Subject: Hi,
Author:
Posted on: 2015-09-14 22:34:00 UTC
Economic Left/Right: -7.88
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -7.33
I am a social democrat and neutral on Russians. Not so neutral on the current Russian government.
Okay, you're probably expecting me to say that about everything you do by now, but this is more specific:
You were wrong to say that Labour didn't really want to elect Jeremy Corbyn as its leader. You were wrong - and yes, I'm including the Labour right-wing here - to say that they should vote for 'Anyone But Corbyn'. You were wrong, and a landslide victory for Corbyn proves it.
I can understand why you were wrong, why you felt that right-wing thinking is the default for Britain's electorate. We've had a rough few decades on the Left - twenty years of a Conservative Thatcher/Major government, followed by Blair gaining power for Labour by moving dramatically to the right; then in 2010 the 'other Left party', the Lib Dems, went into coalition with the Right, and in 2015, the traditionally left-wing Scotland voted Nationalist instead, and a massive proportion of English voters went for Racist Far-Right.
But you were wrong. 60% of the Labour party just told you you're wrong: they elected the leftmost candidate they could to head up Her Majesty's Opposition. When you look across the floor of the House of Commons - or when you look down from the Labour back benches - it's a proper left-wing Opposition leader you'll be looking at.
I have no idea whether Jeremy Corbyn can win the election for Labour in 2020; it's a long five years we've got ahead of us, with UKIP still looming over us, and the SNP unlikely to let go of Scotland. But I do know this: for the first time since I started paying attention to politics, over a decade ago, one of the two major parties has a leader I want to see as PM.
hS
PS: Also, it's absolutely hilarious that one of Labour's biggest mavericks and leadership-defiers is now in charge. I can't wait to see what happens next. ^_^
Can anybody adequately explain why on earth Anarchism is Absolute Left? Isn't the Right supposed to be "A man is entitled to the sweat of his brow, not to anyone but himself and his own," and liberalism being, "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need," and all that jazz? So, shouldn't "No government, no law, man can care for themselves," be Absolute Right? I mean, I don't know about you, but it just seems backwards to me. Totalitarian Communist regime? Close, but not quite the farthest Left. Break it all down and have noting left behind? Now you're there! What the heck?
From the site:
If we recognise that [the traditional designations of Left and Right] is essentially [on] an economic line it's fine, as far as it goes. We can show, for example, Stalin, Mao Tse Tung and Pol Pot, with their commitment to a totally controlled economy, on the hard left. Socialists like Mahatma Gandhi and Robert Mugabe would occupy a less extreme leftist position. Margaret Thatcher would be well over to the right, but further right still would be someone like that ultimate free marketeer, General Pinochet.
That deals with economics, but the social dimension is also important in politics. That's the one that the mere left-right scale doesn't adequately address. So we've added one, ranging in positions from extreme authoritarian to extreme libertarian.
Both an economic dimension and a social dimension are important factors for a proper political analysis. By adding the social dimension you can show that Stalin was an authoritarian leftist (i.e. the state is more important than the individual) and that Gandhi, believing in the supreme value of each individual, is a liberal leftist. While the former involves state-imposed arbitrary collectivism in the extreme top left, on the extreme bottom left is voluntary collectivism at regional level, with no state involved.
...
[D]espite popular perceptions, the opposite of fascism is not communism but anarchism, and that the opposite of communism (i.e. an entirely state-planned economy) is neo-liberalism (i.e. extreme deregulated economy)
And thus the disconnect is resolved.
I find it very interesting how you people from the UK absolutely despise Margaret Thatcher. Now, my great-aunt (at least, I think that's how we're related) is from Scotland, so I have had these disagreements with her on these topics already. I'm not interested in hearing anything about British politics (no offense, but I'm from America, so why should I care?), but I just find it so interesting how much you people seem to just hate Thatcher, and Blair, and Cameron. I'm speaking from ignorance here, but it's my opinion that maybe, possibly, a little bit, they all deserve a bit more credit than they get.
Just from an academic standpoint, of course. That's all I'm saying.
Also, this entire topic is green lit by the PPC Constitution, right? Just making sure. Don't want any undue controversy here, am I right?
So long as everyone behaves and doesn't aim any particular insults at each other, I'll not be having to be doing any biting. *wide grin*
The thing with Thatcher is she is very, very much a point of division because she was a very, very terrifyingly amazingly active lady when it came to making things happen. She was called the Iron Lady for a reason. She was also rather Conservative, and the leader of said UK party back in the 80s.
In a lot of ways (and not necessarily the best of) she was basically the UK's Reagan, with all the implications thereof.
As for Blair and Cameron, it's just part of the fact they're both relatively recent politicians, and we can still see a lot of the effects from how modernization and technology has changed politics and how we perceive things with the beginning of Blair's time in office. (Sorry, Brown, there's not much room for interest in you, here).
You can see the same thing that Blair and Cameron get with Clinton, Bush, and Obama on our side of the ocean.
Which means I assume for the most part Conservative/Right leaning Brits will probably love her, but the left leaning ones, which to me it seems the majority of our British Boarders, and I would say all boarders, will have a differing opinion.
I will be interested to see the chart of leanings that I think hS is putting together. I suspect the vast majority of boarders will fall on the Left side.
I think the British left-wing made a mistake. I don't know what Corbyn's opinions on internal British matters are — and, for that matter, I don't have an opinion on internal British matters anyway — but his foreign policy ideas are disastrous. That's the guy who called HAMAS and Hizballah his friends, and, frankly? Hamas and Hizballah are terrorist organisations, they shoot civilians on purpose, Hizballah helps the murderous Assad regime, and the list goes on and on.
As to his talk of addressing them as friends because a peace process needs to involve them: a) you make peace with enemies, not friends; b) no peace process needs to involve Hizballah because they're not Palestinians and they're not the government of Lebanon; and c) HAMAS needs to change a couple things — like, y'know, recognising Israel's right to exist — before it can be part of any peace process. Toning down the 'kill all Israelis' propaganda would be nice but is less important.
Seriously, the good ol' US of A supported the Khmer Rouge. If you don't know who they are (most people around my area didn't) you should look them up. Just avoid Google image searches, unless you want to see what they did to people. Foreign policy around the globe has always been a game of agenda pushing and behind-the-scenes politicking. Not going to say 'get used to it' but politics are a really ugly business. I'm not even really trying to explain that to you, just complaining.
I agree with you on the matter of supporting groups who shoot civilians. Groups who do that for no good reason are little more than organized crime, in my opinion, not even terrorists. One man's terrorist can be another man's freedom fighter (Not often, but sometimes), but the instant a group decides to add innocents to their list of targets, they have lost all honour and respect in my eyes.
This guy could be good for Britain, but I don't know much about his foreign policies. Hopefully, he drops his support for these groups. I'd hate for an otherwise good (by politician standards) system to need to involve supporting groups like this. No good can come of it. Funny, I hate politicians, yet I might end up as one.
That's not cool.
Frankly, I feel exactly the same way with my country and what we did recently with Iran.
It's even on video. This guy is insane.
Corbyn's response on the issue, cited from here (the Express is a supporter of the nationalist/racist party UKIP), and repeated here in a different order (the Telegraph is a supporter of the Conservative Party).
"I spoke at a meeting about the Middle East crisis in parliament and there were people there from Hezbollah and I said I welcomed our friends from Hezbollah to have a discussion and a debate, and I said I wanted Hamas to be part of that debate. I have met Hamas in Lebanon and I've met Hezbollah in this country and Lebanon.
"I'm saying that people I talk to, I use it in a collective way, saying our friends are prepared to talk.
"Does it mean I agree with Hamas and what it does? No. Does it mean I agree with Hezbollah and what they do? No. What it means is that I think to bring about a peace process, you have to talk to people with whom you may profoundly disagree.
"There is not going to be a peace process unless there is talks involving Israel, Hezbollah and Hamas and I think everyone knows that."
And my responses, for the sake of... y'know, responses:
-We had people from Hezbollah in the Houses of Parliament? That's kind of scary. I hope that they were from the political wing, rather than the proscribed-as-a-terrorist-group militant side. (I believe we made the same distinction between militant and political sides in the case of Northern Ireland, though I may be mistaken.)
-I disagree vehemently that Hezbollah and especially Hamas are in any way friendly. I have heard the word used in the way Corbyn seems to be saying he meant it - 'we have friends in the Soviet government (say), and they're willing to talk [and take what we say back to their unfriendly superiors]' - but I'm not convinced he was using it that way.
-The three ways to get peace seem to be: extermination or removal of one side; complete suppression of one side, including total disarmament and removal of all political authority; negotiated peace between the two sides. I think I'm right in saying most people would like the last? But...
-I don't see Hamas, in particular, as being willing to negotiate any peace that doesn't involve one of the first two options. If Corbyn thinks they will, he's fooling himself.
I maintain that Corbyn was the best choice for leader of the Labour Party, and best choice on the menu for Prime Minister. But on the issue of Israel and its environs, he is naive at best, foolish at middlest, and downright deluded at worst.
hS
(Responding now that I'm a) calm and b) not dead tired.)
-From this quote I gather that he thinks a peace process must happen. While I don't disagree in principle, now is simply not the time.
I also object to the inclusion of Hizballah, which has no place in any sort of peace talks, whether with the Palestinians (it's a Lebanese organisation) or the Lebanese (it's not the government; also, terrorist organisation).
Also, as I've already said — HAMAS needs to change before it can be a part of any sort of peace process.
-I can't find any trace of Hizballah representatives visiting the British parliament, so it might be that his 'invitation' was shot down.
-That said, making a distinction between Hizballah's "political wing" and "military wing" is nonsensical. The "political wing" must know and approve (at least by silence, though I doubt that's the case) about the "military wing's" ideology and methods; ergo, they're cut from the same stock and are just as bad. Dealing with them is no different than dealing with Mustafa Badr Aldin.
-If Corbyn's the best option for PM Britain has, the United Kingdom is in a sorry state indeed; I'd even hazard a leap of faith and say it's in a worse state than Israel (and we had three consecutive Bibi governments).
You say 'now is simply not the time' for a peace process; from the perspective of someone who's actually there, what do you feel should be happening now, and what should it be leading to?
Miscellaneous responses:
-The IRA was a terrorist organisation. Your alternatives are still 'talk to them', 'disarm them', 'ship them out', or 'kill them all', whether they're terrorists or not. We talked to the IRA, and managed to get something approximating peace in Northern Ireland. That said, I'm not aware of any other times that's worked, so you probably have a point. ^^
-The alternatives to Corbyn are:
--The current Conservative PM, who is in the middle of gleefully selling off chunks of the National Health Service (because businesses with their eye on the profit margins are clearly the best people to be caring for the sick), shutting down libraries (because all the people worth thinking about can afford to buy books), making universities much more expensive (so that all those poor people don't get ideas above their station), and so on and so forth.
--Our third party is currently the SNP, a national party whose platform is entirely focussed on Scotland, whose leader is not in the House of Commons, and who, by virtue of only standing in Scotland, are literally incapable of getting a majority.
--Our fourth party are the ones who completely betrayed their voter base and formed a coalition with the Conservatives last time round, revealing that they have exactly no principles.
-Then we have a couple of Irish and Welsh parties.
-Then we have the got-the-third-most-votes-but-only-one-seat nationalist/racist UKIP, whose platform is 'get out of Europe and get rid of brown people'.
-Then we have the Green party, who are perfectly lovely, but only have one seat.
So yeah. Up until the 12th, we didn't have a functioning Left Wing in Britain. We had a 'slightly less right wing'. I've no idea if that's worse than what's going on in Israel, but it's been pretty awful.
hS
(PS: Again purely for information, the division of Hezbollah into 'one terrorist group, one political wing' was <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hezbollah#Designationasaterroristorganizationorresistancemovement">put in place in 2008 by the Labour government, and maintained under the Conservatives of the last five years. It's also in accordance with the official opinion of the EU. I have no idea how Mr. Corbyn views the matter.)
