|
The two explanations I've heard from liberals and leftists for why intellectuals and more educated people lean left are that education breeds empathy and that liberal positions are just more correct (think the Colbert line about reality having a well known liberal bias). The former seems to pertain to difficult to prove value judgments, while the latter (which I'm interested in) suggests that core conservative takes have been refuted with arguments and evidence. I'm skeptical of this notion but I'd like to see what people think are the best examples and where the refutations can be found. It seems to me like conservative positions on univeral healthcare and global warming are very weak, but they have much stronger support on there being an equity-efficiency trade off in economics more generally, tough on crime policies reducing crime, and many politically salient outcome disparities being explained by behavioral disparities (especially the racial disparity in police shootings). It also seems like liberals and leftists think its pretty well established that the republican party is especially politically unscrupulous. I'm skeptical of many Trump era debunkings of supposed right wing misinformation, but I'm not interested in that so much as core ideological questions.
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 02:06
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 6, 2024 19:54 |
|
|
I can't speak much for Colbert, or I guess his writers since that's just a character being played by an actor even though I believe he also was in the writer's room, but I can help give an idea of how things are viewed from a Marxist or materialist perspective if that helps. I've got a general idea of the liberal view of authenticity and their idea of the proper application and structure of the monopoly of violence but it's not really my domain anymore. Which core ideological positions commonly assigned to the GOP are you wondering about?
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 02:37
|
|
|
This is the wrong question to ask. To discredit something means you have to play by the rules of logic and reason. Conservative, or more accurately regressive, policies and positions do not come from a place of reason. They come from a place of emotion, from fear of the unknown and anger over a lack of control. You can’t discredit them any more than you can discredit the word salad of a patient at a mental hospital, because there’s nothing to discredit. If you’re trying to deal with this by appealing to reason, you’re playing the wrong game.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 02:50
|
|
|
I honestly can't think of a modern conservative political position right now that isn't: A. About taking someone's rights away believing it will promote wealthy white interests (real or imagined). If someone I don't like gets hurt that's all the better. B. Owning the libs. Just look at the latest "debate" over burn pit victims funding. Conservative politicians are making intellectually dishonest, hypocritical, self-serving talking points that are objectively false or lies all just to disguise the fact they're butthurt about something else and want control over ending the money when they can. The only genuine philosophical argument I've heard from right wingers at this point is "Abortion should be illegal because I believe it's murder. I don't think abortion under any circumstances should be allowed" Which, ok. I think that's tremendously wrong and leads to greater problems. But it's at least a genuinely consistent and intellectually honest argument. Every other stripe has no other logical outcome beyond controlling women. I think it's hard to "discredit" emotional arguments. Anyone who doesn't follow politics closely or take the time to really educate and engage in political philosophy will see things like crime statistics in cities like Chicago, Birmingham, St. Louis and are reasonably and rightfully be worried about it. It just opens someone up to a well-oiled propaganda machine and racism rather than policies that take work like combatting institutional racism, gun control, et al.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 02:57
|
|
|
Pollyanna posted:This is the wrong question to ask. To discredit something means you have to play by the rules of logic and reason. Conservative, or more accurately regressive, policies and positions do not come from a place of reason. They come from a place of emotion, from fear of the unknown and anger over a lack of control. You can’t discredit them any more than you can discredit the word salad of a patient at a mental hospital, because there’s nothing to discredit. There are various conservative intellectuals and people claiming to make intellectual arguments for conservative positions. Their arguments are either debunked or not, even if they're just a bad faith cover for fear and emotion. And if their arguments aren't debunked its weird, albeit possible, that nobody would believe them for legitimate reasons.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 02:59
|
|
|
toterunner posted:There are various conservative intellectuals and people claiming to make intellectual arguments for conservative positions. Their arguments are either debunked or not, even if they're just a bad faith cover for fear and emotion. And if their arguments aren't debunked its weird, albeit possible, that nobody would believe them for legitimate reasons. How do you propose that an argument being made in bad faith could be debunked? What specific argument from what specific person did you have in mind? There's no conversation to be had here without more to go on than vague wonderings
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 03:04
|
|
|
toterunner posted:I'm skeptical of many Trump era debunkings of supposed right wing misinformation Well by all means, list some of those to give a baseline of what you find to be questionable.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 03:06
|
|
|
