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On August 13 2025 09:00 WombaT wrote:Show nested quote +On August 13 2025 07:56 Billyboy wrote:On August 13 2025 06:58 WombaT wrote:On August 13 2025 06:23 Billyboy wrote:
That is just people not understanding that far left people, especially in the age of social media, are way closer to far right then left or center left. Closer how? I probably should have used tankie instead of far left as lots of people here self identify as far left, when I would consider them left. But the problem is that those who would then be tankie's don't like the terminology so it feels a little rock and hard place. Some similarities are they often both position themselves as champions of the people vs corrupt elites, have a binary us vs them world view, revolutionary or radically transformative goals, cults of leadership, ends justify the means, intolerant of dissent (purity tests). There are Russian and Chinese miss information campaigns that basically just change a few words like replacing globalist with capitalist to hit the different market. And you are also right that there are some big differences, but if you look at our thread with who gets along and who does not, it is pretty telling. I'm sure there is also some enemy of my enemy going on and they figure they can duke it out later or whatever. But most people expectation is that people the more left you get you will only agree with people slightly right of you and disagree more the further right someone gets. That simply is not how it ends up working out. People can disagree with the why's but our thread is a perfect example. GH has always gotten along better and agreed more with the rightwing people than with those center left. I believe this is why people believe GH is a rightwing troll, because to them logically it does not make sense that he would consistently agree with people on the right or that he would write a joyful post when Trump won the election. I dunno if this even holds remotely true.
Then do some research and get back to me. Might find out I'm correct, or you might find some great counter points.
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On August 13 2025 08:40 Billyboy wrote:
If accusing people of that kind of thing was bannable their would be a bunch of actions incoming.
It's basically what MP got banned for a few weeks ago. Repeatedly insisting that Kwark was racist because of his statement that Gazans breed rapidly. It's the persistence of the thing. Spending pages of back and forth on an argument that at worst is defamatory and at best is ad hominem. I was actually against MP's banning because Kwark was provoking him just as much with the Nazi stuff. In this case it's just nonsense and Kwark has done nothing to provoke it. Like great, you think Kwark doesn't care about dead Gazans. Move on.
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On August 13 2025 09:56 BlackJack wrote:Show nested quote +On August 13 2025 08:40 Billyboy wrote:
If accusing people of that kind of thing was bannable their would be a bunch of actions incoming. It's basically what MP got banned for a few weeks ago. Repeatedly insisting that Kwark was racist because of his statement that Gazans breed rapidly. It's the persistence of the thing. Spending pages of back and forth on an argument that at worst is defamatory and at best is ad hominem. I was actually against MP's banning because Kwark was provoking him just as much with the Nazi stuff. In this case it's just nonsense and Kwark has done nothing to provoke it. Like great, you think Kwark doesn't care about dead Gazans. Move on.
It is not that I think some of this shit is too much. It is that when you decide that certain users are allowed to accuse people of being complicit in genocide well over 100 times its hard to pick someone else out and say that is too much. That basically moralized it in multiple threads. The Palestine thread there is a bunch of users who call other users genocide supporters or worse when they do not agree hard enough.
But if there is going to be certain people immune to punishment then people just gets really bitchy and starts trying to do sneaky jabs they won't get caught for, the classic is replying to someone else but making it clear what your actually talking about.
There is a certain fairness to the free for all, we as a small community can either decide to take our own advice a do better. Or we can continue to deal with shitty behavior and justify it with, well there worse.
+ Show Spoiler +if it is not obvious, I'm not saying I'm immune to this but rather the opposite.
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You're not wrong. It's not really an easy thing to moderate with impartiality. Like I said, I was against MP's banning. It did seem to calm the tension a bit, though. It's all just very twitter-esque. At least from what I imagine as I've never really been on twitter. One side calling people genocide supporters and the other side calling people anti-semites. One side calling people transphobic TERFS and the other side calling people women haters. Very little rises above schoolhouse cafeteria name-calling these days.
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On August 13 2025 10:57 BlackJack wrote:
You're not wrong. It's not really an easy thing to moderate with impartiality. Like I said, I was against MP's banning. It did seem to calm the tension a bit, though. It's all just very twitter-esque. At least from what I imagine as I've never really been on twitter. One side calling people genocide supporters and the other side calling people anti-semites. One side calling people transphobic TERFS and the other side calling people women haters. Very little rises above schoolhouse cafeteria name-calling these days.