Basically, going through a peace process now can be likened for a teacher telling two kindergärtners to be friends of each other, despite having had a fight not a moment ago. What we need now are trust-building steps — a halt on one-sided actions, the PA stopping its support of stone and Molotov cocktail terrorism, Israel's police actually starting to police the settlers, etc.
Misc. responses to the misc. responses:
-The IRA is similar to the homegrown terrorists we had back before Independence. It is/was not a religiously-motivated organisation. What's more, in Hizballah's case, there's a legitimate government in Lebanon. There's no reason to talk to Hizballah.
-That sounds like what we have here:
--Likud, Bibi's party, which is... either right-wing or 'stay in power', IDK (coalition).
--Kulanu, supposedly a 'social' party; their track record, especially considering the use of the gas fields offshore, is eh. Right-wing politically (their head, Kahlon, used to be a Likud MK). (coalition)
--The Jewish Home, nasty right-wing religious nutjobs (coalition).
--Shas, Mizrakhi religious fanatics (coalition).
--United Torah Judaism, Ashkenazi religious fanatics (coalition).
--Zionist Union, which consists of the local Labour party and Tzipi Livni's party. Supposedly centre-left, they have some good MKs (Mickey Rosenthal, for example) and a horde of spinless cowards and idiots (Merav Michaeli, I'm looking at you here). (opposition)
--The Joint List, which is basically all the Arab parties and Khadash (communists and Arabs) combined into one (opposition).
--Yesh Atid, which is Yair Lapid's party. Centrist-ish. Their cred isn't too good.
--Yisrael Beitenu, crazy Russian right wing. Really corrupt, too (opposition).
--Meretz, loony left. The defeatist "we're eviiiiiiiil we must punish ourself" claptrap guys.
So all of our parties suck, basically.
(That division, as I've said, is claptrap.)
I don't know what he actually said - all I've ever seen is brief glimpses of 'and he likes terrorists you guyz' - but I agree that those chaps simply aren't civilised what what er... what the strikethrough said. ;)
That said: yes, peace processes involve enemies, not friends, but the times they've worked - I'm thinking Northern Ireland, which sort of worked, in that the IRA isn't bombing London these days - it's been by developing respect between the parties. Which would, yes, include Hamas recognising the right of Israel to exist; the same arguments they use against it (I'm thinking the 'we were here first' argument) apply just as well in the opposite direction, now: the people in Israel today are not the people who created the country, and regardless of how those founders are regarded, the current inhabitants shouldn't have it rubbed off on them.
(Though, er, aren't you still shooting at Hizballah occasionally? So don't you need some sort of peace-making with them too, even if it's the 'make a desert' variety?)
Short version: no, terrorists are not friends. And it would be nice for them to stop shooting at people.
hS
I'm sorry to say this, but I have to disagree with you on Israel. There is significant archeological evidence to suggest that the Jews lived in Israel in ancient times. In fact, the historian Josephus, who lived at the time of the Roman Empire, actually outlines the events that led to the Jews getting kicked out of Israel, I believe it was the Bar Kochba revolt. It was at this point that the Jews, for the most part were kicked out of Israel, which later became Palestine, I believe as a result of the Sykes-Picot Agreement.
What I'm saying is that it's way more complicated than that. Just wanted to bring it to your attention. It's really a fascinating story, the story of the Jews. Here's a link to just a small bit of what I'm talking about. Granted, it looks at things from a Biblical perspective, sort of, but it's much more scientific in its approach and it's documenting the history of Judaism and the Jewish people.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/ancient/archeology-hebrew-bible.html
Also, to go off on a rabbit trail, I have found during my College research recently that Hezbollah (or Hizbollah, however it's spelled) as well as Hamas are both receiving guns and money from Iran. So, I think that there are a lot of factors behind the problems with Hamas and Hezbollah, but things are not as simple as a plain old peace talk. It's infuriating, really.
Oh well. What can ya do, but keep doing the same old thing. The world is an insane place.
I've actually read Josephus, as it happens. Quite interesting. (I picked it up along with the Mabinogion, Iliad & Odyssey, and Machiavelli, at a bookstore that was closing down.)
But by the same logic, I should be entitled to land in Germany (where the Angles came from) and Scandinavia (for my Viking side); the Welsh should be permitted to take over the whole of England; white people should be displaced from the Americas; the whole of Europe should be given up in favour of those people with the most mixed-in Neanderthal DNA...
Oh, and Israel should make a concerted effort to seek out those of Canaanite blood, and deed over all their lands to them. It's only fair. ^~
My point is that it's all wildly irrelevant. The Israelis are there; so are the Arabs; none of the people currently living there are the ones involved in the decisions of '48. Attempting to demand that all Israelis leave/give up their rights/culture/whatever is exactly as wrong as declaring that all of Spain should be handed to the Basque.
Which would be hilarious, come to think of it.
hS
(PS: Thank you for disagreeing with me by agreeing with me. ^^)
Oh, you've read Homer and Machiavelli? Awesome! They're good reads.
That's only assuming that the Jews took over Israel with military force. That didn't happen. The international community gave them Israel. And nobody made the Arabs leave Israel. There are still lots of Arabs there, and in order to try and get along, the Jews gave them some pretty sweet minority rights. It's a good deal for them, and yet they aren't satisfied. They just want the Jews gone. They don't want their land back. Well, some of them do, but the Palestinians are frequently turning to Jihad, and that's not cool.
Also, that's only if you believe that man evolved from whatever it is people say we evolved from. Not everyone believes that. Not saying whether or not I believe it, just saying that not everyone buys into the idea. I think it's seen as an insult, to be honest.
Why? The Canaanites were jerks. Are there even Canaanites still around? I probably should have looked that up beforehand, come to think of it, but I can be real here, right?
I agree. I completely agree. And as I have said just now, the Arabs get a pretty sweet deal with their minority rights. The Israelis just want to get along. Nothing wrong with that.
As for your post script, I'm a little lost. But if we agree, and we can get along and move on, then I'm cool with it. I'll drop this point, because it doesn't matter.
That's only assuming that the Jews took over Israel with military force. That didn't happen. The international community gave them Israel.
And it was, of course, within the rights of Britain er, sorry, "the international community" to do so, and not a half-hearted way of appeasing both the anti-Semites who still wanted Jews out of Europe while quietly trying to get rid of colonies whose native population had become problematic.
And nobody made the Arabs leave Israel.
It's nice that nobody just booted them off the land they'd inhabited for centuries. Wait, that's literally exactly what happened. They were told to leave the land they'd inherited for centuries to make room for people whose ancestors had left thousands of years prior. Do you really think they just "made room" for the influx of people? Getting shunted to the West Bank was part of it. Now they're being kicked out of there. I'm sympathetic to Israelis as well as Palestinians, but to claim no one was made to leave is plain wrong.
There are still lots of Arabs there, and in order to try and get along, the Jews gave them some pretty sweet minority rights.
O_o "some pretty sweet minority rights" doesn't set your teeth on edge at all, huh? They were granted, so generously, minority rights by people coming into land without their consent.
Again, I don't want to see anyone kicked out of land they're living in. I know people who live in Jerusalem, and I know people who live in Lebanon and have family on the West Bank, and really, I pretty much would just like to see all sides of this conflict put down their gorram guns and talk.
I pretty much would just like to see all sides of this conflict put down their gorram guns and talk.
It's probably not going to happen because there's too much religion involved. Not to mention that you need trust for that, and nobody's been trying to build trust here for ages (Obama doesn't count — he's like an elephant in a china store with his lack of attention and understanding of the dramatis personae involved).
American politicians are... coprolite at trying to solve other people's conflicts, with a handful of exceptions. We rarely have the cultural context to understand the tensions involved.
I'd like to think the religious part is eventually possible to reason with. At my university we both have a Jewish group and an Islamic group, and neither have tried to kill each other that anyone's noticed. As far as I can tell, most people just want to live their lives, and religious people want to practice their religion in peace. But when there's decades of pain and anger, and a lot of people angling for more power and money . . . that tends to be hard for anyone, on any side of the border, to achieve. Which is terrifying and sad, since again, I have people I care about on both sides of the gunfire.
It's the "let's kill people" people who run the show here; most of the decent people just want to get on with their lives. There's a line of Agnon that says (pardon me; my translation is not doing his wonderful writing justice), "The wise wash their hands of leading the world because they know there are wiser and want the world to be lead by the perfectly wise. While this is happening the stupid and the evil come and lead the world according to their stupidity and their evil."
That's what we have here; the decent people want decent-er people to lead and in the meantime the nutjobs jump in.
The town I come from has a lot of anti-Islam hate, so it was pretty cool to come to college and see quite a large population of women wearing hijabs and niqabs and the like. Nobody gives them a second glance, either. I've also seen quite a few guys wearing kipas, or kippahs, however you spell it.
Just yesterday, while waiting at the bus stop, I was sitting close enough to a Jewish boy strike up a conversation with a Muslim girl, and they ended up chatting about Doctor Who, of all things. I was so tempted to join in, but then my bus came. :(
But yeah, it's quite the refreshing change. I wish the rest of the world was like this.
I'm so good at this typing thing, you guys.
It's complicated.
1) It should be noted that a peace process isn't an end in and of itself, unlike what some people think. It's a means to and end (peace, obviously), and not the sole means.
2) There have been some border incidents involving Hizballah recently. However, peace with Hizballah is downright pointless since they're basically the Ayatollah regime's stooges. Peace with the Lebanese government is desirable once they actually start functioning.
3) The difference between the IRA and our garden variety terrorists (Hamas, Hizballah, PIJ, etc etc) is best summed up by this anecdote: the commissioner of the Met was interviewed after 7/7; he expressed surprise the terrorists did not phone ahead of time to warn of the bombs. That's a very telling difference between organisations like the IRA (and our own homegrown variety back from before 1948 for that matter) and Islamic Jihadists. Therefore, the things that apply to the IRA don't necessarily apply to our situation here.
4) Just noting that the 'we were here first' argument is blarney; Tacitus mentions Jews in Palestine long before Arabs were even a thing, and he's not exactly philosemitic.
Maybe there's hope yet! In the US, I'm psyched for you guys, and really, really hopeful for the implications for a Sanders win here.
And he's not a comments section in a suit and toupee or anti-vaccine or any other flavor of moron!
America wasn't designed for someone like Sanders to lead us. It literally was not designed that way. Despite what people want to believe, we were built around a Capitalist system, and the Constitution provides us with property rights, and other things, which Socialism, by design, doesn't have room for.
All that to say that I hope Bernie Sanders doesn't win. My money is on Ben Carson, or one of the Republican candidates, if for no other reason than that they have sheer numbers on their side. That can be a liability, but a lot of the candidates will be presenting themselves as the next generation, because they are much younger, or something.
Once again, no Bernie Sanders. You can have him, if you want. (Please take him away.)
First off, of course socialism includes property rights. I'm calling for something like Sweden's system, not gulag-era USSR! No one* wants to abolish all private property, that's absurd.
Strictly speaking, we already have, and have had for some time, parts of a socialist system. They worked pretty well until Reagan and then Bush started dismantling them. For example: public, i.e. tax-funded, education**. Social security - a tax-funded safety net for retirees and seniors. EBT/food stamps - a safety net for families who can't afford to buy food. (Spare me the lists of alleged abuses, please, if anyone's thinking it. I have known far too many people whose parents relied on food stamps in highschool and still couldn't get their kids enough to eat in the summers.)
