You’d have to be pretty dense to think that someone truly cared about
whatever social injustice. If I wanted to eradicate poverty I’d earn as
much money as I could and then donate most of it to charity.
Nobody truly cares about anything unless they work as much as they
can to donate most of their income to that cause.
[link to MIRI donate page]
But please don’t think it has anything to do with this new wave of
Trump derangement syndrome
This ‘new wave,’ for the record, caused by his suggestion to delay
the election. It would be funny if it weren’t so sad how “Trump
derangement syndrome” has worked the opposite of its intent: detailing
just how absurdly accommodating those who use it sincerely are of
Trump’s overreach which, if exhibited by any other president, would be
cause for great alarm from any non-partisan observer.
Maduro tried to legally get a third term (with approval from his people iirc) and that was enough to decry him an authoritarian overlord who had to be stopped.
But Trump hinting again that he will not ever step down is just trump derangement syndrome (Sidenote, using that term on the motte is a failure of the whole rationalist ideal btw, it is the whole thought ender/bingofication of politics the various rationalist say they hate)
Truly, if you're unironically using the phrase "Trump derangement syndrome" outside of a context where you are being paid to create low-effort content for a dark-money-funded conservative media outlet to toss like buckets of absolute slop over pens full of yipping jackals, then you're definitely making yourself look foolish for free.
> (Sidenote, using that term on the motte is a failure of the whole rationalist ideal btw, it is the whole thought ender/bingofication of politics the various rationalist say they hate)
OH SHIT. Are you suggesting that the critical tools that internet rationalism prides itself on are selectively applied?
Yeah, it’s great you can literally make up evidence - I do it all the
time now, I’m like “violent criminals given lower sentences under
activist DA guidelines go onto reoffend significantly more often than
under more conservative ones” or whatever buttresses my argument and
they just eat it up. I suppose to some extent this was always the case
before the internet where you’d have to check the library for books of
stats to find evidence.
At first glance I took this as an edgy strawman of the alt-right.
This “it doesn’t matter if I’m right, only if I win” Gingrich poison is
killing us.
That’s as open an admission as we can hope to get of them arguing in bad faith.
At the risk of seeming superficially like a STEM chauvinist, assume people who frame things in terms of (usually biological) determinism with more confidence than actual biologists are arguing in bad faith. Note how people like Steve Sailer are oddly silent (on any non-racial non-sex based Andrew German posts getting into statistics because he doesn’t care to understand, but rather further his agenda.
These people probably think shouting “13/50”, “Virtue Signalling”,
and most recently “Cancel Culture” is the cleverest thing in the world.
Oh, and they still get a chuckle out of attack helicopter jokes now and
then.
These people are full of so full of shit. I guarantee if they lived under a Bolsonaro or a Duterte they would whine WAY more about "censorship" and "thought crimes".
This is touched on in a favourite article of mine
My best friend did an internship at The Economist at the tender age of 18 and the breadth of ignorance, supported by a breezily confident house style and cherry-picked “facts” dotted around any one Economist piece for superficial authenticity’s sake are pretty well illustrated by her brief tenure there, in combination with the article’s point that almost everybody there is essentially a disoriented freshman to the world of journalism
As a London business guy, my dad still performatively subscribes to The Economist (I don’t think he actually bothers reading it anymore, and finds it almost as loathsome as I do), and I live with him due to the Plague Era, so I often find myself spitting venom into my breakfast when it’s the only reading material in the kitchen.
That aforementioned best friend is Punjabi by the way, and I have a few other connections to India, so not very long ago I made an angry phonecall to her just to vent spleen and list every false claim or crucial omission of fact I’d just read in a feature they did on Hindutva and Modi (I’m not a fan of either, but that’s by the by: the important thing was that whoever wrote the feature was dumb). She was unimpressed to be fair, but otherwise agreed, I guess she’s just used to India being misrepresented by the Western press.
Here’s the article:
https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/1991/10/-quot-the-economics-of-the-colonial-cringe-quot-about-the-economist-magazine-washington-post-1991/7415/
Men like this are the reason I sometimes pretend not to have two
brain cells to rub together at the first whiff of condescension. Better
to be able to escape quickly than to pass the “intellectual peer and
potential romantic prospect” test (felt a chill go up my spine just
typing that). Not enough drugs in the world to make that level of
smugness bearable.
these people love lying so much that they’ll practice them in the
mirror of reddit before trying them out on their loved ones. to be fair,
if they ever tried to say a true statement their tongues would swell up
inside their mouths, they would choke and die immediately.
Irony doesn’t always come across well online, but I’d note that I was
going for a sardonic tone throughout this post - “annoying friends and
intimidating people” is a gag based on How to Win Friends and
Influence People, and in making that quip about Bolsonaro and
Duterte, I had a definite type in mind - note the very deliberate use of
the word “raving.”
