Controversial Political Opinions

[JasonBlack]

Have at it! Hit me with your most controversial opinions about politics. As this is the "theory related political discussions" subforum, let's stick to theoretical opinions rather than ones about specific people or organizations, but other than that, let'a rip!

[JasonBlack]

1) Patriarchy, or at least some level of it, works much better than the so called "equality" we have now. Most women hold unassertive men in contempt and will continue to push them until they meet a guy who will push back. One of the reasons so many end up in abusive relationships nowadays is that the ones willing to push back the hardest...are usually abusive.
2) If you have been incarcerated for marijuana charges, you should receive reparations.
3) The idea that all votes should be created equal doesn't make any sense to me. It's more logical to rank people via tests of competence (say, a more comprehensive version of the ASVAB that covers more topics, allowing people to retake it if/when they feel they've become more competent in a given area) and weight their vote based on their score, with additional bonuses for things like military service and entrepreneurship. It's unlikely my own score would make it into the top percentile range, but so be it. People who are more competent than me, start businesses, have more life experience and/or serve in the armed forces deserve to have their voice heard more strongly than mine. (note: this has nothing to do with your worth as a human being. it has to do with your ability to make rational decisions about political issues)
4) You need some level of collectivism to support individualism in the first place. Unfortunately, exactly how much you need is a much more difficult question to answer.
5) You still have to obey The Constitution during a crisis. There is no "except in cases of energy". It means you ALWAYS follow the Constitution.
6) IQ is real and extremely relevant to one's life prospects and potential. No, I'm not going to share my IQ, because my individual intelligence level is not the point. The point is that neither the liberal "they just need more opportunity!", nor the conservative "they just need to work harder!" proposals are going to work. I know, I know "but if we just raised children better, they'd have higher IQs"....nope, that's not true either past a certain point. We have a large swathe of the population (somewhere between like 10-20%) who are virtually unemployable because they lack the cognitive complexity to perform even an entry level job without substantial supervision.

[Eric the Green]

(03-15-2022, 11:31 PM)JasonBlack Wrote: 1) Patriarchy, or at least some level of it, works much better than the so called "equality" we have now. Most women hold unassertive men in contempt and will continue to push them until they meet a guy who will push back. One of the reasons so many end up in abusive relationships nowadays is that the ones willing to push back the hardest...are usually abusive.

I don't understand your point of view on that very well. To me, the virtue of equality between the sexes is a given. Of course, men and women are different, but I disagree that biology defines who you are, at least not much it doesn't. Women have so much to contribute, and their views on things are generally much saner, especially in politics. I like it that women are now expected to be as much in control of a relationship as men. Women are better at human relationships. They are less confident and emotionally stable though, so the male qualities are still valuable too.

Quote:2) If you have been incarcerated for marijuana charges, you should receive reparations.

Agreed.

Quote:3) The idea that all votes should be created equal doesn't make any sense to me. It's more logical to rank people via tests of competence (say, a more comprehensive version of the ASVAB that covers more topics, allowing people to retake it if/when they feel they've become more competent in a given area) and weight their vote based on their score, with additional bonuses for things like military service and entrepreneurship. It's unlikely my own score would make it into the top percentile range, but so be it. People who are more competent than me, start businesses, have more life experience and/or serve in the armed forces deserve to have their voice heard more strongly than mine. (note: this has nothing to do with your worth as a human being. it has to do with your ability to make rational decisions about political issues)

Of course, votes should be equal. That's basic democracy. And there's no reason to think that any group in society is inherently less able to make good decisions than any other; although the poorly-educated these days have been lied to and taken advantage of by the conservatives who stir up their fears and prejudices (of whom Trump is top of the list). I would say military service and entreprenuership would make you less likely to vote for what's in the best interest of the people than others, if anything; unless they are also well-educated, informed and cultured. There's no reason they can't be, except that they often are not. It sounds like your priority is shaped by your conservative views than by what is really important, but then my priorities are certainly liberal ones. A just society that looks after its people, seeks peace, supports the arts and science, makes sure opportunities are open to all, invests in what serves prosperity and fulfillment, taxes fairly, puts people, law and ethics before profit, and treats all as equal citizens, is much better than the patriarchal society whose values are military, dominated by money, shaped by prejudice or which otherwise favors certain groups.

Quote:4) You need some level of collectivism to support individualism in the first place. Unfortunately, exactly how much you need is a much more difficult question to answer.

It is. The mixed society model is what I favor.

Quote:5) You still have to obey The Constitution during a crisis. There is no "except in cases of energy". It means you ALWAYS follow the Constitution.

You mean "in case of emergency?" Indeed, probably; although these days it seems all that's necessary to ignore the constitution is to put a narcissist bully or a war monger in power, especially if they have a R by their name. The "crisis" can then just be manufactured. It's not good for the nation.

Quote:6) IQ is real and extremely relevant to one's life prospects and potential. No, I'm not going to share my IQ, because my individual intelligence level is not the point. The point is that neither the liberal "they just need more opportunity!", nor the conservative "they just need to work harder!" proposals are going to work. I know, I know "but if we just raised children better, they'd have higher IQs"....nope, that's not true either past a certain point. We have a large swathe of the population (somewhere between like 10-20%) who are virtually unemployable because they lack the cognitive complexity to perform even an entry level job without substantial supervision.

Equal opportunity for all, but not necessarily equal outcomes for all. But kindness, justice and mercy toward all.

IQ is a very limited measurement standard. Human abilities are far more wide ranging than that. I probably would do well if IQ's the standard, or at least I would have when I was younger. But I was lacking in other ways.

[JasonBlack]

(03-16-2022, 04:30 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: I don't understand your point of view on that very well. To me, the virtue of equality between the sexes is a given. Of course, men and women are different, but I disagree that biology defines who you are, at least not much it doesn't. Women have so much to contribute, and their views on things are generally much saner, especially in politics. I like it that women are now expected to be as much in control of a relationship as men. Women are better at human relationships. They are less confident and emotionally stable though, so the male qualities are still valuable too.