So here's my query. A hypothetical man has a wife and two children. He also has four houses, two of which are sprawling estates and the other two of which are country homes. He inherited enough money to put him through business and law school, and then spent 6-12 years as an executive of a major bank. When the bailouts happened, his company didn't have enough money to pay his high-end six-figure salary and that of all their workers, because too many loan customers, who didn't have the money to go to business or law school, and therefore work as cashiers or bus drivers or window-washers, could no longer pay their mortgage.
How much money - like say, how many millions, or billions, of dollars does this man have to have in his bank account before the law says, okay, that's more money than any one person could ever spend, not counting the trust funds for his two kids – now we're going to tax you at a higher rate so the several hundred families who live in the shadow of your mansion can afford to send their kids to a state school?
Because that's where capitalism leads. If this man - who, as I'm sure you know, is both hypothetical and very very real, finds out that he has cancer, he can go to the finest doctors and the best hospitals and, if his health is okay, he has a good chance of recovery. If one of his bank's poorer tenants finds out they have cancer, they will almost certainly not be able to afford treatment, and will almost certainly sicken and die, because good health insurance is expensive and treatment is impossible to afford without it. I fail to understand how the idea of “Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” can lead to a literal price on the human life. And don't even get me started on the "justice" system***.
Capitalism may well be "what America was set up for." That's arguable. Certainly (most of) the founders were interested in maintaining a landed aristocracy upper class, and a hierarchy of landless non-citizens with fewer rights. But I don't particularly care. The founders were neither saints nor prophets, and the Constitution is neither a sacred document not a magic scroll. Among other things, it contains the 3/5 Compromise.
So, fine. America's not set up for socialism, but capitalism. Okay. Then let's fix that, because I'm rather tired of the idea that a government owes more to its wealthy citizens than it does to its poor.
*Some people absolutely want to dismantle the concept of private property, but they are 1) a tiny minority, 2) demonstrably hypocrites, and 3) not socialists, nor even Marxists generally speaking, but anarchists.
**My problem with this is it generally is divided into district-wide income tax, which created vast gaps of education quality based on whether one's parents can afford to live in a "good" or a "bad" district. In Connecticut, you have many places where on one side of the river are good schools, with ~20 kids to a class, both gifted and special ed classes, and modern equipment - and on the other side, 40 kids to a class, equipment and textbooks that haven't been updated in years or decades, and no advanced classes to speak of.
***Because, see, if he gets arrested for having an ounce of cocaine in his pocket, he will pay a fine, worth maybe 1/10 of what his cheapest car is worth, and walk free. If one of his bank's tenants has an ounce of marijuana in his pocket, he'll spend monts or years in prison. Because the "free market" led to one person having so much they need never fear a single consequence, and another, inherently of the same human value, to have nothing.
Let's be honest with ourselves. We are very likely to enter a Republican era. Hillary has a slight chance, but if you thought that the people who scream "Commie Scumbag Obummer" will allow a legit Left candidate, you are very mistaken. And even many of the people who vote Democrat are likely a little more on the right scale then Bernie is. The literals have a target on their backs, and the Republican party knows it.
The best chance Sanders has is if Hillary falls flat on her face harder, and if Trump wins the nomination. Trump is a nutball, and we all know it. However, if just enough people are split over the, what are we at now, sixteen Republican candidates, Trump might have a chance at the nomination. If he gets it, the Dems walk right into the white house. If not... Well, we likely have a Republican government. Yippee.
Not trying to be controversial here, so I'll try and tread lightly.
Let me start off by saying I am a Republican. Specifically, I am a Conservative Republican, because apparently, we are splitting ourselves into petty factions now. (Why can't it be simple, like it used to be?) Now, with that in mind, try and see things from my perspective.
That being said, it does objectively look like a Republican will win this one. Most of them have articulated their positions very well, as compared to the Democrats, who are trying to differentiate themselves from Obama for one reason or another. The biggest exception is Bernie Sanders, and that's why people are drawn to him at all. At least he's honest about what he believes, people are saying. Clinton just comes off as sort of, well, fake. And to top it all off, there's this email thing going on. A lot of people seem to think that she's hiding something. That's significant, obviously.
I take issue with the way you characterized people like me, though. Yes, there are people who think Obama is a Communist, myself NOT being one of them. There is some evidence for this theory. For example, his father was an avowed member of the Communist Party of Kenya. Some of his associates growing up were Marxists. Is he a Communist? Who really knows? He's definitely pretty far Left, though. That has never been in question. As for the scumbag thing, we can fling insults at each other all day. It doesn't solve anything. The only ones who throw them around are Internet trolls and angry people in rural America.
I don't want an apology for that. Just trying to set the record straight.
Now, as for Trump... Hooo, boy! He's a character. He's not presidential material, but he's entertaining. The only reason he does as well as he does is because people are upset by the status quo. And even then, Ben Carson is now tied with Trump in some of the polls. He's losing his steam. He'll drop out eventually. The only question is when, and how much entertainment can we get out of him before he goes?
But who knows? A Republican government might be what we need. I'll admit, the Kennedy administration and the Truman administration were good examples of Democrat administrations that even we Republicans secretly admire. We'll just have to wait and see what we get, I guess. (And vote, of course.)
That he was attacking Conservative Republicans per-se, more so just restating what has been a part of political rhetoric for a long time. Any time there is a clearly left leaning candidate there are calls of either "Socialist" or "Communist" just like any time there is a far right candidate you get calls of "Racist" and "Religious Nut jobs".
That's just part of politics.
I'm not talking your run-of-the-mill Republican. I'm talking those who fall to rhetoric and choose not to study and think for themselves, but take only what Fox and Friends say as absolute truth. Unfortunately, that rhetoric has dominated the political landscape for a long time now, on both sides, and sadly shapes how most people view opposition. I will even admit to falling into it a little myself, though I try my hardest to keep it to a minimum.
I guess I can see where that's coming from. But I don't see why being a "Religious nut job" is a bad thing.
And people get called "racist for the stupidest things nowadays. Apparently, the Pledge of Allegiance is racist, because it makes Muslims "feel threatened" somehow. I noticed that the people saying so were not Muslims.
It's crazy.
The only problem I have with the pledge is how we say we are "one nation, under God." I am a huge champion of First Amendment rights, both to the true legal extent, and the idealized version of it. We honor and protect religious freedoms in this country, by granting the right to pray to any being we please, including the full right to choose not to abide by any faith. Forcing those who follow a religion outside of Judaeo-Christian faiths to send praise to a god not of their own is wrong, and goes against the spirit of the Constitution. Is that racist, though? Not in the least.
As for "religious nut-jobs," I reserve this term for those who try to enforce their specific religion's values onto the whole of America's citizens. Many of those peoples use "religious freedom" as an excuse to stomp down an any other religion that does not recognize Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior, and the tenants spoken of within the Bible. Do you want religious freedom? Then you have to grant freedom to those who follow Buddha, Allah, the Flying Spaghetti Monster, and any other faith of this green Earth.
You can tell this is a touchy subject for me. However, I will call out militant Atheists as well. Just because you hold no faith, does no mean others are not aloud to follow and even preach what they please. If faith in a Higher Power gives them comfort and a purpose in life, what does that have to do with you? Science and faith are not incompatible. It does not have to be, at any rate.
I realized I got off point a tad. I'll keep it in, though. it is something that needed to be said, and something I will continue to say whenever the topic comes up.
Most kids are not of legal consenting age when they learn to say it, and I view it as a form of borderline brainwashing - it's the exact kind of thing we heard horror stories about in the Soviet Union as children: little kids being taught and/or forced to pledge their allegiance to a nation state without any clear understanding of why.
It's nationalism, basically, Cold War era nationalism, and I would really like to see us grow out of it already.
"In what universe could a lot of children standing rigidly to attention before a flag and chanting in a dull monotone possibly be creepy?"
The pledge does predate the Cold War by about 100 years. It was actually part of the Reconstruction Era. Lincoln wanted the Rebels to say the pledge and they he would welcome them back. But it is still a form of nationalism. But nationalism is not inherently a bad thing either. But like all things it is open to abuse.
And if I recall the reason was to largely differentiate ourselves from "those godless reds" or some such or other.
Any historian of post-1865 America* can point to the Cold War as the point where America swung very hard to the right, and has stayed there for the past 70ish years. The push for "We are a Christian Nation with Godly Values and wholesome gender norms" was a direct response to the anti-religion, pro-gender equality ideals of the Soviet regime (at least at first, before Lenin's illness and also before Lenin kind of got cold feet about the whole "gender equality" thing).
*except Mike Allen, who still teaches that in his classes IIRC but published a book saying otherwise for the money
Apparently, my high school didn't recognize the fact that it's not, in fact, legal to force students to peacefully protest the Pledge by not standing during the announcements. My homeroom teacher got in huge trouble when the principal peeked into our room one morning during the Pledge to see me and a small handful of other students not participating. Those of us who refused to stand were also given detention.
Come to America, where freedom and tolerance are our guiding values!
I find it very strange that anyone would find it offensive that "one nation, under God" is in the pledge. I don't get that. In this case, the phrase is being used in a more figurative sense. It's the same thing as people saying, "If this happens, by God I'll be so angry-" or something like that. People who don't believe in the God of the Bible use phrases like that all the time. It's not promoting a single religion over the others, it's just a part of a more archaic version of English.
And religious freedom is more than just the right to pray, actually. It's the right to practice your religion as well. That's why we don't (or at least, didn't used to) force people to do things they didn't want to do for religious reasons. Fundamentalist Christians don't have to fight in the military, they can be conscientious objectors. Jews don't have to eat pork for any reason. Muslims don't have to consume alcohol. I would go into the issue of Christians not needing to be forced to accommodate gay marriage, but that's a whole different issue. I'll just leave that alone with this. If there are two bakers who can bake your wedding cake, one Christian who respectfully declines to bake your cake for religious reasons, and instead points you toward the second bakery, who is all too happy to bake the cake, then why force the Christian baker to bake the cake? It makes no sense.
Who tries to enforce their views on Americans? Can you provide me with examples?
It is indeed a touchy subject for everyone. Why can't we all just get along, am I right? I'll just come out and say it right now, I am an unashamed Christian, and I imagine there are some Atheists here. We aren't here to argue about these things, we're here to have fun with the PPC. But we're all friends here.
As long as we all get to say what we all feel without getting too aggressive with each other, we should all be fine.
Jews keeping kosher, Muslims not drinking alcohols, and fundamentalist Christians not serving in the military are all examples that aren't founded in bigotry or causing harm to other people. Denying people the right to get married, and thus the rights that come with being legally married, is an example absolutely founded in bigotry and can cause harm, in my opinion. In the cake example, well. Certainly they are entitled to their opinion, but all people in the United States should be free from discrimination in their everyday life, including in buying cakes.
It absolutely is NOT founded in bigotry, and I take offense to that. We have our perfectly legitimate reasons to oppose gay marriage, but we are taught to still be kind to them. We are supposed to be kind to everyone, because that's what God did for us. That's the way it is. We don't oppose gay marriage because we hate people! We oppose it because, a) gay marriage will have unintended consequences on traditional marriages, and b) people are trying to FORCE us to do this. That's not right, and that's discrimination against US.
Think about that point of view. If gay marriage is all about love, then why are people so angry? Why are they trying to force their own beliefs on everyone else? I thought that sort of thing made you angry. Why is this any different?
I ain't even mad, bro. Just trying to put another viewpoint, mine, on the table.
So if someone's religious beliefs tell them that, say, being black is a sin, denying a black person service suddenly becomes a-okay and no longer bigotry?
