EPTAt the end of the day, all it comes down to is “if you don’t think this is appropriate for children, don’t take your children to it.” Which is a much easier-to-defend position than “this is weird so the government should send men with guns to stop it.” The right wing isn’t winning with this culture war bullshit, there’s really no reason for even a craven, opportunist politician to retreat.
US Politics Mega-thread - Page 3916
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ChristianS
United States3304 Posts
At the end of the day, all it comes down to is “if you don’t think this is appropriate for children, don’t take your children to it.” Which is a much easier-to-defend position than “this is weird so the government should send men with guns to stop it.” The right wing isn’t winning with this culture war bullshit, there’s really no reason for even a craven, opportunist politician to retreat. | ||
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Mohdoo
United States15743 Posts
On April 19 2023 01:40 GreenHorizons wrote: Are you making the white moderate/respectability politics + Show Spoiler + (pearl clutching over people in drag reading to kids/appeasing those that agree with said clutchers enough to not vote Democrat over it is preposterous to me regardless) To be clear, it's not that I don't think tactics, strategies, etc... can't or shouldn't be assessed for effectiveness and such, but drag reading hour is volunteer community service that should be encouraged by everyone (especially if they aren't offering to volunteer to read to the kids themselves) imo. Democrats are spineless enough as it is, the least they can do is boisterously oppose functionally banning people in drag from reading to kids in public libraries. No, I'm not. I'm saying this specific thing is so benign and unhelpful that the fuel it gives bigots is entirely not worth it. We should always unapologetically fight for what we know is right. We should fight for abortion access, gay rights, all that stuff. But taking a step back: Why do we "fight"? We fight because we want a change to take place. I am not saying to be a shitty, typical democrat politician and settle for less. I am saying "Since the goal is very important, and trans people are literally dying from bigotry right now, please stop with this stupid shit, since it clearly a huge net negative for the lives of LGBTQ people". | ||
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Mohdoo
United States15743 Posts
On April 19 2023 01:44 ChristianS wrote: The value in defending them is because it’s right. Or more specifically, because Democrats want to promote a social message of “different people are doing different things you might find weird, but that’s okay and shouldn’t be illegal,” and betraying that isn’t going to be a political advantage. Making the fearmongering bipartisan while betraying the principled position will hurt, not help. At the end of the day, all it comes down to is “if you don’t think this is appropriate for children, don’t take your children to it.” Which is a much easier-to-defend position than “this is weird so the government should send men with guns to stop it.” The right wing isn’t winning with this culture war bullshit, there’s really no reason for even a craven, opportunist politician to retreat. This is just patting yourself on the back rather than thinking about the impact it actually has. You lunge towards "doing the right thing" rather than wondering what the best way to help LGBTQ people really is. This perspective you have described ignores the 2 most important things 1) How much does this help the people I am trying to help? 2) How much does this help the people I am fighting against? This is a fight. It is not tea time in an ivory tower. We are not served by trying to conduct a dialectic and determine if drag story time is ethical or not. You should focus on what will prevent the spread of bigotry and keep LGBTQ people safe. Trans folks are in an absolutely dreadful situation right now and this ridiculous story time stuff is making it worse. | ||
Liquid`Drone
Norway28825 Posts
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Mohdoo
United States15743 Posts
On April 19 2023 02:24 Liquid`Drone wrote: Do you have any data supporting the notion that whatever democrats are doing in terms of 'drag reading hour' (what are they even doing?) is losing them votes? I understand it's not possible to quantify this precisely, but some type of 'x is what democrats is doing to address this' and '70% of voters oppose x'?, or are you just arguing based on what you think democrats are doing and how you think people you know talk about the issue? The only hard data we have right now is % of dems/repub supporting drag story time and how that data compares to LGBTQ acceptance as a whole. | ||
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NewSunshine
United States5938 Posts
Honestly, you can source whatever you want as to how widely the Democrats approve of it. It doesn't fucking matter. They drag their feet so much on important social issues as it is. To hell with what the party thinks. We should be doing what's right, not what the DNC has determined is marketable. | ||
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NewSunshine
United States5938 Posts
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Mohdoo
United States15743 Posts
On April 19 2023 03:02 NewSunshine wrote: You're right that it is a fight. But your rhetoric is that we should abandon the front line. Letting drag story time get shut down by the Proud Boys is literally letting the terrorists win. Honestly, you can source whatever you want as to how widely the Democrats approve of it. It doesn't fucking matter. They drag their feet so much on important social issues as it is. To hell with what the party thinks. We should be doing what's right, not what the DNC has determined is marketable. story time is not the front line. If story time is the front line, that would mean the left's objective of helping LGBTQ folks relies on folks taking their kid to the library. God help them if that is true. Luckily, it is not true, so its not something to worry about. On April 19 2023 03:11 NewSunshine wrote: Also, if we're still supposed to compare drag story time, which is a form of voluntary activity, with abortion rights and LGBTQ rights at large, which is a discussion of actual policy, I think that's a problematic framework. Unless of course you're suggesting we need to go after people in drag and legislate against them. And I don't think I need to explain my problems with that. I have fundamental problems with your framework, Mohdoo. It sounds like you are not separating the ethics/ideals of the situation with how it actually impacts the country. So we can just call it here. I think I've explained myself and sometimes people don't agree and that's ok. | ||
