I haven't insulted you — counterpunch

Actually, you have. First, you and people like you are an offense to all decent people. Racism is not a religion or an economic philosophy. It's harm is not accidental. It's violence as culture, not just in the individual ways it expresses itself, but to humanity itself. It kills over and over and over throughout history and excuses itself via it's own circularity. It is not difference of opinion: it is inexcusable violent hate that has to be named, condemned and stamped out by every conscientious person capable of caring for others to protect us from its violence.

Plus the aforementioned bs double speak is an insult to intelligence. Like anyone is stupid enough not to see through that brain-dead crap.

It's not me playing identity politics - it's you! — counterpunch

I'm a straight white middle class man from England. My identity is not an issue: that's been one of my many, many privileges. I haven't used it to besmirch people without those privileges because I'm not a scumbag.

I don't think that says what you think it does, or what it appears to say. I have a degree in sociology and politics, including statistical method - and I know first hand the biases in what are laughingly called the social sciences. The humanities are a breeding ground of left wing, politically correct dogma - and the problem here is, as stated above, that a multi level Bayesian analysis is simply unnecessary. It introduces hierarchical values to data points - in order to construe one shooting as more statistically significant than another shooting. i.e. to introduce the biased assumptions that, unsurprisingly then constitute the conclusion. It's a lie.

I'm an offence to all decent people? It's difficult not to take that personally. I think maybe, your problem is that you assume your values are far more universal than in fact they are. I think most people, like me - recognise that left wing politically correct ideology is problematic at best. I'm trying to discuss those problems civilly. If you cannot keep a civil tongue in your head, best you fuck off you mug!

Given that half of government and all of the media are steeped in political correctness; given that Kier Starmer leapt to his knees for Black Lies Matter, and unequivocally endorsed gender self identification - and that the London Mayor just spent £1.3m of public money promoting Black Lies Matter on New Year's Eve, given that Parler has been banned by Google in an ongoing politically correct crusade against freedom of speech, I'd say, they're getting there. Which takes me back to where I came in - with StreetlightX, saying he would murder racists. So how is any of this funny? — counterpunch

Now, don't get me confused with StreetlightX.

was "...public money promoting Black Lies Matter..." deliberate or accidental? I'm not a big BLM fan; granted, the police resort to deadly force in many cases where disabling force would be much more appropriate. Still, black deaths at the hands of police are a small fraction of the deaths caused by civilian (usually black on black) gunfire. BLM should focus on black-on-black gun deaths as well as death by police.

My guess is that most people killed by the police are poor, whether they are black, hispanic, white or asian. A lot of police effort is directed at controlling "the rabble" at the bottom, -- the poor. That so many blacks are poor is a better cause-effect relationship with respect to racism than the activities of the police.

My guess is the Google and Apple did not ban Parler apps for reasons of political correctness. Neither corporation wants to appear as minor league tools of major league politics. Google and Apple are both very much part of The Establishment. Further, the rich people who own Google and Apple (stock holders) are generally always on the side of Law & Order, except when it comes to tax law. As a group, the rich have little (or none) sympathy with the relative poor and trouble makers.

The political right (conservatives, Republicans, etc.) have not been suffering from a lack of access to free speech. Neither has the opposite side of the aisle. If some socialists started calling for a violent take over of (Rhode Island or maybe North Dakota--never mind the U.S Congress) you can rest, assured that they will be promptly deplatformed.

We do not have absolute free speech. Some topics have been ruled out of bounds. I don't like it, but that's life.

It's difficult not to take that personally. — counterpunch

Why the hell would you NOT take it personally?

I think maybe, your problem is that you assume your values are far more universal than in fact they are. — counterpunch

That has often been the case, and the world these past few years has frequently taunted me for it.

I'm trying to discuss those problems civilly. — counterpunch

But I'm justified in treating you uncivilly because I GENUINELY BELIEVE THAT IS THE RIGHT THING TO DO because I GENUINELY BELIEVE YOU ARE A RACIST SCUMBAG and I GENUINELY BELIEVE RACIST SCUMBAGS ARE AN EVIL THREAT TO HUMANITY.

