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Switzerland probably. Direct democracy is cool. Then Norway I would imagine.
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On January 16 2024 06:35 JimmiC wrote:Show nested quote +On January 16 2024 06:28 Nebuchad wrote:
Switzerland probably. Direct democracy is cool. Then Norway I would imagine. Is there any non-democracies in your top 20?
Probably not, I can't think of one that would be in. I inserted "probably" because since I'm a normal person I have never made a top 20 of the countries I prefer politically.
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On January 16 2024 06:43 JimmiC wrote:Show nested quote +On January 16 2024 06:41 Nebuchad wrote:On January 16 2024 06:35 JimmiC wrote:On January 16 2024 06:28 Nebuchad wrote:
Switzerland probably. Direct democracy is cool. Then Norway I would imagine. Is there any non-democracies in your top 20? Probably not, I can't think of one that would be in. I inserted "probably" because since I'm a normal person I have never made a top 20 of the countries I prefer politically. Probably is good enough. I wonder why you would generally hold all democracies at the top if democracies have no values? Are non democracies at the bottom?
Well you don't have to wonder any more, I'll tell you: it's because I hold that social hierarchies are bad for humans, and the more rigid the social hierarchies are, the worse it is for humans. Democracy, as a political system, tends to have less rigid social hierarchies than authoritarian systems do, and therefore they easily rank higher. Direct democracy is less rigid than representative democracy and therefore it ranks higher.
If you follow my logic to the end a stateless society is probably superior to a democracy, but we're living so far away from that today that it's hard for even me to picture that, so I'm still choosing to stick to democratic socialism even though I've been leaning anarchist for a few years now.
All of that is political mechanisms, not values or principles. How can I tell? Well as I've been saying and you've been ignoring me saying, we have examples of democracies throughout history and today breaking every single value or principle that you can name, so clearly that can't be the relevant part.
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Northern Ireland22955 Posts
On January 16 2024 06:54 Nebuchad wrote:Show nested quote +On January 16 2024 06:43 JimmiC wrote:On January 16 2024 06:41 Nebuchad wrote:On January 16 2024 06:35 JimmiC wrote:On January 16 2024 06:28 Nebuchad wrote:
Switzerland probably. Direct democracy is cool. Then Norway I would imagine. Is there any non-democracies in your top 20? Probably not, I can't think of one that would be in. I inserted "probably" because since I'm a normal person I have never made a top 20 of the countries I prefer politically. Probably is good enough. I wonder why you would generally hold all democracies at the top if democracies have no values? Are non democracies at the bottom? Well you don't have to wonder any more, I'll tell you: it's because I hold that social hierarchies are bad for humans, and the more rigid the social hierarchies are, the worse it is for humans. Democracy, as a political system, tends to have less rigid social hierarchies than authoritarian systems do, and therefore they easily rank higher. Direct democracy is less rigid than representative democracy and therefore it ranks higher. If you follow my logic to the end a stateless society is probably superior to a democracy, but we're living so far away from that today that it's hard for even me to picture that, so I'm still choosing to stick to democratic socialism even though I've been leaning anarchist for a few years now. All of that is political mechanisms, not values or principles. How can I tell? Well as I've been saying and you've been ignoring me saying, we have examples of democracies throughout history and today breaking every single value or principle that you can name, so clearly that can't be the relevant part.
Aye it’s a correlative thing. Most democracies I know have certain mechanisms to prevent a ‘tyranny’ of the majority, have certain codified inalienable rights that democratic will can’t subsume etc.
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On January 16 2024 07:29 JimmiC wrote:Show nested quote +On January 16 2024 06:54 Nebuchad wrote:On January 16 2024 06:43 JimmiC wrote:On January 16 2024 06:41 Nebuchad wrote:On January 16 2024 06:35 JimmiC wrote:On January 16 2024 06:28 Nebuchad wrote:
Switzerland probably. Direct democracy is cool. Then Norway I would imagine. Is there any non-democracies in your top 20? Probably not, I can't think of one that would be in. I inserted "probably" because since I'm a normal person I have never made a top 20 of the countries I prefer politically. Probably is good enough. I wonder why you would generally hold all democracies at the top if democracies have no values? Are non democracies at the bottom? Well you don't have to wonder any more, I'll tell you: it's because I hold that social hierarchies are bad for humans, and the more rigid the social hierarchies are, the worse it is for humans. Democracy, as a political system, tends to have less rigid social hierarchies than authoritarian systems do, and therefore they easily rank higher. Direct democracy is less rigid than representative democracy and therefore it ranks higher. If you follow my logic to the end a stateless society is probably superior to a democracy, but we're living so far away from that today that it's hard for even me to picture that, so I'm still choosing to stick to democratic socialism even though I've been leaning anarchist for a few years now. All of that is political mechanisms, not values or principles. How can I tell? Well as I've been saying and you've been ignoring me saying, we have examples of democracies throughout history and today breaking every single value or principle that you can name, so clearly that can't be the relevant part. Yes you like to talk in debate form so you can win internet arguments, taking forever to pull anything out and giving as little as possible in return. As you should be able to tell that is not my preferred way of communication. I clearly understand that democracy alone can not have values, but I can also look at the world and see that for the most part every value I hold is more reflected in democracies than all the other forms of government. I can thereby conclude that there is something special about democracies that cause this. This is why I value democracies over all other forms of government. This does not mean I think they are perfect, just the best. To me democracy is the most important thing a country can be, far more important than left or right, or anything else. I also value the opinions of the countries I hold in high regard. They know things I do not, as the people throughout them are experts and many of them hold similar values to me. That does not mean they are perfect but I do trust them to do the best they can, and I trust in the checks and balances that exist within the system. My biggest issue with direct democracy is where is the line? When I worked in government and started to learn a little bit about the different areas, I learned that a lot of things that I thought were dumb actually made a lot of sense given the rules and constraints they were under. I also learned I know very little about a lot of topics, waste water comes to mind. Even in waste and recycling, before I worked there I would have told you that recycling was far more important than an organics program. Then I learned what happens to apples (and all organics) in the landfill (spoiler is they do not breakdown) and how much green washing there is in the recycling industry (not that it is not good at all, but that it is not nearly as valuable as organics and often decisions are made based on what "looks" like good for the environment and not what is good for it). So, ya when there is a extremely complicated situation like this is, I don't try to boil it down to good and evil or only two options. I also trust in experts, especially from those in countries or organizations I trust. And then I'll look at what countries are supporting what and who. If for example (like in this situation) I see that on one you have Canada and Germany, on the other Iran and Russia, I'm going to with a fair bit of confidence side with the Canadian and German side and it will take a lot of good reasoning for me to switch.