That tends to happen when the main political topics of discussion, such as, as you point out, the validity of the actions of the state of Israel and the validity of the existence of trans people, are things that have an observable answer in the real world that people can see and choose to ignore. There isn't really a way of generating interesting discourse from this sort of starting points.
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On August 13 2025 11:09 Nebuchad wrote:Show nested quote +On August 13 2025 10:57 BlackJack wrote:
You're not wrong. It's not really an easy thing to moderate with impartiality. Like I said, I was against MP's banning. It did seem to calm the tension a bit, though. It's all just very twitter-esque. At least from what I imagine as I've never really been on twitter. One side calling people genocide supporters and the other side calling people anti-semites. One side calling people transphobic TERFS and the other side calling people women haters. Very little rises above schoolhouse cafeteria name-calling these days. That tends to happen when the main political topics of discussion, such as, as you point out, the validity of the actions of the state of Israel and the validity of the existence of trans people, are things that have an observable answer in the real world that people can see and choose to ignore. There isn't really a way of generating interesting discourse from this sort of starting points.
You are simply incorrect on this. You can't boil down issues to binary yes no categories then judge the people in each category as good or evil. I mean I guess clearly you can, but you shouldn't because not only is not helpful for anyone, and not only because it is boring, but also because it is going to lead you to wrong conclusions about all sorts of things including the people. No one needs to be the arbiter of morality.
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On August 13 2025 11:15 Billyboy wrote:Show nested quote +On August 13 2025 11:09 Nebuchad wrote:On August 13 2025 10:57 BlackJack wrote:
You're not wrong. It's not really an easy thing to moderate with impartiality. Like I said, I was against MP's banning. It did seem to calm the tension a bit, though. It's all just very twitter-esque. At least from what I imagine as I've never really been on twitter. One side calling people genocide supporters and the other side calling people anti-semites. One side calling people transphobic TERFS and the other side calling people women haters. Very little rises above schoolhouse cafeteria name-calling these days. That tends to happen when the main political topics of discussion, such as, as you point out, the validity of the actions of the state of Israel and the validity of the existence of trans people, are things that have an observable answer in the real world that people can see and choose to ignore. There isn't really a way of generating interesting discourse from this sort of starting points. You are simply incorrect on this. You can't boil down issues to binary yes no categories then judge the people in each category as good or evil. I mean I guess clearly you can, but you shouldn't because not only is not helpful for anyone, and not only because it is boring, but also because it is going to lead you to wrong conclusions about all sorts of things including the people. No one needs to be the arbiter of morality.
As you can see from the post you just quoted, I didn't judge them as good or evil, I just said that there is an observable answer in the real world so it doesn't lead to interesting discussions.
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On August 13 2025 11:09 Nebuchad wrote:Show nested quote +On August 13 2025 10:57 BlackJack wrote:
You're not wrong. It's not really an easy thing to moderate with impartiality. Like I said, I was against MP's banning. It did seem to calm the tension a bit, though. It's all just very twitter-esque. At least from what I imagine as I've never really been on twitter. One side calling people genocide supporters and the other side calling people anti-semites. One side calling people transphobic TERFS and the other side calling people women haters. Very little rises above schoolhouse cafeteria name-calling these days. That tends to happen when the main political topics of discussion, such as, as you point out, the validity of the actions of the state of Israel and the validity of the existence of trans people, are things that have an observable answer in the real world that people can see and choose to ignore. There isn't really a way of generating interesting discourse from this sort of starting points.
Agreed, when people's best attempt at framing a prompt is "Should we slaughter Gazan babies?" and "Do trans people have a right to exist?" There's really only way for the debate to go. Especially if you just dig your heels in, stick your fingers in your ears, and insist that's really the case the other side is arguing.
