US Politics Mega-thread - Page 3033

On January 18 2021 18:09 evilfatsh1t wrote:

ive thought and wanted to say this for a long time but never said it outright because i didnt wanna deal with someone raging that its racism/prejudice/generalising/stereotypes or whatever. whilst that may be true it doesnt mean theres no truth rooted in such a claim though. im also asian myself so someone could also call bias.
however since the point has been made, might as well nod in agreement with this. the fundamental values and traditions of asian cultures orient them towards results/performance better than western cultures. increased importance placed on authority, discipline, collectivism etc.
imo dominance in all sectors especially from china, but east asia overall also, is only a matter of time and in chinas case the only thing really holding them back is the communist regime itself. if china was to hypothetically become a "free" country ala usa then i dont see how any western country could try to keep them down without resorting to force

On January 18 2021 18:46 EnDeR_ wrote:


There are literally more than a billion Chinese people, it's only to be expected that a good number of them are extremely talented people.

The difference is that in the past, America syphoned off the world's top talent, whilst now this trend is starting to reverse/has reversed in a lot of ways.

On January 18 2021 19:01 Zambrah wrote:
Brilliance or talent or whatever are complicated concepts anyways, there are a lot of factors that can go into developing oneself and Ive never liked ascribing someone's success to some innate talent or whatever.

I will say when I was in China that people were WAY WAY WAY more invested in educating their children. Foreign languages, art, programming, etc. kids had a ton of ways to pursue education beyond the basic structure you see in the US. The US generally does a great disservice when it comes to education, and thats not counting the fact that few people have access to, or can afford (usually a combination of both) supplementary education.

On January 18 2021 19:10 Liquid`Drone wrote:
Remove importance placed on authority as a positive and I'm definitely inclined to agree.

The thing is though, what do we want from the society we live in? Do we want to produce the most, or do we want to be the best place to live?

I thought the data from this page was really interesting.

While the economic growth of South Korea is really impressive in many ways, looking at those numbers between 1976-1990, I'm also reasonably happy I was not a south korean adult during that period. Granted, it seems like average working hours has dropped off by a lot in the past two decades, but they're still almost equal to Norwegian 1955-values. An average of 3000 hours spent working every year sounds terrible. Looking at a country like Germany, sure, they're not the country in the world with the most impressive economic growth - but they've done a great job giving more leisurely time for their inhabitants.

I mean, I can accept that this type of period was necessary for South Korea to achieve its current economic status. But I'd rather have my country - once a certain level of prosperity is achieved - then choose to focus more on distribution is goods and on giving all its inhabitants shorter working days, than to continue focusing on increased productivity as the highest priority. As a Norwegian at around median wage, I'd take a 10% wealth drop coupled with 10% less work (and I like my job!) over a 10% wealth increase coupled with 10% increased work load, no question about it.

On January 18 2021 20:09 Liquid`Drone wrote:
I don't know if this particular thing is about individualism vs collective really. I perceive Norway as a significantly more collectivistic society than the US (but I can see how we're still less collectivistic than asian countries) - but I feel we value leisure time a lot more than americans do (or at least we've structured society to give us more of it). I mean it might still be a significant part of the equation, but in Norway, I feel like the ones who do work significantly more than the norm aren't necessarily (or even usually) doing it to benefit others, but to benefit themselves. This might also be related to us in general having very generous laws and rules for when you get overtime pay (arguable exception for stuff like teachers and people in academia), which means that people who work more than the norm are also paid more.

Like, I can picture asian countries 'overtaking' the west in prosperity, too. But I'm totally fine with that, as long as it doesn't lead to me experiencing an absolute decline in living standards. A relative decline caused by asians massively increasing? Go for it, I'm not gonna spend energy combatting that. :D

On January 18 2021 18:56 evilfatsh1t wrote:

youve completely missed the point. your reasoning is exactly the individualistic mindset that isnt expected in asian countries. china isnt successful now because of a few brilliant individuals. korea has a population of only ~50m. look at how well the country is performing; its not because of a few brilliant individuals like steve jobs

On January 18 2021 21:32 EnDeR_ wrote:


The framing that a talented person is necessarily individualistic is yours, not mine. Even Steve Jobs needed multiple teams of extremely talented people to put his ideas into practice -- concepts only get you so far.

All I am saying is that it is not surprising that Asian countries are, in some respects, doing better than Western democracies, they're no longer 'losing' their top talent to the US.

On January 18 2021 21:16 Liquid`Drone wrote:
I'll happily nuance that latter point a bit, because it's not something I perceive as entirely negative or positive by default, but there are many circumstances where I believe it's more negative than positive, and I understand both that you might disagree with my overall point of view or that you disagree with my slightly flippant point.