Remember that we're talking about this because you said it makes sense for people to support Ukraine and Israel because they're democracies, and democracies (supposedly) have values and principles. If we're in a situation where a democracy isn't upholding those values and principles, it doesn't make sense to appeal to its status as a democracy as a reason to support it, because the problem is precisely that they haven't been living up to that standard.
So I think this logic is backwards. Instead I would start with the principles that I like, and then look at the situations where those principles are materializing. If Switzerland suddenly invaded Liechtenstein and started killing a bunch of Liechtenstein...ese(?) people in an effort to annex Liechtenstein, I wouldn't go "Ah but I like direct democracy and Liechtenstein is only a parliamentary monarchy, therefore that's a good thing." I would go "Okay, in this case Switzerland is clearly in the wrong, so I oppose this shit." It's really not as sophisticated as the length of this conversation is making it appear.
If you don't like my style of arguing you could always not start arguments with me, I'm sure most of the thread would be grateful (me included).
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On January 16 2024 05:04 Magic Powers wrote:Show nested quote +On January 16 2024 04:11 Cerebrate1 wrote:On January 16 2024 00:06 Magic Powers wrote:
With questions like this the only thing you prove is how much of a pro-Israel and anti-Palestinian bias you have. I'm sorry. I thought that empathizing with the plight of Israeli townships that just faced one of the most barbaric atrocities in modern history would be a place where everyone here found common ground. Especially from you who are such an empath that you felt the need to empathize with and rationalize for foot soldiers of the Hamas militant wing. You asked about the safety of Israeli citizens. I explained that this question disregards the safety of Palestinians, which should be considered equally important. It doesn't surprise me that you still don't get the point despite me holding your nose right up to it. Your bias is clouding your judgement. Israeli citizens do not have a greater right to safety than Palestinians.
I know there are some big differences in the things you think are possible and the things folks like me and Cerebrate1 think are possible. But please keep in mind when we adopt those different assumptions, the results we come to are based off of our assumptions, not yours.
I won’t speak for him, but I view the war itself leading to death of some number of people as a guarantee. Think of it like there’s only 1 slice of pizza and only 1 person can eat it. Let’s assume the 1 slice is pizza is sufficient to prevent starvation but any less than 1 slice would mean you die. That means it can’t be shared and it can only go to 1 person. The idea is that you may as well be the one to eat it rather than your enemy. Even when you consider your own life entirely equal, when it is already assumed “it’s either me or you who gets to eat the pizza”, there is no inherent reason to give the pizza to the other guy.
You and I have often disagreed as to how much death can be prevented within this conflict. So when I read your posts, I contextualize what you say with the assumptions I know you are making. In the post I am quoting above, it feels like you are interpreting Cerebrate1’s post through your own assumptions rather than his.
Cerebrate1 has indicated a few different times he is assuming a certain amount of “either you or me” as described by the pizza analogy as a natural and unfortunate consequence of war. So keep in mind that doesn’t mean he thinks Palestinian lives are worth less. It means the framework of assumptions you are making differ greatly. I encourage you to focus on where your assumptions differ.
Most people in this world are not evil. In general when someone appears deeply immoral, it is because their assumption framework is very different. Finding where assumptions differ is likely more productive than assessing each other’s character or moral integrity.
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On January 16 2024 08:18 Mohdoo wrote:Show nested quote +On January 16 2024 05:04 Magic Powers wrote:On January 16 2024 04:11 Cerebrate1 wrote:On January 16 2024 00:06 Magic Powers wrote:
With questions like this the only thing you prove is how much of a pro-Israel and anti-Palestinian bias you have. I'm sorry. I thought that empathizing with the plight of Israeli townships that just faced one of the most barbaric atrocities in modern history would be a place where everyone here found common ground. Especially from you who are such an empath that you felt the need to empathize with and rationalize for foot soldiers of the Hamas militant wing. You asked about the safety of Israeli citizens. I explained that this question disregards the safety of Palestinians, which should be considered equally important. It doesn't surprise me that you still don't get the point despite me holding your nose right up to it. Your bias is clouding your judgement. Israeli citizens do not have a greater right to safety than Palestinians. I know there are some big differences in the things you think are possible and the things folks like me and Cerebrate1 think are possible. But please keep in mind when we adopt those different assumptions, the results we come to are based off of our assumptions, not yours. I won’t speak for him, but I view the war itself leading to death of some number of people as a guarantee. Think of it like there’s only 1 slice of pizza and only 1 person can eat it. Let’s assume the 1 slice is pizza is sufficient to prevent starvation but any less than 1 slice would mean you die. That means it can’t be shared and it can only go to 1 person. The idea is that you may as well be the one to eat it rather than your enemy. Even when you consider your own life entirely equal, when it is already assumed “it’s either me or you who gets to eat the pizza”, there is no inherent reason to give the pizza to the other guy. You and I have often disagreed as to how much death can be prevented within this conflict. So when I read your posts, I contextualize what you say with the assumptions I know you are making. In the post I am quoting above, it feels like you are interpreting Cerebrate1’s post through your own assumptions rather than his. Cerebrate1 has indicated a few different times he is assuming a certain amount of “either you or me” as described by the pizza analogy as a natural and unfortunate consequence of war. So keep in mind that doesn’t mean he thinks Palestinian lives are worth less. It means the framework of assumptions you are making differ greatly. I encourage you to focus on where your assumptions differ. Most people in this world are not evil. In general when someone appears deeply immoral, it is because their assumption framework is very different. Finding where assumptions differ is likely more productive than assessing each other’s character or moral integrity.
