Fox News

[Epikur]

5 minutes ago, John Doe said:

@louhad Alex Jones and Infowars, perhaps. "The frogs are turning gay!"

That is the conservative version of the canary in the coal mine where you then push the alarm button.

[Forestluv]

10 hours ago, Parththakkar12 said:

Somebody tell me what this is. Is this true? Or is this laden with conservative projections? Did they really say 'undo your whiteness'?

This is right-wing victim mentality.

Of course there will be growing pains as society moves up the spiral. There will be problematic approaches that arise, since there is some degree of trial and error.

Notice how Tucker frames diversity training. He doesn’t frame it as something of value. He doesn’t frame it as Seattle is not teaching diversity training well. He doesn’t offer Seattle ideas to improve their diversity training. Rather, he frames it as evil liberals trying to destroy us white people. We are victims of the evil liberals imposing their hate values on us. It is ironic how right-wingers often point at the left as having victim mentality, when they themselves commonly display victim mentality. 

Those that are against diversity are in favor of segregation. If you are in favor of living together in diverse communities, the question is not whether we should try to increase harmony within diverse communities - the question is: how do we best promote progress toward that harmony within diverse communities? Notice how Tucker does not value diversity. It is fair to criticize counter-productive aspects within the Seattle diversity training project - yet notice how Tucker does not suggest ways to improve diversity training. 

Someone who criticizes from above would point out the flaws in Seattle’s approach, describe why they are problematic and then offer better ideas toward the goal of educating people about diversity so that there can be upward evolution. For example, I’ve noticed that a lot of new diversity and anti-racism projects have aspects that can introduce sham and guilt dynamics. Imo, green needs to wake up and realize this is a major counter-productive dynamic. One problem is that some greens DO want to shame and guilt white people. Another problem is that many white people are fragile and hyper-sensitive. And lastly, many of these biases are subconscious and shame / guilt is totally inappropriate when revealing subconscious biases. 

[Epikur]

@Forestluv

Diversity is a vague term let's make some allegories. A garden comes to my mind. How would a diverse garden look like?

 

[Forestluv]

1 hour ago, Epikur said:

@Forestluv Diversity is a vague term let's make some allegories.

Yes, it is a highly nuanced topic that includes many subtopics. Most people are not at that stage of discourse, so unfortunately a general term such as “diversity” is used. The problem is that if the term becomes too vague or includes everything, then the term no longer has meaning. 

[Leo Gura]

59 minutes ago, Epikur said:

How would a diverse garden look like?

Like a rain forest.

Rain forests have the highest bio-diversity of any biome.

https://rainforests.mongabay.com/03-diversity-of-rainforests.html

[Forestluv]

4 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

Like a rain forest.

Rain forests have the highest bio-diversity of any biome.

https://rainforests.mongabay.com/03-diversity-of-rainforests.html

Beautiful. I’ve read that Belize has the highest biodiversity of any country. They have enormous diversity in both the oceanic, forested and jungle ecosytems. I traveled through the jungles and it was mind blowing. Every time I looked in a new direction there was a new whacky plant, animal or insect. 

[Epikur]

13 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

Like a rain forest.

Rain forests have the highest bio-diversity of any biome.

https://rainforests.mongabay.com/03-diversity-of-rainforests.html

Well yes but when you live in Alaska you might want a different kind of garden.

[Leo Gura]

26 minutes ago, Epikur said:

Well yes but when you live in Alaska you might want a different kind of garden.

An all-white garden, you could say, eh?

[Carl-Richard]

On 11.7.2020 at 11:07 AM, Robi Steel said:

I dont see this shit on any Trump forums, I dont see violent sociopaths on there. Seriously, what the fuck is wrong with you. If this is your shadow, stop involving yourself in politics now and start working on yourself, youre clearly not ready to think clearly. God, get all those metric tones of hate out of your body first. Jesus Christ. Its just scary.

If I had said this, you would have banned me outright Leo. Nice complete partisan forum

Luckily, he was so outrageous that now you don't have to address what he was reacting to. Good dodge

[Epikur]

1 hour ago, Leo Gura said:

An all-white garden, you could say, eh?

