault).

Interesting.

Most of those arguing against GM crops don't have an insight into modern farming.

Where does your insight come from?

To those who argue "farmers can't save seeds": Modern farmers don't save seeds. It's far too much effort for far too little reward. Seed is bought, crops are raised, more seed is bought, etc.

Ok, when did they stop? And why is it necessary to make it illegal if they weren't doing it anyway? Why not make strains that produce viable seeds instead of the single-use ones they have today?

http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2013/feb/16/india-rice-farmers-revolution?CMP=twt_gu

To those who argue it affects poor farmers: I find this to argument to be full of unchecked first world privilege. I grew up in Zimbabwe, and better seed allows farmers to make more money/raise themselves out of poverty. The 'plight of the poor farmer' is solely being pushed by those in rich countries.

How is it full of first world privilege, and not just, in your opinion, technically incorrect? There are grassroots movements against GMOs and restrictions on seed saving all over Latin America, and in India, so it seems to me you are simply wrong about this being a first-world-only concern.

Nobody said GMOs per se are bad--I'm aware that they've increased yields and made crops able to grow under different conditions; I was arguing that the IP law to which they are subject eliminates what I understood to be the usual pathways by which diversity is preserved. I admit I don't know a lot about this stuff, but I don't see much in your argument to counter that idea. Nowhere did I argue that GMOs per se are bad. Where did I imply that?

[–]PrettyIceCube 3 ポイント4 ポイント  (16子コメント)

Looks like there is a fair bit of controversy regarding GMOs in this sub. I'll pull together a bunch of stuff from /r/science and /r/askscience later on today. In the mean time, here is an AMA hosted in /r/science around 8 months ago with Professor Kevin Folta from the Horticultural Sciences Department at the University of Florida.

http://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/2dz07o/science_ama_series_ask_me_anything_about/

[–]piyochama 4 ポイント5 ポイント  (15子コメント)

I don't think the controversy on this sub is regarding the science. It's about the economics of the issue

[–]PrettyIceCube 4 ポイント5 ポイント  (14子コメント)

The seed diversity issue mentioned a few times is a biology issue. Also, economics is a science.

[–]piyochama 13 ポイント14 ポイント  (10子コメント)

economics is a science.

As an econ/finance person, I beg to differ. We are very much within the realms of social science - nothing that we do is even remotely empirical.

[–]PrettyIceCube 7 ポイント8 ポイント  (2子コメント)

Social sciences are science.

And I disagree with your opinion on the empirical nature of economics. Here's the first paper I found on the matter, which puts the amount of empirical research done in economics at over 40% for the years 1982-1986. Do you have other more recent sources that disagree?

[–]piyochama 7 ポイント8 ポイント  (1子コメント)

The type of empirical research we do cannot control for all variables - hence we're not a science, because the scientific method cannot be applied to fields like economics.

[–]TheSpaceWhale 5 ポイント6 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Very few scientific endeavors outside of chemistry and physics can control for all variables; observational science is still science.

[–]ModestMaoist 1 ポイント2 ポイント  (6子コメント)

nothing that we do is even remotely empirical.

Why does this not surprise me.

[–]Heidegger 1 ポイント2 ポイント  (2子コメント)

Economics is definitely not a science, according to leading economists like Ha-Joon Chang, Paul Krugman, and Thomas Piketty. It has no testable hypotheses due to a lack of controlled experimentation.

[–]snakebaconer 28 ポイント29 ポイント  (30子コメント)

I'm anti-GMO, but because of the oligarchic nature of the GMO industry. GMO MNCs do some really horrible things around the globe.

[–]Bittervirus 26 ポイント27 ポイント  (29子コメント)

Yeah I'm not anti-GMO because of frankenfoods or whatever buzzwords they use, I'm anti-GMO because being able to own a patent on a specific seed is fucking dumb and ruins the entire point.

[–]tilia-cordata 27 ポイント28 ポイント  (0子コメント)

It is stupid, but plant patents existed in the US since at least 1952 (the first GMO approved was GMO tobacco in 1994). It is a shitty system, but it's not GMOs that are the problem. Most of the world's conventional (non-GMO) seeds are sold by the same multinational corporations that produce GMOs.

Again, GM plants are a red herring for more serious problems in our food system.

[–]sweateraficionado 4 ポイント5 ポイント  (19子コメント)

But without intellectual property protections, how do we incentivize biotech companies to innovate?

[–]snakebaconer 6 ポイント7 ポイント  (7子コメント)

It's also a tactic to strip agency away from poor farmers, and a the patents become tools for MNCs, governments, and international banks to functionally extort farmers and ranchers in poorer areas of the world.

[–]PlushgunMusic[S] 25 ポイント26 ポイント  (3子コメント)

This criticism can be leveled against pretty much every monetized technology.

[–]snakebaconer 5 ポイント6 ポイント  (2子コメント)

No I think Monsanto and others are different in many ways from most tech companies. Especially at the consumer level.

Edit: On rereading this comment it seemed short and rude. Sorry.

[–]TheSpaceWhale 6 ポイント7 ポイント  (1子コメント)

Could you care to explain? I don't see how this is any different than convincing people to rely on petroleum fertilizer systems that force them to continue buying the fertilizer once they've sunk the cost into transitioning to that system.

[–]snakebaconer 14 ポイント15 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Ya, sorry I typed that right as I was falling asleep for a nap. Monsanto, and only a few other global companies, protect their "patents" like lots of other companies in the tech and agricultural world. Unfortunately lots of their genetic patents depend on indigenous knowledge - what plants/herbs could provide the genes for drought or pest resistance - and the indigenous peoples who provide that knowledge to Monsanto aren't appropriately compensated. Indeed GMOs (or pharmaceuticals for that matter) that arise from traditional ecological knowledge often end up costing indigenous peoples and rural farmers more in the long run than they are compensated for assisting in early stages of GMO development.

Another level of this "bioprospecting" that is problematic comes at the national and international scale. Monsanto works with national governments, the World Bank, the IMF, and other development institutions to insert supplies of GMO crops into humanitarian relief efforts, developmental aid packages, or national loans. These deals can take a variety of forms, but importantly they often force open local/rural markets for proprietary GMO crops. When subsistence farmers use a nonreproducing GMO crop for once season - that is to say a variety of corn or rice that can't reseed itself - farmers must continually purchase seeds (often at exorbitant prices) from Monsanto or other GMO outfits. This example is not unlike the one you provide for fertilizer dependence. In fact the two are often complimentary efforts built into the development programs (aka: neoliberal privatization efforts) I mentioned earlier.

Another problem, and one that political ecologists, anthropologists, and other scholars are studying looks at how GMOs provide a conduit for neoliberalism to extend to the genetic and molecular level. The discourse surrounding GMOs depends on both neoliberal notions of market management (that is to say "free" markets) and the ability to patent genes. Both of these discourses reduce complex political systems down to simplified, neoliberal logics. One where the ability to patent a gene or control the distribution of a plant seem not only reasonable but necessary parts of global agriculture. There is an inequality built into every step of the GMO process (like all commodity chains), but in this instance the discourse of this process has become inextricably connected with reregulating food markets for the benefit of Monsanto and other GMO producers.

In many ways this genetic-reductionist discourse erases the social and political causes for the crises that GMOs are popularly seen as solutions to. For example, a drought resistant strain of rice seems a practical solution to water scarcity in parts of Africa or Asia. Right? What the discourse of GMO as savior hides, in this instance, is that often water scarcity arises from corruption in governmental structures, or more commonly the neoliberal privatization of water resources. GMOs are then a solution to anthropocentric (largely neoliberal, free market, and trade specific) problems, but the discourse surrounding them, and the "intellectual property rights" contained within GMO genes, renders those issues moot. It reduces them to an issue correctable by increasing market penetration for GMOs, for tearing down trade barriers, and for globalizing the intellectual property system.

Farmers and indigenous peoples often find themselves at the bottom of a huge, neoliberal dung heap. Where the proposed solutions (GMOs) to their problems (politics) leave them more vulnerable to environmental and economic forces then they were initially. This all stinks because GMOs could be a positive force for global food stores. Unfortunately, they are so wrapped up in systems/structures of inequality that their deployment is problematic (to say the least).

(I'm sorry if this is sloppy. It's dinner time and I don't have time to reread this, and stopped short on the last point. Also, didn't get to say why I think GMOs are different from other systems like the one you mentioned. I hope my point is clear from the bit I mentioned about indigenous intellectual property rights and the politics of non-reproducing crops. Basically, I just wanted to say there is a political difference between GMOs and other consumer technologies - I understood the post I was replying to as talking about consumer products like iPhones, computers, or John Deer tractors.)

[–]Heidegger 6 ポイント7 ポイント  (4子コメント)

GMOs are extremely problematic, just not from a health perspective.

The problem with GMOs is intellectual property rights being used to control farmers and decrease seed diversity.

[–]TheSpaceWhale 21 ポイント22 ポイント  (3子コメント)

The corporatization of agriculture is neither unique to or required from GMOs, and also not what people are generally upset about. GMOs are only one of many tools that put farmers in debt to corporations, and aren't really the main drivers of seed diversity decrease (conventional breeding has been doing that for a long while).

Again: there are tons of problems with the industrial ag system, none of which are particularly unique or even focused on GMOs. But GMOs are scary so they get all of the attention.

[–]piyochama 2 ポイント3 ポイント  (0子コメント)

It's also partly because of the whole Monsanto witch hunt craze too.