I know Cerebrate isn't evil, or at least I assume he isn't. For a person to become evil requires a lot, and an ideological bias is certainly not the only requirement.
However, just as you're judging me on the total sum of my comments, so am I judging Cerebrate in the same way. He has a very consistent record of placing great emphasis on the perspective of Israel and the Israeli people and disregarding the perspective of Palestinians. When he asks what can be done to protect Israeli people, he completely ignores the plight of the Palestinian people. He doesn't ask "what would be best for all?" and that's certainly not a coincidence.
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On January 16 2024 09:17 JimmiC wrote:Show nested quote +On January 16 2024 07:57 Nebuchad wrote:On January 16 2024 07:29 JimmiC wrote:On January 16 2024 06:54 Nebuchad wrote:On January 16 2024 06:43 JimmiC wrote:On January 16 2024 06:41 Nebuchad wrote:On January 16 2024 06:35 JimmiC wrote:On January 16 2024 06:28 Nebuchad wrote:
Switzerland probably. Direct democracy is cool. Then Norway I would imagine. Is there any non-democracies in your top 20? Probably not, I can't think of one that would be in. I inserted "probably" because since I'm a normal person I have never made a top 20 of the countries I prefer politically. Probably is good enough. I wonder why you would generally hold all democracies at the top if democracies have no values? Are non democracies at the bottom? Well you don't have to wonder any more, I'll tell you: it's because I hold that social hierarchies are bad for humans, and the more rigid the social hierarchies are, the worse it is for humans. Democracy, as a political system, tends to have less rigid social hierarchies than authoritarian systems do, and therefore they easily rank higher. Direct democracy is less rigid than representative democracy and therefore it ranks higher. If you follow my logic to the end a stateless society is probably superior to a democracy, but we're living so far away from that today that it's hard for even me to picture that, so I'm still choosing to stick to democratic socialism even though I've been leaning anarchist for a few years now. All of that is political mechanisms, not values or principles. How can I tell? Well as I've been saying and you've been ignoring me saying, we have examples of democracies throughout history and today breaking every single value or principle that you can name, so clearly that can't be the relevant part. Yes you like to talk in debate form so you can win internet arguments, taking forever to pull anything out and giving as little as possible in return. As you should be able to tell that is not my preferred way of communication. I clearly understand that democracy alone can not have values, but I can also look at the world and see that for the most part every value I hold is more reflected in democracies than all the other forms of government. I can thereby conclude that there is something special about democracies that cause this. This is why I value democracies over all other forms of government. This does not mean I think they are perfect, just the best. To me democracy is the most important thing a country can be, far more important than left or right, or anything else. I also value the opinions of the countries I hold in high regard. They know things I do not, as the people throughout them are experts and many of them hold similar values to me. That does not mean they are perfect but I do trust them to do the best they can, and I trust in the checks and balances that exist within the system. My biggest issue with direct democracy is where is the line? When I worked in government and started to learn a little bit about the different areas, I learned that a lot of things that I thought were dumb actually made a lot of sense given the rules and constraints they were under. I also learned I know very little about a lot of topics, waste water comes to mind. Even in waste and recycling, before I worked there I would have told you that recycling was far more important than an organics program. Then I learned what happens to apples (and all organics) in the landfill (spoiler is they do not breakdown) and how much green washing there is in the recycling industry (not that it is not good at all, but that it is not nearly as valuable as organics and often decisions are made based on what "looks" like good for the environment and not what is good for it). So, ya when there is a extremely complicated situation like this is, I don't try to boil it down to good and evil or only two options. I also trust in experts, especially from those in countries or organizations I trust. And then I'll look at what countries are supporting what and who. If for example (like in this situation) I see that on one you have Canada and Germany, on the other Iran and Russia, I'm going to with a fair bit of confidence side with the Canadian and German side and it will take a lot of good reasoning for me to switch. Remember that we're talking about this because you said it makes sense for people to support Ukraine and Israel because they're democracies, and democracies (supposedly) have values and principles. If we're in a situation where a democracy isn't upholding those values and principles, it doesn't make sense to appeal to its status as a democracy as a reason to support it, because the problem is precisely that they haven't been living up to that standard. So I think this logic is backwards. Instead I would start with the principles that I like, and then look at the situations where those principles are materializing. If Switzerland suddenly invaded Liechtenstein and started killing a bunch of Liechtenstein...ese(?) people in an effort to annex Liechtenstein, I wouldn't go "Ah but I like direct democracy and Liechtenstein is only a parliamentary monarchy, therefore that's a good thing." I would go "Okay, in this case Switzerland is clearly in the wrong, so I oppose this shit." It's really not as sophisticated as the length of this conversation is making it appear. If you don't like my style of arguing you could always not start arguments with me, I'm sure most of the thread would be grateful (me included). Your analogies are useless because you do not use them to try to create understanding, you fill them with your biases. As to your other part I disagree. Israel has a lot more values in common with mine than Hamas. That they value democracy is one, women’s rights another, LGBTQ2+ rights is another. One of the major reasons we disagree on this is you frame this as a war of Israel vs Palestinians. I frame it as the IDF vs Hamas with the Palestinians and Israelis as victims. If I framed it as you do where you put Israel on a whole has one party I would have to than put all Palestinians in the Hamas bucket to be logically consistent. And if I did that I would definitely not agree with you, and I do not understand how you can. Other than being logically inconsistent.
I've seen you talk about far right figures in the rest of the world, Trump, Le Pen, many others I'm sure... I don't remember you being so sure that they value democracy. What makes the far right of Israel so special that you now think they do? As for women's rights and LGBT rights, I'm sure a percentage of the Palestinians they've killed, since they're human beings, were also women and LGBT people. But you shouldn't need that to empathize with a minority being denied human rights, you should be able to empathize with Palestinians in the same way that you can empathize with women. It is weird to value treating Israeli minorities well more than you value treating Palestinians well. It would be like saying, okay Republicans are bad on trans rights, but you know a lot of them support gay marriage now, so that's good, we can give them a pass... No, we can't.
