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I keep coming back to whether people in general still think open mindedness is a virtue. By open mindedness, I mean open to new experience, open to new ideas, o

I keep coming back to whether people in general still think open mindedness is a virtue. By open mindedness, I mean open to new experience, open to new ideas, open to new people. Practicing openness means observing and hearing and then evaluating for yourself whether you want to assimilate the experience or idea into your life. Open mindedness also means being open to new information, even if it contradicts a basis for what you already believe or practice. If we are not open to contradiction, we can never recognize when we are wrong about what we believe. Being wrong about what we believe leads to doom for societies. Hate is expressed in many ways, some nuanced, some not. But I have confidence that I can witness it, identify it, and categorize for myself. Allowing others to control what I am exposed to means I am no longer in control of what I know and believe. We've seen this creeping definition of hate over the last so many years. It's modulated to the point that I don't know what people mean any longer when they claim 'racism' for example, yet they prevent me from seeing or reading examples, even so I can just identify it and judge for myself. Freedom means determining for yourself what is and is not hate. Having it hidden from you takes that freedom away. It is our responsibility as free persons to learn how to observe and judge what should and should not be part of our lives. Collectively, we will keep hate at bay simply by recognizing it for ourselves and not assimilating it into our lives.

bhupy 6y ago
In addition, in my experience I’ve found the discussion to be centered around the freedom to express one’s self, but free speech is also very much about the freedom of the recipient to seek out and listen to whatever speech they want.
JPKab 6y ago
You are describing a core concept called liberalism. As a liberal myself, we've become increasingly unwelcome in the United States' only viable left of center political party. We've allowed regressive, illiberal religious fanatics to take over our party. Just like the Republicans allowed regressive, illiberal religious fanatics to take over their party in the 80s. In both cases, they were considered useful idiots to be appeased while the adults in the room winked and nodded at each other. In both cases, the game theory quickly devolves into pandering to them, and increasingly alienating segments of the population. The wokies have increasingly demanded Mao-like public concessions from elites, and have been universally successful in getting it. This echoes what the evangelicals were able to demand and solicit from GOP members in the 80s-today. The worst part about this is that the coalition of regressives on the left is so fractious, because they are all so obsessed with immutable characteristic driven identity. Any time an argument or policy that helps one identity group is proposed, another identity group complains they aren't getting the attention THEY need. Because it's such a fractious coalition, elites within the party apparatus and their allies in the press desperately try to spin certain elements of reality. An example of this is the startlingly weird coverage of the violent attacks against vulnerable Asian Americans in US cities. The fact that they are perpetrated exclusively by young black men is deliberately obfuscated, with significant efforts to conflate the attacks with a narrative of ascendant "white supremacists". This video is from a mainstream, respected news outlet. It's utterly shocking in it's blatant obfuscation of facts to serve a narrative bias: https://youtu.be/1lyVzQsXLl4 https://youtu.be/1lyVzQsXLl4 Meanwhile, the opposition to the fractious regressive left, are feeding off of this. They are recruiting, and are gaining moral license to justify violence. This is extremely dangerous. These right wing extremists, who they are increasingly awakening at an alarming rate, is far more cohesive as a group. Antifa are mainly annoying, and when they use violent tactics, can be mildly dangerous. But they are weak, untrained, and unorganized compared to their right wing counterparts. In the US, they can easily acquire weapons, but the expertise to use them is not easy to come by. Liberals like you and me need to stand up, and boldly and loudly and aggressively speak out against any and all forms of regressive, illiberal leftism. If we don't, 2022 is going to be an absolute bloodbath electorally, but far worse is the increasing opposite reaction these lunatics will solicit from the right. Trump's voters aren't going to just go away because the tech companies have banned them. This article clearly points that out.
- orthecreedence 6y ago
  I've been fairly silent about all this the past few years. It's interesting because I come from the perspective of economic left (libertarian communism/socialism) and seeing the people around me fall pray to this obsession with identity hasn't been easy. More recently I've starting speaking out about it more, because it's getting to the point where it's effectively McCarthy-era. I do have some thoughts on your post though. > The wokies have increasingly demanded Mao-like public concessions from elites Ultra-wokies are created by elites as a divisive mechanism of the working classes. There aren't workers anymore: there are oppressed black workers and privileged white workers. Round one: fight! CRT and post-truth (whether on the cultural left or cultural right) are an arm of the ruling class itself. It's hard for people to realize they're being grifted when they can't even have a conversation without being scolded for breaking some constantly-shifting amorphous blob of contradicting rules. > Trump's voters aren't going to just go away because the tech companies have banned them. Agreed. They'll start to discover decentralization and p2p systems eventually, then they won't be able to be controlled at all. The cultural left (and I say "cultural" because the economic left is alive and well and still exists alongside this late identity craze) is making an error: you don't want to stamp out 100% of wrongthink, just 80% of it! If you try to do more, you risk entire networks forming ouside of your control. And this is what will happen, and they will lose ALL of their control. This in itself might be a good thing. Although Trump's cult of personality might be damaging to the nation, they might end up forming communications infrastructures resistant to censorship, which might ultimately be a net-benefit to humanity.
  - nyczomg 6y ago
    Love that last paragraph. Maybe we’ll have some lemonade after all these lemons...
  - JPKab 6y ago
    Extremely well stated.
wnoise 6y ago
An open mind is like a fortress with its gates unbarred and unguarded.
- xuhu 6y ago
  More like a country that accepts visas.

