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I would say it's more a hope born of necessity. For reasons both ideological and cultural it can be harder for people on the left to countenance people who disagree with them very strongly but that's part of why I think it will take some great national struggle or disaster to return our government to better functioning. Things will have to be placed aside, on both left and right.
Could you explain a bit more about what you mean by "it's harder for people on the left to countenance people that disagree with them very strongly"?
Anecdotally, the two times I've had a conversation with someone heavily pro-Trump, even mild disagreement was taken as a personal offense that could not be countenanced. Neither time was a pleasant conversation.
Anecdotically, also, the couple times I've had a strong disagreement with someone who identifies as 'on the left', it was fairly amicable and we reached a point where we could understand where each of us was coming from. If you want to know, a specific example was about trans people on TV and how this was going to mess up his kids, another was about DEI implementation in the workplace.
Sent hit the nail on the head. In less rancourous times there was a saying, iirc penned by commentator Charles Krauthammer that "Conservatives think liberals are wrong, liberals think Conservatives are evil." I think this is mostly true (keep on mind we are saying "liberal" in the American sense of the word). For the criticism that the right is very "moralistic" i think surely that criticism (if you would even call it that) applies to the left at least as much.
There is also the cultural dimension as well. American popular culture and academia has become so insular and increasingly left-wing that it's far easier, from what i can tell, for someone on the left to hear almost nothing from someone they disagree with than the opposite. It’s surely true on campus, and I and many others could attest to that personally. I'm sure it's not quite so overwhelming in a more conservative state, but any conservative who has ever attended college or seen a single thing a famous actor has said or read a news story in a legacy newspaper has had to read and interact with people they disagree with. Some Trumpers are incredibly annoying though, yes.
I don't disagree that this may have been the case back in the day. But is it true now? I don't think right-wingers are moralistic; that kind of went when Trump became the standard-bearer. There was a clear shift from "holier than thou, you must uphold family values or you will go to hell" to "owning the libs", I don't think this is really arguable to be honest. In fact, it is becoming more and more common for right-wing people to describe anything left of center as their "enemies". You're painting conservatives as some kind of responsible parent with an unruly leftwing teenager, and I just don't think that image holds in modern America.
Somewhat related to what you saying there is an interesting thing happening in the Republican party that it is getting less obviously religious. I think for a long time Democrats yearned for such a day,, now I wonder if they are reconsidering lol.
That aside, I think it's hard to argue against the fact that discourse has gotten worse. For the moment I will abstain from guessing *why* but I do think you are more or less correct. I didn't mean my comments in a paternalistic sense, but I think at least that the type of politicians conservatives used to vote for were less combative. Again, for the sake of discussion I am agnostic as to why this is true.
But I would add that this more aggressive tone doesn't undermine what I said. It's true, if you are left-wing nudist in Berkeley, California who only eats locally grown non-GMO vegetables, there's also a chance your social circle is more "diverse" than an 85% white evangelical town in Nowhereville, Arkansas. But if you or your kids in that small town went to college almost anywhere, if they ever turned on the news, if they ever saw a movie, if they ever read anything at all about the nation they lived in, they'd have a deeper understanding of people on the other side than the free-range Bay Area man. Because that left-wing man in one of the hearts of blue America *probably* knows far less about the tens of millions of citizens who disagree with him than the college educated evangelical Christian. Sure, the former may know lots of people, but he has a huge, huge blind spot. And it would be entirely possible to go on living that way unless he consciously chose to learn something more. It's not that people on the right can't be a-holes or close-minded. I think these are all traits that come with human.exe, no software update required. Maybe that's my conservatism talking.
So I think both sides are growing in their obvious and stated contempt for the other, but combined with what I said and Sent. so succinctly summarized before, I think (my opinion) that it's harder for people on the left to really know what people who disagree with them think. I don't mean people who come from different cultures but all moved the same place and share a kind of mixed cultural milieu, but people who honest to God disagree about some very fundamental things.
My one tiny data point I will give here is that every survey says that people on the left are more willing to cut off family members and friends over politics. At first blush that is not the most open-minded behavior lol
Social media has helped silo people with their media consumption, so maybe both sides are becoming alike, but i do think that for a long time the right had an idea, imperfectly followed, as principles often are, that accepting that people could disagree with you over VALUES was ok.
Ok, i also think is true that a Mile Pence type politician is closer to the archetype conservatives historically voted for. It is also inarguable that that is simply not the direction of travel now.
You're right about leftwing people not being particularly open minded. I saw those same stats. You don't have to go farther than this thread, GH could never picture himself working with someone that doesn't pass his purity tests. We are in a big mess and it's not getting better.
But you are connecting those two dots by saying "this can only mean that leftwing people are ignorant of what people that disagree with them think, otherwise they'd be more open minded". You could make the reverse argument "this is because leftwing people know exactly what the people they disagree with think and can't see themselves engaging with that kind of disregard for human rights". I think the latter is closer to the truth than the former.
ah, I see what you are saying, I think. Is that not disagreeing more with the potential ideological underpinnings previously mentioned? I guess I would return to the (admittedly extreme) example I gave. From what I can tell, it's not that hard, just by accident of birth, to never come across very conservative viewpoints articulated well and and defended systematically. There's no guarantee of it in high school, non in college, almost none in regular print media. In popular media you might have some right-of-center ideas appear and presented perhaps sympathetically (though also often unsympathetically). If those ideas appear there one often has to wonder if it was an accident, and it's often just background or subtext. Now of course it's true that none of these things make those views right or wrong. But I don't think I'm getting too far ahead of myself in saying it's more difficult for someone on the right to avoid opinions and arguments they don't want to hear then someone on the left. Making all allowance for individual circumstances of course.
I do think that conservatives are more likely to work with people they disagree with. This can be both a boon and a curse. You couldn't explain otherwise the extreme ideology takeover that has happened over the conservative party.
The feeling I'm getting is that you're the kind of conservative that'd much rather vote for a Mike Pence than a Charlie Kirk. But you'd also not be that fussed if a Charlie Kirk got elected and started implementing an extreme agenda. And I think that reflects the first point. You're more okay with differing viewpoints as long as it's moving in the direction you want.
Leftleaning folks have a harder time doing that, as they're generally much more aligned with what you'd normally call their 'principles', which are normally centered on granting equal human rights to all. This is also why it's hard to find well-articulated conservative viewpoints. It's just harder to argue that some groups should be more privileged than others.
On September 27 2025 04:44 LightSpectra wrote: I can't help but imagine the mood of a room full of decorated generals and admirals being told what it means to be 'a true warrior' by an alcoholic National Guard reservist.
Barely disguised complete and utter contempt I imagine.
Most general and flag officers should be professionals, free of such tumblr contempt for authority. Unfortunately there is an element of politics once you get to be a general - or rather even when you get to be a general. For the most part they will have basic respect for civilian control of the military and the chain of command, but there's also too many generals in general, so cutting out the ones who think like you do would be great.
You're getting really good at twisting the meaning. While it's true that the military structure placed under the authority of a civilian is something they have balked at since governments started doing it, and with plenty of coups throughout history and around the world as a result, this was, in particular, a flippant remark about Hegseth. Usually the civilian in charge of the military is at least somewhat competent. Hegseth has proven to be anything but. Contempt is singularly understandable.
This is the US military and these are general and flag officers confirmed by Congress, not some McDonalds where your boss made you clean up or cut your hours. If your boss wants to talk to you about something, you give it your full attention and be open how you can make it happen and what you can contribute and how you can inform him. None of that is happening with an attitude of seething resentment that you only have to wait 3.5 years until it's back to autopilot and you're in charge of yourself because you know best and how dare the Secretary of Defense want to have a meeting when I'm so busy and there are still Chinese balloons to let fly over the entire length of the US.
