7 ms·

Do you have any links to examples of moderate views that will get one cancelled? I would be really interested in this topic.

by vostok 6y ago

jjdin14 6y ago
That there are reasons other than racism that partially explain the achievement gap between races.
- tom_ 6y ago
  Such as...?
  - another_sock 6y ago
    various aspects of IQ, demeanor, education, work ethic, surroundings, and a whole host of other variables, some external some internal. Of course the majority of people on HN and in the public will revert to weeping and gnashing of teeth rather than acknowledge this obvious fact, because the majority of people on HN and in the public implicitly tie human worth to economic output and intelligence (which is the actually bigoted and racist thing to do)
    - brsg 6y ago
      I'm not going to "cancel" you, but it's a little telling that your example of a moderate view immediately went there.
      - another_sock 6y ago
        I don't care about you trying to cancel me lol that's why this is a sock account, but it's even more telling that you think basic descriptive (not prescriptive) observations about reality are not moderate.
        brsg 6y ago
        Yeah, but why not stuff like immigration, stances on environmental regulation, income tax rates on high earners, gun rights... You've gotta agree that those fall under the moderate umbrella a bit more right? I've lived/worked in some very conservative environments and I don't think anyone would've walked along with the race IQ path.
        another_sock 6y ago
        My comment was in relation to the topic of the parent comment, which is why I mentioned it at all. Income tax rates and environmental regulation very rarely get brought up in conjunction with why there are gaps in racial outcome that aren't the result of racism. I think we can both agree that the things I mentioned are more more on point with arguments pertaining to racial outcomes, even if you completely disagree with those arguments.
        brsg 6y ago
        That's fair! I think I may have confused you with the OP that responded as such to the moderate point. For what it's worth, I think you may be surprised how much you can discuss on this topic without crossing "the line" for most people. I think that if partisanship wasn't as divisive as it currently is than you'd be able to discover a lot more common ground with people. .... though definitely not online.
        another_sock 6y ago
        I definitely agree with you on that. Most people are far more likely to have a productive discussion when at least one party goes out of their way to be nuanced and careful in how they word things as well as the discussion not taking place in a performative environment (online or in front of other people.) It is definitely a lesson I have learned over time and through my own biases and misbehavior causing myself unneeded problems that were/are quiet foolish in hindsight. With that said, all of these topics are not worth getting too into, since even 100% agreement on HBD or esoteric human rights philosophy topics doesn't really accomplish much. I have arrived at a sort of internal understanding that it doesn't matter if most people would disagree with me on this stuff. Also, if I find the common perspective to be ridiculous or stupid that doesn't really matter or entitle me to pressing the issue when it doesn't matter. What genuinely matters is finding common humanity/shared goals that are mutually beneficial and not getting bent out of shape over stuff that doesn't really matter, which in this case is trivia pertaining to generalized (which is practically useless individually) racial outcomes. Hopefully I've explained myself clearly and shown that I don't have any ill will intended towards you or anybody who has different opinions or may even hate or take offense at how I see the world. Have a nice Sunday :)
  - sokoloff 6y ago
