EPTUS Politics Mega-thread - Page 3038
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Now that we have a new thread, in order to ensure that this thread continues to meet TL standards and follows the proper guidelines, we will be enforcing the rules in the OP more strictly. Be sure to give them a complete and thorough read before posting! NOTE: When providing a source, please provide a very brief summary on what it's about and what purpose it adds to the discussion. The supporting statement should clearly explain why the subject is relevant and needs to be discussed. Please follow this rule especially for tweets. Your supporting statement should always come BEFORE you provide the source. If you have any questions, comments, concern, or feedback regarding the USPMT, then please use this thread: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/website-feedback/510156-us-politics-thread | ||
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JimmiC
Canada22817 Posts
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DarkPlasmaBall
United States46237 Posts
On January 20 2021 04:05 Slydie wrote: She is envoking fear and anger as her main weapons. She is a climate doomsday prophet, never communicating neuance or contamplating the often disastrous consequences of her demands of action. The strategy is easy: -A storm happens-human made climate change -No storm happens-natural variation. -A very warm winter-human made climate change. -A freezing cold wintet-natural variation -The se level rises very slowly-but it will turn soon because of human climate change, just wait! It is bullet proof! We will be just fine, but the climate-doomsday goal-posts will probably keep moving some decades more. Climate scientists have asked nicely for years to do something about human-accelerated climate change, to no avail, and now you're critical of the fact that *completely justifiable fear* is being used, because we're acting so late? There's no goalpost-moving; it just seems like you haven't read the literature on the validity and effects of human-accelerated climate change. From experts. Not Greta Thunberg. The experts have been warning about this for quite some time now, and the data supports their warnings. There's no need to strawman their position and then only attribute it to Greta. | ||
KwarK
United States44203 Posts
On January 20 2021 03:56 evilfatsh1t wrote: the message is indeed more important than the messenger. the message is shit. thats why we have an issue with greta, not because shes autistic. the general gist of her entire agenda is "zero emissions now. if adults dont take action youre all garbage for sabotaging the younger generations' lives". not only is her plan shit (actually, she doesnt have a plan. just a goal), but the way she also plays the child card and "adults bad" tactic in lieu of actually coming up with a coherent plan herself is not productive at all. what she does on a global scale is the literal equivalent to kids nagging their parents for wanting something but not getting their way because they dont understand that somethings arent a matter of simple yes/no solutions. im turning 28 this year so im hardly a middle aged conservative by the way. i just understand that whilst its important to be reminded of the urgeny of an issue, gretas role should stop at exactly that. she has no authority, power or particular expertise and she shouldnt be in the conversation with actual policy makers when they do their job It's not unreasonable to expect the people who have been given the power to make policy to make the policy. Greta complaining that they're fucking it up does not require that Greta herself assume a supreme legislative role. She's not a hypocrite for demanding that the people running the world do a good job while not herself running the world. | ||
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LegalLord
United States13779 Posts
On January 20 2021 03:29 Liquid`Drone wrote: Okay, well, her basic story is; she's a kid with asberger syndrome who started reading about climate change and she got really really really worried the more she read about it. She's really smart (something like top 1% gradewise despite skipping school one day a week), and having asberger (I'm paraphrasing her now), she also focuses all her energy on a singular topic. Well, I knew that much, though I really can’t say that I find it meaningful. I don’t hold it against others per se if they do. People can find inspiration wherever they wish. Regarding the other couple of snippets, I will freely admit to not knowing or caring what food her dad eats or what she said in her 8th speech in Mideastern Polynesia, but that’s fine. You don’t need to obsessively follow every detail about a person to see the bigger picture. I have read some of her speeches and I know what she’s generally talking about. On January 20 2021 03:29 Liquid`Drone wrote: The biggest issue I have here is how much you seem to care about a person and how comfortable you are belittling a person that you seemingly only have a cursory understanding of - and that cursory understanding also seems to be entirely off. And not only that - but you then claim that other people who call you out are 'ignorant and insulting'. It's a pretty rare case of pot calling the kettle black - and I say that as someone who generally appreciates your cynical analysis. Like- you clearly seemed annoyed by her, and you refer to her as smoky the bear. But does smoky the bear actually annoy you? Anyone in the public eye is fair game for criticism on their actions and the content of their speech. I see no reason to warrant an exception here. I see that you do like her as a symbol, so you don’t like some of this criticism, but it’s certainly warranted. You want to talk climate, talk climate. A lot of good ways to go about that, but discussions that bring in Greta are almost always about Greta, not about climate. Not a surprise, because the content of her speeches is fairly