9 ms·

It's more of a case that us upper-middle class liberal elites think we are shaming this segment of the population when we are calling them bigots and racists an

It's more of a case that us upper-middle class liberal elites think we are shaming this segment of the population when we are calling them bigots and racists and stupid and uninformed and homophobic and hicks and white trash, because those are horrible things that we don't want to be called. But a large part of the population don't share that sentiment, they're not shamed, they don't care that you're screaming "RACIST!" at the top of your lungs. And when you address their actual concerns that globalization and automation are killing their jobs, killing their communities, and killing their people with a shrug, with an "I'm so sorry, move to the cities, get an education!", they'll get angry. And political. And here we are.

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lactau 10y ago
I stopped caring about 'racism' long time ago. In the past race was about your color and physical features, now race is a 'big ethnicity'. Well, I can and do dislike different cultures and their cultural practices. I don't care about color. If you redefine race to something not connected to genetics, I am fine with being racist, perfectly fine. Because that's not the type of racists I hate. If I see a black guy, I won't have any prejudices. If I see a black or white or green or whatever guy, who says that only black people can use the word 'nigger', I would consider him racist (in its old sense) and stupid.
- dguaraglia 10y ago
  So basically, you are saying that you, and you alone, can judge people from different cultures and backgrounds on their practices because... hey, you are superior or something. Yeah, that sounds pretty racist.
  - verroq 10y ago
    I can damn well judge on FGM and other "primitive" practices as backward. Nothing is immune to criticism if the argument is valid. Granted there are many different types of cultural relativeism, but you decided by yourself to judge him as racist, I guess that means you are superior to him or something. Sounds like you're pretty racist.
  - lactau 10y ago
    No, I don't. I have no idea what part of my comment made you think so and what kind of mental jumps you've performed to come to this strange conclusion.
    - dguaraglia 10y ago
      If you can't understand why words might mean something completely different to anyone who's got a completely different context built around it, you are either ignorant or too arrogant to care either way.
  - ant6n 10y ago
    ...and being racist has become okay on hacker news.
    - dguaraglia 10y ago
      Not sure why you are being downvoted. I've seen a few comments in the last couple days that support your statement. My biggest fear about this election is the intolerant people in the country would get the wrong idea that being intolerant and bigoted is acceptable. Turns out, I might been right :/
      - reitanqild 10y ago
        Gp is being downvoted for more or less indiscriminately trying to tar everyone who voted for a certain candidate in democratic election. If you check the comment history of gp you'll see. Please note that I am not a fan of Trump, I just refuse to accept that 50% of Americans are dumb and evil.
- csallen 10y ago
  I've never understood this absurd n-word argument. I have a brother. Due to circumstances, I can call him a "stupid idiot" and he will know that I'm not serious and I respect him. However if a stranger calls him the same thing, he will take offense. Is that an unfair double standard? Similarly, the n-word is a derogatory racial slur. Black people are quite justified in taking offense when being called that by an non-black person. However, if called that by a black person, the listener can be reasonably sure that the speaker is not being racist, and also that no 3rd party listener would mistake it for that. It's just an obvious fact of language that context matters, and the speaker matters.
  - lactau 10y ago
    >I have a brother. Due to circumstances, I can call him a "stupid idiot" and he will know that I'm not serious and I respect him. However if a stranger calls him the same thing, he will take offense. Is that an unfair double standard? I wouldn't call my brother 'stupid idiot' in public (neither would I in private by the way). I don't care what you do in private. Though, that's another topic. When black people call other black people nigga, they don't mean it ironically or as an exaggeration. It is just a word which means black person and which is used only by black people. That's like calling someone 'bro', that's not like calling someone 'stupid idiot'.
- ternaryoperator 10y ago
  "Nigger" was coined by whites to denigrate blacks--just like "Boy" and a dozen other terms. Its use by blacks is ironic, its use by whites communicates hate. Willfully refusing to accept that a word intended to communicate white hate would strike blacks differently than it strikes white, well, yeah that is racist.
  - lactau 10y ago
    Yeah, you see. I am white. I didn't coin that word. I am not even American. There is basically nothing that connects me to black slavery except the color of my skin. My family roots go back to slaves too (like roots of >99% of people). I used to use this word ironically to demean pervasive hip hop pop culture. Thankfully, I am no longer in high school and don't have to talk to people who listen to songs about gangsters and fucking bitches.
    - 75j 10y ago
      > pervasive hip hop pop culture So you used the word "nigger" to describe your distaste for "hip hop culture"? Nice. You sound like a real class act.
tajen 10y ago
Would you like to know how a normal person gets to vote for Trump? I'm a male French, in France, and I intend to vote FN (extreme right). I have higer education, 10 years of experience in programming, including 5 in 3 different countries. I have social values, like companies should take care of the humans behind the employee, and we should give our maximum to include everyone who wants to be included. I turned my back on leftist movements because no matter how generous I was (e.g. thousands donated to charities, >1200hrs of volunteering, engaged in social causes, etc), leftists always find a way to depict me as a spoiled child with rich parents, and they dismiss any good work I've made as a result of luck. Oh and my 8-year old cousin was raped by an Arab teenager – I still don't know whether that's due to probability or whether he identifies to the Arabs-against-whites cause. It did change a lot for me. So now that I'm freed from liberal shamers, I've decided to vote depending on only one criteria. In my whole professional experience, promotions were given to women, to the point that it was unfair to me; In my whole life women have been bitter to me. I'm pretty satisfied that there are currently hundreds of laws in favour of women which offset any inequality they can claim; The only party which proposes to keep those existing laws and not adding new ones is FN, the extreme-right French party. All in all, what you need to gain back someone like me is love. Give me luck with finding a girlfriend, give me a fair treatment at work, recognize my social engagement and the positive parts of my values, stop assuming all my rationale is just raw racism or raw machism, stop assuming I've just been lucky with work, and you'll get me back among the centrist voters. But as long as it's not possible to expose my problems without hearing generalizations and shaming, I'll keep voting FN.
- madeofpalk 10y ago
  > Give me luck with finding a girlfriend I'm sorry, but what the fuck does that have to do with politics? What political party is going to promise you a girlfriend? For what it's worth, you're proving the populist-narrative that explains why Trump was elected: Trump rose to power by assuring those who felt that they once had 'power', who've lost it (to minorities or women or whoever), and deserve to have it back again.
  - tajen 10y ago
    > What political party is going to promise you a girlfriend? You've unframed and changed my speech so much that it looks stupid. Obviously, you conclude that this is stupid: You're right! I'm saying: If you don't want me to vote for Trump/FN, then instead of shaming me all the time "because he's from a rich familiy, therefore he doesn't deserve consideration, even if he works hard and donates a lot", try to intervene at the private/social level by having solidarity with people's situation. If you give those people some love, and fix their lives, they'll start voting differently.
ternaryoperator 10y ago
This is probably the best analysis of Trump's victory that I've read so far.
beaner 10y ago
I don't think you really have your finger on the pulse of most voters. I can tell you as someone in silicon valley who sort of vaguely supports trump, that I have been essentially not permitted to talk about it. What's the benefit to it? Why would I speak up and engage in a conversation? Any talk of Trump here isn't actually a real debate. It's everyone around you saying "Trump supporters are racists and bigots. They are disgusting." Nobody _actually_ wants to hear any arguments from the other side. So I sit with my mouth closed. It's better than losing my friends and having my coworkers ostracize me for my political views. Which maybe they would have the chance to change if they were willing to listen, but aren't. I know so many people like myself. I was surprised with the result of the election, but not surprised at the fact that there was a surprise like this. Places like SV don't know how many Trump supporters there are or even _why_ they really support him, because they've essentially put their hands over their eyes and their ears and spun in circles shouting "Trump is racist! You are racist!"
- henrikschroder 10y ago
  > Nobody _actually_ wants to hear any arguments from the other side. I would actually like to hear your case for Trump.
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deleted 10y ago