I think deference to authority is in conflict with equitability. I can definitely see the value from an organizational point of view - and if there's some emergency and a police officer is telling people to stay back, then I want them to respect that. But often (more often than not, I think), 'respect for authority' ends up being 'don't question authority'. The latter, I think is very negative. People who are in a position of authority should almost always be capable of defending why they are in a position of authority. (Again, happy to make an exception for emergency situations. )

I am a teacher. My job is certainly easier if my students or pupils just listen to what I say and do what I tell them to do. But - I don't think my pupils or students are necessarily learning the most they can learn in that scenario. If I am being unreasonable, then I want them to tell me that I am being unreasonable. I want them to address me by my first name, not by my title. And - I want their constant input so that I can improve the job I am doing. And hell, if I ask them to do something unreasonable, I want them to not do it. That is also what I want from adults in a country: to not obey an unreasonable demand or request.

I guess regarding this particular point, 2020 has shown us that many who inhabit the west are too selfish, and it would have been a good thing if fewer people questioned covid-mandates or whatever. But I don't think this applies to Norway. We've questioned mandates, too - but being given satisfactory answers, we mostly end up adhering to the advice given. It's not really a question of always being in opposition, but more about demanding an explanation beyond 'because I am an authority and I am telling you so'.

As an example, I currently teach one class where all the students are immigrants. Mostly eritreans, but also a couple from the Phillipines, some from Syria, etc. In this class, they address me as teacher, and generally, they never question anything I say. One day, I started teaching at 11:30, and I was talking to them about our plan for today, but after ~5-10 minutes, noticed that they were all busily working on their computers and hardly paying attention to me. If it had been a class of Norwegian teenagers, I might have assumed they were playing games or being disrespectful, but there was no way that was the case for this class. So I asked - what are you guys so busy with?

Turns out I had set the wrong deadline for an assignment, and it was due in 30 minutes, while it was supposed to be due in 12 hours and 30 minutes. But none of them complained or raised their hand to mention it - they simply started stressing out like crazy trying to get it done in time for the posted deadline - a deadline which was completely unreasonable.

To be clear - I love teaching that class (and I'm even getting used to being called teacher). But it was a clear example of 'too much respect leading to the lack of an important question being asked'.

The TLDR is I want society to be as non-hierachical as possible, because while it is comfortable to be in a top position, I think it's overall negative if someone is listened to due to his or her title rather than due to the wisdom of his or her words. I do see teachers, in Norway too, say 'because I told you so' when children ask them why they should do something, and even though I think it's most likely a lot less prevalent here than anywhere else outside scandinavia / new zealand, I still don't like it when I do see it.

On January 18 2021 22:27 plated.rawr wrote:
On Thunberg - is the problem here that you think she is wrong, or that she, a young person, is talking against her elders?

Neither objection is acceptable, i feel, as her statements are based on the scientific works of the field of climate science, backed by its scientists, and thus arent just "some kid" making something up. Also, this is not a child talking back to her elders- it's one person from a grand movement, many of it's adherents elder to the elders being told they are wrong. Greta's age is clearly not the problem - authorities have been ignoring the scientific community and their elders in regard to this subject far before she entered the stage.

Sorry for that aside.

Point being though - being old doesn't mean you are especially wise. Being successful doesn't mean you're especially hard-working. Being powerful doesn't mean your virtues as a good human brought you into that position.

On January 18 2021 22:43 Simberto wrote:
I generally dislike the idea of reverence of the elders. Being old is not really an achievement. You just managed to pass the absolute bare minimum criterium of not dying.

I like discourse based on facts and arguments. Just being old or in a position of power is not an argument in itself. If you are really wiser because you are older, you should be capable of providing a compelling argument for your position. And i say that as someone who is slowly approaching being part of said "elders". This is something you learn in math. If you believe something is obvious, but can not actually formulate a good argument as to why that obvious thing is true, it may not be obvious or true, or your understanding of the topic is deeply lacking.

Also, it is incredibly annoying to teach people who are never critically questioning any of what you say. How am i supposed to teach you how to build a good argument, or how to gain deeper understanding of a topic, if you believe "I say it works like that, and i am older" is a compelling argument.

On January 18 2021 22:40 evilfatsh1t wrote:

the bigger problem is obviously that i feel what shes saying is wrong. i dont check every figure or fact that she cites and i dont doubt that many of them are probably correct. however, being armed with the results of scientific studies unfortunately does absolutely nothing for implementation of policy and realistically enacting change. yeah great, science says if we dont reduce emissions by x% by 20xx we're gonna die. so how are you going to realistically achieve those goals? its entirely possible that it isnt possible at the moment, whether it be due to general demand or lack of technology or just lack of a well thought out plan. its fine to have correct facts backed by actual scientific studies but what she actually proposes as a solution (zero emissions) is where the problem lies. and in any case, if things arent going the way they should be the correct course of action isnt to have a fit on stage and just bag out an entire generation. either you wait your turn to have a say because youre a child, or you use the platform youve been given and have some maturity and class. you shouldnt have it both ways and you shouldnt expect everyone to put up with that kind of tirade. maybe not everyone, but a lot of real people are probably taking their job and the same issues very seriously and dont need to deal with that shit.

in response to your last sentence. i completely agree. there are always exceptions to the rule, but generally speaking thats how it goes. maybe not the powerful part but the other two