US Politics Mega-thread - Page 8364

On August 11 2017 08:23 Danglars wrote:

Hey, call out societal problems as well as political problems. The trouble is myself and others never asked for legal solutions and redress, because it's Google's own damn problem if its going to hurt the company to satisfy cultural norms. That's more the obviously illegal activities, like silencing invited speakers with violence in public university campuses.

Now labeling people who disagree with you to be part of an undesirable group of people (MGTOW in your case, alt-right in many others) is another problem we can hopefully address from a logical point of view. But maybe this Damore thing should lower my hope.

On August 11 2017 09:04 Plansix wrote:
Yet, if people hadn't used Nature as a justification that women were inferior to men for most of human history, we wouldn't have his problem in the first place. Considering the long history of using science to justify sexism, any gender preference argument should expect to be meet with extreme skepticism.

Edit: But political correctness went to far in the 1990s? How can it go to far again?

Edit 2: The discussion around Space Marines is hysterical. They are so over the topic with hyper masculinity that it is full blown satire. Just like all of 40K, where Tolkien and Heavy Metal had a fucked up baby in space and then adopted some anime.

When offered the choice of playing with either a doll or a toy truck, girls will typically pick the doll and boys will opt for the truck. This isn't just because society encourages girls to be nurturing and boys to be active, as people once thought. In experiments, male adolescent monkeys also prefer to play with wheeled vehicles while the females prefer dolls — and their societies say nothing on the matter.

The monkey research, conducted with two different species in 2002 and 2008, strongly suggested a biological explanation for children's toy preferences. In recent years, the question has become: How and why does biology make males (be they monkey or human) prefer trucks, and females, dolls?

New and ongoing research suggests babies' exposure to hormones while they are in the womb causes their toy preferences to emerge soon after birth. As for why evolution made this so, questions remain, but the toys may help boys and girls develop the skills they once needed to fulfill their ancient gender roles.

First, in 2009, Gerianne Alexander, professor of psychology at Texas A&M University, and her colleagues found that 3- and 4-month-old boys' testosterone levels correlated with how much more time they spent looking at male-typical toys such as trucks and ballscompared with female-typical toys such as dolls, as measured by an eye tracker. Their level of exposure to the hormone androgen during gestation (which can be estimated by their digit ratio, or the relative lengths of their index and ring fingers) also correlated with their visual interest in male-typical toys.

On August 11 2017 09:04 Plansix wrote:
Yet, if people hadn't used Nature as a justification that women were inferior to men for most of human history, we wouldn't have his problem in the first place. Considering the long history of using science to justify sexism, any gender preference argument should expect to be meet with extreme skepticism.

Edit: But political correctness went to far in the 1990s? How can it go to far again?

Edit 2: The discussion around Space Marines is hysterical. They are so over the topic with hyper masculinity that it is full blown satire. Just like all of 40K, where Tolkien and Heavy Metal had a fucked up baby in space and then adopted some anime.

On August 11 2017 09:00 Wulfey_LA wrote:


So let the law lie as it is? I actually do think that political correctness in the workplace has gone too far. If you express ideas that are too different from management then you are gone. What kind of Free Speech is that? Why do we have to simply accept that Google can shitcan anyone who doesn't keep their disagreements with policy quiet? Some labor law here might actually put some meat on the bones of the right of free speech so you can keep your job if you and your boss disagree.

On August 11 2017 09:04 Plansix wrote:
Yet, if people hadn't used Nature as a justification that women were inferior to men for most of human history, we wouldn't have his problem in the first place. Considering the long history of using science to justify sexism, any gender preference argument should expect to be meet with extreme skepticism.

On August 11 2017 09:55 Danglars wrote:

I argue that his post legitimately shows he doesn't consider women inferior to men. Are you seriously of the opinion that where science has been misused for private purposes, future calls to that science must be smeared ala what a_flayer's called you out on? It would seem you are aided by judging sane writers on their merits rather than attacking them based on history they aren't a part of.

