5 ms·

I appreciate the honesty when it comes to the naming of this group https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persuasion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persuasion

kspacewalk2 6y ago
Here's the rationale[0] for the naming of the group: >“Persuasion” stands for: >1) A commitment to a free society in which everyone gets to pursue a dignified life. >2) A belief in the social practice of persuasion, which necessitates free speech. >3) A determination to persuade, not to mock or troll, those who disagree with us. In my view, they are succeeding admirably in meeting these 3 goals. [0] https://twitter.com/Yascha_Mounk/status/1278707858188664832 https://twitter.com/Yascha_Mounk/status/1278707858188664832
- petermcneeley 6y ago
  A quick glance at the contributing authors makes it obvious as to what one is being persuaded of.
- the_benno 6y ago
  Personally, I'm a little less convinced of the 1st bullet point. In particular, I see many obstacles to a "free society in which everyone gets to pursue a dignified life": healthcare costs, ongoing climate disaster, erosion of labor rights, rising nativism and authoritarianism on the far-right, etc. chief among them. To be as monomaniacally focused on "cancel culture" as Mounk (and many others on the center/right of the American political spectrum) strikes me as misguided at best and disingenuously self-serving at worst. Persuasion seems to me a massive over-reaction to the minor injustice that is "cancel culture" wrapped in some self-important and grandiose rhetoric.
  - kspacewalk2 6y ago
    Listen to the podcast and read some more articles on Persuasion. Mounk is not "monomaniacally focused on cancel culture". He's monomaniacally focused on defending liberalism from populism - there's a lot on his podcast about nativism, authoritarianism and the populist right (the whole damn podcast started as a way to explore how the populism of Trump, Orban etc can be defeated in the realm of ideas). And generally, I find him to be the most prepared interviewer with the most thoughtful questions that I ever encountered in podcasting.
    - the_benno 6y ago
      Thanks, I'll dig in some more. Perhaps I'm unfairly projecting onto Mounk and conflating his work with that of other "intellectual dark web" types and their fakakta cancel-culture takes. I haven't followed him closely since the flurry of discussion/debate when the project launched last summer.

kspacewalk2 6y ago

Here's the rationale[0] for the naming of the group: >“Persuasion” stands for: >1) A commitment to a free society in which everyone gets to pursue a dignified life. >2) A belief in the social practice of persuasion, which necessitates free speech. >3) A determination to persuade, not to mock or troll, those who disagree with us. In my view, they are succeeding admirably in meeting these 3 goals. [0] https://twitter.com/Yascha_Mounk/status/1278707858188664832 https://twitter.com/Yascha_Mounk/status/1278707858188664832

petermcneeley 6y ago
A quick glance at the contributing authors makes it obvious as to what one is being persuaded of.
the_benno 6y ago
Personally, I'm a little less convinced of the 1st bullet point. In particular, I see many obstacles to a "free society in which everyone gets to pursue a dignified life": healthcare costs, ongoing climate disaster, erosion of labor rights, rising nativism and authoritarianism on the far-right, etc. chief among them. To be as monomaniacally focused on "cancel culture" as Mounk (and many others on the center/right of the American political spectrum) strikes me as misguided at best and disingenuously self-serving at worst. Persuasion seems to me a massive over-reaction to the minor injustice that is "cancel culture" wrapped in some self-important and grandiose rhetoric.
- kspacewalk2 6y ago
  Listen to the podcast and read some more articles on Persuasion. Mounk is not "monomaniacally focused on cancel culture". He's monomaniacally focused on defending liberalism from populism - there's a lot on his podcast about nativism, authoritarianism and the populist right (the whole damn podcast started as a way to explore how the populism of Trump, Orban etc can be defeated in the realm of ideas). And generally, I find him to be the most prepared interviewer with the most thoughtful questions that I ever encountered in podcasting.
  - the_benno 6y ago
    Thanks, I'll dig in some more. Perhaps I'm unfairly projecting onto Mounk and conflating his work with that of other "intellectual dark web" types and their fakakta cancel-culture takes. I haven't followed him closely since the flurry of discussion/debate when the project launched last summer.