It is very silly to frame this as the IDF vs Hamas given the facts on the ground. The offensive of Israel is very clearly targeted at the entirety of Gaza, not specifically at Hamas. But if you don't mind I'd rather focus on something broader that you're doing, which talking about IDF vs Hamas is a part of: presenting two different visions of the conflict that are contradictory. Very often you'll accept Israel's framing as true, for example when they say that they're only fighting Hamas, that they only kill civilians because the civilians are used as human shields, that they aren't engaged in ethnic cleansing or war crimes and all the statements that they've made that seem to indicate that they are are irrelevant (I still don't know why but ok), or that they're only defending themselves, and really what else can you do but defend yourself?
This is okay on its own, you get to believe in Israeli propaganda if you want, you wouldn't be the first or the last. But at the same time that you're doing that, you also insist on saying that you're not a defender of Israel when people push you on that, talking about how Netanyahu is really bad as well and you wouldn't defend him. The issue is that, if all those arguments that you mention from time to time were true, then Israel wouldn't be doing anything wrong. In the version of the story that Israel is pushing, they're the good guys. So why do you at the same time push their story where they're the good guys, but also insist that you don't think they are?
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On January 16 2024 10:19 JimmiC wrote:Show nested quote +On January 16 2024 09:58 Nebuchad wrote:On January 16 2024 09:17 JimmiC wrote:On January 16 2024 07:57 Nebuchad wrote:On January 16 2024 07:29 JimmiC wrote:On January 16 2024 06:54 Nebuchad wrote:On January 16 2024 06:43 JimmiC wrote:On January 16 2024 06:41 Nebuchad wrote:On January 16 2024 06:35 JimmiC wrote:On January 16 2024 06:28 Nebuchad wrote:
Switzerland probably. Direct democracy is cool. Then Norway I would imagine. Is there any non-democracies in your top 20? Probably not, I can't think of one that would be in. I inserted "probably" because since I'm a normal person I have never made a top 20 of the countries I prefer politically. Probably is good enough. I wonder why you would generally hold all democracies at the top if democracies have no values? Are non democracies at the bottom? Well you don't have to wonder any more, I'll tell you: it's because I hold that social hierarchies are bad for humans, and the more rigid the social hierarchies are, the worse it is for humans. Democracy, as a political system, tends to have less rigid social hierarchies than authoritarian systems do, and therefore they easily rank higher. Direct democracy is less rigid than representative democracy and therefore it ranks higher. If you follow my logic to the end a stateless society is probably superior to a democracy, but we're living so far away from that today that it's hard for even me to picture that, so I'm still choosing to stick to democratic socialism even though I've been leaning anarchist for a few years now. All of that is political mechanisms, not values or principles. How can I tell? Well as I've been saying and you've been ignoring me saying, we have examples of democracies throughout history and today breaking every single value or principle that you can name, so clearly that can't be the relevant part. Yes you like to talk in debate form so you can win internet arguments, taking forever to pull anything out and giving as little as possible in return. As you should be able to tell that is not my preferred way of communication. I clearly understand that democracy alone can not have values, but I can also look at the world and see that for the most part every value I hold is more reflected in democracies than all the other forms of government. I can thereby conclude that there is something special about democracies that cause this. This is why I value democracies over all other forms of government. This does not mean I think they are perfect, just the best. To me democracy is the most important thing a country can be, far more important than left or right, or anything else. I also value the opinions of the countries I hold in high regard. They know things I do not, as the people throughout them are experts and many of them hold similar values to me. That does not mean they are perfect but I do trust them to do the best they can, and I trust in the checks and balances that exist within the system. My biggest issue with direct democracy is where is the line? When I worked in government and started to learn a little bit about the different areas, I learned that a lot of things that I thought were dumb actually made a lot of sense given the rules and constraints they were under. I also learned I know very little about a lot of topics, waste water comes to mind. Even in waste and recycling, before I worked there I would have told you that recycling was far more important than an organics program. Then I learned what happens to apples (and all organics) in the landfill (spoiler is they do not breakdown) and how much green washing there is in the recycling industry (not that it is not good at all, but that it is not nearly as valuable as organics and often decisions are made based on what "looks" like good for the environment and not what is good for it). So, ya when there is a extremely complicated situation like this is, I don't try to boil it down to good and evil or only two options. I also trust in experts, especially from those in countries or organizations I trust. And then I'll look at what countries are supporting what and who. If for example (like in this situation) I see that on one you have Canada and Germany, on the other Iran and Russia, I'm going to with a fair bit of confidence side with the Canadian and German side and it will take a lot of good reasoning for me to switch. Remember that we're talking about this because you said it makes sense for people to support Ukraine and Israel because they're democracies, and democracies (supposedly) have values and principles. If we're in a situation where a democracy isn't upholding those values and principles, it doesn't make sense to appeal to its status as a democracy as a reason to support it, because the problem is precisely that they haven't been living up to that standard. So I think this logic is backwards. Instead I would start with the principles that I like, and then look at the situations where those principles are materializing. If Switzerland suddenly invaded Liechtenstein and started killing a bunch of Liechtenstein...ese(?) people in an effort to annex Liechtenstein, I wouldn't go "Ah but I like direct democracy and Liechtenstein is only a parliamentary monarchy, therefore that's a good thing." I would go "Okay, in this case Switzerland is clearly in the wrong, so I oppose this shit." It's really not as sophisticated as the length of this conversation is making it appear. If you don't like my style of arguing you could always not start arguments with me, I'm sure most of the thread would be grateful (me included). Your analogies are useless because you do not use them to try to create understanding, you fill them with your biases. As to your other part I disagree. Israel has a lot more values in common with mine than Hamas. That they value democracy is one, women’s rights another, LGBTQ2+ rights is another. One of the major reasons we disagree on this is you frame this as a war of Israel vs Palestinians. I frame it as the IDF vs Hamas with the Palestinians and Israelis as victims. If I framed it as you do where you put Israel on