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On August 13 2025 11:21 BlackJack wrote:Show nested quote +On August 13 2025 11:09 Nebuchad wrote:On August 13 2025 10:57 BlackJack wrote:
You're not wrong. It's not really an easy thing to moderate with impartiality. Like I said, I was against MP's banning. It did seem to calm the tension a bit, though. It's all just very twitter-esque. At least from what I imagine as I've never really been on twitter. One side calling people genocide supporters and the other side calling people anti-semites. One side calling people transphobic TERFS and the other side calling people women haters. Very little rises above schoolhouse cafeteria name-calling these days. That tends to happen when the main political topics of discussion, such as, as you point out, the validity of the actions of the state of Israel and the validity of the existence of trans people, are things that have an observable answer in the real world that people can see and choose to ignore. There isn't really a way of generating interesting discourse from this sort of starting points. Agreed, when people's best attempt at framing a prompt is "Should we slaughter Gazan babies?" and "Do trans people have a right to exist?" There's really only way for the debate to go. Especially if you just dig your heels in, stick your fingers in your ears, and insist that's really the case the other side is arguing.
Need I remind you that when you tried to explain the case of the rightwing on trans people to me, you went immediately to "rape in prison", an event that happens all the time without trans people involved and will continue to happen routinely no matter how you decide to treat trans people?
There isn't a "good case" that the other side is arguing. They're simply not operating from a rational starting point.
Edit: also since we're soon going to be reminded that this isn't the thread to talk about this, let's produce a list of stuff that the rightwing is currently doing with regards to trans people:
" Many of the new policies are tied up in the courts, and a full accounting of the administration’s actions is difficult to pin down. But they have included:
- Removing trans people from the military
- Sending the FBI and the Justice Department to investigate hospitals that offer particular medical services for trans children
- Eliminating any mention of trans people on federal websites; stopping data collection on health issues
- Removing trans people from hate crime surveys
- Suing states for allowing trans athletes to play on high school sports teams
- Dropping Fair Housing investigations
- Ending reimbursements by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission for state and local agencies that investigate gender identity claims"
Looking at this list, what do we reckon the rightwing is trying to do with regard to trans people? Let's create two columns, one that "protects women" and one that "denies the existence of trans people", which of these policies would you put in which column?
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On August 13 2025 11:20 Nebuchad wrote:Show nested quote +On August 13 2025 11:15 Billyboy wrote:On August 13 2025 11:09 Nebuchad wrote:On August 13 2025 10:57 BlackJack wrote:
You're not wrong. It's not really an easy thing to moderate with impartiality. Like I said, I was against MP's banning. It did seem to calm the tension a bit, though. It's all just very twitter-esque. At least from what I imagine as I've never really been on twitter. One side calling people genocide supporters and the other side calling people anti-semites. One side calling people transphobic TERFS and the other side calling people women haters. Very little rises above schoolhouse cafeteria name-calling these days. That tends to happen when the main political topics of discussion, such as, as you point out, the validity of the actions of the state of Israel and the validity of the existence of trans people, are things that have an observable answer in the real world that people can see and choose to ignore. There isn't really a way of generating interesting discourse from this sort of starting points. You are simply incorrect on this. You can't boil down issues to binary yes no categories then judge the people in each category as good or evil. I mean I guess clearly you can, but you shouldn't because not only is not helpful for anyone, and not only because it is boring, but also because it is going to lead you to wrong conclusions about all sorts of things including the people. No one needs to be the arbiter of morality. As you can see from the post you just quoted, I didn't judge them as good or evil, I just said that there is an observable answer in the real world so it doesn't lead to interesting discussions.
Not everyone agrees with your observable answer, and I hate to break it to you but you are not infallible. And if you don't want discussions, just do not participate.
As BJ pointed out there is other platforms if you just want to send your message out in one direction, discussion boards are meant for a back and forth, it says so in the name.
