4 ms·

Talk to people from the other party. But not about politics.

by im3w1l 6y ago

matwood 6y ago
It's hard because so much has become politicized. The dominant item in many people's lives right now is the coronavirus either directly or indirectly, which unfortunately has also become political.
zo1 6y ago
I agree, we are all human after all. But that's becoming more and more difficult. The divide between the left and the right is no longer revolving around ideology, politics, regulation, laws, etc. It's now become a matter of "life and death", "racism" and "violence" for a large chunk of the Left (and to some extent more and more from the Right too if I'm being honest). The slogans that are emerging are being sponged by the individuals on the ground, and that is starting to make reasonable non-political discussion next to impossible. I.e. You can no longer mention in-passing that you support certain parties/politicians/political-beliefs.
- matwood 6y ago
  What I see anecdotally is that the left has become more inclusive, and the right as become more extreme. People have fled the right either to no party or to the center left. That leaves behind the extremes on the right which have become emboldened by Trump and their shrinking bubble. It's like evaporating water out of a glass of salt water. The water left behind becomes more and more salty. If you have ever had a salt water aquarium you'll know that you don't add salt water back to the tank, but fresh water in order to balance out the evaporation. You mention racism. The same people may have been racist before, but now they are ok yelling it out loud because the only people left in their bubble think the same way (Trump may or may not be racist, but he certainly stokes this fire). And this is why it's difficult, because if someone tells me they do not want black people living in their neighborhood, I'm going to tell them that's a racist statement.
  - throwaway894345 6y ago
    > What I see anecdotally is that the left has become more inclusive, and the right as become more extreme. I think there are some on the right who have become more extreme, but I interpret this as a reflex against a rapidly growing extreme leftism (apologies to anyone offended by this term; I don’t mean it as a value judgment as much as a literalism). I’m a liberal, personally, and I certainly feel like the left is moving quickly leftward. I feel this way because there are a lot of people who call moderate liberals “Nazis” and “white supremacists” and so on. To give another example, 10 years ago I couldn’t imagine the media uncritically accepting the BLM racial narrative without asking about whether we should consider violent crime rates when we talk about disproportions in police killings (which isn’t to say that the BLM folks wouldn’t have a good, enlightening response). Maybe I’m wrong, but it certainly feels like a significant leftward shift. It also feels like the extreme left are less tolerant than most of the rest of the spectrum, and they even kind of own up to it by arguing that their intolerance is necessary to prevent other intolerance (Paradox of Tolerance); however, in many cases, their intolerance is marshaled against people who can’t credibly be considered “intolerant”—the Hispanic utility worker who was fired after a left-wing Twitter mob accused him of white supremacy for accidentally making an “ok sign” with his hand while cracking his knuckles, or the professor who was suspended for saying a Mandarin phrase (even prefacing that it was a mandarin phrase) that sounded vaguely like the N word, or the journalist who was almost fired for interviewing a black man, or the data scientist who was fired for quoting a prominent black researcher’s research on the efficacy of nonviolent protests, or etc etc etc. These people don’t seem intolerant to me, and yet they are met with intolerance. My more controversial opinion is that this behavior drives