People love to forget the Green revolution when they talk about this, but that's not really that surprising either.

[–]xyz1983 34 ポイント35 ポイント  (13子コメント)

The heavy focus on cultural appropriation while completely ignoring cultural imperialism is extremely regressive in my opinion.

[–]piyochama 15 ポイント16 ポイント  (12子コメント)

Also sort of in line with this, but examining other cultures... While using your own culture as the main lens. Like wtf? Do you really think you can just superficially critique how people do things from your own completely wrong understanding of things?

[–]draw_it_now 18 ポイント19 ポイント  (3子コメント)

After seeing this video [13:40], I've really started to hate the monthly post we seem to get of pictures from before the Iranian revolution, with everyone lamenting how 'free' and 'progressive' everything looked.

What nobody seems to realise is that part of the reason for the revolution was that everything was too Americanised - Iranians were worried that their own culture was being eradicated.

Not only that, but pre-revolutionary Iran was a dictatorship! just because it looks good doesn't mean it is good!

Iran has had, and continues to have a terribly oppressive government, but both of them were terrible for opposite cultural reasons - simply saying "Looks American = Good" is pathetically shallow and even damaging.

[–]piyochama 11 ポイント12 ポイント  (2子コメント)

What nobody seems to realise is that part of the reason for the revolution was that everything was too Americanised - Iranians were worried that their own culture was being eradicated.

EXACTLY. They don't even realize that the hijab was appropriated by feminists in the Middle East as a means of resistance - that it was a way to resist the cultural imperialism that was going on throughout the region.

[–]Ziggy55 4 ポイント5 ポイント  (1子コメント)

Can you post a source for that info about the hijab? That's super interesting!

[–]piyochama 5 ポイント6 ポイント  (0子コメント)

No problem, happy to do so:

This link is pretty good.

This isn't to say that this analysis is consistent across the North African/Middle Eastern region, either. Different feminists across the spectrum have different reasons for either embracing or rejecting the hijab across the Muslim world - this paper, for example, describes the very different rationale Nigerian feminists had for embracing the hijab.

This is only a start, too. Try Google Scholar for more, like:

https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=feminism+1970s+hijab&hl=en&as_sdt=0&as_vis=1&oi=scholart&sa=X&ei=bOc2VY-EJK3nsATTkYEI&ved=0CBsQgQMwAA

[–]NowThatsAwkward 1 ポイント2 ポイント  (5子コメント)

If it isn't too exasperating to talk about, would you mind please giving some examples you have in mind? It's really good to keep this cultural lens in mind, so I'd like to be able to look up some examples of how this has happened in so I can learn more about it and be more aware of my own biases.

But I understand if it would be too exasperating, it's not always fun to list a bunch of things that piss you off!

[–]piyochama 6 ポイント7 ポイント  (4子コメント)

No problem, I don't mind at all.

Things like:

  • Sexualization in other countries - doing entertainment analysis critically tends to 100% be skewed by the person's own bias. I see this even in academia, which you'd expect to be a lot better (but really isn't).

  • Homophobia - a lot of people overstate how welcoming Japan is to GSM people, for example, because "Tokyo allows gay marriage licenses!" when in fact the fight over there is probably one of the tougher forms of discrimination to fight (basically, discrimination by erasure - they don't really think there are any GSM in their immediate proximity so they just don't care about it).

  • The hijab - Western feminist discourse on this pisses me off so much, because people simply don't understand the rationale different people have for wearing it.

  • Anything to do with religion in general, actually. Lots of people grew up in religious households without really understanding the religion and its inner workings, and this seems to be very common everywhere in activism, essentially.

[–]TrueArmenianHero 5 ポイント6 ポイント  (1子コメント)

The hijab - Western feminist discourse on this pisses me off so much, because people simply don't understand the rationale different people have for wearing it.

Most feminists I respect have the same ideas of Hijabs as they have of any other clothing item (or lack thereof), that as long as it's their choice and they aren't forced or pressured into wearing it than there is no issue. Is that problematic?

[–]piyochama 4 ポイント5 ポイント  (0子コメント)

The problem is this idea that all women who wear it are forced to do so. It robs Muslim women of their choice, and imposes on them this idea that Westerners know better.

[–]NowThatsAwkward 2 ポイント3 ポイント  (1子コメント)

Thank you for explaining! I wasn't sure what you were referring to, but that makes total sense.

[–]piyochama 1 ポイント2 ポイント  (0子コメント)

No problem, let me know if you have any questions

[–]rmc 0 ポイント1 ポイント  (1子コメント)

Welcome to not being in the USA!

[–]piyochama 2 ポイント3 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Even then, this is really present internationally. People from different countries seemingly tend to think from their own perspective only.

[–]NowThatsAwkward 27 ポイント28 ポイント  (2子コメント)

This is somewhat related to anti-gmo and organic food stuff, but it annoys and baffles the hell out of me when people claim to be "anti-chemical". Where they use 'chemical' to mean 'unnatural' rather than something that can't be separated. Equating 'natural' with 'healthy' is bizarre enough, but some people I've talked to genuinely seemed to have no idea that natural things are/have a chemical composition.

Just this morning my mother was proud that she found an all-natural recipe for pear jam that "has no pectin in it." She didn't mean the recipe had no pectin in it, when asked to clarify- because plenty of recipes for high pectin-producing fruits like pears don't add extra- she thought that the end product had no pectin in it. And apparently non-pectin jam is good because pectin is a chemical, so it must be bad.

[–]OneJobToRuleThemAll 1 ポイント2 ポイント  (1子コメント)

unnatural

So... artificial?

[–]NowThatsAwkward 1 ポイント2 ポイント  (0子コメント)

They're not just against artificial things though! I guess a better way to put it is that they don't like things that aren't whole, but that doesn't fully explain it either. I'm struggling to find a concise way to explain that particular view.

Like with my mom yesterday- pectin is perfectly natural, even as an additive. But she didn't want it as an additive or otherwise- she got upset when I eventually told her there was naturally pectin in her pear jam.

I eventually had to lie and agree that I was probably mistaken about pectin being produced by default in some homemade jams because she was thinking about swearing off all jams because of it.

[–]PlushgunMusic[S] 46 ポイント47 ポイント  (6子コメント)

And another one, and this might just be because I'm a grump but: "naughty" cancer awareness campaigns.

I'm not sex negative, and I think they have the right goals in mind but sheesh...I get it. Love your boobs. Love your butt. See my boobs! SEE THEM. For cancer.

[–]NowThatsAwkward 53 ポイント54 ポイント  (0子コメント)

It's especially grating when they use the slogan "SAVE THE BOOBIES". Not only does it imply that they care more about the person's sexual characteristics than the person themselves, it also somewhere between ignores and outright insults people who choose to or have to have mastectomies.

[–]Priorwater 25 ポイント26 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Ha, yeah that's like the definition of "pseudo-progressive." On my college's campus there was a "save second base" campaign that ended up receiving a bit of flak from feminist groups for framing breast cancer awareness in the context of male desire. Maybe I'm being optimistic, but I get the feeling that more and more folks are understanding that those campaigns use questionable methods and there are other methods available.

[–]Clumpy 2 ポイント3 ポイント  (3子コメント)

There's a flip side to those, though—the "I had a double mastectomy and I'm still beautiful" campaigns—which I think have a really nice message behind them. I feel like PETA had a big hand in propagating the sort of lurid ones you're talking about.

[–]greenduch 3 ポイント4 ポイント  (2子コメント)

PETA, as in the animal rights people?

[–]Clumpy 5 ポイント6 ポイント  (1子コメント)

Yeah, they've been doing "I'd rather not wear anything at all than wear fur" campaigns with celebrities in the nude for like a decade.

[–]greenduch 1 ポイント2 ポイント  (0子コメント)

ahh okay I see, thanks :)

[–]onegallant 20 ポイント21 ポイント  (3子コメント)

Anti-imperialism that doubles as totalitarian apologism. Specifically thinking of a shitty Michael Parenti book I had to read for a Sociology class at the undergraduate level that had a chapter that began from the premise of opposing the recent Iraq War, good so far, and somehow ended up idealizing Saddam fucking Hussein and spreading debunked bullshit regarding the Anfal Campaign.

[–]piyochama 13 ポイント14 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Oh yeah that is SO COMMON. EVEN HERE OMG

The thread the other day about not voting in US elections basically had people come out of the woodwork and explicitly state that they would recognize the sovereignty of a nation to commit acts of genocide on their own people... because anti imperialism amirite???

The horseshoe effect is real.

[–]tapedeckgh0st 3 ポイント4 ポイント  (0子コメント)

This really hits home for me.

[–]AliceTaniyama [スコア非表示]  (0子コメント)

I hear this same sort of thing whenever people talk about Vietnam. It's always some white person talking about how evil South Vietnam was and how they deserved to be pillaged and driven out of the country by the patriotic North, all because the North opposed U.S. imperialism.

Always, said white person "knows real Vietnamese people" (from Hanoi, of course) who can confirm that the Vietnamese, a monolithic people with no political divisions, all agree on this matter, and those who were killed, imprisoned, or pushed out of the country aren't important. They don't know how mad I get when I hear this sort of thing, since a big chunk of my family (and all of my in-laws) were refugees, and what hurts worse is that they don't care, because white progressive causes are more sacred than dead family if the dead family has a different perspective on history.

