Presidential election, 2016

[Bob Butler 54]

(01-09-2017, 01:27 AM)Warren Dew Wrote:

(01-08-2017, 07:32 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: I like to think my own way of looking at the world is well thought out, logical, based on lessons from history, common sense and developed on reasonable teachings of my culture.  I also like to think that everybody thinks their values are such, well thought out, logical, based on lessons from history, common sense and developed on reasonable teachings of their cultures.

Your mistake is in assuming it's all about culture for everyone, just because it happens to be so for you.  In fact, most of the conservatives here are libertarian leaning, and base our reasoning not on culture but on facts and proven economic theory.  Assuming that it's a clash of cultures may be why you go wrong so much.

I often use 'culture' as meaning 'a large group of people who share common world views and values'.  Don't assume that when talking cultures in abstract that I am always referring to one of the groups from Albion's Seed.

I'm from greater Boston and fit reasonably with the 'Yankee' pattern from Albion's Seed.  I'm also a software guy with a formidable respect for science.  I went to Catholic Saturday religious classes in my youth, which effects my views on morality, though I never fully bought into the Catholic's authoritarian hierarchical side.  I chased after a handful of spiritual systems in my youth, and retained a few snippets of wisdom.  All these influences and others merge together to form something much more complex than the expectations one might have of someone who is committed to any one of the above influences.

I assume this is true of most people.  If someone is sufficiently religious, the fact that he comes from one of the regions and cultures covered by Albion's Seed might or might not be entirely irrelevant.  If someone is sufficiently politically partisan, his religion might or might not mean much.  There are all sorts of people who center their lives on different things.

By this understanding, libertarianism is a culture, a set of values and a way of looking at the world shared by many people.  As I see it, this political philosophy is much more dominant in yourself than any element of 'yankee' culture you might have picked up by living near Boston.  It would be a gross and obvious mistake to assume Albion's Seed will provide insight into your thought.  This isn't to say that Albion's Seed doesn't provide considerable insight on the country's divisions.  Albion's Seed provides a useful set of stereotypes, but stereotypes are quite often a very poor tool for understanding people. 

I try to recognize this complexity and respect that all these ways of looking at the world had valid historical reasons for coming into existence.  No matter what culture one comes from, growing up within that culture will allow firm commitment to that culture's values and world view.  Members of cultures can develop a very firm faith that commitment to that culture is rational, logical, justified and entirely defensible.  Thus, as much as I deplore large parts of Hillbilly culture, reading Hillbilly Eulogy helps me understand how the culture evolved and why they are what they are.

Many people are locked into their own values and culture.  What they believe is true.  Anything that conflicts with it is false.  Thus, they must create intense defense mechanisms that allows them to reject anything that conflicts with their belief system.  Thus, we have extreme partisans, intensely clinging to their own perspective, required to deny any validity to other perspectives, casually thinking that anyone from another culture must be wrong.  Often they'll use stronger words than 'wrong'...  insane, ammosexual, evil, stupid, etc...

That's where we're really coming from different places.  I am doubtful that you will be able follow what I'm trying to say without learning to respect other people's perspectives.  I see you as too firmly committed to your own perspective to learn to do that.