5 ms·

Yes, liberals in America are all smug and holier-than-thou, unlike their ideological opponents, who really listen to what you have to say and never judge you ah

by vacri 10y ago

Yes, liberals in America are all smug and holier-than-thou, unlike their ideological opponents, who really listen to what you have to say and never judge you ahead of time. And, of course, they never pass comment on how a person looks.

oldmanjay 10y ago
You don't get to claim the moral high ground and use the tactics of the opposition at the same time.
- M_Grey 10y ago
  The only claim of a moral highground here is implicit in that shitpost of an article.
  - venomsnake 10y ago
    The article gave advanced warning of 6 months. That nobody heeded ...
    - jessaustin 10y ago
      In fairness, there were lots of advance warnings of why Trump would lose as well. Someone had to be right...
  - andars 10y ago
    Yes, the article isn't very good. In essence, it reverses the direction of "holier than thou". However, it raises an excellent point. The United States is not going to get anywhere if half the country looks down on the other half as a bunch of plebs, and in response the "plebs" disdain the elites. (I understand that this is a gross simplification, but I have seen this attitude often enough that it is significant). For me, the article was about the need for mutual respect.
    - M_Grey 10y ago
      There will be no mutual respect here; the schism that began with Reagan, and widened with W. just ripped wide open today. The only thing coming out of this is going to be deepening resentment, and incredible economic hardship. Ironically, the people who are going to take it most directly in the tuckus, are the people who voted Trump.
      - majormajor 10y ago
        If large parts of your community are already on unemployment, disability, and/or heroin, are you focused on the downside risk or looking for anyone willing to even pretend to have a new plan?
      - andars 10y ago
        I didn't say this election will do anything positive. I just said that we should strive for mutual respect.
    - ant6n 10y ago
      I think the problem is that the "plebs" don't just hate the elites, they also hate minorities and people who don't have their religion; and they have big issues with patriarchy and sexism. That's why the minorities and the "elites" don't respect them. In the end "the left" doesn't care if they are poor or uneducated and whatnot, they'd still embrace them. But refusing to accept basic democratic ideals of equality and freedom of religion and separation of church and state is always going to be a problem.
      - reitanqild 10y ago
        > the "plebs" don't just hate the elites, they also hate minorities and people who don't have their religion Can you stop telling who other people hate? At the moment you are the one who spreads hate.
  - oldmanjay 10y ago
    I replied to a post, not to the article.
- majormajor 10y ago
  It's even more pragmatic than that: regardless of how Republicans act, if your strategy is a losing one you might want to think twice about it. Clinton largely campaigned on shame and fear, and the midwest felt too left behind to care about that.
- vacri 10y ago
  Where did I claim the moral high ground? I was just pointing out that the article is one-eyed. I don't even live in America, so it's not like I consider myself an American liberal. In fact, in my country, the Liberal Party are the conservatives, and being centre-left, I wouldn't identify with them either.
grundymonday 10y ago
Indeed, the ideological opponents of liberals in America also have a smugness problem, but that may be because they themselves are also liberals. "[T]he contemporary debate within modern political systems are almost exclusively between conservative liberals, liberal liberals, and radical liberals. There is little place in such political systems for the criticism of the system itself, that is, for putting liberalism in question" (Alasdair MacIntyre, Whose Justice? Which Rationality?, 394). Smugness is a problem for liberal liberals and conservative liberals alike. Perhaps smugness is a natural temptation or outgrowth of liberalism itself.
norea-armozel 10y ago
As a serious question. Do you think civil protections for LGBT people, gay marriage, and the like needs debate and/or negotiation? Because what makes some of us on the left come off smug or haughty is the fact that conservatives refuse to accept that we deserve those protections. Worse still, some of them think that LGBT people should be put into some kind of hospital to be "cured" because "JESUS!" I'm not trying to lash out but it's a real complaint I have as someone who was formerly an evangelical Christian. It's a thread of thought I see that conservatives get looped into that their faith should override their sense of good law. I'm not asking for the Christian churches out there to let me join their congregations. I'm asking for them to respect my civil rights as I respect theirs. It's a reciprocal arrangement with both benefit. It's mutualism at it's best. Why is this so hard for them? I just want a good answer beyond their emotive, knee jerk reactions.
- judahmeek 10y ago
  If you were a former evangelical Christian, then you should understand that according to most modern evangelical strains of Christianity (Southwestern Baptist anyways), treating LGBT people like human beings basically means rejecting the Christian faith. Sodom & Gorromah (& all that Old Testament jazz) & Romans 1:24 - 27 & 1 Corinthians 6:9 - 20 (& etc) were all impressed upon me from a very young age. Oh, and religion & faith is largely based on emotion, so asking for something other than an emotive response from an Evangelical Christian is... misguided. (As far as I'm concerned, the Evangelical & Pentecostal strains of Christianity have evolved to be largely based on inspiring emotion particularly in their services, from the pop style worship music to the street preacher style sermons).
  - norea-armozel 10y ago
    There's plenty of errors in their theology on this but I'll say that the fact Jesus in his own teachings and that of his followers thereafter saw a distinction between matters of the spiritual and the temporal means they're in error. The laws of the land protecting individuals are not tests of faith except where such laws force to you to believe or espouse otherwise. Marriage in this regard is civil marriage and not spiritual marriage (marriage affirmed by God or that of church elders). The fact they conflate the civil (temporal) with the spiritual amuses me to no end because it shows the mental gymnastics they'll go through to assert the Kingdom is a literal domain on Earth despite the canon and non-canon sources for what Jesus said on this (i.e. the Kingdom isn't the temporal/material). So, I think there will come a reckoning in the church if/when followers start to read their own Bibles and not listen to their pastors (the spirit of discernment is not exclusive to church elders). I just wish to live to see that day as much amusement will be had when it all falls apart.

by vacri 10y ago

oldmanjay 10y ago

You don't get to claim the moral high ground and use the tactics of the opposition at the same time.