The US military doesn't balk at civilian control of itself. Anyone who goes down that road should say goodbye to their career and potentially freedom. For example a #NotMyPresident Hillary supporter who thought the 2016 election was illegitimate can never be trusted with a command.
Thankfully there's not an actual case of this we're talking about, it's just forum posters projecting what they hope general and flag officers should do and feel to stick it to their boss and defending imaginary generals/admirals for their first amendment right to do/feel things there's no report they have done/felt.
What about a Jan 6 insurrectionist? Would they be fit for military command?
I find it hilarious and sad that you bring up a hypothetical case of not accepting the presidential elections as opposed to the very real one that happened more recently.
But that is all aside from the very real security concerns of (1) forcing your deployed commanders to leave their command and fly thousands of miles to attend a meeting ,and (2) gathering all your military command together in a single location so you can give them a speech. Making all of that happen without problems will be time consuming and expensive.
If i were a DOGE enthusiast as you so clearly were, I would be up in arms about an unprecedented meeting like this. A meeting that, according to what info anybody has, could've been an email.
And if this were called by even a halfway competent defense secretary like Jim Mattis, we'd expect it to be a necessary thing. But it's Pete Hegseth. So most likely he just wants his Instagram moment.
I would say it's more a hope born of necessity. For reasons both ideological and cultural it can be harder for people on the left to countenance people who disagree with them very strongly but that's part of why I think it will take some great national struggle or disaster to return our government to better functioning. Things will have to be placed aside, on both left and right.
Could you explain a bit more about what you mean by "it's harder for people on the left to countenance people that disagree with them very strongly"?
Anecdotally, the two times I've had a conversation with someone heavily pro-Trump, even mild disagreement was taken as a personal offense that could not be countenanced. Neither time was a pleasant conversation.
Anecdotically, also, the couple times I've had a strong disagreement with someone who identifies as 'on the left', it was fairly amicable and we reached a point where we could understand where each of us was coming from. If you want to know, a specific example was about trans people on TV and how this was going to mess up his kids, another was about DEI implementation in the workplace.
Sent hit the nail on the head. In less rancourous times there was a saying, iirc penned by commentator Charles Krauthammer that "Conservatives think liberals are wrong, liberals think Conservatives are evil." I think this is mostly true (keep on mind we are saying "liberal" in the American sense of the word). For the criticism that the right is very "moralistic" i think surely that criticism (if you would even call it that) applies to the left at least as much.
There is also the cultural dimension as well. American popular culture and academia has become so insular and increasingly left-wing that it's far easier, from what i can tell, for someone on the left to hear almost nothing from someone they disagree with than the opposite. It’s surely true on campus, and I and many others could attest to that personally. I'm sure it's not quite so overwhelming in a more conservative state, but any conservative who has ever attended college or seen a single thing a famous actor has said or read a news story in a legacy newspaper has had to read and interact with people they disagree with. Some Trumpers are incredibly annoying though, yes.
I don't disagree that this may have been the case back in the day. But is it true now? I don't think right-wingers are moralistic; that kind of went when Trump became the standard-bearer. There was a clear shift from "holier than thou, you must uphold family values or you will go to hell" to "owning the libs", I don't think this is really arguable to be honest. In fact, it is becoming more and more common for right-wing people to describe anything left of center as their "enemies". You're painting conservatives as some kind of responsible parent with an unruly leftwing teenager, and I just don't think that image holds in modern America.
Somewhat related to what you saying there is an interesting thing happening in the Republican party that it is getting less obviously religious. I think for a long time Democrats yearned for such a day,, now I wonder if they are reconsidering lol.
That aside, I think it's hard to argue against the fact that discourse has gotten worse. For the moment I will abstain from guessing *why* but I do think you are more or less correct. I didn't mean my comments in a paternalistic sense, but I think at least that the type of politicians conservatives used to vote for were less combative. Again, for the sake of discussion I am agnostic as to why this is true.
But I would add that this more aggressive tone doesn't undermine what I said. It's true, if you are left-wing nudist in Berkeley, California who only eats locally grown non-GMO vegetables, there's also a chance your social circle is more "diverse" than an 85% white evangelical town in Nowhereville, Arkansas. But if you or your kids in that small town went to college almost anywhere, if they ever turned on the news, if they ever saw a movie, if they ever read anything at all about the nation they lived in, they'd have a deeper understanding of people on the other side than the free-range Bay Area man. Because that left-wing man in one of the hearts of blue America *probably* knows far less about the tens of millions of citizens who disagree with him than the college educated evangelical Christian. Sure, the former may know lots of people, but he has a huge, huge blind spot. And it would be entirely possible to go on living that way unless he consciously chose to learn something more. It's not that people on the right can't be a-holes or close-minded. I think these are all traits that come with human.exe, no software update required. Maybe that's my conservatism talking.
So I think both sides are growing in their obvious and stated contempt for the other, but combined with what I said and Sent. so succinctly summarized before, I think (my opinion) that it's harder for people on the left to really know what people who disagree with them think. I don't mean people who come from different cultures but all moved the same place and share a kind of mixed cultural milieu, but people who honest to God disagree about some very fundamental things.
My one tiny data point I will give here is that every survey says that people on the left are more willing to cut off family members and friends over politics. At first blush that is not the most open-minded behavior lol
Social media has helped silo people with their media consumption, so maybe both sides are becoming alike, but i do think that for a long time the right had an idea, imperfectly followed, as principles often are, that accepting that people could disagree with you over VALUES was ok.
People cutting off their family members over politics isn't less open-minded, unless you somehow have information on why they cut them off. Trump is in power. Trump is a fascist. If my family supports Trump and shows complete disregard for my well-being, then cutting them off is sad but reasonable, and not closed-minded whatsoever.
Also I wanna see a source for this absurd claim that left-wingers are less exposed to a variety/opposing viewpoints, or to specific viewpoints, and thus effectively less knowledgeable about politics. Seriously now, come on. Prove it.
I would say it's more a hope born of necessity. For reasons both ideological and cultural it can be harder for people on the left to countenance people who disagree with them very strongly but that's part of why I think it will take some great national struggle or disaster to return our government to better functioning. Things will have to be placed aside, on both left and right.
Could you explain a bit more about what you mean by "it's harder for people on the left to countenance people that disagree with them very strongly"?
Anecdotally, the two times I've had a conversation with someone heavily pro-Trump, even mild disagreement was taken as a personal offense that could not be countenanced. Neither time was a pleasant conversation.
Anecdotically, also, the couple times I've had a strong disagreement with someone who identifies as 'on the left', it was fairly amicable and we reached a point where we could understand where each of us was coming from. If you want to know, a specific example was about trans people on TV and how this was going to mess up his kids, another was about DEI implementation in the workplace.
Sent hit the nail on the head. In less rancourous times there was a saying, iirc penned by commentator Charles Krauthammer that "Conservatives think liberals are wrong, liberals think Conservatives are evil." I think this is mostly true (keep on mind we are saying "liberal" in the American sense of the word). For the criticism that the right is very "moralistic" i think surely that criticism (if you would even call it that) applies to the left at least as much.