Now, if you will kindly recall:

There is no alternative to acting on the basis of belief — counterpunch

This is your philosophy. Whereas the Trump rioters had only evidence against their beliefs, you have provided ample evidence that you are a racist. So even by your stricter criteria, I am justified in my response. I perceive your racism whether you own it or not. I believe you are a racist.

So ACCORDING TO YOUR AVOWEDLY GENERAL PHILOSOPHY, how would you say I should treat you?

Just wanted to see if you believed your supposed principles or whether they'd crumble the second they didn't fit into your ideology.

Black Lies Matter — counterpunch

Trying to not be PC? It makes you appear alt-right.

I can only hope to fare better in your esteem.

The Mayor of London used the New Year's Eve firework display money to hire drones, to form the BLM raised fist slogan in the sky. It was very deliberate, and kept secret until the big show. He's a left wing Labour Mayor, and I've just realised what you're asking.... - yes, the omission was deliberate. Black Lies Matter is a statistically false, social media narrative. When it all kicked off, I looked up the data on the Bureau of Justice Statistics website, and it's just not true that the US police are engaged in some sort of racist genocide.

I'm inclined to agree that poverty is a factor, but I'm betting it comes down to intelligence. If a police officer points a gun at you, and you ain't clever enough to comply, then you might just get your dumb ass shot - no matter what colour you are.

I don't quite get your point regards Parler. In the context of a politically correct crusade across all forms of social media - against right wing voices, who have to claim free speech protections for their opinions from the ubiquity of left wing cancel culture, I think it's just another example of shutting down the right while letting the left run wild.

You mention StreetlightX - I came in when he said he wanted to hang racists. He wants to murder people for their opinions. Serious or not, that's extreme - and something I don't think any right winger could get away with. They'd have police kicking their door off if they said that; find themselves in prison for inciting violence. The left wrap their villainy in the garb of righteousness; with such pathetic, self effacing, submissive displays of self recrimination it makes my skin crawl.

So I say to them, you know slavery existed since the dawn of time, right? You know it was thousands of years, black people had been selling other black people into slavery before Europeans got involved. You know we ended the salve trade - and invented almost everything in the modern world. But no. They are blind to the facts. The left hate us. They hate themselves. They'll side with anyone before us.

Why the hell would you NOT take it personally? — Kenosha Kid

Because this is a philosophy forum, not a chat forum. I'm here to discuss philosophy. I'm not here to butter you up, and become your firmest friend. I'm not here to call you names and become your bitterest enemy. I'm here to discuss philosophy - and frankly, you're letting the side down by dragging the conversation into the gutter of the giving and taking of personal offence.

I don't care whether you like me or not. I do care what you think about political correctness. I'd like you to explain it to me - because, I don't think you can, because it doesn't make a lick of sense.

If you think that makes me racist, then a) you're wrong. and b) I don't give a little rat's turd.

Adopt some academic distance. Discuss the subject matter, and keep your barbed tongue sheathed, or leave me the hell alone.

Trying to not be PC? It makes you appear alt-right. — praxis

Philosophically speaking, given that your lot appeal to a subjectivism. how I appear to you says something about you, but it says nothing about me. For you, reality is subjectively constructed. You are responsible for how I appear, not me. So, what is alt-right? Is it like Viet Cong, or the Red Peril? Some menacing name conjured up to stereotype, and demonise anyone who opposes the left wing, politically correct cultural strangle hold?

I ask you, seriously, human being to human being, do you not think political correctness is problematic? Do you really think JK Rowling hates trans people because she said something about 'the cervixed" used to be called women? Don't you not think it's incredibly hysterical and childish - and that free speech and a thick skin are better things to encourage in the next generation than a hair trigger sensitivity to offence?

One of my problems (being a lefty) is I don't like a lot of the Left's knee-jerk positions. Like... the so-called cancel culture where one rumor of disapproved behavior and you are out of the game. Like... the left's insistence on the rights of any person to immigrate from anywhere to anywhere else. Like... the hasty adoption of leftist buzz words (like white privilege) by people who were not interested in their privileged status (if they even were) until it became a sign of virtue to confess it. Ad nauseam.