Epic High Five posted:How do you propose that an argument being made in bad faith could be debunked? What specific argument from what specific person did you have in mind? There's no conversation to be had here without more to go on than vague wonderings Richard Hanania tweeted about a study claiming unions reduce product quality. Even if he's really just looking for arguments against unions because he identifies with the rich and despises workers, the study could still be debunked. Tucker Carlson frequently cites statistics about how the black share of cop killers is greater than the black share of people shot by police. Even if he is saying this to stoke up white resentment, it could still be proven that the black over representation among people shot by the police isn't caused by behavioral risk factors. I recall Wes Yang citing this article to argue for policing as a method to reduce crime (and to mock some of the framing in the article). Even if he just hates woke liberals and is looking for examples of them being wrong, the studies claiming that police presence reduces crime could be debunked. Those three examples relate to the three areas my OP says the conservative position seems well founded, though I don't have any ideological affinity for anti union positions and I haven't looked at that particular study, its just a recent example I could remember when a conservative pundit I followed posted something relating to the equity efficiency trade off. I find it extremely unlikely that the general existence of an equity-efficiency trade off, policing reducing crime, or police shootings not being racially biased will turn out to be topics where the conservative position has been decisively refuted. I'm more interested if there are other areas where the conservative position has been so debunked that it can be said that conservative views are more broadly debunked than liberal ones. Mulva posted:Well by all means, list some of those to give a baseline of what you find to be questionable. This seems like an especially dishonest debunking (Tucker Carlson showed a clip of Joe Biden saying whites becoming a minority is a good thing, the debunker claims he was actually saying that immigration was a good thing, but Tucker's interpretation is obviously right and the debunker's is nonsensical). This is a more typical example of bad debunking. There are lots of debunkings of the claim that election observers in Atlanta were told to leave because of a broken water main, but the actual claim I see a lot is that they were falsely told vote counting would be done for the night because of a broken water main, and left because of that. I never see debunkings of that claim. There's also the thing about the changing definition of a recession that's going on now.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 03:49
|
|
|
toterunner posted:conservative intellectuals Oxymoron
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 03:50
|
|
|
toterunner posted:(Tucker Carlson showed a clip of Joe Biden saying whites becoming a minority is a good thing, the debunker claims he was actually saying that immigration was a good thing, but Tucker's interpretation is obviously right and the debunker's is nonsensical) Thanks, this is what I was looking. Good bye and good thread, I'm sure it'll go well for you.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 03:52
|
|
|
Western conservatism has the problem that its mostly a collection of naked special interest grouped together because they believe that they are axiomatically right, others are wrong, and that they can technically make a world where all three exist. They also view politics and power as a zero sum game, to be used to seize resources from the outsiders. Fundamentally the issue is that these worldviews have nothing to offer anyone not on their particular inside, so debating with them is basically pointless. Lets toss up the big three Business and the cult of Ayn Rayn: Axiomatic belief in the power of markets and the morality of wealth and self interest above all. You might notice that this position cant really compromise, to make money most efficiently they must pick the pockets of everyone using the lever of capital and its a sin to relieve the suffering of the suckers who never got a real chance. Sectarian nationalism: Axiomatic belief that (FAITH OF CHOICE) had a perfect and divine moral code outlined to them by a/some) morally perfect deity/deities. You might notice that this position cant really compromise, because the current set of answers, which they generate through an poorly understood process that mostly involves senile old men arguing about some poorly translated, improperly transcribed, archaically written fantasy novels, is correct because the book proves it. Things not in line with this severely dated view of the world are sins being promoted by heretics/apostates/atheists/outsiders and must be crushed. The religions are the most up front but also the least credible to outsiders so they mostly just infect the narratives of other similar religious groups. Ethnic nationalism: Axiomatic belief that (SUPERFICIAL GROUP MARKING FEATURE) indicates that you are, in fact, the best and therefor all resources must be allocated to (GROUP) to maximize the good of humanity. You might notice that this position cant really compromise, because the inferiors need to be destroyed or enslaved and anyone from (GROUP) standing up to you is a race traitor who has clearly been corrupted and also must be destroyed. And then there are the clueless jerks who populate the mass following, near mindlessly parroting talking points for an issue that one of the above has latched onto to propel themselves to power. Issues are designed to grab groups that are insulated, disempowered, or ostracized by social and economic changes. Typical taking points are designed to be very simple, easy to memorize and are almost always total lies (hes secretly MUSLIM!), utterly meaningless (TAN SUIT), or such twists of the truth they can be evaluated for use as high tension cables (Quote mining emails to say people are