The Confederate Flag

Discussion in 'World Events' started by dumbest man on earth, Jun 15, 2020.

  1. Vociferous Valued Senior Member

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    Who's condoning murder?

    Trying to keep others from making a living is disgusting. No wonder you condone it.
     
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  3. James R Just this guy, you know? Staff Member

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    What makes you think that anybody "gives a crap" about your opinion, any more than billvon's, Vociferous? Why is your defence of the flag not "empty whining", just as you consider suggestions that it is a racist symbol "empty whining"?

    Aren't you "virtue signalling" to your right-wing buddies, in just exactly the same way you're criticising billvon for? In his case, his virtue is in appearing anti-racist, etc., whereas for you the virtue lies in standing up for free speech regardless of the social costs.

    What makes you better than billvon?
     
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  5. Vociferous Valued Senior Member

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    Thanks, James. This is a fun post. I so rarely find reason to express who I am, rather than just what I think.


    First, I never expect anyone to give a crap about any opinion of mine. I'm not needy like that.
    Second, I've never characterized people viewing it as a racist symbol as even vaguely "empty whining", and I'd challenge you to show where you think I have. People who feel other than I do still have valid feelings, and denying that fact would be very obtuse.
    Third, my defense of free speech is enshrined in and explicitly protected by the US Constitution. You can call that "whining" if you want, but that's a lot more basis for my opinion than calls to outlaw it or demand people "just do better" by someone's subjective lights.

    Wait, I have right-wing buddies here? News to me. See, unlike leftists, who seem to feel the need to commiserate with each other, as mutual quelling of their collective cognitive dissonance and a perhaps only subconscious inkling of the need to bolster their views with tacit appeals to popularity, most right-wingers are pretty independent. Even when we do agree with each other on this forum, we typically understand that our own arguments are better than fallacious appeals to consensus. And we don't usually require the social acceptance of someone just chiming in to simply agree.

    So if I were virtue-signalling, I'd probably be better off doing it on Twitter or some other social media I also don't bother with, where posts are shared by many more people who would be apt to "like" them, thus providing the feedback sought in such signalling in the first place. And whereas billvon may want validation that he's not a racist, I require no validation to justify my own principles.

    Nothing. How would you even get that impression?

    People are equal, ideas are not.
     
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  7. CptBork Valued Senior Member

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    Unless it's Mexicans, or black people from poor neighbourhoods getting profiled right?
     
  8. Vociferous Valued Senior Member

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    Why, are there stories about minorities getting fired for simply being pulled over? Maybe you could cite a few?
     
  9. CptBork Valued Senior Member

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    Examples:
    -Black people tailed by police because driving while black, busted for marijuana possession, spend decade or more in prison, cannot get hired for decent job with criminal record.
    -Mexican refugees being denied the ability to reunite with their families living in USA, or booted from the US after living and working there for decades because no passport.

    You didn't say anything about the law, you just said "Trying to keep others from making a living is disgusting," which is what happens for instance when Donald Trump tries to build a wall to keep out the same people he previously hired to scrub the toilets and trim the hedges in his hotels.
     
  10. CptBork Valued Senior Member

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    If a rich white Canadian hockey player gets busted for cocaine and ecstacy possession in the US and pleads guilty, how many years should they get in prison? At least as many as a black American citizen who gets busted smoking a doobie right? Should they get to spend zero years in prison and still have the right to come live in the US and get paid millions of dollars to play a kid's game as long as they don't get caught with more drugs in the next 2 or 3 years?
     
  11. Vociferous Valued Senior Member

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    And some of those we can thank Kamala Harris for.
    Wait, you mean they were actually breaking the law? Omigosh!

    You don't spend "decades or more in prison" on a misdemeanor pot possession charge. That requires some serious quantities, with intent to distribute.
    And having a criminal record for pot possession myself, no, it doesn't make finding a job any harder. You know what does? Rioting that drives all the good jobs out of your neighborhood and Democrat mismanagement that drives large employers out of cities and states (like AOC did with Amazon).

    You mean illegal aliens, again, breaking the law? Omigosh!
    No, you getting here illegally doesn't mean you get a pass for your whole extended family. You can reunite any time you like, across the border. Don't like that shithole country? Fix it, or have something to contribute and come here the right way.