Intelligence may be a factor in police encounters. It seems self-evident to me that aggression toward cops is always a bad idea. local culture with respect to machismo is another; even style figures into what happens when police and civilians have freighted encounters. If "in-your-face" confrontation is de rigueur in interpersonal behavior, that could result in a hostile response from the police. Having a string of criminal convictions is a prejudicial fact. Et cetera.

Clearly, black people have been the targets of highly discriminatory practices since the days of slavery. There are planned, managed, systematically executed reasons why black people in the United States are, on average, poor. Their poverty is neither self-inflicted nor accidental. Economic racism has been at work. But economic exploitation is an equal opportunity game. The white working class has, by and large, been fucked over since the earliest colonial period of US history. So have a lot of other people.

As for the history of slavery, everybody was fair game. Back in the day when Britain was considered barbarian, slaves from Britain were quite popular--red hair, pink complexions, exotic. Thank the Romans for that. In Classical Greece, anyone could become a slave through financial misfortune. And once enslaved, many stayed enslaved.

Nah, someone who gets their panties in a twist about a response to the equivocation of racism and disagreement — StreetlightX

Someone's panties are in a twist about a consistent pattern of management doing everything it can to lower the quality of this forum.

It [recent insurrection at US capital] doesn't demonstrate anything about racial dominance - as far as I can tell. If you think it does, please explain in what way. I don't see it. — counterpunch

Basically, white conservatives forced access and ransacked the nation's capital. Imagine, if you will, ten thousand African American US citizens planning a protest at the capital, acquiring all appropriate licenses, and on the planned date protesting at the gates of the capital. Would they be able to force entry into the heart of our nation's democracy as easily and deeply as the white conservatives? Even if they were protesting the extinction of a species of butterfly it is very hard to imagine that they would. Of course this is speculative but I think shows a practical difference in racial dominance. One race litteraly has more access to a place than others.

I'm here to discuss philosophy - and frankly, you're letting the side down by dragging the conversation into the gutter of the giving and taking of personal offence. — counterpunch

Terrific wilful missing of the point, full marks for that. Not a milligram of intellectual rigour or shame to you, I see.

Philosophically speaking, given that your lot appeal to a subjectivism. how I appear to you says something about you, but it says nothing about me. For you, reality is subjectively constructed. You are responsible for how I appear, not me. So, what is alt-right? Is it like Viet Cong, or the Red Peril? Some menacing name conjured up to stereotype, and demonise anyone who opposes the left wing, politically correct cultural strangle hold? — counterpunch

Remarkable that you can stereotype and criticize stereotyping in the same breath. I merely mentioned that you appear alt-right, meaning that you reason and say the same sort of things that alt-right folks do. It's not a good sign simply because you've identified as a centrist. It indicates deception.

Don't you not think it's incredibly hysterical and childish - and that free speech and a thick skin are better things to encourage in the next generation than a hair trigger sensitivity to offence? — counterpunch

Who was recently whining about StreetlightX's manner of expression?

I'm in the UK, and I'm Blairite still. It was after the fall of Communism in Russia and China, Blair sought a Third Way - re-rooting socialist values in a compromise with capitalist economics. It was very popular. He won three elections. Nonetheless, Labour denounced him as a red Tory, rejected his philosophy, and doubled down on neo marxian, post modern, reverse identity politics. Problem is, it's a zero sum game - and so the political landscape is utterly polarised.

For me, I'm proud of my country and what we've achieved - and will achieve, if only I could be heard above the madding crowd. The right deny climate change; or insofar as they acknowledge it, make promises for the far distant future they know they won't be around - to fail to deliver. The left use climate change as a battering ram against western civilisation generally, and capitalism in particular. Again polarisation and both wrong. It's not just political correctness. I'm politically homeless, and seek solace in philosophy.

