'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby stickdog99 » Mon May 02, 2022 3:04 pm

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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby Belligerent Savant » Sun May 08, 2022 1:08 pm

@MadameKempe

What is wrong with today’s left, part 542:

I just had a long time friend end our friendship because I said that while I remained pro-choice, I thought abortion was a complex issue and noted RBG thought Roe was a bad decision.

THAT IS IT. That is all I said. End of friendship.

This person also accused me of “union busting” because I said teacher unions have too much power in blue states and harmed children w/school closures.

The person’s final words to me were that she had “defended” me to our feminist friend group for long enough and she was done.

“Defended” me. As if I had broken the law or grievously harmed someone or was a drug addict!

This is the attitude this group takes to people with different views from their own.

If person deviates from the “correct” way of thinking, it’s as if they’ve joined the Nazis.

I shared the same views with my pro-life friends and their response was: “Interesting!”

When did the left become so polarized, so intolerant and so moralistic?

They’re like a fundamentalist religious group that sees any questioning of the “holy word” as the devil’s work.

And the weird thing is: none of these feminists can see this. They see themselves as the most rational, kind, compassionate and intelligent people on the planet — even as they refuse to engage with any nuance on an issue and ruthlessly shun people in their community who disagree!


https://twitter.com/MadameKempe/status/ ... bJ5-z3pzgA
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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby PufPuf93 » Mon May 09, 2022 12:44 am

Belligerent Savant » Sun May 08, 2022 10:08 am wrote:
@MadameKempe

What is wrong with today’s left, part 542:

I just had a long time friend end our friendship because I said that while I remained pro-choice, I thought abortion was a complex issue and noted RBG thought Roe was a bad decision.

THAT IS IT. That is all I said. End of friendship.

This person also accused me of “union busting” because I said teacher unions have too much power in blue states and harmed children w/school closures.

The person’s final words to me were that she had “defended” me to our feminist friend group for long enough and she was done.

“Defended” me. As if I had broken the law or grievously harmed someone or was a drug addict!

This is the attitude this group takes to people with different views from their own.

If person deviates from the “correct” way of thinking, it’s as if they’ve joined the Nazis.

I shared the same views with my pro-life friends and their response was: “Interesting!”

When did the left become so polarized, so intolerant and so moralistic?

They’re like a fundamentalist religious group that sees any questioning of the “holy word” as the devil’s work.

And the weird thing is: none of these feminists can see this. They see themselves as the most rational, kind, compassionate and intelligent people on the planet — even as they refuse to engage with any nuance on an issue and ruthlessly shun people in their community who disagree!


https://twitter.com/MadameKempe/status/ ... bJ5-z3pzgA


Misogynist much?

Projecting much?
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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby stickdog99 » Mon May 09, 2022 2:33 am

Just wait until the Holy Cult of Correctness unleashes the Spamish Inquisition.
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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby Belligerent Savant » Mon May 09, 2022 8:12 am

PufPuf93 » Sun May 08, 2022 11:44 pm wrote:
Belligerent Savant » Sun May 08, 2022 10:08 am wrote:
@MadameKempe

What is wrong with today’s left, part 542:

I just had a long time friend end our friendship because I said that while I remained pro-choice, I thought abortion was a complex issue and noted RBG thought Roe was a bad decision.

THAT IS IT. That is all I said. End of friendship.

This person also accused me of “union busting” because I said teacher unions have too much power in blue states and harmed children w/school closures.

The person’s final words to me were that she had “defended” me to our feminist friend group for long enough and she was done.

“Defended” me. As if I had broken the law or grievously harmed someone or was a drug addict!

This is the attitude this group takes to people with different views from their own.

If person deviates from the “correct” way of thinking, it’s as if they’ve joined the Nazis.

I shared the same views with my pro-life friends and their response was: “Interesting!”

When did the left become so polarized, so intolerant and so moralistic?

They’re like a fundamentalist religious group that sees any questioning of the “holy word” as the devil’s work.

And the weird thing is: none of these feminists can see this. They see themselves as the most rational, kind, compassionate and intelligent people on the planet — even as they refuse to engage with any nuance on an issue and ruthlessly shun people in their community who disagree!


https://twitter.com/MadameKempe/status/ ... bJ5-z3pzgA


Misogynist much?

Projecting much?


You do realize the person who typed the words above is a woman and a mother, according to her profile.

Or is this person lying? Because it can't be that a woman and a mother can type the words above, is this what you're suggesting? If so, you're proving the point of this thread.



Madame Kempe
@MadameKempe

advocate for equality, mom, lover of horses and dogs

Joined April 2019

297 Following
2,587 Followers

https://twitter.com/MadameKempe
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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby stickdog99 » Fri May 20, 2022 1:57 am

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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby stickdog99 » Mon May 23, 2022 3:58 pm

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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby conniption » Tue May 24, 2022 8:30 pm

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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby Belligerent Savant » Wed Jun 01, 2022 2:55 pm

@dogvoyages
·
I have a newfound zero tolerance policy for gaslighting. "The science doesn't support your illness" is no longer a valid argument. The science isn't science- it's a highly biased process for pharmaceutical companies to justify their actions by saying "well it was safe for most!"

As a (former) member of the "compassionate left", I am absolutely disgusted with the way that vaccine injured people have been treated by the party that prides itself on being full of empathy. If your political views prevent you from acknowledging the suffering of other people...