pedos). For example, what rational purpose could just objectively lying about coal serve except to cynically pander to people who got stuck in an asset trap when coal died with some fake hope? It benefits no one but the person lying about it. Or talking about bathrooms as a way to associate a group they morally disprove of with rapists, without any evidence that its particularly more likely than a random rear end in a top hat walking in off the street doing it, or that its far more likely to be a person the victim knows. Or whining about policies they themselves implemented a year before an election a year after it. Or running on policies they voted against? Engaging in any form of meaningful discussion requires a degree of mutual respect and frankly they haven't earned it and don't give it. Meaningfully engaging would require that their points be grounded in something other than lies or axiomatic presumptions. it would require me to believe that they had some flaw in their worldview I could help correct by presenting evidence. They have seen it before and rejected it, clinging to their own perceived interests or a safety blanket of a fairy tale telling them it will all be okay in the end. In fact asking you to debunk something is basically just an excuse to nitpick a debunking, totally ignoring the 99% that shreds their bullshit to focus on some meaningless detail they can use to pivot to an unrelated talking point. Its a way to play to audiences. Barrel Cactaur fucked around with this message at 04:13 on Aug 2, 2022 |
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 04:02
|
|
|
In the interest of educating lurkers with a sincere interest, a modern conservative pillar that is on shaky (or in this case, flatly false) foundation: Economists Reinhart and Rogoff authored a study claiming to prove that national debt strangles economic growth -- in particular, that once the debt-to-GDP ratio of an "advanced" nation reaches 90%, economic growth stagnates and reverses. This finding was widely circulated, cited more than 500 times, heavily profiled in popular media, and was the sole economic study behind Paul Ryan's famous "Path to Prosperity" budget -- a solid example of how much this influenced the global austerity response to the 2008 financial crisis. The problem is they screwed up. Having flubbed an excel formula that removed the results of 5 countries and had a different error strike another, Reinhart and Rogoff "accidentally" excluded data from 6 of the 19 countries they examined. Quelle surprise, including the omitted data flipped the sign and eliminated the dread inflection point. This took years to catch out because, for unclear reasons, Reinhart and Rogoff refused to share their dataset until caught redhanded. The authors, for instance, removed 4 years of data from New Zealand. All 4 featured New Zealand in the 90%+ ratio range, 4 of the 5 instances for that nation. Only the bolded GDP growth was included in their calculations, the italicized were omitted: 7.7%, 11.9%, -9.9%, 10.8%, -7.6%. Doubling down on the "error", the weighting Rogoff and Reinhart chose to use amplified the omission (for unclear reasons, the included New Zealand year was given the same cumulative weight as Britain's decade+ with positive growth in the same debt category  ). Conversely, they happened to include the corresponding years for the United States, the only years in the study where the US was in the 90%+ range. While one may choose to blame the predominantly negative GDP growth during those years to the ratio of debt vs GDP, it's generally accepted that the driver of 1946-1949 economic contraction in the United States was actually demobilization.Rogoff and Reinhart, boldly, owned up to the mistakes while explaining that while it may look like the analysis was altered, it wasn't. These mean University of Massachusetts economists and grad students chose to emphasize the error rather than their own findings were "broadly similar".... "Nevertheless, the weight of the evidence to date –including this latest comment -- seems entirely consistent with our original interpretation of the data in our 2010 AER paper.". Which is to say that the widely publicized takeaway of their paper (A high debt-to-GDP ratio leads to economic contraction) is entirely consistent with their interpretation of the findings after addressing the excel oopsie (economic growth remains positive but slows somewhat at high debt-to-GDP ratios). "Entirely consistent" and "broadly similar" apparently being terms of art among conservative economists which bear no relationship to the dictionary definitions of the words. Luckily, their troubles ended with trying to mislead the Washington Post about the errant analysis that underpinned years of global austerity and false testimony to the US Sena  of course it didn't. See, the group that Reinhart and Rogoff snarked in reply to identified a pair of issues but only pursued the spreadsheet snafu. They left it to their counterpart (and one of the world's foremost experts on minimum wage) to cover the other flaw in the analysis. The implication, in Ryan's budget and most of the press, was that economic slowdown - or even contraction - was caused by a high debt-to-GDP ratio, that a country who tips past the inflection point on public debt will see growth suffer. Luckily, Arin Dube knows how to conduct detailed analysis. His work confirms what was long postulated by many popeconomists in the years following Rogoff and Reinhart's world tour: Economic downturns cause elevated debt-to-GDP ratios for the most algebraic of reasons: "The ratio has a numerator (debt) and denominator (GDP): any fall in GDP will mechanically boost the ratio. Even if GDP growth doesn’t become negative, continuous growth in debt coupled with a GDP growth slowdown will also lead to a rise in the debt-to-GDP ratio." Dube, unlike me, is not content with explaining fractions to a pair of Harvard professors at a grade school level (however badly they need the remedial assistance). So, wearily, we trudge on to further establish