Boethius

@Vagos In killing this person your friend would become a murderer. It's one thing to engage in abstract, intellectual thought experiments on these sorts of topics, but watch some videos made by former US soldiers who took lives in Iraq or Afghanistan to see what murder does to a person.

@Raphael I can see how using a punching bag everytime you are upset with someone fails to get to the "root" issue, but I think writing a letter doesn't really operate in that way. Writing a letter is usually a one-time thing that reveals the fundamental issues you have with that person. Then burning the letter, for instance, is a way of letting go of those fundamental issues (whereas sending the letter to the person amounts to bringing the issues to the other person's attention and tucking the letter away somewhere for further reading amounts to keeping the issues in "limbo"). Note: I'm not recommending you write a letter that's just filled with the phrase "Fuck you! Fuck you! Fuck you!" Instead, I'm suggesting you write out as clearly (and maybe even as calmly) as possible what you understand as the issue you faced with the person.

As regards politics, I think it's important to have space where we can explore different perspectives whereas at work it's important to have a "polished" presentation of one's perspective. So I see no contradiction in being relatively anonymous on the Internet (as long as one isn't a racist troll, of course). As regards personal stuff, I draw a pretty sharp boundary between work and my private life -- I don't feel obligated, for instance, to come out as gay at work if I don't feel comfortable with the situation.

@Raphael You can write a letter to them telling them everything that you might want to tell them to their face. Then you can send the letter to them in the mail, you can tuck it away in a closet, or you can use it as kindling in a fire. After writing it all out, it will probably be clear what you need to do with it.

@Carl-Richard Ayn Rand's Objectivism would go under Orange (next to Libertarianism, of course).

@Boethius After thinking about it for a bit, and sitting with Leo's statement in the video that Onecirrus posted about how we tend to project onto "the elites" our own ego shit, I will admit that my cynicism may well stem from a frustration that as a society we don't in fact have the Wisdom necessary to help bring people to an "enlightened" understanding of the world. In all fairness, maybe that's in part because people feel they are being "programmed" -- as in this documentary -- by a corrupt elite! I guess people who wish to help shape the world (leaders, journos, academics, and teachers) should try to maintain a high degree of moral fiber, in order to maintain trust....

@Artsu The program I mentioned is primarily for "moderate" drinkers who are conflicted about their drinking. It actually tackles head-on this idea that you are either a normal drinker in total control of your drinking or an alcoholic who needs to abstain for life. This idea is a stumbling block for most people, myself included, since it prevents us from asking a different set of questions like "does alcohol serve me?" and "is alcohol really my friend?" So it's not about whether I should stop drinking but whether I want to keep drinking, and for me the answer turned out to be no.

I'm trying to understand what it is about the "conspiracy" in this documentary that is appealling to people. In all honesty, after the 20 minute mark I started skipping through the rest of the documentary because it just seemed like a boring waste of time to watch the whole thing. But what stood out to me from the parts I saw is this idea that we are somehow being "programmed" through the "entertainment" we are consuming. But isn't this kind of obvious? I mean, through movies and tv shows we come to understand what is socially acceptable in our contemporary society (lessons about multiculturalism, for example) which some people (fundamentalist Christians) might reject but most of us have come around on over time. At times the media can in fact fail us, as they did in the early 2000's for example with the boosting of Bush's case for the Iraq War, but I guess I don't see "the patterns" that add up to an overarching conspiracy. Honestly, I think our political leaders, journos, & academics are too fucking dumb/lazy to pull such a thing off. Maybe cynicism is the best defense against conspiracism....

The philosopher Edward Feser has some very interesting criticisms of Scientism, materialism, and New Atheism.

@Someone here The treatment modality required probably depends on the level of addiction. I was able to kick my "weekend warrior" routine with alcohol through a month-long online experiment of abstinence (you can look up Annie Grace, in case you're curious about this) that made use of mindfulness to explore our relationship with alcohol. The basic theory was that if we (consciously or unconsciously) desire to keep drinking it will be almost impossible to use willpower alone in giving up alcohol permanently, so we should tackle those desires head on. With three months of total sobriety, I can say that this approach has worked well for me.

