If it was Bartricks, he was sneaking back into the party with a loudspeaker announcing "I'm sneaking back into the party!"

Don't know if it's worth mentioning as he/she wasn't here long, but banned @Zettel for responding to a moderation request with an insult/refusing moderation.

Are you having a bad day? And can you stop having a bad day now, please?

It's not that we are fundamentally shit or the world is fundamentally shit, it's that both attitudes are equally symptomatic of a cultivated lack of imagination. The injunction "Give up!" is no better than "Compete!" for it simply being antithetical to the system.

so the usual advice is as you and others are doing which is the self-help mindset of change yourself so you can try to fit the system better. — schopenhauer1

Success pertains in the degree to which we can resist the system's conception of success in preference for our own. Success lies neither in being appropriated by some arbitrary cultural notion of success nor by giving in to helplesness and misery. E.g. The best free climber in the world, Alex Honnold, was, initially, virtually unknown, had no money and lived out of his car. He neither dumped his passion to pursue more traditional forms of success nor spent his time fretting over useless self-defeating philosophies. And I very much doubt he stole his desire from a self-help cookie jar.

You did phrase it as a utilitarian argument. Maybe you made a whoopsie. But I take the logic of your position as deontological not utilitarian, i.e. "It is wrong in principle, regardless of circumstances, to ever compromise on free speech." Another way of saying free speech is the greatest good. No need to dress it up.

Why is my redirecting the lens as to focus on the external restraints not allowed — schopenhauer1

Au contraire, I've told you twice:

feel free — Baden

I am not one to stand between someone and their pleasure. I'm merely holding the flashlight.

Exactly. There is no need to be upset. Just the opposite. But too often we are, even in a place as philosophical as this.

It's not luck that your loaded question satisfies you. It satisfies you because it satisfies your story. No more. And what validates or invalidates our stories is our experience of the behaviours that manifest them. If your story satisfies you in terms of how you live your life to its demands then that is your justification for maintaining it. The pretence to objectivity fails. Your pills are for those who like prisons. And that's fine for those who do.

Speaking of a segue to:

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/13957/intent-and-selective-word-use

Can you redefine the prison or do you just accept the conditions as it is what it is? — schopenhauer1

Can you redefine your loaded question or do we just accept your condition is what we are?

:smile:

Anyone can do this, and one may very well argue that virtue and self-mastery are cultivated more frequently by those who have less than those who have more. — Tzeentch

:up:

For example, words like brave, loyal, innovative, ambitious, dependable, and conscientious might be words that could be used to describe a hypothetical human trafficker. Nevertheless, we hate human traffickers, so we're definitely not going to use any of those words which paint this scumbag in a positive light — Judaka

Firstly, this practice is socially enforced, so even if you did decide to start labelling human traffickers using language in a supposedly unbiased way, your peers will tear you apart for doing it. — Judaka

:up: A good example of this was when Bill Maher talking of the 9/11 hijackers said:

"Staying in the airplane when it hits the building, say what you want about it, it's not cowardly,"

https://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/story?id=102318&page=1

The response was as you described.

In summary, we will choose our words based on our feelings and intent, in an unavoidable process that necessarily biases our perspective and conclusions. Subjects may vary in how greatly they're affected, and specific methods of reaching a conclusion also vary. And no, I don't feel threatened by this, I'm comfortable with asserting that opinions can have value while still being biased. — Judaka

Or others will do it for us. It can be interesting to pick apart media articles to watch how this plays out in subtle and not-so-subtle ways. E.g. The game of hide the agent: "There were thirteen civilian casualties in an explosion in Aleppo last night" (Our side did it). "Russian missiles have targeted an apartment block in Aleppo killing thirteen, including six women and three children" (their side did it).

Often what's upsetting is the suppressed possibility that the other might be right. I think it's hard to get upset unless an idea takes hold somewhere in the self and conflicts with another idea in the self. We rarely appreciate an antithesis shoved into our thesis.

If you think that's the best you can come up with, feel free.

Philosophy occurs when a community permits discourses that question its truth and necessity. When the "other" within is recognised and integrated rather than immediately ostrasized or punished.

Philosophy, IMO, begins (again and again) wherever the question "How do we know our assumptions are true or our givens are real?" predominates like an itch that grows as we scratch it. — 180 Proof

:up:

Yes, consumer society is exploitative and alienating. I agree. If that is enough for you to build a prison for yourself, feel free.

Welcome!

"Life is a competition" is a story that comes from the command "Compete!" But insofar as we are human, to give in to that command is a choice and however we then feel is a result of our own choice. We can deny but not escape our responsibility here. Social ideologies (stories) have only and all the power we give them, and we don't have to give them everything. "Compete" is not the only possible command as un pointed out. There is "Cooperate", "Flourish", "Create" etc.