There is also the cultural dimension as well. American popular culture and academia has become so insular and increasingly left-wing that it's far easier, from what i can tell, for someone on the left to hear almost nothing from someone they disagree with than the opposite. It’s surely true on campus, and I and many others could attest to that personally. I'm sure it's not quite so overwhelming in a more conservative state, but any conservative who has ever attended college or seen a single thing a famous actor has said or read a news story in a legacy newspaper has had to read and interact with people they disagree with. Some Trumpers are incredibly annoying though, yes.
I don't disagree that this may have been the case back in the day. But is it true now? I don't think right-wingers are moralistic; that kind of went when Trump became the standard-bearer. There was a clear shift from "holier than thou, you must uphold family values or you will go to hell" to "owning the libs", I don't think this is really arguable to be honest. In fact, it is becoming more and more common for right-wing people to describe anything left of center as their "enemies". You're painting conservatives as some kind of responsible parent with an unruly leftwing teenager, and I just don't think that image holds in modern America.
Somewhat related to what you saying there is an interesting thing happening in the Republican party that it is getting less obviously religious. I think for a long time Democrats yearned for such a day,, now I wonder if they are reconsidering lol.
That aside, I think it's hard to argue against the fact that discourse has gotten worse. For the moment I will abstain from guessing *why* but I do think you are more or less correct. I didn't mean my comments in a paternalistic sense, but I think at least that the type of politicians conservatives used to vote for were less combative. Again, for the sake of discussion I am agnostic as to why this is true.
But I would add that this more aggressive tone doesn't undermine what I said. It's true, if you are left-wing nudist in Berkeley, California who only eats locally grown non-GMO vegetables, there's also a chance your social circle is more "diverse" than an 85% white evangelical town in Nowhereville, Arkansas. But if you or your kids in that small town went to college almost anywhere, if they ever turned on the news, if they ever saw a movie, if they ever read anything at all about the nation they lived in, they'd have a deeper understanding of people on the other side than the free-range Bay Area man. Because that left-wing man in one of the hearts of blue America *probably* knows far less about the tens of millions of citizens who disagree with him than the college educated evangelical Christian. Sure, the former may know lots of people, but he has a huge, huge blind spot. And it would be entirely possible to go on living that way unless he consciously chose to learn something more. It's not that people on the right can't be a-holes or close-minded. I think these are all traits that come with human.exe, no software update required. Maybe that's my conservatism talking.
So I think both sides are growing in their obvious and stated contempt for the other, but combined with what I said and Sent. so succinctly summarized before, I think (my opinion) that it's harder for people on the left to really know what people who disagree with them think. I don't mean people who come from different cultures but all moved the same place and share a kind of mixed cultural milieu, but people who honest to God disagree about some very fundamental things.
My one tiny data point I will give here is that every survey says that people on the left are more willing to cut off family members and friends over politics. At first blush that is not the most open-minded behavior lol
Social media has helped silo people with their media consumption, so maybe both sides are becoming alike, but i do think that for a long time the right had an idea, imperfectly followed, as principles often are, that accepting that people could disagree with you over VALUES was ok.
Ok, i also think is true that a Mile Pence type politician is closer to the archetype conservatives historically voted for. It is also inarguable that that is simply not the direction of travel now.
You're right about leftwing people not being particularly open minded. I saw those same stats. You don't have to go farther than this thread, GH could never picture himself working with someone that doesn't pass his purity tests. We are in a big mess and it's not getting better.
But you are connecting those two dots by saying "this can only mean that leftwing people are ignorant of what people that disagree with them think, otherwise they'd be more open minded". You could make the reverse argument "this is because leftwing people know exactly what the people they disagree with think and can't see themselves engaging with that kind of disregard for human rights". I think the latter is closer to the truth than the former.
ah, I see what you are saying, I think. Is that not disagreeing more with the potential ideological underpinnings previously mentioned? I guess I would return to the (admittedly extreme) example I gave. From what I can tell, it's not that hard, just by accident of birth, to never come across very conservative viewpoints articulated well and and defended systematically. There's no guarantee of it in high school, non in college, almost none in regular print media. In popular media you might have some right-of-center ideas appear and presented perhaps sympathetically (though also often unsympathetically). If those ideas appear there one often has to wonder if it was an accident, and it's often just background or subtext. Now of course it's true that none of these things make those views right or wrong. But I don't think I'm getting too far ahead of myself in saying it's more difficult for someone on the right to avoid opinions and arguments they don't want to hear then someone on the left. Making all allowance for individual circumstances of course.
I do think that conservatives are more likely to work with people they disagree with. This can be both a boon and a curse. You couldn't explain otherwise the extreme ideology takeover that has happened over the conservative party.
The feeling I'm getting is that you're the kind of conservative that'd much rather vote for a Mike Pence than a Charlie Kirk. But you'd also not be that fussed if a Charlie Kirk got elected and started implementing an extreme agenda. And I think that reflects the first point. You're more okay with differing viewpoints as long as it's moving in the direction you want.
Leftleaning folks have a harder time doing that, as they're generally much more aligned with what you'd normally call their 'principles', which are normally centered on granting equal human rights to all. This is also why it's hard to find well-articulated conservative viewpoints. It's just harder to argue that some groups should be more privileged than others.
Now that first paragraph is fascinating and it's so tempting to follow it further. But I sense we are winding down (or maybe it's just getting late here and I'm mistaken).
I would agree with the broad strokes of what you are saying, though maybe not the particulars. Arguably, part of what makes conservatism is its non-utopian view that inclines people to get the best they can from an imperfect situation. Like all things this can lead to having a little too large of a tent at times. There are certainly those on the left I think who would take a different view of the underlying reasons for the manifested behavior. And I appreciate that your last paragraph is kinda demonstrating the ideological or principled argument, in its own way.
I don't fully accept that framing as you laid it out (certainly not as it leads to your last sentence), but I certainly agree that's how many on the left see it. And I agree that on the part of many well-meaning and thoughtful lefties that's how it would appear.
I guess to sum up my part of this, I would encourage anyone reading this to make more of an attempt to understand, after all, it's not like tens of millions of your fellow citizens will just disappear : )
edit: I will add this, thinking about what you said. I disagree with "This is also why it's hard to find well-articulated conservative viewpoints." Going back to what I said about values, and what you said about principles, I feel there is a tendency to slam to the door shut and to not even take up the argument, even just as an argument, that could be debated. It's often considered wrong to even consider it. It's not like there haven't been serious people conservatives claim as intellectual ancestors. So I don't think agree with this, though the dearth of (open) conservative academics is not good for anyone.
On September 27 2025 04:44 LightSpectra wrote: I can't help but imagine the mood of a room full of decorated generals and admirals being told what it means to be 'a true warrior' by an alcoholic National Guard reservist.
Barely disguised complete and utter contempt I imagine.
Most general and flag officers should be professionals, free of such tumblr contempt for authority. Unfortunately there is an element of politics once you get to be a general - or rather even when you get to be a general. For the most part they will have basic respect for civilian control of the military and the chain of command, but there's also too many generals in general, so cutting out the ones who think like you do would be great.
You're getting really good at twisting the meaning. While it's true that the military structure placed under the authority of a civilian is something they have balked at since governments started doing it, and with plenty of coups throughout history and around the world as a result, this was, in particular, a flippant remark about Hegseth. Usually the civilian in charge of the military is at least somewhat competent. Hegseth has proven to be anything but. Contempt is singularly understandable.
This is the US military and these are general and flag officers confirmed by Congress, not some McDonalds where your boss made you clean up or cut your hours. If your boss wants to talk to you about something, you give it your full attention and be open how you can make it happen and what you can contribute and how you can inform him. None of that is happening with an attitude of seething resentment that you only have to wait 3.5 years until it's back to autopilot and you're in charge of yourself because you know best and how dare the Secretary of Defense want to have a meeting when I'm so busy and there are still Chinese balloons to let fly over the entire length of the US.