vapid and stunts like the transatlantic ship voyage are a distasteful example of virtue signaling. Yet at the same time, being a young kid talking about climate is a touching message to latch onto, and in practice it’s easier to hold up a person as an ideal than a specific policy proposal. Which makes it easy to say “you don’t like Greta because she gets this climate thing and you hate the environment” like too many people do. I’ll freely admit to being nettled by this particular brand of misguided moralizing. Regarding Smokey. It’s not a bad thing in the slightest to be a symbol or mascot. I am fond enough of those “only you can prevent forest fires” commercials and I bet they did some genuine good. But people don’t hold Smokey up as some idol you have to be fond of lest you be one of those forest haters, nor do people have a lot of good reasons to talk about Smokey’s moral failings. Not really so with Greta. | ||
Liquid`Drone
Norway28873 Posts
On January 20 2021 03:56 evilfatsh1t wrote: the message is indeed more important than the messenger. the message is shit. thats why we have an issue with greta, not because shes autistic. the general gist of her entire agenda is "zero emissions now. if adults dont take action youre all garbage for sabotaging the younger generations' lives". not only is her plan shit (actually, she doesnt have a plan. just a goal), but the way she also plays the child card and "adults bad" tactic in lieu of actually coming up with a coherent plan herself is not productive at all. what she does on a global scale is the literal equivalent to kids nagging their parents for wanting something but not getting their way because they dont understand that somethings arent a matter of simple yes/no solutions. im turning 28 this year so im hardly a middle aged conservative by the way. i just understand that whilst its important to be reminded of the urgeny of an issue, gretas role should stop at exactly that. she has no authority, power or particular expertise and she shouldnt be in the conversation with actual policy makers when they do their job This is the opinion of someone who watched part of one of her speeches. Say you know nothing about her at all, and then you instead watch this video: What part of her message here are you disagreeing with? Is the 'this is not a drill-alarm'-sound at the beginning offensive? | ||
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WombaT
Northern Ireland27228 Posts
Like poverty the problem is pretty damn simple to identify, solutions to it may be more complex. The English footballer Marcus Rashford has generally got quite a bit of praise for his advocacy for impoverished British children, but still a bit of flak too for his outrageous position that children going hungry in a Western nation in 2021 is a bad state of affairs | ||
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Neneu
Norway492 Posts
On January 20 2021 04:05 Slydie wrote: She is envoking fear and anger as her main weapons. She is a climate doomsday prophet, never communicating neuance or contamplating the often disastrous consequences of her demands of action. The strategy is easy: -A storm happens-human made climate change -No storm happens-natural variation. -A very warm winter-human made climate change. -A freezing cold wintet-natural variation -The se level rises very slowly-but it will turn soon because of human climate change, just wait! It is bullet proof! We will be just fine, but the climate-doomsday goal-posts will probably keep moving some decades more. How does your points differentiate from: -A smoker develops lung cancer-smoke made cancer -A smoker doesn't develop lung cancer-natural variation. -An overweight person develops diabetes-the overweight caused the diabetes. -An overweight person grows old with no problems-natural variation -There will slowly be a problem with antibiotics resistance-but it will turn soon because of overuse, just wait! What's next, are you going to equate regional warm periods (like the warm period of Greenland about 1000 years ago) with global heating? | ||
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DarkPlasmaBall
United States46237 Posts
It's just misdirection by people who deny that human-accelerated climate change is leading to devastating effects, and/or enjoy the personal benefits that climate change has given them, and/or are easily fooled into being angry at the wrong people. | ||
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evilfatsh1t
Australia8913 Posts
On January 20 2021 04:10 JimmiC wrote: How is she supposed to come up with a global coherent plan, no one has one. And yes she uses hyperbole in her speeches most people do. Her goal is to wake people up and start the ball rolling on change. If you go into too much detail people start harping on those details and nothing happens. She is a impressive young woman, who is not perfect, who happened to get a large voice (mainly because of the anger she generated) and has become a symbol for the young people who don't have any of the power to make the changes they desire. Her message is quite accurate most environmentalists support her in a big way because the people that you and LL seem to want to hear from, no one actually wants to hear from! There are tons of climate scientists out there with twitter, posting accurate reports with amazing modeling, very few care. And those who hate on Greta certainly do not because that number is about 1000000x the number of followers of climate scientists. yes, no plan exists. however there are people in various positions around the world whose job is to formulate a plan. greta is not in one of these positions. the first issue is that she isnt just relaying facts and data, she is actively trying to influence world politics by creating a backing for zero emissions policies. this is a point that biff was referring to earlier with his video. greta goes further than just displaying the results of studies, she provides her opinion on