[–]greenduch 14 ポイント15 ポイント  (6子コメント)

I'll give an example of mine: The "Celebrities Without Makeup are just stunning" trend. Please, can we be more ableist and Ayn Randian?

I don't understand those two sentences together. Can you expand?

[–]PlushgunMusic[S] 9 ポイント10 ポイント  (5子コメント)

What I meant is: the trend of celebrities posting "makeup-free" selfies on instagram, then consumed by clickbait sites like Huffington Post and Buzzfeed. The articles always intend to promote the idea that beauty can be "makeup free" but really just give credence to the idea that beautiful celebrities are just naturally, genetically beautiful and thus superior to all of those other people that feel like they need makeup to feel conventionally beautiful.

[–]greenduch 11 ポイント12 ポイント  (1子コメント)

huh. being concerned about the ableism in that kinda seems to be uh... missing the forest for a tree, but okay.

[–]PlushgunMusic[S] 1 ポイント2 ポイント  (0子コメント)

I think a lot of people on the whole are taking this more seriously than intended. I'm just pointing out annoying mainstream trends, not major frictions with movement progressivism. I don't see those types of articles and get filled with rage - it's met with more of an eye roll (take for example, my position on "naughty" cancer awareness campaigns)

[–]grumpenprole 6 ポイント7 ポイント  (2子コメント)

I... still don't really get it. Those celebrities are still the people who use the most makeup, which means... anything with a subtext like that is shaming them and their natural looks most of all? I don't get it at all.

[–]PlushgunMusic[S] 6 ポイント7 ポイント  (1子コメント)

Have you seen the kind of clickbait I'm talking about? What I mean is, it is supposed to "celebrate natural beauty" when it really just propagates a very strict idea of natural beauty

[–]Hazlzz 64 ポイント65 ポイント  (11子コメント)

The organic food movement. It's actively contributing to increased food prices and incredibly elitist. I find it baffling that it's become so synonymous with progressive left-wing people.

[–]PlushgunMusic[S] 14 ポイント15 ポイント  (0子コメント)

This x100... It really needs to be broadcast through a megaphone in a car driving around Brooklyn.

[–]snerrymunster 16 ポイント17 ポイント  (8子コメント)

I agree with aspects of it, but not the obsession with "organic vs conventional. Wanting to know *exactly what goes into your food, how it is grown and processed is perfectly reasonable however. Considering how disconnected we are from our food sources in the 21st century this knowledge is valuable.

[–]NewtonBill 16 ポイント17 ポイント  (7子コメント)

But "organic" is definitely not a shortcut label for "healthy, ethical, and sustainably grown" or whatever else many in the organic food movement want it to be. (Just to be clear, I am not ascribing this position to you.)

[–]TrueArmenianHero 6 ポイント7 ポイント  (0子コメント)

I find it baffling that it's become so synonymous with progressive left-wing people.

I think animal rights groups get lumped in with the progressive left, and a lot of the "do you know what happens to your food before you eat it" conversation started from animal rights organizations. From that sprouted everything from eating organic, to GMO's, to all the other food debates seen as leftist and progressive.

The one good things is that the "organic" movement has really helped small farmers markets grow. Because of this their prices tend to drop and they become more accessible and start accepting things like food stamps and EBT. Things like that and urban farming are where it's at.

[–]gepeg-libre 39 ポイント40 ポイント  (4子コメント)

The PC Police where I'm from are on this new kick of being super shitty to trans dudes cuz apparently they have all this sweet trans-dude privilege that they should be checking more often. As if it's easy to be trans even if you're trans masculine. Oh and apparently it's problematic for them to say transphobia instead of transmisogyny and cissexism because transphobia doesn't centre trans women of colour?

I dunno I feel like we maybe have bigger fish to fry, there...

[–]TheSpaceWhale 18 ポイント19 ポイント  (0子コメント)

In a lot of feminist and queer spaces transmasculinity IS very privileged and respected while transfemininity is denigrated and marginalized (e.g. MichFest). This is getting better but still apparent in some communities, and those are the communities that trans women often have to live in and get their support from, and where they've often had difficulty making their voices heard.

[–]aufhebendeNegatvtaet 15 ポイント16 ポイント  (2子コメント)

I get what you're saying, but you sound equally sarcastic about the violence faced by trans women of color. The violence faced by TWoC is very real and asymmetrical. I think it's possible for us to recognize this violence while simultaneously not engaging in trans masculine erasure, but not playing the oppression olympics doesn't mean that we magically pretend it's just as hard to be a trans woman of color as any other flavor of trans.

[–]gepeg-libre 20 ポイント21 ポイント  (1子コメント)

Right. It's just like, in the midst of all this mindblowing violence and hatred you have these small scenes of radical kids tearing each other apart over what terminology they use to talk about the horrible shit people do to them and their friends and it's like... I get it and it's worth talking about but at least where I'm living kids are taking it to epic new levels of nitpickery and witch-hunt callout culture and it's turning me waaay the fuck off.

[–]aufhebendeNegatvtaet 11 ポイント12 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Yeah, I mean, I agree with that 100%. SJ spaces can become really focused on vocab rather than personal expression. The words we use are nothing compared to the violence some of us face. Callout culture is just a means of centering conversation on the individual rather than the collective.

I hate ID-Pol, because a lot of the time it ends up feeling like angsty teenagers who want to blog about the depth of their personality and their sorrows rather than exist in a real community. Which is why we end up having conversations like

T-Guy: But my parents were really mean to me too :(.
T-Girl: But I didn't have any friends in high-school either!

rather than focusing on the ways that we can blow up civil society as a whole.

[–]kissedbyfire9 20 ポイント21 ポイント  (2子コメント)

those spiritual people that support eastern mysticism and "noble savage" tropes. their movements are usually full of white people wearing all sorts of clothing from different cultures and follow some sort of blend of every spiritual belief that could be seen as "exotic" and saying some "I don't see colour" and "everyone bleeds red" bullshit while posting peaceful and pro-nature quotes that are attributed to some no named native american person (and are usually fake when you look them up). they try to seem super progressive but I think there's a reason why most of these people tend to be white.

[–]piyochama 5 ポイント6 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Tell me about it! Also, as a person who studies theology just for fun... Goddamn their appropriation of Eastern religions is infuriating, to say the least.

[–]raison_de_eatre 1 ポイント2 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Visiting relatives in Asian majority Buddhist/animist country and I see this white tourist couple on the train. He's dressed conservatively and unremarkably. She's slobbed out, shorts, tank top, showing off an enormous lotus flower tattoo. Trust me honey 0.0 people in that car were impressed. I like me some sweatpants and flashing tats too when in America (though mine don't scream RELIGIOUS DILLETANTE ...I think) but have some situational awareness and respect.

ETA for Lucille Bluth voice: And sleeves.

[–]UncleEggma 40 ポイント41 ポイント  (8子コメント)

Dove commercials for women being happy with their bodies featuring 0 women who would actually be considered 'plus-size' or anything close

[–]Priorwater 15 ポイント16 ポイント  (6子コメント)

I do think this is a complicated issue: Dove is totally an example of what happens when capitalism appropriates progressive language/"values" in order to sell a product... but, it does serve to popularize those values. I'd rather give my money to Dove than to a company that doesn't [pretend to] support those values. And while there's no plus-size women, there's also a lot fewer size zero women, which is definitely a step in the right direction.

I don't know, I have very mixed feelings on it.

[–]yellowmadgey 29 ポイント30 ポイント  (5子コメント)

a company that doesn't [pretend to] support those values

You mean like Unilever, the company that owns the Axe brand, and is responsible for that marketing?

Unilever also owns the Dove brand. Dove and Axe are in no way individual entities, but brands owned by the same company.

Unilever doesn't even pretend to support those values.

[–]Priorwater 10 ポイント11 ポイント  (4子コメント)

Well, it's that classic, capitalistic "vote with your money" advice (I can't find it right now, but I read a great piece by a Buddhist that argued that defining a human's moral efficacy by their wallet was fundamentally dehumanizing). Arguably, Unilever execs see which brands are selling, and continue to use the sales methods that work--if people keep buying Dove and keep not buying Axe, maybe the execs will change their tune. But again, I feel really uncomfortable with that argument, it's in many senses playing into capitalism's hands. But... sometimes you're in a big box store and need to buy soap? idk

[–]piyochama 2 ポイント3 ポイント  (1子コメント)

maybe the execs will change their tune.

Not at all. They'll continue to brand Dove the way Dove has been marketed and so forth.

This isn't "vote with your money", which is only meant for competing products that are similarly positioned. This is simply a matter of differentiation from other products. Nothing else regarding Dove or Unilever has changed.

[–]TrueArmenianHero 6 ポイント7 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Not at all. They'll continue to brand Dove the way Dove has been marketed and so forth.

Even so, it's successful and may influence other marketing campaigns to at least pretend to be more body-positive and less objectifying. If I'm correct, advertising plays a huge role in the way women view themselves and their self worth. Maybe advertisers will start to think "Instead of making women feel horrible and ugly, by making them feel beautiful and loved the way they are they are more likely to buy our product!" It's not the best motivation for change, but it's something towards the direction of social change which is hard to ask for from advertisers. Certainly not ideal and needs to be called out for that, but at least better than 10 years ago.

[–]Sansa_Culotte_ 1 ポイント2 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Arguably, Unilever execs see which brands are selling, and continue to use the sales methods that work--if people keep buying Dove and keep not buying Axe, maybe the execs will change their tune.