If the story of our life is based on the idea that we have no control over its direction (there is one and only one ultimate command beyond out capacity to choose) then we have already failed regardless. We have failed to recognise we are human and have choices, not only over how we do things but over what we value. We should not punish ourselves for failing to get to the end of a social cul de sac. Better to create stories for ourselves that give us power and reject those that take it away.

Yes, not a fan of Photoshopping except for very basic stuff. Nice to know this has a clear character anyhow. :) I go into these photo expeditions knowing most shots won't work out.

Doesn't this belong in the Lounge? — T Clark

Yes, actually.

Well, you've certainly bitten the bullet on it re your position here. So, that's fair.

"Free Speech Absolutist" is a binary category, which I don't see you fitting into according to your clarification. I think @NOS4A2 probably does. The implication is he would literally give his life and those of others not to compromise in any way whatsoever on free speech (0% security, publicise the nuclear secrets etc. Let it be so!). He seems to consider it a sacred or holy principle rather than anything ultimately relatable to practical or pragmatic goals. That's bizarre to me. However, there's a sense in which he fits Zizek's ethical subject for whom true ethics consists in reconstituting norms in a way that should seem bizarre. That angle might be pushing it, but his position is crazy enough for me to have kind of a grudging respect for.

@Judaka @Metaphysician Undercover @Joshs

Much appreciate the clarification on where we agree and disagree. It's been very helpful in terms of scrutininsing my own intuitions. I guess we agree this is happening and problematic:

"The thought process that went into building [social media] applications, Facebook being the first of them … was all about: ‘How do we consume as much of your time and conscious attention as possible?’

That means that we needed to sort of give you a little dopamine hit every once in a while because someone liked or commented on a photo or a post or whatever … It’s a social validation feedback loop … You’re exploiting a vulnerability in human psychology … The inventors, creators — it’s me, it’s Mark [Zuckerberg], it’s Kevin Systrom on Instagram, it’s all of these people — understood this consciously."

https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2017/11/14/facebooks-ex-president-we-exploited-vulnerability-in-human-psychology/

But I would need to establish a much more systematic and detailed justification of why I conceive identity(ies) operating as I've described, either here or potentially as a new OP in order to do justice to the points you've all raised.

Cheers :) . It looks very like a painting, but it's actually a photograph. I used a long shutter speed and moved the camera to get the effect (rather than use post-editing / Photoshop etc). This method doesn't always work, but in this case it was meant to express pretty much what you felt.

I also like really like that red and the shape is intriguing. This is a bit more sombre.

I would prefer 1 to 2 — NOS4A2

Ok, well you have bitten the bullet. But it seems then you'd want to allow newspapers to publish a country's nuclear secrets even if it meant, in the extreme case, that country's annihilation. I find that odd. Why would absolute free speech be preferable in this case to not being dead?

But his comments about identity... make me wonder how I managed to read your OP three or four times and miss how you defined identity. I've probably wasted a lot of your time and my own by failing to read this part of your OP properly. I'll take this as a learning lesson, showing that I really have a hard think about how to avoid this problem in the future. I think I just read the parts I thought were interesting, and impatiently skimmed over what seemed unimportant, I have ADHD, so maybe that's a factor... — Judaka

No worries. Appreciate your honesty.

It seems to me folks are generally free speech absolutists in the way Elon Musk says he is, even though he's not really (his Twitter still censors / bans etc.). It's like a club or religion that sounds good, but in practice is just the same as being a regular free speech advocate because if you ask hard questions over what the "absolutist" part really means, you realise that its followers either can't or won't pin it down. They mostly go on about the type of free speech the majority of us agree with anyway, ignoring that the absolutist part is only really crucial when you get to the 0.01% of situations where it would be really self-defeating to be absolutist about free speech. So, yes, nice club. Good for selling badges and T-shirts, I presume, but otherwise meaningless (or to the extent it's not, absurd in its implications).

The concepts are quite slippery but I'm clearer about your objection to how I'm using them now at least. I'll read over your posts again and come back to this.

@Judaka
I don't think it needs futher explantion but to really spell it out to avoid running in circles again. From your own example:

1: "Social Persona"/Online identity: = Image woman is "forced to present". A "lie" that needs to be maintained.
2: Offline identity = Failed businesswoman. A truth that needs to be hidden.

Those personas/identities are obviously in conflict. They are both in one person. = Inner conflict.

EDIT: If your objection boils down to something like MU was saying, let me know. It might make more sense.

I'm still left unsure as to where "inner conflict" or really anything related to your OP about would come in. You don't know how to prove it exists, — Judaka

You need look no further than your own first post for an example of how inner confllct would come in..

In a separate case, there was a documentary on how multi-level marketing schemes would attract mothers who perhaps had had their children leave home. To sell accessories, cosmetics or clothes, and to present this image of themselves on social media as living a great life. As things would start to go poorly, they couldn't face the shame of admitting their failures online and so felt forced to maintain the lie. They preferred to continue their losing strategy than embarrass themselves to friends and family.