Interesting thing is, I was looking at the US Constitution yesterday, and it states:

Fifteenth Amendment
Section 1
The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.

That was adopted in 1870. Read in relation to the rest of the Constitution, that guarantees legal equality, it's quite difficult to understand how "economic racism" has been effected. Poverty is not proof of racism. But it is very difficult to escape.

Going back just a little further to 1847, the workers of the Northern mill town where I grew up - all worked in the mill, children too, when Parliament passed the Factories Act - ensuring that , "women and children between the ages of 13 and 18 could work only 63 hours per week." And they were paid in tokens, that could only be redeemed at the company store.

My grandfather - born about 1905, failed his 11 plus and was immediately taken out of school and put to work in the mines, opening and closing doors when the trucks passed, for sixpence a week. Later he was conscripted to fight in WWII, and died in a rented house with hardly a penny to his name. If I lack sympathy for claims of discrimination, it's because I'm white and far from fucking privileged.

I'm here to discuss philosophy — counterpunch

I haven't been paying attention enough to tell how much of a racist you actually are or aren't, just skimming some comments that accuse you of it, but I would be interested or at least amused to see an attempted justification of whatever it is you think that's being called racist in terms of deep philosophical principles.

E.g. I can formulate an argument directly to anti-racism from a deep abstract and general philosophical principle like "every meaningful question has a universally correct answer". I'd be interested to see if you can do likewise.

Sorry, I don't understand your question. I can assure you I'm not racist. I do however have big problems with political correctness - not least, that it makes race an issue, and proceeds far beyond colour blind equality into positive discrimination - which effectively, discriminates against white people. And straight people, and men. But we were discussing political correctness in relation to race, and so - the kneejerk response from the left is to accuse me of racism.

Black Lives Matter were just applauded uncritically by the left wing media for killing around 40 people, causing hundreds of millions of dollars of property damage, for looting shops and burning businesses. Your critique of the capitol protests is just as biased. I'm a philosopher. I seek fairness and impartiality in my reason. I know black lives matter is based on social media lies with no statistical basis in fact. I don't know if the election was a fraud. You still haven't explained why the left claimed the 2016 election was a fraud, and why now, you think the electoral system has been fixed. Or, admitted you were lying in 2016 when you protested against Trump's election.

Remarkable that you can stereotype and criticize stereotyping in the same breath. I merely mentioned that you appear alt-right, meaning that you reason and say the same sort of things that alt-right folks do. It's not a good sign simply because you've identified as a centrist. It indicates deception.

Don't you not think it's incredibly hysterical and childish - and that free speech and a thick skin are better things to encourage in the next generation than a hair trigger sensitivity to offence?
— counterpunch

Who was recently whining about StreetlightX's manner of expression? — praxis

To you! But again, to subjectivists, beauty, or deception - is in the eye of the beholder. Personally, I see no value in deception - at least, not on a philosophy forum. I've been very forthright, and consistent in my views. Why would I go to this trouble to express things I don't believe. To deceive who? You? What would be the point?

Challenging what someone says, particularly when they say, they would gladly murder people for having the 'wrong' opinion, is not whining about someone's manner of expression. It's a genuine concern - not least because the genocides of the left have been far more frequent, and much, much larger in scale than any such atrocity by the right, and yet you continue to propound this obviously dangerous, runaway train of a dictatorial dogma.

In my view, your hysterical offence taking is a very small price to pay for freedom. I hope you're offended. I wish it. I'm glad of it, because every time a commie cries, freedom gets its wings!

I'm a philosopher — counterpunch

Absolutely, and I'm Wittgenstein

I don't recall any major outlets or Democratic politicians saying that votes were inaccurately counted in 2016. Do you have an example?

Hillary Clinton conceded within 24 hours.

Objections to the election were:
1. The claim that the Electoral College system is antiquated, undemocratic, and unfair. No one claimed it wasn't the law of the land, they said it should be changed, a reform that had bipartisan support and almost happened under Nixon.