Except what typically happens in these case is that they will sell and market both products: One for the ethically-conscious liberal-minded people who buy Dove products because of the anti-sizeist message of its ads, and one for the bros who identify with the Axe ads.

[–]sdfjhsdkjfh 1 ポイント2 ポイント  (0子コメント)

maybe the execs will change their tune

No they would not, that would be diluting the Dove brand. That's like marketing 101.

[–]PlaidCoat 22 ポイント23 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Or how about the special k (cereal) ads that promote doing away with numbered sizes and replacing them with things like "radiant" but then it ends with "What will you gain when you lose"

[–]TunicSongForKaren 26 ポイント27 ポイント  (39子コメント)

Not a movement, but USSR-apologia gets on my nerves. I think a lot of these people have never visited Eastern Europe and seen what happened there. Similarly, any totalitarian apologia is annoying too. It detracts from what socialism is about.

[–]piyochama 8 ポイント9 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Agreed. I don't know if they've ever studied the history. Not to say that things are better now - in fact it's worse - but the USSR - or any communist country for that matter - is not really a nice place to be in.

[–]ModestMaoist 5 ポイント6 ポイント  (37子コメント)

There's plenty of Eastern Europeans and others from former communist states who would say that life was better under communism. Seems silly to accuse them of "never visiting" when they lived through the whole thing.

[–]TunicSongForKaren 14 ポイント15 ポイント  (36子コメント)

I know an anecdote doesn't make an argument, but I am friends with a Polish writer. She lived through communist times and life standards were borderline intolerable. Scarcity, oppression, state surveillance, no freedom of speech at all, indiscriminate arrests, getting by by selling berries, bread and old paper on the black market, little to no facilities, awful schooling. I can go on and on about the horrors of the Warsaw Pact.

I am a socialist. I condemn apologists of the opppressive regimes in the Warsaw Pact. Those corrupted and distorted socialism and created a new bourgeoisie centered around wealthy party members. They made a proper socialist revolution impossible by forever distorting Marx's ideas for their own gain. In fact, ironically enough, the Warsaw Pact countries were some of the more classist societies of the 20th century.

[–]Heidegger 35 ポイント36 ポイント  (17子コメント)

American Libertarians

They claim to support all kinds of good things, but when you check the fine print the only thing they actually support is property rights.

[–]narrenburg 9 ポイント10 ポイント  (16子コメント)

Don't even give them the honor of calling them libertarians. Private property, and by extension, capitalism, can never be structurally liberating. This is why most libertarians around the world reject capitalism as an economic system and mode of production.

And it's not like this farce of a political tendency developed in tandem with libertarianism. The word had anti-capitalist origins from the start. Not to mention the first use of the word to describe people with certain beliefs was from an anarcho-communist to a mutualist deriding the latter's sexist views. Libertarians who claim they aren't anti-capitalist, anti-state, and anti-patriarchy all at once do not represent the majority.

And get this: On page 83 of Betrayal of the American Right, Murray Rothbard admits that Americans stole the word. So there's no denial of this.

[–]sweateraficionado 7 ポイント8 ポイント  (14子コメント)

I think you're fundamentally wrong. Private property can be liberating. The lack of well-defined land rights is a key impediment to economic advancement for many people in low-income countries. The lack of proper documentation of ownership and enforcement of property rights leaves people, specifically subsistence-level farmers, ripe for exploitation from corrupt local leaders and predatory foreign corporations.

[–]narrenburg 1 ポイント2 ポイント  (13子コメント)

Yes, because exclusive human title over large swathes of land and resources better used in common (by humans and other species alike) and the capacity to exploit those who need to access capital to work on this land will definitely result in collective economic advancement.

And, like, that's bad, but you'd be somewhat vindicated if labour movements were advocating for this. They're not. In a sense, supposedly primitive, backwards communities are ahead of us in the West in recognizing that having the right capitalists or having local capitalists isn't the answer. It's getting rid of capitalism altogether.

[–]sweateraficionado 10 ポイント11 ポイント  (12子コメント)

Common ownership of resources, specifically farm land, is very difficult if not impossible to implement successfully. There are a lot of perverse incentives at play that cause resources to misused and depleted. Private property ownership successfully incentivizes people to make decisions regarding property that are beneficial in the long-term. I'd recommend you take a look at the work of Elinor Ostrom.

Also, your usage of the term Global South is problematic. The label is externally applied and inherently imperialistic. There is no such universal grouping. You also seem to be utilizing a noble savage trope to paint non-Westerners as rustic and untainted by capitalism. Many of them are in fact pro-market.

[–]greenduch 6 ポイント7 ポイント  (5子コメント)

Also, your usage of the term Global South is problematic.

Heya, can you perhaps give more information about this? I've consulted with other mods and its not something we've heard before.

Google comes up with the following:

[–]sweateraficionado 7 ポイント8 ポイント  (1子コメント)

The NPR article says that the Global South has its own issues along with the other terms. My issue with the term is that it implies a universality between lower-income countries that doesn't exist, turning the entire non-Western world into a universal other. This is a rehash of older, orientalist idea of the civilized West versus the uncivilized rest of the world. That way it's no different from the other terms.

[–]greenduch 3 ポイント4 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Well, the NPR article says there are issues with the term, not that it is problematic (which is the case with various other terms). Regardless, thanks for expanding regarding your thoughts on the matter :)

[–]oskomena 2 ポイント3 ポイント  (1子コメント)

I'm going to second their concerns, although I wouldn't say the word is outright off-limits but that it should be used carefully. I've seen people fetishise and routinely project their ideals onto faceless masses of the poor in the developing world. It's an interesting mechanism: if we disagree, we're filthy rich white liberals, as the great poor masses would wholeheartedly agree with radical politics. I'm not saying they would disagree either, but poor people across the entire globe are not a hivemind.

[–]greenduch 2 ポイント3 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Yeah I think basically any term would end up being used poorly, unfortunately, due to the reasons you list. My question was more so regarding the "inherently problematic", and the validity of policing people to not use the term at all.

Your concerns seem super valid, and I can very much see how that has a tendency to happen in US-centric SJ spaces.

[–]ModestMaoist 0 ポイント1 ポイント  (0子コメント)

This person also said

Private property ownership successfully incentivizes people to make decisions regarding property that are beneficial in the long-term.

So any concerns they have about racism or poverty are already disingenuous.

[–]narrenburg 3 ポイント4 ポイント  (5子コメント)

Also, your usage of the term Global South is problematic. The label is externally applied and inherently imperialistic.

K. Edited.


You also seem to be utilizing a noble savage trope to paint non-Westerners as rustic and untainted by capitalism.

No... in fact, I'm making the opposite argument. The "low-income countries" you mention are on the receiving end of capitalist oppression, so its people are more in tune to how much it sucks. That's precisely what I meant when I said:

In a sense, supposedly primitive, backwards communities are ahead of us in the West in recognizing that having the right capitalists or having local capitalists isn't the answer. It's getting rid of capitalism altogether.

I used the word "supposedly" to indicate that I don't agree with the notion that anyone in particular is "rustic and untainted by capitalism."

Many of them are in fact pro-market.

Capitalism != market.


Common ownership of resources, specifically farm land, is very difficult if not impossible to implement successfully.

Just what the fuck were we doing between the Paleolithic and the adoption of capitalism then? Sure wasn't perfect, but much better than the ecological crisis we have right now.

There are a lot of perverse incentives at play that cause resources to misused and depleted.

If you're talking about tragedy of the commons, know that the thesis proposed in the book is repudiated by most mathematicians and economists.

Private property ownership successfully incentivizes people to make decisions regarding property that are beneficial in the long-term.

To whom? The people working on the land for the capitalist who owns it? The other organisms in the biosphere who have to live on the same geographical area the property is? Those looking for any work they can find?

[–]piyochama 4 ポイント5 ポイント  (4子コメント)

Tragedy of the commons has been repudiated? Where did you get this?

[–]Heidegger 8 ポイント9 ポイント  (0子コメント)

I couldn't agree more. They don't deserve the term "libertarian" but they get so much more press than real libertarians that it's just convenient to refer to them that way. Actually, I have a couple "Libertarian" friends and I've found it really pisses them off to be called "American Libertarians" with capitalization, since they want to land-grab the more general lower-case unmodified term and relegate actual libertarians to "left-libertarianism."

[–]Hellkyte 39 ポイント40 ポイント  (138子コメント)

This isn't a movement really, just a political ideology that I find disheartening, and it's the "republicans and democrats are the same so there's no point voting". This is almost always espoused by hard left liberals who are such a distance from the more moderate democrats that they can't make out the differences between the two. As a democrat myself this really kills me, because there is a huge difference between a Ted Cruz and a Barack Obama, and people may just get to experience that difference in a few years.

[–]Ferociousaurus 18 ポイント19 ポイント  (4子コメント)

I have trouble taking people with this position seriously intellectually. Yeah, Obama's drone program is hugely problematic and has killed thousands of innocent people. You know what it isn't, though? A decade-plus land war that killed hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of Iraqis, and created a giant power vacuum in the Middle East that is currently being filled by ISIS. This type of analysis goes as deep as "Bush did war stuff, Obama did war stuff, Bush and Obama's foreign policy is identical." Or the classic "Obama has bombed more countries than Bush." Yeah, okay, here's some news: targeted missile strikes for a few weeks in Libya is not the same in scope as invading and occupying a sovereign nation, in the process killing hundreds of thousands of civilians. Nor are drone strikes in Pakistan or Yemen. Obama has massively drawn down troop involvement in Iraq, is trying to avoid war with Iran, didn't start wars in Syria or Ukraine when he was heavily pressured to do so. You think a Republican president would have done any of that? Republicans want nothing less than to join Israel in setting off World War III in the Middle East and crushing the institution of Islam, and would be well into that process if there was a Republican in the Oval Office. If you think Democrats are indistinguishable because you can't tell the difference between that and running sporadic drone strikes on suspected terrorists, sorry, but that's laughably childish.