I guess Alaska has in general more "problems" with diversity. I guess nobody cares

White: 66.7% (Non-Hispanic White: 64.1%) Black 3.6% Asian 5.4% (4.4% Filipino, 0.3% Chinese, 0.2% Laotian, 0.2% Japanese, 0.1% Indian, 0.1% Vietnamese, 0.1% Thai) American Indian or Alaskan Native 14.8%

[Parththakkar12]

4 hours ago, Forestluv said:

Notice how Tucker frames diversity training. He doesn’t frame it as something of value. He doesn’t frame it as Seattle is not teaching diversity training well. He doesn’t offer Seattle ideas to improve their diversity training. Rather, he frames it as evil liberals trying to destroy us white people. We are victims of the evil liberals imposing their hate values on us. It is ironic how right-wingers often point at the left as having victim mentality, when they themselves commonly display victim mentality. 

Those that are against diversity are in favor of segregation.

Precisely! What we have to understand as progressives is that most people will be PC and say they're pro-diversity to your face, but really they aren't pro-diversity. They have a shadow that wants a segregated community where they have their culture, customs, traditions, etc. So yeah, they will perceive diversity as a threat to the survival of their community. I can perfectly understand that.

Diversity cannot be preached to them, it's gonna have to be sold to them. You'll have to convince such people that diversity benefits them. And there is the possibility that they never see that you're right, even IF you are. (which is a huge 'if' btw)

For this, you'll have to include them too! You'll have to stop demonizing them. You'll have to be willing to admit to things that don't benefit them and own up to them. You'll have to make a genuine effort to include them. You'll have to be open to possibilities of your ideas not actually taking society forward, but actually backward, which is why they could be resisting you. Imagine this : What if what you're defining as progress isn't actually progress, but it's actually moving us back? The conservatives will be able to help you see that if it's true. They'll say stuff like 'Yeah this was tried back in my day. Didn't work for these reasons.' You'll have to be willing to consider this possibility and restructure your ideas to actually make progress.

This is where your key to true progress lies. Once you have them on your side, there's nothing stopping you from having all the progress you want.

I'm telling you Green people this stuff because you're the side that's more conscious. It's always the responsibility of the side that's more conscious/progressive to build a bridge to higher consciousness for the side that's unconscious. 

[Forestluv]

6 hours ago, Parththakkar12 said:

Precisely! What we have to understand as progressives is that most people will be PC and say they're pro-diversity to your face, but really they aren't pro-diversity. They have a shadow that wants a segregated community where they have their culture, customs, traditions, etc. So yeah, they will perceive diversity as a threat to the survival of their community. I can perfectly understand that.

That’s a step in the right direction. Marginalization and stigmatization works in both directions. Green is intolerant of intolerance. Green’s preference is that people will evolve toward genuine inclusion and equality. If that is not possible, then they want to marginalize intolerance. 

Some people view inclusion and equality as a threat to their culture, customs, traditions etc. And from one perspective, they are correct. I grew up in the 1980s and that culture, customs and traditions have fizzled out. In some ways, it’s sad and I miss it. Yet in other ways, it’s nice to see new things appear. This is the dynamic with conservatives and progressives. Conservatives don’t want old ways of being to fizzle out. Most conservatives are decent people and they prefer things stay as they have been. They begrudgingly go along with newer stuff. They may complain along the way. For others, it’s much more intense. There is fear and survival dynamics thrown in. Now, saying “Happy Holidays” is not inclusion, it is a “War on Christmas”. It is an existential threat. Taking down a statue of a Confederate slave trader becomes a mortal threat to “our history and culture”. This is the game Tucker and Trump are playing. They want to intensify fear of survival in conservatives.

6 hours ago, Parththakkar12 said:

Diversity cannot be preached to them, it's gonna have to be sold to them. You'll have to convince such people that diversity benefits them. And there is the possibility that they never see that you're right, even IF you are. (which is a huge 'if' btw)

I think there is something to this. That is, show the good aspects of diversity such that people will want to join in. For example, there could be a festival in a city with diverse food, music, dancing, art, culture. Some of the musicians on stage may make a comment about how they love the diverse environment. People like being a part of that. I think attraction is important. Yet this is much easier to do in urban areas that are inherently diverse. If NYC has a festival that is diverse, that is totally normal for NYC, since they are diverse. Yet if a festival of diversity is held in Oklahoma it may be perceived by Mr. McWhiterson as “those liberals shoving their lifestyle down my throat”.

