The Trump Presidency

[Josh]

Room 101

That’s nice and all, but what do you know about Apartment 223 with body parts under my bed. Cut your abdomen out, stab your fucking leather coat. I chant while candles burn with robes on.

[Space Pirate Roberts]

Yes, but if you gave up those two issues, would they still have the support to do these things?

I don't imagine that people on each side are 100% this way or that way. I would think it would be easier to gain support after the single issue voters were removed.

I for one would be a lot less enthusiastic about supporting a Democratic party that caved on abortion, and it's not even one of my top issues (although it is closely related to church-state separation, which is). We learned 70 years ago appeasement doesn't work. Remove this wedge, they'll just manufacture another one the same way they did abortion (learning that mainstream Protestants were by and large fine with it until the 70s, when a massive, concerted effort was made by clergy in cooperation with politicians to recast it as a form of murder for the express purpose of political exploitation, was a real mind-blower) and then we'll have people saying we need to capitulate on whatever that ends up being. No. That'll always be a losing strategy; as usual, the real answer is something much harder - getting people to see through wedge issue exploitation.

Guns I'm a little less firm on, mostly because what needs to happen realistically can't, at least without major cultural shifts happening first.

[Some Stupid Japanese Name]

Candles wearing robes? C’mon...

[Frogacuda]

It's called pushback, and it exists because the "liberal social consensus of the millennial group" is saturated with identity politics and imaginary pronouns. Staging a mass campus temper tantrum to silence an opposing view is about as illiberal as it gets.

The "dopey libertarian" thing is just another example of the holier-than-thou bullshit that repels people who might otherwise be open to your ideas. Nobody likes to be talked down to, and that's especially true when you're under 30.

Bruh, come on. Libertarianism is basically just "If communism is bad, then the extreme opposite must be good, right?" It's like if your doctor told you your blood pressure was too low, so you decided it should be as high as possible. There is no functioning libertarian capitalism anywhere, ever in history. It's as much a fantasy as utopian communism, and I'll call people who believe in that dopey too.

The interest in individual liberty isn't dopey. That's something important that needs to be considered in weighing and balancing collectivist solutions to macro-level problems. But you can't have capitalism without both those concerns and just thinking you can have one or the other is hopelessly naive. That's not me being holier than thou, that's just living in the real world.

[Calliander]

"Whataboutism" is my submission for Room 101 this year. It's used as some sort of magic bullet whenever hypocrisy or general bullshit is pointed out. And it's time for it to go.

I agree. So let's keep all of it in one room - the people who who shout it at every turn and the Bill Clinton questions alike - and lock the door so none of it can get out.

[kedawa]

I think it comes down to where we've placed the goalposts in recent years.

"There are thirty genders." = entitled silliness
"I disagree, there are only two." = ignorant bigotry

Not a lot of room for productive conversation under these conditions.

I meant actual ignorant bigotry, like "He wants me to call him 'zhe'? Fuck that! Kill all the faggots!"

[Calliander]

I meant actual ignorant bigotry, like "He wants me to call him 'zhe'? Fuck that! Kill all the faggots!"

Yeah, though I will be the first to admit that I've given the stinkeye to people I thought were crossing the line who weren't. Sometimes, expressions of frustration with the kids lingo look like "Fuck that! Kill all faggots!" but are really just, "Ugh, we're up to 83 now?"

Of course, the kids are intolerant of both those positions.

EDIT:

Remove this wedge, they'll just manufacture another one

Fair or not, this is an accurate summary of why I don't trust social conservatives. At a higher level, I don't like banning stuff, but their points always seem toddler height so that doesn't really matter.

[Drewbacca]

I do not trust these dicks who are pushing back to correct for any reason. The act of pushing back is inherently immature - believe me, I know from experience. We're not looking to/for change. We're only looking for others to step aside.

But why would they “step aside”? What does that even mean? Why would an individual trying to make the most in life step aside on the basis of their race?

Identity politics gave licence to people to revert to being a person made up primarily of their ethnic group. It was inevitable some white people would do the same. These are pretty terrible ideas.

There are other very bad Marxist ideas in colleges too. But I don’t think any of these things survive well outside the walls of University stink tanks in the US. Not sure why an entire party would orient itself around this.

Canada on the other hand has draconian enforcement tribunals and such. That’s where it gets in the shit.

Bruh, come on. Libertarianism is basically just "If communism is bad, then the extreme opposite must be good, right?" It's like if your doctor told you your blood pressure was too low, so you decided it should be as high as possible. There is no functioning libertarian capitalism anywhere, ever in history. It's as much a fantasy as utopian communism, and I'll call people who believe in that dopey too.

The interest in individual liberty isn't dopey. That's something important that needs to be considered in weighing and balancing collectivist solutions to macro-level problems. But you can't have capitalism without both those concerns and just thinking you can have one or the other is hopelessly naive. That's not me being holier than thou, that's just living in the real world.

This is true. I’m not sure how libertarianism taken to an extreme would even work. It’s social nihilism I guess?

The most diligent among us would prosper but everyone else not might be problematic. I think capitalism has largely “solved” this from a macro standpoint. I don’t know why we have to pick. Capitalism with social assistance for those hitting 0 in the game.

Fe: The Dems need to keep on with abortions over guns. It’s a tough decision that has ultimately been proven to be good for society. But late term abortions are pretty much murder. They’re saving babies up here at 24 weeks now. They’re little potato people.

[Frogacuda]

"Whataboutism" is my submission for Room 101 this year. It's used as some sort of magic bullet whenever hypocrisy or general bullshit is pointed out. And it's time for it to go.

It gets misapplied sometimes, but it is a real thing. Like when people go "Yeah, well Woodrow Wilson was racist and he was a DEMOCRAT." Like yeah, no shit, but neither of us were even fucking alive then, so let's focus on the conversation at hand.

I've seen this sort of thing a lot. If you point out inconsistencies in what a person supports, that's hypocrisy. But if you just point out that another person of the same party or race supported something different than you at some point in time, that's evasive nonsense.

[A Robot Bit Me]

It's really weird how disproportionately angry Andrew is about the gender thing. I think this has come up before, but how many times has someone actually corrected you about pronoun usage? How many times in a way other than politely?

For me, once, and zero times. And my job is calling 19-year-olds by their names all day.