    The general unwillingness (and career danger) to even study this topic is concerning to me. Maybe there are correlated factors, maybe there aren’t. I think we’d all be better off if these topics could be studied, so they could be understood, so any negative effects could be ameliorated most effectively. When I see respected economists reporting that there are differences in economic success that are correlated with race and respected sociologists reporting differences and other factual data analysis, I see differences that seem to persist by race. All of those are output measurements. What’s the next logical thing you do as an academic, seeking to understand a problem in search of a persistent, structural solution? Go look for input measures and see what you can learn about the system. That’s the step that seems to be a third-rail and if we’re not willing to study the structural inputs to the problem, we’re handicapping ourselves in solving any of it.
  - jariel 6y ago
    Culture and everything to do with it is 90% of the answer. Asian Americans face racism, and have absolutely zero cultural standing, nobody cares that Asian Americans don't win Oscars, they are not on TV shows, they are not represented in sports. And yet Asian Americas are literally 2x the national income and make up vastly disproportionate numbers of high tech workers etc.. The notion that somehow how 'Asian Americans' have 'vast Racial Privilege' that enable them to gain success is plainly ridiculous, obviously. Most of them do not come to America with stashes of wealth to give them advantage, though some do. So how are Asian Americans so successful? Because as individuals, they focus on the things that matter to them, and that enable them to have much higher incomes - like education as one obvious example. Those attitudes, motivations, concerns, behaviours are passed down from generation to generation and though it's unfair to characterize anyone by their culture, those things have tremendous impact.
krona 6y ago
It's pretty easy to find such examples throughout accademia, it's hard to know where to start. https://heterodoxacademy.org/the-skeptics-are-wrong-part-2/ https://heterodoxacademy.org/the-skeptics-are-wrong-part-2/
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
jariel 6y ago
? Most cancellations are of moderates. JK Rowling's view that Women, and Men who transition to women, while they should have 'equal rights' - are not the same thing, that there is a difference and that difference should be respected - got her cancelled. They are out for here in droves. This is a mainstream view and probably extremely popular. In fact, outside of hyperbolic politics I'll be basically anyone that even accepts 'trans folks' (because a lot of people wouldn't in the first places) actually feels that way. The movement to 'erase' any possible difference that people might view Women/Trans Women differently is rooted I think in a really emotional, almost child-like concern/anger/will to 'defend rights!!!' in such a way that anyone who disagrees must be destroyed, without conceding some probable, basic realities. I actually think that in a more calm, moderate, less hyperbolic situation, nobody would want to cancel her. It's the aggressive voice of less than 0.1% on the fringe who've internalized a lot of their academic views into emotional one's. They tried to cancel Steven Pinker recently for suggesting, that according to the science, Americans are more generally subject to quite a bit more police aggression overall, and that though Black people to face disproportionate ire, that the problem is more general and widespread whereupon Black people have an acute situation. Which personally always felt was the case, and absolutely nobody is willing to say it. Put in other words, he almost said, in an academic kind of way that 'All Lives Matter' i.e. police aggression is more or less a general problem, not just a Black problem. For this there were signatories, back room pushes etc. to cancel him. Fortunately, he's respected enough that he didn't have to worry but any 'less famous' prof. would have been destroyed. This is again similar to JK Rowling in that a very basic, factual and what should be 'not even controversial opinion' gets you in a lot of trouble. Almost ironically, during