...you're on the wrong side of history. This is something that both sides of our incredibly polarized system are guilty of- but at least one is willing to admit it while the other pretends to be the party of kindness and virtue. The emperor has no clothes.

https://twitter.com/dogvoyages/status/1 ... BB91xLSOkw
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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby conniption » Thu Jun 09, 2022 9:41 pm

Cindy Sheehan's Soapbox Newsletter

Can the Left be Relevant Again?
An Analysis and Call to Action by Cindy Sheehan and Mickey Z.

Cindy Sheehan
June 8, 2022


Thank you for reading Cindy Sheehan's Soapbox Newsletter. This post is public so feel free to share it.
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Mickey Z: Recently, Cindy and I appeared on each other’s podcasts (Cindy Sheehan’s Soapbox Newsletter & Post-Woke). While talking off-air, Cindy suggested we collaborate on an article related to our experiences with the Left — particularly since March 2020. To follow is the first part of that conversation.

MZ: About a month or two ago, a subscriber to my Substack described it as a “conservative blog.” She did so while pointing out how “unexpected” it is that someone running a conservative blog also runs a one-man program to help homeless women. Strangely, I didn’t flinch or feel any need to defend or explain myself. Welcome to 2022.

For the record, I am not a conservative. I’m also not a liberal. These days, I doubt I qualify as anything traditionally “left” or “right” and I’m not sure it matters in any ideological sense. But it certainly matters in an interpersonal sense. For the crime of pointing out the lies and contradictions in the Covid narrative, I’ve lost friends and family members. And that sucks. Again, welcome to 2022.

Cindy Sheehan: I have had similar experiences with people for the past two years, as my comrade, Mickey. If I had a nickel for every time someone called me a "Trumper," or "Proud boy," or even the ultimate 2020's slur: “Anti-vaxxer,” I'd have hundreds of nickels!

As someone who has stood fast on her principles of peace, economic equality, and working-class solidarity, for almost two-decades in the public eye, I thought I had earned some caché, or that I had piled up some credits in the Cindy Sheehan Bank of Trust. But as soon as a ¡VIRUS! hit our shores with a bigger P.R. blitzkrieg than even George W. Bush's rush to war in Iraq, my star faded in the eyes of former friends, colleagues, and comrades; while the stars of such criminal exploiters like Trump, Biden, Fauci, and Gates' (not an inclusive list) went SUPER-NOVA in their galaxy.

MZ: I hear you, Cindy, and I’ve certainly always seen you that way. Whether or not I agree with you (and I most often do!), I know where you’re coming from and I recognize the hard work you do before reaching conclusions. It’s heartbreaking to witness the divisive power of fear in action. We got more than a little taste of it after 9/11 — when I also lost friends, comrades, and family members. Since March 2020, however, the programming went nuclear and has (so far) proven more potent than decades of reputation-building, friendship, and community.

In the meantime, as you and I have mentioned on our respective podcasts, we’ve made some new allies. So, how do you see yourself building on these new connections and addressing the very urgent issues of the moment (censorship, the Great Reset, etc.) — all while sustaining your commitment to principles of peace, economic equality, and working-class solidarity?

CS: As an illustrative example, Mickey and I had a fall-out in 2016 over the presidential elections. It took Mickey reaching out this year for us to re-establish a connection.

When we both realized we had the same ideas about the current situation, I know I was elated to be back in touch, but dismayed at the lost opportunity we had to work together to oppose the neo-fascism we were all experiencing. I tell this story because before the ¡VIRUS! I was very guilty of applying the "purity test" to my activist relationships.

I mean, there are times when there are chasms that cannot be crossed, but when it comes to revolutionary victory over the global ruling-class, we all need to grasp the fact that no matter how loony your neighbor may appear to you - right, left, or center - we have more in common with any of them than we do with the ilk of Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos. If we continue obsessing on how anyone voted in 2016, or 2020 and making the profoundly corrupt electoral process our litmus test, we cannot even begin to address anything that is not a wedge issue (guns/abortion) like imperialism and diseased capitalism.

Where do you see we can build a movement across political divides without compromising our values?

MZ: I very much hope I finally and fully learned the purity test lesson, too! But I agree that some chasms are best left alone. Better to use that time and energy to connect with someone with whom there’s some kind of starting point. As for your question, here’s my long attempt at answering it:

Ten years ago, I was still heavily involved with Occupy Wall Street. I was at several protests, events, and demos each week — often, I was the one speaking. I gave talks on a regular basis and even led teach-ins in NYC parks. My old Facebook page was a frenzy of radical activity.

That said, I have no interest in participating in the same old virtue signaling, exhibitionist, futile “activism” now. Even if I was, the vast majority of the people I worked with back then have since rejected me. First, it was my examination of “activist” tactics. Then I dared to question the trans agenda. Finally, pandemic politics became the proverbial last straw.

So, I had to go back 20 years for inspiration. I had a huge global audience thanks to the books I was writing and my non-stop articles on sites like Z Net and Counterpunch. I even jumped on the blog bandwagon to further solidify my standing in that pre-social media world.