As for the "traditional marriages" part, honestly, every time I see someone espousing "traditional family values" they end up having two accounts on Ashley Madison or have been remarried 4 times. I'm not saying that either of those situations are necessarily bad (. . .though cheating on your spouse is pretty definitely not cool), it's just that there's a lot of hypocrisy that permeates that argument! (Side note: am not accusing you of those things, it's just a trend I've noticed with that argument.) The idea of "traditional marriages" tends to be very Christian-centric and often kinda shitty towards women, among other things. So my question is, why is having some people break that mold so bad?
In other words, how does two strangers getting married in any way affect you or your life?
Okay, what religions do you know of that says that? Name one major religion that is still around today that says that. That is a false analogy, to use terminology that is far more harsh than I intended it to be.
What kind of people have you been hanging around with? I'd say that the people who do those things have serious issues that they need to deal with.
And those are bad situations. Putting your personal information into an unsecure website so that you can cheat on your spouse is a bad situation. As for being married four times, that's either a bad situation, or the person who was married four times is very unlucky, and their spouses all died. That's not likely, so it's a bad situation.
Okay, so you're basically saying that just because the people who have traditional marriages are screwed up people, that makes the entire institution of traditional marriage screwed up? That literally makes no sense. There's hypocrisy on the side of gay marriage as well, I'd like to point out. If it's all about love, then why are the homosexuals so angry with the Christians? Okay, so say that we are being unreasonable and bigoted. Let's just assume that for a second. If gay marriage is all about love, and we're being the mean ones, then why can't they all go somewhere that will accommodate them? Why is it they don't want to just be left alone? If it's all about love, then why all the hatred for us?
Thank you for not accusing me of those things, because I am literally in College, have been single my whole life, and am smart enough not to do any of those stupid things on the Internet.
So what if it's Christian-centric? Secular people (or atheists, or whatever you prefer I call you) use our ideas all the time. Without Christianity, Western civilization would have turned out completely different.
I thought that that sort of language was supposed to stay off the Board!
In what ways are traditional marriages bad for women? The man works the fields, the woman works on monopolizing the workings of the home itself. It's division of labor. That's fair.
It's bad because the mold gets broken. Think about it. In the majority of cases, divorces create some level of drama, because it wasn't naturally supposed to be that way. Same thing with certain things outside of marriage, if you know what I mean.
First of all, why would two total strangers marry each other? That doesn't make any sense. Second of all, it doesn't affect my life, but that's a false argument. The point I'm getting across is that it's wrong, no matter how it affects me. Something else that's wrong is trying to force other people to do what you want them to do, like get two homosexuals married, despite the fact that it violates that person's faith. That's wrong! That's what I'm trying to say. It doesn't matter how people getting married affects my life, because it doesn't. I personally think that if two gay people want to get married, under the laws of the United States, they can get married. I have a religious objection to that, but still. The problem arises when you try and force people to do things your way, and even worse when you try and force them to like it that they're forcing you to do it.
Does that make sense? Does that answer your question?
Religious arguments were being used during the Civil Rights Movement to try to avoid having to integrate and to continue discriminating. Those arguments failed then, and will do so again, we saw that recently with Kim Davis being sentenced to prison for Contempt of Court.
Likewise, people on the Civil Rights Movement also quoted Scripture. Like Martin Luther King Jr. Has everyone forgotten that he was a pastor?
They will continue to fail, I agree. But true Christians, the ones who actually understand the Bible, don't do that. I think you need to actually find some real Christians, not those fake ones you're always hearing about.
Kim Davis has been released from prison. The only thing she was jailed for was not abandoning her religious beliefs. The judge overreacted, and I think he's kind of a hateful person. He also clearly has no respect for the First Amendment.
She was jailed for being in Contempt of Court. A court has various powers, it can compel through injunction, etc. In this case the Court used its own Constitutional Powers to compel Ms. Davis, who lets be clear was an employee of the Court system to do her job. She refused. When a party ignores a Court's command, they can sentence the individual to prison for being in Contempt of Court.
It had nothing to do with her Religious Belief, and everything to do with violating the law.
She was a conscientious objector for religious reasons, and she made that clear. Her Constitutional rights say that her religious liberties are protected by law, which clearly isn't the case after all.
Not every religious belief is protected. Lemon v. Kurtzman and US v. Reynolds, as well as Employment Division v. Smith, and Epperson v. Arkansas (as well as a whole host of others) show that.
Religious Freedom works both ways, freedom for religion and freedom from religion. If you really want me to start the legal debate I will.
Hmm...
The Bible says that traditional marriage is between one man and one woman. The Bible says almost nothing about race being a factor.
Because what I remember of the Old Testament is a whole lot of polygamy - Abraham? Jacob? David? Solomon? - and a heck of a lot of people being attacked and killed due to interracial/interreligious (being basically synonyms at that point) marriage.
As for the New Testament? I remember one story about seven brothers serially marrying the same woman (is that idea still part of Traditional Marriage, the notion that a widow should immediately remarry her dead husband's brother?), and a whole lot of Paul telling people to avoid marriage at all costs.
All marriages in the Bible - and in fact in America up to, oh, probably the mid-19th-century, I don't have the exact data - were also arranged by the couple's parents, with none of this silly 'love match' stuff going on. That's a very traditional component of marriage.
hS
.. just how much you actually know about the Bible. Because any true Christian can tell you that the Old Testament was like a dictionary of things that you should not do. Setting people on fire, sacrificing babies, polygamy, all of those things are presented negatively.
Abraham had one wife, Sarah. He fooled around with his slave, which he was not supposed to do and made him unhappy. Jacob was conned by his father-in-law and was caught between his love for someone else and his cultural duty not to divorce his other wife. Besides which, Jacob's life was pretty much screwed up in many other ways. David's infidelity cost him the lives of his children. He wasn't supposed to do what he did, and he suffered for it. And Solomon screwed up big time, he even said as much.
The interracial stuff is much more complicated than that. The Old Testament authors thought that we would be smart enough to understand that. I don't have the time or knowledge to explain it all to you, but I would suggest finding a real, honest Christian who understands the Bible fully to explain it to you, not one of your wishy-washy Christians who hurl insults at people at Chili's.
Oh boy. One single story. Well, doesn't that just sink my entire argument (not). That has cultural context that you need to look into. And no, nobody does that anymore, not even the Jews, who were the ones who did that.
Paul said that because he was single and very happy about it. He didn't say avoid marriage at all costs, buddy. He actually said in the exact same letter that any man and woman who want to get married should do so.
Wrong. Not all marriages were arranged, many of them were approved. Big difference.
So, what I'm getting here is that you don't think that love should be a part of marriage.
How much YOU know. First things first: stop with the "true Christian" stuff, it's quite insulting to those of us who AREN'T going after people for their choice of love. Quite frankly, it implies that you, as a "true Christian", are better than someone else simply because of how much you claim to know. Romans 3:23 says that "all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God". Galatians 3:28 states that "we are all one in Christ Jesus." Basically? We are all equal. You can't claim moral superiority, and seeing as those are basic verses taught in 1st and 2nd grade Sunday schools, you really ought to know better if you're at a Christian college. In addition? Back up what you claim. Your professors would be ashamed to hear you claim things without the Scripture to back it up, dude.
Second, you can't throw around the Old Testament and then claim people are ignoring cultural context. The Old Testament is almost entirely contextual to the Israelites, so don't try to apply it to situations today without, again, backing it up.
You're treading on a lot of toes right now. Watch your tone.
You're essentially answering all points with "Well, MY interpretation of the Bible disagrees with that, so no Real, True Christian would believe it." You're an army of one right now. I guarantee you hS has read the Bible quite thoroughly. He's schooled me many times in my angry fundamentalist days, on New and Old Testament alike.
Aside from which, Nathan's speech to David makes it clear that he's not being punished for polyamory OR infidelity - he's being punished because he took another man's wife and then had her husband killed.
Tell that to the guy yelling Bible verses at his daughter in the Chili's I used to work at. He was none too fond of her new black boyfriend and he pulled his Bible out at the restaurant to show her why it was an abomination before God.
Tell that to the pastors preaching against interracial marriage during the Civil Rights Movement.
In fact, tell that to the pastors preaching against interracial marriage today.
They all seem to think The Bible supports their views.
-Phobos, son of a pastor
Sounds like that guy at Chili's was on drugs.
Yeah, and the people during the Civil Rights Movement also believed in free love and moral relativism. The arguments those people used, and the dinosaurs who still use the Bible today, don't present very good arguments to support their outdated and clearly bigoted views. I'm at a Christian College, and there are dozens of interracial couples here. Those people who say it's an abomination need to take a chill pill.
From same-sex couples? Why is one acceptable and the other not?
One can use the Bible to support whatever viewpoint you want.
Religious marriage is an entirely different entity from the modern civil legal marriage.
A religious Christian marriage- as indicated by the bible- is for the purpose of procreation and having of children.
While love is a nice thing to include in there, it is by no means the beginning of said marriage. Husband and wife are to respect each other and be loyal, with much made of the wife's character and submission to her husband.
The Bible doesn't call it traditional, because we called it traditional. It's the same principle we used to label classical music classical music. The adjective "traditional" was added to identify it in relation to where we are in history.
Okay, now it's "religious marriage?" I thought this was about traditional marriage. I'm sorry. Totally different topic. Married people can practice whatever religion they want, as far as I'm concerned. But they probably ought to have the same religion, or there will be some conflict. Ya know?
But seriously, it is definitely different because for some reason, the government decided to get itself involved with marriage. I'm not sure when that started, and I don't know why, but I can ask my professors. My guess is that they'll probably tell me that the government wanted to protect the institution of marriage as it was traditionally. Say what you want about it. Say that it promotes one religion over the others, or whatever you want, but that's just an educated guess what my professors are going to say.
So wait, love is NOT an essential ingredient for marriage? That's the first time I've heard that one. Oh, you must be referring to the archaic practice of marrying into powerful families for wealth or political power. Or perhaps you're referring to the barbaric practice of selling your daughter to a man who can afford her dowry? Oh yeah, those are much better examples of marriage than one man and one woman in today's society.
Well, without mutual respect and loyalty, it's going to be a lousy marriage. But they're not exactly THE primary ingredients for marriage.
Well, submission had a different definition back then. I'll have to look up exactly what it meant, but it didn't mean what it does now.
Your words are not clever, not smart, nor are they correct in any sense outside of what definitions you are choosing to give them.
It is not my place, nor anyone else on this board's, for that matter, to have to bother to waste the time or energy to educate you, when you clearly have no interest in the matter, and are setting forth examples that prove you have a closed world view, and are vehemently interested in keeping it that way. You are going out of your way to offend people, including myself. I cannot possibly imagine what you think you are getting out of this, because it's certainly not winning anyone over.
This will be my last response to you.
It was my understanding that I was actually just answering a bunch of questions. It's everyone else's fault for bringing me here.
Who said I was trying to be clever?
Oh, so just because I have a different interpretation of the facts doesn't make me educated? I see how it is. That's fine, go ahead and be mad at me. They are definitely correct, though. You just don't agree with me, and you're tired of arguing with me. Which is fine, because I never wanted to argue with anyone in the first place.
If that were true, then why have you people been trying so hard for all this time? For real. And I actually am open to changing my mind. It's just that you people haven't given me any good reasons to. Your reactions to them have actually proven that you're all just as close-minded as I am.
I am not going out of my way to offend people. I have been as careful as I can be. I have bent over backwards to try not to offend people! It's your fault you got offended. What do you want from me?
Hey, I'm the one on defensive here. I have been this whole time! I haven't cared about winning anyone over, all I have done is answer your questions.
Okay, then.
I know that I may be alone in this issue, but let me draw an analogy. Should a Christian doctor be forced to euthanize someone? Or should a Christian salesman be forced to trick customers into a bad deal?
No, because it goes against their rights to conscience. It goes against the basic tenets of Christianity. And nobody forces people to do those things, because they're wrong.