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NewSunshine
United States5938 Posts
Agree to disagree. | ||
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Liquid`Drone
Norway28825 Posts
The wording (Many public libraries in America now host “Drag Queen Story Hour,” in which men dressed as women perform for young children. How appropriate for children are such events?) might influence it - 'perform for young children' sounds different and more of a drag-show than 'read books/tell stories for children' (which I thought was it?) But either way those numbers grant some legitimacy to Mohdoo's point - that optics-wise, this isn't something democrats will gain votes based on, and that, it being such a tiny thing, might not be worth losing voters defending. (I'm not really engaging with whether 'the optics' should be a factor when designing policy - I'll happily state that I think 'no, generally not', but I'm sure there are some valid 'greater good utilitarianism' arguments to be made where in some instances it makes sense.) However, I'm left with the impression that there are some things in contention here. 1: What does drag story time actually look like? I'm not at all convinced that these numbers will be the same if people saw a video of a person in drag reading Aesop's fables for a group of children. I think it might just be that the republicans have lied about what 'drag story time' entails, and that people are like 'oh I don't want my kid exposed to that', while those same people might not actually oppose a person in drag reading a neutral story. 2: What are democrats actually doing? I'm seeing that in New York, there are a couple public libraries where this takes place. But I mean, I'm guessing the yearly funding required to support a couple evenings of 'drag story time' in a couple libraries is.. laughably small. How about a message of 'nobody is forcing your children to attend these events, but the government spends money on a whole ton of different things, and you guys that are opposed to this can rest safely knowing that we spend somewhere between a million and a billion times more on the military than we spend on this, and the people who are happy to send their children to drag story time tend to be opposed to just that - but they have to deal. So you guys have to deal with this'? | ||
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Mohdoo
United States15743 Posts
On April 19 2023 03:22 Liquid`Drone wrote: I'm seeing a Rasmussen poll (tends to lean repub but we can grant it legitimacy) where 60% of adults consider drag story time inappropriate for children, 44% very opposed, while only 29% are positive and 11% very positive. The wording (Many public libraries in America now host “Drag Queen Story Hour,” in which men dressed as women perform for young children. How appropriate for children are such events?) might influence it - 'perform for young children' sounds different and more of a drag-show than 'read books/tell stories for children' (which I thought was it?) But either way those numbers grant some legitimacy to Mohdoo's point - that optics-wise, this isn't something democrats will gain votes based on, and that, it being such a tiny thing, might not be worth losing voters defending. (I'm not really engaging with whether 'the optics' should be a factor when designing policy - I'll happily state that I think 'no, generally not', but I'm sure there are some valid 'greater good utilitarianism' arguments to be made where in some instances it makes sense.) However, I'm left with the impression that there are some things in contention here. 1: What does drag story time actually look like? I'm not at all convinced that these numbers will be the same if people saw a video of a person in drag reading Aesop's fables for a group of children. I think it might just be that the republicans have lied about what 'drag story time' entails, and that people are like 'oh I don't want my kid exposed to that', while those same people might not actually oppose a person in drag reading a neutral story. 2: What are democrats actually doing? I'm seeing that in New York, there are a couple public libraries where this takes place. But I mean, I'm guessing the yearly funding required to support a couple evenings of 'drag story time' in a couple libraries is.. laughably small. How about a message of 'nobody is forcing your children to attend these events, but the government spends money on a whole ton of different things, and you guys that are opposed to this can rest safely knowing that we spend somewhere between a million and a billion times more on the military than we spend on this, and the people who are happy to send their children to drag story time tend to be opposed to just that - but they have to deal. So you guys have to deal with this'? You bring up some good points that I did not specifically address, so I will now: Point 1: Yes, like 100% of the other bigotry in the world, it is largely fueled by ignorance. Some things are more impacted by ignorance than others. And you are right to point out that the polls do a good job at showing this is mostly a matter of ignorance. Now let me ask you this: Do you think this ignorance will be overcome here? Your perspectives are generally skewed by your experiences living in a civilized country, but I do think you have hung around this thread for long enough to not think "but what if we can help republicans not be ignorant?" is not the play here. I think biting my own dick off would be equivalent to any other effort to decrease ignorance in this topic. You need to assume this ignorance is a fixed value. It is not a variable. If you look at the last 20 years in the US and conclude "We can effectively fight ignorance", not sure what to say while remaining polite. Point 2: Almost nothing. The actual scope/reach/impact of this whole thing is effectively zero. It is mostly just people trying to do the right thing in whatever way they can, which turns out to equal 0.00001 in this case. So that means we are accomplishing effectively nothing, all while Fox News and social media blasts "democrats are trying to use drag queens to make your kids gay". And from the study you cited, its not just Cletus who thinks this. While some people are saying "they are trying to make my kid gay", other more reasonable people are just saying "ehhh, this seems inappropriate, but I do support gay rights". So when we see pictures of Cletus and his inbred cousins bringing guns to sit outside a library to intimidate people, and seeing what a national issue conservatives have turned the minuscule exercise into, boy it sure does look like a bad situation. I will borrow NewSunshine's language and say: We have a situation where people are trying to save their family from wolves by surrounding their home with meat. It doesn't seem to be going well. The scope of the response is orders of magnitude higher than the benefit being provided by the story time. All we have done is get a bunch of ignorant wolves riled up and hungry. | ||