What I’m doing today is both similar to this and new. I’m still engaged in 24/7 self-education and relentlessly sharing what I discover. But I’ve lost most of my comrades and now, social media censors me. This led me to create a Substack and jump on the podcast bandwagon. My approach is to talk with a wide spectrum of guests on the podcast while posting about just as wide a spectrum of topics in my written posts. All of this is in the name of exposing my readers and listeners to viewpoints that would be erased on any site governed by an algorithm.

CS: It's interesting to me, Mickey, that our experiences are essentially the same, moving through separate spaces. Is it because of who we are as humans, or how the "movements" are?

I never imagined before my son Casey was killed in Iraq in April of 2004, that I would become an activist, never mind all of the attention my activism got (Camp Casey in Crawford pre-dated the OWS movement by six years?).

I was such a noob when I decided that I would, with my sister-comrade Dede Miller (RIP), go to Crawford, Tx in August of 2005 to ask George W, Bush "What Noble Cause?" To say I was stunned at the response is an understatement. People poured into poor Crawford by the thousands, and we had many thousands of people around the world in solidarity with us. It was obnoxious how much media scrutiny I came under.

My first mistake in my "career" was thinking that everyone who came to Crawford that summer wanted the post-9/11 wars to end: Afghanistan and Iraq. I had so much support that summer that I felt blessed by the universe and I felt that we were really going to end the wars. All of my energy and positivity would come to a crashing halt though when the Democrats regained a majority in Congress and they did nothing to end the wars. So, I left the party, and more than 1/2 of my support left me. Fake-lefty online spaces like The Daily Kos, Huffington Post, Democracy Now, Democrats.com, TruthOut, CommonDreams, etc. left me and dropped me like the proverbial hot potato.

By the time the ¡VIRUS! struck in 2020, I was down to a handful of really strong anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist comrades. I thought if they were still with me after I left the War Party; opposed Obama's wars; and still held Democrats to the same standard I held the Republicans, then they would be my comrades FOR LIFE - no matter what. However, I think I lost more than half of those people to the “shining examples of sacrifice and morality”: the previously mentioned criminals. All of a sudden, instead of being a person of integrity and courage, I became a pariah to my own community. Ironically, the same people who castigated me for not hating Trump enough were now castigating me because I was hesitant to inject his Operation Warp Speed juice into my body. In 2020, then candidates Sloppy Joe Biden and Kopmala Harris are on the record as saying that they would NEVER inject something in their bodies that was propagated by Trump - until they became the neo-fascists in charge of it, then even the most ardent Trump haters lined up for their jabs. In my humble opinion, no matter how we personally feel about the Covax, it should be no ones business what medical procedure we decide to take, or not, from vaccines to abortions.

How can we triumph over the paradigm of war and profiteering over people that we have in this country when we always have to play the "Blue No Matter Who" Game? Look where that has led us: to the brink of nuclear annihilation.

MZ: Wow, Cindy, it appears you and I have accumulated a lot of weird “activist” karma. What shadow work do we need to do? Why do we seem to be condemned to so much acceptance-then-rejection? (Personally, I’ve always related to the Cassandra myth.)

I’ve also always flinched at decades of claims that I “never offer a solution.” I even have a stock answer to this charge. Here goes: Way too many people imply that unless a critic expounds a specific strategy for change, their opinion is worthless. This reaction misses the essential role critical analysis plays in a society where problems — and their causes — are so cleverly disguised.

CS: Mickey and I are hoping that this contribution to the current state of activism, or lack thereof, will begin a conversation about how we can “build a movement across political divides without compromising our values." We need everybody to stop the world's rapid slide into all out war and environmental devastation. We are asking for your comments, thoughts, experiences, and solutions to incorporate into Part 2 of this conversation and to begin to build the movement we need to undermine the capitalists, profiteers, and imperialists.
_______
Thanks for reading and we are looking forward to your thoughts!

https://cindysheehan.substack.com/p/can ... -again?s=r


***

Cindy Sheehan's Soapbox Newsletter

The Hitchhikers Guide to the Global Pandemic
Cindy Sheehan
April 12, 2022


https://cindysheehan.substack.com/p/the ... global?s=r


***

Cindy Sheehan's Soapbox Newsletter

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The Lockdown Left v. The Silenced Left
Soapbox Podcast with Dr. Christian Parenti

Cindy Sheehan
May 7, 2022


https://cindysheehan.substack.com/p/the ... =r#details
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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby stickdog99 » Tue Jun 14, 2022 5:00 pm

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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby Belligerent Savant » Wed Jun 15, 2022 12:04 pm

https://michaelshellenberger.substack.c ... essive?s=r

Why I Am Not A Progressive

And Why, From Climate Change to Homelessness, Liberal People Are Giving Up

Michael Shellenberger
Aug 10, 2021

For all of my adult life I have identified as a progressive. To me, being a progressive meant that I believed in empowerment. In 2002, when I co-founded a labor-environmental coalition to advocate for renewable energy, the symbol we chose to represent us was of Rosie the Riveter, an image of a woman factory worker during World War II flexing her muscle beneath the words, “We Can Do It!”. When President Barack Obama ran for office in 2008, it seemed fitting to me that he chose the slogan, “Yes we can!”