Now, I want to clarify something before anybody even goes here. We do believe that homosexuality is a sin. But we also believe that there are literally dozens, if not hundreds of different sins, and that everyone everywhere is guilty of at least one of them. Do we hate the people who commit these sins? No, because that would be hypocritical, because we are just as guilty, if not more so, and it would go against what God tells us. We are to show compassion for, and offer forgiveness, and share common humanity with everyone, regardless of who they are or what they've done. You know why? Well, believe me or disbelieve me, but the reason is that the Lord has forgiven us Christians for our sins, and we're not better than God, so we can't judge people.
We oppose gay marriage for the same reasons we oppose brothels and pornography (sorry to raise some taboo subjects, but I had to). But again, we don't judge the people in there as being lesser than we are, or inferior in some way. The only difference between those people and us is that we know God and they don't, or they don't care to. And in American fashion, that's fine if they don't care to. All we Christians can do is present Christianity to them, like salespeople, and they can take it or leave it.
Interestingly enough, Islam also opposes gay marriage. We never hear anyone threatening them with lawsuits.
Your branch of Christianity is not the only or the right way to practice it. There are other Christians, myself included, that do not believe homosexuality is a sin.
I have discussed this. Angrily. At length.
I am a straight, Caucasian male with conflicting beliefs. However, I feel like people should be able to love who they love. My mom's best friend is bi or lesbian, mine is pansexual. My dad's little brother is bi. And I wouldn't have them be any other way.
Let me share a story. My mom's friend was originally married to a(n ostensibly) Christian man. She had three kids with him. But he terrifies her. He likely beat her, scared her into staying with him. She divorced him, took the kids, and is currently living with her girlfriend, whom she adores.
Are you telling me that my mother's best friend, who was almost an adopted aunt for me, should leave her girlfriend who loves her and return to a husband that scares her? Because if you are, then I'm afraid we're not going to get along very well.
I'm getting tired of these emotionally-fueled, blinded by preconception, false arguments. They make me think you're getting mad at me.
I personally trust the recent scientific finds that say homosexuality is an abnormality in the brain. But does that mean we should treat them like they're subhuman? No! I have a little brother who has autism, and his brain doesn't function correctly either. He's just as human, and maybe a little bit smarter than I am (or was, at his age).
All that to say, it's not even about love, it's about sexual attraction. They're two very different things.
What is pansexual?
Well, good for you for saying that. They're family, you're stuck with them either way. And I would still love any of my brothers if they were gay, too. But I wouldn't let them sin that way. I view it as a responsibility of mine to help them understand why it's wrong. I don't treat them any differently, and I get them to understand that God loves them, even if they're gay.
Oh boy, a story.
Doesn't sound like he was a very Christian man to me. Sounds like he was a dirt bag. But you're giving me a false choice here. You're making it seem like the ONLY options are homosexuality, or an abusive marriage. That's not the choice I would suggest at all, and you know it. I'd have to be a dirt bag for even saying that it is. She has many other options, besides that dog. (The husband, not the other lady)
You sound like you're accusing me of being a horrible person. I don't appreciate that.
However, autistic people's brains work perfectly well, thank you. We are not broken neurotypicals. It's nice you think we're human, but that's pretty much the bare minimum to be a decent person, and I'd like you to stop passing judgement on the validity of my brain, please. -_-
Are you implying that a large chunk of Boarders, myself included, have something wrong with them?
Because I find that pretty offensive.
... that you're being a bigot toward like half the Board, right?
You're all being bigoted towards me! You're all attacking me and my viewpoints as if I'm a horrible person. I'm starting to think that this Board is anti-Christian.
You have stated a position, and we have argued against it. And look as a Christian myself, I do not think the board is remotely anti-Christian.
I think you take things too personally. Just because someone states a position that does not agree with your own does not mean we are attacking you personally. There are multiple ways to see different issues, we are just portraying an alternative position.
... you're being a bigot toward, what, 75% of us?
Including me. I have Asperger's.
I think differently, but that doesn't mean I don't think correctly.
Really. For your own good.
"I personally trust the recent scientific finds that say homosexuality is an abnormality in the brain."
This is offensive.
"No! I have a little brother who has autism, and his brain doesn't function correctly either."
While you are talking about your brother specifically, this is also offensive.
"All that to say, it's not even about love, it's about sexual attraction. They're two very different things."
Strange, because that's how heterosexuality works!
Good lord.
I will stop talking about it, but I still haven't been proven how I'm wrong about this. And it may offend people, but according to the source below, it's true.
http://www.natureworldnews.com/articles/10443/20141118/homosexuality-genetic-strongest-evidence.htm
Okay, I'll give you that. It's not nice to say things about people with autism. My bad for that.
Homosexuality and heterosexuality are independent of love. That was my point. Love is separate. No retraction for that.
Because that source says literally nothing about brain abnormalities, all it says is that there is a possible genetic cause for homosexuality. Genetic cause does not necessarily mean "abnormal"; in fact, that article reinforces that, gasp, homosexuality isn't a choice and isn't unnatural?
I'm not trying to be antagonistic. I'm actually curious. Do you mean that it's okay for two people of the same gender or sex to be in love, as long as they don't have sex?
"I personally trust the recent scientific finds that say homosexuality is an abnormality in the brain."
Show me your sources. Obscure, never-heard-of-them research institutes are not allowed.
"A study of 409 individuals shows that gay men share a specific gene pattern located on two chromosomes. This is believed to be linked their sexual orientation."
You could say the same thing about the genes that code for ethnicity: people within the same ethnic group share traits in their genes that code for their physical appearance.
Nowhere does the study say that being gay is an abnormality. You're letting your beliefs tinge your conclusions.
"Abnormality" alludes to something that's actually debilitating, such as Crohn's disease or something.
DB16:
"But again, we don't judge the people in there as being lesser than we are, or inferior in some way."
...but denying a specific demographic services such as marriage is totally okay. Treating them as second-class citizens based on an aspect of their person that they can't possibly control is okay.
Hrm. Where have we heard this before?
I identify as genderfluid. I am pansexual. Christians, for all the talk of hating the sin and not the sinner, still demand I become a straight male under threat of eternal hellfire and damnation. So do other religions, but the key point is that the present ruler of the United States publicly identifies as a Christian, as did the forty-three previous incumbents. It is not discrimination against Christian Americans to demand they treat people with the respect and privileges that they themselves have been accorded. Indeed, that is an article of faith - do unto others and all that. Denying someone the right to marry the person they love purely on the basis of said person's biology? That is discrimination. It is also an affront to any society that considers itself civilized.
That's my piece said. Talk amongst yourselves.
Nothing to do with who you are, what you wear, or decide you are.
What matters is I treat you right, as a person deserves to be treated.
Any other treatment is wrong and not rooted in that.
Should a Christian doctor be forced to euthanize someone?
If that Christian doctor has knowingly become a doctor in a place where the duties of a doctor include administering euthanasia, then yes. They should. That's their job. And if that's not a job they want to do, they should find a different job.
If you're a vegetarian working in McDonald's, you don't get to refuse to sell hamburgers. If you're a paramedic who hates gang violence, you don't get to refuse to treat people involved in it. If you're running a polling station and despise the Republican candidate, you don't get to chuck out the Republican votes.
And yes, if you apply for a job which is literally described as 'trick customers into a bad deal', then you don't get to complain that you're asked to do precisely that. You do your job, or you quit and find another. I recommend the latter, because that's a terrible job description.
Marriage between same-sex couples is a legal right in the United States now. Given that you've said you don't intend to force people to accept your beliefs, that means you also accept it as a moral right - the right to do something even though Christians say it's wrong. So if you're a Christian whose job is to make marriages, or bake wedding cakes, or whatever - then you have a choice between doing your job, or finding another one.
hS
Dunno about you.
When Donald Trump calls you out on foolish behavior.
I forget the exact quote, but it was along the lines of:
We're a nation of laws, she broke the law, and if she did not like the decision or did not want to issue the licenses there were better ways to do it, like doing her job and then protesting, or letting a subordinate do it.
Not all Christians believe that homosexuality and same-sex marriage is wrong. Just because one group says something does not mean it represents the whole.
Supposed there is a person whose job it is to make marriages. When they chose this job, marriage to them (and everybody else they talked to) meant one man and one woman, and they had no reason to expect that this would change in the foreseeable future. Now, the U.S. Supreme Court decided to regard a wider definition of marriage. Should we tell them that they, if they don't like the change in their job description that results from our*) expanded definition of marriage, should stop doing what they enjoyed to do for many years, and find a new job, because they are never allowed to make any marriage ever? This doesn't feel right to me.
All Dark Brother asks for is apparently that persons should be allowed to opt out of an unexpected new duty that had not been in the job description, if they genuinely don't feel prepared to do it; and although I'm not religious I can understand somebody asking for this.
On the other hand, not everybody has the privilege of being able to travel far, and the least gays can ask for is that we*) don't allow the existence of regions where it is impossible to find somebody who didn't opt out. I don't see an easy way to have this cake and eat it too.
*) I'm obviously no part of the U. S. Supreme Court or the U. S. legislature, but I'm totally fraternizing there.
HG
1/ We're talking about the clerks who hand out marriage licenses, apparently, and their job description hasn't changed: it's 'give licenses to couples permitted to get married'. What has changed is the law, and you don't get to opt out of bits of the law that you don't like. ^_~
2/ Even if that weren't the case... no. If you're a vegetarian who works in a sandwich shop, and that shop suddenly introduces a steak sandwich, you don't get to refuse to serve people who ask for it. Your customers come in expecting a certain service; if you can't give that to them, should you really still be doing the job?
My job has just expanded. I work for a chemical company (yes, yes, the horror, shaddup, we sell soap); due to new regulations, we're now required to be able to trace anything that harms microbes back to an approved supplier. We don't get to opt out of that - I don't get to opt out of that, since the task of getting our Sales team to actually gather the information has fallen on my shoulders. It's a horrible job, and definitely not in my job description even now - but it's my job, and if I refuse to do it, why are they paying me?
hS
Clerks who provide the marriage licenses willing joined the Government. So circumstances have somewhat changed, but they really haven't, every year more States were legalizing same-sex marriage on their own.
Saying that they should be exempt from issuing the licenses because of the changed circumstances seems absurd to me. Taking that logic to it extreme you could say a person who joins the military in peace and there is no indication of any war starting for the individuals term, and then a war occurs, that would mean that he should be allowed to leave without consequence.
The fact of the matter is the clerks signed up for the job, and if they do not like the decision they have plenty of options, like resigning.
A better analogy would be a soldier who is perfectly willing to do most of their job, and certainly doesn't want to leave; they just don't want to kill this specific soldier over there in the other trench because this "enemy" happens to be their best friend from the PPC Board. Of course the officer in command won't have such nonsense, and this must end in tragedy.
But since in having a wedding immediate action shouldn't be as urgent as in a war, no such big drama should ensue. If Clerk A doesn't want to provide the marriage license to a specific couple for whatever reason, let Clerk B do it, and let Clerk A do their duty for any number of other couples. It's mostly a matter of thoughtful scheduling. Problems should only arise if Clerk B doesn't exist or is out of reach.
Clerk A is supposed to be part of an oppressed minority to whom this is a matter of live or death (or rather heaven or hell), and largely outnumbered by Clerk Bs, who don't see much of a problem there. In such circumstances, can't we find better solutions than going up to eleven on the authoritarian/libertarian-axis? I'm naive, I believe we can.
HG
This was basically an individual breaking the law and getting punished for it. Just because one does not agree with a law does not mean they can choose not to follow it.
Made more complex and difficult than it has to be because she's the person in that county in charge of handling it.
Her name is the one that goes on the record.
She refuses to do her job whatsoever when it comes to the gay marriages going on in her county. Where it becomes problematic is that not only does she not want to do it, she also does not want anyone else to be allowed to do it in her place.