a whole has one party I would have to than put all Palestinians in the Hamas bucket to be logically consistent. And if I did that I would definitely not agree with you, and I do not understand how you can. Other than being logically inconsistent. I've seen you talk about far right figures in the rest of the world, Trump, Le Pen, many others I'm sure... I don't remember you being so sure that they value democracy. What makes the far right of Israel so special that you now think they do? As for women's rights and LGBT rights, I'm sure a percentage of the Palestinians they've killed, since they're human beings, were also women and LGBT people. But you shouldn't need that to empathize with a minority being denied human rights, you should be able to empathize with Palestinians in the same way that you can empathize with women. It is weird to value treating Israeli minorities well more than you value treating Palestinians well. It would be like saying, okay Republicans are bad on trans rights, but you know a lot of them support gay marriage now, so that's good, we can give them a pass... No, we can't. It is very silly to frame this as the IDF vs Hamas given the facts on the ground. The offensive of Israel is very clearly targeted at the entirety of Gaza, not specifically at Hamas. But if you don't mind I'd rather focus on something broader that you're doing, which talking about IDF vs Hamas is a part of: presenting two different visions of the conflict that are contradictory. Very often you'll accept Israel's framing as true, for example when they say that they're only fighting Hamas, that they only kill civilians because the civilians are used as human shields, that they aren't engaged in ethnic cleansing or war crimes and all the statements that they've made that seem to indicate that they are are irrelevant (I still don't know why but ok), or that they're only defending themselves, and really what else can you do but defend yourself? This is okay on its own, you get to believe in Israeli propaganda if you want, you wouldn't be the first or the last. But at the same time that you're doing that, you also insist on saying that you're not a defender of Israel when people push you on that, talking about how Netanyahu is really bad as well and you wouldn't defend him. The issue is that, if all those arguments that you mention from time to time were true, then Israel wouldn't be doing anything wrong. In the version of the story that Israel is pushing, they're the good guys. So why do you at the same time push their story where they're the good guys, but also insist that you don't think they are? I don’t support the far right in Israel and I’ve been clear in this OVER and OVER. I’ve also posted about their losses in the courts. Your need to be so dishonest about that shows how weak your arguments are. Clearly Israel, at this moment is 10000x the democracy Gaza is. And yes all people die in war. It’s not silly because it is factual. That you do not seem to understand how Hamas has operated, and is operating is not my issue. But it leads you to a lot of false conclusions. Now it is far more likely that you do know how their human shield strategy works but you choose to ignore it for you Israel is evil trope. Why you do it I’m not sure. I’ve never said they are only defending themselves, see paragraph one on how you need to make shit up. Nor have I said ONLY this is total war, they’ve also killed hostages and other IDF members, war is pretty fucked up. Lots of mistakes happen with awful consequences. I’ve explained your last couple of sentences ad nauseam (see paragraph one). I think Israel should have gone after the money and power behind Hamas because the cost of fighting Hamas is what we are seeing and the cost is way too high. If you actually were arguing against my points and not the strawmen you keep going back to over and over again I would slightly understand your self righteous attitude and arrogance, but likely it is those characteristics that you embody so completely that do not allow you to understand my position and therefore you can’t effectively argue it. I can’t imagine the amount of time you have invested responding to my posts (maybe even reading some of them) and having such a poor understanding. To quote drone “ The meaning of his post is obvious and you're either an idiot or disingenious.” figure it out. (Btw direct quote so it’s one time you can’t blame me for the bad spelling).
It's very clear that in the first part you're just answering for answering's sake. In this post where I'm "dishonest" for not saying that you don't support the far right of Israel, I conclude by making a point in which I very clearly state that you say you don't. It's the main argument that I make in my post. I also talk about the extremely dehumanizing human shield defense that Israel keeps using, which you criticize me for not knowing about. Do you think maybe you should have read my entire post before deciding I was dishonest for not mentioning things I mentioned, or ignorant of things I talked about? Maybe you should have went back and deleted this part when you read the part in which I mentioned it?
A couple of pages ago, you asked "What else should Israel have done?" in reference to fighting Hamas, and bemoaned that none of us could find a good answer to that question. This is only an interesting question in the context of thinking they're defending themselves, so that's why I added that part. It also flows naturally from a framing of Israel vs Hamas. If you're just fighting a terrorist organization, then it's probably self-defense, isn't it?
I don't think it's very clear why the cost is way too high according to your viewpoint. Is it the death toll? The death toll is on Hamas, remember, the dead are human shields, so you shouldn't put that cost on Israel. Israel's defense is pretty coherent, it has a consistency. The only problem with it, as far as I can see, is that none of it is true. But if it was true, it would work. When I think of the other people who regularly use these talking points, like Ren or Cerebrate, they don't then follow with talking about how Israel is also bad. I find their position more sustainable than yours.
I've done a much better job of representing your arguments than you've done mine, or those of most people in the thread. You're insanely bad at representing arguments, and so it's aggravating when you whine over being misrepresented for small distinctions. One page ago you literally talked about the countries I support over the West to talk about how illogical and misled I am, then you immediately had to admit that you had no idea which countries I support.
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On January 16 2024 05:04 Magic Powers wrote:Show nested quote +On January 16 2024 04:11 Cerebrate1 wrote:On January 16 2024 00:06 Magic Powers wrote:
With questions like this the only thing you prove is how much of a pro-Israel and anti-Palestinian bias you have. I'm sorry. I thought that empathizing with the plight of Israeli townships that just faced one of the most barbaric atrocities in modern history would be a place where everyone here found common ground. Especially from you who are such an empath that you felt the need to empathize with and rationalize for foot soldiers of the Hamas militant wing. You asked about the safety of Israeli citizens. I explained that this question disregards the safety of Palestinians, which should be considered equally important. It doesn't surprise me that you still don't get the point despite me holding your nose right up to it. Your bias is clouding your judgement. Israeli citizens do not have a greater right to safety than Palestinians.