I don’t think this Dark Arts stuff is very healthy - I describe it as
silly bullshit in the post itself - but there are times when one just
wants to get the hell out of a conversation in good grace, and this is a
way to do so. I also think it’s broadly applicable regardless of your
political alignments; if you’re surrounded by MAGAhats, then channeling
the conversation towards something obscure but at least nominally
mutually valued can be a nice way to turn down the heat. Conservatives
don’t tend to value cosmopolitanism as much as liberals, so talking
about e.g. Bangladeshi politics may not work so well, but American
history could be good - if someone’s extolling Trump’s virtues and
asking why you don’t respect him, you could say “Well, he’s a bit of
Millard Fillmore to my mind, don’t you agree?”
You could just be normal and say, "hey let's talk about other stuff" instead of dropping a steamer and letting the smell drive people away.
Generally, you'll do much better in life if you treat other people like people and not bad game AI that you're trying to kite into a desired reaction.
*implying that anyone on TheMotte has ever had a ten minute conversation with anyone not on TheMotte*.
I mean everyone has heterodox opinions on something, but normal people aren’t going around trying to low key redpoll people on those views.
I agree that this is generally the thing to do, but it's not always that easy. Everyone jokes about how Thanksgivings devolve into bitter arguments between feuding relatives ([The Onion has its own helpful guide](https://www.theonion.com/tips-for-avoiding-conflict-at-thanksgiving-1820840210)), and to judge from the frequency with which people complain about being subjected to unwanted political conversations, it seems like the situation is getting worse.
That's probably because of the pandemic, the crashing economy, the president trying to cancel elections, the social unrest, and the natural disasters.
But other than that, I dunno why all the normies are so spun up.
Would I be wrong in guessing that you're on the young side?
>Would I be wrong in guessing that you're on the young side?
Sadly the first president I remember from TV was Reagan, so I'm guessing I no longer count as young.
>That's probably because of the pandemic, the crashing economy, the president trying to cancel elections, the social unrest, and the natural disasters.
Agreed on most of the causes, although I'd add social media in there. Really seems to be negatively affecting a lot of people.
Anyway, I thought it might be interesting and fun to talk about the post here and get a different perspective from the Motte, but other comments aren't going well so I'd probably best bugger off and leave you all to it. Wouldn't mind continuing this conversation at some point, though.
Looking up esoteric historical or current events facts in an attempt to bewilder people out of engaging with you isn't really useful or funny, even in an iRoNiC way, it just strikes me as pathetic.
If you don't want to engage with people, just don't engage. This just seems like a smarmy way to assure yourself of your own superiority over others, i.e., it screams insecurity.
The unironic kernel of the post isn't about obscurity or esotericism - as I say in the first paragraph of the post, there are many *important* things happening in places outside the US and Europe that people should know about but don't. By paying attention to goings on elsewhere, not only do you become a better informed person, but you can use your new-found knowledge to divert away from those toxic and endless arguments about domestic politics that you don't want to have (and whose occurrence is a regular source of complaint at The Motte).
Learning to name-drop people you think your interlocutor won't be familiar with is not, in fact, a skill that improves your own understanding of the world.
You encouraged people to become better informed so that they can dunk on less informed people, not for its own sake. If you want to make a point, make one, instead of saying "oh this part of my post was ironic, but not this one," and in so doing rendering the post entirely incoherent. You're not clever.
I was going for a deliberately silly snarky tone in the original post, and the main reason I wrote it was because people often complain about being subjected to unwanted conversations about politics. My take was: if you're constantly frustrated about being subjected to political conversations you don't want to have, try engaging with non-American politics, it'll steer the conversation towards more interesting lower drama stuff and hey, you should probably know about it anyway. The second half of the post was MUCH more tongue in cheek, and the main kick I got out of writing it was making fun of the shallowness of most pompous intellectuals' knowledge in a bunch of domains. But I don't like having conversations with this amount of heat, and I recognise this isn't really my place, so I'm going to leave y'all to it.
Yeah, I get it. Explaining it again doesn't make me think it's any less dumb.
It's not so much that we enjoy heated debates here, so much as we cherish calling dumb things dumb. I spent a lot of time in the old CW threads, until I realized, man these are dumb.
next time say "if you're consistently frustrated about being subjected to political conversations you don't want to have, try being a black 12 year old in a public park getting shot at by a cop, you cowardly fuckheads, you pathetic, sniveling computer touchers"
I wonder how many group conversations that you've been involved in have featured someone rolling their eyes and making a jerkoff motion just out of your line of sight.