But now, on all the major issues of the day, the message from progressives is “No, you can’t.” No: poor nations like Bangladesh can’t adapt to climate change by becoming rich, insist progressives; rather, rich nations must become poor. No: we can’t prevent the staggering rise of drug deaths in the U.S., from 17,000 in 2000 to 93,000 in 2020, by helping people free themselves from addiction; rather, we must instead provide Safe Injection Sites and Safe Sleeping Sites, in downtown neighborhoods, where homeless addicts can use fentanyl, heroin, and meth safely.

Progressives insist they are offering hope. Many scientists and activists yesterday said that, while we have gone past the point of no return, when it comes to climate change, and that “No one is safe,” we can make the situation less bad by using solar panels, windmills, and electric cars, albeit at a very high cost to the economy. And in California, progressive leaders say that we just need to stick with the progressive agenda of Safe Injection Sites and Safe Sleeping Sites until we can build enough single unit apartments for the state’s 116,000 unsheltered homeless, most of whom are either addicted to hard drugs, suffering from untreated mental illness, or both.

But progressives are talking out of both sides of their mouth. Yesterday I debated a British climate scientist named Richard Betts on television. After I pointed out that he and his colleagues had contributed to one out of four British children having nightmares about climate change he insisted that he was all for optimism and that he agreed with me about nuclear power. But just hours earlier he had told the Guardian that we were “hopelessly unprepared” for extreme weather events, even though deaths from natural disasters are at an all time low and that, objectively speaking, humankind has never been more prepared than we are today.

And on the drug deaths crisis, the consensus view among Democrats in Sacramento is that “the problem is fundamentally unsolvable,” according to one of the Capitol’s leading lobbyists. Facing a recall that is growing in popularity, Governor Gavin Newsom yesterday tried to demonstrate that he believes he can solve the problem. He came to Berkeley California and cleaned up garbage created by an open air drug scene (“homeless encampment”) underneath a freeway underpass. A reporter for Politico posted a picture of Newsom who he said was “looking tired, sweaty and dirty.” But a commenter noted that the video was shot at 12:12 pm and by 12:25 pm Newsom was holding a press conference. The governor hadn’t even bothered changing out of his Hush Puppies into work boots. People close to the governor say that it is Newsom himself who believes homelessness is a problem that cannot be solved.

The reason progressives believe that “No one is safe,” when it comes to climate change, and that the drug death “homelessness” crisis is unsolvable, is because they are in the grip of a victim ideology characterized by safetyism, learned helplessness, and disempowerment. This isn’t really that new. Since the 1960s, the New Left has argued that we can’t solve any of our major problems until we overthrow our racist, sexist, and capitalistic system. But for most of my life, up through the election of Obama, there was still a New Deal, “Yes we can!,” and “We can do it!” optimism that sat side-by-side with the New Left’s fundamentally disempowering critique of the system.

That’s all gone. On climate change, drug deaths, and cultural issues like racism, the message from progressives is that we are doomed unless we dismantle the institutions responsible for our oppressive, racist system. Those of us in Generation X who were raised to believe that racism was something we could overcome have been told in no uncertain terms that we were wrong. Racism is baked into our cultural DNA. Even apparently positive progressive proposals are aimed at fundamentally dismantling institutions. The Democrats’ $1 trillion infrastructure bill, supported by many Republicans, and their $3.5 trillion budget proposal, contain measures that would finance the continuing degradation of our electrical grids by increasing reliance on unreliable, weather-dependent renewables, and establish racial incentives for industries including trucking, where there is already a shortage of drivers in large measure because not enough of them can pass drug tests. And does anyone really believe that, if those bills pass, progressives will abandon their dark vision of the future and return to Rosie the Riveter?

Meanwhile, at the state and local level, progressive governments faced with worsening racial disparities in education and crime, are attempting to “solve” the problem by eliminating academic standards altogether, and advocating selective enforcement of laws based on who is committing them. Such measures are profoundly cynical. Progressives are effectively giving up on addressing racial disparities by ignoring them. But such is the logical outcome of victim ideology, which holds that we can divide the world into victims and oppressors, that victims are morally superior and even spiritual, and no change is possible until the system that produces victims and oppressors is overthrown.

To some extent none of this is new. After World War II, it was progressives, not conservatives, who led the charge to replace mental hospitals with community-based care. After the community-based care system fell apart, and severely mentally ill people ended up living on the street, addicted to drugs and alcohol, progressives blamed Reagan and Republicans for cutting the budget. But progressive California today spends more than any other state, per capita, on mental health, and yet the number of homeless, many of whom are mentally ill and suffering addiction, increased by 31% in California since 2010 even as they declined by 18 percent in the rest of the US.

Also after World War II, it was progressives, not conservatives, who insisted that the world was coming to an end because too many babies were being born, and because of nuclear energy. The “population bomb” meant that too many people would result in resource scarcity which would result in international conflicts and eventually nuclear war. We were helpless to prevent the situation through technological change and instead had to prevent people from having children and rid the world of nuclear weapons and energy. It took the end of the Cold War, and the overwhelming evidence that parents in poor nations chose to have fewer children, as parents in rich nations had before them, where they no longer needed them to work on the farm, for the discourse to finally fade.

But the will-to-apocalypse only grew stronger. After it became clear that the planet was warming, not cooling, as many scientists had previously feared, opportunistic New Left progressives insisted that climate change would be world-ending. There was never much reason to believe this. A major report by the National Academies of Science in 1982 concluded that abundant natural gas, along with nuclear power, would substitute for coal, and prevent temperatures from rising high enough to threaten civilization. But progressives responded by demonizing the authors of the study and insisting that anybody who disagreed that climate change was apocalyptic was secretly on the take from the fossil fuel industry.