Social media has taken away the barrier between the personal and social, all spaces are social spaces. It creates a state of being constantly on display, which creates constant social pressure. That social persona, however, is personalised and individualistic and exists on a page for one's exclusive use, presenting intimate details of one's life and thoughts. Social media has created an environment where so many are either addicted or forced to constantly present the image of themselves they want others to see online. — Judaka

We can't prove the contents of others' inner worlds but unless we're solipsists, we can often reasonably infer something about them. But, yes, if it's not a reasonable inference that such a dynamic could result in inner conflict that would be very problematic for my theory.

I have a hard time seeing how words can threaten security. — NOS4A2

Unless you have a hard time seeing how a wire tap on the Pentagon could threaten America's security, you don't really. And it's not hard to translate this into a free speech issue whereby a newspaper might be prevented from printing the results of such a wire-tap. Or should the U.S. allow its newspapers to give away America's nuclear secrets (again, hypothetically) just to get from 99.9% to 100% free speech as free speech absolutism would seem to demand? Is the obvious answer perhaps why almost no one takes the idea seriously though it may be fashionable to pay lip service to it?

Here you may also see why the contradiction runs in the opposite way to how you conceive it. An insistence on free speech absolutism could threaten to undermine the grounds of its own possibility. No security, no freedom. So, free speech absolutism is essentially incoherent and self-contradictory in practice.

I would prefer 100% free speech to 100% security — NOS4A2

That's not the hypothetical choice I posed though.

Prefer which:

1) 100% free speech and 0% security
2) 99.9% free speech and 100% security

Just as a hypothetical, 1) or 2)?

Freedom of expression is an important social value. So is e.g. security. Sometimes, social values conflict. Where they do, a rational society prioritizes what is good for it--usually some compromise that retains as much of the positive elements of each value as possible rather than prioritizing one particular value over all others. Can you explain why it should do otherwise? E.g. suppose we can retain 99.9% rather than 100% of free speech and simultaneously retain 100% security (just hypothetically), would that not be preferable to 100% free speech and 0% security? A free speech absolutist must say no, right? This is why the position is irrational in practice and is not followed to its logical conclusions.

(As in, I say identities are narratives and are open to manipulation as such--which manipulation (in the form presented) is bad. Whereas you seem to say, viewing identities as narratives is what's bad.)

In lieu of diving into this for now, while we both espouse a form of freedom as a goal, my impression is that your route primarily involves normative claims about potential modes of self-conceptualization whereas mine primarily involves descriptive claims thereof to further a normative claim re the action of social institutions. Would you agree?

(Culture is essentially political and so must any challenge to it be. And politics is the art of creating and manipulating narratives as tools to naturalise and denaturalise, elevate and denigrate, forms of life in their manifestation in behaviours, individuals, technologies, and institutions. Don't bring a knife to a gun fight.)

Turning my own commitment to pragmatism against me. I like it. :up: I don't know is the short answer. But it's a potentially useful avenue of approach and has the advantage of emphasising that what's under threat is our relationship to ourselves, which idea appeals to a potentially more salient existential discourse vs a medical one and that may feed into a more generalised critical orientation. "Social media is making me depressed >>no biggie, I'll take a pill". "Social media functions to process my social capital needs into profits at the expense of my personal development >> ?"

I do not think that "identity" provides a good principle for establishing a hierarchy of goals. — Metaphysician Undercover

A hierarchy is just one mode of organization and not how I imagine goals being organizaed in an identity, at least not in the strict sense,

This principle is more directed toward the narrative of past events, and any proposed "identity" gains its strength from an extended temporality. That is to say that an identity is something derived from a long period of time. The structuring of goals on the other hand must be extremely adaptable, such that even goals which we have held on to for a very long duration must be capable of being dropped at a moments notice, due to the occurrence of unforeseen circumstances. — Metaphysician Undercover

Identities gain strength over time precisely insofar as they provide coherent frameworks for the activity of our desires as defined both through our conceptualised goals and immediate needs for gratification. Identities may be directed by goals and direct goals. There’s no contradiction here.

Part of the identity of “mother” is bound up with goals that are largely defined in terms of responsibilities and duties which have sociobiological roots. These can be organised under the general idea of what it means to be a mother. Of course, individual mothers will not all agree on what this is but their narratives will have a common core which organizes their dispositions as mothers and which is their “mother” identity.
— Baden
— Metaphysician Undercover

This is an example of the use of "types" which I said previously is deficient for describing a person as an active agent. The point being that one's goals must be strongly individualized, due to the role of 'the present circumstances' and the need to adapt,, as outlined above. An individual might refer to a "type" as guidance in producing goals, but ultimately the urgency of the current situation will necessitate that the rules of the type must be broken. Then if the person is trained only in the ways of choosing according to type, that person would be lost in some situations. — Metaphysician Undercover

There is no deficiency excepting the imposition of a level of determinism applied to the idea of how identity functions which not only have I never implied but that runs counter to the core of my argument. The logic of my posing the problem of self-conflicting selves contains within it the notion that breaking the “rules” of an identity is both something that happens and that is problematic. So, yes people get “lost in some situations” because a goal or desire conflicts with one or more of their identities. That’s part of the point I’ve been making.