There is no Clerk B in this scenario, only Clerk A, who refuses to step aside.
She has to step aside. Religious beliefs are no excuse for hurting people.
(I was thinking about a scenario where Clerk A is the only person who might be hurt and feel like a martyr. Not sharing somebody’s religious beliefs is no excuse for hurting them either.)
HG
The military during wartime is far different than the military in peacetime.
Many joined after 9/11 in a burst of patriotism, yes, but there were plenty who finished up their enlistment or commission and checked out once they were finished.
That said, by and large they all did finish their job, because it is what they swore to do, whether or not they were very happy about the details involved.
It may well be different, but just because you go to war does not mean a soldier should be able to quit before the term is up because of a change of circumstances.
Articulation is hard! You are good at it. Now I don't have to blather around trying to make my point because you did it so concisely :p
You also hear a lot of "god's law is of higher authority than the American legal system" (for the record. Darkbrother16, not accusing you of this necessarily, it's just an argument I see a lot of!) which just rubs me the wrong way every time. Not everyone is Christian, fsssss.
I am convinced that Trump, if he loses the primary, will pull a Theodore Roosevelt, and for the same reason – his ego can't take the party without him.
On Sanders . . .
The Democratic Party, a slim but definite majority, is made up of 40% Sanders supporters and 60% would-be Sanders supporters going "if he were only more popular, he'd have a chance, but I just can't risk such a far-out candidate." This is beginning to frustrate me.
...about a Trump nomination being good for Dems. I think the best chance the Dems have is for Trump to lose the nomination and run as a 3rd party candidate. He will pull the extreme Right vote, leaving the Republicans with the center-Right and opening the door for the Dems no matter who has their nomination.
-Phobos
Is that anyone and everyone slightly to the left of Enoch Powell was comprehensively redbaited out of mainstream American politics over the course of several decades, and it's still going on now. To put things into context, the Democrats are only now beginning to edge tentatively leftwards, though are still far, far short of being actual socialists (universal healthcare'd be a good start, which - let me be clear - Obamacare only sort of is); during the '90s, they were doing much the same stuff as the Tory party, particularly Clinton repealing the Glass-Spiegel Act as a sop to the Republicans.
To an outside observer, the Democrats and the Republicans are respectively the party of the right and the party of the considerably further right. And then you have Donald Trump and his hairstyle like a small electrocuted Muppet, who managed to be about as right-wing as it's possible to be without sounding like an Onion article. There are no mainstream alternatives. This needs to change. Sanders having a good run, well, it'll work.
So the centre-right by European standards is the Democrats' core vote, the far-right is the Republicans', and Trump... well, I was working on the assumption that his pointy ghost outfit was in the wash. What I'm worried about is that the Republicans will be dragged further and further towards The Donald, and that American politics will become even more disgustingly, uselessly partisan than it is already. Americans deserve better than that, in my view.
But then, it's not like I'm not biased.
The Donald doesn't already sound like an Onion article? I am shocked. He should work on that.
Anyway, I basically agree with you. I am actually of the opinion that the ridiculousness of Donald Trump is a harbinger of a fracturing Republican party. They will split and it will end in an over all leftward (in this case meaning "more centered on the center") shift of the American political spectrum.
So, yeah, I am with you on your analysis, actually. The Republicans are being dragged right in an effort to keep up with Trump, politics is getting uselessly partisan, and we deserve better.
Some of these points are part of why I have seriously considered a career in politics.
-Phobos, future Supreme Ruler! politician?
The sheer level of anger most people seem to have, has everyone flocking to Trump. Even early polls are showing Trump with leads over everyone, including both Sanders and Clinton.
And a couple other points, but this will be all I am saying on it (at least until the parties are decided). As to Sander's being a Left Candidate, that's not necessarily a good thing. First just because something works in Europe does not mean it will work in the US with the US context. Take for example the Civil Law. It works well in Europe, and in-fact most of the rest of the world, but in the US the only true Civil Law Jurisdiction is an absolute mess. Second, does a left government actually work?
Let me set up an example. I know two people, on the far side of middle-aged. Born and raised in the US, both were at points very left aligned Democrats, though they since shifted right of center over a 20 year period. Due to reasons they relocated to France. A country that is well considered to be a left government. And they have problems all over the place, because the government policies clash with elements of American Culture. Let us start with the work week, in France, it is legally mandated 40 work week, one of the people in this couple fits very much into the "Puritan Work Ethic" foreigners often remark about of the US. He would willingly work 50+ hours a week sometimes. The 40 hour mandatory limit is problematic.
There is also the crippling bureaucracy. This couple has been living in France for over a year now, and they still do not have the State Healthcare, because of the bureaucratic quagmire. There are ways around that, called "grease" payments, better known as bribes. This is something that in certain departments is if not tolerated, then expected. These types of payments are incredibly common throughout the world, but I find anathema to the US. We were the leaders in the world on anti-bribery and anti-corruption, that many parties thought we were too restrictive, because these "grease" payments were expected if not encouraged. (I cannot actually speak to the situation of corruption this is secondhand reports from a French National)
My bottom line on this line of questioning is that the US's overall culture may not be an acceptable climate from a Left government, particularly one that is both Left in Social and Economics (like Sanders).
Now the last point, a Republican Government is not necessarily a bad thing. A Tea-Party government on the other hand, that could be problematic. But not all Republicans are Tea Party members. The only true Tea Party candidate in my opinion is Cruz, and he will go nowhere. The Religious Right will also go nowhere.
That crippling bureaucracy is by no means endemic to left-leaning governments; take Israel's for example. It's right-wing (Bibi + Bennett + Haredi parties can't lean any other way) and the bureaucracy is as bad as you can imagine.
Right-wing bureaucracies are worse. Because far-right governments are constantly trying to "cut waste" by shredding civil service budgets, the people forced to run these institutions have to do the exact same job of work on a whole lot less money. This means they do a worse job, which gives the right-wing government in charge an excuse to pare back even further because the problem is clearly in the people working there. It couldn't be their fault. That would be silly.
In the interests of full disclosure, I should mention that I did a Work Trial Placement at Dover JobCentre+. It was a shambles. I basically had to rebuild their filing system from the ground up. And when I went to Atos later in the year, one of the private contractors who get paid through the nose by the taxpayer to sort this out because private finance brings efficiency or some similar guff, it was worse. A lot worse. It was like the civil service but with all the compassion and joy taken out, which (as hS and others will doubtless know) is saying quite something.
More so saying that what works for one context does not work for others.
Crippling Bureaucracy is basically a problem of Western Civilization, it exists here in the US, though not as bad. In retrospect that was not the best example, but I was again more getting at, Left does not necessarily mean good, Right does not necessarily mean bad, and more importantly just because Left Governments tend to work in Europe, does not by any stretch mean that they will work in the US. Different cultural contexts and all that.
I really want to see how well he does in the end there and also hope that Trump doesn't happen. Good lord.
I'll be missing it all.
I remain wildly unconvinced that the Political Compass correctly places individual responders relative to political parties. But what it does do is place them well relative to each other.
Take the test. Let's see where we all stand.
I'm at -6.75 Economic, -6.31 Social, which puts me way down in the lower-left quadrant. When we did this this time last year, I was at -6.50/-6.56, so I haven't really moved.
Let's build a chart! ^_^
hS, blah politics blah
It's still on the first page, so let's try it :
Economic Left/Right: -5.63
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -5.59
Generic Boarder. They really need to add "neutral" answers, though.
The 2015 reanalysis of the elements of the political table has led to some shifts. Per the proposed division of the table shown above, the team have crafted the following chart:
Elements which have been reexamined are shown in orange; those which could not be redetected are highlighted in blue. We would not wish to cast doubt upon the work of our esteemed colleagues, but further testing may be required to determine the validity of these substances.
Perhaps the most exciting aspect of the re-testing has been the shifting of Phobos (Ph) and Iximaz (Ix) into the same region as Hieronymus (Hm). If these three elements are in fact one and the same, the academic world will be shaken to the core. The reassignment of Desdendelle (Dd) and Darkotas (Dk) to refer to the same element, while also significant, is far less prominent.
Other shifts have been equally pronounced. The movement of PoorCynic (Pc) up two periods, and its replacement by the newly-identified element World-Jumper (Wj) has been noted, as has the identification of an entire new block, shown in brown and containing the most reactive elements yet discovered. (The failure to obtain a sample of doctorlit (Dl) is surprising, given the unreactiveness of this element).
This is an exciting time in the field of politicoprotectorate chemistry. The potential identicality of Ph and Ix opens whole new fields of possible compounds, based on the Ix-Dd and Ns-Ph bonds. We look forward to seeing the future work that is doubtless forthcoming.
~
(I'm a chemist. Did you notice? ^_^)
(Hardric, you popped in just south of Iximaz/Hieronymus on the previous charts. Since this one didn't have labels and all.)
hS
The great continent of Plortitics is a land divided. Of course. Because they all are.
The main hub of civilisation is the great Central City, where the towns of PoorCynic, Elcalion, Phobos, Iximaz, Hieronymus, James Shields, and World-Jumper have joined together in a metropolis to astound the world. Under the protective aegis of Central City, the villages of Huinesoron, ratbrainbasher, and SeaTurtle prosper. So too do the twin port-towns of DawnFire and eatpraylove, but they do not go uncontested.
The nomads of the Great Desert have begun to band together. Trading ports have sprung up at Seafarer in the south and Sergio Turbo in the north, and there are rumours of a city to rival Central growing out in the wastes, at Desdendelle-Darkotas. Yet relations between the civilised peoples and the nomads are friendly - they are allies against other powers.
The northerly Grand Forest is home to woodsmen of unparalleled skill; all the technology of Central City cannot rout them from their tree-bound fastness. Their hidden refuge of Pippa's Ghost is guarded by the fastnesses of JulyFlame, Irish Samurai, and sonofheaven176.
And far to the east, explorers in the Towering Mountains have reported two vast fortresses, teeming with warriors. None know their alliegence, but whispered rumours have assigned them names: Dark Brother and Uber Overlord.
And that is all... save, perhaps, for the peoples who live west of the Fabled River. The villages at Artell, Scapegrace, and VixenMage are small and humble... but legends tell of a vast, deserted metropolis buried at Kaitlyn, an ancient power long-since forgotten... at least, forgotten by those east of the river...
hS
And apparently I'm almost the centre of the Board.
Perhaps in time I will write about the fortress of the Vowel Overlord.
So we are all towns this time around instead of people? Interesting.
In the little village of Scapegrace, life continued as it had for many years. The free peoples tilled their lands in the iron-rich soils beyond the River's reach when it flooded, as rivers are wont to do. They grew tomatoes, turnips, peas, beans, sugar beet; sensible things, things that lasted long enough for the surplus to reach Central City by caravan or one of the Popular Dirigible Company's freighter blimps. The seasons came and went, but the years seemed to turn slower somehow, and the rich red earth fed all.
The call came from Central City, and the Centrists from Iximaz in particular were anxious to treat with the villagers. So they got what they could of the summer's blood-orange harvests in and began to assemble in the village square. They joined hands, as one, and waited for the Power to summon forth a representative.
Any individual from Scapegrace could touch upon the Power, but alone they could cast but a few sparks, enrich the earth, fix a blown gasket on a tractor. In concert? All the villagers together had cast one treaty to the Red Power, and did so every twenty years, after the fifth mayoral election. It kept the sun hanging in the sky, kept pests at bay, let their crops grow tall and their children grow strong. Scapegrace was a place of mild winters and lazy summers, with the wind blowing eastward to cool the harvest teams' collective brows. The Power did this, as long as people thought it would, and worked to make it work.