Where there have been relatively straightforward fixes to societal problems, progressives have opposed them. Progressives have opposed the expanded use of natural gas and nuclear energy since the 1970s even though it was those two technologies that caused emissions to peak and decline in Germany, Britain and France during that decade. Progressive climate activists over the last 15 years hotly opposed fracking even though it was the main reason emissions in the US declined 22 percent between 2005 and 2020, which is 5 percentage points more than President Obama proposed to reduce them as part of America’s Paris climate agreement.

The same was the case when it came to drug deaths, addiction, and homelessness. People are shocked when I explain to them that the reason California still lacks enough homeless shelters is because progressives have opposed building them. Indeed, it was Governor Newsom, when he was Mayor of San Francisco, who led the charge opposing the construction of sufficient homeless shelters in favor of instead building single unit apartments for anybody who said they wanted one. While there are financial motivations for such a policy, the main motivation was ideological. Newsom and other progressives believe that simply sheltering people is immoral. The good is the enemy of the perfect.

As a result, progressives have created the apocalypse they feared. In California, there are “homeless encampments,” open drug scenes, in the parks, along the highways, and on the sidewalks. But the problem is no longer limited to San Francisco. A few days ago somebody posted a video and photo on Twitter of people in Philadelphia, high on some drug, looking exactly like Hollywood zombies. The obvious solution is to provide people with shelter, require them to use it, and mandate drug and psychiatric treatment, for people who break laws against camping, public drug use, public defecation, and other laws. But progressives insist the better solution is Safe Sleeping Sites and Safe Injection Sites.

Should we be surprised that an ideology that believes American civilization is fundamentally evil has resulted in the breakdown of that civilization? Most American progressives don’t hold such an extreme ideology. Most progressives want police for their neighborhoods. Most progressives want their own children, when suffering mental illness and addiction, to be mandated care. And most progressives want reliable electrical and water management systems for their neighborhoods.

But most progressives are also voting for candidates who are cutting the number of police for poor neighborhoods, insisting that psychiatric and drug treatment be optional, and that trillions be spent making electricity more expensive so we can harmonize with nature through solar panels made by enslaved Muslims in China, and through industrial wind projects built in the habitat of critically endangered whale species.

Does pointing all of this out make me a conservative? There are certainly things I support that many progressives view as conservative, including nuclear power, a ban on public camping, and mandating drug and psychiatric treatment for people who break the law. But other things I support might be fairly viewed as rather liberal, or even progressive, including universal psychiatric care, shelter-for-all, and the reform of police departments with the aims of reducing homicides, police violence, and improving the treatment of people with behavioral health disorders, whether from addiction or mental illness.

And there is a kind of victim ideology on the Right just as there is on the Left. It says that America is too weak and poor, and that our resources are too scarce, to take on our big challenges. On climate change it suggests that nothing of consequence can be done and that all energy sources, from coal to nuclear to solar panels, are of equal or comparable value. On drug deaths and homelessness it argues that parents must simply do a better job raising their children to not be drug addicts, and that we should lock up people, even the mentally ill, for long sentences in prisons and hospitals, with little regard for rehabilitation.

The two grassroots movements I have helped to create around energy and homelessness reject the dystopian victim ideologies of Right and Left. There are progressive and conservative members in both coalitions. But what unites us is our commitment to practical policies that are proven to work in the real world. We advocate for the maintenance and construction of nuclear plants that actually exist, or could soon exist, not futuristic reactors that likely never will. We advocate for Shelter First and Housing Earned, universal psychiatric care, and banning the open dealing of deadly drugs because those are the policies that have worked across the U.S. and around the world, and can be implemented right away.

If I had to find a word to describe the politics I am proposing it would be “heroic,” not liberal, conservative, or even moderate. We need a politics of heroism not a politics of victimhood. Yes, Bangladesh can develop and save itself from sea level rise, just as rich nations have; they are not doomed to hurricanes and flooding. Yes, people addicted to fentanyl and meth can recover from their addictions, with our help, and go on to live fulfilling and rewarding lives; they are not doomed to live in tents for the rest of their shortened lives. And yes, we can create an America where people who disagree on many things can nonetheless find common ground on the very issues that most seem to polarize us, including energy, the environment, crime, and drugs.

On October 12 HarperCollins will publish my second book in two years, San Fransicko, focused on drugs, crime, and homelessnes. It and Apocalypse Never will constitute a comprehensive proposal for saving our civilization from those who would destroy it. What both books have in common is the theme of empowerment. We are not doomed to an apocalyptic future, whether from climate change or homelessness. We can achieve nature, peace, and prosperity for all people because humans are amazing. Our civilization is sacred; we must defend and extend it.

San Fransicko was inspired, in part, by the work of the late psychiatrist, Victor Frankl, who was made famous by a book where he described how he survived the Nazi concentration camps by fixating on a positive vision for his future. During the darkest moments of Covid last year I was struck by how much my mood had improved simply by listening to his 1960s lectures on YouTube. Why, I wondered, had progressives embraced Frankl’s empowering therapy in their personal lives but demonized it in their political lives? Why had progressives, who had done so much to popularize human potential and self-help, claimed that promoting self-help in policies and politics were a form of “blaming the victim?”

