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> Honest question, care to elaborate? Many people may not think it is their place to speak. Some people may think they wouldn't be the best person to advocate.

> Honest question, care to elaborate? Many people may not think it is their place to speak. Some people may think they wouldn't be the best person to advocate. Others might think other people speak better about it. Other people might not be in a position to speak about it. In the UK we have many people who claim to talk for the "working class" that as one of my friends put it "looked like they have never done a day of heavy lifting in their life". I wouldn't speak on behalf of the working class, I do a white collar job. > From my perspective opting out means no change. And no change means structures stay the same. Therefore, they persist and are maintained with your (weak) approval. Does it? Many structures fall in under their own weight, many organisation reform from within. You are assuming the world and people within them around doesn't ever change. There is a whole bunch of assumptions you are making. Sometimes the best thing you can do is to do nothing. I used to cycle to work every day. That was more effective to get my coworkers cycling in than any amount of advocacy I may have done verbally. Just yourself being the change you want in the world is sometimes sufficient.

Spellman 7y ago
To your first point (don't feel equipped/proper place), that's definitely true. But that doesn't mean you can't support those who are better advocates instead. In your example, by ignoring the "working class" and their issues, you implicitly leave the existing (both good and bad) structures in place. To the second (things change anyways), structures and the world reform due to pressure from individuals within and without. So, yes, perhaps you can hope the system changes without your input (and honestly due to human limitations you really shouldn't have involvement in every issue) but my point is ignoring the issue isn't purely neutral. You are instead offloading the responsibility of change to others. So my point is to point out how being "passive" is actually an "active" choice with consequences. Interestingly, by cycling, many would argue you made an actual statement by your lifestyle that influenced others on a topic. This is why people use the term "everything is political." Your actions, as you noted, spoke louder than any verbal advocacy and changed people's lives. This leads to a similar statement, "be the change you wish to see." Because verbal advocacy is often easy and simple and valued much less persuasively than actions and lifestyle. Does that make sense to you? Or perhaps I'm misunderstanding your positions? These are great questions and good examples!
- uk_programmer 7y ago
  > To your first point (don't feel equipped/proper place), that's definitely true. But that doesn't mean you can't support those who are better advocates instead. And it doesn't mean I have to either. > In your example, by ignoring the "working class" and their issues, you implicitly leave the existing (both good and bad) structures in place. No I don't. I neither leave it in place or remove it. > To the second (things change anyways), structures and the world reform due to pressure from individuals within and without. So, yes, perhaps you can hope the system changes without your input (and honestly due to human limitations you really shouldn't have involvement in every issue) but my point is ignoring the issue isn't purely neutral. Sometimes things literally do stop existing when you don't pay attention to them e.g. I don't watch broadcast TV because I don't want to pay the TV license for something I barely watch anyway. I live my life as if it doesn't exist. So as far as I am concerned it doesn't exist unless I choose to pay attention to it. > You are instead offloading the responsibility of change to others. So my point is to point out how being "passive" is actually an "active" choice with consequences. Who made it my responsibility to change anything? Again there are a bunch of presumptions you have made in that statement and I don't think you even know you made them. > Interestingly, by cycling, many would argue you made an actual statement by your lifestyle that influenced others on a topic. There you go again. You are inserting assumptions in with the term "lifestyle". It wasn't a lifestyle. It was just cheaper and quicker to cycle. > This is why people use the term "everything is political." Your actions, as you noted, spoke louder than any verbal advocacy and changed people's lives. This leads to a similar statement, "be the change you wish to see." Because verbal advocacy is often easy and simple and valued much less persuasively than actions and lifestyle. No people use the term "everything is political" because they want to make everything political because it benefits them and their political agenda to make something that is apolitical, political.
