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> I think the biggest contributor is just that left-leaning people are more likely to be offended by right-leaning views. More likely to have empathy is anothe
by nascar_is_bad 8y ago
> I think the biggest contributor is just that left-leaning people are more likely to be offended by right-leaning views.
More likely to have empathy is another way to phrase that.
- orbifold 8y agoYou can be super emphatic an right wing, how do you think someone becomes a populist nationalist. Besides from a European perspective even someone like Obama or even more obviously Hillary (based on the amount of war mongering she has done alone) is center or ultra right.
- eropple 8y ago> You can be super emphatic an right wing, how do you think someone becomes a populist nationalist. At the bottom? Fear of the other; in the United States, fear of the other rooted particularly in racism. Because it's not "nationalism" here--a disease by itself, but a controllable one. It's white supremacism, given nicer clothes by calling it "white nationalism" for some godforsaken reason, peddled by leaders who want the bottom to vote their way. It's not like it's news. Lee Atwater pegged this whole disgraceful thing decades ago. To legitimize and get boots on the ground for economically regressive policies, the right wing of the United States leveraged this racially-motivated insecurity; now the racist tiger has eaten them and they are so very surprised that the racist tiger was racist all along. At the top? They're the ones doing the peddling. Some is surely true-believer racism. Some is also surely cynicism--because the bottom will eat it up and there's your leash to drag them where you want. It isn't exactly complex. (And, no, Obama and Clinton are not "ultra right" from a European perspective; that's the sort of mendacious both-sidesing I expect out of actually far right speakers, though. Obama and Clinton would be generically center- to center-right politicians on a Europe-calibrated axis. The modern Republican Party is more like Ukip.)
- hueving 8y agoNationalism and white supremacism are not the same thing at all. Equating them and needlessly injecting race into it is bog standard Russian divisive propaganda.
- eropple 8y agoIn America, they are. Both are historical and current disasters; the icing on the cake of American white supremacism fueling American nationalism is extra gross, though. I do want to compliment you for the rhetorical twirl of trying to co-opt reality with the Russian specter, though. It's bold. Projecting...but very bold.
- hueving 8y agoPlease try to rephrase that by actually saying something. I'm genuinely curious why you think that absurd equality is so obvious it requires no evidence.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- throwaway724b 8y agoThere's nothing wrong with nationalism, or wanting to live on the same plot of land with people of your own race. The word nation is rooted in birth, stock, tribe, race. And there's nothing inherently wrong with White nationalism either. Or Jewish nationalism. Or German nationalism. Or Japanese, Indian, or African nationalism. Each nation has spilled much blood for its territory, and each race has a right to defend its existence and secure a future for its children. Alas, the experiment of multiculturalism in the U.S. and Europe has been a complete disaster. It has led to increasingly divided, low trust, and hateful societies. There were some good intentions behind multiculturalism, but there were also destructive intentions. The multiculturalists, the globalists, the corporate elite, the international communists -- whatever you want to call them -- have very good reasons for wanting to destroy racial, national, cultural, familial identities. They want atomized individuals, rootless, without a history and without a real identity, because atomized individuals do not have strong enough bonds with a people to resist being subjugated and controlled. Multiculturalism is a religion which preaches "diversity is our strength", but practices the destruction of diversity, of nationality, of race, of family. Those at the top have an agenda to consolidate power over a homogenized people who are easy to rule. At the bottom are the "educated" postmodern zealots who believe everyone is equal, everything is relative, and nothing is real. It's bullshit and now people know it, too.
- dahdum 8y agoMy example would be prolifers, that requires pretty deep empathy for the unborn to override the natural empathy for the mothers.
- lordCarbonFiber 8y agoExcept prolifers don't care at all about the unborn; only about erroding the rights of women. This is why you don't see any of them campaigning to reduce miscarriages or enable better prenatal care.
- dahdum 8y ago41% of women are pro-life, to think they are only driven by the motivation to erode their own rights is far too simplistic. Broad characterization of the opposing side as evil, morally bankrupt, racist, sexist, fascist, communist, or other negative traits is why our politics are so toxic.
- lordCarbonFiber 8y ago[citation needed] Instead of "but both sides" and a false appeal for civility, you could read some accounts of people involved with the movement. http://www.patheos.com/blogs/lovejoyfeminism/2012/10/how-i-lost-faith-in-the-pro-life-movement.html http://www.patheos.com/blogs/lovejoyfeminism/2012/10/how-i-l...
- dahdum 8y agoIt's not a false appeal, I genuinely believe the hasty generalization of the opposing side cheapens the argument for prochoice. That article was a good personal account which could definitely change minds.
- s73v3r_ 8y ago"Besides from a European perspective even someone like Obama or even more obviously Hillary (based on the amount of war mongering she has done alone) is center or ultra right." All things are relative. Given that description of Obama or Clinton, what would you classify those who ran as Republicans in the last election?
