Thoughts, prayers, optimism, and pessimism are all really effective against climate change, along with all the other isms mentioned. Climate is a matter of faith and ideology.


Sarcasm alert.

It's rocket science! Always happy to see an asshole hoisted on his own farts.

It would be nice if skin colour didn't matter the way ear size doesn't matter. One would not need to be colour-blind any more than one needs to be ear-size-blind, because in seeing colour, one would see only colour.

Unfortunately, this is not the world we live in; it is a fantasy.

Prove that people get killed because of race often. — Harry Hindu

Prove you have any intelligence.

maybe you can answer the question I’ve asked of that side several times: is a policy of treating people the same regardless of their race “colorblind” in the sense you are against? If so, what specifically would you have people do differently in what circumstances to avoid doing the bad thing you’re against? — Pfhorrest

Take an extreme but sadly not uncommon situation where a neighbouring country is involved in a bout of 'ethnic cleansing'. Africa, Asia, Europe, at least have famous examples in my lifetime. Probably a good idea to segregate the refugees into Tutsi and Hutu camps, or whatever the division is. Unless the argument that everyone is the same is very very convincing, which it is not because clearly people are unconvinced.

You didn't give a reason (in other words - you aren't reasoning). You just gave another example of bandwagoning. — Harry Hindu

Feel free to get reasonably run down by the band wagon of your choice. I like money because the nice people at Walmart collect it, and they give me stuff in exchange for it. People get killed because of their race rather often. That is a reasonable reason for taking it to be a real thing. That it has no basis in genetics is irrelevant.

Do they not still teach how to write a concise paper where you state your premise at the start, and then logically structure the rest of the paper as a support for the premise? — Terrapin Station

Like this?



Alas those days are gone.

There are differences in eye and hair color as well, but most people seem to be focused on skin color. Why? Probably because of how you were raised. — Harry Hindu

Exactly the same reason I value those particular bits of paper with the complicated design that say "£20" on them. What a munchkin eh? Good job there are some rational folk around that just throw them away.

I deny the manifestation of genetic differences as having any ground to begin to differentiate people on any meaningful level. At least in terms of human and civil rights issues and basic “all men are created equal” values. (things like artistic, athletic, or intellectual gifts, etc. are not involved in what I mean with genetic manifestations, to be clear. Surface level bodily makeup stuff is what I’m referring to) — La Cuentista

I repeat, you can deny it all you want and I might even agree with you in one sense. but in another sense there really are differences of skin colour, and they really do make a significant difference to one's chances of surviving the KKK lynch-mob.

So we have skin colour as a partially genetically determined variable, and that, in a particular society, is closely correlated with the chances of being lynched. So what in this are you denying?

In my mind, the only meaningful difference between any two random people on Earth is cultural. i.e language, values, beliefs, etc. — La Cuentista

Does your mind take no account of the mind of others and no account of society? It is all too often the the case that 'they' decide that you are Jew or a Gypsy, or a mental defective, or some other un meaningful term and have no consideration for your views at all as the assault, imprison, or kill you, in ways that your mind will find difficult to deny.

People say such things so frequently about race, but they very rarely say it about that other social construct, property and money.

I was merely asking if race factors into your own judgement, and if not, why should it factor into the judgement of others? — NOS4A2

And I was saying that of course it does, and to pretend that it doesn't is fairly shitty. It shouldn't according to some fantasy of social relations, but it does. So I acknowledge the fact, and if you would have the honesty to do the same, then we could begin to talk about whether there is anything to be done about it. When I see @180 Proof walking down the street, I'm watching to see if he pulls out a weapon. And he knows my white fear, and he's watching me the same way. Until maybe we say hi, and then since we are both liberal to a degree, he might let me move in next door or marry his daughter.

Do you prefer judging people — NOS4A2

That's a fairly shitty question. I'd prefer to conduct a detailed interview following a written application, and then follow up the references. But when I'm walking down the street at 1.30 am on a Saturday night, I don't have that luxury. And that's why people who look intimidating tend to get shot by cops. They're not trying to be prejudiced, they don't prefer to be, they just are.

For Instance color blindness is not just practiced by white people, despite the claims of identity politicians. — NOS4A2

Indeed, racism is not confined to white people either. I have already hinted at this. Colour blindness is however just practiced by dominant power groups. So in, say, a situation where the police, lawyers and judges are overwhelmingly black, they may very well claim to be colour blind, because justice is their job, but the white supplicant will be hyper vigilant about colour.