And this hasn't even touched on domestic or economic policy. If there was a Republican president with the current congressional makeup, we'd be seeing massive, across the board cuts to social programs, federal hate legislation against the LGBT community, enormous tax cuts for the rich, attacks on reproductive freedom, a Supreme Court packed with corporatist Justices for decades, and so on and so forth. This "they're all the same" bullshit ignores the wildly, unconscionably regressive policies that unfettered Republican leadership would bring. It's just a naive, petulant "any president who doesn't give me every single thing I want is identical to any other president who doesn't give me every single thing I want." And it's a position frequently adopted by people in a position of privilege, who don't see the obvious and vast human cost of right-wing leadership.

[–]whyohwhydoIbother 5 ポイント6 ポイント  (1子コメント)

You don't have to be hard left to see little difference between Republicans and Democrats. They're barely even distinguishable from the perspective of an average european tory.

[–]Sansa_Culotte_ 5 ポイント6 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Oh come on. By that same token the 'respectable' European parties (i.e. those that aren't Nazis or full-bore communists) are all the same because they buy into the same fundamental ideas of representative democracy, corporate-controlled market economies, and timid-and-monetarily efficient welfare states.

Even if you don't follow the news regularly, there are some key social issues where (most) Dems and Reps differ rather significantly, such as abortions, GLBT rights, taxation, and welfare state measures.

Being similar isn't the same as being interchangeable, after all.

[–]Heidegger 1 ポイント2 ポイント  (1子コメント)

What about Obama's continued support for various Syrian rebel groups in their ongoing (4+ year) conflict that has killed about 300,000 people?

It's true he hasn't engaged in as wide-scale direct military intervention as Bush, but neither did he have the impetus or popular backing to do so (9/11). He did what he could as the head of a country universally sick of war. He is nonetheless a warmonger and does not represent a qualitative change from Bush.

I would add that under his leadership, the USA has enormously increased their military presence in Asia, the so-called "Asian Pivot":

http://blogs.reuters.com/great-debate/2015/04/07/china-to-the-united-states-the-pacific-is-no-longer-a-big-american-lake/

What's the worst that could happen, right?

[–]Ferociousaurus 2 ポイント3 ポイント  (0子コメント)

What about Obama's continued support for various Syrian rebel groups in their ongoing (4+ year) conflict that has killed about 300,000 people?

Providing logistical support to one side or another in a conflict that would be happening regardless is not the same as directly participating in or initiating that conflict. If you include all the proxies giving aid to various factions in Syria, there are literally dozens of belligerents. Obama didn't cause the Syrian civil war. Have you forgotten that he was heavily pressured to perform direct missile strikes in Syria, and didn't?

It's true he hasn't engaged in as wide-scale direct military intervention as Bush, but neither did he have the impetus or popular backing to do so (9/11). He did what he could as the head of a country universally sick of war. He is nonetheless a warmonger and does not represent a qualitative change from Bush.

So Obama hasn't done the main thing Bush did militarily or anything approaching it in scope. State Senator and Senator Obama consistently opposed the war and President Obama has massively drawn down troop involvement in Iraq. But based on ?????, he maybe would have invaded Iraq if he was Bush, therefore he is Bush. Got it.

I would add that under his leadership, the USA has enormously increased their military presence in Asia, the so-called "Asian Pivot":

Geopolitical posturing between global superpowers is not warmongering. We are not going to war with China any time soon.

[–]Heidegger 6 ポイント7 ポイント  (36子コメント)

There's a huge difference in what they say. What they actually get accomplished is another story.

What has Obama done that's impressed you?

[–]Hellkyte 14 ポイント15 ポイント  (35子コメント)

To be honest I'm more centrist than a lot of dems so I can't say I approve of everything he's done, but I wouldn't for a second deny the quantity of what he's accomplished. He's been one of the most activist presidents in a long time. I'm not sure if you're asking rhetorically or you genuinely don't think he's accomplished much, but here's a short list of things he's done that no republican would have touched with a ten foot pole

Stimulus package

ACA

Dream act

Allowing gays to serve openly in the military

Federal recognition of same sex marriages

Not going after states that have legalized marijuana (since the Feds technically have the right to arrest anyone doing it)

Withdrawal from Iraq

The Jobs Bill (which didn't pass and was a pipe dream at best, but still)

At this point in his presidency there's not much left he can accomplish since he forced through so much extremely divisive legislation and so many executive actions.

Ed: I said the Dream Act but that's not the right name. I'm talking about his executive actions on immigration.

[–]PlushgunMusic[S] 22 ポイント23 ポイント  (4子コメント)

You can add to that: proactively trying to avoid war with Iran, rather than do everything politically possible to go to war with Iran (a rather concrete difference between not only Obama and the GOP but Obama and other dems..)

[–]Hellkyte 2 ポイント3 ポイント  (3子コメント)

Yeah, that's a good one. There's a lot of other ones I've missed that I'm remembering now, like closing GitMo and improving relations with Cuba.

[–]shallow- 9 ポイント10 ポイント  (2子コメント)

GitMo hasn't been closed.

[–]Hellkyte 3 ポイント4 ポイント  (1子コメント)

Wow. Just looked it up. You're absolutely right. Have they at least stopped accepting new people?

[–]shallow- 2 ポイント3 ポイント  (0子コメント)

They released some Yemeni prisoners recently, I don't know if they're emptying it out or it's related to the current crisis in Yemen.

[–]Heidegger 8 ポイント9 ポイント  (29子コメント)

Stimulus package

Which was inadequate and largely a supply-side affair. Republicans would've done the same thing if their neck had been on the line.

ACA

He killed the public option despite it having 70% public approval according to polls at the time, and implemented a system model on Republican ideas from the 90s.

Dream act

Immigration reform still alludes us. He has deported more undocumented immigrants than any president in history.

Allowing gays to serve openly in the military

I've got to hand it to him for that one.

Federal recognition of same sex marriages

That one too. I can't fault Obama for his support for gay rights. But I think the tide has been turning for a while and even a (moderate) Republican president would have been pressured into doing this eventually.

Not going after states that have legalized marijuana (since the Feds technically have the right to arrest anyone doing it)

I don't know what you're smoking, but he's gone after them like mad in CA where I'm from. The feds even raided a dispensary in my home town during his first term.

Withdrawal from Iraq

That was Bush's doing; Obama tried to find a way out but was legally obliged to abide by the agreement GWB made with the Iraqis. His broader foreign policy has been like GWB on steroids. Nobody worth talking to would defend his warmongering.

The Jobs Bill (which didn't pass and was a pipe dream at best, but still)

Yep, nothing but talk. He also turned his back on unions quite famously during the whole Wisconsin thing.

[–]Hellkyte 12 ポイント13 ポイント  (26子コメント)

Like I said, I don't agree wth all of them, but if you think those things are no different than what you would have seen from a republican, well....like I said, it's disheartening.

[–]Heidegger 6 ポイント7 ポイント  (25子コメント)

He was different, but not enough to consider voting Democrat a viable path to progress. I'll still vote for Elizabeth Warren when and if she runs, but without hope. I believed in Obama before he was elected. Now I know the system is broken beyond its ability to repair itself. The only change will come from below, imo.

[–]Hellkyte 5 ポイント6 ポイント  (24子コメント)

Eh, maybe. I've never been terribly impressed by grass roots campaigns. I spent 6 years living in an intentional community and I quickly became dissillusioned with the idea that people at the ground level have any better idea what to do. Lots of revolutionaries always willing to burn the ship rather than watch it veer off course. Which really leads to the problem with people who won't play in the middle, they aren't willing to compromise their ideology. This is just as true for the hard left as it is for the Tea Party.

The reality is that people on the extremes think politics is a game of checkers when in fact it's a game of chess. Their goals are too stark, their victory conditions too simple, and they lack the ability to play the long game. Extremists do serve a purpose in creating a little modulating pressure on the system, but it's usually not that's significant, the Tea Party has been a bit of an anomoly in that regard.

Generally though they are a forgettable blip in the system.

I normally wouldn't care, but we need the extra votes we could get from the outsiders, especially in this next election which is almost guaranteed to go republican.

[–]Heidegger 3 ポイント4 ポイント  (6子コメント)

Nobody has really figured out a solution to the mess we're in, just have to keep trying new things I suppose.

That's very interesting about the intentional community. I've known a couple people with experiences like that, and they do seem fraught with problems. What was yours like?

[–]Hellkyte 10 ポイント11 ポイント  (5子コメント)

It was in college, I lived in a housing cooperative. Member owned and all that. I operated at multiple levels of leadership there ranging from house level stuff to organization wide financial director. The main thing I remember were the meetings. Things were supposed to be by consensus, which would imply that everyone agreed. Which is nothing near the truth, consensus voting is a terrible system. For one it carries a heavy chill factor that keeps shy people out because they don't want to rock the boat. It also allows ego maniacs to hijac even the most mundane of agreements by refusing to consent. You could have multi-hour conversations about what kind of toilet paper we were going to buy.