We can probably re-litigate the various cases of cancellation all day long, since most of them will be "edge" cases. But haven't we seen this sort of phenomenon before? I'm thinking (a) sexual harassment/assault complaints against powerful men (b) police brutality against Black people Not to draw too much of a moral equivalence here, but in both (a) and (b) there were complaints ongoing for a long time that there was a problem & the "mainstream" of American society would analyze each case in isolation and say "I don't see the problem". Is it that much of a stretch that (c) cancellation of people who have rubbed socially-minded people the wrong way is another such societal problem? Maybe it really just requires each one of us to find an example of the phenomenon that we find to be convincing in order for us to be convinced.... Well, here is a list of examples if people want to see whether they do or do not find this to be a pattern: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/06/stop-firing-innocent/613615/ https://www.cnn.com/2019/12/08/us/2019-canceled-stories-trnd/index.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/28/style/is-it-canceled.html For myself, the general rule "where there's smoke there's fire" leads me to accept that (a), (b), and (c) are not just isolated, arguable incidents but are all parts of larger patterns of problems we are facing as a society.

I assume you're responding to my comment about natural hierarchies? I mentioned it because I am actually not inherently opposed to shifting speech norms where people recognize that their group identity limits & informs their "view" of the world. For example, I don't really think the average white person's views on the problems of the Black community should be given much weight -- just look at recent forum posts here, about Black people being inferior to white people, to see where unrestricted free speech leads. So I feel roughly in agreement with the Left's techniques of centering marginalized voices, uplifting the voices of POC, owning one's privilege, being mindful of positionality, etc. And yet... if we're all expected to just parrot the "ideological" views on these issues then I don't see that the problems are truly going to solved. To your previous point, as well, this is probably not going to lead to the creation of great art.

@Leo Gura There are natural hierarchies on topics of race, gender, sexuality, etc: hierarchies of expertise as regards how to systematically solve problems connected to these issues. I mean, the average Black person does have the lived experience of what it's like being Black in America, but they probably don't have any especially deep insight into how to refinance, restructure, and reform the public education system. I feel like free speech can be defended if not on universal grounds (which progressives today have little sympathy for) then at least on pragmatic ones.

"The actual problem is that we have a new bunch of “speech regulators” (not in the legal sense, not usually at least) who are especially humorless and obnoxious and I would say neurotic — in the personality psychology sense of that word. I say let’s complain about the real problem, namely the moral fiber, emotional temperaments, and factual worldviews of the individuals who have arrogated the new speech censorship functions to themselves." -- Tyler Cowen

Yeah, I have definitely seen that with certain sectors of the academy and I can see it to an extent with journalism. I can't really say I have great empathy for any one individual who has been "cancelled" either, but I do believe that ideological conformity's greatest casualty is the chilling effect it has on the speech (and maybe even the thinking) of average people. Like I myself am very careful in what I post to social media, even though I don't have a platform of any real size, and I imagine I am far from alone in that.

@DivineSoda Speaking for myself, I've spent a lot of time following & thinking about political/social issues the past few years, well enough to listen to two random people at a bar or restaurant start a conversation about these issues and pretty much know where that convo will end up in 10 minutes time. By this I mean I can pick up on each person's suppositions and premises, listen to the early stages of their convo, and intuit whether they're going to end up agreeing or arguing, and if arguing then where are they gonna get stuck. Spiral dynamics has definitely helped me understand the contours of these conversations. But honestly, this gets to be incredibly boring for me sometimes, like "oh, here we go again!" Where I'm at now is in really considering whether it's even worth it to engage on these issues, and in trying to set an intention. Do I want to win an argument? try to form a consensus? shut it down? or simply listen to what the other person has to say? I think that unless we are living like a hermit in a cave, it's probably not appropriate for us to be completely uninformed/unengaged on these issues while at the same time I accept that we become pretty 1-dimensional if this is all we think about. Anyways, that's an answer to your question only in the form of some comparatively random thoughts.

@commie Yes, the responses I have seen are not about the actual contents of the letter. And yes, it would be insane for you to have implied as much (though I realize now that I misread your original response, sorry). I myself am in broad agreement that something like this is required, just as I am in broad agreement with the Chicago Principles for academia. I guess my point here would be that I don't see this letter doing more than polarizing people even more on the topic of "free speech" and open expression.