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lactau 10y ago

I stopped caring about 'racism' long time ago. In the past race was about your color and physical features, now race is a 'big ethnicity'. Well, I can and do dislike different cultures and their cultural practices. I don't care about color. If you redefine race to something not connected to genetics, I am fine with being racist, perfectly fine. Because that's not the type of racists I hate. If I see a black guy, I won't have any prejudices. If I see a black or white or green or whatever guy, who says that only black people can use the word 'nigger', I would consider him racist (in its old sense) and stupid.

dguaraglia 10y ago
So basically, you are saying that you, and you alone, can judge people from different cultures and backgrounds on their practices because... hey, you are superior or something. Yeah, that sounds pretty racist.
- verroq 10y ago
  I can damn well judge on FGM and other "primitive" practices as backward. Nothing is immune to criticism if the argument is valid. Granted there are many different types of cultural relativeism, but you decided by yourself to judge him as racist, I guess that means you are superior to him or something. Sounds like you're pretty racist.
- lactau 10y ago
  No, I don't. I have no idea what part of my comment made you think so and what kind of mental jumps you've performed to come to this strange conclusion.
  - dguaraglia 10y ago
    If you can't understand why words might mean something completely different to anyone who's got a completely different context built around it, you are either ignorant or too arrogant to care either way.
- ant6n 10y ago
  ...and being racist has become okay on hacker news.
  - dguaraglia 10y ago
    Not sure why you are being downvoted. I've seen a few comments in the last couple days that support your statement. My biggest fear about this election is the intolerant people in the country would get the wrong idea that being intolerant and bigoted is acceptable. Turns out, I might been right :/
    - reitanqild 10y ago
      Gp is being downvoted for more or less indiscriminately trying to tar everyone who voted for a certain candidate in democratic election. If you check the comment history of gp you'll see. Please note that I am not a fan of Trump, I just refuse to accept that 50% of Americans are dumb and evil.
csallen 10y ago
I've never understood this absurd n-word argument. I have a brother. Due to circumstances, I can call him a "stupid idiot" and he will know that I'm not serious and I respect him. However if a stranger calls him the same thing, he will take offense. Is that an unfair double standard? Similarly, the n-word is a derogatory racial slur. Black people are quite justified in taking offense when being called that by an non-black person. However, if called that by a black person, the listener can be reasonably sure that the speaker is not being racist, and also that no 3rd party listener would mistake it for that. It's just an obvious fact of language that context matters, and the speaker matters.
- lactau 10y ago
  >I have a brother. Due to circumstances, I can call him a "stupid idiot" and he will know that I'm not serious and I respect him. However if a stranger calls him the same thing, he will take offense. Is that an unfair double standard? I wouldn't call my brother 'stupid idiot' in public (neither would I in private by the way). I don't care what you do in private. Though, that's another topic. When black people call other black people nigga, they don't mean it ironically or as an exaggeration. It is just a word which means black person and which is used only by black people. That's like calling someone 'bro', that's not like calling someone 'stupid idiot'.
ternaryoperator 10y ago
"Nigger" was coined by whites to denigrate blacks--just like "Boy" and a dozen other terms. Its use by blacks is ironic, its use by whites communicates hate. Willfully refusing to accept that a word intended to communicate white hate would strike blacks differently than it strikes white, well, yeah that is racist.
- lactau 10y ago
  Yeah, you see. I am white. I didn't coin that word. I am not even American. There is basically nothing that connects me to black slavery except the color of my skin. My family roots go back to slaves too (like roots of >99% of people). I used to use this word ironically to demean pervasive hip hop pop culture. Thankfully, I am no longer in high school and don't have to talk to people who listen to songs about gangsters and fucking bitches.
  - 75j 10y ago
    > pervasive hip hop pop culture So you used the word "nigger" to describe your distaste for "hip hop culture"? Nice. You sound like a real class act.