what must be done as a conclusion to that data. herein lies the 2nd problem. her conclusion is that the impossible must be done. now if she was voicing this opinion in her backyard with her parents that would be perfectly fine, but she has been empowered by media in particular as the younger generations' saving grace. the main problem with this is if you considered the political landscape in relation to climate change as simply pro-action vs no-action, shes creating another divide amongst those who could agree that some action has to take place. all this does is create an even bigger distraction from what is already a very complicated debate. to add on to this, you cant even attack her agenda at its merits because when it becomes convenient for her she is suddenly a child again. if some random politician said the exact same things as greta their views would be attacked and it would be fair game just as with all other political discussions. yet you try to attack gretas views because they suck and suddenly youre a threatened conservative who cant stand the sight of a young girl speaking up. she should have no place in the political forum now. her message has been delivered loud and clear. let the people who were appointed to handle these matters do their job. the 2nd point i mentioned is particularly dangerous and will only get worse the more you empower someone who is not only wrong but cant be called out on it. (and again for the record, im not saying the data she cites is wrong. im saying her hardline stance on zero emissions is) | ||
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LegalLord
United States13779 Posts
On January 20 2021 04:20 WombaT wrote: I don’t see why she needs a plan. On the other hand, do we really need one more person saying, “there’s a problem, fix it!” ? It’s not that people don’t know there’s a problem, it’s that the real story behind what it would take to fix it is an ugly one, so people and governments understandably balk at the sacrifices that would have to be made to fix it. | ||
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KwarK
United States44203 Posts
Currently the world is run by people who live in a town upstream and they keep dumping raw sewage in the river. Greta lives downstream and she's bitching about it. The people who live upstream are enjoying all their clean water, they're drinking it, they're bathing in it, they're washing their clothes in it. Greta can't do that because the river is full of shit. Her points are very simple 1) How dare you enjoy all the clean river water while flooding everyone downstream from you with shit 2) Stop shitting in the river It's really weird that this became so controversial. | ||
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DarkPlasmaBall
United States46237 Posts
On January 20 2021 04:27 evilfatsh1t wrote: yes, no plan exists. however there are people in various positions around the world whose job is to formulate a plan. greta is not in one of these positions. the first issue is that she isnt just relaying facts and data, she is actively trying to influence world politics by creating a backing for zero emissions policies. this is a point that biff was referring to earlier with his video. greta goes further than just displaying the results of studies, she provides her opinion on what must be done as a conclusion to that data. herein lies the 2nd problem. her conclusion is that the impossible must be done. now if she was voicing this opinion in her backyard with her parents that would be perfectly fine, but she has been empowered by media in particular as the younger generations' saving grace. the main problem with this is if you considered the political landscape in relation to climate change as simply pro-action vs no-action, shes creating another divide amongst those who could agree that some action has to take place. all this does is create an even bigger distraction from what is already a very complicated debate. to add on to this, you cant even attack her agenda at its merits because when it becomes convenient for her she is suddenly a child again. if some random politician said the exact same things as greta their views would be attacked and it would be fair game just as with all other political discussions. yet you try to attack gretas views because they suck and suddenly youre a threatened conservative who cant stand the sight of a young girl speaking up. she should have no place in the political forum now. her message has been delivered loud and clear. let the people who were appointed to handle these matters do their job. the 2nd point i mentioned is particularly dangerous and will only get worse the more you empower someone who is not only wrong but cant be called out on it. (and again for the record, im not saying the data she cites is wrong. im saying her hardline stance on zero emissions is) The people in these positions aren't doing anything. Do we really need to look at Trump's EPA picks? 1. Scott Pruitt, the guy who literally dissolved the EPU in Oklahoma; 2. Andrew Wheeler, the coal lobbyist. These are foxes guarding the henhouse, and maybe if world leaders did what they were supposed to, then the Greta Thunbergs wouldn't need to exist. The experts have been ignored forever, and it's gotten so bad that literal children are telling adults to shape up. | ||
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KwarK
United States44203 Posts
On January 20 2021 04:31 LegalLord wrote: It’s not that people don’t know there’s a problem There are an awful lot of people, including the current government of the largest contributor to climate change by any metric, who do insist there isn't a problem. If you plan to argue that bitching about a problem doesn't help when everyone already agrees that there's a problem then you first have to explain why there is no agreement that there is a problem. | ||
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evilfatsh1t
Australia8913 Posts