    Where in that post did I mention the law? I guess that deflection means you have no stories you can cite. Just your bare assertions, obviously ignorant of things like prison sentences.

    Trump delivered record low unemployment and historically low minority unemployment. As a private citizen, it was not his duty to enforce US immigration law, and I don't think anyone has accused Trump of being especially consistent or principled.

    Again, no one (black, blue, grey, or otherwise) gets "years... in prison" for "smoking a doobie", even in the strictest municipalities.
     
  12. CptBork Valued Senior Member

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    Are wages for minorities at record highs relative to inflation? Employment means almost nothing if they're not earning enough to survive without massive government subsidies and charities.
     
  13. James R Just this guy, you know? Staff Member

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    I'm glad it brightened your day. Here's a fun reply to your thoughts.

    Your position is interesting to me. I postulate that it's probably not too uncommon for conservatives to think that the buck stops at the Constitution or some other legal document. Morality for some people is grounded in fear of punishment and that's about as far as they go. They might be law abiding, but it's only because they fear the legal consequences if they don't obey the law. That kind of thinking goes all the way up to the level of the Constitution and its Bill of Rights.

    But there's another way of thinking about morality, other than just as adherence to rules handed down by some kind of enforcer. People who progress to that level of thinking ask questions like: is the law just? In some cases, such people will conclude that aspects of the law are flawed, or perhaps that the way it is applied is inequitable or produces morally undesirable outcomes. That kind of thinking goes all the way up to thinking about the Constitution and its Bill of Rights, too.

    You say that if there's a law there's "more basis" for enforcing it than for "calls to outlaw it". That's a typically conservative response. It assumes as a default that laws are best left how they are. The default progressive attitude, on the other hand, is more likely to be "if it's broken, we should fix it". If changing the laws themselves is very difficult (as it is, for example, with the Constitution), then there may well be other ways to fix problems, like trying to changing attitudes or interpretations, or by trying to ensuring that laws are enforced more equitably.

    Forget buddies. You told me that you regard having internet friends as sad and pathetic, so I assume you don't have any. Call them "like-minded thinkers" then, if you prefer. You self-identify as a conservative, so you regard yourself as part of a community, loosely or rigidly defined.

    Or, to put it another way, leftists tend to value community more than right-wingers, who tend to view independence and self-sufficiency as virtues that override caring for other people whenever push comes to shove.

    You say that, and yet a lot of your supposedly independent views and arguments become fairly predictable once we know that you identify as a conservative. You would put that down to your belief that conservatives are more rational and have intrinsically superior arguments to mere "leftists". I would put it down to your drinking the kool aid from your in-group. It's what makes you comfortable. That's not that different to what the progressives do. They (we) might just be a little more self-aware than you are. Speculating, it might come from having better skills at trying to put yourself in another person's shoes, to see things from his or her perspective.

    When it comes to "equality", I think we have to look not so much at what people say but more about what they do. Mouthing the words "people are equal" is no guarantee that you will treat them as equals, in practice.
     
    Last edited: Aug 16, 2020
  14. Vociferous Valued Senior Member

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    President Trump frequently celebrates the experience of black workers, noting correctly that the group’s unemployment rate is at its lowest on record.

    Their wages are also going up — a New York Times analysis of government data found that wage growth for black workers has accelerated recently after lagging for much of the decade-long economic expansion.
    https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/07/business/black-unemployment-wages.html

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    Again, law is not morality. There's plenty of immoral things that are legal. The saying is true: locks only keep honest men out. Those who only follow the law out of fear are the same that ask themselves "but what if no one found out".

    No, I didn't say 'if there's a law there's "more basis" for enforcing it than for "calls to outlaw it"'. If you want to entertain the notion of outlawing it, you're also running up against the natural right the law is based on. And there is zero natural right to not be offended. There are authoritarians who would grant the subjective rights of some people to negate the natural rights of others.

    The default progressive attitude is "if I don't like it, it should be done my way". Luckily, a great many people have already changed their attitude and interpretation of the Confederate flag. And BLM/Antifa flags are being flown just as equitably.

