172 million Muslims live in India (only 30 million less than Pakistan)
No, my first reaction to your earlier comment “Be the solution. Start by not ridiculing the other side and calling them stupid names.” is that it’s precisely setting up a false equivalency. There was a time when the difference between Democrats and Republicans was indeed a matter of differences in values and world-view, when you might agree more with one ideology than the other but rational discussions could be had because both sides were basically rational and there were discernible common goals. Those kinds of discussions were basically philosophical and just represented different values and different approaches to achieving those goals.
In the current situation Republicans have become divorced from science, facts, and reason, and have increasingly attracted a dedicated group of like-minded followers, reaching its low point this last election cycle where blatant, rampant dishonesty is the new normal. This is not a group that is going to be mollified by a conciliatory approach or appeal to facts and reason. Even the goals are no longer common when many believe the ideal is a Christian white America that shuns immigrants, disdains science, and wants to drive the economy by burning every ounce of fossil fuel that they can dig or pump out of the ground. What productive strategy would you actually imagine would come out of trying to “be the solution”? What is the solution when someone’s core beliefs are manifestly disconnected from reality, when many of the views are not just anti-science but anti-social, tribal and isolationist, disdainful and fearful of minorities, religiously dogmatic, and the person is insulted when confronted with it?
I like this post. I’ve been trying to encourage posters here to ease up on the hyperbole recently, but I don’t think it’s had much effect.
this is purely north american liberatarian ideological nonsense without analytical foundation.
there are plenty of the examples from developed european countries where such developments are not subject to the partisan divides like this.
It is a pure assertion that also the issues of marketplace and private actors also do not become partisan political.
I don’t think we can heal the rift, red and blue America are two separate cultures with opposing visions for the world they want to live in. I honestly don’t know how I’m to compromise with climate change denial and wanting to prevent gay marriage.
Could you be more specific here, please?
The main issue in society is the inability to accept that opposite viewpoints might have validity. In this thread alone, Merneith and asahi have shown that they already are unwilling to do this. In their minds, apparently, the sort of shouted propaganda found in many broadcasts from a certain news organization can be equated to the entirety of the conservative political spectrum’s politics. For example, because some commentators and politicians speak of “climate change” as a “hoax”, all conservatives must be acting upon such principles. This, of course, ignores the fact that most conservative politicians actually accept that anthropogenic climate change is happening, and simply disagree on what the extent of the effect is, and what, if anything, we should do politically in response, which is a much more nuanced position, and one that cannot simply be dismissed as unreasonable per se. And, yes, there are people (plenty) on the conservative side who dismiss “liberal” viewpoints in similar ways.
I’ll narrate an example from my own personal history. Shortly after starting teaching high school students, a minor political debate erupted in one of my mathematics classes. In the process, one of my students, a relatively bright young woman with very conservative political and Christian views, made an assertion to the effect that anyone who was in favor of allowing abortion must be crazy. I gently suggested that it was possible for perfectly rational, reasonable people to believe that abortion should be allowed, and, after letting that statement sink in for a minute, we moved back into the less contentious discussion of solving quadratic equations.
About two weeks later, I ended up being called into my principal’s office. She asked me about the discussion that had occurred. I told her what had been discussed, and what I had said. She then informed me that the young lady in question had gone to her church the Sunday after the debate, and had told her pastor that Mr. Young thought anyone who was anti-abortion was wrong. This lead to a sermon to the congregation about the evils of public schools, and a visit from the pastor and some church elders to the school, to discuss how their beliefs were being trampled. Fortunately, I had a very good principal, who, after ascertaining the facts, let the pastor know he was mistaken as to what had happened, and assured him that, at our school, no one’s beliefs were thrown under the bus.
In ruminating about this episode, it occurred to me that the problem was that the young lady could not see the issue in anything other than absolutes. She was right, and anyone who didn’t agree with her was wrong. So my comment about the ability of reasonable people to differ in their opinions on the subject never had a chance to make an impact on her. In viewing things that way, I, as someone who didn’t agree with her, must be someone who was teh evil.
We see this all the time in American politics these days. On the Conservative side, it often comes up via opinions on morality: the debate over abortion is an example. If you truly believe that an unborn foetus has already been ensouled, it’s hard to see abortion as anything but “murder.” Thus, it’s impossible to see someone who advocates “murder” as having any validity to their arguments. On the Liberal side, it often comes up via opinions one modern scientific thinking (both hard sciences and soft): the “debate” over evolution is an example. Evolution is a compelling theory for explaining what we have found in the way of a fossil record, but it cannot account for the possibility of supra-natural occurrences (say, for example, spontaneous creation of an entire universe by an omnipotent deity with those fossils in situ). Yet many liberal people accept the explanation not as a scientific theory (here’s what appears to be true, based upon the evidence), but rather as accepted fact (here’s what MUST be true, and any opinion to the contrary is wrong). To anyone who attempts to espouse a viewpoint based upon some alternative assumption (such as a religious one based in omnipotent creation), the response is not that they may be right, but we’ll never be able to know via the evidence, but rather that they cannot be right, period.