that the last decade of conservative economic principle was based on an Excel error and a motivated blindness to blatant reverse-causation.quote:The graph shows that GDP growth rates were unusually low and falling prior to the 10 point increase in the debt-to-GDP ratio. If you average the growth differentials from the 3 years prior to the increase in debt, (i.e., the values associated with -3,-2,-1 on the X-axis), it is –0.6 (or 6/10 of a percent lower growth than usual) and statistically significant at the 5 percent level. In contrast, the average growth rates from years 1, 2 and 3+ after the 10 point increase in debt-to-GDP ratio is 0.2 (or 2/10 of one percent) higher than usual. Awfully judgy of me here. Let those of us who haven't inspired a decade of public benefit cuts and prolonged an economic recovery by making a teensy excel error cast the first stone, right? I'll leave to lurkers (privately or in the thread) if it's worth continuing on to some of the other false pillars: Voter fraud is a classic, but other topics include making benefits contingent on drug testing, the prevalence of tax fraud by income bracket, and the labor effects of minimum wage. Paracaidas fucked around with this message at 05:29 on Aug 2, 2022 |
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 05:22
|
|
|
toterunner posted:
quote:
This is the interpretation you think is "obviously right" So you think it's obviously right that Biden is practicing eugenics via some plan to reduce the amount of white people? This is why debunking many conservative opinions is pointless they are so far off from reality the effort required to get to a common ground often isn't worth it.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 05:30
|
|
|
socialsecurity posted:This is the interpretation you think is "obviously right" So you think it's obviously right that Biden is practicing eugenics via some plan to reduce the amount of white people? I don't think he's practicing eugenics or implementing a plan to reduce the amount of white people, just that that he is saying that its a good thing whites are becoming a minority, which the article denies. I posted an article I read months ago without re-reading it and all I remembered was that the article claimed that Biden was saying immigration, rather than whites being a minority, was the source of our strength (in my defense that's how I characterized it in my post, I didn't say anything about eugenics or a plan). I guess you could say its not so clear that the author was saying that but that's still how I read this quote:The second part was the “unrelenting stream of immigration” which he said was a source of U.S. strength. (This is the brief section Carlson aired.) This is the relevant portion of the Biden speech. toterunner fucked around with this message at 06:02 on Aug 2, 2022 |
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 06:00
|
|
|
The Jewish space laser beans have been heavily discredited.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 06:12
|
|
|
Not even on the second page and OP is already nitpicking the meaning of words to avoid having to admit they're just wrong LOL
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 06:20
|
|
|
toterunner posted:but they have much stronger support on there being an equity-efficiency trade off in economics more generally, tough on crime policies reducing crime, Stop and search, the death penalty, to name two example entirely out of nowhere, famously effective at reducing crime.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 06:57
|
|
|
OwlFancier posted:Stop and search, the death penalty, to name two example entirely out of nowhere, famously effective at reducing crime. One of the key things is that it makes no sense if you take the ad copy at face value, it makes perfect sense when you realise the not particularly well masked real purpose of those policies.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 07:10
|
|
|
Ghost Leviathan posted:One of the key things is that it makes no sense if you take the ad copy at face value, it makes perfect sense when you realise the not particularly well masked real purpose of those policies. Oh sure, I'm very much aware of that, it's just an amazingly counterfactual statement, like literally the opposite of reality. Social stratification and punitive responses to crime do not and have never reduced crime rates, right wing ideology is wholly effective at making society work worse because they need people to be unhappy so that they can take their resources and rights in order to create a wealthy and privileged ruling class.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 07:36
|
|
|
OwlFancier posted:Stop and search, the death penalty, to name two example entirely out of nowhere, famously effective at reducing crime. https://www.ojp.gov/pdffiles1/nij/247350.pdf Simple two-page leaflet here about deterrence, also mentions this, which is relevant to what OP mentioned about "tough on crime" politics: quote:4. Increasing the severity of punishment does little to Sources and further details are provided in the link.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 09:51
|
|
|
Anthropogenic climate change is on its way to fully debunking Money.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 13:05
|
|
|
toterunner posted:I don't think he's practicing eugenics or implementing a plan to reduce the amount of white people, just that that he is saying that its a good thing whites are becoming a minority, which the article denies. I posted an article I read months ago without re-reading it and all I remembered was that the article claimed that Biden was saying immigration, rather than whites being a minority, was the source of our strength (in my defense that's how I characterized it in my post, I didn't say anything about eugenics or a plan). I guess you could say its not so clear that the author was saying that but that's still how I read this so since this example turned out to be the opposite of what you were thinking of, got any more in mind?
