3 ms·
Spend more time with real people and you'll see why it's worthwhile to have relationships with persons who have differing political or social philosophies. Vari
by cookiecaper 11y ago
Spend more time with real people and you'll see why it's worthwhile to have relationships with persons who have differing political or social philosophies. Variety in personal judgment and alternative worldviews are really beneficial to be able to access; you can learn a lot that way, and your own perspectives and arguments will be improved.
You don't have to agree, but people are still worth something and still have valuable information no matter how vehemently you disagree with them.
Also note that the vehemence of disagreement is usually heavily exaggerated, for propaganda purposes. Very few people, in the global sense, are sufficiently different from each other that they're actually totally incapable of getting along. If we make a basic effort to keep an open mind, I think we could fix a lot of our contemporary issues.
A total breakdown in communication and dismissal of people on the other side is not a win. It's a massive loss, one that means that the parent society is on thin ice. We need to maintain basic levels of respect for each other.
- m_fayer 11y agoI happen to know a few people who have grown up stewing in a sometimes-violent sometimes-cold conflict. They are openly and honestly essentialist racists, and if given the red genocide button would likely push it, or so they say. They are on the borderline about compatriots who question them, making dark jokes about traitors. I've never truly tried to engage with them, hampered by internal disquiet that kept me mostly quiet. I would say the value of knowing them lies in the knowledge of where complete breakdown of the peace leads. But I am disturbed by the way I see them, as lost causes and human writeoffs.
- clock_tower 11y agoI upvoted both you and cookiecaper; I agree with you both.