a CBC interview, Pinker spoke politely at length about the issues and used soft language to refer to the 'more extreme' on the left - but hilariously he used the language 'Social Marxist' which is almost identical to the term 'Cultural Marxist' (a derogatory term coined apparently by some bad person). It's funny because the logic of the terminology, which is to say that while Marx spoke about 'class struggle', the 'Social Marxists' (Pinker's words) use the same language but for race, gender etc.. If Pinker would have been anyone else, on a US outlet and had used slightly different words, he would have been publicly pilloried. It's funny how that works. The fact that even Steven Pinker has come to the very obvious conclusion that this is very similar ideology but instead of 'class' you have 'race' or 'gender' - but that literally using any terminology to reflect that could get you in hot water, is Orwellian. Imagine if the Nazis made a rule to suggest that any reference to the existence of Nazism or the power of the government will be met with prison or death. People all running around in that totalitarianism without even the language to point to said totalitarianism. It's probably the most 'Orwellian' of all 'Orwellian' concepts. There is an interesting historical parallel during the Weimar republic, the German Communist Party (KPD) hated the 'centre left' socialists (i.e. people like Rowling, Pinker) more than anyone. "The party directed most of its attacks against the Social Democratic Party of Germany, which it regarded as its main adversary and referred to as "social fascists"; the KPD considered all other parties in the Weimar Republic to be 'fascists'." Literally anyone 'less Communist' than them, was a 'fascist' and subject of most of their ire. Actually, this is not even 'parallel' - this is the the same social response being played out. There are surely some 'Real American Nazis' who feel the same way, but I don't think anyone actually supports them, they have no power at all, whereas the 'Social Cancellers' have control over academia, a powerful wing in Congress, and weirdly enough extensive influence in the board room and are now trying to drive corporate social policy with some success which I think is due to the fact there's a lot of mostly good intention there, hard to separate from the more radical stuff. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communist_Party_of_Germany https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communist_Party_of_Germany
falcolas 6y ago
Being pro abortion rights and pro gun rights. Thinking that private companies should have to respect the right to freedom of speech as much as the government (especially when they hold a monopoly on “public spaces”). Thinking that perhaps capitalism is not the cure to all of society’s ills - that it even causes some of those problems. Thinking that socialism is - practically speaking - impossible due to basic human nature. Basically, holding views from both parties, and not just toeing one party’s line.
michaelt 6y ago
Maybe it doesn't rise to the level of 'cancelled' but a few decades ago you were taking a progressive, modern, left-wing stance if you said: * These cases of minority students with 1600 on the SAT not being offered places in top colleges are bad. College admissions and grading should be name- race- and gender-blind. * These cases of people trying to ban gay media and speakers for 'obscenity' or 'outraging public decency' are bad. People should be able to publish what they like, and colleges certainly shouldn't ban invited speakers, even if some students find their views challenging. * These people writing about computers and always referring to the user as 'he' is pretty out of date. Generous use of 'they' in preference to gendered pronouns is the inclusive choice. The same stances, when viewed from a few decades later, sound right-wing: To modern ears, those stances oppose affirmative action, oppose no-platforming, and say it's OK to ignore people's preferred pronouns. To some, those views would sound positively Jordan Peterson-esque.