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On August 13 2025 11:26 Billyboy wrote:Show nested quote +On August 13 2025 11:20 Nebuchad wrote:On August 13 2025 11:15 Billyboy wrote:On August 13 2025 11:09 Nebuchad wrote:On August 13 2025 10:57 BlackJack wrote:
You're not wrong. It's not really an easy thing to moderate with impartiality. Like I said, I was against MP's banning. It did seem to calm the tension a bit, though. It's all just very twitter-esque. At least from what I imagine as I've never really been on twitter. One side calling people genocide supporters and the other side calling people anti-semites. One side calling people transphobic TERFS and the other side calling people women haters. Very little rises above schoolhouse cafeteria name-calling these days. That tends to happen when the main political topics of discussion, such as, as you point out, the validity of the actions of the state of Israel and the validity of the existence of trans people, are things that have an observable answer in the real world that people can see and choose to ignore. There isn't really a way of generating interesting discourse from this sort of starting points. You are simply incorrect on this. You can't boil down issues to binary yes no categories then judge the people in each category as good or evil. I mean I guess clearly you can, but you shouldn't because not only is not helpful for anyone, and not only because it is boring, but also because it is going to lead you to wrong conclusions about all sorts of things including the people. No one needs to be the arbiter of morality. As you can see from the post you just quoted, I didn't judge them as good or evil, I just said that there is an observable answer in the real world so it doesn't lead to interesting discussions. Not everyone agrees with your observable answer, and I hate to break it to you but you are not infallible. And if you don't want discussions, just do not participate. As BJ pointed out there is other platforms if you just want to send your message out in one direction, discussion boards are meant for a back and forth, it says so in the name.
What you can do in this situation is explain what specifically I am wrong about, instead of gesturing at the possibility that I might, in some mysterious case, be wrong about something.
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On August 13 2025 11:29 Nebuchad wrote:Show nested quote +On August 13 2025 11:26 Billyboy wrote:On August 13 2025 11:20 Nebuchad wrote:On August 13 2025 11:15 Billyboy wrote:On August 13 2025 11:09 Nebuchad wrote:On August 13 2025 10:57 BlackJack wrote:
You're not wrong. It's not really an easy thing to moderate with impartiality. Like I said, I was against MP's banning. It did seem to calm the tension a bit, though. It's all just very twitter-esque. At least from what I imagine as I've never really been on twitter. One side calling people genocide supporters and the other side calling people anti-semites. One side calling people transphobic TERFS and the other side calling people women haters. Very little rises above schoolhouse cafeteria name-calling these days. That tends to happen when the main political topics of discussion, such as, as you point out, the validity of the actions of the state of Israel and the validity of the existence of trans people, are things that have an observable answer in the real world that people can see and choose to ignore. There isn't really a way of generating interesting discourse from this sort of starting points. You are simply incorrect on this. You can't boil down issues to binary yes no categories then judge the people in each category as good or evil. I mean I guess clearly you can, but you shouldn't because not only is not helpful for anyone, and not only because it is boring, but also because it is going to lead you to wrong conclusions about all sorts of things including the people. No one needs to be the arbiter of morality. As you can see from the post you just quoted, I didn't judge them as good or evil, I just said that there is an observable answer in the real world so it doesn't lead to interesting discussions. Not everyone agrees with your observable answer, and I hate to break it to you but you are not infallible. And if you don't want discussions, just do not participate. As BJ pointed out there is other platforms if you just want to send your message out in one direction, discussion boards are meant for a back and forth, it says so in the name. What you can do in this situation is explain what specifically I am wrong about, instead of gesturing at the possibility that I might, in some mysterious case, be wrong about something.
I'm not sure what you are missing. I'm saying you are consistently wrong, on multiple levels, when you boil these things down to binary yes and no to make them easy. Take the BJ discussion, he clearly believes in the clearly of the validity of trans people, he also clearly has a lot of thoughts on the issue that people disagree with. So there is a non stop accusing him of not believing in the validity of trans people and him arguing that he does over and over again, instead of talking about whatever the actual disagreement is, which is almost always with BJ anyway something very small over all.
You can repeat this in the Palestine thread over and over with people not agreeing hard enough on whatever and some one branding them as pro israel from there on out, or genocide supporter, or whatever else is the flavor of the time.