Few of my conclusions will surprise anyone, though the agenda, and philosophy, that I am proposing might. It truly is a mix of values, policies, and institutions that one might consider progressive and conservative, not because I set out to make it that way, but because it was that combination that has worked so often in the past. But beyond the policies and values I propose there is a spirit of overcoming, not succumbing; of empowerment, not disempowerment; and of heroism, not victimhood. That spirit comes before, and goes beyond, political ideology and partisan identity. It says, against those who believe that America, and perhaps Western Civilization itself, are doomed: no they’re not. And to those who think we can’t solve big challenges like climate change, drug deaths, and homelessness, it says yes we can.


One of the comments to the above piece:

Exhausted Majority
Aug 10, 2021 - edited Jan 12

To the extent that Progressives have an ironically negative worldview problem, they also have an essential branding problem. I'm not sure why they continue to choose to call themselves by that name, since it represents the goals they seek to abolish and to which they are reactionary. Progressives, more and more, are showing that they are neither interested in progress nor can they identify progress when they see it. Beware the use of language by the group that employs the top down re-definition of words without public mandate, in order to confuse and scare the polity into supporting things which make no sense and are actively harmful and hazardous. The fundamental confusion of almost religious ideas ("We can make a utopian society only by which standards are lowered and to whom minorities are condescended" and " 'Progress' means the impoverishment and immiseration of planet Earth in order to regress to a time we weren't a threat to nature" and "There can't possibly be a benefit to American/Western culture since bad things also happened") is why I am no longer a "Progressive".


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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby Belligerent Savant » Wed Jul 27, 2022 1:18 pm

.

@JeffWellsRigInt

I've never called myself a libertarian but the bar for being called one is getting ridiculously low.

"Oh, you think you have the right to eat food? Kinda cringe."

Replying to
@JeffWellsRigInt

“So I see you want nothing more than to be left alone to live in peace, huh? Know who else wanted that?”

Replying to
@JeffWellsRigInt

"Whoa, you think this specific regulation is overreach and may be prone to abuse? OK, Ayn Rand."

Replying to
@JeffWellsRigInt

"Oh you think you should have a right over your own body? Hmm, fascist much?"

Replying to
@JeffWellsRigInt and @Medieval_Bops

Um, don’t want to get into the cube and eat the bugs? Sounds like someone didn’t notice that they’re getting subsidized housing

https://twitter.com/JeffWellsRigInt/sta ... OTRzAecE0g

Sharing the above here as it's germane to the topic of the thread. I sense when I type or share certain things here in RI that a few folks immediately apply the "libertarian" tag on my content. When I turned 18 I registered as an independent, one of the few teenaged decisions, in retrospect, that turned out to be prescient/sound. I've voted blue, green, and red (a ~couple of times, though haven't kept count) since then, despite the fact I haven't trusted the veracity of U.S. Elections, particularly national elections, for some time now -- at least since 2000, but of course even JFK's election likely had help from some paisans.

But I don't affix a label to my views/positions, because 1) my positions may well -- and have -- shift(ed) as new info/circumstances present themselves, 2) I never aligned fully with any single pre-packaged political affiliation/philosophy, and 3) I've always applied -- healthy, and increasingly necessary -- scrutiny of all politicians/talking heads, across all political spectrums.

In the last 2 years, however, many* self-identified "liberals" and "leftists" have truly blasted through the Overton Window into an entirely new paradigm of reality distortion. The "Right" has also shifted, but not nearly as dramatically.

*but not all; there are growing exceptions as more begin to awaken from their collective trance.

There are so many examples to draw from, but a recent NY Times piece apparently attempting to soften views on cannibalism, ostensibly as a lure to promote books/shows, is one of many examples of the looming collapse of Empire. Or perhaps it's just poor -- or savvy, depending on perspective -- copy/editorializing and nothing else. Time will tell.

@nytimes

Cannibalism has a time and a place. Some recent books, films and shows suggest that the time is now. Can you stomach it?

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/23/styl ... books.html

Jul 23, 2022


And:
...

The Times highlights the line “cannibalism has a time and a place” on social media to bait readers into clicking and subscribing. However, the piece does not argue what it teases.

“Did the New York Times just say it’s okay to …” is how the paper hopes readers interpret the promotion of the article.

And to that, the outlet succeeded, hopefully in shame. A write-up on Fox News shows that most readers did, in fact, interpret the tweet as a “normalization” of cannibalism.

In other words, the outlet is okay with readers thinking it’s justifying cooking human liver for dinner, so long as they are reading. Consider this a desperate ploy for attention, one so emblematic of the state of journalism.

In actuality, the piece explores the rising inclusion of cannibalism in films and novels.

“[C]annibalism has a time and a place. In the pages of some recent stomach-churning books, and on television and film screens, Ms. Summers and others suggest that that time is now,” the article reads.

The author quotes television writers to explain why cannibalism cuts through among consumers:
As to what may be fueling the desire for cannibalism stories today, Ms. Lyle, the “Yellowjackets” co-creator, said, “I think that we’re obviously in a very strange moment.” She listed the pandemic, climate change, school shootings and years of political cacophony as possible factors.


https://www.outkick.com/new-york-times-cannibalism/
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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby Belligerent Savant » Wed Aug 24, 2022 12:22 pm

Unfortunately (and frustratingly) much of this is all too accurate in my anecdotal observations over the last ~2yrs.