So when one speaks of white privilege it is not an inherent property of whiteness, but a property of power. The prejudices of Blacks in the US or Pakistanis in Britain, may be just as widespread, virulent and unconscious as those of European descent, but it has importance only to the extent that the group or the individuals have power.

Power is manifested in stereotypes (general rule) - positive stereotypes for dominant groups, and vice versa. Stereotypes have unconscious influence even on people who consciously reject them.

If you can, Patricia Williams Reith Lectures audio here or in book form is very informative on why 'colour-blindness' is not where it's at.

There are plenty of Germans (i.e., people of German descent) — Artemis

Well there you have it. One begins with a nationality, and it becomes a race. Such is identity. But what, then does one make of 'American'? Some Americans are Germans that don't speak German? Some Americans are Africans? Are there some American Americans? If there are, they sure ain't white or black.

Some Americans speak English - some Americans are English. It would be nice to be able to say this is all nonsense, and it is all nonsense in the same way that the holocaust was nonsense - lethal nonsense. And that is my point against the op and his ilk. You can make the denial of race, but are you putting your life on the line? Because if you aren't then you are abusing your (white) privilege. Because if those others start treating you just like any other nigga, you gonna freak out big time.

How does someone come to assume what others think, or how they behave, because of the color of their skin? Most likely how someone was raised. If your folks were raised in a different time, then they're going to raise you as if there times are still relevant today. They aren't. We have, and are still trying to move past racism and the only way to do that is to stop dividing people and making assumptions about them based on the color of their skin. — Harry Hindu

That's not going to happen. Given [insert local history here] it simply is the case that people of ethnicity X are liable to be in danger from people of ethnicity Y in the places where people of ethnicity Y rule the roost and there is a history of conflict. This applies to honkeys in the South African townships, and blacks almost anywhere in the US or Europe. Only if you are of ethnicity Y that rules the roost can you afford to ignore the obvious facts of life on some theoretical principle.

One comes to assume these things because they are true, not because genes or skin colour make it true, but because social forces make it true. Just as Germans tend to speak German despite there being no gene for speaking German and no distinct race of Germans. It is a wonder to me that seemingly educated folks hereabouts cannot get their heads around this.

No, the deplorables are the ones seeking deplorables. — ssu

I disagree. Generally, I blame the people with power and money and influence more than the ordinary Joes. But social ills that are not natural disasters are deplorable. When there are mass killings and widespread torture and all sorts of avoidable suffering, one cannot say 'oh no one is to blame.'

As to the mob baying for blood, 'Forgive them for they know not what they do.' But there are those who do know what they do, and for them 'it were better they were cast into the sea with a millstone round their neck.' One needs to be very cautious with one's righteous anger, but even the Nazis wanted to improve things.

A dog simply knows, in excitement it shows.
What it means when you pick up the lead.
And can well be deceived by what is perceived
Through perceptions it's learned how to read.

one puzzle piece is to not alienate roughly half of the US population( of voters.) If you begin with an attack, the person will get defensive. — csalisbury

This is rather important, but also rather delicate. One says to a supporter, Stop voting for Trump, he's a misogynist; to vote for Trump is to vote for misogyny, and voting for misogyny is mysogynist. But you are not a mysognist, you have been misled into supporting mysogyny.

Perhaps one can emphasise that it is not 63 million mainly poor voters that are deplorable, any more than it was or is smokers or drug addicts that are deplorable. The deplorables are the rich people and their propagandists lawyers, and other apologists who knowingly persuade people to act against their interests. Like these:

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/meet-the-money-behind-the-climate-denial-movement-180948204/?fbclid=IwAR2er6o1UcgEO2EIcEKply6PJvu1QmjhgbhP3QbGV23U0ETlDhhd1xLgThc#yhiBukAYcJPDfIUC.01

↪unenlightened
Does the label matter ?
— Amity

the body politic under threat from foreign bodies and so on. I reject the framing of the crisis in terms of us and them
— unenlightened
Nevertheless,, this is precisely our situation: it is the formation of different "foreign bodies" within our societies through various gradations of hatred: dehumanization, labeling, delegitimization, and intolerance. Essentially, the true borders are not the outer ones, but the invisible internal barriers, so that the extreme partisanship has been advancing. — Number2018

Yes, labels matter, fuck wit. I seem to have labeled one of you 'fuck wit'. In this case it is unimportant because I am unimportant. but if I were your defence lawyer in court, it matters a great deal.

And whenever someone uses 'true' as an adjective like that, one can be sure that they are bullshitting. The classic case of the bullshitter is Simon Cowell, the world famous transformer of original musical creative talent into bland mediocrity, "...and I genuinely mean that."