This wasn't true for all the houses (some did straigh up and down votes), it was far worse in the more politically active houses.

You would see lots of other issues as well. Free riders were a big problem, even with the fairly structured system of labor we had people could get away with doing little because people weren't always willing to enforce the rules. Moreover some people were just willing to contribute a LOT more to the house, and people would rely on them to pick up the slack.

In my case I was able to get out of work by joining the leadership, which is so clearly similar to what often happens in communist dictatorships that it's hard not to laugh. In truth I did do a lot of work in leadership, but I didn't get my hands dirty often.

Then there were just the realities of living with a bunch of people on very limited resources in tight confines. In all fairness it was actually a great experience, and I don't regret it for a second, but I also look back on it with a better perspective of what it means to be a member of a group, or what it means to manage said group.

It's actually led to me being a significantly better employee as I've gotten older, I'm very good at cutting through bullshit in meetings and bypassing petty personal crap to get things done. These were skills I learned there.

It also left me with a ton of great friends, a few good lovers, more bad ones, only 1 rash, and a good set of skills in a kitchen.

[–]piyochama 2 ポイント3 ポイント  (4子コメント)

The saddest thing about your anecdote is that anarchist communal systems like that are optimized for groups smaller than 140 people.

Any larger, and all of the things you mentioned are supposed to kick in. It's sad to hear that this happened even in a small group like yours.

[–]piyochama 5 ポイント6 ポイント  (16子コメント)

Lots of revolutionaries always willing to burn the ship rather than watch it veer off course.

This is my biggest problem. Revolutions are costly, and they are absolutely taxing - both in human lives and in lost potential.

You have to believe the system so incredibly fucked up beyond all repair to actually think this is worth it.

[–]Hellkyte 3 ポイント4 ポイント  (15子コメント)

Yeah, so much this. I've had a couple conversations with liberal extremists that have gotten really eye opening when we start discussing this. One one occasion I remember I pointed out that the only way the government could shift gears overnight would be a bloody revolution, to which he replied "So?".

I think the sad reality is that most of them don't want a better democracy, they just want a benevolent dictatorship more in line with their views.

Ed: to be clear I don't for a second think right wing extremists are different. I've just never had many conversations of this nature with them. The few I've had have been with objectivists who are pretty ok with people dying on the streets just to motivate the rest of us.

[–]HalflingTea 5 ポイント6 ポイント  (11子コメント)

"Liberal extremists" lol.

Tell me, do you think people are going to magically vote away capitalism and private property? And who are YOU to tell the poor (and other marginalized people) to wait for a rose-tinted, peaceful and non-violent revolution? (and that means peaceful and non-violent to the majority and those living comfortable lives, fuck all it meaning anything for those already oppressed). I used to be on the other side of the table but I completely understand where the leftists are coming from--so much, that I'm a fucking ML now lol.

[–]piyochama 7 ポイント8 ポイント  (2子コメント)

Yeah that's something that I've come to notice too, even in SRSD. People don't want democracy - they don't care what other people think. They simply want a government that enforces their views, and their views only - they are that convinced they are right, to the point that other views are immediately disregarded.

[–]-Dolmance 5 ポイント6 ポイント  (1子コメント)

I can't fault Obama for his support for gay rights.

It's worth noting that the specific gains in this case were allowing gays and lesbians inclusion in regressive institutions. This has quickly become the easy out for proving one's supposedly-progressive credentials, while simultaneously lionizing said institutions.

[–]nuclearseraph 1 ポイント2 ポイント  (0子コメント)

When you engage more with leftist thought as opposed to liberal thought, the republicans and democrats of the U.S. do end up looking more or less the same. This isn't just some reductionist wanna-be-edgy observation; both parties support the same massive power structures of the U.S. (Capitalism, religion, the military, etc.) and disagree over tiny things (the best type of capitalism, the existence of oppression while failing to point to its root causes).

That having been said, I will vote for dems in national elections because they are slightly less awful than conservatives. I completely understand why some folks don't bother taking the time to vote as well, though, and have no interest in shitting on them for that.

[–]narrenburg 12 ポイント13 ポイント  (92子コメント)

[T]here is a huge difference between a Ted Cruz and a Barack Obama

No there isn't.

They both

  • Believe in capitalism

  • Believe in the state

  • Engage in neocolonialism (just different kinds of neocolonialism)

  • Support use of North American fossil fuels as a long-term solution to energy independence (which clearly contributes to systemic ecocide)

  • Give mandates to ubiquitous surveillance internally and externally

  • Have draconian immigration policies (note: detaining thousands of Central Americans for extended periods of time is not progressive)

  • Say zilch about prison reform

and that's what I can list in two minutes.

To sum it up - if you're talking about two people who seek to preserve the same system, they're not that different.

[–]TrueArmenianHero 7 ポイント8 ポイント  (2子コメント)

Support use of North American fossil fuels as a long-term solution to energy independence (which clearly contributes to systemic ecocide)

From what I've seen, Obama has been very very supportive of green energy, more so than any Republican. I mean his budget proposal was totally in line with that. We still may be using oil, but at least we're setting something up for the future instead of ignoring the issue altogether. All your other stuff is true as far as I know, and it's not ideal for green energy, but I highly doubt Ted Cruz would make a proposal like that when his main backing would be oil-rich, red states.

There's a reason why when we talk about American politics, the term "the lesser of two evils" is thrown around constantly. You're right on just about everything you listed, but not voting isn't an act of protest. No one will see my lack of a vote and go "that person right there is making a statement". They'll just assume I'm another lazy 18-27 year old who couldn't be bothered to get away from my phone to vote. But you know his voting? My racist, "Oh bummer" yelling neighbor who thinks people on food stamps are the worst thing to happen to the economy and that we should just nuke the middle east already. And if there's a choice in this country between one fascist, capitalist, draconian, lying politician and another, I'll at least use my vote to cancel out his.

[–]Lazman101 19 ポイント20 ポイント  (76子コメント)

believe in capitalism

There are different flavors of capitalism. In a broad sense, Cruz is pro-laissez-faire, whereas Obama is for tighter state controls.

believe in the state

Got me there. However, statehood is a necessity for the current geopolitical make-up of the world.

Engage in neocolonialism

You're going to have to define neocolonialism here. Do you mean military intervention? Corporate spread?

Support use of North American fossil fuels

That's just not true. While oil exports have increased under President Obama, he has consistently endorsed and fiscally supported solar energy as the best long-term energy strategy.

Surveillance

Yeah I'll agree with you on that.

Draconian immigration polices

Once again, not true. Obama has consistently proposed a more open immigration policy, and the need for reform. He's supported amnesty, the DREAM Act, etc. Cruz wants to tighten down on immigration drastically.

Say zilch about prison form

Dude, that's just not true either. He's pardoned low-level drug offenders, criticized the racial bias in law enforcement, and instituted a drug-clemency program where hundreds of thousands of prisoners have applied for a pardon.

To sum it up - there's a clear difference between people who want to preserve the system, and those who want to reform it.

[–]narrenburg 6 ポイント7 ポイント  (75子コメント)

There are different flavors of capitalism. In a broad sense, Cruz is pro-laissez-faire, whereas Obama is for tighter state controls.

Still capitalism. Still sucks. Moreover, there are more flavors of socialism, and the differences between them vary more than those of capitalism.

You're going to have to define neocolonialism here. Do you mean military intervention? Corporate spread?

Neocolonialism generally excludes direct military intervention. The United States is a state which uses both neocolonialism and military intervention.

Although Nkrumah is (edit: was) only a democratic socialist, his work Neo-Colonialism, the Last Stage of imperialism, dated, still reflects the picture we have today, and it especially helps to read from the perspective of the recipient.

Support use of North American fossil fuels

That's just not true. While oil exports have increased under President Obama [emphasis mine], he has consistently endorsed and fiscally supported solar energy as the best long-term energy strategy.

You just contradicted yourself. Also, supporting solar and fossil fuels (petrol (including shale and hydraulic fracturing) and coal) aren't mutually exclusive.

Once again, not true. Obama has consistently proposed a more open immigration policy, and the need for reform. He's supported amnesty, the DREAM Act, etc. Cruz wants to tighten down on immigration drastically.

Perhaps you misunderstand - to me, any immigration policy other than "dissolve the borders and allow total freedom of movement" is draconian.

Dude, that's just not true either. He's pardoned low-level drug offenders, criticized the racial bias in law enforcement, and instituted a drug-clemency program where hundreds of thousands of prisoners have applied for a pardon.

That's not prison reform, that's jurisprudence reform.


To sum it up - there's a clear difference between people who want to preserve the system, and those who want to reform it.

For the last time - I know there's a difference; it would be false of me to say otherwise. However, what I am contesting is the notion that this difference is "huge".

[–]sha742 7 ポイント8 ポイント  (74子コメント)

Still capitalism. Still sucks. Moreover, there are more flavors of socialism, and the differences between them vary more than those of capitalism.

What does a non-market economy look like, out of curiosity? Is there currency? Are we all sustenance producers?

[–]SinfulSinnerSinning 6 ポイント7 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Obama:

  • Largely maintains the status quo of a fucked up system
  • Makes slightly progressive reforms
  • Pandered to the pseudo-progressives during elections

Cruz:

  • Will largely maintain the status quo of a fucked up system
  • Will make regressive reforms.
  • Panders to the batshit insane during elections

[–]Hellkyte 17 ポイント18 ポイント  (9子コメント)

Similarities in politics abound, and it's a relatively simple game to find them. The fact that similarities exist doesn't mean they are the same.

