Can’t get much of a spectrum with only 2 or 3 people.
Thank you, octopus, for this useful post. Let’s have a look at it.
And we start off with a light well-poisoning. octopus is quite right in saying that “nobody” is saying that “the virus was created atom by atom in a lab”. I didn’t even say it in the post he responded to. So why did he?
Of course, it is true that quite a lot of people, predominantly on the right and including some high-level Republicans, did at various points suggest that the virus was deliberately engineered by China as a bioweapon, which is what I was referring to. But by starting off by denying a claim nobody made, he also gets to insinuate without saying it that my comment about people claiming the virus being created in a lab was somehow without merit, even though it was patently true.
And the thing is that if poisoning the well wasn’t his intent, there was no point in saying what he said in the first place.
Pause a moment and admire the craftsmanship here. Note especially the “made more dangerous” bit, and how it subtly implies that the “Left” were wrong about the bioweapon claim (which they weren’t) while allowing him plenty of plausible deniability to claim that he didn’t mean deliberately made more dangerous (which then allow a whole host of other unspecified interpretations, one of which the right might have been right about but we don’t know which but the rightness can always be claimed post hoc), while he simultaneously denounces the Left for debunking the actually false claim in the first place and gets to play the “conservative persecution” card. Neat.
The ambiguity here is a feature, not a bug, hence the weasel words “very plausible and probably accurate”. Is it plausible? Sure. Is it “probably accurate”? Undetermined. But by claiming the Left were in some way trying to shut down the Right (who were apparently right all along about…something), we move on to:
So the Left was “exceedingly dishonest” for doing a vaguely-described thing about a still-undetermined theory. And apparently that’s why we shouldn’t listen to the “so-called scientists” (another slick smear, this time against scientists - very nice) and “the media”. One wonders who he thinks does have “credibility” about this.
And he finishes with an octopus special, a toxic, baseless smear against the Left with a heavy dollop of projection. He’s always keen to include one in as many posts as possible regardless of the forum, as it’s guaranteed to foul any thread he squats it into. I mean, “political correctness” has nothing to do with this but he’s squeezed it in anyway, and then attempts to claim it’s the Left that value ideology over facts (immediately after he’s just insulted the scientists, mind you). I guess he’s trying to mix it up after using his “woke” slur earlier in the thread.
Conservatives reading this: this is why you have such a bad reputation on this board. This guy right here, and a small group of similar folk. He contributes nothing of value and makes every thread he participates in worse, sticking to his long-debunked Preferred Narratives everywhere he goes. With virtually every post he proves himself a disingenuous asshole, and then (disingenuously) claims that he’s being “demonized” for being “conservative”.
Because if one of your own repeatedly insists that being a disingenuous asshole and being a conservative are synonymous, who are the rest of us to argue?
As you so aptly demonstrate in your post, plenty enough for that disingenuity and self martyrdom.
There are many more than 2 or 3 conservatives on this board, but maybe you all even look alike to yourselves at this point that you don’t realize it.
Puh-leeze. You fools who label anything and anyone to the right of Mao or Stalin as being fascist are the fools who make this board a toxic place.
And, yes, the left and those who opposed the bad orange man were willing to ignore any inconvenient fact and spin it in such a way that the Ministry of Truth or Baghdad Bob would have been ashamed of.
My question is, can you do anything about that situation, and if not, why not? My guess is that the answer is that no, you can’t do anything about that situation. The reason being that the radical right wingers now vastly outnumber the old fashioned conservatives, maybe by as much as a 10 to 1 margin.
I’m a liberal, not a conservative, and I don’t keep track of who conservatives are or what they’re saying. I’ve got no reason to.
@octopus, are you a conservative, do you support Trump?
WOW! I didn’t know that Biden was to the left of Stalin and Mao! Tell me more, Octoputz!
See, seriously, it is posts like this that make all conservatives look bad.
If you can’t stop for yourself, stop it for your fellow conservatives.
Even your fellow travelers see that you are simply lying here, why do you do this?
You simply lie, and lie, and lie, and think that somehow, you are contributing anything useful.
That may be your self label, but those are not the positions that you take.
When you are vehemently against pretty much every social liberal position, it’s hard to take seriously the claim that you are a liberal.
On what position do you consider yourself to be a liberal?
Then why did you claim to have a count of them?
We really didn’t need yet another episode of “The Daily Buzz Live with Octopus”.
Be more than a snark parrot. Try to come up with an original thought.
Of course the hive loves to use the “we”.
Somebody hear a buzz?
That’s rich from someone whose entire corpus of conversation consists of “you guys are a hive mind”.
Supporting liberal values like equality and individual liberty, private property and individual rights, limited constitutional government, pluralism, toleration, autonomy, bodily integrity and consent. Supporting social democracy with a stronger safety net, universal healthcare, higher taxes on the rich. Voting for left-wing parties. That kind of thing.
I didn’t. I was just highlighting that they are kind of scarce around here.
Mollusk, please. @Gyrate roasted you so good, that the food tasters had to call the police forensic laboratories for a positive identification.
DISCLAIMER: I didn’t read the entirety of this thread, which seems to be moving at the speed of light.
The title should be “This board does not need conservatives in the political forums.”
Try to remember (could be a song…) that political threads do not make up the entirety of the SDMB. Back in the days when politics was not a life & death enterprise, I never even looked in the Elections forum (as it was known back then) or the Pit. So let’s keep in mind that @asahi’s premise is about the political discussions here.
We also discuss food, movies, pets, travel, home improvement projects, science, and bunches of other stuff.
That is all. Carry on. I’m outta here.
I’d just as soon take guidance from you on “good faith discussion” as I would attend a seminar on racial tolerance conducted by H.P. Lovecraft.
You, more than anyone else here, are guilty of ascribing the labels “conservative” and “racist” to any position within the liberal spectrum that you don’t personally agree with or find leftist enough, and even of specifically accusing individual people of getting their opinions from Donald Trump, including on topics which Trump has never discussed. Of course, you have the privilege of attacking posters in the debate fora in this disingenuous, personalized way and never getting sanctioned for it, because that’s how the deck is stacked.
You derail every thread you post in by accusing people of holding “conservative” positions of no relevance to the topic - barely a week ago you entered a thread about the way in which the rules of the Pit forum are applied to accusations of racism and out of nowhere accused everyone else of being an anti-vaxxer.
The idea that “everyone who disagrees with me about anything for any reason is part of a conspiracy that holds every bad idea I can conceive of” is about as far from dealing in reality or good faith discussion possible, and you are the absolute king of dragging that notion into every fucking thread.
And what the hell does that have to do with Gyrates very thorough low by blow knock down of your previous post? He never mentions fascists or Trump. Anytime you are presented with an argument that you don’t have a good response for you simply reply with a complete non-sequitor insult.
It’s boring as hell. we might as well just program @discbot for random combinations of hivemind, liberal, woke, deplorable, Mao and Stalin and then you wouldn’t have to post.
Well thanks for showing all what an idiot you are, that reply (and I explained this on that thread too) was for another poster that in general insisted that many current conservatives were not following crazy things. I also pointed at the craziness of most Republican still following the big lie from Trump.
So, yeah. Craziness, bad faith and lying are what conservatives like you do bring to the forum. There are other more reasonable conservatives, even in this thread, that noticed your reprehensible behavior already.