No, the true borders are the one people die trying to cross.

This is an aspect of racism that now permeates throughout American culture and is spreading, to the point that it has become institutional, manifesting in policies such as “diversity training” for example. It is being taught in school.
— NOS4A2

oh wow — Maw

This is worth looking at head on, because this is what we have come to. This is the logic that applies also at times to freedom of speech and justice, and above all the organisation of workers into unions.

Race is a social construct, therefore race does not exist.
Therefore diversity training is fake training.
This fake training unfairly affects white people, therefore it is racist.

I happens all the time these days, though not usually quite as blatantly. In fact it happened to me the other day on the Brexit thread. Pointing out racist tropes is said to be racist, and racism is something that only white people suffer from.

Similarly one cannot criticise people who say such things because 'freedom of speech'.

It's the political equivalent of 'He who smelt it dealt it.' And there's a lot of it about.

I dunno, Frank. What's the immune system represent in this analogy? What's the lethal organisms?

The problem is that this is a typically fascist analogy from the start; the body politic under threat from foreign bodies and so on. I reject the framing of the crisis in terms of us and them, and so I reject the notion of 'deplorables'. Actions, policies, speeches can be deplorable, and i think I have specified what I deplore in broad terms already. I think is the business of philosophers to critique this kind of framing analogy, and not to indulge in it so casually. People are suffering, people are being misled, and manipulated, and it is being done by people. And people are objecting to it. There are no aliens - no pathogens.

, 'any given poster who disagrees with me politically is inches away from being as bad as the worst, if not there already' isn't a good way of approaching things either. — csalisbury

Of course. One has to add up the inches. Of course one will be more inclined to make excuses for someone whose views one shares. Here in the UK, I see the best, the most honourable of the opposition (to my views), resigning or being ejected. I see the executive attacking the judiciary I see outright lying pass as good tactics and so on. I see a pattern.

And I see the same pattern elsewhere. As I have mentioned here already, it's not just the lies, it's the fomenting of hatred, the focus on borders and us them, the inhumane internment, the packing of the judiciary. It's not just Trump any more than it was ever just Hitler. It's a pattern, a heap of things inching in the direction of arbitrary, divisive and unaccountable rule. It's above all the loss of balance, the loss of basic common sense protections of the environment and public health in the name of a fantasy of freedom.
And of course it is cyclic; the last of those who experienced the war are dying and the rhetoric of war replayed as nostalgia returns. The good old days when the US and Britain saved the world return in irony as we lead the world to the fascism from which we then saved it.

I think the same of you. — frank

I gave a list of several factors that are to my mind and to many others, common precursors of fascism, the collapse of democracy, and the beginning of catastrophic state violence. You dismiss them without argument. I don't think you "think the same of me" by a long shot.

history tells us that it comes like a violent storm — frank

I think you need to interrogate history more closely.

I seems to me that the Nazi Death camps are the apotheosis of industrialised death, but merely the Gold medal winner in an event that many have entered. The Gulags, the Cambodian killing fields, I won't give all the runners...

Please I beg you all, left and right - if you are human - you and your beneficent leader are capable of entering this event in the Depravity Olympics. Not having reached the finish line is not something to be proud of. Do not forbid the question that every regime must be asked on a regular basis - are you going a bit Nazi? Ask yourself every now and then. Learn to recognise the symptoms before the slaughter begins: polarisation of society, economic decline, dehumanising propaganda and the undermining of honest reporting, populism, the invention of crisis, immanent invasion, economic exploitation, above all the enemy within. Be especially wary of any attempted takeover of one arm of government by another and especially especially, of the judiciary. A government not subject to the law becomes tyrannical every time.

It is not foolish or unfair to make such comparisons and ask such questions; it is the utmost folly not to. Every leader should have to defend himself and his every policy decision against the charge of being tyrannosaurus-ish, of being cruel and inhuman, because every human is capable of inhumanity.

You might like this. I don't think there is a better exposition the source and meaning of such experiences.

And?

By way of slightly changing the direction, try a comparison with the Handmaid's tale instead of the Nastis...
Deplorable or not deplorable?

https://talkingpointsmemo.com/feature/inside-the-christian-legal-army-weakening-the-church-state-divide?fbclid=IwAR1LIERSfxJJ-pz-FxHDT3Qmc8ffYzPi_kJ-dAWkFYgPrgl5tmeRLI8r3Og

I don't know how reputable this source, but my recollections that religious courts were not that great an idea and apart from the Church-state separation thing, they don't do free speech very well either, which is ironic.

the undemocratic bullshit that is the electoral college — StreetlightX

More democracy, not less. — StreetlightX

I'm tempted to start a new thread - "What is democracy?" (apart from distilled political niceness and legitimacy that is). But in the meantime, what is it you want more of and what would that look like? It's not the Dictatorship of the Deploriat, I assume?