I probably should have elaborated a bit more. In a sense, I also favor "gender equality", but I think of it differently. To me, gender equality means you have a balance of benefits and privileges with responsibilities and risks. In general, being higher on neuroticism and agreeableness, and lower on industriousness, women are generally willing to give up a bit more authority for the sake of greater security. Men, again, in general, are the reverse: lower on neuroticism and agreeableness, and higher on industriousness, so they're typically willing to take on both more risk and more responsibility for the sake of greater freedom and authority. These trends are stable across virtually all historical periods and cultures.

When you keep that in mind, most people aren't actually interested in "equality" in the sense of "having exactly the same expectations of both men and women". It just doesn't make biological sense. Even among the most egalitarian societies, the idea that men and women generally have different roles they need to fill was kind of a given. One of the reasons why gender roles diverge in a 4T is because the loss of greater affluence brings people down to earth and reminds us of common sense, instinctual truths we could previously afford to ignore.

Quote:Of course, votes should be equal. That's basic democracy. And there's no reason to think that any group in society is inherently less able to make good decisions than any other; although the poorly-educated these days have been lied to and taken advantage of by the conservatives who stir up their fears and prejudices (of whom Trump is top of the list). I would say military service and entreprenuership would make you less likely to vote for what's in the best interest of the people than others, if anything; unless they are also well-educated, informed and cultured. There's no reason they can't be, except that they often are not. It sounds like your priority is shaped by your conservative views than by what is really important, but then my priorities are certainly liberal ones. A just society that looks after its people, seeks peace, supports the arts and science, makes sure opportunities are open to all, invests in what serves prosperity and fulfillment, taxes fairly, puts people, law and ethics before profit, and treats all as equal citizens, is much better than the patriarchal society whose values are military, dominated by money, shaped by prejudice or which otherwise favors certain groups.

Keep in mind that such a system would likely favor people with beliefs more similar to yours. Better educated people tend to be more socially liberal, care more about environmentalism and favor things like socialized healthcare. The main difference is that there would also be a shift toward policies which favor meritocracy and incentives that reward people based on various forms of contribution.

To play devil's advocate though, I think the major risk is that more intellectual people tend to lack and appreciation for structure or the ease which comes with simple, straightforward rules. We can sometimes forget that, in any era, the types of people who analyze situations individually, research political theory/history and make decisions based on what makes sense to them...are not the majority. Most people want clear paths, clear norms and clear roles which simplify life, so we run the risk of designing a society by and for the disproportionately intelligent. To an extent, we're already seeing this now, as most of the innovations that shape society in the long run were invented by highly intelligent, technical minds, and have contributed to an increasingly user-unfriendly world, were normal people have to run on treadmills to keep up technologically and the less intelligent are left behind completely.

This goes back to why I think IQ is an important metric: a difference of even 15 points can lead to serious issues with communication. A difference of 30 points and you may feel as if you're talking to a different species.

Quote:You mean "in case of emergency?" Indeed, probably; although these days it seems all that's necessary to ignore the constitution is to put a narcissist bully or a war monger in power, especially if they have a R by their name. The "crisis" can then just be manufactured. It's not good for the nation.

eh, Obama, Biden, HRC, LBJ and many other democrats have extremely hawkish track records. Let's not forget it was Biden who actually wrote most of The Patriot Act, and that Obama had twice as many SWAT raids for drug-related offenses in one of his terms than Bush had in both of his (source: Rise of the Warrior Cop). Overall though, I can sympathize with your contempt for the more hawkish side of neo conservatives. I have never been a fan of them.

Quote:Equal opportunity for all, but not necessarily equal outcomes for all. But kindness, justice and mercy toward all.

exactly

Quote:IQ is a very limited measurement standard. Human abilities are far more wide ranging than that. I probably would do well if IQ's the standard, or at least I would have when I was younger. But I was lacking in other ways.

At the very least, the kind of people who can actually grasp generational theory and have nuanced debates about it aren't going to be low IQ. We're talking at least 120 if I had to guess, most will be higher.

[Eric the Green]

That sounds a bit better Jason, but I still quibble. That makes for discussion, at least.

I don't think women are less "industrious." I think some may be less assertive and more risk-averse.

There are differences between the sexes, but more and more it is being shown there are less than previously thought. In a free and just society with opportunity for all, meritocracy is natural because the best do the best, without leaving the rest behind. I am also more sanguine about the less "intelligent," because as I said IQ is a poor measure of this. IQ tests are also geared toward the dominant culture and ethnic group. Your analysis might apply to the handicapped and retarded, but most people want to be free and have fair rather than arbitrary rules placed on them. I agree with the old Rascals song, "people everywhere just want to be free." We can see that in the huge, mass uprisings for freedom and people power we see today worldwide, and which unfortunately the tyrants and their weapons routinely suppress. There's no way in hell these monsters are any more "intelligent" than the people they oppress. In a 4T and 1T, gender widening may also be due to the increased tendency toward conformity and a reversion to the unjust and unfair ways of the past because rulers and other powerful people gain more power as crises demand swift and collective action.

[JasonBlack]

(03-16-2022, 04:10 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: That sounds a bit better Jason, but I still quibble. That makes for discussion, at least.

I don't think women are less "industrious".

several studies have been done on this subject which suggest otherwise.

Quote:I think some may be less assertive and more risk-averse

this much is true

Quote:There are differences between the sexes, but more and more it is being shown there are less than previously thought.

such as? from what I've seen, little evidence is pointing in this direction. apart from the differences I've already mentioned, men have about 17x more testosterone, have higher visual spacial intelligence, have lower verbal intelligence and produce far less oxytocin.

this article lists some other differences  
https://stanmed.stanford.edu/2017spring/...erent.html

Quote:In a free and just society with opportunity for all, meritocracy is natural because the best do the best, without leaving the rest behind. I am also more sanguine about the less "intelligent," because as I said IQ is a poor measure of this.