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On August 13 2025 12:01 Billyboy wrote:Show nested quote +On August 13 2025 11:29 Nebuchad wrote:On August 13 2025 11:26 Billyboy wrote:On August 13 2025 11:20 Nebuchad wrote:On August 13 2025 11:15 Billyboy wrote:On August 13 2025 11:09 Nebuchad wrote:On August 13 2025 10:57 BlackJack wrote:
You're not wrong. It's not really an easy thing to moderate with impartiality. Like I said, I was against MP's banning. It did seem to calm the tension a bit, though. It's all just very twitter-esque. At least from what I imagine as I've never really been on twitter. One side calling people genocide supporters and the other side calling people anti-semites. One side calling people transphobic TERFS and the other side calling people women haters. Very little rises above schoolhouse cafeteria name-calling these days. That tends to happen when the main political topics of discussion, such as, as you point out, the validity of the actions of the state of Israel and the validity of the existence of trans people, are things that have an observable answer in the real world that people can see and choose to ignore. There isn't really a way of generating interesting discourse from this sort of starting points. You are simply incorrect on this. You can't boil down issues to binary yes no categories then judge the people in each category as good or evil. I mean I guess clearly you can, but you shouldn't because not only is not helpful for anyone, and not only because it is boring, but also because it is going to lead you to wrong conclusions about all sorts of things including the people. No one needs to be the arbiter of morality. As you can see from the post you just quoted, I didn't judge them as good or evil, I just said that there is an observable answer in the real world so it doesn't lead to interesting discussions. Not everyone agrees with your observable answer, and I hate to break it to you but you are not infallible. And if you don't want discussions, just do not participate. As BJ pointed out there is other platforms if you just want to send your message out in one direction, discussion boards are meant for a back and forth, it says so in the name. What you can do in this situation is explain what specifically I am wrong about, instead of gesturing at the possibility that I might, in some mysterious case, be wrong about something. I'm not sure what you are missing. I'm saying you are consistently wrong, on multiple levels, when you boil these things down to binary yes and no to make them easy. Take the BJ discussion, he clearly believes in the clearly of the validity of trans people, he also clearly has a lot of thoughts on the issue that people disagree with. So there is a non stop accusing him of not believing in the validity of trans people and him arguing that he does over and over again, instead of talking about whatever the actual disagreement is, which is almost always with BJ anyway something very small over all. You can repeat this in the Palestine thread over and over with people not agreeing hard enough on whatever and some one branding them as pro israel from there on out, or genocide supporter, or whatever else is the flavor of the time.
It is very binary and very easy. On the subject of trans people, what the rightwing is doing is rooted in discrimination and has the ultimate goal of denying their existence. This is obvious from their actions, their ideology, and their words. What BJ believes personally, I don't know. It doesn't really matter, he's just some guy. He is presenting the notion that the rightwing has some other goals and some other ideas when it comes to trans people, and that is observably wrong. That's all, there's no complexity here.
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On August 13 2025 12:07 Nebuchad wrote:Show nested quote +On August 13 2025 12:01 Billyboy wrote:On August 13 2025 11:29 Nebuchad wrote:On August 13 2025 11:26 Billyboy wrote:On August 13 2025 11:20 Nebuchad wrote:On August 13 2025 11:15 Billyboy wrote:On August 13 2025 11:09 Nebuchad wrote:On August 13 2025 10:57 BlackJack wrote:
You're not wrong. It's not really an easy thing to moderate with impartiality. Like I said, I was against MP's banning. It did seem to calm the tension a bit, though. It's all just very twitter-esque. At least from what I imagine as I've never really been on twitter. One side calling people genocide supporters and the other side calling people anti-semites. One side calling people transphobic TERFS and the other side calling people women haters. Very little rises above schoolhouse cafeteria name-calling these days. That tends to happen when the main political topics of discussion, such as, as you point out, the validity of the actions of the state of Israel and the validity of the existence of trans people, are things that have an observable answer in the real world that people can see and choose to ignore. There isn't really a way of generating interesting discourse from this sort of starting points. You are simply incorrect on this. You can't boil down issues to binary yes no categories then judge the people in each category as good or evil. I mean I guess clearly you can, but you shouldn't because not only is not helpful for anyone, and not only because it is boring, but also because it is going to lead you to wrong conclusions about all sorts of things including the people. No one needs to be the arbiter of morality. As you can see from the post you just quoted, I didn't judge them as good or evil, I just said that there is an observable answer in the real world so it doesn't lead to interesting discussions. Not everyone agrees with your observable answer, and I hate to break it to you but you are not infallible. And if you don't want discussions, just do not participate. As BJ pointed out there is other platforms if you just want to send your message out in one direction, discussion boards are meant for a back and forth, it says so in the name. What you can do in this situation is explain what specifically I am wrong about, instead of gesturing at the possibility that I might, in some mysterious case, be wrong about something. I'm not sure what you are missing. I'm saying you are consistently wrong, on multiple levels, when you boil these things down to binary yes and no to make them easy. Take the BJ discussion, he clearly believes in the clearly of the validity of trans people, he also clearly has a lot of thoughts on the issue that people disagree with. So there is a non stop accusing him of not believing in the validity of trans people and him arguing that he does over and over again, instead of talking about whatever the actual disagreement is, which is almost always with BJ anyway something very small over all. You can repeat this in the Palestine thread over and over with people not agreeing hard enough on whatever and some one branding them as pro israel from there on out, or genocide supporter, or whatever else is the flavor of the time. It is very binary and very easy. On the subject of trans people, what the rightwing is doing is rooted in discrimination and has the ultimate goal of denying their existence. This is obvious from their actions, their ideology, and their words. What BJ believes personally, I don't know. It doesn't really matter, he's just some guy. He is presenting the notion that the rightwing has some other goals and some other ideas when it comes to trans people, and that is observably wrong. That's all, there's no complexity here.