Do you have any links to examples of moderate views that will get one cancelled? I would be really interested in this topic.

by vostok 6y ago

Do you have any links to examples of moderate views that will get one cancelled? I would be really interested in this topic.

jjdin14 6y ago

That there are reasons other than racism that partially explain the achievement gap between races.

tom_ 6y ago
Such as...?
- another_sock 6y ago
  various aspects of IQ, demeanor, education, work ethic, surroundings, and a whole host of other variables, some external some internal. Of course the majority of people on HN and in the public will revert to weeping and gnashing of teeth rather than acknowledge this obvious fact, because the majority of people on HN and in the public implicitly tie human worth to economic output and intelligence (which is the actually bigoted and racist thing to do)
  - brsg 6y ago
    I'm not going to "cancel" you, but it's a little telling that your example of a moderate view immediately went there.
    - another_sock 6y ago
      I don't care about you trying to cancel me lol that's why this is a sock account, but it's even more telling that you think basic descriptive (not prescriptive) observations about reality are not moderate.
      - brsg 6y ago
        Yeah, but why not stuff like immigration, stances on environmental regulation, income tax rates on high earners, gun rights... You've gotta agree that those fall under the moderate umbrella a bit more right? I've lived/worked in some very conservative environments and I don't think anyone would've walked along with the race IQ path.
        another_sock 6y ago
        My comment was in relation to the topic of the parent comment, which is why I mentioned it at all. Income tax rates and environmental regulation very rarely get brought up in conjunction with why there are gaps in racial outcome that aren't the result of racism. I think we can both agree that the things I mentioned are more more on point with arguments pertaining to racial outcomes, even if you completely disagree with those arguments.
        brsg 6y ago
        That's fair! I think I may have confused you with the OP that responded as such to the moderate point. For what it's worth, I think you may be surprised how much you can discuss on this topic without crossing "the line" for most people. I think that if partisanship wasn't as divisive as it currently is than you'd be able to discover a lot more common ground with people. .... though definitely not online.
        another_sock 6y ago
        I definitely agree with you on that. Most people are far more likely to have a productive discussion when at least one party goes out of their way to be nuanced and careful in how they word things as well as the discussion not taking place in a performative environment (online or in front of other people.) It is definitely a lesson I have learned over time and through my own biases and misbehavior causing myself unneeded problems that were/are quiet foolish in hindsight. With that said, all of these topics are not worth getting too into, since even 100% agreement on HBD or esoteric human rights philosophy topics doesn't really accomplish much. I have arrived at a sort of internal understanding that it doesn't matter if most people would disagree with me on this stuff. Also, if I find the common perspective to be ridiculous or stupid that doesn't really matter or entitle me to pressing the issue when it doesn't matter. What genuinely matters is finding common humanity/shared goals that are mutually beneficial and not getting bent out of shape over stuff that doesn't really matter, which in this case is trivia pertaining to generalized (which is practically useless individually) racial outcomes. Hopefully I've explained myself clearly and shown that I don't have any ill will intended towards you or anybody who has different opinions or may even hate or take offense at how I see the world. Have a nice Sunday :)
- sokoloff 6y ago
  The general unwillingness (and career danger) to even study this topic is concerning to me. Maybe there are correlated factors, maybe there aren’t. I think we’d all be better off if these topics could be studied, so they could be understood, so any negative effects could be ameliorated most effectively. When I see respected economists reporting that there are differences in economic success that are correlated with race and respected sociologists reporting differences and other factual data analysis, I see differences that seem to persist by race. All of those are output measurements. What’s the next logical thing you do as an academic, seeking to understand a problem in search of a persistent, structural solution? Go look for input measures and see what you can learn about the system. That’s the step that seems to be a third-rail and if we’re not willing to study the structural inputs to the problem, we’re handicapping ourselves in solving any of it.
- jariel 6y ago
  Culture and everything to do with it is 90% of the answer. Asian Americans face racism, and have absolutely zero cultural standing, nobody cares that Asian Americans don't win Oscars, they are not on TV shows, they are not represented in sports. And yet Asian Americas are literally 2x the national income and make up vastly disproportionate numbers of high tech workers etc.. The notion that somehow how 'Asian Americans' have 'vast Racial Privilege' that enable them to gain success is plainly ridiculous, obviously. Most of them do not come to America with stashes of wealth to give them advantage, though some do. So how are Asian Americans so successful? Because as individuals, they focus on the things that matter to them, and that enable them to have much higher incomes - like education as one obvious example. Those attitudes, motivations, concerns, behaviours are passed down from generation to generation and though it's unfair to characterize anyone by their culture, those things have tremendous impact.

krona 6y ago

It's pretty easy to find such examples throughout accademia, it's hard to know where to start. https://heterodoxacademy.org/the-skeptics-are-wrong-part-2/ https://heterodoxacademy.org/the-skeptics-are-wrong-part-2/