On January 20 2021 04:27 DarkPlasmaBall wrote: Greta became an activist when she was around 15 (she's now 18). Imagine criticizing a Swedish teenager for not literally solving the climate change crisis, instead of criticizing world leaders for not even starting to address the climate change crisis that experts have been warning about for years. It's just misdirection by people who deny that human-accelerated climate change is leading to devastating effects, and/or enjoy the personal benefits that climate change has given them, and/or are easily fooled into being angry at the wrong people. i see this point brought up a lot about how the "people in power" were deliberately negligent or incompetent at their jobs when combating climate change. the question i want to ask is this. if people genuinely believed that the people in power couldnt or wouldnt do their jobs in good faith, then wtf is a now 18 yr old girl going to do about it? now i dont believe that every person who has the legitimate ability to influence policy is acting in bad faith. i dont think greta does either. so now that her message has been delivered its time to cool down | ||
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KwarK
United States44203 Posts
On January 20 2021 04:38 evilfatsh1t wrote: i see this point brought up a lot about how the "people in power" were deliberately negligent or incompetent at their jobs when combating climate change. the question i want to ask is this. if people genuinely believed that the people in power couldnt or wouldnt do their jobs in good faith, then wtf is a now 18 yr old girl going to do about it? now i dont believe that every person who has the legitimate ability to influence policy is acting in bad faith. i dont think greta does either. so now that her message has been delivered its time to cool down If the people in power can't or won't do their jobs in good faith then, in a democracy, it's absolutely appropriately to talk about that as loudly and as often as possible. Do you read your own posts before submitting them? Serious question because I don't get why you would say that it's not useful to talk about government incompetence or malfeasance in a democracy or why you would say that you should only bring it up once and then stay quiet while the problem continues. Greta is doing exactly what every activist who feels strongly about an issue should do in a democracy. She's loudly drawing attention to the failures of the government so they either shape up or are held accountable by the voters. This is exactly how democracy is meant to work and she should be lauded for taking part in it. Loudly and repeatedly bringing up the issue is what being a good citizen in a democracy looks like. This is peak citizenship. She's a role model for that alone, regardless of whether you believe in climate change. | ||
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evilfatsh1t
Australia8913 Posts
On January 20 2021 04:33 KwarK wrote: Let's treat time as a stream. Older people are upstream, younger people are downstream. Currently the world is run by people who live in a town upstream and they keep dumping raw sewage in the river. Greta lives downstream and she's bitching about it. The people who live upstream are enjoying all their clean water, they're drinking it, they're bathing in it, they're washing their clothes in it. Greta can't do that because the river is full of shit. Her points are very simple 1) How dare you enjoy all the clean river water while flooding everyone downstream from you with shit 2) Stop shitting in the river It's really weird that this became so controversial. yeah this is a pretty bad analogy. the people upstream may have shit in the river but if they didnt there may not have even been a river to drink out of. the world didnt reach this level of carbon emissions because we liked fucking with mother nature. its the direct result of our pursuit for prosperity and better quality of life. whether greta admits it or not, she is a direct beneficiary of that wealth and she has no right to get on a moral high horse and call out her previous generations for trying to better them and their childrens' lives. what were our ancestors supposed to do? the world enters into industrial and modern eras and they all just say "you know what lets not raise people out of poverty and lets keep riding horses because otherwise in a few hundred years greta thunberg is gonna call us evil"? | ||
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evilfatsh1t
Australia8913 Posts
On January 20 2021 04:41 KwarK wrote: If the people in power can't or won't do their jobs in good faith then, in a democracy, it's absolutely appropriately to talk about that as loudly and as often as possible. Do you read your own posts before submitting them? Serious question because I don't get why you would say that it's not useful to talk about government incompetence or malfeasance in a democracy or why you would say that you should only bring it up once and then stay quiet while the problem continues. Greta is doing exactly what every activist who feels strongly about an issue should do in a democracy. She's loudly drawing attention to the failures of the government so they either shape up or are held accountable by the voters. This is exactly how democracy is meant to work and she should be lauded for taking part in it. Loudly and repeatedly bringing up the issue is what being a good citizen in a democracy looks like. This is peak citizenship. She's a role model for that alone, regardless of whether you believe in climate change. youre right about her activism work. i guess what i actually wanted to say was she should stop being propped up by media etc. rather than her stop activism work. that would be within her rights | ||
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KwarK
United States44203 Posts