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 14:30
|
|
|
Op all political parties are proponents of the capitalist order and thusly must be rightly destroyed. Being a leftist means you are aware of the extension of class struggle that is political machinery. The destruction not only of the political machines grasp on information but also the destruction of the idea that there is a left and right in America. It's center and center right sliding far right. The left Is violently crushed by the Babylon complex that the capitalist state derives it's power from.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 14:51
|
|
|
Paracaidas posted:In the interest of educating lurkers with a sincere interest, a modern conservative pillar that is on shaky (or in this case, flatly false) foundation: Oh no, please, this was an excellent post, and super duper informative. Oh do go on~ 
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 15:21
|
|
|
Yeowch!!! My Balls!!! posted:so since this example turned out to be the opposite of what you were thinking of, got any more in mind? It might be the opposite of what I was thinking in terms of Tucker Carlson being right, but it seems quite like what I was thinking in terms of it being a clip of Biden saying a white minority is a good thing and the debunker denying that. But I'll give a few more. The context I came across that article was after the Buffalo shooting there were lots of articles saying the great replacement theory was debunked, and conservatives were posting lots of examples of liberals in media and politics saying whites becoming a minority was a good thing. In response, there was this weird uniformity of vox types saying "gee just because people were acknowledging the political effects of demographic change doesn't mean there was a plot to cause it." And ok, it doesn't prove that there was a plot to cause demographic change, but that's still a misrepresentation of the examples people were posting. It was like there is this aversion to admit that there are people with influence over immigration policy who were gloating about whites becoming a minority and saying its a good thing. You could admit that and still say there is no evidence that these attitudes are actually a cause of demographic change, but then conservatives could score a whataboutism by pointing out how its liberal orthodoxy that authority figures with racist beliefs will necessarily have their attitudes influence their actions, but that would still leave it a marginal factor causing demographic change compared to economic factors. Another is how its supposedly misinformation that critical race theory is being taught in schools. The claim that CRT is only taught in law schools is totally bogus as its clearly taught in colleges of education and there are official school district websites (iirc, its something like that) that explicitly mention CRT in reccomended materials for training teachers. The weaker claim that CRT might be involved in the training of teachers but not the instruction of students is misleading. If students are taught material that is part of CRT and also part of other frameworks, but CRT is the one their teachers are trained in, it makes sense to call it teaching CRT. That relates to a larger dynamic, which I think is very dishonest, where there's a huge aversion to any convenient name for this ascendant ideology preaching collective guilt, that members of certain groups should have their claims about oppression be uncritically accepted, etc. Another example is how Twitter in the run up to the 2020 election would label tweets by Trump about some specific story that made him wary of voter fraud as misinformation and link not to a debunking of the specific claim, but material about how voter fraud was historically rare. Implying that voter fraud was so historically rare that the prior probability of fraud occuring in a specific election was so rare that specific claims about it could be discounted. But there were likely 100,000 fraudulent votes in the 1982 illinois gubernatorial election and the people convicted said they had been taught by their predecessors, which would lend support to the theory that the 1960 presidential election was stolen, in which case the prior probability of a presidential election being stolen isn't miniscule.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 15:32
|
|
|