Almost, you are right that the nebulous rightwing is doing that, and you are correct that BJ is not the nebulous rightwing. So the ask is to discuss with BJ what BJ thinks and not constantly act as though he has all the exact nebulous "rightwing" beliefs. Now with oBlade you can can probably do that without much issue, he basically agrees with everything MAGA. With GH if you go with what ever is the farthest left opinion, bam you probably nailed him. But the rest of the people, for the most part, have more complex and differing views. It is interesting to talk to people about those, especially when there are so many (or could be) different persepctives from people all over the globe.
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United States44171 Posts
On August 13 2025 07:21 Nebuchad wrote:Show nested quote +On August 13 2025 07:04 KwarK wrote:On August 13 2025 06:58 WombaT wrote:On August 13 2025 06:23 Billyboy wrote:
That is just people not understanding that far left people, especially in the age of social media, are way closer to far right then left or center left. Closer how? They absolutely loathe neoliberalism. Conservatives and communists both agree that it’s the worst and that anyone who thinks it’s a basically tolerable state of affairs is the enemy. 1. Conservatives do not loathe neoliberalism. 2. Even if they did, that's not how you determine that people's politics are similar.
Liberalism and conservatism is the iconic historical political struggle. Fundamental rights and freedoms vs hierarchies. You might as well assert that Superman and Lex Luther aren’t opposed for all the good it’ll do you.
Communists and conservatives both believe the individual should be subsumed to the hierarchy. They believe that the country or the society or whatever the fuck else they’re building is what matters, not the individuals within it. They disagree strongly about what it should look like but not that they should build it and that they should trample individuals to do so.
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On August 13 2025 12:18 Billyboy wrote:Show nested quote +On August 13 2025 12:07 Nebuchad wrote:On August 13 2025 12:01 Billyboy wrote:On August 13 2025 11:29 Nebuchad wrote:On August 13 2025 11:26 Billyboy wrote:On August 13 2025 11:20 Nebuchad wrote:On August 13 2025 11:15 Billyboy wrote:On August 13 2025 11:09 Nebuchad wrote:On August 13 2025 10:57 BlackJack wrote:
You're not wrong. It's not really an easy thing to moderate with impartiality. Like I said, I was against MP's banning. It did seem to calm the tension a bit, though. It's all just very twitter-esque. At least from what I imagine as I've never really been on twitter. One side calling people genocide supporters and the other side calling people anti-semites. One side calling people transphobic TERFS and the other side calling people women haters. Very little rises above schoolhouse cafeteria name-calling these days. That tends to happen when the main political topics of discussion, such as, as you point out, the validity of the actions of the state of Israel and the validity of the existence of trans people, are things that have an observable answer in the real world that people can see and choose to ignore. There isn't really a way of generating interesting discourse from this sort of starting points. You are simply incorrect on this. You can't boil down issues to binary yes no categories then judge the people in each category as good or evil. I mean I guess clearly you can, but you shouldn't because not only is not helpful for anyone, and not only because it is boring, but also because it is going to lead you to wrong conclusions about all sorts of things including the people. No one needs to be the arbiter of morality. As you can see from the post you just quoted, I didn't judge them as good or evil, I just said that there is an observable answer in the real world so it doesn't lead to interesting discussions. Not everyone agrees with your observable answer, and I hate to break it to you but you are not infallible. And if you don't want discussions, just do not participate. As BJ pointed out there is other platforms if you just want to send your message out in one direction, discussion boards are meant for a back and forth, it says so in the name. What you can do