bhupy 6y ago

In addition, in my experience I’ve found the discussion to be centered around the freedom to express one’s self, but free speech is also very much about the freedom of the recipient to seek out and listen to whatever speech they want.

JPKab 6y ago

You are describing a core concept called liberalism. As a liberal myself, we've become increasingly unwelcome in the United States' only viable left of center political party. We've allowed regressive, illiberal religious fanatics to take over our party. Just like the Republicans allowed regressive, illiberal religious fanatics to take over their party in the 80s. In both cases, they were considered useful idiots to be appeased while the adults in the room winked and nodded at each other. In both cases, the game theory quickly devolves into pandering to them, and increasingly alienating segments of the population. The wokies have increasingly demanded Mao-like public concessions from elites, and have been universally successful in getting it. This echoes what the evangelicals were able to demand and solicit from GOP members in the 80s-today. The worst part about this is that the coalition of regressives on the left is so fractious, because they are all so obsessed with immutable characteristic driven identity. Any time an argument or policy that helps one identity group is proposed, another identity group complains they aren't getting the attention THEY need. Because it's such a fractious coalition, elites within the party apparatus and their allies in the press desperately try to spin certain elements of reality. An example of this is the startlingly weird coverage of the violent attacks against vulnerable Asian Americans in US cities. The fact that they are perpetrated exclusively by young black men is deliberately obfuscated, with significant efforts to conflate the attacks with a narrative of ascendant "white supremacists". This video is from a mainstream, respected news outlet. It's utterly shocking in it's blatant obfuscation of facts to serve a narrative bias: https://youtu.be/1lyVzQsXLl4 https://youtu.be/1lyVzQsXLl4 Meanwhile, the opposition to the fractious regressive left, are feeding off of this. They are recruiting, and are gaining moral license to justify violence. This is extremely dangerous. These right wing extremists, who they are increasingly awakening at an alarming rate, is far more cohesive as a group. Antifa are mainly annoying, and when they use violent tactics, can be mildly dangerous. But they are weak, untrained, and unorganized compared to their right wing counterparts. In the US, they can easily acquire weapons, but the expertise to use them is not easy to come by. Liberals like you and me need to stand up, and boldly and loudly and aggressively speak out against any and all forms of regressive, illiberal leftism. If we don't, 2022 is going to be an absolute bloodbath electorally, but far worse is the increasing opposite reaction these lunatics will solicit from the right. Trump's voters aren't going to just go away because the tech companies have banned them. This article clearly points that out.

orthecreedence 6y ago
I've been fairly silent about all this the past few years. It's interesting because I come from the perspective of economic left (libertarian communism/socialism) and seeing the people around me fall pray to this obsession with identity hasn't been easy. More recently I've starting speaking out about it more, because it's getting to the point where it's effectively McCarthy-era. I do have some thoughts on your post though. > The wokies have increasingly demanded Mao-like public concessions from elites Ultra-wokies are created by elites as a divisive mechanism of the working classes. There aren't workers anymore: there are oppressed black workers and privileged white workers. Round one: fight! CRT and post-truth (whether on the cultural left or cultural right) are an arm of the ruling class itself. It's hard for people to realize they're being grifted when they can't even have a conversation without being scolded for breaking some constantly-shifting amorphous blob of contradicting rules. > Trump's voters aren't going to just go away because the tech companies have banned them. Agreed. They'll start to discover decentralization and p2p systems eventually, then they won't be able to be controlled at all. The cultural left (and I say "cultural" because the economic left is alive and well and still exists alongside this late identity craze) is making an error: you don't want to stamp out 100% of wrongthink, just 80% of it! If you try to do more, you risk entire networks forming ouside of your control. And this is what will happen, and they will lose ALL of their control. This in itself might be a good thing. Although Trump's cult of personality might be damaging to the nation, they might end up forming communications infrastructures resistant to censorship, which might ultimately be a net-benefit to humanity.
- nyczomg 6y ago
  Love that last paragraph. Maybe we’ll have some lemonade after all these lemons...
- JPKab 6y ago
  Extremely well stated.

wnoise 6y ago

An open mind is like a fortress with its gates unbarred and unguarded.

xuhu 6y ago
More like a country that accepts visas.