This increasing insistence that “I’m right, you’re wrong” that is pervading our public discourse is causing increasing bifurcation of our society. What’s particularly disappointing about this is that the mentality involved is no longer the property of the uneducated. Instead, we see increasing examples of such bi-polar thinking among supposedly highly educated people. Economic principles rejected out-of-hand because they don’t square with one’s own thinking. Scientific principles rejected out-of-hand because they don’t allow one to do what one wants politically or economically. And political principles rejected out-of-hand for no other reason than that they are the politics of the “other” party.
When people see things in such ways, name-calling, etc. are inevitable. If “I’m right, and you’re wrong”, then you are no longer worthy of respect, because you are not someone else with a competing viewpoint, but rather an enemy, who must be defeated. We are seeing that, in my opinion, more and more on this message board: two groups of people who, instead of debating, simply talk past each other, trading veiled insults along the way. We must break that sort of bi-polar thinking, if we are to avoid totally splitting ourselves along an ever-widening breach.
I think this paragraph demonstrates exactly why we will never heal the rift. It is not just “some commenters and politicians” who deny climate change, it is the Republican president of the United States. I think it is incredibly disingenuous to try to suggest otherwise.
There is room for reasonable debate about many things, and I’m willing to engage in it.
I am certain, however, that Trump is a disgraceful human who is wholly unqualified in every way to be President of the United States. I’m willing to write off anyone who doesn’t see that.
But I don’t see this in NY State. NY State is bigger than most EU countries by size and population. There is a healthy debate at any number of levels on how to best provide for college, sustainably power our infrastructure with renewable forms of energy, the identification of corruption, the best route for bike paths, gun control, economic development, health care etc, etc. Many of the participants in the discussion are conservative, it’s just their brand of conservatism is far milder than what comes from Alabama or North Carolina. NY State, in particular, NY City, probably has more cultural variation than almost any other part of the planet Earth.
There are plenty of conservative lending their voice here, it’s just that their voice does not dominate and hopefully, it never will again.
This is like asking me to attend Church just to get a theological perspective when I know all of it is unacceptable bullshit mythology. I don’t care if I don’t participate in theological discussions, just like I don’t care about the argument of whether there is Climate Change. I want to live in a place where people ant to discuss moral and ethical applications of the law and want to figure out what ot do about Climate Change. many types of Conservatives are just too far gone for me.
One of my problems with people on the right, which I would say is a lot less of a problem with people on the left (until you get to the college students and other far left idiots) is that they refuse to edit themselves for their audience.
Do you not say certain things at work, at church or school or in front of children or you mom? Congratulations, you know how to edit your words based on your audience.
All too many right wingers have this idea that because “FREE SPEECH!”, they can just let loose with casual racism or bigotry in front of anyone and no one can say anything about it. Had a gamer buddy petulantly drop out of the group because he just kept throwing out racist jokes and comments and then getting called on it. Boo hoo, how mean everyone was to be calling him a racist! But he clearly is. I dropped out of the group for other reasons, but I guess he went crawling back and learned to shut up. :rolleyes:
But this kind of bitter discourse is not new. It is as old as Humanity.
I don’t know about my side, but the other side is right.
I am an existential threat to their values and way of life.
I’m not ok with black people being denied the vote, as long as it only happens in Alabama. I’m not ok with trans boys being bullied in school and forced to use the girls’ restroom as long as it happens in North Carolina. I’m not ok with women having to travel to another state to get an abortion just because they live in Texas.
I want these things to end.
I want bigotry to end.
I don’t advocate violence. I’d much rather win on these issues through education than legislation, but the fact is that it will take both.
Meanwhile, I don’t have to attend a BBQ fundraiser for the KKK just to break out of my bubble. I read books about woo and try to grok the p.o.v. of the authors/practitioners. I attended a community event recently at the local mosque. I do outreach for my local atheist group at teh farmers Market downtown and speak with people on all sides. I seek out opinions and facts that will challenge by presuppositions.
I feel the same way about people who want to ban guns or think Christianity should be a bar from public office.
Yup, we’re not countrymen HD.
To pick a nit, NYC is certainly in the top 10, but there are other places that can make a stronger case. I believe that Toronto is actually the most diverse.
Edited to add that your qualifier “probably” indicates that it’s near the top, which it is.
Every decision for the last 160 years? What about Bi-Metallism, the Kellog-Briand pact, the League of Nation, Court Packing, the NRA, goo-gooism, the Korean War, Bretton Woods, stagflation?
Republicans have caused natural disasters? Is there anything they can’t do?
Climate change is an easy compromise, You take the amount of warming you want done and then figure the amount of carbon reduction it would take to achieve it and then you cut that in half.
For gay marriage, how about places that want to recognize gay marriage are allowed to do so and places that don’t want to do so are allowed not to?
So I should treat red state America like some kind of third world quasi democracy where human rights are not really respected? I already do that, it’s why I don’t consider them to be my countrymen.
Good for you Alan Smithee, but there are any number of ways to have a free exchange of ideas without being specifically about political ideas. People choose to deal with ideas they want to address. It’s not a problem. It’s a made up problem.