I hope you're right about this. As it stands now, we have a pretty ugly problem to deal with on our hands that is not favorable to any mainstream morality, whether liberal, conservative or libertarian. 

Quote:IQ tests are also geared toward the dominant culture and ethnic group.

Actually, most tests that account for cultural bias show wider gaps than the ones which don't attempt to account for it. Personally, I think a big contributing factor is prenatal care, but all the work done by people like Dr. Richard Haier and Robert Plomin is pretty bleak in terms what we can do after a child is born. 

Quote:There's no way in hell these monsters are any more "intelligent" than the people they oppress. 

depends. no strong opinion without further context. 

Quote:In a 4T and 1T, gender widening may also be due to the increased tendency toward conformity and a reversion to the unjust and unfair ways of the past because rulers and other powerful people gain more power as crises demand swift and collective action.

with respect, boomer feminists are quite a bit more tolerable than millennial feminists, and I don't think you have experience dealing with the sheer viciousness of milllennial feminists and their doxxing, threats, physical abuse, and yes, false allegations (the 2% figure most people cite is false allegations that make it all the way to court, which is a small minority of total sexual allegations)

Of course, you have no reason to take the experience of my own or my friends' experiences at face value. There is a grim amount of evidence on this subject. 

First, let's take this little experiment. imagine how men would respond if it were men hitting women 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LlFAd4YdQks

now look at these abuse statistics from the CDC. 
https://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/p...2010-a.pdf
"According to the CDC’s statistics — estimates based on more than 18,000 telephone-survey responses in the United States — roughly 5,365,000 men had been victims of intimate partner physical violence in the previous 12 months, compared with 4,741,000 women"



And then we have the "Women Are Wonderful Effect". Mounting, replicable evidence has shown that both women and men view women substantially more favorably than they view men.
https://becauseits2015.wordpress.com/201...-misogyny/



okay, so how are those male abuse victims treated when they try to seek help 
"When it comes to domestic violence, many believe that men are the only perpetrators. In a study of 302 abused men by Denise Hines, Ph.D, 32% who called a domestic violence hotline were instead “referred to a batterer’s program” (a support group for people who abuse), and 25% were “given a phone number to call that turned out to be a batterer’s program.” Almost 70% of these abused men claimed the hotlines to be “not at all helpful” (Sacks). A total of 57% of these abused men ended up being directed to a batterer’s program instead of receiving the help they needed. Even though anybody of any gender can be a batterer, even domestic violence hotlines will assume it is the male."

https://archive.ph/nLLs6


Perhaps most convincingly, take a look at this interview with Erin Pizzey. This is not a MAGA fan, a "redpiller", an "incel" or any other of the basic alt right bros clustering around certain parts of the internet. She was one of the women who helped found the first domestic violence shelter in the UK. After years of doing other work trying to help men and being blocked by the establishment, she is now...a men's rights activist. 

[JasonBlack]

The bottom line is: in a 4th turning, we need male stoicism, male courage and male authority. We don't just need men to do things, we need to provide them the necessary respect that they deserve if they are to be the heroes who will get us out of this crisis. We need to stop sneering at concepts like valor, mocking concepts like dignity, and over-correct for the feminine, hedonistic excesses and celebrity circuses of the unraveling. Frankly, this notion that women and men should be expected to fill the same roles is nonsense, and virtually every past culture, whether tribal, agricultural or nomadic, knew this instinctually. The worst part isn't even what feminists are doing, but how readily they get away with virtually everything they do with zero consequences. I do think we need to be rational about this and avoid some sort of violent swing in the other direction, but frankly...there needs to be some punishment. We aren't going to fix these issues unless there are real, tangible consequences for some of the abuses being heaped on men.

Anyway, I'll give an example of what I mean in practice: how domineering and forceful women like a man can vary, but most women like men who are in charge. If you're dealing with a woman with good manners and character, the best approach is to present with a frame of friendly authority (think like a doctor or something). This doesn't have to be aggressive, disrespectful, dismissive of her intelligence, etc. It just sets a tone that causes most women to feel a sense of "I can relax when he's around, because I know he has everything handled, so I'm going to let him take the reigns for the most part". Think less Tyler Durdin, Damon Salvatore or Christian Gray and more Charlton Heston, Liam Neeson or Winston Churchill. The problem with most millennial conservatives is that they don't know how to do this in a way that isn't weird. They turn things into too much of an overt contest, don't have enough of that "less is more" touch of someone who is authoritative rather than simply someone who does authority.

[JasonBlack]

Another one: vaccines. I'm not opposed to the vaccines, but I am opposed to the intellectually dishonest way this pandemic has been handled. 
1) Most obviously, these lockdowns all violate the first amendment, period. 
2) The CDC changed the definition of "pandemic" to accommodate the political catastrophizing and fear mongering that led to the current lockdowns.
3) They also changed the definition of "herd immunity" to literally the opposite of what the original definition was (enough of the herd are exposed to a virus to develop antibodies which, in turn, protect the rest of the herd. why would a herd even have "herd immunity", if it required artificial technology like a vaccine?)
4) It's one thing to change your opinion based on thorough scientific evidence. This is called good science and open mindedness and should be encouraged. What is not good science is conducting a series of studies, then changing your mind every time a new study finishes and expecting the rest of the public to follow suit. Good science doesn't just mean clear data, it means clearly replicable data. If you keep conducting studies and getting different results, the intellectually honest thing to do is to admit that you don't have the answer yet, not to demand that your suggestions be followed under pain of prosecution. 
5) Pfizer, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson all claim to have done extensive studies guaranteeing the vaccine would be safe from long term detrimental effects....via studies that took under a year to complete. 
6) How about some other recommendations for boosting immunity? Probiotics, weight lifting, green tea/other antioxidants, Vitamin D, Zinc, avoiding sugar? The goal is to prevent people from getting sick right? Where are all the other sensible recommendations which could help them do so? 
7) .....really? It took a friggin college study to tell you that children were more likely to become obese when we don't let them play outside? Sometimes they make it difficult to give them even the slightest benefit of the doubt. 
8) Cell phone chargers were considered an essential item during the lockdowns, while baby formula was not.