tajen 10y ago

Would you like to know how a normal person gets to vote for Trump? I'm a male French, in France, and I intend to vote FN (extreme right). I have higer education, 10 years of experience in programming, including 5 in 3 different countries. I have social values, like companies should take care of the humans behind the employee, and we should give our maximum to include everyone who wants to be included. I turned my back on leftist movements because no matter how generous I was (e.g. thousands donated to charities, >1200hrs of volunteering, engaged in social causes, etc), leftists always find a way to depict me as a spoiled child with rich parents, and they dismiss any good work I've made as a result of luck. Oh and my 8-year old cousin was raped by an Arab teenager – I still don't know whether that's due to probability or whether he identifies to the Arabs-against-whites cause. It did change a lot for me. So now that I'm freed from liberal shamers, I've decided to vote depending on only one criteria. In my whole professional experience, promotions were given to women, to the point that it was unfair to me; In my whole life women have been bitter to me. I'm pretty satisfied that there are currently hundreds of laws in favour of women which offset any inequality they can claim; The only party which proposes to keep those existing laws and not adding new ones is FN, the extreme-right French party. All in all, what you need to gain back someone like me is love. Give me luck with finding a girlfriend, give me a fair treatment at work, recognize my social engagement and the positive parts of my values, stop assuming all my rationale is just raw racism or raw machism, stop assuming I've just been lucky with work, and you'll get me back among the centrist voters. But as long as it's not possible to expose my problems without hearing generalizations and shaming, I'll keep voting FN.

madeofpalk 10y ago
> Give me luck with finding a girlfriend I'm sorry, but what the fuck does that have to do with politics? What political party is going to promise you a girlfriend? For what it's worth, you're proving the populist-narrative that explains why Trump was elected: Trump rose to power by assuring those who felt that they once had 'power', who've lost it (to minorities or women or whoever), and deserve to have it back again.
- tajen 10y ago
  > What political party is going to promise you a girlfriend? You've unframed and changed my speech so much that it looks stupid. Obviously, you conclude that this is stupid: You're right! I'm saying: If you don't want me to vote for Trump/FN, then instead of shaming me all the time "because he's from a rich familiy, therefore he doesn't deserve consideration, even if he works hard and donates a lot", try to intervene at the private/social level by having solidarity with people's situation. If you give those people some love, and fix their lives, they'll start voting differently.

ternaryoperator 10y ago

This is probably the best analysis of Trump's victory that I've read so far.

beaner 10y ago

I don't think you really have your finger on the pulse of most voters. I can tell you as someone in silicon valley who sort of vaguely supports trump, that I have been essentially not permitted to talk about it. What's the benefit to it? Why would I speak up and engage in a conversation? Any talk of Trump here isn't actually a real debate. It's everyone around you saying "Trump supporters are racists and bigots. They are disgusting." Nobody _actually_ wants to hear any arguments from the other side. So I sit with my mouth closed. It's better than losing my friends and having my coworkers ostracize me for my political views. Which maybe they would have the chance to change if they were willing to listen, but aren't. I know so many people like myself. I was surprised with the result of the election, but not surprised at the fact that there was a surprise like this. Places like SV don't know how many Trump supporters there are or even _why_ they really support him, because they've essentially put their hands over their eyes and their ears and spun in circles shouting "Trump is racist! You are racist!"

henrikschroder 10y ago
> Nobody _actually_ wants to hear any arguments from the other side. I would actually like to hear your case for Trump.

deleted 10y ago

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