On August 11 2017 09:52 Danglars wrote:

It'd be different if he got fired for whistleblowing at Google's illegal discrimination in hiring and promotions, for example. I'm really hesitant to put government's arm into the mix more than it already is and more than society is already returning to censure intolerant attitudes from left and right. By the way, the content and expression of that may further change and some is good and some is bad.

But on my second point on lumping critics into MGTOW, are you of the opinion that all criticism leaves you open to smear, and do you worry about labeling people who disagree with you to be part of an undesirable group of people?

The four plaintiffs in a lawsuit against the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority are from across the political spectrum: the American Civil Liberties Union, a health care group called Carafem that provides abortions, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals and conservative provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos.

What they have in common is that the transit agency known as WMATA has rejected their advertisements, saying the ads ran counter to its guidelines. They have now banded together, saying the guidelines introduced in 2015 violate their First Amendment right to free speech.

In fact, the ACLU's rejected advertisement displays the text of the First Amendment in English, Arabic and Spanish, with the ACLU's logo and the slogan "We the People."

WMATA did not explain in writing why it rejected the ACLU's ad, according to the complaint. Outfront Media, which manages the system's advertising, initially told the ACLU that it was rejected because it "does not take any issue oriented advertising." Outfront later stated that "you'll need to dramatically change your creative in order to resubmit," the complaint says.

"In its zeal to avoid hosting offensive and hateful speech, the government has eliminated speech that makes us think, including the text of the First Amendment itself," said ACLU senior staff attorney Lee Rowland. "The ACLU could not more strongly disagree with the values that Milo Yiannopoulos espouses, but we can't allow the government to pick and choose which viewpoints are acceptable."

The D.C. metro system changed its advertising policy in 2015. According to the ACLU, it happened "following controversy surrounding a set of anti-Muslim advertisement." The ACLU, Carafem and PETA had previously advertised with Metro.

The guidelines on commercial advertising, which are published on WMATA's website, say medical messages are allowed "only from government health organizations, or if the substance of the message is currently accepted by the American Medical Associated and/or the Food and Drug Administration."

It also blocks ads "intended to influence members of the public regarding an issue on which there are varying opinions," those "that support or oppose an industry position or industry goal without any commercial benefit to the advertiser" and those "that are intended to influence public policy."

In a statement about the lawsuit to NPR, WMATA pointed to its change in policy and said it "intends to vigorously defend its commercial advertising guidelines, which are reasonable and viewpoint neutral."

The Carafem advertisement says it sells the FDA-approved mifeprex/misoprostol regimen used to end pregnancy at up to 10 weeks. The "10-week-after pill," it reads, "for abortion up to 10 weeks."

WMATA rejected multiple PETA ads, including one saying "I'm ME, not MEAT. See the Individual. Go Vegan," next to a photo of a pig. The plaintiffs argue that "WMATA has accepted and displayed many advertisements that are intended to influence riders to buy, do and believe things that are at odds with PETA's viewpoint on humans' proper relationship with animals."

WMATA initially accepted advertisements for a book by conservative commentator Milo Yiannopoulos but took them down after receiving complaints, saying they violate the guidelines, according to the complaint.

The lawsuit claims that WMATA's rejection of the ads from the ACLU, Carafem and Milo Yiannopoulos was not because the ads themselves violated the guidelines. Instead, it says the ads were rejected for reasons outside of their content — "such as the identity of the advertiser, the advertiser's known or presumed viewpoints, or the advertiser's line of business."

On August 11 2017 10:30 TheTenthDoc wrote:
I mean, the problem isn't that he said "there are potential biological causes of gender differences" it's that he said they should nuke diversity programs of several stripes in the memo, remove multiple programs oriented at removing non-biological biases (which he even admits exist!), and "de-emphasize empathy" (lmao). At least that's what I got out of skimming his text and list of suggestions.

If you take the studies showing evidence of biological causes of gender differences as fact, you need to take into account the studies showing that Jane or Joaquin Doe with the same resume as James Doe are less likely to get hired.

On August 11 2017 10:20 ZerOCoolSC2 wrote:

Does he hear himself when he speaks? Or is he like Peter Griffin in that he drifts in and out?