Again, I'm not asking any of you to become anti-vaccine, subscribe to Alex Jones or join Q, but the CDC and WHO need to be held accountable for the intellectually dishonest, bad faith means by which they forced the entire country to shut down. You can be socially responsible and demand government accountability. You don't have to choose one or the other.

[David Horn]

(03-16-2022, 08:47 PM)JasonBlack Wrote: The bottom line is: in a 4th turning, we need male stoicism, male courage and male authority. We don't just need men to do things, we need to provide them the necessary respect that they deserve if they are to be the heroes who will get us out of this crisis. We need to stop sneering at concepts like valor, mocking concepts like dignity, and over-correct for the feminine, hedonistic excesses and celebrity circuses of the unraveling. Frankly, this notion that women and men should be expected to fill the same roles is nonsense, and virtually every past culture, whether tribal, agricultural or nomadic, knew this instinctually. The worst part isn't even what feminists are doing, but how readily they get away with virtually everything they do with zero consequences. I do think we need to be rational about this and avoid some sort of violent swing in the other direction, but frankly...there needs to be some punishment. We aren't going to fix these issues unless there are real, tangible consequences for some of the abuses being heaped on men.

All those characteristics you define as 'male' are actually role models some embrace and others not. But if anything has been learned in the past few decades, it's the fact that we're all different -- male and female alike. There are uniquely female roles, childbearing being the most obvious, but uniquely male roes are less so, at least today. Women can be brave, as Marina Ovsyannikova proved when she walked out on Russian TV with a sign protesting an intolerant tyrant. On the other hand, many men and women shrink in the face of a challenge they should meet. That's not a gender issue, though the method of meeting the challenge may be. We men were endowed, by our own testosterone, with superior musculature; sometime that still matters. But we shouldn't assume that we are all equally capable. We aren't.

JasonBlack Wrote:Anyway, I'll give an example of what I mean in practice: how domineering and forceful women like a man can vary, but most women like men who are in charge. If you're dealing with a woman with good manners and character, the best approach is to present with a frame of friendly authority (think like a doctor or something). This doesn't have to be aggressive, disrespectful, dismissive of her intelligence, etc. It just sets a tone that causes most women to feel a sense of "I can relax when he's around, because I know he has everything handled, so I'm going to let him take the reigns for the most part". Think less Tyler Durdin, Damon Salvatore or Christian Gray and more Charlton Heston, Liam Neeson or Winston Churchill. The problem with most millennial conservatives is that they don't know how to do this in a way that isn't weird. They turn things into too much of an overt contest, don't have enough of that "less is more" touch of someone who is authoritative rather than simply someone who does authority.

Here we'll have to agree on principle but disagree in practice. We should all respect one another. We don't always act that way. Again, that's not a uniquely male role to fill.

[JasonBlack]

(03-17-2022, 07:52 AM)David Horn Wrote: All those characteristics you define as 'male' are actually role models some embrace and others not. But if anything has been learned in the past few decades, it's the fact that we're all different -- male and female alike. There are uniquely female roles, childbearing being the most obvious, but uniquely male roes are less so, at least today. Women can be brave, as Marina Ovsyannikova proved when she walked out on Russian TV with a sign protesting an intolerant tyrant. On the other hand, many men and women shrink in the face of a challenge they should meet. That's not a gender issue, though the method of meeting the challenge may be. We men were endowed, by our own testosterone, with superior musculature; sometime that still matters. But we shouldn't assume that we are all equally capable. We aren't.

Women can be brave just like men can be empathetic, but there are more brave men and more empathetic women. The whole "we're not all equally capable" is kind of the point. Our general expectations should reflect this general difference in capability. You can have a general way in which you treat people while still making individual exceptions as they arise. For example, most of my female friends are pretty masculine. Their sense of humor is like a male, their emotional expression is more like a male, what they actually do in practice is more like a male, so I treat them more like how I treat my guy friends. To reiterate the previous point, the main issue I have with modern feminism is that they want all the privileges of being a man, all the privileges of being a woman, and the responsibilities of neither. Doctors, members of the armed forces, construction workers, etc all get a certain package of privileges that I don't, because they're willing to take on jobs that I don't and have competence that I don't. Likewise, men are generally willing to take on tasks that women don't want to or are less able to, and women are generally willing to take on tasks that men don't want to or are less able to. It's only logical we adjust the privileges and responsibilities we expect accordingly.

Quote:Here we'll have to agree on principle but disagree in practice. We should all respect one another. We don't always act that way. Again, that's not a uniquely male role to fill.

you can respect both women and men while being cognizant that women are more likely to appreciate someone else having things under control.