2. Hillary Clinton's campaign was negatively affected by a hack of her party's email server and selective leaks of internal communications. This action was traced back to Russian intelligence. Foreign intervention in elections always happens, but the level of espionage was unprecedented. The complaint against the Trump campaign was that he broke norms by not condemning said foreign intervention, and indeed publicaly applauding it. Later, it was revealed that Trump's campaign manager and son met with a member of Russian intelligence after they had suggested in an email that they had "dirt on Clinton." This meeting was scheduled shortly before the hacked emails were released. The claim was that the campaign had known about the espionage and supported it.


To be honest, I think it's entirely possible that this meeting was set up solely to falsely implicate the Republican campaign and sow internal division. It was safer than letting them in on it and had the same effect on national unity; it's a damn genius move.

Notably, they tried the same thing in several European nations and had far less impact because all domestic parties condemned the leaks and foreign interference.

3. There were the perennial complaints about voter registration purged, gerrymandering, abuse of the justice system to disenfranchise minorities by giving them felony status for crimes such as non-violent drug use, for which White citizens rarely lose their right to vote (and bear arms).

4. James Coney's late announcement that some of the infamous "emails," might have been found days before the election. (The politicization of investigations was a long time coming, so I'm not sure how unprecedented it really was).

I hope you can see the difference between these complaints and claiming that you did in fact win the election you lost, "in a landslide," and that millions of fake votes were submitted. No one claimed that less people in key states voted for Donald Trump in 2016, and Hillary Clinton conceded, rather than claiming that Trump had to "prove there wasn't fraud to enter the White House." Clinton never called elections officials in swing states to personally lobby them to reverse the results. She never called state legislators and asked them to pick electors in line with her candidacy, rather than the results of the election. She never asked Congress to toss out election results certified by the states.

I found the Women's March protests distasteful and embarrassing, but it's hard to take GOP lawmakers and conservative pundits seriously when, after their loss, they've thrown a hissy fit an order of magnitude larger.

The investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election was unfortunately politicized by both sides, although I'd point out that the President began calling it a hoax before the investigation had even started, putting political expediency ahead of national security. This behavior is an issue that John Bolton and General Mattis, among others, hardly liberal partisans, say was perennial. The Democrats for their part undermined their credibility by jumping on half baked conspiracy theories and stretching the evidence available. By focusing on Russia, they distracted from the fact that multiple Cabinet members have come out on the record saying the President put personal gain above national security in myriad other, provable situations.

Black Lives Matter were just applauded uncritically by the left wing media for killing around 40 people, causing hundreds of millions of dollars of property damage, for looting shops and burning businesses. ... I'm a philosopher. I seek fairness and impartiality in my reason. — counterpunch

Fairness and impartiality are good. How about evidence? Can you post a link of any media outlet doing what you claim?

Again you’re not sounding centrist.

Absolutely, and I'm Wittgenstein — Maw

Are you really? I thought you were dead. Esoteric, incomprehensible, and dead.

A self proclaimed philosopher calling Wittgenstein incomprehensible

All those Cunts needed mowing down, including their ringleader — The Opposite

You're like, a bit dull aren't you? — StreetlightX

You're a traitor to this country. There's nothing left to say about you. Disgusting, and utterly pathetic. You can't die off quickly enough. — Xtrix

Can you explain that?
— Brett

I could, but I won't — Maw

What a shocker. Please drop dead. — Xtrix

I heard antifa fucked your girlfriend
— Maw — Xtrix

Which makes you even more of a cancer. — Xtrix

With the number of racists and fascists on the site atm, I'm worried you think I was being serious.
— Kenosha Kid — Baden

I'm getting tired of your selective sensitivity. It wasn't there when it was black people doing much less worse stuff than killing police officers. Don't pretend to be rational when you're stinking of bias. — Baden

Just nice to know you’re not fooling anyone with this act, probably not even your self. Your hypocrisy and pro-Trump bias is obvious. — Xtrix

Go rest your head Brett. — Xtrix

Drop the act of being objective or truly interested in any way. Just jump right to the complete rationalization of what happened yesterday. Spare yourself the mental gymnastics.
— Xtrix — Brett