[–]narrenburg 5 ポイント6 ポイント  (8子コメント)

I hope you realize you're telling an anarchist that there's a huge difference between two functionaries of liberal democracy.

[–]Hellkyte 9 ポイント10 ポイント  (7子コメント)

There is a difference, it's just not obvious from your perspective. However, in fairness it's in the same way it's not obvious to me from my perspective the difference between Ted Cruz and Bobby Jindal.

[–]narrenburg 6 ポイント7 ポイント  (6子コメント)

No, I understand the difference. It's there. All I'm saying is - it's not "huge" like you say it is.

[–]Hellkyte 7 ポイント8 ポイント  (1子コメント)

Yeah. I mean. I hear you, compared to the views of an anarchist the difference isn't that huge. but I still think it's a matter of perspective. To most people it really is a large gulf. I guess it really is subjective at the end of the day.

[–]-Dolmance 4 ポイント5 ポイント  (0子コメント)

If we're going to ultimately boil it down to interchangeable individual perspectives (neoliberalism, ho!), we pretty much forfeit any chance for meaningful analysis.

[–]Hellkyte 1 ポイント2 ポイント  (3子コメント)

Sorry for the super delayed response. I've just been thinking about the conversation a lot today. And after seeing the budget numbers come out of Brownback's reign in Kansas I had one thing to offer. First up though let me be clear and say that I'm not asking these questions to be condescending.

Did you get exposed to some of your political beliefs in school?

Ed: I won't drag you through a long Q/A process, but republicans are doing a great job dismantling higher education in this country. Given time it will become harder and harder for people of modest means to easily be exposed to more radical political philosophies. This is something that I would hope even an anarchist would see as a large difference between the two organizations.

[–]narrenburg 3 ポイント4 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Not in school, but during upper years of high school.

Also, Democrats make it hard too. (But I won't belabor the point of their co-responsibility.)

[–]enormous_butthole 5 ポイント6 ポイント  (0子コメント)

and it's the "republicans and democrats are the same so there's no point voting".

There's no point voting because voting is an economically worthless action, but that's a story for another time.

[–]raveiskingcom 11 ポイント12 ポイント  (6子コメント)

The "I think we should legalize weed but not harder drugs like coke and heroin". It is completely unprincipled and I feel like people just say it to get along with everyone else. Most of the negative side-effects of prohibition of alcohol and weed cause the same issues with the other drugs.

[–]PlushgunMusic[S] 7 ポイント8 ポイント  (1子コメント)

And also they probably smoke it

[–]raveiskingcom 5 ポイント6 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Exactly. "It can't be that bad if I do it!"

[–]synaesthetica4 4 ポイント5 ポイント  (3子コメント)

I don't really agree with it but there's clearly a principle there - weed should be legalized because it's not as bad as alcohol, but coke and heroin shouldn't be legalized because they're a lot worse than alcohol.

[–]raveiskingcom 2 ポイント3 ポイント  (2子コメント)

But that is a difference in degree, not a difference in kind.
http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/bridge/Framing/framing2.htm

[–]ampersamp [スコア非表示]  (1子コメント)

And why is that bad, necessarily? Age of consent laws are also differences of degree.

[–]lampcouchfireplace 15 ポイント16 ポイント  (10子コメント)

American anarchists. Or basically any leftists that refuse to vote Democrat.

I don't live in America, so I have the privilege of voting with my conscience. But in America, you have two options and while both suck, one is a hell of a lot scarier.

I get it, I'm not on board with capitalism either. But considering the current condition of that country, it makes me sick that there are well meaning eligible voters (with whom I probably agree politically!) that are either not voting or throwing it away on a third party.

It would be great if there was an alternative to voting Democrat, but America just doesn't have one and refusing to recognise that might just end up criminalising abortion, invalidating people's marriages and who knows what else.

[–]kropot-kin 7 ポイント8 ポイント  (0子コメント)

refusing to recognise that might just end up criminalising abortion, invalidating people's marriages and who knows what else.

Fuck this whole thread, and the last one about this shit, but while we're at it I want to say to observers that while I can understand on a personal level prioritizing domestic over foreign policy, the way y'all consider it completely negligible is downright inhuman. Fucking democrats sure seem to spend a lot of time demanding allyship from people while ignoring that those people might have a reason to care about someone outside of this country as personal and integral to their identity as any other.
Does anyone else think it's really fucking weird that we're always talking about legislative issues during the executive elections and executive issues during the legislative elections?

EDIT: Ok seriously is your comment about worrying that Ruthie-G is gonna croak or something?

[–]narrenburg 5 ポイント6 ポイント  (8子コメント)

American anarchists

Oh this is gonna be good.

Or basically any leftists that refuse to vote Democrat.

I know this is gonna be good.

I don't live in America, so I have the privilege of voting with my conscience. But in America, you have two options and while both suck, one is a hell of a lot scarier.

Eh... not really. Democrats are scary as fuck too - especially w.r.t. foreign policy.

I get it, I'm not on board with capitalism either.

So why do you support voting for a capitalist party?

But considering the current condition of that country, it makes me sick that there are well meaning eligible voters (with whom I probably agree politically!) that are either not voting or throwing it away on a third party.

Wait, I thought democracy meant expressing your politics by picking the people/party you want, not picking amongst two evil parties.

It would be great if there was an alternative to voting Democrat, but America just doesn't have one and refusing to recognise that might just end up criminalising abortion, invalidating people's marriages and who knows what else.

Electoralism doesn't lead to social progress - collective, extraparliamentary agitation does. So I mean, go ahead and vote Democrat, but don't pretend as if it will change anything long term.

[–]lampcouchfireplace 1 ポイント2 ポイント  (2子コメント)

  1. I never said Democrats are the good guys. Both parties have fucked up ideas, but the difference is that the Democrats at least support some good ones as well. I think it's downright naive to say that the dems are just as bad as the republicans. Your choice is for horrifying domestic and foreign policy, or horrifying foreign policy with slightly less horrifying domestic policy. Not a great choice, but I never said it was.
  2. I support voting for the less bad capitalist party as a stop gap because you're not dismantling capitalism in a single election cycle. You can still vote and then participate in *actual anti-capitalist activism. * You don't lose your anarchist card by mitigating a republican victory.
  3. Democracy does mean that you express your politics by voting for the party you want. America does not participate in democracy. If there was a preferential voting system in America, this would be a whole different discussion. Currently there's no way for Americans to say "I'd prefer the socialist party, then the green party, but if it comes down to Democrat vs. Republican, count my vote against the republican."
  4. I agree that a Democratic government won't fix the shambles of capitalist America. And I never said that voting Democrat is anything less than a mitigating strategy in the face of a greater wrong. I do think you should continue to agitate, but I think that if you abstain from voting or vice for a third party, you are behaving like a petulant child.

[–]kropot-kin 3 ポイント4 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Your choice is for horrifying domestic and foreign policy, or horrifying foreign policy with slightly less horrifying domestic policy.

If we truly believe that the system is this broken, participating in it, rather than trying to establish an alternative vehicle for justice, shouldn't even be on the table.

but I think that if you abstain from voting or vice for a third party, you are behaving like a petulant child.

My concept of adulthood isn't so strongly tied to submission.

[–]narrenburg 3 ポイント4 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Your choice is for horrifying domestic and foreign policy, or horrifying foreign policy with slightly less horrifying domestic policy. Not a great choice, but I never said it was.

Or, you know, extraparliamentary pressure. Like has always been the case when you want something to get done.

I support voting for the less bad capitalist party as a stop gap because you're not dismantling capitalism in a single election cycle. You can still vote and then participate in *actual anti-capitalist activism. * You don't lose your anarchist card by mitigating a republican victory.

I never said "actively refuse to vote". I'm simply saying, "don't pretend that voting is a good strategy".

Democracy does mean that you express your politics by voting for the [people/decisions/]party you want.

Then what's the point?

but I think that if you abstain from voting or vice for a third party, you are behaving like a petulant child.

Lol. People doing what actually reflects their views is childish.

[–]PiscineCyclist 21 ポイント22 ポイント  (12子コメント)

I'm growing tired of the people who want to decouple genitalia from man/woman generalizations, e.g. claiming that the noun "a woman's vagina" is inherently damaging to trans people. Of all the trans-exclusionary issues with our language, this is not the battle you want to fight. The English language just isn't equipped to respect people with genitalia unexpected for their gender identity, and any attempt to include these marginal cases in everyday speech will be clunky.

There are better hills to die on. There's only so much prescriptivism that laymen can take before they stop listening.

[–]asublimeduet 16 ポイント17 ポイント  (8子コメント)

How is this pseudo-progressive? It's entirely progressive, you just don't think it's viable or worth supporting. It's also a misrepresentation, 'a woman's vagina' would only be cissexist in certain contexts. This rhetoric dialectically reinforces and is reinforced by the same essentialism that it becomes in practice, e.g. putting trans people in the wrong prisons, requiring genital surgery for legal sex recognition, etc. It also enforces the gender binary, something that will always oppress nonbinary people and whose existence needs to be recognised by laypeople. What are we but laypeople ourselves? Or does layperson here mean cis people?

Furthermore, you're being prescriptivist as hell. The English language evolves all the time, it wasn't equipped to cope with plenty of technological and ideological changes in the past but has adapted.