The US military doesn't balk at civilian control of itself. Anyone who goes down that road should say goodbye to their career and potentially freedom. For example a #NotMyPresident Hillary supporter who thought the 2016 election was illegitimate can never be trusted with a command.
Thankfully there's not an actual case of this we're talking about, it's just forum posters projecting what they hope general and flag officers should do and feel to stick it to their boss and defending imaginary generals/admirals for their first amendment right to do/feel things there's no report they have done/felt.
How ironic, then, that the current commander in chief has called various elections illegitimate. Thank you for agreeing that he can't be trusted.
I would say it's more a hope born of necessity. For reasons both ideological and cultural it can be harder for people on the left to countenance people who disagree with them very strongly but that's part of why I think it will take some great national struggle or disaster to return our government to better functioning. Things will have to be placed aside, on both left and right.
Could you explain a bit more about what you mean by "it's harder for people on the left to countenance people that disagree with them very strongly"?
Anecdotally, the two times I've had a conversation with someone heavily pro-Trump, even mild disagreement was taken as a personal offense that could not be countenanced. Neither time was a pleasant conversation.
Anecdotically, also, the couple times I've had a strong disagreement with someone who identifies as 'on the left', it was fairly amicable and we reached a point where we could understand where each of us was coming from. If you want to know, a specific example was about trans people on TV and how this was going to mess up his kids, another was about DEI implementation in the workplace.
Sent hit the nail on the head. In less rancourous times there was a saying, iirc penned by commentator Charles Krauthammer that "Conservatives think liberals are wrong, liberals think Conservatives are evil." I think this is mostly true (keep on mind we are saying "liberal" in the American sense of the word). For the criticism that the right is very "moralistic" i think surely that criticism (if you would even call it that) applies to the left at least as much.
There is also the cultural dimension as well. American popular culture and academia has become so insular and increasingly left-wing that it's far easier, from what i can tell, for someone on the left to hear almost nothing from someone they disagree with than the opposite. It’s surely true on campus, and I and many others could attest to that personally. I'm sure it's not quite so overwhelming in a more conservative state, but any conservative who has ever attended college or seen a single thing a famous actor has said or read a news story in a legacy newspaper has had to read and interact with people they disagree with. Some Trumpers are incredibly annoying though, yes.
I don't disagree that this may have been the case back in the day. But is it true now? I don't think right-wingers are moralistic; that kind of went when Trump became the standard-bearer. There was a clear shift from "holier than thou, you must uphold family values or you will go to hell" to "owning the libs", I don't think this is really arguable to be honest. In fact, it is becoming more and more common for right-wing people to describe anything left of center as their "enemies". You're painting conservatives as some kind of responsible parent with an unruly leftwing teenager, and I just don't think that image holds in modern America.
Somewhat related to what you saying there is an interesting thing happening in the Republican party that it is getting less obviously religious. I think for a long time Democrats yearned for such a day,, now I wonder if they are reconsidering lol.
That aside, I think it's hard to argue against the fact that discourse has gotten worse. For the moment I will abstain from guessing *why* but I do think you are more or less correct. I didn't mean my comments in a paternalistic sense, but I think at least that the type of politicians conservatives used to vote for were less combative. Again, for the sake of discussion I am agnostic as to why this is true.
But I would add that this more aggressive tone doesn't undermine what I said. It's true, if you are left-wing nudist in Berkeley, California who only eats locally grown non-GMO vegetables, there's also a chance your social circle is more "diverse" than an 85% white evangelical town in Nowhereville, Arkansas. But if you or your kids in that small town went to college almost anywhere, if they ever turned on the news, if they ever saw a movie, if they ever read anything at all about the nation they lived in, they'd have a deeper understanding of people on the other side than the free-range Bay Area man. Because that left-wing man in one of the hearts of blue America *probably* knows far less about the tens of millions of citizens who disagree with him than the college educated evangelical Christian. Sure, the former may know lots of people, but he has a huge, huge blind spot. And it would be entirely possible to go on living that way unless he consciously chose to learn something more. It's not that people on the right can't be a-holes or close-minded. I think these are all traits that come with human.exe, no software update required. Maybe that's my conservatism talking.
So I think both sides are growing in their obvious and stated contempt for the other, but combined with what I said and Sent. so succinctly summarized before, I think (my opinion) that it's harder for people on the left to really know what people who disagree with them think. I don't mean people who come from different cultures but all moved the same place and share a kind of mixed cultural milieu, but people who honest to God disagree about some very fundamental things.
My one tiny data point I will give here is that every survey says that people on the left are more willing to cut off family members and friends over politics. At first blush that is not the most open-minded behavior lol
Social media has helped silo people with their media consumption, so maybe both sides are becoming alike, but i do think that for a long time the right had an idea, imperfectly followed, as principles often are, that accepting that people could disagree with you over VALUES was ok.
Ok, i also think is true that a Mile Pence type politician is closer to the archetype conservatives historically voted for. It is also inarguable that that is simply not the direction of travel now.
You're right about leftwing people not being particularly open minded. I saw those same stats. You don't have to go farther than this thread, GH could never picture himself working with someone that doesn't pass his purity tests. We are in a big mess and it's not getting better.
But you are connecting those two dots by saying "this can only mean that leftwing people are ignorant of what people that disagree with them think, otherwise they'd be more open minded". You could make the reverse argument "this is because leftwing people know exactly what the people they disagree with think and can't see themselves engaging with that kind of disregard for human rights". I think the latter is closer to the truth than the former.
ah, I see what you are saying, I think. Is that not disagreeing more with the potential ideological underpinnings previously mentioned? I guess I would return to the (admittedly extreme) example I gave. From what I can tell, it's not that hard, just by accident of birth, to never come across very conservative viewpoints articulated well and and defended systematically. There's no guarantee of it in high school, non in college, almost none in regular print media. In popular media you might have some right-of-center ideas appear and presented perhaps sympathetically (though also often unsympathetically). If those ideas appear there one often has to wonder if it was an accident, and it's often just background or subtext. Now of course it's true that none of these things make those views right or wrong. But I don't think I'm getting too far ahead of myself in saying it's more difficult for someone on the right to avoid opinions and arguments they don't want to hear then someone on the left. Making all allowance for individual circumstances of course.
We already know that you consider far-right publications "right-of-center", so I hope you excuse me for laughing out loud while you describe "right-of-center" ideas as those being presented in movies/TV etc. in your argument about left-wingers not being tolerant of/knowledgeable about right-wing (read: far-right) ideas.
You're crafting an argument on a basis of pure assumptions. You're still assuming a biased conclusion before fabricating a premise to fit the conclusion. If you stopped doing that, we could take you seriously.
I would say it's more a hope born of necessity. For reasons both ideological and cultural it can be harder for people on the left to countenance people who disagree with them very strongly but that's part of why I think it will take some great national struggle or disaster to return our government to better functioning. Things will have to be placed aside, on both left and right.
Could you explain a bit more about what you mean by "it's harder for people on the left to countenance people that disagree with them very strongly"?
Anecdotally, the two times I've had a conversation with someone heavily pro-Trump, even mild disagreement was taken as a personal offense that could not be countenanced. Neither time was a pleasant conversation.
Anecdotically, also, the couple times I've had a strong disagreement with someone who identifies as 'on the left', it was fairly amicable and we reached a point where we could understand where each of us was coming from. If you want to know, a specific example was about trans people on TV and how this was going to mess up his kids, another was about DEI implementation in the workplace.