It was this power that so intrigued the young woman from Central City, her graduation wand from the Iximaz School of Witchcraft and Wizardry still shiny from lack of use - and no matter how much the little scrits back at the School had said so, it wasn't the thought of muscular young farmhands of all genders working up a sweat beneath a burnt-blue August sky. She alighted delicately from the helicopter as it landed (crashing would not be quite the right term) in the beet field that was at present lying fallow and giving sterling service as a helipad. She'd been expecting wood, this far south, but Scapegrace was apparently ably served by the brick-kilns at Artell. As she reached the square, she slowed and stopped.
There was the Red Power, flickering above the swaying, singing villagers like a demon holding court, powerful as a hurricane, strong as a mountain's roots. Strong here, anyway, where there were still those who believed. It was said in the village that the Power took on a different shape for everyone, and yet the general image remained the same; a human figure, holding a worker's tool in an experienced hand. To the young Centrist, the Red Power resembled her old Ancient Runes instructor, but with a burlier cast than the mantis-like academic had ever had.
As she stood, powerless to move, the Red Power descended from above the village, the rune-patterned cracks in its skin glowing like starlight as it moved. The marks intensified as it moved towards her, until the woman was all but blinded by it.
It reached out its hand, that was and was not a hand.
She took it.
And the Red Power was gone, its task done.
The villagers of Scapegrace came out of their trance like children roused from sleep on a long train ride. They looked around, and a small child ran towards the new arrival.
"Da, da! Look! 'S'an angel!"
A slim farmhand, with close-cut blond hair and the kind of smoothly toned body that the woman liked best, strode over and picked the little boy up. "Never mind him, young friend," he said over his shoulder, "he don't mean owt by... it..."
And he stared at the woman's hands, and with good reason, for they glowed like stars.
"Please, come with me... we asked the Power ter choose, an' it chose you, friend. Yer must be took to Mayor Cassandra an' welcomed proper. What do we call'n, other than friend of the People?"
"Gabrielle," the woman said, and shortly thereafter she heard it cheered.
---
Ain't no magic like socialist magic. =]
Economic Left/Right: -5.13
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -5.03
That may or not have something to do with the fact that my supposedly leftist government is not working so well for us right now. Honestly, most parties here are actually pretty much the same thing, despite claimed ideologies.
Some of the current social programs do work pretty well, but the levels of corruption that are being uncovered are astounding. The scandals are so big that I know for a fact that they have reached international headlines. I mean, does the name Petrobras ring any bells for anyone here? I'm willing to bet that it probably does.
My results were -4 Economic, 0.1 Social, which means... something. Probably.
There was a whole bunch of text along with the results, but I sort of got bored at that point.
- the Irish Samurai cannot politics
It has been brought to my attention that I unfairly singled out the Right as being evil on the last graph.
I mean, I didn't do that, but it was still brought to my attention.
I have found a way to ensure I'm never accused of that again.
The realm of Diabolico is in chaos. The demise of Queen Average Boarder, while not treated with suspicion (death of arsenic poisoning while drowning in a shark-infested river with cuts all over your body and bullet wounds in your arms seems perfectly normal to me), has led to dissent between her potential successors.
Her potential successors, in this case, being 'everyone'. Four main factions have formed, united by their plans for domination:
Team Muahahaha, led by Field Marshall of the Fleet JulyFlame, are viewed by most commentators as ridiculously evil. Their plan is the simplest: eatpraylove, EAIUO, Sergio Turbo, and Dark Brother 16 will surround the palace, and while everyone is distracted, JulyFlame will parachute in from her zeppelin and claim the throne.
Team The Good Guys are generally seen as comically evil. Under Kaitlyn's leadership, they have all grown evil moustaches to twirl (though Kaitlyn's is in fact her braid, wrapped around to the front). Their evil scheme is to threaten to blow the palace up with a five ultraton bomb, and then, while everyone is trying to figure out what that is in joules, to walk in and steal the throne.
Team I'll Show You Who's Mad are renowned for being hilariously evil. Their plot is to use PoorCynic's earthquake machine to set off all their opponents' volcano fortresses simultaneously, engulfing the realm in a flood of lava which they will escape from in their zeppelin.
Finally, Team Surrounded By Incompetent Fools are noted as being ludicrously evil. They intend to summon an army of demons, using the power of their twin leaders Iximaz and Hieronymus to unleash the Hadean hordes upon the unsuspecting Diabolico.
Who will claim the victory? It's impossible to tell. The fate of Diabolico - nay, the world - hangs in the balance between these... there is no other way to say it... these evil hordes.
~
Because let's face it, we're all Chaotic Evil really.
DID I SAY EVIL ENOUGH YET?
hS
So I took the test. Unfortunately, there's no Neutral option, so a few of the answers may be slightly off /shrugs/ Either way--I did the thing! No clue how accurate it is for anything, but I did the thing!
Economic Left/Right: -5.75
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -3.38
Wheeeee.
(Actually, being some weird sort of Leftist (??) doesn't really surprise me. I think I tend to think I'm one; problem is, the definitions have apparently shifted, or something, so supposedly Left parties are apparently not actually in line with what I believe and so on...? Whatever. Doesn't matter--I'm not exactly going to go 'Ha! A left-of-center party! I don't care what their policies are like or who's involved, I'm gonna vote for them! Yay!'
I did do the thing, though. Wonder where I fall on the graphs...looks rather like I could be in any of the evils on this one, I'm not sure exactly where I fall in that intersecting bit and can't be bothered to figure it out right now. Guess I'll just wait for the next update.)
~DF
Also, according to the test, I'm at -5.75 economic and -3.13 social. Hello, fellow lower-left-wingers! *waves cheerfully*
Economic Left/Right: -7.25
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -7.9
I'm a socialist - honestly I usually go as far as neo-Marxist - who wants large corporations either tied down or disbanded and complete separation of church and state. Mostly because the countries where citizens, rather than corporations, ARE actually supported by tax money, it seems to work quite well.
Economic Left/Right: -4.63
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -1.74
... I'm roughly Gandhi according to the example chart.
Economic left/right: -7.0
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -5.95
I was expecting smaller numbers (as in, larger negatives. I hate numbers.)
Economic -6.13
Social -5.18
Moving right and down from last year’s -5.88 / -3.95, I got -5.63 and -5.18 this year.
HG
All this debate over where the centreline should be made me realise something: who cares? We're not comparing ourselves to the outside world, here - we're comparing with each other.
So I created an Average Responder, and used them as the zero-point.
That Average Responder is apparently Des. [Shrugs] And we have two people who are 'far right' relative to the average - but note that ScapeDeathToAllCapitalistsGrace is only fairly moderate left, indicating a massive skew in the baseline.
It is interesting that EAIUO and Dark Brother both fall off the fairly consistent diagonal line - you're not nearly as authoritarian as one would expect from the trend. Make of that what you will.
But you know what this graph needs, to make it 100% more awesome?
A bit more D&D.
(Dark colours are Evil, light are Good; the Good/Evil axis mirrors around the centreline. It seemed the fairest way.)
...who swears he's going to head out soon guys, really. Just need to sharpen the old sword, and off I go.
And in the other, I'm barely toeing the line between being a fairly good person, on the whole, and supporting an anarcistic revolution. I mean, I won't start it or anything, but you know, should one show up...
And in the third, I am throwing dragons at eleven year olds, praying I can brute-force around the fact I have no idea what I'm doing, and handing shiny badges and disks to those who realize I'm super incompetent and only stumbled my way into running a gym. (Though, to be fair, the dragons are very loyal. Magic of Friendship and all that.)
...I don't know what this says about me, really.
I always thought I was Lawful, but apparently I'm TN. (-4.88 economic, -3.33 social).
I came down as -2.72 on the Libertarian/Authoritarian. But if you were using one of the Average responders which were in the lower-left quadrant, then it makes sense. I knew I was more Right leaning than the majority of the community.
Not sure I like the analogy that Right is evil though.
As for falling of the diagonal, for me it is not surprising at all, I am a social liberal, but an economic conservative. And the fact that I get considered "far-right" is also telling of the average of the community, because I am a centrist if anything.
Anywhere the colors get darker is evil. Only in Neutrality is there Good. Join us in Holy Neutralness.
-Phobos, "If I don't make it... tell my wife, 'hello'."
PPC Neutrality is not actual neutral, which was part of the point of the exercise, which is why I trend so far right in comparison, when I am actually only just right of center.
I hereby make Iximaz the Queen of Love and Beauty!
My second decree is that the losers of the Friendship Cup are to be sent underground. Mimes get send underground anyway.
I like to think of myself as Lawful Evil. :P
Also, why does Des get to be king? I didn't vote for him.
-Phobos, the Truly Neutral
Voting is a Lawful action; he was elected by July, sonofheaven, and Pippa. Dark Brother voted against him.
His response, being of course Neutral himself, was 'meh'.
hS
(PS: In case it was a genuine question: because he's in the middle. ^_~)
Is it you, hS?
I'm pretty sure it's you.
You chaotic elf-fiend.
But that doesn't mean I get to go around saying I'm an emperor because some moistened bint lobbed a scimitar at me!
-Iximaz, who likes to think she's a bit more Chaotic than that
-Sailor July
Or, in full:
General JulyFlame of the Fleet Air Force (Special Space Forces Division).
hS
There's lots of Air in the wide open Spaces of Polyticz. :D
To be honest, given that the other medieval setting has 'baron' as the highest military rank, maybe it's best to assume I just pick words out of a hat in that regard?
hS
You, use something as orthodox as a hat?
;D
but you're not the only conservative on the Board, from what it seems here. Looks like, as always, it depends on the topic.
But only just.
But in my partial defense, you scored right of center economically, slightly left socially.
Does that make me special? Oh, my mommy always said I was a special little boy. *exaggeratedly giddy giggle*
My results are 4.5 to the Right and 2.0 Authoritarian.
Oogh. Now I kind of feel bad for myself. Even we Americans don't like Authoritarians. Maybe I am crazy.
I do have a few problems with this test, though.
1. The very first question on page 1/6 doesn't seem fair. I don't support a globalized economy at all, because countries are all different, and frankly, a globalized anything is a sign of the apocalypse (don't judge me).
2. Question number four on page 1/6 doesn't make much sense to me. Is this some sort of racist test?
3. I'm going to be honest, question number four on page 2/6 sounds kind of Communist to me. Just saying.
4. Question number seven of page 2/6 is confusing to me. Is it referring to rich people, or is it referring to the leeches of society in general?
5. Question two on page 4/6 is one sided. I'm an American, so I take it personally that it says a one party system is better than a multi party system.
6. Question six on page 4/6 is an unfair question, because whether or not abstract art represents anything is often debatable.
Just some pet peeves of mine. Don't take this as me being a deliberate pain.
Is the Stock Market not a form of globalized economy? A means of transferring and accruing wealth for any assortment of businesses in the world? Just something to ponder.
Also, the quiz never says anything about how you are supposed to vote. That's why there is a disagree button, mate. If it offends you, say that you "Strongly Disagree." Unless the very presence of such an idea is dumbfounding to you, in which case, I feel we need to have a few political talks.
To respond to specific points:
2. Yes, question four is supposed to be racist. It increases your Totalitarian points. Nazis and KKK and all that jazz.
3. That's because it is one of the greatest championed quotes of Marx. Otherwise known as, the author of the Communist Manifesto. "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need."
4. Stock brokers, and those who make money shifting money around. Bankers, investors, brokers. Those sorts. At least, that's how I took it.
6. Yeah, to be honest, I have no idea why that is there either. I think it's supposed to play off some idea that liberal hippies say that anything can be art man, where conservative grumps say art must have some form to it. Consider it a dud question, it won't affect the numbers much.
The stock market is something that just completely bewilders me. It's a form of Capitalism, from what I can tell, because people buy and sell stocks in a company, but that's all I know about it. I think that's more of a globalized market, not a globalized economy. Again, don't know anything about it almost, but that's what I think.