On January 20 2021 04:44 evilfatsh1t wrote: yeah this is a pretty bad analogy. the people upstream may have shit in the river but if they didnt there may not have even been a river to drink out of. the world didnt reach this level of carbon emissions because we liked fucking with mother nature. its the direct result of our pursuit for prosperity and better quality of life. whether greta admits it or not, she is a direct beneficiary of that wealth and she has no right to get on a moral high horse and call out her previous generations for trying to better them and their childrens' lives. what were our ancestors supposed to do? the world enters into industrial and modern eras and they all just say "you know what lets not raise people out of poverty and lets keep riding horses because otherwise in a few hundred years greta thunberg is gonna call us evil"? The argument that nobody who indirectly benefits from X can ever criticize X is a stupid argument and people should really stop making it if they don't want other people to call them stupid. Greta absolutely has a moral high ground, she's not complicit in the sins of the past just because she benefited from them, but even if she was a hypocrite, that doesn't actually make her point wrong. The argument you're using is some grade A Ben Shapiro idiocy where, instead of actually addressing whatever the issue is, he attempts a "gotcha" to paint the other side as hypocrites. But whether or not the other side are hypocrites has no bearing on the issue in question. Ben Shapiro is an idiot who boasts about his inability to sexually satisfy women. Don't be like him. Also the argument "if people upstream didn't shit in the river then there might not have even been a river today" doesn't justify continuing to shit in the river. Like okay, there was a time when there was insufficient technology to properly dispose of shit and so back then you felt like you had to shit in the river. Whatever, fine. But you're still doing it now when you no longer have to, and you're shitting way more than people used to. Just stop. | ||
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Liquid`Drone
Norway28873 Posts
Read this. I'll even point to some key figures: 'A global strike on 15 March 2019 gathered more than one million strikers in 2,200 strikes organised in 125 countries. On 24 May 2019, the second global strike took place, in which 1,600 events across 150 countries drew hundreds of thousands of protesters. The events were timed to coincide with the 2019 European Parliament election. The 2019 Global Week for Future was a series of 4,500 strikes across over 150 countries, focused around Friday 20 September and Friday 27 September. Likely the largest climate strikes in world history, the 20 September strikes gathered roughly 4 million protesters, many of them schoolchildren, including 1.4 million in Germany. On 27 September, an estimated two million people participated in demonstrations worldwide, including over one million protesters in Italy and several hundred thousand protesters in Canada.' How is this not being influential? The young people participating in these strikes are going to overwhelmingly vote green in future elections - which for most of them is one or two election cycles from now. If you actually spend some time talking to a wide range of youth and children (and in particular girls - she definitely appeals more to girls than to boys), it will quickly be evident that a very significant number are inspired by her to do 'whatever they can' (be it picking plastic from beaches or having meat free monday or using the train instead of plane to go somewhere) to help save the climate. I mean - if you don't actually think we have a climate crisis, if you reject that we're living at the beginning of a mass extinction, then I can totally see how her message would annoy you, because she might help inspire policies that you don't like. But if you actually agree with the message (that the environment is in a crisis and dire action is urgently needed), then she's one of the most important people in the world to spread that message. Doesn't really matter whether you find her off-putting, that's on you. | ||
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DarkPlasmaBall
United States46237 Posts
On January 20 2021 04:38 evilfatsh1t wrote: i see this point brought up a lot about how the "people in power" were deliberately negligent or incompetent at their jobs when combating climate change. the question i want to ask is this. if people genuinely believed that the people in power couldnt or wouldnt do their jobs in good faith, then wtf is a now 18 yr old girl going to do about it? now i dont believe that every person who has the legitimate ability to influence policy is acting in bad faith. i dont think greta does either. so now that her message has been delivered its time to cool down I think this circles back to a point I tried to make earlier: one 18-year-old Swedish girl isn't going to be able to change things single-handedly, but if she and other young adults continue to go viral and potentially motivate and mobilize young voters, then I think the snowball effect can actually be quite impactful. For example, if millions of young American voters realize just how screwed their planet is going to be in 30, 40, 50 years, I could see "aggressively addressing climate change" becoming a very serious presidential/congressional topic, during elections. We know that a few million votes can decide even the largest elections in our country, and so if (hypothetically) the Democratic platform includes being pro-environment and the Republican platform includes being anti-environment, that could drastically help one party and hurt the other. Even if older politicians don't care about younger generations, their retention of power might be at risk, since those younger generations will be able to vote. If anything, I think the message needs to be amplified, not reduced. The message of anything important needs to be amplified until actual, meaningful change is made. | ||
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