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NewSunshine
United States5938 Posts
The polls don't mean anything because unless Democrats join in attacking drag queens then they don't have to actually take a major stance, they merely have to assert that people are free to do as they will. So I'll repeat for the N-th time that I have fundamental problems with comparing drag story time to questions of policy like trans rights or abortion. It's apples to oranges, you can't compare them like this. | ||
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Liquid`Drone
Norway28825 Posts
Spending government money on culture is often a bit divisive, and doubly so when (which, to be fair, often seems to be the case) money is spent on the type of culture that tends to be appreciated by the group of people least opposed to paying taxes in the first place. Maybe throw them a bone and spend some cash on small scale wrestling events. My actual point is that this isn't an issue where there are two contending stances (ban or permit this), but three: Ban the event, allow the event, fund the event. I personally have no issues with funding it, and banning it is just hateful bigotry, but I'm sure there's a pretty big crowd in the 'sure people should be free to send their children to this but I don't want my tax money funding it' section. | ||
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Mohdoo
United States15743 Posts
Is it a part of the national conversation? It is a factor. Its that simple. We live in a really, really, really bad world. Look at that disgusting reality in the eyes, understand it, and think about what you can do to slit its throat. Nothing else matters. | ||
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Slydie
1956 Posts
As mentioned, this is an invented problem. How many have actually heard about "drag storytime" before this debate stirred up? There must be some dads around here, has anyone attended one? | ||
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Simberto
Germany11905 Posts
On April 19 2023 04:04 Slydie wrote: It is also a question of what are you actually banning. I mentioned trouser roles in Operas, are those safe for kids? What if a kids show has a man dressed up as a woman as part of the story? How do you even define what "drag" means? Fashions change, male K-pop groups can have a very feminine look, would those be banned? As mentioned, this is an invented problem. How many have actually heard about "drag storytime" before this debate stirred up? There must be some dads around here, has anyone attended one? Exactly. This is a case of the right digging something up and getting enraged about it. They do that constantly. And completely opposed to their actual principles. The core issue is not this specific thing. It is just something which is an easy target for the bigots. But if it is gone, they will find the next target, and the next. The outrage machine does not stop. The general principle is "People should be allowed to dress how they want, should generally be allowed to host whatever events they want, and parents should be allowed to take their children to events if they feel like it". That should not be controversial. And these are the liberties we should be protecting from the fascists. They want the ability to tell everyone else how to think, how to act, how to dress, what to believe, who to be. That is the ultimate goal in this outrage machine. Nibble at little bits until people just start giving in whenever the fascists get angry about something, so they can dictate everything. It is very obvious that the right don't have any principles, either. One of their core principles is that parents can generally do whatever they want with their children. Their position in the past has been that you can take your children to brainwashing classes, send them to torture camps to change who they are, withhold healthcare, physically harm them, all because the parents know best. And now taking them to a library to get a story read to them is too much, just because a man in a womans dress is doing the reading? There are no principles here, only culture war bullshit. And sadly, that means that one cannot give in, and one cannot find a compromise. The fascists don't have principles, they don't believe in anything, and they surely don't want reasonable solutions. If too many americans are on board with this bullshit and don't see through it, then the US is lost. | ||
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GreenHorizons
United States24054 Posts
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KwarK
United States44131 Posts
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Mohdoo
United States15743 Posts
On April 19 2023 04:21 GreenHorizons wrote: @Mohdoo Have you considered that caving on stuff like letting Republicans pull funding from schools and libraries that allow drag story times is falling into a behavior trap? No, I think we can use more nuance than "any time you abandon a shitty idea, the enemy wins". I don't see AOC blabbing about Latinx anymore, for example. I'd also like to point out that I view this as democrats falling into a behavioral trap by defending anything vaguely associated with LGBTQ rights. I think people are letting their knee jerk instinct to support anything Cletus opposes send them down a silly, ineffective path. People are being tricked into thinking this is some kinda "front lines" issue. | ||
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Liquid`Drone
Norway28825 Posts
Now I'm more firmly on the side of 'that's sweet. keep funding it.' | ||
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