some people to the far right. While I think Trump provokes these leftists and thus creates more far-right-wingers, I think this effect predates him and indeed his very viability as a political candidate couldn’t have happened without the earlier rise of extreme leftism. I could be wrong here, but this explanation jives with much of what I see. Note that this doesn’t absolve anyone of moving to the far right, but it’s important to try to understand the dynamics at play. Notably, if I’m right about the dynamics, the best way to combat the far right is by moderating the left. > You mention racism. The same people may have been racist before, but now they are ok yelling it out loud because the only people left in their bubble think the same way (Trump may or may not be racist, but he certainly stokes this fire). And this is why it's difficult, because if someone tells me they do not want black people living in their neighborhood, I'm going to tell them that's a racist statement. I don’t know many people who would object to that definition of racism. I think people have a problem with more abstract definitions of racism which would encompass our utility worker, journalist, data scientist, and professor examples above and not, for example, people on the left who are opposed to mixed-race relationships and cultural exchange.
bogwog 6y ago
Make politics boring again.
- api 6y ago
  Politics and government are definitely in the class of things we want to be boring. Interesting government and interesting politics were a major cause of death in the first half of the 20th century.
  - krapp 6y ago
    Unfortunately, ever since the debate between JFK and Richard Nixon, we increasingly demand that politics be spectacle, and that the president, specifically, be demagogue in chief. We don't believe politics can be useful, so it should at least be entertaining. I'd rather being president were more like being prime minister, just a bureaucratic position without much prestige, necessary but no one is calling you "leader of the free world." But Americans are too entranced with the Great Man view of history (and their own importance) to allow that.
    - luckylion 6y ago
      > I'd rather being president were more like being prime minister, just a bureaucratic position without much prestige, necessary but no one is calling you "leader of the free world." I agree, but I don't think it's a possibility. An administration that would essentially just be boring and bureaucratic wouldn't "change" the country, but essentially run it on the status quo. Lots of people aren't happy with the status quo for various reasons, they want to change it. That in turn makes other people want to stop them from changing it. If you didn't have two groups that split across some major fault lines, you didn't have "exciting" politics. When you have these divided groups, how could you have boring politics?
      - krapp 6y ago
        Except politics isn't "exciting" due to honest debates between honorable adversaries who recognize each others' legitimacy and respect the integrity of the political system, it's "exciting" because of scandal, propaganda, outrage and violence. Driven by conspiracy theories about satanic pedophiles and new world order death camps. We've descended from Lincoln-Douglas to the juvenile circus between Biden and Trump. And the main reason for this, in my opinion, is having "change" be embodied in a single demagogue figure elected to force their party's agenda through at any cost, rather than having "change' understood to be an effect of long-term and widespread engagement with the system at multiple levels. Change shouldn't be the president's job anyway, that's what the legislature is for, and people wanting change should engage more with local and state politics. The executive keeps the system running, which implicitly means keeping the status quo.
BurningFrog 6y ago
They don't even live in the same area.