@commie It is crytpic because she signed the letter but then her name was removed after saying that she does not "endorse" the letter, leaving unanswered why (or even whether) she signed the letter in the first place. Then in response to a huge number of tweets pointing out this discrepancy (tweets I myself was reading earlier today) she shuts down her twitter account. And as far as "unearned privilege and authority", I'm not sure I understand. Are you saying someone like Fareed Zakaria (one of the letter's signers) has authority that is unearned? Does he not deserve to be host of the CNN show of which he is the host? Are you implying with your comment about "teams" that he is a secret Trump supporter or a member of the alt right?

Kerri Greenidge (on twitter) simply said that she "does not endorse" the letter, which many people found to cryptic. Her twitter account is now unavailable. From what I can tell, Twitter absolutely blew up yesterday over this letter. So this is very controversial, which makes sense because there is very little "context" for people to make sense of it.

There are some people who have already started to retract their signature from this letter.

@Artsu Same. We probably need an educational overhaul, quite honestly, since our current system too often takes a diminished view of what it means to become "educated".

I wonder how they "sort" students who are biracial. I mean, it's not like people are "all Black" or "all white", and is it really the place of school administrators to determine which students have sufficient Blackness to qualify as being Black? Maybe I'm reading a bit into this, but for me that is where things start to get potentially problematic and maybe even dehumanizing.

@Terell Kirby I spent more time than I should have trying to think about how to explain an experience I had (two years ago) to other people. I never did share it with more than one or two people because I figured most people would look at me like a person in need of psychiatric help. In fact, I wasn't entirely sure myself if what I experienced was "genuine" or just the result of unskillful Buddhist practice, so I had to find someone I did trust (a spiritual counselor) so that I could talk about it and then "release it" a year later. In fact, this article https://www.lionsroar.com/just-when-you-think-youre-enlightened/ helped me a lot! These days, I find journaling is a really good way to try to honor an experience I might be having by finding its insights but then letting go of the less "relevant" aspects (which for me are usually visually hallucinogenic).

@PepperBlossoms The gamification of learning seems to be pretty effective. And as a college professor myself, I will say that students seem to value getting a good grade above all else (even above meaningful learning, unfortunately). That said, I do think schools should get better at incentivizing students beyond just a letter (A, B, C, D, F, W) that they receive at the end. I've tried this with making "interesting" assignments and giving students some choice over what they can do to receive course credit. Unfortunately this (a) requires a LOT of work on my end and (b) is difficult to mesh with a system that is by design about credentially students and providing an arena for competition (where a student with a 3.9 is more likely to get a job than a student with a 2.5, let's say)

Apparently the Netherlands are potentially entering into the 2nd tier (as a society). I haven't found a great many resources online for describing this, but I do find this David Brooks article on the NYT to be suggestively interesting: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/13/opinion/scandinavia-education.html "They look at education differently than we do. The German word they used to describe their approach, bildung, doesn’t even have an English equivalent. It means the complete moral, emotional, intellectual and civic transformation of the person. It was based on the idea that if people were going to be able to handle and contribute to an emerging industrial society, they would need more complex inner lives." "Today, Americans often think of schooling as the transmission of specialized skill sets — can the student read, do math, recite the facts of biology. Bildung is devised to change the way students see the world. It is devised to help them understand complex systems and see the relations between things — between self and society, between a community of relationships in a family and a town." “Bildung is the way that the individual matures and takes upon him or herself ever bigger personal responsibility towards family, friends, fellow citizens, society, humanity, our globe, and the global heritage of our species, while enjoying ever bigger personal, moral and existential freedoms.” "Their intuition was that as people grow, they have the ability to go through developmental phases, to see themselves and the world through ever more complex lenses. A young child may blindly obey authority — Mom, Dad, teacher. Then she internalizes and conforms to the norms of the group. Then she learns to create her own norms based on her own values. Then she learns to see herself as a node in a network of selves and thus learns mutuality and holistic thinking." It's pretty amazing, actually, that an entire society has figured all that out. Meanwhile, we in the USA are stuck with the comparatively adolescent Libertarian view of "greed is good" and "every man for himself".