toterunner posted:But I'll give a few more. The context I came across that article was after the Buffalo shooting there were lots of articles saying the great replacement theory was debunked, and conservatives were posting lots of examples of liberals in media and politics saying whites becoming a minority was a good thing. In response, there was this weird uniformity of vox types saying "gee just because people were acknowledging the political effects of demographic change doesn't mean there was a plot to cause it." And ok, it doesn't prove that there was a plot to cause demographic change, but that's still a misrepresentation of the examples people were posting. It was like there is this aversion to admit that there are people with influence over immigration policy who were gloating about whites becoming a minority and saying its a good thing. You could admit that and still say there is no evidence that these attitudes are actually a cause of demographic change, but then conservatives could score a whataboutism by pointing out how its liberal orthodoxy that authority figures with racist beliefs will necessarily have their attitudes influence their actions, but that would still leave it a marginal factor causing demographic change compared to economic factors. It seems likely that conservatives and liberals both made a range of claims and some did misconstrue one another but this is all so vague as to be basically useless. I don't think anyone relied on pure probability to suggest that Trump's claims were spurious. You are stretching the definition of "conservative positions" quite a bit Harold Fjord fucked around with this message at 15:44 on Aug 2, 2022 |
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 15:42
|
|
|
A lot of conservative positions, I've noticed, make sense as causal arguments, but the causation falls apart when you look at the data. Minimum wage is a good example - it's argued that minimum wage will reduce employment, which makes sense if you beep-boop economics 101 assume that higher price = lower demand. But we have actual, real life empirical evidence that this is not the case - when a state or city raises its minimum wage its level employment does not suffer relative to its neighbors, but its level of poverty does go down. Another example is deregulation: everybody hates "red tape" when they encounter it in their day to day lives, and may notice delays in construction projects, or even notice companies leaving (or threatening to leave) to states with lower regulations. But ultimately, we can observe that states with heavier amounts of regulation have stronger economies and much higher residential demand than states with low level of regulation. Which makes sense when you consider that maybe one factory being more profitable does not offset the economic effects of reduced health among thousands of citizens. Or the effects of workers becoming permanently disabled from negligent work environments. Same with lower taxes allegedly leading to massive increases in economic activity. Or reducing unemployment benefits to "incentivize" work. These are all theories that make logical sense, but do not hold up in our real life conditions. This is because the effects conservatives propose are real, but only take effect when these policies are taken to extremes that nobody is proposing in the real world (like a $100/hr minimum wage, or 90% flat taxes, or indefinitely paying people more to be unemployed than to work). Mellow Seas fucked around with this message at 15:50 on Aug 2, 2022 |
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 15:48
|
|
|
Mellow Seas posted:Another example is deregulation: everybody hates "red tape" when they encounter it in their day to day lives, and may notice delays in construction projects, or even notice companies leaving (or threatening to leave) to states with lower regulations. But ultimately, we can observe that states with heavier amounts of regulation have stronger economies and much higher residential demand than states with low level of regulation. Which makes sense when you consider that maybe one factory being more profitable does not offset the economic effects of reduced health among thousands of citizens. Or the effects of workers becoming permanently disabled from negligent work environments. I’m a little suspicious of the claim that e.g. the wealth of coastal CA and NYC are due to state and local government policy. NYC and coastal CA have a lot of natural and historical advantages that other areas of the US do not have. In the case of the wealth of nations, for example, I seriously doubt you’d attribute the wealth of the US to its government policies and would be quick to attribute its status as the richest country in the world to natural & historical advantages the US has over a lot of the world.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 17:10
|
|
|
silence_kit posted:I’m a little suspicious of the claim that e.g. the wealth of coastal CA and NYC are due to state and local government policy. NYC and coastal CA have a lot of natural and historical advantages that other areas of the US do not have. There is also the matter of exactly what regulations we are talking about; a conservative rhetorical trick is to put them all under one umbrella when some are more essential than others, and some are less economically constrictive than others. A trap that perhaps I have fallen into myself here. 