@gnocchiwizard

how can so many leftists (nearly all of them) be two and a half years into this bullshit and STILL fail to see the propaganda, the machinations of the elite, their total disregard for the costs to humanity of their ruthless pursuit of power and wealth

@77_steeze
Replying to @gnocchiwizard

they’ve been told that this is a “collective” effort and that’s the romance that keeps it all alive. To criticize it in their eyes means to side with like, Ayn Rand over their leftist favs. second order consequences like Pharma cash grabs are subordinate to the foundational myth

@Chris_Liss
Replying to @gnocchiwizard

because they care foremost about status among their peers, and awareness of what's happening is not only irrelevant to its pursuit, it's almost certainly a negative

@gnocchiwizard
·
i agree with this answer. today's left is held together by social pressure and the sole reward is remaining part of the in group (there are of course heavy economic incentives at play as well, where there's money to be made there's covid psychos, so better to be one yourself).

@Chris_Liss
·
They lack faith that believing what's true is always long-term better than believing what's socially and professionally convenient. In so doing they become easy marks for their masters to manipulate them via incentives.

https://twitter.com/gnocchiwizard/statu ... o8qIPoRDyQ
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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby Belligerent Savant » Thu Aug 25, 2022 1:15 pm

.

This seems a good place for this recent bit of white noise.

Sam Harris and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

Just like Trump, Sam Harris wants to be taken seriously, but not literally.

Dr RollerGator PhD
Aug 22

A few days ago, best-selling author and public persona Sam Harris, host of the “Making Sense” podcast gave an interview on another podcast, “Triggernometry”. Such an event would normally be unremarkable but for some of the statements Harris made about the 2020 election.

A few hours after the podcast had posted to YouTube, a twitter thread started that live tweeted personal reactions to the interview. In a few sections, clips of the interview were excerpted that contained extensive argumentation by Harris that it was absolutely true that those in power conspired to control true information from being disseminated in the weeks prior to the 2020 election; it was absolutely morally justified for them to do so; and that but for them engaging in this action Trump would be President for a second term.

While claims like this may raise eyebrows when made by an arbitrary person picked at random, they are particularly controversial when made by Sam Harris because his earlier career was distinguished by him being opposed to the very idea of lying in virtually all cases. In fact, being against the idea is one of his best-selling books.

Viral clips
Full disclosure: The author of the above mentioned tweet thread that went viral is a friend of mine whom I talk to regularly.

One of the clips in particular has garnered over five million views, been copied and replayed on cable news and syndicated radio shows, and has been the topic of discussion across large swaths of the internet since it posted.

@alexandrosM

In which, Sam Harris says that it's ok to conspire against Trump getting elected, because he was the equivalent of an asteroid headed towards earth. Literally literally. Worth watching just for Francis' reaction at the end. Omg.
...


Harris:
Hunter Biden literally could have had the corpses of children in his basement - I would not have cared.

[…]

That doesn’t answer the people who say that it’s still completely unfair to not have look at [Hunter Biden’s] laptop in a timely way and to have shut down the New York Post’s twitter account. That’s just a left-wing conspiracy to deny the Presidency to Donald Trump. Absolutely it was. Absolutely. But I think it was warranted.


Yikes.

At the beginning of the Triggernometry interview Sam is asked to describe what makes him stand out as a public figure.

I think there’s one algorithm I’m running more than most which is, you know, what I would call ‘Intellectual Honesty.’ The burden is not to be who you were yesterday. The burden isn’t to join some tribe - who, you know, you’ll get some social reinforcement from for, you know, conforming to. Insofar as I’m continually just trying to figure out what’s true and what’s consistent to what I claimed was true five minutes ago or five years ago. That causes me to just bump up against taboos and blasphemies and theologies that, uhm, are more rigid than that. Right? I mean if you’re, I mean really it’s…it’s…I mean even having an identity itself is too much. You know, not only can you not conform to a tribe you can’t really even conform to who you were yesterday if your master value is to be honest and rigorous and available to new data and new arguments and new insights.

In July 2017 Sam Harris had a discussion with Scott Adams, who is most famous for being the artist and creator of the nationally syndicated cartoon Dilbert. Scott had recently started a new trajectory in his career - opining to a wide audience his view of a political world where Donald Trump is a centerpiece. Scott also was soon to be releasing a book “Win Bigly: Persuasion in a World Where Facts Don't Matter.”

In this discussion, Scott Adams made the argument that Donald Trump’s words should be taken seriously but not literally echoing similar sentiments as others. Harris strongly rejected this idea.

Scott said to Sam
They are almost always emotionally true, or they're emotionally compatible with what his his supporters are already thinking. There is an emotional and directional truth to what he does that's independent from the facts being completely wrong.


Sam described that explanation as “fairly strange, ethically.”
For instance, this idea that he's making this first offer that is extreme, that then he walks back to something more reasonable and that this is a technique for which he pays no penalty [that] it's just an unambiguously good technique that his fans recognize…

The Sam of five years ago it seems would find the Sam today “fairly strange, ethically” when hearing a statement such as
Hunter Biden literally could have had the corpses of children in his basement - I would not have cared.