Sent hit the nail on the head. In less rancourous times there was a saying, iirc penned by commentator Charles Krauthammer that "Conservatives think liberals are wrong, liberals think Conservatives are evil." I think this is mostly true (keep on mind we are saying "liberal" in the American sense of the word). For the criticism that the right is very "moralistic" i think surely that criticism (if you would even call it that) applies to the left at least as much.
There is also the cultural dimension as well. American popular culture and academia has become so insular and increasingly left-wing that it's far easier, from what i can tell, for someone on the left to hear almost nothing from someone they disagree with than the opposite. It’s surely true on campus, and I and many others could attest to that personally. I'm sure it's not quite so overwhelming in a more conservative state, but any conservative who has ever attended college or seen a single thing a famous actor has said or read a news story in a legacy newspaper has had to read and interact with people they disagree with. Some Trumpers are incredibly annoying though, yes.
I don't disagree that this may have been the case back in the day. But is it true now? I don't think right-wingers are moralistic; that kind of went when Trump became the standard-bearer. There was a clear shift from "holier than thou, you must uphold family values or you will go to hell" to "owning the libs", I don't think this is really arguable to be honest. In fact, it is becoming more and more common for right-wing people to describe anything left of center as their "enemies". You're painting conservatives as some kind of responsible parent with an unruly leftwing teenager, and I just don't think that image holds in modern America.
Somewhat related to what you saying there is an interesting thing happening in the Republican party that it is getting less obviously religious. I think for a long time Democrats yearned for such a day,, now I wonder if they are reconsidering lol.
That aside, I think it's hard to argue against the fact that discourse has gotten worse. For the moment I will abstain from guessing *why* but I do think you are more or less correct. I didn't mean my comments in a paternalistic sense, but I think at least that the type of politicians conservatives used to vote for were less combative. Again, for the sake of discussion I am agnostic as to why this is true.
But I would add that this more aggressive tone doesn't undermine what I said. It's true, if you are left-wing nudist in Berkeley, California who only eats locally grown non-GMO vegetables, there's also a chance your social circle is more "diverse" than an 85% white evangelical town in Nowhereville, Arkansas. But if you or your kids in that small town went to college almost anywhere, if they ever turned on the news, if they ever saw a movie, if they ever read anything at all about the nation they lived in, they'd have a deeper understanding of people on the other side than the free-range Bay Area man. Because that left-wing man in one of the hearts of blue America *probably* knows far less about the tens of millions of citizens who disagree with him than the college educated evangelical Christian. Sure, the former may know lots of people, but he has a huge, huge blind spot. And it would be entirely possible to go on living that way unless he consciously chose to learn something more. It's not that people on the right can't be a-holes or close-minded. I think these are all traits that come with human.exe, no software update required. Maybe that's my conservatism talking.
So I think both sides are growing in their obvious and stated contempt for the other, but combined with what I said and Sent. so succinctly summarized before, I think (my opinion) that it's harder for people on the left to really know what people who disagree with them think. I don't mean people who come from different cultures but all moved the same place and share a kind of mixed cultural milieu, but people who honest to God disagree about some very fundamental things.
My one tiny data point I will give here is that every survey says that people on the left are more willing to cut off family members and friends over politics. At first blush that is not the most open-minded behavior lol
Social media has helped silo people with their media consumption, so maybe both sides are becoming alike, but i do think that for a long time the right had an idea, imperfectly followed, as principles often are, that accepting that people could disagree with you over VALUES was ok.
Ok, i also think is true that a Mile Pence type politician is closer to the archetype conservatives historically voted for. It is also inarguable that that is simply not the direction of travel now.
You're right about leftwing people not being particularly open minded. I saw those same stats. You don't have to go farther than this thread, GH could never picture himself working with someone that doesn't pass his purity tests. We are in a big mess and it's not getting better.
But you are connecting those two dots by saying "this can only mean that leftwing people are ignorant of what people that disagree with them think, otherwise they'd be more open minded". You could make the reverse argument "this is because leftwing people know exactly what the people they disagree with think and can't see themselves engaging with that kind of disregard for human rights". I think the latter is closer to the truth than the former.
ah, I see what you are saying, I think. Is that not disagreeing more with the potential ideological underpinnings previously mentioned? I guess I would return to the (admittedly extreme) example I gave. From what I can tell, it's not that hard, just by accident of birth, to never come across very conservative viewpoints articulated well and and defended systematically. There's no guarantee of it in high school, non in college, almost none in regular print media. In popular media you might have some right-of-center ideas appear and presented perhaps sympathetically (though also often unsympathetically). If those ideas appear there one often has to wonder if it was an accident, and it's often just background or subtext. Now of course it's true that none of these things make those views right or wrong. But I don't think I'm getting too far ahead of myself in saying it's more difficult for someone on the right to avoid opinions and arguments they don't want to hear then someone on the left. Making all allowance for individual circumstances of course.
We already know that you consider far-right publications "right-of-center", so I hope you excuse me for laughing out loud while you describe "right-of-center" ideas as those being presented in movies/TV etc. in your argument about left-wingers not being tolerant of/knowledgeable about right-wing (read: far-right) ideas.
You're crafting an argument on a basis of pure assumptions. You're still assuming a biased conclusion before fabricating a premise to fit the conclusion. If you stopped doing that, we could take you seriously.
I contend your lack of familiarity with the American right is perfectly ok but makes you look silly when you start talking like this. you are free to contest the premises but I have made a valid argument. Unfortunately, to dispute the premises you have to know something about them.
I would say it's more a hope born of necessity. For reasons both ideological and cultural it can be harder for people on the left to countenance people who disagree with them very strongly but that's part of why I think it will take some great national struggle or disaster to return our government to better functioning. Things will have to be placed aside, on both left and right.
Could you explain a bit more about what you mean by "it's harder for people on the left to countenance people that disagree with them very strongly"?
Anecdotally, the two times I've had a conversation with someone heavily pro-Trump, even mild disagreement was taken as a personal offense that could not be countenanced. Neither time was a pleasant conversation.
Anecdotically, also, the couple times I've had a strong disagreement with someone who identifies as 'on the left', it was fairly amicable and we reached a point where we could understand where each of us was coming from. If you want to know, a specific example was about trans people on TV and how this was going to mess up his kids, another was about DEI implementation in the workplace.
Sent hit the nail on the head. In less rancourous times there was a saying, iirc penned by commentator Charles Krauthammer that "Conservatives think liberals are wrong, liberals think Conservatives are evil." I think this is mostly true (keep on mind we are saying "liberal" in the American sense of the word). For the criticism that the right is very "moralistic" i think surely that criticism (if you would even call it that) applies to the left at least as much.
There is also the cultural dimension as well. American popular culture and academia has become so insular and increasingly left-wing that it's far easier, from what i can tell, for someone on the left to hear almost nothing from someone they disagree with than the opposite. It’s surely true on campus, and I and many others could attest to that personally. I'm sure it's not quite so overwhelming in a more conservative state, but any conservative who has ever attended college or seen a single thing a famous actor has said or read a news story in a legacy newspaper has had to read and interact with people they disagree with. Some Trumpers are incredibly annoying though, yes.
I don't disagree that this may have been the case back in the day. But is it true now? I don't think right-wingers are moralistic; that kind of went when Trump became the standard-bearer. There was a clear shift from "holier than thou, you must uphold family values or you will go to hell" to "owning the libs", I don't think this is really arguable to be honest. In fact, it is becoming more and more common for right-wing people to describe anything left of center as their "enemies". You're painting conservatives as some kind of responsible parent with an unruly leftwing teenager, and I just don't think that image holds in modern America.