M_Grey 10y ago
The only claim of a moral highground here is implicit in that shitpost of an article.
- venomsnake 10y ago
  The article gave advanced warning of 6 months. That nobody heeded ...
  - jessaustin 10y ago
    In fairness, there were lots of advance warnings of why Trump would lose as well. Someone had to be right...
- andars 10y ago
  Yes, the article isn't very good. In essence, it reverses the direction of "holier than thou". However, it raises an excellent point. The United States is not going to get anywhere if half the country looks down on the other half as a bunch of plebs, and in response the "plebs" disdain the elites. (I understand that this is a gross simplification, but I have seen this attitude often enough that it is significant). For me, the article was about the need for mutual respect.
  - M_Grey 10y ago
    There will be no mutual respect here; the schism that began with Reagan, and widened with W. just ripped wide open today. The only thing coming out of this is going to be deepening resentment, and incredible economic hardship. Ironically, the people who are going to take it most directly in the tuckus, are the people who voted Trump.
    - majormajor 10y ago
      If large parts of your community are already on unemployment, disability, and/or heroin, are you focused on the downside risk or looking for anyone willing to even pretend to have a new plan?
    - andars 10y ago
      I didn't say this election will do anything positive. I just said that we should strive for mutual respect.
  - ant6n 10y ago
    I think the problem is that the "plebs" don't just hate the elites, they also hate minorities and people who don't have their religion; and they have big issues with patriarchy and sexism. That's why the minorities and the "elites" don't respect them. In the end "the left" doesn't care if they are poor or uneducated and whatnot, they'd still embrace them. But refusing to accept basic democratic ideals of equality and freedom of religion and separation of church and state is always going to be a problem.
    - reitanqild 10y ago
      > the "plebs" don't just hate the elites, they also hate minorities and people who don't have their religion Can you stop telling who other people hate? At the moment you are the one who spreads hate.
- oldmanjay 10y ago
  I replied to a post, not to the article.
majormajor 10y ago
It's even more pragmatic than that: regardless of how Republicans act, if your strategy is a losing one you might want to think twice about it. Clinton largely campaigned on shame and fear, and the midwest felt too left behind to care about that.
vacri 10y ago
Where did I claim the moral high ground? I was just pointing out that the article is one-eyed. I don't even live in America, so it's not like I consider myself an American liberal. In fact, in my country, the Liberal Party are the conservatives, and being centre-left, I wouldn't identify with them either.

grundymonday 10y ago

Indeed, the ideological opponents of liberals in America also have a smugness problem, but that may be because they themselves are also liberals. "[T]he contemporary debate within modern political systems are almost exclusively between conservative liberals, liberal liberals, and radical liberals. There is little place in such political systems for the criticism of the system itself, that is, for putting liberalism in question" (Alasdair MacIntyre, Whose Justice? Which Rationality?, 394). Smugness is a problem for liberal liberals and conservative liberals alike. Perhaps smugness is a natural temptation or outgrowth of liberalism itself.

norea-armozel 10y ago

As a serious question. Do you think civil protections for LGBT people, gay marriage, and the like needs debate and/or negotiation? Because what makes some of us on the left come off smug or haughty is the fact that conservatives refuse to accept that we deserve those protections. Worse still, some of them think that LGBT people should be put into some kind of hospital to be "cured" because "JESUS!" I'm not trying to lash out but it's a real complaint I have as someone who was formerly an evangelical Christian. It's a thread of thought I see that conservatives get looped into that their faith should override their sense of good law. I'm not asking for the Christian churches out there to let me join their congregations. I'm asking for them to respect my civil rights as I respect theirs. It's a reciprocal arrangement with both benefit. It's mutualism at it's best. Why is this so hard for them? I just want a good answer beyond their emotive, knee jerk reactions.

judahmeek 10y ago
If you were a former evangelical Christian, then you should understand that according to most modern evangelical strains of Christianity (Southwestern Baptist anyways), treating LGBT people like human beings basically means rejecting the Christian faith. Sodom & Gorromah (& all that Old Testament jazz) & Romans 1:24 - 27 & 1 Corinthians 6:9 - 20 (& etc) were all impressed upon me from a very young age. Oh, and religion & faith is largely based on emotion, so asking for something other than an emotive response from an Evangelical Christian is... misguided. (As far as I'm concerned, the Evangelical & Pentecostal strains of Christianity have evolved to be largely based on inspiring emotion particularly in their services, from the pop style worship music to the street preacher style sermons).
- norea-armozel 10y ago
  There's plenty of errors in their theology on this but I'll say that the fact Jesus in his own teachings and that of his followers thereafter saw a distinction between matters of the spiritual and the temporal means they're in error. The laws of the land protecting individuals are not tests of faith except where such laws force to you to believe or espouse otherwise. Marriage in this regard is civil marriage and not spiritual marriage (marriage affirmed by God or that of church elders). The fact they conflate the civil (temporal) with the spiritual amuses me to no end because it shows the mental gymnastics they'll go through to assert the Kingdom is a literal domain on Earth despite the canon and non-canon sources for what Jesus said on this (i.e. the Kingdom isn't the temporal/material). So, I think there will come a reckoning in the church if/when followers start to read their own Bibles and not listen to their pastors (the spirit of discernment is not exclusive to church elders). I just wish to live to see that day as much amusement will be had when it all falls apart.