[Eric the Green]

(03-16-2022, 11:04 PM)JasonBlack Wrote: Another one: vaccines. I'm not opposed to the vaccines, but I am opposed to the intellectually dishonest way this pandemic has been handled. 
1) Most obviously, these lockdowns all violate the first amendment, period. 
2) The CDC changed the definition of "pandemic" to accommodate the political catastrophizing and fear mongering that led to the current lockdowns.
3) They also changed the definition of "herd immunity" to literally the opposite of what the original definition was (enough of the herd are exposed to a virus to develop antibodies which, in turn, protect the rest of the herd. why would a herd even have "herd immunity", if it required artificial technology like a vaccine?)
4) It's one thing to change your opinion based on thorough scientific evidence. This is called good science and open mindedness and should be encouraged. What is not good science is conducting a series of studies, then changing your mind every time a new study finishes and expecting the rest of the public to follow suit. Good science doesn't just mean clear data, it means clearly replicable data. If you keep conducting studies and getting different results, the intellectually honest thing to do is to admit that you don't have the answer yet, not to demand that your suggestions be followed under pain of prosecution. 
5) Pfizer, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson all claim to have done extensive studies guaranteeing the vaccine would be safe from long term detrimental effects....via studies that took under a year to complete. 
6) How about some other recommendations for boosting immunity? Probiotics, weight lifting, green tea/other antioxidants, Vitamin D, Zinc, avoiding sugar? The goal is to prevent people from getting sick right? Where are all the other sensible recommendations which could help them do so? 
7) .....really? It took a friggin college study to tell you that children were more likely to become obese when we don't let them play outside? Sometimes they make it difficult to give them even the slightest benefit of the doubt. 
8) Cell phone chargers were considered an essential item during the lockdowns, while baby formula was not.

Again, I'm not asking any of you to become anti-vaccine, subscribe to Alex Jones or join Q, but the CDC and WHO need to be held accountable for the intellectually dishonest, bad faith means by which they forced the entire country to shut down. You can be socially responsible and demand government accountability. You don't have to choose one or the other.

The government taking health measures to protect the people from disease is not dishonest. It is necessary. The shutdowns were necessary. Trump constantly trying to end them too soon caused the pandemic to be much greater than it otherwise was. He ended them too soon for fear of damage to his re-election chances because of the slowed economy. He was responsible for this, and he lost re-election largely as a result of his negligence. Then he lied and said he did not lose the election, and then staged a coup based on his lie. No conservatives or Republicans should give any credit to any of Trump's views or policies. He is an aspiring dictator and a deadly tyrant just like Putin and Xi Jinping. He was the conspiracy theorist in chief too.

The CDC did not define or declare the pandemic. The WHO did, and very correctly and timely.

There was no alternative but to adjust rules and recommendations according to the science. Complaining about this is dishonest.

The studies that showed the vaccine had no long term detrimental effects were accurate. Charges that the vaccines were "experimental" even though they were approved for emergency use were dishonest and very harmful to the public health.

#6 is the only one of your charges that I might agree with. But I would not propose that such immunity boosting should in any way substitute for vaccines and treatments.

[Eric the Green]

(03-17-2022, 01:10 PM)JasonBlack Wrote:

(03-17-2022, 07:52 AM)David Horn Wrote: All those characteristics you define as 'male' are actually role models some embrace and others not.  But if anything has been learned in the past few decades, it's the fact that we're all different -- male and female alike.  There are uniquely female roles, childbearing being the most obvious, but uniquely male roes are less so, at least today.  Women can be brave, as Marina Ovsyannikova proved when she walked out on Russian TV with a sign protesting an intolerant tyrant.  On the other hand, many men and women shrink in the face of a challenge they should meet.  That's not a gender issue, though the method of meeting the challenge may be.  We men were endowed, by our own testosterone, with superior musculature; sometime that still matters.  But we shouldn't assume that we are all equally capable.  We aren't.

Women can be brave just like men can be empathetic, but there are more brave men and more empathetic women. The whole "we're not all equally capable" is kind of the point. Our general expectations should reflect this general difference in capability. You can have a general way in which you treat people while still making individual exceptions as they arise. For example, most of my female friends are pretty masculine. Their sense of humor is like a male, their emotional expression is more like a male, what they actually do in practice is more like a male, so I treat them more like how I treat my guy friends. To reiterate the previous point, the main issue I have with modern feminism is that they want all the privileges of being a man, all the privileges of being a woman, and the responsibilities of neither. Doctors, members of the armed forces, construction workers, etc all get a certain package of privileges that I don't, because they're willing to take on jobs that I don't and have competence that I don't. Likewise, men are generally willing to take on tasks that women don't want to or are less able to, and women are generally willing to take on tasks that men don't want to or are less able to. It's only logical we adjust the privileges and responsibilities we expect accordingly.

Quote:Here we'll have to agree on principle but disagree in practice.  We should all respect one another.  We don't always act that way.  Again, that's not a uniquely male role to fill.

you can respect both women and men while being cognizant that women are more likely to appreciate someone else having things under control.

I would rather put it that feminists want equal opportunity, rather than equal outcomes, in the various occupations.

We need more women in control. Feminism is right that this should be about equal. Women make more sane decisions, and are less inclined to enact or support policies that harm life than policies created by men.

[Eric the Green]

(03-16-2022, 08:41 PM)JasonBlack Wrote:

(03-16-2022, 04:10 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: That sounds a bit better Jason, but I still quibble. That makes for discussion, at least.

I don't think women are less "industrious".

several studies have been done on this subject which suggest otherwise.

I don't see that you have quoted or referred to any such studies yet. Are you really suggesting that men work harder than women at their jobs? So a women seamstress is slower than a male one? Women who do jobs like Lucy and Ethel on the assembly line are slower and less industrious than males who do those jobs? That's what "industrious" means.

Quote:

Quote:There are differences between the sexes, but more and more it is being shown there are less than previously thought.

such as? from what I've seen, little evidence is pointing in this direction. apart from the differences I've already mentioned, men have about 17x more testosterone, have higher visual spacial intelligence, have lower verbal intelligence and produce far less oxytocin.

this article lists some other differences  
https://stanmed.stanford.edu/2017spring/...erent.html

I observe the results in performance, and I don't have studies to quote, but women have entered many occupations formerly held by only men and are doing well. Women executives have even run for political office as conservatives, like Meg Whitman and Carly Fiorina, and I don't think they rose to their positions because they were less competent than men. Women do jobs in the military now, and I don't hear any reports that they are less competent in the jobs to which they are assigned. Women in sports are catching up to men too, and often have better endurance than many men. I don't put as much stock as you do on biological differences, not believing that biology is all that we are.