Somewhat related to what you saying there is an interesting thing happening in the Republican party that it is getting less obviously religious. I think for a long time Democrats yearned for such a day,, now I wonder if they are reconsidering lol.
That aside, I think it's hard to argue against the fact that discourse has gotten worse. For the moment I will abstain from guessing *why* but I do think you are more or less correct. I didn't mean my comments in a paternalistic sense, but I think at least that the type of politicians conservatives used to vote for were less combative. Again, for the sake of discussion I am agnostic as to why this is true.
But I would add that this more aggressive tone doesn't undermine what I said. It's true, if you are left-wing nudist in Berkeley, California who only eats locally grown non-GMO vegetables, there's also a chance your social circle is more "diverse" than an 85% white evangelical town in Nowhereville, Arkansas. But if you or your kids in that small town went to college almost anywhere, if they ever turned on the news, if they ever saw a movie, if they ever read anything at all about the nation they lived in, they'd have a deeper understanding of people on the other side than the free-range Bay Area man. Because that left-wing man in one of the hearts of blue America *probably* knows far less about the tens of millions of citizens who disagree with him than the college educated evangelical Christian. Sure, the former may know lots of people, but he has a huge, huge blind spot. And it would be entirely possible to go on living that way unless he consciously chose to learn something more. It's not that people on the right can't be a-holes or close-minded. I think these are all traits that come with human.exe, no software update required. Maybe that's my conservatism talking.
So I think both sides are growing in their obvious and stated contempt for the other, but combined with what I said and Sent. so succinctly summarized before, I think (my opinion) that it's harder for people on the left to really know what people who disagree with them think. I don't mean people who come from different cultures but all moved the same place and share a kind of mixed cultural milieu, but people who honest to God disagree about some very fundamental things.
My one tiny data point I will give here is that every survey says that people on the left are more willing to cut off family members and friends over politics. At first blush that is not the most open-minded behavior lol
Social media has helped silo people with their media consumption, so maybe both sides are becoming alike, but i do think that for a long time the right had an idea, imperfectly followed, as principles often are, that accepting that people could disagree with you over VALUES was ok.
Ok, i also think is true that a Mile Pence type politician is closer to the archetype conservatives historically voted for. It is also inarguable that that is simply not the direction of travel now.
You're right about leftwing people not being particularly open minded. I saw those same stats. You don't have to go farther than this thread, GH could never picture himself working with someone that doesn't pass his purity tests. We are in a big mess and it's not getting better.
But you are connecting those two dots by saying "this can only mean that leftwing people are ignorant of what people that disagree with them think, otherwise they'd be more open minded". You could make the reverse argument "this is because leftwing people know exactly what the people they disagree with think and can't see themselves engaging with that kind of disregard for human rights". I think the latter is closer to the truth than the former.
ah, I see what you are saying, I think. Is that not disagreeing more with the potential ideological underpinnings previously mentioned? I guess I would return to the (admittedly extreme) example I gave. From what I can tell, it's not that hard, just by accident of birth, to never come across very conservative viewpoints articulated well and and defended systematically. There's no guarantee of it in high school, non in college, almost none in regular print media. In popular media you might have some right-of-center ideas appear and presented perhaps sympathetically (though also often unsympathetically). If those ideas appear there one often has to wonder if it was an accident, and it's often just background or subtext. Now of course it's true that none of these things make those views right or wrong. But I don't think I'm getting too far ahead of myself in saying it's more difficult for someone on the right to avoid opinions and arguments they don't want to hear then someone on the left. Making all allowance for individual circumstances of course.
We already know that you consider far-right publications "right-of-center", so I hope you excuse me for laughing out loud while you describe "right-of-center" ideas as those being presented in movies/TV etc. in your argument about left-wingers not being tolerant of/knowledgeable about right-wing (read: far-right) ideas.
You're crafting an argument on a basis of pure assumptions. You're still assuming a biased conclusion before fabricating a premise to fit the conclusion. If you stopped doing that, we could take you seriously.
I contend your lack of familiarity with the American right is perfectly ok but makes you look silly when you start talking like this. you are free to contest the premises but I have made a valid argument. Unfortunately, to dispute the premises you have to know something about them.
I know the American right as well as you do. Argue with my argument, don't attack me as a person. Follow the thread rules.
I would say it's more a hope born of necessity. For reasons both ideological and cultural it can be harder for people on the left to countenance people who disagree with them very strongly but that's part of why I think it will take some great national struggle or disaster to return our government to better functioning. Things will have to be placed aside, on both left and right.
Could you explain a bit more about what you mean by "it's harder for people on the left to countenance people that disagree with them very strongly"?
Anecdotally, the two times I've had a conversation with someone heavily pro-Trump, even mild disagreement was taken as a personal offense that could not be countenanced. Neither time was a pleasant conversation.
Anecdotically, also, the couple times I've had a strong disagreement with someone who identifies as 'on the left', it was fairly amicable and we reached a point where we could understand where each of us was coming from. If you want to know, a specific example was about trans people on TV and how this was going to mess up his kids, another was about DEI implementation in the workplace.
Sent hit the nail on the head. In less rancourous times there was a saying, iirc penned by commentator Charles Krauthammer that "Conservatives think liberals are wrong, liberals think Conservatives are evil." I think this is mostly true (keep on mind we are saying "liberal" in the American sense of the word). For the criticism that the right is very "moralistic" i think surely that criticism (if you would even call it that) applies to the left at least as much.
There is also the cultural dimension as well. American popular culture and academia has become so insular and increasingly left-wing that it's far easier, from what i can tell, for someone on the left to hear almost nothing from someone they disagree with than the opposite. It’s surely true on campus, and I and many others could attest to that personally. I'm sure it's not quite so overwhelming in a more conservative state, but any conservative who has ever attended college or seen a single thing a famous actor has said or read a news story in a legacy newspaper has had to read and interact with people they disagree with. Some Trumpers are incredibly annoying though, yes.
I don't disagree that this may have been the case back in the day. But is it true now? I don't think right-wingers are moralistic; that kind of went when Trump became the standard-bearer. There was a clear shift from "holier than thou, you must uphold family values or you will go to hell" to "owning the libs", I don't think this is really arguable to be honest. In fact, it is becoming more and more common for right-wing people to describe anything left of center as their "enemies". You're painting conservatives as some kind of responsible parent with an unruly leftwing teenager, and I just don't think that image holds in modern America.
Somewhat related to what you saying there is an interesting thing happening in the Republican party that it is getting less obviously religious. I think for a long time Democrats yearned for such a day,, now I wonder if they are reconsidering lol.
That aside, I think it's hard to argue against the fact that discourse has gotten worse. For the moment I will abstain from guessing *why* but I do think you are more or less correct. I didn't mean my comments in a paternalistic sense, but I think at least that the type of politicians conservatives used to vote for were less combative. Again, for the sake of discussion I am agnostic as to why this is true.
