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No need to be polite. Extremist weirdos are behind essentially all important, groundbreaking, awesome things. A well mannered "normal" person would have never

No need to be polite. Extremist weirdos are behind essentially all important, groundbreaking, awesome things. A well mannered "normal" person would have never written the GPL and would have tolerated software that didn't match their politics. The fringe provides a mandatory function in steering the cultural ship. Early advocates for things like minimum wages or child labor laws were Molotov cocktail throwing anarchists. Early women suffragists were equally way out there - even by quite permissive modern standards. Subversives are necessary in order to subvert and often make the world a better place.

spiridon64 10y ago
Hugo Black or Edgar Gardner Murphy were molotov coctail throwing anarchists? Well, the more we know...
- Veen 10y ago
  The history of progressive politics is both older than the 20th Century and broader than the United States.
  - spiridon64 10y ago
    Henri Tolain, George Odger, Keir Hardie, Robert Owen, George Loveless, Giuseppe Mazzini, Benoît Malon or Lloyd Jones and basically most of the early labour right activists were respected members of the society. Even the anarchists of the time like Paul Brousse, Élisée Reclus, César De Paepe, Peter Kropotkin or Tito Zanardelli led relatively normal life, they weren't really "extremist weirdos" apart from having progressive ideas.
- kristopolous 10y ago
  You have to go back to the 1800s. The Haymarket riot, Thibodaux massacre, Homestead strike, Great railroad strike, Pullman strike, Colorado labor wars, West Virginia coal wars were about wages and labor. The era of nonviolent Ghandi-style protest hadn't begun so violent worker insurrection was a common element. The railroad strike, for instance, had over 100 workers killed and people feared a bloody worker-run revolution like the Paris Commune of 1871. The Civil War, which was largely about labor, was recent so the idea of a 2nd labor war wasn't implausible. A president was assassinated by a unionist steel worker. Wall Street and the LA Times, an anti-union paper at the time, was bombed. Clandestine bombs were sent to dozens of industrialists and anti labor congresspeople. The modern equivalent would be if Obama was killed, Fox News and 740 Park Avenue was bombed, and the Koch brothers had to dodge constant assassination plots by various "fight for $15" people. The 1900-era version of that actually happened. So the struggle for the minimum wage wasn't just the whim of a supreme court justice or the musings of armchair intellectuals, it was a bloody multi generational insurrection by syndicalists, unionists, anarchists, and marxists. Even leading up to the 1938 ruling you had the memorial day massacre, hilo massacre, martial law being declared during teamster strikes, and machine gun companies being called to fight with the national guard, all within 2 years of the Wagner Act.
semi-extrinsic 10y ago
"The reasonable man adapts to the world, while the unreasonable man tries to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man."
- bryanrasmussen 10y ago
  really, do reasonable people do absolutely nothing to adapt the world to themselves? The reasonable person isn't able to think well that is messed up and I would like it to change, or hmm, I think this could be improved a bit. The history of small innovations in things (as opposed to the more impressive big and rare innovations) would indicate that yes, reasonable people do try to adapt the world to themselves to some extent. Because to never attempt to adapt the world to oneself would mean not just that one was unreasonable, but maybe also that one was not even human.
  - kristianc 10y ago
    Judging by the experiments in both far-left and far-right governments in the 20th Century, we can be quite grateful that for the most part we have had leaders who are grateful to tinker at the edges.
- superflyguy 10y ago
  He's a reasonable man trying to change the world though. He's more a Mandela, King or Chomsky than a Trump or a Hitler. Sometimes people try to change the world to be a better place. It's unreasonable not to.
616c 10y ago
THANK YOU! I keep having to tell people I don't even enjoy my views, I radicalize to mediate all to the center. It unnerves people. Haha. I think a fundamental portion of civil society is owning the notion that you must strive for the rights of those you like and love least. One day you might be on their side of the railroad tracks and finally get their angst.

spiridon64 10y ago

Hugo Black or Edgar Gardner Murphy were molotov coctail throwing anarchists? Well, the more we know...

Veen 10y ago
The history of progressive politics is both older than the 20th Century and broader than the United States.
- spiridon64 10y ago
  Henri Tolain, George Odger, Keir Hardie, Robert Owen, George Loveless, Giuseppe Mazzini, Benoît Malon or Lloyd Jones and basically most of the early labour right activists were respected members of the society. Even the anarchists of the time like Paul Brousse, Élisée Reclus, César De Paepe, Peter Kropotkin or Tito Zanardelli led relatively normal life, they weren't really "extremist weirdos" apart from having progressive ideas.
kristopolous 10y ago
You have to go back to the 1800s. The Haymarket riot, Thibodaux massacre, Homestead strike, Great railroad strike, Pullman strike, Colorado labor wars, West Virginia coal wars were about wages and labor. The era of nonviolent Ghandi-style protest hadn't begun so violent worker insurrection was a common element. The railroad strike, for instance, had over 100 workers killed and people feared a bloody worker-run revolution like the Paris Commune of 1871. The Civil War, which was largely about labor, was recent so the idea of a 2nd labor war wasn't implausible. A president was assassinated by a unionist steel worker. Wall Street and the LA Times, an anti-union paper at the time, was bombed. Clandestine bombs were sent to dozens of industrialists and anti labor congresspeople. The modern equivalent would be if Obama was killed, Fox News and 740 Park Avenue was bombed, and the Koch brothers had to dodge constant assassination plots by various "fight for $15" people. The 1900-era version of that actually happened. So the struggle for the minimum wage wasn't just the whim of a supreme court justice or the musings of armchair intellectuals, it was a bloody multi generational insurrection by syndicalists, unionists, anarchists, and marxists. Even leading up to the 1938 ruling you had the memorial day massacre, hilo massacre, martial law being declared during teamster strikes, and machine gun companies being called to fight with the national guard, all within 2 years of the Wagner Act.

semi-extrinsic 10y ago

"The reasonable man adapts to the world, while the unreasonable man tries to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man."

bryanrasmussen 10y ago
really, do reasonable people do absolutely nothing to adapt the world to themselves? The reasonable person isn't able to think well that is messed up and I would like it to change, or hmm, I think this could be improved a bit. The history of small innovations in things (as opposed to the more impressive big and rare innovations) would indicate that yes, reasonable people do try to adapt the world to themselves to some extent. Because to never attempt to adapt the world to oneself would mean not just that one was unreasonable, but maybe also that one was not even human.
- kristianc 10y ago
  Judging by the experiments in both far-left and far-right governments in the 20th Century, we can be quite grateful that for the most part we have had leaders who are grateful to tinker at the edges.
superflyguy 10y ago
He's a reasonable man trying to change the world though. He's more a Mandela, King or Chomsky than a Trump or a Hitler. Sometimes people try to change the world to be a better place. It's unreasonable not to.

616c 10y ago

THANK YOU! I keep having to tell people I don't even enjoy my views, I radicalize to mediate all to the center. It unnerves people. Haha. I think a fundamental portion of civil society is owning the notion that you must strive for the rights of those you like and love least. One day you might be on their side of the railroad tracks and finally get their angst.