    Really? Even though Republicans participate in religious communities and give to charity far more than Democrats?
    https://www.pewforum.org/religious-landscape-study/party-affiliation/
    https://www.philanthropyroundtable.org/almanac/statistics/u.s.-generosity

    And? The same can be said of leftists. Except leftists demand a degree of loyalty to their in-group that conservatives do not.
    Yeah, the left is really self-aware of their own bubble [/sarcasm].
    Conservatives owe their principles, like anti-slavery/pro-civil rights, to understanding that all people are "created equal" and similar enough to themselves to "do as you would have them do unto you". And without the overemphasis on care and fairness to the exclusion, and often detriment, of all other moral concerns.

    And prioritizing people by race is a sure way for people to not be treated as equals.
     
  15. CptBork Valued Senior Member

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    Like I said, you didn't mention the law, you were just trying to use a principle to justify another one of your bullshit opinions, and I explained how you don't universally apply your own principle even when compassion demands it.

    I looked into it and it seems the laws on possession of small amounts are much less strict than they used to be, so I'll give you that. A year in prison is still a year more than Canadian Jarrett Stoll got for possessing cocaine and ecstacy in your country though.

    Your graph shows black income virtually flatlining from 2017-2018 once Trump's administration took over, and you've done nothing to demonstrate that the recent trend cited by the New York Times has been sustained since it was reported.
     
  16. James R Just this guy, you know? Staff Member

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    39,397
    But still fairly consistently double or more of the white unemployment rate. The gap is largely due to structural racism in the labour market. Celebrations might be a little premature, I think.

    You regard freedom of speech - or at least the First Amendment version of that - as a natural right? Didn't you tell me something about it being necessary to carry out an action in order for it to be a natural right? How is free speech naturally necessary?

    Or not to be smacked in the mouth, apparently. It strikes me as strange that free speech would therefore be a natural right.

    Of course. Dictators, for instance. Supremacists of all kinds.

    I'd say that's equally characteristic of progressives and conservatives. Don't try to tell me you don't want things done your way.

    In my opinion, the Pew Study you cite doesn't show "far more" religious participation for Republicans compared to Democrats, though admittedly I don't know what you would define as "far more". It is interesting that you point to religion, though. It's a biased sample, because clearly more Republicans believe in God than Democrats (based on data from the same source). Therefore, it is questionable as to whether differences in religious participation are indicative in any way of differences in overall level of community participation (including non-religious communities).

    The philanthropy study is also interesting. Guess which causes are the biggest recipients of donor money in the United States! But you already know, don't you? It's religious causes. I don't suppose there's any connection between Republicans being more philanthropic whilst also being more religious. Moreover, we might need to dig into the reasons why Republicans like to donate to religious causes.

    What makes you think that?

    Nice phrasing there. "Created equal" doesn't automatically mean that one has to remain equal after one's creation. The stereotypical conservative attitude goes something along the lines of "I worked for everything I have and I therefore deserve it. I have no obligation to give anybody else a hand up." Historical structural inequalities are to be conserved in the present. At the same time, a pretense is carried on that they have all been eliminated and that there is now a true level playing field of opportunity. It's the American dream, baby!

    Here's a handy list of moral concerns:
    1. Harm/Care, which is the universal desire to minimize human suffering.
    2. Fairness/Reciprocity, which is about a desire to see arguments and disputes handled fairly.
    3. Ingroup/Loyalty, which describes the desire to protect group membership (societal) boundaries.
    4. Authority/Respect, which concerns the desire to organize society into a hierarchy of social superiors and subordinates, with subordinates showing respect for the superior's superior position.
    5. Purity/Sanctity, which concerns the desire to maintain group membership in a pristine, pure, clean or proper state, and correspondingly, to reject from the group that which is dirty, impure, unclean and improper.
    What you are saying is that "leftists" or progressives overemphasise care and fairness, which are the first two items on this list. Would it be fair to say, then, that you and your fellow conservatives consider some of the other items on the list to be more important - or at least think that they deserve more emphasis than the evil leftists place on them? If you had to rank the importance of these five concerns, how would you rank them?