I find it unfortunate that you keep falling back to ad hominems instead of focusing on the points of debate. I'm not sure if there are any moderation rules on this forum, but I assure you that it would be a more productive and enjoyable place for everyone if that were a less common theme here. More time could be spent discussing philosophy, world politics, and how we can make the world a better place and less on people yelling at each other about who is the bigger jerk.
As for my "not getting" your point, you might not have read my original post carefully, because I brought up that very point there. There is therefore, of course, no need to "shove my nose" back into something I literally brought up myself.
Here it is again:
On January 15 2024 13:49 Cerebrate1 wrote:
As an outsider, you may still prefer over a thousand Israelis dying in a massacre every once in a while to an all out war, but it's not reasonable to expect Israelis to feel that way. Imagine if the country next door to you invaded and slaughtered 1,000 of your countrymen. Would you say at that point "full country to country war is a lot more devastating than 1,000 deaths, so let's just let our neighbors remain with their current regime and move on"?
You, as an outsider, are saying exactly as I said you might, that Israeli citizens should just accept upon themselves the occasional massacre rather than starting a war to attempt to stop it (you may disagree with the efficacy of that solution, but that's another topic and we'll lose the train of thought if we rehash that debate now) because less total people die in the short term. Israelis, on the other hand, would rather live, than die for your higher purpose.
So yes, I understand where you are coming from.
Do you understand the perspective of the people living in southern Israel?
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Northern Ireland22955 Posts
On January 16 2024 10:19 JimmiC wrote:Show nested quote +On January 16 2024 09:58 Nebuchad wrote:On January 16 2024 09:17 JimmiC wrote:On January 16 2024 07:57 Nebuchad wrote:On January 16 2024 07:29 JimmiC wrote:On January 16 2024 06:54 Nebuchad wrote:On January 16 2024 06:43 JimmiC wrote:On January 16 2024 06:41 Nebuchad wrote:On January 16 2024 06:35 JimmiC wrote:On January 16 2024 06:28 Nebuchad wrote:
Switzerland probably. Direct democracy is cool. Then Norway I would imagine. Is there any non-democracies in your top 20? Probably not, I can't think of one that would be in. I inserted "probably" because since I'm a normal person I have never made a top 20 of the countries I prefer politically. Probably is good enough. I wonder why you would generally hold all democracies at the top if democracies have no values? Are non democracies at the bottom? Well you don't have to wonder any more, I'll tell you: it's because I hold that social hierarchies are bad for humans, and the more rigid the social hierarchies are, the worse it is for humans. Democracy, as a political system, tends to have less rigid social hierarchies than authoritarian systems do, and therefore they easily rank higher. Direct democracy is less rigid than representative democracy and therefore it ranks higher. If you follow my logic to the end a stateless society is probably superior to a democracy, but we're living so far away from that today that it's hard for even me to picture that, so I'm still choosing to stick to democratic socialism even though I've been leaning anarchist for a few years now. All of that is political mechanisms, not values or principles. How can I tell? Well as I've been saying and you've been ignoring me saying, we have examples of democracies throughout history and today breaking every single value or principle that you can name, so clearly that can't be the relevant part. Yes you like to talk in debate form so you can win internet arguments, taking forever to pull anything out and giving as little as possible in return. As you should be able to tell that is not my preferred way of communication. I clearly understand that democracy alone can not have values, but I can also look at the world and see that for the most part every value I hold is more reflected in democracies than all the other forms of government. I can thereby conclude that there is something special about democracies that cause this. This is why I value democracies over all other forms of government. This does not mean I think they are perfect, just the best. To me democracy is the most important thing a country can be, far more important than left or right, or anything else. I also value the opinions of the countries I hold in high regard. They know things I do not, as the people throughout them are experts and many of them hold similar values to me. That does not mean they are perfect but I do trust them to do the best they can, and I trust in the checks and balances that exist within the system. My biggest issue with direct democracy is where is the line? When I worked in government and started to learn a little bit about the different areas, I learned that a lot of things that I thought were dumb actually made a lot of sense given the rules and constraints they were under. I also learned I know very little about a lot of topics, waste water comes to mind. Even in waste and recycling, before I worked there I would have told you that recycling was far more important than an organics program. Then I learned what happens to apples (and all organics) in the landfill (spoiler is they do not breakdown) and how much green washing there is in the recycling industry (not that it is not good at all, but that it is not nearly as valuable as organics and often decisions are made based on what "looks" like good for the environment and not what is good for it). So, ya when there is a extremely complicated situation like this is, I don't try to boil it down to good and evil or only two options. I also trust in experts, especially from those in countries or organizations I trust. And then I'll look at what countries are supporting what and who. If for example (like in this situation) I see that on one you have Canada and Germany, on the other Iran and Russia, I'm going to with a fair bit of confidence side with the Canadian and German side and it will take a lot of good reasoning for me to switch. Remember that we're talking about this because you said it makes sense for people to support Ukraine and Israel because they're democracies, and democracies (supposedly) have values and principles. If we're in a situation where a democracy isn't upholding those values and principles, it doesn't make sense to appeal to its status as a democracy as a reason to support it, because the problem is precisely that they haven't been living up to that standard. So I think this logic is backwards. Instead I would start with the principles that I like, and then look at the situations where those