"Differences in human behavior are overwhelmingly cultural not biological as anthropologists have understood since at least 1910. Known biological controls of subtle, sophisticated behavior (within the normal range) are trivial. Behavior patterns rarely match the visible biological variations or putative race categories.....

Culture is a much more complicated and powerful force than people realize. Culture is not merely composed of superficial things people do (art, music), it is a complex “grammar” that defines and controls every aspect of people’s lives, including their actions, thoughts, identities, and self images. It defines appropriate behavior, values, morals, goals, and perceptions of cause and effect. It controls where people focus and what they selectively see and hear out of a stream of information otherwise too complex to comprehend. It controls methods of categorizing, analogies, and logic. It controls how and what people learn, and how they express what they have learned (e.g., medium, style, convention, meaning, and symbolism). It limits the available repertoire of thought and action, making behavior comprehensible and predictable within the group, while also enforcing group identity, and thus defining and separating “us” from of “them.” One’s culture can promote a sense of superiority over others, inculcating patterns, perceptions, and ethnocentrism, a kind of patriotism, through some form of both formal and informal learning of shared cultural perceptions, whether they are accurate or not...."

https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-scie...-iq-scores

Quote:

Quote:IQ tests are also geared toward the dominant culture and ethnic group.

Actually, most tests that account for cultural bias show wider gaps than the ones which don't attempt to account for it.

Cherry-picking of studies can support bogus claims. "New research suggests that a universal test of intelligence quotient does not exist. Results in this type of test are determined to a strong degree by cultural differences." https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/20...092048.htm

Quote:

Quote:In a 4T and 1T, gender widening may also be due to the increased tendency toward conformity and a reversion to the unjust and unfair ways of the past because rulers and other powerful people gain more power as crises demand swift and collective action.

with respect, boomer feminists are quite a bit more tolerable than millennial feminists, and I don't think you have experience dealing with the sheer viciousness of milllennial feminists and their doxxing, threats, physical abuse, and yes, false allegations (the 2% figure most people cite is false allegations that make it all the way to court, which is a small minority of total sexual allegations)

Of course, you have no reason to take the experience of my own or my friends' experiences at face value. There is a grim amount of evidence on this subject. 

.... look at these abuse statistics from the CDC. 
https://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/p...2010-a.pdf
"According to the CDC’s statistics — estimates based on more than 18,000 telephone-survey responses in the United States — roughly 5,365,000 men had been victims of intimate partner physical violence in the previous 12 months, compared with 4,741,000 women"

But how severe are these violent attacks by women, as compared with those by men?

Maybe the stress of living in a 4T makes millennial women seem more "vicious"? No, I don't put much stock on personal experiences in place of stats. But if women are becoming more violent in intimate partnerships, what does this prove? That women are not as nice as they are portrayed? So what? Are you saying that, therefore, gender widening is not happening? You stated before than women are more "agreeable", and now you cite stats that you might say disprove this. Do you assign ANY valuable virtues to women, then, or are they now all gone among millennials?

And I'm sure you would not want to mention that enormous gap between women and men when it comes to violent crime in general.

Quote:And then we have the "Women Are Wonderful Effect". Mounting, replicable evidence has shown that both women and men view women substantially more favorably than they view men.
https://becauseits2015.wordpress.com/201...-misogyny/

That sounds like sloganeering to me. Men saying women are "wonderful" does not account for the pay gaps and the glass ceilings.

[JasonBlack]

(03-17-2022, 01:22 PM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(03-17-2022, 01:10 PM)JasonBlack Wrote:

(03-17-2022, 07:52 AM)David Horn Wrote: All those characteristics you define as 'male' are actually role models some embrace and others not.  But if anything has been learned in the past few decades, it's the fact that we're all different -- male and female alike.  There are uniquely female roles, childbearing being the most obvious, but uniquely male roes are less so, at least today.  Women can be brave, as Marina Ovsyannikova proved when she walked out on Russian TV with a sign protesting an intolerant tyrant.  On the other hand, many men and women shrink in the face of a challenge they should meet.  That's not a gender issue, though the method of meeting the challenge may be.  We men were endowed, by our own testosterone, with superior musculature; sometime that still matters.  But we shouldn't assume that we are all equally capable.  We aren't.

Women can be brave just like men can be empathetic, but there are more brave men and more empathetic women. The whole "we're not all equally capable" is kind of the point. Our general expectations should reflect this general difference in capability. You can have a general way in which you treat people while still making individual exceptions as they arise. For example, most of my female friends are pretty masculine. Their sense of humor is like a male, their emotional expression is more like a male, what they actually do in practice is more like a male, so I treat them more like how I treat my guy friends. To reiterate the previous point, the main issue I have with modern feminism is that they want all the privileges of being a man, all the privileges of being a woman, and the responsibilities of neither. Doctors, members of the armed forces, construction workers, etc all get a certain package of privileges that I don't, because they're willing to take on jobs that I don't and have competence that I don't. Likewise, men are generally willing to take on tasks that women don't want to or are less able to, and women are generally willing to take on tasks that men don't want to or are less able to. It's only logical we adjust the privileges and responsibilities we expect accordingly.

Quote:Here we'll have to agree on principle but disagree in practice.  We should all respect one another.  We don't always act that way.  Again, that's not a uniquely male role to fill.

you can respect both women and men while being cognizant that women are more likely to appreciate someone else having things under control.

I would rather put it that feminists want equal opportunity, rather than equal outcomes, in the various occupations.

We need more women in control. Feminism is right that this should be about equal. Women make more sane decisions, and are less inclined to enact or support policies that harm life than policies created by men.

Even if feminists are right about equality, we live in a country that privileges women far above men, saddles them with less responsibilities and grants them far more assistance. We need a swing in the other direction that celebrates masculinity, order, courage, authority and stoic decisiveness during hard times.