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

jariel 6y ago

? Most cancellations are of moderates. JK Rowling's view that Women, and Men who transition to women, while they should have 'equal rights' - are not the same thing, that there is a difference and that difference should be respected - got her cancelled. They are out for here in droves. This is a mainstream view and probably extremely popular. In fact, outside of hyperbolic politics I'll be basically anyone that even accepts 'trans folks' (because a lot of people wouldn't in the first places) actually feels that way. The movement to 'erase' any possible difference that people might view Women/Trans Women differently is rooted I think in a really emotional, almost child-like concern/anger/will to 'defend rights!!!' in such a way that anyone who disagrees must be destroyed, without conceding some probable, basic realities. I actually think that in a more calm, moderate, less hyperbolic situation, nobody would want to cancel her. It's the aggressive voice of less than 0.1% on the fringe who've internalized a lot of their academic views into emotional one's. They tried to cancel Steven Pinker recently for suggesting, that according to the science, Americans are more generally subject to quite a bit more police aggression overall, and that though Black people to face disproportionate ire, that the problem is more general and widespread whereupon Black people have an acute situation. Which personally always felt was the case, and absolutely nobody is willing to say it. Put in other words, he almost said, in an academic kind of way that 'All Lives Matter' i.e. police aggression is more or less a general problem, not just a Black problem. For this there were signatories, back room pushes etc. to cancel him. Fortunately, he's respected enough that he didn't have to worry but any 'less famous' prof. would have been destroyed. This is again similar to JK Rowling in that a very basic, factual and what should be 'not even controversial opinion' gets you in a lot of trouble. Almost ironically, during a CBC interview, Pinker spoke politely at length about the issues and used soft language to refer to the 'more extreme' on the left - but hilariously he used the language 'Social Marxist' which is almost identical to the term 'Cultural Marxist' (a derogatory term coined apparently by some bad person). It's funny because the logic of the terminology, which is to say that while Marx spoke about 'class struggle', the 'Social Marxists' (Pinker's words) use the same language but for race, gender etc.. If Pinker would have been anyone else, on a US outlet and had used slightly different words, he would have been publicly pilloried. It's funny how that works. The fact that even Steven Pinker has come to the very obvious conclusion that this is very similar ideology but instead of 'class' you have 'race' or 'gender' - but that literally using any terminology to reflect that could get you in hot water, is Orwellian. Imagine if the Nazis made a rule to suggest that any reference to the existence of Nazism or the power of the government will be met with prison or death. People all running around in that totalitarianism without even the language to point to said totalitarianism. It's probably the most 'Orwellian' of all 'Orwellian' concepts. There is an interesting historical parallel during the Weimar republic, the German Communist Party (KPD) hated the 'centre left' socialists (i.e. people like Rowling, Pinker) more than anyone. "The party directed most of its attacks against the Social Democratic Party of Germany, which it regarded as its main adversary and referred to as "social fascists"; the KPD considered all other parties in the Weimar Republic to be 'fascists'." Literally anyone 'less Communist' than them, was a 'fascist' and subject of most of their ire. Actually, this is not even 'parallel' - this is the the same social response being played out. There are surely some 'Real American Nazis' who feel the same way, but I don't think anyone actually supports them, they have no power at all, whereas the 'Social Cancellers' have control over academia, a powerful wing in Congress, and weirdly enough extensive influence in the board room and are now trying to drive corporate social policy with some success which I think is due to the fact there's a lot of mostly good intention there, hard to separate from the more radical stuff. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communist_Party_of_Germany https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communist_Party_of_Germany

falcolas 6y ago

Being pro abortion rights and pro gun rights. Thinking that private companies should have to respect the right to freedom of speech as much as the government (especially when they hold a monopoly on “public spaces”). Thinking that perhaps capitalism is not the cure to all of society’s ills - that it even causes some of those problems. Thinking that socialism is - practically speaking - impossible due to basic human nature. Basically, holding views from both parties, and not just toeing one party’s line.

michaelt 6y ago

Maybe it doesn't rise to the level of 'cancelled' but a few decades ago you were taking a progressive, modern, left-wing stance if you said: * These cases of minority students with 1600 on the SAT not being offered places in top colleges are bad. College admissions and grading should be name- race- and gender-blind. * These cases of people trying to ban gay media and speakers for 'obscenity' or 'outraging public decency' are bad. People should be able to publish what they like, and colleges certainly shouldn't ban invited speakers, even if some students find their views challenging. * These people writing about computers and always referring to the user as 'he' is pretty out of date. Generous use of 'they' in preference to gendered pronouns is the inclusive choice. The same stances, when viewed from a few decades later, sound right-wing: To modern ears, those stances oppose affirmative action, oppose no-platforming, and say it's OK to ignore people's preferred pronouns. To some, those views would sound positively Jordan Peterson-esque.