    I'd say that depends on whether you're talking about positive or negative discrimination. But perhaps you think discrimination is always bad, no matter what?
     
    Last edited: Aug 16, 2020
  17. iceaura Valued Senior Member

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    And not hired, promoted, etc. Yep. Thousands of them.
    No political organization in the US. demands more loyalty than the Republican Party.
    American "conservatives" have no principles, in fact. There is no principle that any self-identified American "conservative" has adhered to over the past twenty years.

    If you doubt that, try naming the principle and the self-identified "conservative" who has adhered to it.
     
  18. iceaura Valued Senior Member

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    30,994
    Unemployment rates do not count the dead, or the incarcerated, or those not looking for work. Nor do they allow for the anomaly of the Republican Crash of 2008.

    The employment rate for black people - a more informative number - has not grown from its pre-Republican Crash level.

    Your data link confuses household income with "workers" income, and likewise overlooks the Republican Crash - a form of cherrypicking, and an invalidation of your statistical inference.

    And so forth.

    That has all been pointed out to you before. Why are you still posting bogus and debunked statistics?

    Especially in defense of the Slaveowner's Flag - note that the unemployment rate of black people in the Confederacy under that flag was nearly zero. That was not something to celebrate then, and it's dubious now.
     
  19. Vociferous Valued Senior Member

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    So I supposedly didn't make an argument that I somehow made anyway? What kind of self-flagellating mental contortion is that?
    Whatever you think you've read or done, in your head, isn't actually reflected in reality.

    How many time do I have to tell you? No one gets a year, much less in prison, for simply smoking pot, and haven't for decades.

    Yeah, that's called a plateau. Where the market settled, with historically low minority unemployment and higher wages than pre-recession. You do realize that a stable job market doesn't continue to shoot up and down, right?



    Have you already forgotten that you agreed that culture affects choices? Structural/systemic racism is a bugaboo. It's an unfalsifiable myth of the modern left. It's something in the ether that you resort to when you can't find enough actual racism to point to.

    Could you survive among other humans without the freedom to communicate? Many people don't even seem to hold up mentally under a complete lack of communication. What about scaring off predatory animals without any vocalization?

    Just came across this great quote:
    “A natural right is an animal right, and the power to act it, is supposed, either fully or in part, to be mechanically contained within ourselves as individuals.”
    - Thomas Paine​

    Again, no right is absolute.

    ...people trying to ban freedom of expression.

    The difference is that if a leftists doesn't like what you say, they think it should be illegal, and if a conservative doesn't like what you say, they still defend your right to say it.

    Okay, I'll bite. Where's the comparable secular Democrat community gatherings? Are they weekly or better? Or does group therapy and yoga classes somehow count as community?
    Religious participation positively correlates with charity and volunteer work.

    Yes, if you have a strong sense of community, you do give to that community. That's true in any community.

    I certainly don't see many conservatives "cancelling" each other.

    The affect of "historical structural inequalities" on present day are an unfalsifiable myth.
    Again, those cultural difference in choices. Remember?

    Conservatives favor all those equally, without sacrificing one for another. You know, a rational sense of balance.
    And since you're aware of that moral theory, I'm sure you can find that's true for yourself.

    You're kidding yourself if you really think some kind of discrimination is moral.
     
  20. Xelasnave.1947 Valued Senior Member

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    I wonder if you had a flag, with Satan on it and the words "Jesus is a loser", on a stick outside a church would the church goers just have to suck it up. You know keep their emotional baggage to themselves and not complain about being offended. Seems reasonable...

    Alex
     
  21. James R Just this guy, you know? Staff Member

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    Vociferous:

    So do circumstances.

    You're misinformed. It's well documented and evidenced.


    I'll get back to our discussion of natural rights later. I really don't want to run it in two separate threads and thereby have to duplicate effort, so I won't comment on this here and now.

    Without discussing specific examples, it's difficult to generalise.

    Yes, group therapy and yoga classes count as communities. So do sporting clubs, book clubs, gatherings at the local bar, attending the theatre or a pop concert, knitting groups, hiking clubs, bungee jumping societies, tuba players r us, the Hells Angels biker gang, etc. etc. If you choose to spend every Sunday down at your local Hillsong church instead of at the skate park or whatever, that's your choice. It doesn't make the skater community any less of a community than your favorite church group.