principles are materializing. If Switzerland suddenly invaded Liechtenstein and started killing a bunch of Liechtenstein...ese(?) people in an effort to annex Liechtenstein, I wouldn't go "Ah but I like direct democracy and Liechtenstein is only a parliamentary monarchy, therefore that's a good thing." I would go "Okay, in this case Switzerland is clearly in the wrong, so I oppose this shit." It's really not as sophisticated as the length of this conversation is making it appear. If you don't like my style of arguing you could always not start arguments with me, I'm sure most of the thread would be grateful (me included). Your analogies are useless because you do not use them to try to create understanding, you fill them with your biases. As to your other part I disagree. Israel has a lot more values in common with mine than Hamas. That they value democracy is one, women’s rights another, LGBTQ2+ rights is another. One of the major reasons we disagree on this is you frame this as a war of Israel vs Palestinians. I frame it as the IDF vs Hamas with the Palestinians and Israelis as victims. If I framed it as you do where you put Israel on a whole has one party I would have to than put all Palestinians in the Hamas bucket to be logically consistent. And if I did that I would definitely not agree with you, and I do not understand how you can. Other than being logically inconsistent. I've seen you talk about far right figures in the rest of the world, Trump, Le Pen, many others I'm sure... I don't remember you being so sure that they value democracy. What makes the far right of Israel so special that you now think they do? As for women's rights and LGBT rights, I'm sure a percentage of the Palestinians they've killed, since they're human beings, were also women and LGBT people. But you shouldn't need that to empathize with a minority being denied human rights, you should be able to empathize with Palestinians in the same way that you can empathize with women. It is weird to value treating Israeli minorities well more than you value treating Palestinians well. It would be like saying, okay Republicans are bad on trans rights, but you know a lot of them support gay marriage now, so that's good, we can give them a pass... No, we can't. It is very silly to frame this as the IDF vs Hamas given the facts on the ground. The offensive of Israel is very clearly targeted at the entirety of Gaza, not specifically at Hamas. But if you don't mind I'd rather focus on something broader that you're doing, which talking about IDF vs Hamas is a part of: presenting two different visions of the conflict that are contradictory. Very often you'll accept Israel's framing as true, for example when they say that they're only fighting Hamas, that they only kill civilians because the civilians are used as human shields, that they aren't engaged in ethnic cleansing or war crimes and all the statements that they've made that seem to indicate that they are are irrelevant (I still don't know why but ok), or that they're only defending themselves, and really what else can you do but defend yourself? This is okay on its own, you get to believe in Israeli propaganda if you want, you wouldn't be the first or the last. But at the same time that you're doing that, you also insist on saying that you're not a defender of Israel when people push you on that, talking about how Netanyahu is really bad as well and you wouldn't defend him. The issue is that, if all those arguments that you mention from time to time were true, then Israel wouldn't be doing anything wrong. In the version of the story that Israel is pushing, they're the good guys. So why do you at the same time push their story where they're the good guys, but also insist that you don't think they are? I don’t support the far right in Israel and I’ve been clear in this OVER and OVER. I’ve also posted about their losses in the courts. Your need to be so dishonest about that shows how weak your arguments are. Clearly Israel, at this moment is 10000x the democracy Gaza is. And yes all people die in war. It’s not silly because it is factual. That you do not seem to understand how Hamas has operated, and is operating is not my issue. But it leads you to a lot of false conclusions. Now it is far more likely that you do know how their human shield strategy works but you choose to ignore it for you Israel is evil trope. Why you do it I’m not sure. I’ve never said they are only defending themselves, see paragraph one on how you need to make shit up. Nor have I said ONLY this is total war, they’ve also killed hostages and other IDF members, war is pretty fucked up. Lots of mistakes happen with awful consequences. I’ve explained your last couple of sentences ad nauseam (see paragraph one). I think Israel should have gone after the money and power behind Hamas because the cost of fighting Hamas is what we are seeing and the cost is way too high. If you actually were arguing against my points and not the strawmen you keep going back to over and over again I would slightly understand your self righteous attitude and arrogance, but likely it is those characteristics that you embody so completely that do not allow you to understand my position and therefore you can’t effectively argue it. I can’t imagine the amount of time you have invested responding to my posts (maybe even reading some of them) and having such a poor understanding. To quote drone “ The meaning of his post is obvious and you're either an idiot or disingenious.” figure it out. (Btw direct quote so it’s one time you can’t blame me for the bad spelling).
I think Neb has done a pretty fair interpretation of some of your points of view. You view certain things through a lens of liberal democratic values, in much the same way a GH views topics through his ideological prescriptions.
Which isn’t a particular criticism, indeed quite the opposite at a core level. Not much point espousing values one doesn’t actually ascribe to and have some investment in.
I’ll just note that, and something I’m guilty of is while there is overlap, democracy or democratic values are not 100% descriptors of a kind of egalitarian, respect for inalienable human rights in the way people often use the term. What you’d call that idk, but that kind of (I suppose Western) universalism is certainly an aspiration I’d also subscribe to being more widespread across the globe.
These are different phenomena though, conflating the two enables contradictory logic, as I think is somewhat the case here and what Neb mentioned.
We can’t demarcate a shifting line between the Israeli people and civic society depending on the issue, precisely because of Israel’s democratic structures. Certainly we can avoid ‘all Israeli’ pitfalls but if we’re doling out credit for egalitarian values in certain areas to the former, but absolving on the latter it’s a bit inconsistent as an approach.