But I would add that this more aggressive tone doesn't undermine what I said. It's true, if you are left-wing nudist in Berkeley, California who only eats locally grown non-GMO vegetables, there's also a chance your social circle is more "diverse" than an 85% white evangelical town in Nowhereville, Arkansas. But if you or your kids in that small town went to college almost anywhere, if they ever turned on the news, if they ever saw a movie, if they ever read anything at all about the nation they lived in, they'd have a deeper understanding of people on the other side than the free-range Bay Area man. Because that left-wing man in one of the hearts of blue America *probably* knows far less about the tens of millions of citizens who disagree with him than the college educated evangelical Christian. Sure, the former may know lots of people, but he has a huge, huge blind spot. And it would be entirely possible to go on living that way unless he consciously chose to learn something more. It's not that people on the right can't be a-holes or close-minded. I think these are all traits that come with human.exe, no software update required. Maybe that's my conservatism talking.
So I think both sides are growing in their obvious and stated contempt for the other, but combined with what I said and Sent. so succinctly summarized before, I think (my opinion) that it's harder for people on the left to really know what people who disagree with them think. I don't mean people who come from different cultures but all moved the same place and share a kind of mixed cultural milieu, but people who honest to God disagree about some very fundamental things.
My one tiny data point I will give here is that every survey says that people on the left are more willing to cut off family members and friends over politics. At first blush that is not the most open-minded behavior lol
Social media has helped silo people with their media consumption, so maybe both sides are becoming alike, but i do think that for a long time the right had an idea, imperfectly followed, as principles often are, that accepting that people could disagree with you over VALUES was ok.
Ok, i also think is true that a Mile Pence type politician is closer to the archetype conservatives historically voted for. It is also inarguable that that is simply not the direction of travel now.
You're right about leftwing people not being particularly open minded. I saw those same stats. You don't have to go farther than this thread, GH could never picture himself working with someone that doesn't pass his purity tests. We are in a big mess and it's not getting better.
But you are connecting those two dots by saying "this can only mean that leftwing people are ignorant of what people that disagree with them think, otherwise they'd be more open minded". You could make the reverse argument "this is because leftwing people know exactly what the people they disagree with think and can't see themselves engaging with that kind of disregard for human rights". I think the latter is closer to the truth than the former.
ah, I see what you are saying, I think. Is that not disagreeing more with the potential ideological underpinnings previously mentioned? I guess I would return to the (admittedly extreme) example I gave. From what I can tell, it's not that hard, just by accident of birth, to never come across very conservative viewpoints articulated well and and defended systematically. There's no guarantee of it in high school, non in college, almost none in regular print media. In popular media you might have some right-of-center ideas appear and presented perhaps sympathetically (though also often unsympathetically). If those ideas appear there one often has to wonder if it was an accident, and it's often just background or subtext. Now of course it's true that none of these things make those views right or wrong. But I don't think I'm getting too far ahead of myself in saying it's more difficult for someone on the right to avoid opinions and arguments they don't want to hear then someone on the left. Making all allowance for individual circumstances of course.
We already know that you consider far-right publications "right-of-center", so I hope you excuse me for laughing out loud while you describe "right-of-center" ideas as those being presented in movies/TV etc. in your argument about left-wingers not being tolerant of/knowledgeable about right-wing (read: far-right) ideas.
You're crafting an argument on a basis of pure assumptions. You're still assuming a biased conclusion before fabricating a premise to fit the conclusion. If you stopped doing that, we could take you seriously.
I contend your lack of familiarity with the American right is perfectly ok but makes you look silly when you start talking like this. you are free to contest the premises but I have made a valid argument. Unfortunately, to dispute the premises you have to know something about them.
I know the American right as well as you do. Argue with my argument, don't attack me as a person. Follow the thread rules.
Your "argument" about publications like National Review was based on you looking them up on a website you trusted. It doesn't inspire confidence and it's not an argument, or if I'm being charitable, not an interesting one. You are the one who has started from his conclusion, one you didn't even reach yourself directly. Again, that's fine, but...
Could you explain a bit more about what you mean by "it's harder for people on the left to countenance people that disagree with them very strongly"?
Anecdotally, the two times I've had a conversation with someone heavily pro-Trump, even mild disagreement was taken as a personal offense that could not be countenanced. Neither time was a pleasant conversation.
Anecdotically, also, the couple times I've had a strong disagreement with someone who identifies as 'on the left', it was fairly amicable and we reached a point where we could understand where each of us was coming from. If you want to know, a specific example was about trans people on TV and how this was going to mess up his kids, another was about DEI implementation in the workplace.
Sent hit the nail on the head. In less rancourous times there was a saying, iirc penned by commentator Charles Krauthammer that "Conservatives think liberals are wrong, liberals think Conservatives are evil." I think this is mostly true (keep on mind we are saying "liberal" in the American sense of the word). For the criticism that the right is very "moralistic" i think surely that criticism (if you would even call it that) applies to the left at least as much.
There is also the cultural dimension as well. American popular culture and academia has become so insular and increasingly left-wing that it's far easier, from what i can tell, for someone on the left to hear almost nothing from someone they disagree with than the opposite. It’s surely true on campus, and I and many others could attest to that personally. I'm sure it's not quite so overwhelming in a more conservative state, but any conservative who has ever attended college or seen a single thing a famous actor has said or read a news story in a legacy newspaper has had to read and interact with people they disagree with. Some Trumpers are incredibly annoying though, yes.
I don't disagree that this may have been the case back in the day. But is it true now? I don't think right-wingers are moralistic; that kind of went when Trump became the standard-bearer. There was a clear shift from "holier than thou, you must uphold family values or you will go to hell" to "owning the libs", I don't think this is really arguable to be honest. In fact, it is becoming more and more common for right-wing people to describe anything left of center as their "enemies". You're painting conservatives as some kind of responsible parent with an unruly leftwing teenager, and I just don't think that image holds in modern America.
Somewhat related to what you saying there is an interesting thing happening in the Republican party that it is getting less obviously religious. I think for a long time Democrats yearned for such a day,, now I wonder if they are reconsidering lol.
That aside, I think it's hard to argue against the fact that discourse has gotten worse. For the moment I will abstain from guessing *why* but I do think you are more or less correct. I didn't mean my comments in a paternalistic sense, but I think at least that the type of politicians conservatives used to vote for were less combative. Again, for the sake of discussion I am agnostic as to why this is true.
But I would add that this more aggressive tone doesn't undermine what I said. It's true, if you are left-wing nudist in Berkeley, California who only eats locally grown non-GMO vegetables, there's also a chance your social circle is more "diverse" than an 85% white evangelical town in Nowhereville, Arkansas. But if you or your kids in that small town went to college almost anywhere, if they ever turned on the news, if they ever saw a movie, if they ever read anything at all about the nation they lived in, they'd have a deeper understanding of people on the other side than the free-range Bay Area man. Because that left-wing man in one of the hearts of blue America *probably* knows far less about the tens of millions of citizens who disagree with him than the college educated evangelical Christian. Sure, the former may know lots of people, but he has a huge, huge blind spot. And it would be entirely possible to go on living that way unless he consciously chose to learn something more. It's not that people on the right can't be a-holes or close-minded. I think these are all traits that come with human.exe, no software update required. Maybe that's my conservatism talking.
So I think both sides are growing in their obvious and stated contempt for the other, but combined with what I said and Sent. so succinctly summarized before, I think (my opinion) that it's harder for people on the left to really know what people who disagree with them think. I don't mean people who come from different cultures but all moved the same place and share a kind of mixed cultural milieu, but people who honest to God disagree about some very fundamental things.
My one tiny data point I will give here is that every survey says that people on the left are more willing to cut off family members and friends over politics. At first blush that is not the most open-minded behavior lol
Social media has helped silo people with their media consumption, so maybe both sides are becoming alike, but i do think that for a long time the right had an idea, imperfectly followed, as principles often are, that accepting that people could disagree with you over VALUES was ok.