  - Spellman 7y ago
    >> To your first point (don't feel equipped/proper place), that's definitely true. But that doesn't mean you can't support those who are better advocates instead. > And it doesn't mean I have to either. Correct. Never said otherwise. >> In your example, by ignoring the "working class" and their issues, you implicitly leave the existing (both good and bad) structures in place. > No I don't. I neither leave it in place or remove it. I think this encapsulates my point and where we disagree. Non-action means leaving what exists in existence and is an active choice. > Sometimes things literally do stop existing when you don't pay attention to them e.g. I don't watch broadcast TV because I don't want to pay the TV license for something I barely watch anyway. I live my life as if it doesn't exist. So as far as I am concerned it doesn't exist unless I choose to pay attention to it. Hm, to quote Momento, pretty sure the world still exists when I close my eyes. I get you're making a bit of a "if a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it" argument, but by choosing to ignore broadcast television it 1) doesn't mean it doesn't exist to others and 2) you are actually removing attention/power/money from broadcast television. So I'm not sure that's a particularly good counter example. >> You are instead offloading the responsibility of change to others. So my point is to point out how being "passive" is actually an "active" choice with consequences. > Who made it my responsibility to change anything? Again there are a bunch of presumptions you have made in that statement and I don't think you even know you made them. OK, perhaps not my best wording. Nobody says you have the responsibility, or perhaps a better term is obligation, to change anything. But you do have the inherent opportunity, and by opting out you surrender that opportunity to others to do as they see fit. My point isn't to say go out and do EVERYTHING. I'm trying to draw out the notion that inaction isn't completely void and has zero effect on the world around you. So, in effect, you have an opportunity cost of what things you act on and what things you ignore. I'm trying to draw awareness to those choices of things you ignore as still having an effect.
DFHippie 7y ago
> In the UK we have many people who claim to talk for the "working class" that as one of my friends put it "looked like they have never done a day of heavy lifting in their life". I wouldn't speak on behalf of the working class, I do a white collar job. Let's take this rhetorical pattern for a spin around the block. Here in the USA in the 19th century we had many people who claimed to speak for slaves who looked like they'd never been black a day in their lives. I wouldn't speak on behalf of slaves. I'm a free person. Here in the UK during the Potato Famine we had many people who claimed to speak for starving Irish people who looked like they'd never been starving or Irish for a day in their lives. I wouldn't speak on behalf of the starving Irish. I'm well-fed and English. Here in Wherever we have many people who claim to speak for sexually harassed women who look like they haven't been a woman for a day in their lives. I wouldn't speak on behalf of women. I'm a man. It doesn't seem all that robust.
- uk_programmer 7y ago
  People always take the most extreme examples. In the example I gave it wasn't nearly anywhere as extreme. Obviously it depends on the circumstances.
  - powowowow 7y ago
    Your example was also fatally flawed because it buys into the notion that white collar work is not working class. White collar laborers are labor; they are not capital. I make a couple hundred thousand dollars per year. I have far more in common with a nurse or a teacher or a store clerk than I do with somebody who was born with $10MM in a trust fund, and who makes as much as I do (by selling my full-time labor) just by buying and holding VTI.
    - uk_programmer 7y ago
      Blue collar work means physical labour typically. White collar means office work and traditionally office work has been done by the middle class and the elite. I will concede that In the last decade or those definition probably don't make any sense. So maybe I should have said "traditional working class" to make the distinction.