I've no objection to appealing to logic, but I can never decide [which one to use](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_first-order_theories). [Dialetheism is fun, at least.](https://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/11/28/paradoxical-truth/)
Not a sneerclubber but "Theory" in this context does not mean what people usually refer to as a theory, and in fact has nothing to do with it. Instead it refers to the axioms that must be satisfied for something to be a structure of the form we are interested in.
For example the theory of "Groups" has axioms for identity, inverses and associativity (and add in a sentence for commutativity if you want abelian groups, so the theory of abelian groups is an extension of the theory of groups etc.), and the theory of "Posets" has just one axiom for transitivity. That doesn't mean they are inconsistent, just that they define different structures.
Note the lack of stuff like Modus Ponens which is what you would expect any decent theory of "Logic (TM)" to have, these theories specify the structure of an object and have nothing to do with what people call Logic (TM).
For political-economy you could read some Marx which will easily win you any simple or intermediate debate (you may have to read some Lenin and Mao for high level discussions especially on guerilla tactics etc).
Yea really didn't come off like that came off as a guide for adolescents to cheat and lie their way out of ever getting into a benefical discourse in which the aim is truth not victory.
Then again idk how it goes in the States maybe it literally is impossible to have an intelligent conversation about politics/history/anything real that exists in the world.
Side note though now like critiquing what you recommended - I am so baffled at, what I perceive to be- the pre-American history of what are now bosom values.
You lot seem to love talking of Liberty and the value of English and the greatness of the Constitution, but also seem to treat them as if in a vacuum - God given.
Idk maybe I'm wrong in that but like - conservatives may be able to argue why they like tradition and older cultural values if they fucking understood them and the history of their origin?
The constitution makes a lot more sense within the context of the Enlightenment.
Our way of understanding many core values makes a lot more sense if you understand the mongrel nature of English and how the geneology of its words was used by the likes of Shakespeare and Milton and the King James Bible - and how these texts inform our modern day through the shaping of the language of social and poltical thought..
The history of religion, of grassroots politics, of greed of wealth of war of love.
The diverse history of diverse ideas from diverse people from diverse places over the last few thousands of years that made up all the places that not only the population but the ideas and ideals of modern American.
Also orangeman really bad like criminally bad. Both in that hes a criminal, hes bad, hes bad at being a criminal, and hes runs the country badly and criminally.
Thanks xxx
(Some of that was sarcastic btw)
Nobody truly cares about anything unless they work as much as they can to donate most of their income to that cause.
[link to MIRI donate page]
This ‘new wave,’ for the record, caused by his suggestion to delay the election. It would be funny if it weren’t so sad how “Trump derangement syndrome” has worked the opposite of its intent: detailing just how absurdly accommodating those who use it sincerely are of Trump’s overreach which, if exhibited by any other president, would be cause for great alarm from any non-partisan observer.
At first glance I took this as an edgy strawman of the alt-right. This “it doesn’t matter if I’m right, only if I win” Gingrich poison is killing us.
These people probably think shouting “13/50”, “Virtue Signalling”, and most recently “Cancel Culture” is the cleverest thing in the world. Oh, and they still get a chuckle out of attack helicopter jokes now and then.
Alternate title: “If you start raving about how much you love Bolsonaro and Duterte or hate Maduro, you’ll be tipping your hand”
[deleted]
Imagine learning about international politics from The Economist
Men like this are the reason I sometimes pretend not to have two brain cells to rub together at the first whiff of condescension. Better to be able to escape quickly than to pass the “intellectual peer and potential romantic prospect” test (felt a chill go up my spine just typing that). Not enough drugs in the world to make that level of smugness bearable.
these people love lying so much that they’ll practice them in the mirror of reddit before trying them out on their loved ones. to be fair, if they ever tried to say a true statement their tongues would swell up inside their mouths, they would choke and die immediately.
TL;DR
Irony doesn’t always come across well online, but I’d note that I was going for a sardonic tone throughout this post - “annoying friends and intimidating people” is a gag based on How to Win Friends and Influence People, and in making that quip about Bolsonaro and Duterte, I had a definite type in mind - note the very deliberate use of the word “raving.”
I don’t think this Dark Arts stuff is very healthy - I describe it as silly bullshit in the post itself - but there are times when one just wants to get the hell out of a conversation in good grace, and this is a way to do so. I also think it’s broadly applicable regardless of your political alignments; if you’re surrounded by MAGAhats, then channeling the conversation towards something obscure but at least nominally mutually valued can be a nice way to turn down the heat. Conservatives don’t tend to value cosmopolitanism as much as liberals, so talking about e.g. Bangladeshi politics may not work so well, but American history could be good - if someone’s extolling Trump’s virtues and asking why you don’t respect him, you could say “Well, he’s a bit of Millard Fillmore to my mind, don’t you agree?”