- _emacsomancer_ 8y agoBy some measures, Clinton campaigned (slightly) to the right of Trump in the run-up to the general election: https://www.politicalcompass.org/uselection2016 https://www.politicalcompass.org/uselection2016 For the primaries, using similar measures at least, the Republicans all more or less clumped together to the right of Clinton.
- s73v3r_ 8y agoThat article makes claims that are just not true. "Trump supported a decent minimum wage from the start, wants free education in state universities, has supported universal health care, consistently opposed the Transpacific Partnership Agreement and wants more bank regulation." He very clearly is not in favor of free education, he is very clearly not in favor of raising the minimum wage, he very clearly is not in favor of universal health care, and very clearly is not in favor of more bank regulation. So I find the claims that Clinton was more to the right of Trump quite dubious.
- _emacsomancer_ 8y agoI think Trump has taken almost every conceivable position on every issue, so the claims in the article were presumably true for some particular moment of time.
- moduspol 8y ago“More capable of selective application of empathy” is how I’d describe it usually, but that’s neither here nor there.
- hueving 8y agoEveryone applies "selective empathy". People on the left in the US care very little about employees of coal miners, oil companies, etc because of larger environmental concerns. In every case, there is some "more important cause" that someone prioritizes that makes it look like they don't have empathy.
- nascar_is_bad 8y agoIs that why Obama created a job retraining program for them? Because he cares very little for them? Or is it actually because he cares for them MORE than conservatives who want to lead them even further down the path of dependence on a dying industry.
- geofft 8y agoThis is the same sort of confusion that leads to ideas like "Blue Lives Matter." A life isn't inherently blue. A person isn't inherently a coal miner. I think you will find a lot of leftists caring deeply about the lives of people who are currently working in coal mines or in a police force, and concluding that the best answer for them is found in different employment. It is no lack of empathy to the life of a coal miner to say that coal should stop being mined any more than it is a lack of empathy to the life of a soldier to say that a war should end.
- hueving 8y agoIt's a lack of empathy when they vote to end coal miner jobs without having job replacement though (which is exactly what Hillary promised for example). It's the same with people on the right with this immigration issue. They care about immigrants, but they care about rigid immigration policies to prevent "free-riders" even more. That's why you will find very few right-leaning people against legal immigrants as opposed to the many against illegal immigrants.
- hueving 8y agoIf you're looking to troll, "more likely to be offended by rationality" is another way to phrase it.
- dahdum 8y agoThe data backs you up on that, with Democrats ranking empathy much higher when making arguments. That fact almost proves the point OP was making though, when your argument is emotion based offense at hostile views comes naturally.
- nascar_is_bad 8y agoOf course it does. That's why I just rephrased it for him in a way that isn't right-wing propaganda to maybe open his eyes. "liberals are easily offended" is just right wing spin of the clear fact that the left have always cared more about real people.
- s73v3r_ 8y agoBut now you're trying to make it seem like conservatives tend to more apply logic in their arguments. Considering a lot of their arguments come from religion, I can't agree with that.
- saas_co_de 8y agoBut attacking people on the basis of their faith (which is not a protected status at all) is a perfectly logical and reasonable way to engage in public discourse.
- slededit 8y agoReligion is one of the earliest protected classes. So early its enshrined directly in the constitution.
- s73v3r_ 8y agoI'm not attacking anyone. I'm calling out that faith based arguments are not made from a place of logic and reason.
- dahdum 8y agoFaith is like a blueprint, codifying rules in an effort to maintain a stable society. Some of these rules, IMHO, are absurd, but many you'd come to the same conclusion without faith as with it.
- Mikhail_Edoshin 8y agoAh, that famous empathy that only left-wing people seem to have :)
- nascar_is_bad 8y agohttps://stackoverflow.com/users/478521/mikhail-edoshin https://stackoverflow.com/users/478521/mikhail-edoshin From Russia eh?
- dang 8y agoAll: attacking another user based on their nationality is totally not ok here, and we ban accounts that do it. We've banned this one. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- Mikhail_Edoshin 8y agoYep.
- nascar_is_bad 8y agoAll I need to know :) thanks. Execute the gays amirite?
- dang 8y agoWe've banned this account for egregiously violating the site guidelines. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- Mikhail_Edoshin 8y agoYou're not much interested in real people, are you? :)
- dang 8y agoCould you please not do flamewars on HN? That commenter was way out of line to attack you based on nationality, and we've banned their account for trolling. But you also posted provocations in this thread, and we need people not to do that. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- AnimalMuppet 8y agoYour username is kind of interesting in light of your comment here. It kind of argues against your point...
- 6cd6beb 8y ago>Be civil. Don't say things you wouldn't say face-to-face. Don't be snarky. Comments should get more civil and substantive, not less, as a topic gets more divisive. I'm sure you meant to phrase it differently but in its current form, your comment comes across as more snarky than substantive or civil.
- s73v3r_ 8y agoThe one they were responding to wasn't that civil itself.