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On January 16 2024 10:55 Cerebrate1 wrote:Show nested quote +On January 16 2024 05:04 Magic Powers wrote:On January 16 2024 04:11 Cerebrate1 wrote:On January 16 2024 00:06 Magic Powers wrote:
With questions like this the only thing you prove is how much of a pro-Israel and anti-Palestinian bias you have. I'm sorry. I thought that empathizing with the plight of Israeli townships that just faced one of the most barbaric atrocities in modern history would be a place where everyone here found common ground. Especially from you who are such an empath that you felt the need to empathize with and rationalize for foot soldiers of the Hamas militant wing. You asked about the safety of Israeli citizens. I explained that this question disregards the safety of Palestinians, which should be considered equally important. It doesn't surprise me that you still don't get the point despite me holding your nose right up to it. Your bias is clouding your judgement. Israeli citizens do not have a greater right to safety than Palestinians. I find it unfortunate that you keep falling back to ad hominems instead of focusing on the points of debate. I'm not sure if there are any moderation rules on this forum, but I assure you that it would be a more productive and enjoyable place for everyone if that were a less common theme here. More time could be spent discussing philosophy, world politics, and how we can make the world a better place and less on people yelling at each other about who is the bigger jerk. As for my "not getting" your point, you might not have read my original post carefully, because I brought up that very point there. There is therefore, of course, no need to "shove my nose" back into something I literally brought up myself. Here it is again: Show nested quote +On January 15 2024 13:49 Cerebrate1 wrote:
As an outsider, you may still prefer over a thousand Israelis dying in a massacre every once in a while to an all out war, but it's not reasonable to expect Israelis to feel that way. Imagine if the country next door to you invaded and slaughtered 1,000 of your countrymen. Would you say at that point "full country to country war is a lot more devastating than 1,000 deaths, so let's just let our neighbors remain with their current regime and move on"? You, as an outsider, are saying exactly as I said you might, that Israeli citizens should just accept upon themselves the occasional massacre rather than starting a war to attempt to stop it (you may disagree with the efficacy of that solution, but that's another topic and we'll lose the train of thought if we rehash that debate now) because less total people die in the short term. Israelis, on the other hand, would rather live, than die for your higher purpose. So yes, I understand where you are coming from. Do you understand the perspective of the people living in southern Israel?
I've said nowhere that Israelis should accept getting massacred. I added an "/s" at the end of my remark specifically to let you know that your insinuation was absurd to begin with. Unlike you I care about both Israeli lives and Palestinian lives, while you only care about Israeli ones.
And no, you did not address the point I made at all. Nothing in this quote addresses my point:
"As an outsider, you may still prefer over a thousand Israelis dying in a massacre every once in a while to an all out war, but it's not reasonable to expect Israelis to feel that way. Imagine if the country next door to you invaded and slaughtered 1,000 of your countrymen. Would you say at that point "full country to country war is a lot more devastating than 1,000 deaths, so let's just let our neighbors remain with their current regime and move on"?"
There's just nothing there about Palestinians. Literally not one word.
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Northern Ireland22955 Posts
On January 16 2024 19:13 Magic Powers wrote:Show nested quote +On January 16 2024 10:55 Cerebrate1 wrote:On January 16 2024 05:04 Magic Powers wrote:On January 16 2024 04:11 Cerebrate1 wrote:On January 16 2024 00:06 Magic Powers wrote:
With questions like this the only thing you prove is how much of a pro-Israel and anti-Palestinian bias you have. I'm sorry. I thought that empathizing with the plight of Israeli townships that just faced one of the most barbaric atrocities in modern history would be a place where everyone here found common ground. Especially from you who are such an empath that you felt the need to empathize with and rationalize for foot soldiers of the Hamas militant wing. You asked about the safety of Israeli citizens. I explained that this question disregards the safety of Palestinians, which should be considered equally important. It doesn't surprise me that you still don't get the point despite me holding your nose right up to it. Your bias is clouding your judgement. Israeli citizens do not have a greater right to safety than Palestinians. I find it unfortunate that you keep falling back to ad hominems instead of focusing on the points of debate. I'm not sure if there are any moderation rules on this forum, but I assure you that it would be a more productive and enjoyable place for everyone if that were a less common theme here. More time could be spent discussing philosophy, world politics, and how we can make the world a better place and less on people yelling at each other about who is the bigger jerk. As for my "not getting" your point, you might not have read my original post carefully, because I brought up that very point there. There is therefore, of course, no need to "shove my nose" back into something I literally brought up myself. Here it is again: On January 15 2024 13:49 Cerebrate1 wrote:
As an outsider, you may still prefer over a thousand Israelis dying in a massacre every once in a while to an all out war, but it's not reasonable to expect Israelis to feel that way. Imagine if the country next door to you invaded and slaughtered 1,000 of your countrymen. Would you say at that point "full country to country war is a lot more devastating than 1,000 deaths, so let's just let our neighbors remain with their current regime and move on"? You, as an outsider, are saying exactly as I said you might, that Israeli citizens should just accept upon themselves the occasional massacre rather than starting a war to attempt to stop it (you may disagree with the efficacy of that solution, but that's another topic and we'll lose the train of thought if we rehash that debate now) because less total people die in the short term. Israelis, on the other hand, would rather live, than die for your higher purpose. So yes, I understand where you are coming from. Do you understand the perspective of the people living in southern Israel? I've said nowhere that Israelis should accept getting massacred. I added an "/s" at the end of my remark specifically to let you know that your insinuation was absurd to begin with. Unlike you I care about both Israeli lives and Palestinian lives, while you only care about Israeli ones. And no, you did not address the point I made at all. Nothing in this quote addresses my point: "As an outsider, you may still prefer over a thousand Israelis dying in a massacre every once in a while to an all out war, but it's not reasonable to expect Israelis to feel that way. Imagine if the country next door to you invaded and slaughtered 1,000 of your countrymen. Would you say at that point "full country to country war is a lot more devastating than 1,000 deaths, so let's just let our neighbors remain with their current regime and move on"?" There's just nothing there about Palestinians. Literally not one word.
There’s a certain amount of abstraction when we get to a nation state so it’s not directly equivalent, but I mean who here if offered a Sophie’s choice between a loved one being taken away, or multiple strangers is actually picking the latter?
As per my position on much of what Hamas does I don’t think this makes it a morally correct position, but at least a somewhat explicable one.
The sentiment for security is a pretty reasonable one, although counter-intuitively often policies seeking that actually make said breaches more likely, as it can be with hardline criminal justice. And as it is in this case IMO.
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Regarding the pitfalls of democracy: democracy is internal, and the liberties provided by democracy (such as voting rights) are only moderately meaningful for its foreign policies. The US was a fairly liberal country prior to actively participating in various brutal and unjust wars (and if not the beginning, then the continuation of these wars certainly was brutal and unjust). Likewise, Israel's democracy may also not necessarily have a meaningful impact on the threatment of Palestinians. That is, in large part, due to how Israel was founded. It's a nationalist state and it has never turned away from that. Democracy, in and of itself, can't tame such an oppressive beast.
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EPT