[Eric the Green]

(03-17-2022, 01:51 PM)JasonBlack Wrote:

(03-17-2022, 01:22 PM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(03-17-2022, 01:10 PM)JasonBlack Wrote:

(03-17-2022, 07:52 AM)David Horn Wrote: All those characteristics you define as 'male' are actually role models some embrace and others not.  But if anything has been learned in the past few decades, it's the fact that we're all different -- male and female alike.  There are uniquely female roles, childbearing being the most obvious, but uniquely male roes are less so, at least today.  Women can be brave, as Marina Ovsyannikova proved when she walked out on Russian TV with a sign protesting an intolerant tyrant.  On the other hand, many men and women shrink in the face of a challenge they should meet.  That's not a gender issue, though the method of meeting the challenge may be.  We men were endowed, by our own testosterone, with superior musculature; sometime that still matters.  But we shouldn't assume that we are all equally capable.  We aren't.

Women can be brave just like men can be empathetic, but there are more brave men and more empathetic women. The whole "we're not all equally capable" is kind of the point. Our general expectations should reflect this general difference in capability. You can have a general way in which you treat people while still making individual exceptions as they arise. For example, most of my female friends are pretty masculine. Their sense of humor is like a male, their emotional expression is more like a male, what they actually do in practice is more like a male, so I treat them more like how I treat my guy friends. To reiterate the previous point, the main issue I have with modern feminism is that they want all the privileges of being a man, all the privileges of being a woman, and the responsibilities of neither. Doctors, members of the armed forces, construction workers, etc all get a certain package of privileges that I don't, because they're willing to take on jobs that I don't and have competence that I don't. Likewise, men are generally willing to take on tasks that women don't want to or are less able to, and women are generally willing to take on tasks that men don't want to or are less able to. It's only logical we adjust the privileges and responsibilities we expect accordingly.

Quote:Here we'll have to agree on principle but disagree in practice.  We should all respect one another.  We don't always act that way.  Again, that's not a uniquely male role to fill.

you can respect both women and men while being cognizant that women are more likely to appreciate someone else having things under control.

I would rather put it that feminists want equal opportunity, rather than equal outcomes, in the various occupations.

We need more women in control. Feminism is right that this should be about equal. Women make more sane decisions, and are less inclined to enact or support policies that harm life than policies created by men.

Even if feminists are right about equality, we live in a country that privileges women far above men, saddles them with less responsibilities and grants them far more assistance. We need a swing in the other direction that celebrates masculinity, order, courage, authority and stoic decisiveness during hard times.

Well, this is the thread you started for controversial opinions. OK!

We disagree on this totally.

What you want a "swing" to is typical of fascist and authoritarian societies. We have already swung way too far in that direction over the last 40 years of neoliberalism and inequality.

George Monbiot mentions that neoliberals are quite "overt" about their opposition to democracy (about 1 1/2 minute in).
https://youtu.be/jOuzABjrAo4

"There are no examples in history of such an unequal society as ours that is not either in revolution or a police state" Nick Hanauer
https://youtu.be/scok7hEexCk?t=482

"We have endured 40 years of trickle-down economics, and that is why our democracy is disintegrating today" -- Nick Hanauer
https://youtu.be/scok7hEexCk?t=133

Watch the hard lessons of the "swing" you advocate.





If we want a better country, we'd better focus less on identity issues in general. If we do focus on them, we need to continue the movement toward greater equality and respect for all REGARDLESS of identity. We need to focus far more on containing or overturning tyranny and stopping assaults on democracy and human rights, here at home and around the world. We'd better focus on the enormous wealth gaps and the resulting social and health problems that are far worse in the USA than in any other developed country and in many less-developed ones too. This is a big crisis. And we'd better focus on securing our health and equal access to healthcare by whatever measures are workable and necessary. And most of all, we'd better focus on changing the way we relate to our environment and use energy, lest we leave those who come after us (including ourselves in coming decades, however long we remain here, and if we re-incarnate here, and where else would we want to reincarnate to, and do we want to spend another billion years in heaven or hell....????) with a planetary toxic junk heap hothouse, with no intelligent life on it anymore!!!!!

[JasonBlack]

Quote:Well, this is the thread you started for controversial opinions. OK!

that's right. bring it!

Quote:If we want a better country, we'd better focus less on identity issues in general.

YES! This is 2T/3T shit. We don't need to focus on that in a 4T.

Quote:If we want a better country, we'd better focus less on identity issues in general. If we do focus on them, we need to continue the movement toward greater equality and respect for all REGARDLESS of identity.

respect: yes
equality: in the sense of starting all people off with the tools they need to get ahead and educate themselves to command a comfortable living, yes. 

Quote:What you want a "swing" to is typical of fascist and authoritarian societies. We have already swung way too far in that direction over the last 40 years of neoliberalism and inequality.

yes and no, I'll start with the yes: we need to crack down on the lobbying and corrupt deal-making that have lead to a fusion of corporations and government. I will even admit I wasn't nearly concerned enough about this a few decades ago. The corrupt bureaucracy needs to be broken apart before we can build new institutions and facilitate the growth of small businesses which actually play by the rules and get ahead with their productivity, strategy and wit over backroom deals.

I would argue our major swing toward fascism has had more to do with massive government surveillance, lockdowns, and curtailing of personal liberties. however, we should also note the "liberal" in "neoliberal" is there for a reason, as it tends to be far more permissive than anything resembling actual fascism.

Obviously, I'm a libertarian and I hate fascism, but actual fascists would do much more to crack down on our celebrity circuses, emotional histrionics, weak, overly emotional ideologies and luxury beliefs that only the most privileged people can afford to believe (this is one reason why Civic gens tend to criticize Idealist gens, and why working class people tend to criticize the ivory tower idealism of university students/graduates). One of the few things they get right is that they are hyper aware of the need to restore a sense of strength and pride as a means of getting through crises. I say this not as a justification, but as an acknowledgement that we need to find our own way of addressing these same needs if we wish to avoid over-correcting in that direction, similar to how capitalists need to address certain concerns over inequality in order to avoid an over-correction into violent communism.