Nice to hear I'm a marginal case tho

[–]kissedbyfire9 10 ポイント11 ポイント  (7子コメント)

I just think it's pure laziness. If you accept the fact that trans people exist than you start to feel wrong when you say things like, "well women are discriminated against just for having a vagina" or "reproductive issues like abortion are only for women to decide" etc. because you realize trans people do exist and they don't fit into what you're saying. You know what's a quick way to change that? "well women are discriminated against for just being women." "reproductive issues like abortion are only for people with vaginas to decide." Wow look and now it's trans-inclusive and I barely had to change what I said. I think people like that literally just must be cool with trans-erasure.

[–]PlaidCoat 3 ポイント4 ポイント  (4子コメント)

"reproductive issues like abortion are only for people with vaginas to decide."

Or how about "only for the pregnant person to decide" ?

[–]kissedbyfire9 2 ポイント3 ポイント  (3子コメント)

sure, I mean they both mean essentially the same thing but that probably makes more sense. I think the difference in sentences is about the impersonal/personal. I'd like to think people who could be affected by a lack of reproductive services, regardless of current pregnant state, should be the ones first and foremost to make decisions about these reproductive services (I'm talking in a political sense).

[–]TrueArmenianHero 3 ポイント4 ポイント  (1子コメント)

From a movement that asks everyone else to consider that the words they use and the way the talk could have unknowing negative effects on the people around them, we should be the last to put up a fight when it's asked of us.

[–]asublimeduet 1 ポイント2 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Agree, and pushing responsibility for that onto 'what will the laypeople think' is both incredibly elitist and bizarre when I see a language shift happening right now.

[–]imogenbeeton 6 ポイント7 ポイント  (0子コメント)

What's wrong with saying "people with vaginas" or "people with prostates" instead of 'men' or 'women'?

[–]grapesandmilk 0 ポイント1 ポイント  (1子コメント)

Many languages don't have a third-person gender-neutral pronoun either.

[–]asublimeduet 2 ポイント3 ポイント  (0子コメント)

There are documented cases of languages developing new binary pronouns, which previously did not exist, in the last century (although most due to colonisation and the increasing imperial gains of the West). Meanwhile plenty of languages belonging to peoples with different gender systems have been rendered nearly extinct, but they certainly existed.

[–]Racecarlock [スコア非表示]  (0子コメント)

My mom SWEARS that if I just stop eating gluten, my depression will go away! And gee, why wouldn't I when most of the food is twice as expensive? So I got this enzyme which I take after eating anything with gluten, but strangely my depression hasn't magically gone away, though it will apparently after two weeks when the magic spell is complete.

[–]piyochama 8 ポイント9 ポイント  (1子コメント)

A lot of critiques about our economy are just... completely and insanely wrong. It's annoying to deal with, and even more annoying when they insist that they are absolutely right and all economic theory (and so forth) are just trumping an imperialist agenda.

[–]sha742 8 ポイント9 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Any allusions to my degrees in economics during a discussion and I get 'you've been brainwashed by pro-capitalist bullshit.'

It's funny; I camped with the Occupy protesters in 2011 and they were often more moderate than the armchair anarchists I see online.

[–]lalilulelo09 14 ポイント15 ポイント  (106子コメント)

Pedo-apologists, racist apologists and anyone who is quick to defend free speech when it's a white dudebro being mocked for his regressive statements.

[–]snerrymunster 11 ポイント12 ポイント  (4子コメント)

Can you define pedo-apologia? I personally feel that providing support to people who acknowledge they have a problem being attracted to kids should receive help and support if they seek it. I feel that making someone feel like an outcast or pariah due to an unconscious preference they have (if they have not acted and restrained themselves) rather than trying to help them would perpetuate sexual violence rather than fight against it.

[–]1egator 5 ポイント6 ポイント  (2子コメント)

If we consider pedophilia a mental disorder (subconscious desire that is detrimental to both offender and victim), then calling it "pedo-apologia" would be pure ableism. Just because someone is an offender doesn't mean that they can't also be a victim. For example inner city youth who continue the cycle of urban violence.

[–]PlushgunMusic[S] 15 ポイント16 ポイント  (85子コメント)

I'm going to add to that: anyone who is quick to abandon free speech when it is a white dudebro being mocked for his regressive statements.

[–]rmc 11 ポイント12 ポイント  (3子コメント)

Funny how many dudebros don't support free speech for feminists.

and by funny I mean totally not surprising

[–]grumpenprole 6 ポイント7 ポイント  (2子コメント)

Who is out there calling for government censorship of feminists

Whenever anyone brings up free speech it's awful, and that includes this

[–]rmc 3 ポイント4 ポイント  (1子コメント)

Yes, the offical legal definition of "right to free speech" means "the government cannot make what you say illegal".

However people will cry "free speech" and claim they are being censored when (say) reddit bans sexy pics of underage people. Some claim that any consequences of what you say is "censorship" since they have a "right to free speech". When feminist group calls for a boycott of a company that said something sexist, some people claim that those feminists are "censoring" the company/employee and "hate free speech".

However, those same people will do exactly the same thing to feminists. If a group/company says something that's pro-feminist (e.g. calls out gamergate for what it is), many "free speech defenders" will do exactly what they claim to hate, to that person/group.

[–]Billy_Whiskers 4 ポイント5 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Yes, the offical legal definition of "right to free speech" means "the government cannot make what you say illegal".

That's just the American's definition of it under their constitution. Some watered down technocratic measure crammed into whatever space the US Supreme Court currently thinks will keep it out of the way of their national interest.

That's not at all what I mean by free speech. Having grown up in a dictatorship, I find it in bad taste the way Western SJ types who have some measure of free expression mock what is a real aspiration for those not the global 1%.

[–]NowThatsAwkward 2 ポイント3 ポイント  (78子コメント)

There are countries further socially left than the US with anti-hate speech laws. So some of us from those countries don't see the first amendment as terribly progressive compared to anti-hate speech laws.

Imo it becomes much murkier once you're past anti-hate speech laws, because everyone seems to have their own ideas of where it begins to be unacceptable censorship.

I suppose being for laws about hate speech is another gradient on that scale as well. It just seems that more people agree on that as a stopping point than other pro-censorship positions.

[–]PlushgunMusic[S] 19 ポイント20 ポイント  (54子コメント)

Having the state decide what is and is not appropriate speech by threats of imprisonment is about as regressive as you can get in my opinion. But then again, I am from the US. ¯_(ツ)_/¯

[–]NowThatsAwkward 1 ポイント2 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Yeah, this is definitely a case of differing opinions, and each being glad for the position their government takes on the issue.

[–]narrenburg 4 ポイント5 ポイント  (6子コメント)

Anti-hate speech regulation isn't pro-censorship. And think about it this way:

Every bigot you allow a platform will contribute to the silence of entire groups of marginalized people. That does not jive well with the spirit of free speech. If you're really committed to it, you'll oppose oppressive speech on sight because only then will everyone be comfortable speaking out.

[–]plenty_of_time 10 ポイント11 ポイント  (4子コメント)

I don't agree with this at all. How exactly do you propose banning oppressive speech? You think that everyone whose comment is on SRS should be legally disallowed from making those posts, or what? Speech isn't zero-sum like you're making it out to be. The fight to give a voice to marginalized people does not depend on the legal silencing of oppressors, or else marginalized people have less of a voice now than ever, since free speech protections (in the US) are stronger than ever.

[–]NowThatsAwkward 1 ポイント2 ポイント  (0子コメント)

I agree. I feel that 100% free speech is to freedom as ancap libertarianism is to economic and social freedom.

[–]InoriAizawa 6 ポイント7 ポイント  (3子コメント)

the pushback coming from liberals against actual leftism is pretty fucking annoying

[–]narrenburg 5 ポイント6 ポイント  (8子コメント)

Fucking this and anything like it.

A single amendment will not solve a contradiction in liberal democracy.

[–]PlushgunMusic[S] 12 ポイント13 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Hmmmmmm gonna have to disagree with this one here. Sure it won't exactly save the world but could pave the way for candidates that support climate change legislation -- so yeah, I guess it could save the world.

[–]WingedPastry 4 ポイント5 ポイント  (2子コメント)

Those clowns aren't just pushing for a Constitutional amendment, they're pushing for a new Constitutional Convention, which is pretty much the worst idea ever. There's a movement on the right for a convention to get a balanced budget amendment (BBA), which would be fucking disastrous, and they already have 27 states on board out of the 34 they need. We're just lucky that they haven't suckered Democrats into supporting their BBA efforts in exchange for supporting these efforts to overturn Citizens United. State legislatures are the ones who'd be ratifying any amendments coming out of a convention, and the states are deep, deep red right now. The idea that any progressive amendment could be ratified in the current political climate is pure, dangerous fantasy.

[–]narrenburg 2 ポイント3 ポイント  (0子コメント)

I mean, I mainly oppose it because it's futile weaksauce reform, but I guess that too.

[–]PlushgunMusic[S] 0 ポイント1 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Very good points on the push for a CC.

[–]pezz29 3 ポイント4 ポイント  (0子コメント)

[–]sha742 2 ポイント3 ポイント  (0子コメント)

Like everything that pertains to economics

*College education should be free

*Capitalism in all its forms is evil

*Universities are powerless; tuition increases is all the evil banks

*FDI flows vampirically extract wealth from developing nations

It's like, all of these are perfectly OK opinions. But everyone gets silly when they're told that the numbers don't really support this.