As well, there is only so much behavior to be tolerated, especially at systemic levels. I’m not so concerned about a few guys telling racist jokes during poker night in their home. I’m more concerned about employers firing their employees because they find out they are gay. 

6 hours ago, Parththakkar12 said:

For this, you'll have to include them too! You'll have to stop demonizing them. You'll have to be willing to admit to things that don't benefit them and own up to them. You'll have to make a genuine effort to include them. You'll have to be open to possibilities of your ideas not actually taking society forward, but actually backward, which is why they could be resisting you. Imagine this : What if what you're defining as progress isn't actually progress, but it's actually moving us back? The conservatives will be able to help you see that if it's true. They'll say stuff like 'Yeah this was tried back in my day. Didn't work for these reasons.' You'll have to be willing to consider this possibility and restructure your ideas to actually make progress.

It depends on the issue. For example, progressives may want to raise taxes on the wealthy and corporations to a very high rate. Conservative economists may enter and say “I know you mean well, yet if you raise the taxes that high, there will be unintended consequences”. Progressives should be open to that. Some progressives want to have pure form of democratic socialism. Yet it might be better to have a socialism / capitalism mix. Some progressives can only see the toxicity of excessive capitalism. Yet there are benefits to. For example, moderate competition is healthy for progress - and that’s what progressives desire - progress.

Imagine that everyone has their basic needs of food, clothing and shelter met. Most people (not all) will have a desire to do something. To learn, create, produce and contribute something. Adding in moderate competition can be healthy to stimulate and speed up people to reach their higher potential and contributions.

6 hours ago, Parththakkar12 said:

This is where your key to true progress lies. Once you have them on your side, there's nothing stopping you from having all the progress you want.

This is one variable, yet it is insufficient for a high pace of progress. For example, decades ago there was a huge theme of “Celebrate Diversity!”. It was a progressive theme phrase. As well, gay people started to be shown on TV shows as normal people. This is important, yet insufficient. Progressives don’t want to wait 100 years for people to ‘naturally’ come around and realize gay people are not scary, immoral people that want to shove their ‘lifestyle’ down their throats. In addition to raising consciousness from social networks, education and laws are important as well. 100% voluntary compliance takes forever to evolve. It would take hundreds of years for everyone to realize it’s not OK to fire someone because they are gay. Thus, there needs to be education and ant-discrimination laws. Of course, that pressure will cause some conservatives to scream and complain. That is a price of speeding up progress. I would rather have LGBTQ be legally protected in the workplace now and have conservatives whine and complain, rather than waiting 100 years for conservatives to naturally come to realize it.

[Parththakkar12]

30 minutes ago, Forestluv said:

This is one variable, yet it is insufficient for a high pace of progress. For example, decades ago there was a huge theme of “Celebrate Diversity!”. It was a progressive theme phrase. As well, gay people started to be shown on TV shows as normal people. This is important, yet insufficient. Progressives don’t want to wait 100 years for people to ‘naturally’ come around and realize gay people are not scary, immoral people that want to shove their ‘lifestyle’ down their throats. In addition to raising consciousness from social networks, education and laws are important as well. 100% voluntary compliance takes forever to evolve. It would take hundreds of years for everyone to realize it’s not OK to fire someone because they are gay. Thus, there needs to be education and ant-discrimination laws. Of course, that pressure will cause some conservatives to scream and complain. That is a price of speeding up progress. I would rather have LGBTQ be legally protected in the workplace now and have conservatives whine and complain, rather than waiting 100 years for conservatives to naturally come to realize it.

Oh yeah for sure. I'm not advocating for 100% voluntary compliance. There's gonna be conservatives who will conform to whatever is there. Yeah they'll whine and complain, but no big deal. If you ask them whether it's voluntary compliance, they'll say no. But, because they're unaware of how they're programmed to comply with authority, they won't see how it is in fact voluntary. 