Talk to people from the other party. But not about politics.

by im3w1l 6y ago

Talk to people from the other party. But not about politics.

It's hard because so much has become politicized. The dominant item in many people's lives right now is the coronavirus either directly or indirectly, which unfortunately has also become political.

zo1 6y ago

I agree, we are all human after all. But that's becoming more and more difficult. The divide between the left and the right is no longer revolving around ideology, politics, regulation, laws, etc. It's now become a matter of "life and death", "racism" and "violence" for a large chunk of the Left (and to some extent more and more from the Right too if I'm being honest). The slogans that are emerging are being sponged by the individuals on the ground, and that is starting to make reasonable non-political discussion next to impossible. I.e. You can no longer mention in-passing that you support certain parties/politicians/political-beliefs.

matwood 6y ago
What I see anecdotally is that the left has become more inclusive, and the right as become more extreme. People have fled the right either to no party or to the center left. That leaves behind the extremes on the right which have become emboldened by Trump and their shrinking bubble. It's like evaporating water out of a glass of salt water. The water left behind becomes more and more salty. If you have ever had a salt water aquarium you'll know that you don't add salt water back to the tank, but fresh water in order to balance out the evaporation. You mention racism. The same people may have been racist before, but now they are ok yelling it out loud because the only people left in their bubble think the same way (Trump may or may not be racist, but he certainly stokes this fire). And this is why it's difficult, because if someone tells me they do not want black people living in their neighborhood, I'm going to tell them that's a racist statement.
- throwaway894345 6y ago
  > What I see anecdotally is that the left has become more inclusive, and the right as become more extreme. I think there are some on the right who have become more extreme, but I interpret this as a reflex against a rapidly growing extreme leftism (apologies to anyone offended by this term; I don’t mean it as a value judgment as much as a literalism). I’m a liberal, personally, and I certainly feel like the left is moving quickly leftward. I feel this way because there are a lot of people who call moderate liberals “Nazis” and “white supremacists” and so on. To give another example, 10 years ago I couldn’t imagine the media uncritically accepting the BLM racial narrative without asking about whether we should consider violent crime rates when we talk about disproportions in police killings (which isn’t to say that the BLM folks wouldn’t have a good, enlightening response). Maybe I’m wrong, but it certainly feels like a significant leftward shift. It also feels like the extreme left are less tolerant than most of the rest of the spectrum, and they even kind of own up to it by arguing that their intolerance is necessary to prevent other intolerance (Paradox of Tolerance); however, in many cases, their intolerance is marshaled against people who can’t credibly be considered “intolerant”—the Hispanic utility worker who was fired after a left-wing Twitter mob accused him of white supremacy for accidentally making an “ok sign” with his hand while cracking his knuckles, or the professor who was suspended for saying a Mandarin phrase (even prefacing that it was a mandarin phrase) that sounded vaguely like the N word, or the journalist who was almost fired for interviewing a black man, or the data scientist who was fired for quoting a prominent black researcher’s research on the efficacy of nonviolent protests, or etc etc etc. These people don’t seem intolerant to me, and yet they are met with intolerance. My more controversial opinion is that this behavior drives some people to the far right. While I think Trump provokes these leftists and thus creates more far-right-wingers, I think this effect predates him and indeed his very viability as a political candidate couldn’t have happened without the earlier rise of extreme leftism. I could be wrong here, but this explanation jives with much of what I see. Note that this doesn’t absolve anyone of moving to the far right, but it’s important to try to understand the dynamics at play. Notably, if I’m right about the dynamics, the best way to combat the far right is by moderating the left. > You mention racism. The same people may have been racist before, but now they are ok yelling it out loud because the only people left in their bubble think the same way (Trump may or may not be racist, but he certainly stokes this fire). And this is why it's difficult, because if someone tells me they do not want black people living in their neighborhood, I'm going to tell them that's a racist statement. I don’t know many people who would object to that definition of racism. I think people have a problem with more abstract definitions of racism which would encompass our utility worker, journalist, data scientist, and professor examples above and not, for example, people on the left who are opposed to mixed-race relationships and cultural exchange.

bogwog 6y ago

Make politics boring again.

api 6y ago
Politics and government are definitely in the class of things we want to be boring. Interesting government and interesting politics were a major cause of death in the first half of the 20th century.
- krapp 6y ago
  Unfortunately, ever since the debate between JFK and Richard Nixon, we increasingly demand that politics be spectacle, and that the president, specifically, be demagogue in chief. We don't believe politics can be useful, so it should at least be entertaining. I'd rather being president were more like being prime minister, just a bureaucratic position without much prestige, necessary but no one is calling you "leader of the free world." But Americans are too entranced with the Great Man view of history (and their own importance) to allow that.
  - luckylion 6y ago
    > I'd rather being president were more like being prime minister, just a bureaucratic position without much prestige, necessary but no one is calling you "leader of the free world." I agree, but I don't think it's a possibility. An administration that would essentially just be boring and bureaucratic wouldn't "change" the country, but essentially run it on the status quo. Lots of people aren't happy with the status quo for various reasons, they want to change it. That in turn makes other people want to stop them from changing it. If you didn't have two groups that split across some major fault lines, you didn't have "exciting" politics. When you have these divided groups, how could you have boring politics?
    - krapp 6y ago
      Except politics isn't "exciting" due to honest debates between honorable adversaries who recognize each others' legitimacy and respect the integrity of the political system, it's "exciting" because of scandal, propaganda, outrage and violence. Driven by conspiracy theories about satanic pedophiles and new world order death camps. We've descended from Lincoln-Douglas to the juvenile circus between Biden and Trump. And the main reason for this, in my opinion, is having "change" be embodied in a single demagogue figure elected to force their party's agenda through at any cost, rather than having "change' understood to be an effect of long-term and widespread engagement with the system at multiple levels. Change shouldn't be the president's job anyway, that's what the legislature is for, and people wanting change should engage more with local and state politics. The executive keeps the system running, which implicitly means keeping the status quo.

BurningFrog 6y ago

They don't even live in the same area.