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 17:30
|
|
|
toterunner posted:It might be the opposite of what I was thinking in terms of Tucker Carlson being right, but it seems quite like what I was thinking in terms of it being a clip of Biden saying a white minority is a good thing and the debunker denying that. these aren't specifics, these are vague gestures at The Discourse as a whole annoying you. in particular, the last is just you complaining about the tenor of liberal messaging in response to the (nonsensical) claims by Trump that 2020 was stolen from him... somehow. what is a specific conservative position that you believe has not been discredited. there's got to be at least one, right
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 17:44
|
|
|
Elephant Ambush posted:Not even on the second page and OP is already nitpicking the meaning of words to avoid having to admit they're just wrong Let's keep things constructive, please. There have been a lot of good posts in this thread so far, best not to focus on perceived shortcomings of one participant when more constructive means both get your point here across and add interesting analysis.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 17:54
|
|
|
We don't even have a coherent definition of "conservative position". They range from things Trump said to things OP might have heard once. Discredited conservative positions: The inherent superiority of whites or of societal racial homogeneity. The inherent superiority of Christianity or religious homogeneity. Gender essentialism. Id call various forms of homogeneity discredited because it is clear that it is the kind of thing that is only a problem when conservatives choose to make it a problem so that they can then declare it a problem. "race mixing shouldnt happen because it is bad because I hate black people and will freak out about race mixing" is tautological. Harold Fjord fucked around with this message at 18:09 on Aug 2, 2022 |
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 18:03
|
|
|
I imagine a lot of positions can be discredited by putting "inherent superiority" in front of them.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 18:13
|
|
|
Are you saying it's an inaccurate portrayal of the conservative position? Do you have a better way to describe it that you think is not discredited?
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 18:16
|
|
|
Honestly, a lot of positions are impossible to 'discredit' per say- for example, assuming the premise is correct, that unions increase wages and benefits to the worker but cut productivity, that would still be a value judgement between the value of ensuring maximum production and ensuring maximum benefit to those working there. It is a dilemma, assuming, of course, the premise is true, and in that case, it's more a test of values rather than a test of 'truth'.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 18:17
|
|
|
Harold Fjord posted:Are you saying it's an inaccurate portrayal of the conservative position? Do you have a better way to describe it that you think is not discredited? Yes, its an inaccurate portrayal of the conservative position. "Jesus rose from the dead" is a Christian position that hasn't been discredited. "Some average behavioral differences between self identified racial groups are partly explained by genetics" is a far right position that hasn't been discredited. "Increased diversity reduces societal trust/ productivity of companies" are positions of some mainstream social scientists that haven't been discredited.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 18:34
|
|
|
If you believe people can return from the dead despite all evidence to the contrary I am not sure what you would consider necessary to discredit positions.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 18:36
|
|
|
toterunner posted:Yes, its an inaccurate portrayal of the conservative position. "Jesus rose from the dead" is a Christian position that hasn't been discredited. "Some average behavioral differences between self identified racial groups are partly explained by genetics" is a far right position that hasn't been discredited. "Increased diversity reduces societal trust/ productivity of companies" are positions of some mainstream social scientists that haven't been discredited. Does a position have to be credited before it can be discredited? "2000 years ago this man came back from the dead" is not something that can be further disproven, it's like trying to discredit Rapunzel or some poo poo. I'm not even touching the rest of that though because it boils down to "disprove my racism" socialsecurity fucked around with this message at 18:43 on Aug 2, 2022 |
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 18:38
|
|
|
toterunner posted:"Increased diversity reduces societal trust/ productivity of companies" are positions of some mainstream social scientists that haven't been discredited. Does it matter that those social scientists holding those positions makes it impossible to approach the question objectively? It doesn't seem like you're leaving any room for anyone to debate or discuss anything. Conservative positions are unfalsifiable. socialsecurity posted:it boils down to "disprove my racism"
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 18:39
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 6, 2024 19:54 |
|
|
Epic High Five posted:Let's keep things constructive, please. There have been a lot of good posts in this thread so far, best not to focus on perceived shortcomings of one participant when more constructive means both get your point here across and add interesting analysis. I'll just bow out and lurk then because this is just another iteration of the same problem we have where certain people just flat out refuse to concede anything and resort to all the usual suspect "debate tactics" that cause endless circular arguments You are correct that there have been a lot of good posts and maybe I'm just jaded because I've seen all this happen a thousand times before. I hope it ends up being somewhat educational for others though 
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2022 18:40
|
|