in this situation is explain what specifically I am wrong about, instead of gesturing at the possibility that I might, in some mysterious case, be wrong about something. I'm not sure what you are missing. I'm saying you are consistently wrong, on multiple levels, when you boil these things down to binary yes and no to make them easy. Take the BJ discussion, he clearly believes in the clearly of the validity of trans people, he also clearly has a lot of thoughts on the issue that people disagree with. So there is a non stop accusing him of not believing in the validity of trans people and him arguing that he does over and over again, instead of talking about whatever the actual disagreement is, which is almost always with BJ anyway something very small over all. You can repeat this in the Palestine thread over and over with people not agreeing hard enough on whatever and some one branding them as pro israel from there on out, or genocide supporter, or whatever else is the flavor of the time. It is very binary and very easy. On the subject of trans people, what the rightwing is doing is rooted in discrimination and has the ultimate goal of denying their existence. This is obvious from their actions, their ideology, and their words. What BJ believes personally, I don't know. It doesn't really matter, he's just some guy. He is presenting the notion that the rightwing has some other goals and some other ideas when it comes to trans people, and that is observably wrong. That's all, there's no complexity here. Almost, you are right that the nebulous rightwing is doing that, and you are correct that BJ is not the nebulous rightwing. So the ask is to discuss with BJ what BJ thinks and not constantly act as though he has all the exact nebulous "rightwing" beliefs. Now with oBlade you can can probably do that without much issue, he basically agrees with everything MAGA. With GH if you go with what ever is the farthest left opinion, bam you probably nailed him. But the rest of the people, for the most part, have more complex and differing views. It is interesting to talk to people about those, especially when there are so many (or could be) different persepctives from people all over the globe.
BJ made the argument that the rightwing, which is not nebulous at all it's currently governing the United States of America, has some good points when it comes to trans people and that they aren't trying to deny the existence of trans people. This is obviously wrong from their actions, their ideology and their words. Unless you want to argue that he didn't believe in his own argument, this is a discussion of what he thinks.
On August 13 2025 12:31 KwarK wrote:
Liberalism and conservatism is the iconic historical political struggle. Fundamental rights and freedoms vs hierarchies. You might as well assert that Superman and Lex Luther aren’t opposed for all the good it’ll do you.
Communists and conservatives both believe the individual should be subsumed to the hierarchy. They believe that the country or the society or whatever the fuck else they’re building is what matters, not the individuals within it. They disagree strongly about what it should look like but not that they should build it and that they should trample individuals to do so.
This is mixing up terms from different political periods and/or models. Liberalism in the historical period as you use it here, with opposition to hierarchies as the main point, is synonymous with leftism, so if that's the understanding of liberalism that we're going with then the horseshoe doesn't work anymore as leftists and liberals represent the same faction. It is also unclear what the "neo" refers to here, which is mayhaps why you dropped it from this post.
As you know neoliberalism is closely associated with Reagan and Thatcher in its origin (but yeah it was a team effort the other parties were also involved), and conservatives continue to routinely defend that legacy to this day.
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We already know KwarK is annoyed with how "liberalism" is used in the US, and that could probably apply to US conservatism too which is distinct from its European counterparts in many ways. Using the adjective "conservative" when discussing Alex Jones is evidence the understanding is not exactly the same.