One presumes that this sentence is not to be taken literally, despite the inclusion, literally, of the word “literally”. The forgiving interpretation is that he believes that what was likely to be found on Hunter Biden’s laptop would be more sensational than truly concerning - and that the threshold to meet for concern in the contents is exceptionally high and unlikely to be met.

That would be taking Sam Harris seriously, but not literally. What Sam said has an emotional and directional truth.

Sam then goes on to walk back his statement about children’s corpses (his first offer) towards something seemingly more reasonable.
Whatever [the] scope of Joe Biden’s corruption is…like if we could just go down that rabbit hole endlessly and understand that he’s getting kickbacks from Hunter Biden’s…Ukraine or wherever else...or china. It is infinitesimal to the corruption we know Trump is involved in. It’s like a firefly to the sun. Like, like, there’s just it doesn’t even stack up against Trump University. Right? Trump University, as a story, is worse than anything that could be in Hunter Biden’s laptop.

Seemingly more reasonable, since we do not have corpses of children to consider as being worse than Trump University. That comes at the cost though of insinuating that the forms of corruption he included, which normally make someone unworthy for the office, are now acceptable qualities for his vote. Nevermind all the lying about it he finds acceptable in contrast to Trump.

The lack of consistency between Sam five years ago about Trump and Sam today is made more stark when you hear his own words from both time periods together.



Sam Harris “five minutes ago”

One of the problems Sam has today matching the Sam described at the start of his interview is that his usage of hyperbole and looseness with factual information must be heard only as “emotionally or directionally true.” Additionally, he is regularly in a mode of rationalization - where the justification for his actions or professed beliefs comes after they have been made.

One such location this can be seen is in a part of the interview where Sam discusses Donald Trump and Alex Jones being banned from Twitter. Sam starts by saying that he believes it’s time to allow social media platforms to discriminate against anyone they wish. He articulated that it should be up to the company to decide in any manner they wish, who is allowed on the platform, even if it would classically violate the 1964 civil rights act. Nobody should be allowed to tell a company who to have on their platform.

But then immediately after, he says about Twitter
I see a company that has a Terms of Service which people like Alex Jones and Trump clearly violated. I mean whether in fact they violated the Terms of Service as written, I think they violated any coherent terms of service that Twitter should have had.

In two sentences we go from a truth claim: Trump and Alex Jones clearly violated Twitter’s Terms of Service, to them violating Terms of Service Sam Harris thinks they should have had. What Sam thinks the Terms of Service should have been of course goes against the principle of nobody telling a company who to have on their platform, but I’m sure he would argue he doesn’t have any power to force them so it’s moot.

But Sam’s construction here shows an ambivalence towards truth by making a truth claim, realizing he didn’t know if the claim was true, and then constructing an argument that the truth of the situation is irrelevant. If Sam wishes to hold truth as his master value, he can save himself and everyone else time by simply saying “Trump and Alex Jones should have been banned because I think they should have been banned.” That’s the truth.

Sam’s magnum opus of inconsistency

Sam’s inability to maintain consistency for a few sentences in the case of Twitter may be easy to discard. Trump and Alex Jones were banned, and many people could find themselves in agreement with that action. Twitter, or any social media company, could put a clause in their Terms of Service that says they can ban any user at any time at their discretion and except by having a court agree they shouldn’t have been banned, like recently happened with independent journalist Alex Berenson.

But discarding the next example might prove more difficult.
That doesn’t answer the people who say that it’s still completely unfair to not have look at [Hunter Biden’s] laptop in a timely way and to have shut down the New York Post’s twitter account. That’s just a left-wing conspiracy to deny the Presidency to Donald Trump. Absolutely it was. Absolutely. But I think it was warranted.


The host pushes back on Sam and asks him if he really supports “a left-wing conspiracy to deny the Presidency to Donald Trump.”

Sam: Well, no I’m content w-…but it’s…the thing is that it’s not left-wing. I mean, Liz Cheney is not left-wing.

Host: You’re content with a conspiracy to prevent someone from being democratically elected?

Sam: Well, no it’s not…there’s nothing…Conspiracy? There’s it’s there was a conspiracy out in the open but it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter what part’s conspiracy what part is out in the open. I mean, it’s like, if people get together and talk about ‘what should we do about this phenomenon’ it’s like…if…if there was an asteroid hurtling toward earth and we got in a room with all of our friends and have a conversation about what we could do to deflect it’s course…right…is that a conspiracy?


So in an exceptionally short time Sam has demonstrated his quest to figure out what’s true and to be consistent with what he said to be true “five minutes ago,” by the following sequence of claims

1. There was absolutely a left-wing conspiracy to withhold information from the American public to deny the presidency to Donald Trump

2. It’s not a left-wing conspiracy because Liz Cheney supported it

3. Conspiracies out in the open aren’t conspiracies

4. It doesn’t matter how much or how little is out in the open because is it really a conspiracy just because people are conspiring?

Sam’s resorting to the asteroid analogy was of necessity. If Sam had spent more time trying “figure out what’s true and what’s consistent to what I claimed was true five minutes ago or five years ago,” he may have been able to spot where he went wrong.

He wants people to take him seriously, but not literally.

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