Whiners and complainers on either side don't count. Those perspectives are passive and powerless anyways and will not really give you insight on what to do, or they won't really be able to resist. The real resistance you'll face is from people who know what they're talking about and have good reasons to resist you. That's when you'll fail to create the change you want. That's when you'll need to either increase your level of empowerment, or you'll have to get them on board and sell them the change. 

If you're successful in creating the change you want, that's indication enough that it's right for society. 

[Forestluv]

4 minutes ago, Parththakkar12 said:

Whiners and complainers on either side don't count. Those perspectives are passive and powerless anyways and will not really give you insight on what to do, or they won't really be able to resist. The real resistance you'll face is from people who know what they're talking about and have good reasons to resist you. That's when you'll fail to create the change you want. That's when you'll need to either increase your level of empowerment, or you'll have to get them on board and sell them the change. 

The perspectives of whiners and complainers are not passive and powerless. People like Trump, Hannity and Tucker are the biggest whiners and complainers and they are extremely overt and have influential power. Even someone like JP is a whines and complains - yet he does it in a more reasonable tone. He is able to communicate and have discussions with green. The more extremes like Hannity are uninterested and incapable of having conversations with green. To rabid red / blue, green is the enemy and conversing with them would be a form of negotiating and surrendering. Hardline blue is portraying green as if they are terrorists and they don’t want to negotiate with terrorists. 

[Parththakkar12]

19 minutes ago, Forestluv said:

The perspectives of whiners and complainers are not passive and powerless. People like Trump, Hannity and Tucker are the biggest whiners and complainers and they are extremely overt and have influential power. Even someone like JP is a whines and complains - yet he does it in a more reasonable tone. He is able to communicate and have discussions with green. The more extremes like Hannity are uninterested and incapable of having conversations with green. To rabid red / blue, green is the enemy and conversing with them would be a form of negotiating and surrendering. Hardline blue is portraying green as if they are terrorists and they don’t want to negotiate with terrorists. 

If they have power, it's because people are listening to them. That's because they look like whiners to Green, but really they have the power of the homeostasis of the status-quo with them. That's where their power lies in fact, in guarding the status-quo. Their power also lies in the fact that they understand their audience better than you, that's why they're getting the attention you aren't. 

As progressives who care about creating the change we want, we have one option, that is to compete with these powerful conservatives and beat them at their own game. That means competing for their audience and selling them a progressive ideology that really gives them hope for the future. For this we'll have to understand the psychology and ego-needs of their audience and figure out a better way to cater to them than the current ones. If they have a positive motivation to get on board, this will beat the negative, fear-based motivations that conservatives are playing off of.

This is where stopping the demonization comes in. We need to understand that the audience of these poweful conservatives is giving them the power, which means the audience has its own power. We need to have respect for this power, cease to demonize them and actually care about them. Then you come up with progressive ideas to help them.

When the public happily gets on board with what you're selling them, powerful shifts can happen!

Edited July 13, 2020 by Parththakkar12

[Forestluv]

32 minutes ago, Parththakkar12 said:

As progressives who care about creating the change we want, we have one option, that is to compete with these powerful conservatives and beat them at their own game. That means competing for their audience and selling them a progressive ideology that really gives them hope for the future. For this we'll have to understand the psychology and ego-needs of their audience and figure out a better way to cater to them than the current ones. If they have a positive motivation to get on board, this will beat the negative, fear-based motivations that conservatives are playing off of.

I agree this is a useful strategy. Yet it is one component of a larger strategy. There can be a multi-pronged strategy. 

32 minutes ago, Parththakkar12 said:

This is where stopping the demonization comes in. We need to understand that the audience of these poweful conservatives is giving them the power, which means the audience has its own power. We need to have respect for this power, cease to demonize them and actually care about them. Then you come up with progressive ideas to help them.

When the public happily gets on board with what you're selling them, powerful shifts can happen!

I agree that this has strategic value and green can get too emotional and idealistic. 

However, marginalization and shaming can have a powerful impact. Look at the Lincoln Project. These are ex-republican conservatives. They know how conservatives think, because they have been conservative. Look at some of their ads. They can be absolutely brutal in marginalizing, stigmatizing and shaming racism. And they are very effective. Sometimes it’s wise to hold someone’s hand and lead them. Other times it’s wise to punch a bully. 