2. Oh, gotcha. It seems like a trick question, but I guess there are some people who might hit it out there.
3. So, what I'm getting here is that we should steal from the rich to feed drugs to the poor with the money we take from them. This is one of my hot button topics, so I think I'll back off before I start to get going on it, ya know?
4. But that's their jobs. It's not as if it's a secret society of shadow governments manipulating the money to make themselves rich at the expense of some poor population in Kenya, or whatever. Anybody could become those things. I see absolutely nothing wrong with that.
6. Maybe it's meant to size up our personalities.
They never quite line up with me. I do no think that four bubbles is enough to accurately describe my political belief system.
Economic: 2.75
Social: -2.72
To me it seems just a bit right of center. Another similar test I did come in at a notch right of center. But unsurprisingly, I probably come down as the farthest right leaning boarder. I largely expected that outcome.
This year, I got -6.13 Economic and -4.56 Social, as compared to last year's -5.25 Economic and -5.49 Social. And, just like last year, I'm a little iffy on the methodologies and definitions used in determining these numbers. But it's still interesting to see and compare.
It really folds everything down when it's really not as simple as what can be pinned on an axis, and it really could use some refining, overall.
Because while I'm arguably conservative, and haven't really changed so, it's harder to actually go into the how with something like this.
Economic Left/Right: -3.25
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -0.36
That was a quite surprising result. I would not have expected to be categorized as on the political or economic Left. Then again, I'm near zero on the libertarian/authoritarian axis, so it could be that I'm a bit more free-thinking than one would expect when one speaks of topics other than the ones lumped as "social issues" here in the States.
My compass:
Economic Left/Right: -3.75
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -3.85
Apparently I'm closest to Ghandi. Huh.
Looks like I fall at -5.63 Economics and -4.92 Social. Compare that to -7.00/-5.28 last year. I've shifted a fair bit on the Economic scale, not much on the Social.
-Phobos
Economic Left/Right: -5.25
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -5.54
I do wish I had a "no real opinion one way or the other" option. There were a few questions that that would have been helpful.
Last year, I was -4.00 economic, -3.75 social. Now I am -4.25 economic, -3.08 social. I tend to think that's within the standard deviation of the test (owing to choosing slightly different answers each time).
It also says something about that test — to wit, it's not very good in telling Israeli political opinions; it looks like it has a massive bias toward the left, because I count as very moderate centre-left, not 'left'.
That's why I've been adjusting us around Pippa's Centrist, which gives this; you're right there on the Social centreline, a little left of centre.
Interesting that our two military types were in almost the same place last year, but have since moved apart. Quirky.
hS
For Des it's mandatory. I joined up as a volunteer.
So it makes sense that there are changes thus.
And there's also timeframes. It makes intuitive sense that someone who's just joined the military would swing to the Authoritarian end (due to the whole taking orders thing); someone who was already there last time - which I think Des was - won't show that swing, but might potentially start regressing to previous mindsets.
And so forth. I dunno, numbers are fun, graphs are funner.
hS
I know that my opinions drifted toward the authoritarian end of the scale after joining the army, but it's a) not too pronounced and b) not a result of army indoctrination; it had more to do with accessing a wider variety of news and information sources.
I have not detected any change on economic policy, however, nor have I detected any regression.
*shrugs*
Then again, I'm not representative in any way, shape or form.
Economic: -7.38
Social: -7.38
And they aren't fond of Russians.
Economic Left/Right: -7.88
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -7.33
I am a social democrat and neutral on Russians. Not so neutral on the current Russian government.
Democratic socialist on my part, which is the same thing unless you're a sixty-seven-year-old retired teacher. As for the present Russian government, it's a kleptocracy run by an ex-KGB torturer. No reason to be neutral, especially since it wants me dead. =]
I'm a sixty-seven year old retired teacher... or I have a master's degree in political science?
It's funny because I agree with various socialistic ideas. Just not as far as you do.
Admittedly it gives aspirin for everything from headaches to spider bites, but still.
Hammered through the opposition of conservative doctors (who benefited hugely from the previous system) just after the War by Aneurin Bevan. Fun fact: Nye resigned from the Labour Party because the government of the day decided to dip into NHS funds to pay for rearmament. I like to think I'd do the same.
This is us so far, with everyone moved up/right 2.5 in accordance with Pippa's Centrist. Yellow is 2014 dots for those who have them - looks like July's gone up-right, Iximaz has gone down-left, and I've... not moved. ^_^
Here's the editable version.
hS
It really isn't that surprising. For me at least.
Economic Left/Right: -3.75
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -0.15
Will be interesting to see how this puts me against everyone else.
-7.0 Economic
-4.92 Social
Stalin-like levels of collectivism tempered with Gandhi-ish levels of libertarianism. Fun for the whole family!
I'm Economic: -2.5
Social: 0.97
So, yes, technically Centrist, but still what you'd call Right.
We theorised last year that every user entry gets skewed to the left; the fact that you're calling yourself centrist but coming down left of everyone except the Greens is in direct agreement with that.
For comparison purposes, then, I think I'll be adding 2.5 to everyone's Economic values, putting you exactly in the centre. Should we do the same thing for Social values? I'm honestly not sure, people don't have a ready answer for 'where are you on the authoritarian/libertarian scale?'. Perhaps it's best to leave it.
hS
Because I classify myself as centrist as well, but adding that 2.5 would push me pretty far right, further than I classify myself.
If the scale goes from -10 to +10 then IMHO anything between -3.33... to +3.33... inclusive can count as Centrist. I'm happy with my result.
(At least, according to the demonstrative chart. :P)
Economic Left/Right: -5.63
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -5.18
They changed the examples from last year. I went from being the Dalai Lama to being Gandhi.
I'll take it. :P
Yes, this is a very good thing overall, and not just for the UK.
(Also psst check Google docs.)
I say wait until after Labour crashes and burns spectacularly in the next General Election before deciding who was wrong.
Still, you are right about one thing, though. It is hilarious how Labour's left-wing are so out of touch they actually think electing Corbyn would help the party! Don't you people have any clue about what attracts floating voters?
Oh, well. At least we won't have to worry about the threat f a Labour government for the foreseeable future. So I'm happy about that.
The idea expressed by the Telegraph that Labour didn't actually want to elect Corbyn, but were just putting him on the ballot to make a point, was emphatically and categorically wrong. The point made by Alastair 'Right-Wing Labour' Campbell that Corbyn can't win an election may or may not be wrong; as I said, I have no idea. But given that his thesis was, literally, 'we should put getting power above actually having a good platform', I don't particularly care what he says. ^^
If Labour can only gain voters by being 'the Conservative Party but wearing red ties', there's no point to them whatsoever.
So: no, they (not necessarily you personally) were objectively wrong to think that Corbyn wasn't the person Labour genuinely wanted to lead them.
hS
PS: Hi! I didn't know we have anyone on the UK-Right on-Board. My library is cutting its hours and it's allllll the fault of the Tory Government. ^~ hS
if they think it will help sales (or website views nowadays). And pundits will give any controversial opinion, because they know it will be printed and get publicity. Don't take any of them seriously.
Anyway, sorry I misunderstood your post. I saw the Subject line, and thought you were personally addressing the UK Right on this board, so I took it rather personally.
(To be honest, I'm more Centrist than truly Right. But I still qualify as Right by your definition.)
... you were WRONG!!!!! about what I meant? ^^ ^~ dear sweet Nienna the smileys are taking over.
Eh, the political spectrum is massively skewed at the moment anyway. The Political Compass (which I think is run by someone on the Right) places all three major parties--
-- wait, how many major parties do we have now? --
-- all three traditional major parties massively right of centre. That's part of why I'm so pleased about this - regardless of your political alignment, you can't expect decent politics out of a system where every party is saying the same things. You just... can't.
hS
That's going dangerously into territory that we don't condone on the board.
You may not share political opinions with hS but it doesn't mean you have to be derogatory about the party hS supports, or his opinions.
I do not consider Pippa's post(s?) to be personal attacks. Even if I were actually a member of the Labour Party, I wouldn't.
I consider them to be a valid difference in opinion of how politics should work. Pippa's Ghost thinks that the goal of a party should be 'what attracts floating voters'. I'd rather see Labour - heck, or any party! - do and support what they think is best for the country - or, really, the world. If the only way to get votes is to abandon any position you think is worth holding... then what are you getting votes for, except to get a comfy seat in the Commons?
That's rhetorical, I already know the answer: because those positions you are able to hold onto are going to be better than the other side would do if they get the comfy seats. As I say, that's a valid position - but it's not one I hold.
hS
I grew up in a very left-wing family in the eighties, and saw close-up and first hand how self-destructive the Left's self-absorbed idealism was. Meanwhile, out there on the news, Maggie was actually making a difference, getting things done, making things happen in the real world.
There was no contest. And even after all this time, I'd still rather be with the side that's going to get things done, rather than the one that makes an empty pointless display and achieves nothing.
The left-wing parties were behind both halves of the 'actually helping the people who need it' movement - first with the Liberal party bringing in old age pensions and the original unemployment support, then (decades later) the Labour party single-handedly creating the National Health System.
Thatcher... uh, well the things I know about her are keeping hold of some grotty little islands in the South Atlantic, and crushing the Trade Unions so that working-class people couldn't force the government to give them actual rights any more.
So I'm still going for idealism over getting things done that I don't want/care about, ta.
hS
I was talking about the eighties, long after the creation of the NHS. If the Labour Party had remained as organised and practical as that, I might have stayed on the Left.
I'm talking about people like "Red Ted", the (at the time) infamous Labour leader of Lambeth Council who refused to set a council budget as a gesture of defiance against the Tories. The council services ended up in a mess, as the council headed to bankruptcy. He and his colleagues ended up being taken to court and fined as a result. And they still refused to take any responsibility for their actions, declaring themselves martyrs, converting one of the rooms in the Town Hall into a shrine to themselves, and blaming the Government for everything.
He and his colleagues were family friends, and held up by my mother as good role-models. Did they achieve anything? Nothing they intended to anyway.
Find it here.
I shan't say anything more, because you're doubtless as intransigent on this stuff as I am and frankly it's not worth the effort.
I have no problem with strikes - provided they're properly and accountably organised and with a specific, legitimate goal. Very different from the meaningless, self-indulgent, unaccountable action I was talking about.
He made an unprovoked attack saying everyone who disagreed with him was "wrong".
I know I have anger issues, but I don't see how he should be allowed to get away with that.
His post was directly in response to a given item on which yes, they were wrong.
At no ppint did he actually attack anyone, which you did. Rule 3 of the Constitution is there for a reason.
Anger issues is no excuse for anything.
Once upon a time way back in 2008 we were discussing the American presidential election.
I mentioned I voted for McCain. I was attacked, and quite viciously so.
hS expressing this political opinion of his does not warrant that same reaction, even though I do not agree with everything the British Labour party stands for.
Instead, I'm very glad he feels like he can share his opinion here on the board, and I intend to protect his ability to do so, and yours as well if you choose to exercise it respectfully.
I said that saying that Labour didn't want to elect Corbyn was wrong - which it was - and that saying no-one should vote for him was wrong - which 60% of Labour's voters think it was.
As I said, 'you're probably expecting me to say that about everything you do by now'... but I didn't say that.
Factually, the Right was as collectively wrong about Corbyn's chances of getting elected [leader] as the Left was about Labour's chances in the General Election. That's not an opinion - it's an evidence-based judgement.
But I'm sorry for coming across as attacking. That was not my intent.
hS
Like I said, I thought your post was addressed to people on this board, so I took it more personally than I should've done.
Sorry for my stupid misunderstanding, and any upset it's caused anyone.