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On August 13 2025 11:25 Nebuchad wrote:Show nested quote +On August 13 2025 11:21 BlackJack wrote:On August 13 2025 11:09 Nebuchad wrote:On August 13 2025 10:57 BlackJack wrote:
You're not wrong. It's not really an easy thing to moderate with impartiality. Like I said, I was against MP's banning. It did seem to calm the tension a bit, though. It's all just very twitter-esque. At least from what I imagine as I've never really been on twitter. One side calling people genocide supporters and the other side calling people anti-semites. One side calling people transphobic TERFS and the other side calling people women haters. Very little rises above schoolhouse cafeteria name-calling these days. That tends to happen when the main political topics of discussion, such as, as you point out, the validity of the actions of the state of Israel and the validity of the existence of trans people, are things that have an observable answer in the real world that people can see and choose to ignore. There isn't really a way of generating interesting discourse from this sort of starting points. Agreed, when people's best attempt at framing a prompt is "Should we slaughter Gazan babies?" and "Do trans people have a right to exist?" There's really only way for the debate to go. Especially if you just dig your heels in, stick your fingers in your ears, and insist that's really the case the other side is arguing. Need I remind you that when you tried to explain the case of the rightwing on trans people to me, you went immediately to "rape in prison", an event that happens all the time without trans people involved and will continue to happen routinely no matter how you decide to treat trans people? There isn't a "good case" that the other side is arguing. They're simply not operating from a rational starting point. Edit: also since we're soon going to be reminded that this isn't the thread to talk about this, let's produce a list of stuff that the rightwing is currently doing with regards to trans people: " Many of the new policies are tied up in the courts, and a full accounting of the administration’s actions is difficult to pin down. But they have included: - Removing trans people from the military - Sending the FBI and the Justice Department to investigate hospitals that offer particular medical services for trans children - Eliminating any mention of trans people on federal websites; stopping data collection on health issues - Removing trans people from hate crime surveys - Suing states for allowing trans athletes to play on high school sports teams - Dropping Fair Housing investigations - Ending reimbursements by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission for state and local agencies that investigate gender identity claims" Looking at this list, what do we reckon the rightwing is trying to do with regard to trans people? Let's create two columns, one that "protects women" and one that "denies the existence of trans people", which of these policies would you put in which column?
If you know this isn't the thread to be talking about it. Why do you double down on talking about it instead of copy pasting your post and taking it to the correct thread?
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Are people's brains really so tiny they have to pretend that people who believe in opposite principles about 90% of the time are the same just so they can group people into 'good/bad' more easily?
Horseshoe theory is for absolute fucking morons with very shitty intentions.
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On August 13 2025 09:56 BlackJack wrote:Show nested quote +On August 13 2025 08:40 Billyboy wrote:
If accusing people of that kind of thing was bannable their would be a bunch of actions incoming. It's basically what MP got banned for a few weeks ago. Repeatedly insisting that Kwark was racist because of his statement that Gazans breed rapidly. It's the persistence of the thing. Spending pages of back and forth on an argument that at worst is defamatory and at best is ad hominem. I was actually against MP's banning because Kwark was provoking him just as much with the Nazi stuff. In this case it's just nonsense and Kwark has done nothing to provoke it. Like great, you think Kwark doesn't care about dead Gazans. Move on.
Calling KwarK a racist isn't what got me banned. Many other people are equally accusatory - including KwarK unfortunately - but they generally don't get banned for that behavior. My behavior was in line with the general forum culture.
People have also noted that the ban was unfair because other people didn't get banned. I agree with that notion. In a vacuum my ban was 100% justified, and I'm arguing that all people engaging in that behavior should always get banned. Unfortunately mods are very hesitant to ban people nowadays. There used to be ban waves which had the desired effect, as people started behaving more civilized. Lately there haven't been any ban waves and we can see the result.
I think the reason why people don't get banned anymore for inflammatory content is because it's often directed at KwarK. Eye for an eye. It'd be unfair to ban people if they lash out at him the same way he lashes out at them.
And you're right on the one hand. KwarK hasn't said the things he's been accused of lately. He's not asking for dead Gazans, he's not asking for an eternally ruined Gaza. And yet mods can't do anything to stop the false accusations and constant bickering. Because on the other hand KwarK behaves the same way, he likewise falsely accuses people and bickers with them just because they disagree with him.
If that's ok, then the response from people must also be ok for fairness sake. But enabling it breeds a horrible forum culture. So something's gotta give. We can have fairness and nothing will change. Or we can have a healthier forum culture but that requires a change from the top to bottom (i.e. users AND mods) and not just from the bottom.
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EPT