Spellman 7y ago

To your first point (don't feel equipped/proper place), that's definitely true. But that doesn't mean you can't support those who are better advocates instead. In your example, by ignoring the "working class" and their issues, you implicitly leave the existing (both good and bad) structures in place. To the second (things change anyways), structures and the world reform due to pressure from individuals within and without. So, yes, perhaps you can hope the system changes without your input (and honestly due to human limitations you really shouldn't have involvement in every issue) but my point is ignoring the issue isn't purely neutral. You are instead offloading the responsibility of change to others. So my point is to point out how being "passive" is actually an "active" choice with consequences. Interestingly, by cycling, many would argue you made an actual statement by your lifestyle that influenced others on a topic. This is why people use the term "everything is political." Your actions, as you noted, spoke louder than any verbal advocacy and changed people's lives. This leads to a similar statement, "be the change you wish to see." Because verbal advocacy is often easy and simple and valued much less persuasively than actions and lifestyle. Does that make sense to you? Or perhaps I'm misunderstanding your positions? These are great questions and good examples!

uk_programmer 7y ago
> To your first point (don't feel equipped/proper place), that's definitely true. But that doesn't mean you can't support those who are better advocates instead. And it doesn't mean I have to either. > In your example, by ignoring the "working class" and their issues, you implicitly leave the existing (both good and bad) structures in place. No I don't. I neither leave it in place or remove it. > To the second (things change anyways), structures and the world reform due to pressure from individuals within and without. So, yes, perhaps you can hope the system changes without your input (and honestly due to human limitations you really shouldn't have involvement in every issue) but my point is ignoring the issue isn't purely neutral. Sometimes things literally do stop existing when you don't pay attention to them e.g. I don't watch broadcast TV because I don't want to pay the TV license for something I barely watch anyway. I live my life as if it doesn't exist. So as far as I am concerned it doesn't exist unless I choose to pay attention to it. > You are instead offloading the responsibility of change to others. So my point is to point out how being "passive" is actually an "active" choice with consequences. Who made it my responsibility to change anything? Again there are a bunch of presumptions you have made in that statement and I don't think you even know you made them. > Interestingly, by cycling, many would argue you made an actual statement by your lifestyle that influenced others on a topic. There you go again. You are inserting assumptions in with the term "lifestyle". It wasn't a lifestyle. It was just cheaper and quicker to cycle. > This is why people use the term "everything is political." Your actions, as you noted, spoke louder than any verbal advocacy and changed people's lives. This leads to a similar statement, "be the change you wish to see." Because verbal advocacy is often easy and simple and valued much less persuasively than actions and lifestyle. No people use the term "everything is political" because they want to make everything political because it benefits them and their political agenda to make something that is apolitical, political.
- Spellman 7y ago
  >> To your first point (don't feel equipped/proper place), that's definitely true. But that doesn't mean you can't support those who are better advocates instead. > And it doesn't mean I have to either. Correct. Never said otherwise. >> In your example, by ignoring the "working class" and their issues, you implicitly leave the existing (both good and bad) structures in place. > No I don't. I neither leave it in place or remove it. I think this encapsulates my point and where we disagree. Non-action means leaving what exists in existence and is an active choice. > Sometimes things literally do stop existing when you don't pay attention to them e.g. I don't watch broadcast TV because I don't want to pay the TV license for something I barely watch anyway. I live my life as if it doesn't exist. So as far as I am concerned it doesn't exist unless I choose to pay attention to it. Hm, to quote Momento, pretty sure the world still exists when I close my eyes. I get you're making a bit of a "if a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it" argument, but by choosing to ignore broadcast television it 1) doesn't mean it doesn't exist to others and 2) you are actually removing attention/power/money from broadcast television. So I'm not sure that's a particularly good counter example. >> You are instead offloading the responsibility of change to others. So my point is to point out how being "passive" is actually an "active" choice with consequences. > Who made it my responsibility to change anything? Again there are a bunch of presumptions you have made in that statement and I don't think you even know you made them. OK, perhaps not my best wording. Nobody says you have the responsibility, or perhaps a better term is obligation, to change anything. But you do have the inherent opportunity, and by opting out you surrender that opportunity to others to do as they see fit. My point isn't to say go out and do EVERYTHING. I'm trying to draw out the notion that inaction isn't completely void and has zero effect on the world around you. So, in effect, you have an opportunity cost of what things you act on and what things you ignore. I'm trying to draw awareness to those choices of things you ignore as still having an effect.

DFHippie 7y ago

> In the UK we have many people who claim to talk for the "working class" that as one of my friends put it "looked like they have never done a day of heavy lifting in their life". I wouldn't speak on behalf of the working class, I do a white collar job. Let's take this rhetorical pattern for a spin around the block. Here in the USA in the 19th century we had many people who claimed to speak for slaves who looked like they'd never been black a day in their lives. I wouldn't speak on behalf of slaves. I'm a free person. Here in the UK during the Potato Famine we had many people who claimed to speak for starving Irish people who looked like they'd never been starving or Irish for a day in their lives. I wouldn't speak on behalf of the starving Irish. I'm well-fed and English. Here in Wherever we have many people who claim to speak for sexually harassed women who look like they haven't been a woman for a day in their lives. I wouldn't speak on behalf of women. I'm a man. It doesn't seem all that robust.

uk_programmer 7y ago
People always take the most extreme examples. In the example I gave it wasn't nearly anywhere as extreme. Obviously it depends on the circumstances.
- powowowow 7y ago
  Your example was also fatally flawed because it buys into the notion that white collar work is not working class. White collar laborers are labor; they are not capital. I make a couple hundred thousand dollars per year. I have far more in common with a nurse or a teacher or a store clerk than I do with somebody who was born with $10MM in a trust fund, and who makes as much as I do (by selling my full-time labor) just by buying and holding VTI.
  - uk_programmer 7y ago
    Blue collar work means physical labour typically. White collar means office work and traditionally office work has been done by the middle class and the elite. I will concede that In the last decade or those definition probably don't make any sense. So maybe I should have said "traditional working class" to make the distinction.