Ok, i also think is true that a Mile Pence type politician is closer to the archetype conservatives historically voted for. It is also inarguable that that is simply not the direction of travel now.
You're right about leftwing people not being particularly open minded. I saw those same stats. You don't have to go farther than this thread, GH could never picture himself working with someone that doesn't pass his purity tests. We are in a big mess and it's not getting better.
But you are connecting those two dots by saying "this can only mean that leftwing people are ignorant of what people that disagree with them think, otherwise they'd be more open minded". You could make the reverse argument "this is because leftwing people know exactly what the people they disagree with think and can't see themselves engaging with that kind of disregard for human rights". I think the latter is closer to the truth than the former.
ah, I see what you are saying, I think. Is that not disagreeing more with the potential ideological underpinnings previously mentioned? I guess I would return to the (admittedly extreme) example I gave. From what I can tell, it's not that hard, just by accident of birth, to never come across very conservative viewpoints articulated well and and defended systematically. There's no guarantee of it in high school, non in college, almost none in regular print media. In popular media you might have some right-of-center ideas appear and presented perhaps sympathetically (though also often unsympathetically). If those ideas appear there one often has to wonder if it was an accident, and it's often just background or subtext. Now of course it's true that none of these things make those views right or wrong. But I don't think I'm getting too far ahead of myself in saying it's more difficult for someone on the right to avoid opinions and arguments they don't want to hear then someone on the left. Making all allowance for individual circumstances of course.
We already know that you consider far-right publications "right-of-center", so I hope you excuse me for laughing out loud while you describe "right-of-center" ideas as those being presented in movies/TV etc. in your argument about left-wingers not being tolerant of/knowledgeable about right-wing (read: far-right) ideas.
You're crafting an argument on a basis of pure assumptions. You're still assuming a biased conclusion before fabricating a premise to fit the conclusion. If you stopped doing that, we could take you seriously.
I contend your lack of familiarity with the American right is perfectly ok but makes you look silly when you start talking like this. you are free to contest the premises but I have made a valid argument. Unfortunately, to dispute the premises you have to know something about them.
I know the American right as well as you do. Argue with my argument, don't attack me as a person. Follow the thread rules.
Your "argument" about publications like National Review was based on you looking them up on a website you trusted. It doesn't inspire confidence and it's not an argument, or if I'm being charitable, not an interesting one. You are the one who has started from his conclusion, one you didn't even reach yourself directly. Again, that's fine, but...
No, sorry. National Review is strictly far-right. They're a propaganda outlet, not a "right-of-center publication". The longer you deny this, the more convinced I am that you view far-right content as "moderately right-wing". It's up to you to change my perception of your media consumption.
I just opened National Review and the current main page has 4 articles about why charging Comey is wrong, one about why retaking Bagram is wrong, and one vague one about how the fed isn't independent but the more we pretend it's independent the more it actually is which is good.
On September 27 2025 20:11 oBlade wrote: I just opened National Review and the current main page has 4 articles about why charging Comey is wrong, one about why retaking Bagram is wrong, and one vague one about how the fed isn't independent but the more we pretend it's independent the more it actually is which is good.
"Today morning I looked outside the window and I felt the warmth of the sun on my skin. I conclude the whole week, month and year it's always sunny and warm from sunrise to sunset in the whole city, state and country."
Apparently every single career scientist (read: non-partisan) has been fired or left the CDC under RFK Jr. What was it again the Nazis did? Wasn't it that they erased good science and instated their own pseudo science? Yeah, I think I remember that correctly.
Alex Jones apparently found a new way to get all the ladies:
"“I went to a gas station, I went in a grocery store this morning, and it was spectacular, being a white guy that has German features — classical German features — and with a Hitler mustache, and it was very interesting,” Jones said.
“I could tell you it had a wild effect on women. I thought they were about to start throwing their panties at me. And they didn’t know why… Lex-Luthor-meets-Adolf-Hitler looks with blue eyes, and they just didn’t know what to do. They’re like, melting.”"
I don’t have a stake in this, but I got curious as to how the National Review is rated on all them sites that scores publications in terms of left/right. So far every site indeed rates them as right leaning/biased. Who knows, perhaps the 3-4 sites I checked are not… credible, but I thought it could be useful to add for anyone else like me
Yes, even the National Review admits its right-leaning bias: "National Review was founded in 1955 by William F. Buckley Jr. as a magazine of conservative opinion. The magazine has since defined the modern conservative movement and enjoys the broadest allegiance among American conservatives." https://www.nationalreview.com/about/
On September 27 2025 20:47 blomsterjohn wrote: I don’t have a stake in this, but I got curious as to how the National Review is rated on all them sites that scores publications in terms of left/right. So far every site indeed rates them as right leaning/biased. Who knows, perhaps the 3-4 sites I checked are not… credible, but I thought it could be useful to add for anyone else like me
Don't let Introvert fool you so easily. He named three outlets, two of them under the same company, and all three of them are rated far right. Introvert does the ol' trick where he directs your attention towards only one of the three outlets while deliberately not mentioning the other two. That way, if that one particular outlet gets a less radical rating from a few fact checkers, he can pretend to be reading "right-of-center publications", while in reality the aggregate of the outlets he reads is much further to the right.
On September 27 2025 20:11 oBlade wrote: I just opened National Review and the current main page has 4 articles about why charging Comey is wrong, one about why retaking Bagram is wrong, and one vague one about how the fed isn't independent but the more we pretend it's independent the more it actually is which is good.
"Today morning I looked outside the window and I felt the warmth of the sun on my skin. I conclude the whole week, month and year it's always sunny and warm from sunrise to sunset in the whole city, state and country."
You're the one who just said they were strictly far-right propaganda. You're the "I" in that. Except you didn't even open the window, you may not even have a window, you checked one weather forecast in a faraway place. Since you accept those are explicitly not far-right you must have gotten very unlucky indeed with the weather.
On September 27 2025 20:11 oBlade wrote: I just opened National Review and the current main page has 4 articles about why charging Comey is wrong, one about why retaking Bagram is wrong, and one vague one about how the fed isn't independent but the more we pretend it's independent the more it actually is which is good.
"Today morning I looked outside the window and I felt the warmth of the sun on my skin. I conclude the whole week, month and year it's always sunny and warm from sunrise to sunset in the whole city, state and country."
You're the one who just said they were strictly far-right propaganda. You're the "I" in that. Except you didn't even open the window, you may not even have a window, you checked one weather forecast in a faraway place. Since you accept those are explicitly not far-right you must have gotten very unlucky indeed with the weather.
No, I'm not the one who calls them far-right propaganda. MBFC labels them far-right with mostly factual reporting. Between you and I, they have a far better understanding of the subject matter. You can reject reality and live in a fantasy land, but I actively embrace reality.
On September 27 2025 21:06 Magic Powers wrote: No, I'm not the one who calls them far-right propaganda.
On September 27 2025 17:41 Magic Powers wrote: National Review is strictly far-right. They're a propaganda outlet, not a "right-of-center publication". The longer you deny this, the more convinced I am that you view far-right content as "moderately right-wing".
What are we doing here buddy? Let's make it more than one page without personality transplanting.
On September 27 2025 21:06 Magic Powers wrote: You can reject reality and live in a fantasy land, but I actively embrace reality.
Okay.
Tell us what outlets you think are merely right, but not far, strictly, or propagandaly so.
(Notice I'm not requesting you tell us what MBFC labels right, but not far, strictly, and propagandaly so, which you will then abandon immediately and refuse to justify at the slightest scrutiny.)
EPT