Still don't understand the rationale of having a user on this site who repeatedly cites and parrots nefarious lies of radical rightwing publications, and then acts like he never believed in it to begin with when he's called out on it, or just ignores it entirely and moves on to the next fabrication to waste everyone's time with. — Maw

No you fuck, you don't get to make shit up and ask to be proven wrong. — StreetlightX

Really, don't worry your pretty head about it. If you really can't figure it out, I don't want your brain to fry from over-exertion. — StreetlightX

A point people like you also conveniently ignore in favor of licking the asses of your corporate masters. — Xtrix

No one needs to respond to your made-up bullshit with actual figures other than to point out the fact that you're making shit up. — StreetlightX

People like Brett really think this is character creation in D&D or something. 10 points to charisma! -4 to humility! Fucking larping rubbish. — StreetlightX

But that's neither here nor there, given that making shit up based on lazy preconceptions is a shit way to argue. — StreetlightX

It's not a matter of agreeing or disagreeing its the fact that you fabricated shit out of thin air and expect anyone to put in any effort to take that shit seriously. — StreetlightX

No, I'm not engaging with shit you pulled out of your arse other than to call it out for having been pulled out of your arse. — StreetlightX

No you fuck, you don't get to make shit up and ask to be proven wrong. — StreetlightX

Really, don't worry your pretty head about it. If you really can't figure it out, I don't want your brain to fry from over-exertion. — StreetlightX

A point people like you also conveniently ignore in favor of licking the asses of your corporate masters. — Xtrix

No one needs to respond to your made-up bullshit with actual figures other than to point out the fact that you're making shit up. — StreetlightX

People like Brett really think this is character creation in D&D or something. 10 points to charisma! -4 to humility! Fucking larping rubbish. — StreetlightX

But that's neither here nor there, given that making shit up based on lazy preconceptions is a shit way to argue. — StreetlightX

It's not a matter of agreeing or disagreeing its the fact that you fabricated shit out of thin air and expect anyone to put in any effort to take that shit seriously. — StreetlightX

No, I'm not engaging with shit you pulled out of your arse other than to call it out for having been pulled out of your arse. — StreetlightX

All those Cunts needed mowing down, including their ringleader — The Opposite

Worthy of the TPF Quote Cabinet.

:lol:

There are Republican members that are not treated as you’ve been treated, therefore you can’t conclude that it’s because of your political identity.

I don't know if you'd call John Oliver a major outlet. I'm in the UK. I'm not glued to Fox or MSNBC - watching in depth political analysis of American politics I can recall 4 years after the fact. But Oliver is generally left wing - and he did a video on voting machines before the 2016 election. I recall a lot of people claiming Trump is 'not my president' - and then there was all the collusion stuff on top of that. The left clearly cast doubt on the validity of the 2016 election. And you are doing still.

I'm not on the frontlines. I've made that clear. I'm from the UK. I've said I don't know if the election was fraudulent or not. But it does seem strange, for all the doubt cast in 2016, that now there's utter certainty on the left that the election was entirely valid. I wonder if they'd be saying that if they'd lost?

If it weren't for Covid - the US economy would still be booming, and Trump would have walked it. He isn't/wasn't such a bad President in many ways. Disaster for the environment - something I care a lot about, but in other ways, he was pretty good. He didn't start any wars, even while he called out China for devaluing their currency and dumping on European and American markets. He encouraged Europe to step up to its obligations on defence, while engaging with the likes of North Korea. He lived up to the small government, low tax principles of the right - and challenged political correctness by saying what he damn well pleased. I think history will remember him fondly.

Conversely, I fear that Biden is beholden to extreme left wing elements, that political correctness will become utterly oppressive, and that his $2 trillion Green New Deal will be a disaster; in that, I don't believe windmills and solar panels can ever provide enough energy to meet our needs. In 25 years they'll all be scrap, and by then it'll be too late to stop climate change. I'd rather a climate change denier - than a plan to apply the wrong technologies, and in doing so, silence all discussion of the subject.