    According your source, less than half of all Republicans attend religious services at least once at week. 23% of Republicans seldom or never attend religious services.

    Yes.

    Sure. Also, giving doesn't always involve money.

    I guess you don't count Never Trump Republicans and the like as part of your "peeps".

    You're mistaken. These could be disproved by looking at appropriate data, but the data actually shows the opposite.

    You are assuming that the historical ability to make free choices was unimpeded. The history of slavery says otherwise.

    Heh. Of course you regard the views you hold as indicative of "a rational sense of balance". For my part, I think that assigning the same priority to maintaining "purity" as one assigns to trying to prevent suffering is to have your priorities severely out of whack. On the other hand, that you do so does go a long way towards explaining why you're so resistant to the idea that humans are similar to the other primates, not only in anatomy but also in mind. You want to keep those poo-flinging dirty animals as separated from you as possible, physically but more importantly conceptually, so as to maintain your belief that you're one of God's chosen special ones.

    Not at all.

    Consider wheelchair access to buildings, for instance. Lots of places have laws saying that certain business or government services must spend extra money to provide access for people in wheelchairs. A staunch conservative such as yourself might well say "All people are created equal. It's not my fault those people can't walk up the stairs! Why should I, as a taxpayer, pay for their silly ramps. It's their problem if they can't enter the post office. Let them work it out themselves!"

    A legal requirement to provide wheelchair access is an example of positive discrimination. A consideration is made as to what you, as an able-bodied person, require in order to be able to access the building, and a consideration is made as to what a wheelchair-bound person requires. The decision is made to force you as a taxpayer to pay for the wheelchair ramp, which is discriminating against you (making you pay for something you don't need) and in favour of the wheelchair people. Importantly, though, this decision to make you pay (in part) for the ramp is not made in order to oppress you or to privilege the wheelchair people. It is made in order to level the playing field when it comes to ability to access the same service (say the postal service, which the wheelchair people, as taxpayers themselves, are as entitled to access as you are).

    I say the decision to make you pay for the wheelchair ramp is clearly a moral one. Clearly, though, you disagree. Tell me why.
     
    Last edited: Aug 17, 2020
  22. Baldeee Valued Senior Member

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    I’m not sure this actually is an example of positive discrimination.
    In my view it is simply the correcting of a discrimination against those in wheelchair users.
    When the building was first built, not having a ramp discriminated against such users: it prevented them from entering, purely because they required the use of a wheelchair.
    The requirement for ramps is to correct that discrimination.
    With the ramp and the stairs everyone can enter the building equally.
    It is not positive discrimination.

    Positive discrimination is, for example, the requirement to have a certain number of women on a company’s board, rather than simply hiring the best person.
    In the workplace it is the active discrimination in favour of those who have a protected characteristic (sex, age, colour, religion, etc) who have been discriminated against in the past, in an effort to correct the balance.
    In the UK this is illegal. e.g. when recruiting you can’t favour someone due to having those protected characteristics.

    In South Africa there was ( a quota system for sports, that meant the national teams had to have a certain number of black players, even if there were better white players.
    This is positive discrimination, with arguments for and against.

    Positive discrimination is not the same as correcting a previous negative discrimination such that there is no longer discrimination, but is to actually discriminate in favour of those who had previously been discriminated against.
    Correcting a previous discrimination is to end with all people treated equally, whereas positive discrimination ends with the previously discriminated against getting favourable treatment... i.e. everyone else now ends up being discriminated against.
     
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  23. Sarkus Hippomonstrosesquippedalo phobe Valued Senior Member

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    Apologies, but I can’t see where you have answered CptBork: are the wages of the minorities higher than pre-recession level once adjusted for inflation? Or is the graphs you posted, for example, based on actual $ median household income without any adjustment for inflation? ‘Cos between 2006 and 2018 the buying power of the dollar has dropped 20% due to inflation. So if those incomes are only now at 2007 levels, they’re still some 20% down in real terms, are they not?
     

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