This is not (generally) a consciously calculative process but the outcome of the human need to meaningfully interact. It is that need, that overarching goal that organizes our other disparate goals into manageable narratives that we can set against each other in order to more efficiently and less resource-intensively make decisions. E.g. If we prioritize certain narratives about ourselves, it makes it easier to choose between conflicting desires / goals. Our goals are given an extra layer of meaningful contextualization. And this is just what makes human social life possible. General social identities (your narratives of the other) become internalized in specific but not unrelated ways (my narratives of the self) so that we may relate coherently to others.
— Baden

What you appear to be doing here is placing the need for social interaction as the highest priority in ones goals. — Metaphysician Undercover

Yes, humans are inherently social. It's our ultimate contextualization; a recognizably human consciousness absent of all social interaction is incoherent. But we're social in a specifically human way that doesn’t preclude the prioritization of goals other than the immediately social. E.g. Our relationship to ourselves is mediated through the social phenomenon of language, which not only doesn’t restrict the variety of goals available to us but largely enables it. So, to speak of an overarching social goal that organizes our other sets of goals is just to admit that insofar as we are human we can't separate ourselves and our goals fully from our particular social context and the ideological hold it has over us.

Then the other goals will be shaped and prioritized around this. I see the opposite situation. Social interaction is inevitable, absolutely unavoidable, as portrayed in unenlighten's post. Goals are prioritized according to what is wanted or needed, and this constitutes privation. Therefore social interaction is at the opposite end of the scale from where goals are. Goals relate to freedom of choice, possibilities, while social relations related to necessities, what is impossible to be otherwise. — Metaphysician Undercover

Social relations define the field in which notions of freedom of choice become coherent. We don’t operate in a social vacuum and sociality is not a factor we can fully externalise either re our conceptualisation of goals or our decision-making processes as to how they may be achieved.

So it appears to me, like the difference between starting from a narrative, and starting from goals or intentions, produces a huge gap between the way that you and I understand these things. It's not a huge difference, because the understanding is quite similar, but it's a huge gap, like flip sides of the same coin. We both understand both sides, but disagree as to which side is up. — Metaphysician Undercover

To me, it’s as if you are trying to understand art by starting from one category of elements in different paintings as if they had such significance outside their individual framings they made such framings irrelevant. It’s a narrow perspective in two senses. Firstly, it elides the importance of dispositions, histories, capacities (analagous to other elements in the paintings), which are necessary for the realisation of goals. Secondly, it conceptualises the frame overly simplistically as a pure limitation. But just as It's the frame that allows for art to function as art, it's identities and the ideologies that underly their formation that allow the social to function as social. To imagine a world where the individual pursuance of goals absent of ideological framings occurs under simple social limitations is hardly coherent. The social finds its form not in a bunch of obstacles we as individuals need to navigate but as the very field of possibilities which allows us to define ourselves as the kinds of beings who navigate.

People wear masks, and people employ deception to get what they want. The kinds of masks and deception employed are dependent upon the context, and there are differences between what builds social capital on say, social media or in the workplace. Hopefully, you also agree that masks are not just tools to build social capital, but are important psychologically for a variety of reasons, and can be used socially for many reasons, even if they won't build social capital. They may also exist for a variety of negative reasons, such as social anxiety, fear of repercussions, repression, etc.

I agree that masks & deception can have intrapersonal significance, in fact, I think masks & deception can exist purely for one's psychological needs, even if it hurts their ability to attain social capital. Such as putting on a tough guy persona as a self-defence mechanism, or hiding your true feelings to avoid criticism.

There are so many different reasons to use masks, one could easily write books on the subject, it's such a complicated and nuanced area. In some cases, people aren't aware, in some they are, and it's complicated. — Judaka

I do pretty much agree with this. There's a lot to untangle and it is complicated. To reiterate, the specific dynamic I'm criticising is where masks become in themselves a focus of our appetites, commodified such that their variety of expression tends to lead to exercises of purely formal freedom. This is why I emphasised earlier that it is not social-technologies in themselves that are problematic but their intersection with consumer culture whereby the manipulation of our instinctive desires for social validation is the logical outcome of the profit motive embedded therein, serving formal freedom (more opportunities to satisfy appetites) at the expense of freedom proper (in what I've described as effortful cognitive engagement).