From a strategic standpoint, ostracizing and ridiculing can be effective in some contexts. It helps shape the boundaries of acceptable social behavior. If men can lose their jobs for harassing women and gay people, it is incentive not to harass women and gay people at the workplace. 

[Parththakkar12]

5 minutes ago, Forestluv said:

However, marginalization and shaming can have a powerful impact. Look at the Lincoln Project. These are ex-republican conservatives. They know how conservatives think, because they have been conservative. Look at some of their ads. They can be absolutely brutal in marginalizing, stigmatizing and shaming racism. And they are very effective. Sometimes it’s wise to hold someone’s hand and lead them. Other times it’s wise to punch a bully. 

Are you sure this won't come back to bite you in the ass? It doesn't feel like a conscious strategy that maximises consciousness and love. 

I have a feeling that the election of Trump is a result of the failure of a shaming and marginalisation strategy on the part of progressives. This will cause them to contract into their perspective and get defensive. There will be surface-level political correctness, but there won't be a deep sense of belief in your vision for the future. Will this be good for your cause long-term?

I'm aware that most progressives will disagree with me on this issue. Only time will show the results of the different strategies! 

[Parththakkar12]

32 minutes ago, Forestluv said:

From a strategic standpoint, ostracizing and ridiculing can be effective in some contexts. It helps shape the boundaries of acceptable social behavior. If men can lose their jobs for harassing women and gay people, it is incentive not to harass women and gay people at the workplace. 

Makes sense. You do want to have a policing system that punishes behavior that's unacceptable. 

I don't particularly have an issue if you want to do this. I personally don't want to do the shaming and ridiculing thing. That's my personal preference. The reason is as follows: today's progressive is tomorrow's conservative. So, if I get attached to the morality of today's progressivism, it will become archaic and barbaric tomorrow. Then, I'll be the conservative one defending the old morality and I'll be the one facing the music! As depressing as it sounds, we will see this effect happen. 

There definitely is a place in the movement for people who believe in the progressive morality. Nothing against them. As long as they aren't being the useful idiots of people whose intentions they don't know, should be fine!

Edited July 13, 2020 by Parththakkar12

[Forestluv]

2 minutes ago, Parththakkar12 said:

Are you sure this won't come back to bite you in the ass? It doesn't feel like a conscious strategy that maximises consciousness and love.

It’s not an either / or thing to me.

It would be like an athlete lifting weights. In certain contexts, lifting weights can be beneficial to the athlete. Yet in other contexts, it is harmful. If an athlete lifts too many weights, he can get injured. If an athlete lifts heavy weights the day before a game, their performance will go down. Yet, just because lifting weights can be a negative, it wouldn’t be wise to say “Lifting weights is bad. Let’s never lift weights”. Rather, it would be better to strategically design a weight lifting program that maximizes it’s benefits and minimizes the risks and harm.

From a relative perspective, love is not being an enabler. If my friend is destroying his life due to alcoholism, love is not enabling is alcoholism. Love is an intervention to show him the impact of alcoholism on him, his family and his friends. This can be extremely uncomfortable for the alcoholic to look at. Yet it is a form of “tough love” for him. 

[Forestluv]

10 minutes ago, Parththakkar12 said:

I don't particularly have an issue if you want to do this. I personally don't want to do the shaming and ridiculing thing. That's my personal preference. The reason is as follows: today's progressive is tomorrow's conservative. So, if I get attached to the morality of today's progressivism, it will become archaic and barbaric tomorrow. Then, I'll be the conservative one defending the old morality and I'll be the one facing the music! As depressing as it sounds, we will see this effect happen. 

Freeing slaves was once the progressive position that conservatives fought against. Is freeing slaves now archaic and barbaric?

Similarly, allowing gay people to get married is a progressive position. In 100 years, progressives are not going to look back and say “Allowing gay people to marry each other is archaic and barbaric!!”. 

Progressivism builds on itself. Progressives first fought to allow people in inter-racial relationships to get married, then they fought to allow gay people to get married. It’s like learning math. We first learn algebra and then learn calculus. While learning calculus we don’t say “Algebra is archaic. Let’s do calculus without algebra!”.