(not directed at you specifically) One of the reasons why coming-of-age Civics slowly take control of the societal mood away from aging Idealists is that we are the ones most acutely aware of a need to correct in the direction of greater self-regulation, a commonsense concept of order and the need to stop ignoring various concepts which have been unconsciously pushed aside during times where we could afford to focus more on ideology over practice (ex: our discussion over gender differences and roles is a perfect example. the science over just how different men and women are has been mounting for decades). Meanwhile, Idealist gens (indeed, this tendency has been along well before boomers) have a tendency to want to tackle the problems of the 4T the same way they charged to the front of the line during a 2T, bringing with them a focus on "awareness" that, while useful at times to bolster the morale of the young, does little to address the need for greater structure and organization of which the last two turnings left a gaping whole.

[JasonBlack]

1) The concept of "a minimum wage should be a living wage" is not inherently offensive, but a living wage for 1 person. Not "father works for 40 hours a week and supports a wife and kids", you shouldn't be having kids with a stay-at-home mother if you only make minimum wage. A lot of people move the goalpost on this issue like crazy.
2) Welfare should come with some expectation of community service. At the very least, something like "you have to plant X number of trees this month to get your welfare payments".
3) Marriage should be a contract drawn up between two parties where they agree on terms, planning for instances of divorce, disability, cheating, etc in advance. The government's only role should be enforcing that contract, the same way they enforce other contracts.
4) Employers should have to pay AT LEAST double wages for work done on Christmas, Thanksgiving or Black Friday.

[JasonBlack]

(03-17-2022, 01:19 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: There was no alternative but to adjust rules and recommendations according to the science. Complaining about this is dishonest.
#6 is the only one of your charges that I might agree with. But I would not propose that such immunity boosting should in any way substitute for vaccines and treatments.

It is the the context of point 6 that their recommendations are bad. The CDC laying down rules based on the current science is, for the most part, just doing its job. The problem is
1) if they are unwilling to give even common sense advice on diet and exercise to help fight the pandemic, one is legitimate in questioning their motives.
2) I reiterate point #4: there is a difference between giving initial rules for people to follow, and expecting them to continue following your rules after consistently non-replicable findings indicate you aren't close to the answer. I call this the "fallacy of consistent credibility": in which one who has reached a particular status or position demands the same amount of respect and obedience regardless of how frequently they demonstrate diminished competence. Credibility can be taken away just as easily as it has been given, and under the circumstances, that could not be more relevant.

[David Horn]

I was going to pass this by but thought better of it.  I created a list to simplify my response.

(03-18-2022, 02:23 AM)JasonBlack Wrote:

1. The concept of "a minimum wage should be a living wage" is not inherently offensive, but a living wage for 1 person. Not "father works for 40 hours a week and supports a wife and kids", you shouldn't be having kids with a stay-at-home mother if you only make minimum wage. A lot of people move the goalpost on this issue like crazy.
   
2. Welfare should come with some expectation of community service. At the very least, something like "you have to plant X number of trees this month to get your welfare payments".
   
3. Marriage should be a contract drawn up between two parties where they agree on terms, planning for instances of divorce, disability, cheating, etc in advance. The government's only role should be enforcing that contract, the same way they enforce other contracts.
   
4. Employers should have to pay AT LEAST double wages for work done on Christmas, Thanksgiving or Black Friday.
   

1. The minimum wage should not be based on our evaluation of its use, but on a mathematically sound extrapolation of the concept since its inception.  If we examine both the per capita growths of the economy and the minimum wage in real terms dating back to the late 1960's, the current rate should be about $20 per hour (estimates are low side: $18; high side: $22).  This correlates with the growth of paid work in general, which is nearly as far behind the curve as the minimum wage.  Note: return on capital is vastly above the curve.  I wonder why.  
   
2. First, there is little of what can be called 'welfare' to even discuss.  Bill Clinton did it in, much to his shame.  Almost everyone receiving anything (and far too little imho) is either mentally or physically unable to work, or both.  All the Welfare Queen nonsense is just that.  There is a codicil: benefits scammers are prolific and tend to avoid being caught.  Isn't it better to extract them from the shadows, provide aid if it's needed and ignore the blame game?
   
3. Really?  I know some people who actually tried something like that, and they ended their relationships as bitter enemies ... even before they began.  Matters of the heart don't do well in the legal realm.
   
4. Well, we agree on something.  I would expand the list, but you have the right idea.
   

[JasonBlack]

(03-19-2022, 09:28 AM)David Horn Wrote: First, there is little of what can be called 'welfare' to even discuss.  Bill Clinton did it in, much to his shame.  Almost everyone receiving anything (and far too little imho) is either mentally or physically unable to work, or both.  All the Welfare Queen nonsense is just that. 

https://www.budget.senate.gov/imo/media/...rtened.pdf
"The total amount spent on these 80-plus federal welfare programs amounts to roughly $1.03
trillion."
^we can argue about what is a reasonable amount, which items should be included or which items should be slashed/added to. what we cannot argue about is that it is a small amount.

Quote:There is a codicil: benefits scammers are prolific and tend to avoid being caught.  Isn't it better to extract them from the shadows, provide aid if it's needed and ignore the blame game?

100%, that was my intention from the get go.

Quote:Really?  I know some people who actually tried something like that, and they ended their relationships as bitter enemies ... even before they began.  Matters of the heart don't do well in the legal realm.

I would need more case studies to be convinced.

Quote:Well, we agree on something.  I would expand the list, but you have the right idea.

supporting capitalism does not mean I support the majority of the tenants of American-style capitalism. frankly, depriving people of holidays in the name of not supporting "laziness" or "entitlement" is just contemptuous.