Are you saying I lied? I don't get it? Maybe you are responding to a different person or thread? — ZhouBoTong

No. I am giving an example of a belief one might have in something that does not exist. Something that might be both more easily understandable and intuitively acceptable. And I am doing this because I have already given a definition of 'god', and 'faith' or 'belief' and 'exist' seem fairly uncontroversial. But having already gone round the definition roundabout in this thread and got bored, I will stick to my word which you quoted and wait for you to elucidate the contradiction before responding further.

And the EU Commission can employ the Queen to read them a speech they have written telling them whatever they want to hear, and we'll call that the democratic mandate of legitimate government. I deserve a knighthood for this! Lord Unenlightened at your service.

We can call it "unexit".

I have the solution!

The name of the EU in English shall be changed to "The New British Empire". Then we'll have none of this German conspiracy to become independent led by the blond Aryan traitor Boris.

Job done!

I don't think that screwing the promise of the first referendum is betraying the promise. — Punshhh

No. to the extent that there was a promise to respect the result, not respecting the result is breaking the promise. That would be a good thing, but it would be breaking the promise. Let's not resort to gobbledygook.

It would make absolutely 0 difference. The EU has four central pillars : freedom of movement, freedom of services, freedom for goods and freedom of capital. No proposal that undermines any of those pillars is going to be acceptable in any way, shape or form. — Benkei

As far as i can see, that means the options are:

Remain, and break the referendum promise.
Reinstate the border in N. Ireland, and break the N.I treaty.
Unification of Ireland, and break the treaty.

There can be a fudge where we leave but remain subject to most of the rules, a la permanent backstop, but in order to not have internal borders, the EU needs proper external borders.

Or we could invade the Republic again, and make them be part of Even Greater Britain.

especially Leftists. — jamalrob

So as a leftist, I have a somewhat different story. About 6 mins into the vid, the Trump apologist says that he made a very populist speech similar to one that Bill Clinton made. And that has the ring of truth to it, because back here in Blighty, the Labour party too had been transformed into a populist party (from a party of principle) From Blair onwards, Labour was indeed "the establishment" and all parties were the establishment.

Populism promises people what they want; it is the crack dealer of politics. and a lot of people are going to have to die before folks realise that they better not have what they want.

I believe in honesty. Everybody lies, I do myself. Yet if i don't believe in honesty, the there can be no communication.

I didn't say anything about contradictions. — Terrapin Station

I didn't say you did say anything about contradictions. I don't have to wait for you to say something before I can say it. But you know what a contradiction is don't you? I think we mean the same thing here. You said this.

I'd have no problem with someone saying that I have "faith in a non-existent God." I don't consider it faith, — Terrapin Station

There is a contradiction there: someone says they have faith and you contradict them - 'that's not faith'. And that is the same kind of trick you played earlier, when I said 'God is love' and you said 'love is an emotion. And again you are not engaging, not trying to understand but just having words your own way and shrugging.

By the way, I was reading "faith in a non-existent God" as saying, "Faith in the non-existence of God." Is that not what you meant by that? — Terrapin Station

Of course it isn't. Tell you what though, we were in agreement further back -atheism isn't a position at all and the argument is futile. So I think I'll stop here.

So if I say something like "I have faith in a god that does not exist." then if you want to engage, you cannot just let it pass that there is a contradiction in the terms according to how you understand them, you have elucidate to me what that contradiction is and thus enable me to begin to see which words we are using differently and what hidden premises are being invoked. In other words, you have to try and make sense of it. Or you can just say 'religious nutter' quietly to yourself and move on. I do that quite a lot.

That was a joke. We have to assume we speak the same language, and try and reach an understanding of what we agree and disagree about. So no, different people do not use the same term in different ways, or if they do, the difference has to be elucidated in terms that they do use in the same way. Otherwise, we are not communicating. A good deal of understanding philosophy is a matter of catching the flows of meaning between philosophers and through the centuries. So a philosopher who says things like 'Plato was wrong because there is no world of forms' is a third rate philosopher who has not troubled to understand even what is meant by 'a world'. And understanding a word is not a matter of defining it in other words one does not understand.