5 ms·

You make it sound like this only happens on the democratic side. Republicans have similar echo chambers. I think conformity happens within circles. Then it's a

You make it sound like this only happens on the democratic side. Republicans have similar echo chambers. I think conformity happens within circles. Then it's a question how big the circle is. I agree with your main concern though, online vs real life credit systems.

inglor_cz 5y ago
I am a non-American who is right of centre, and I can see "my" people adapting cancel culture tactics as well, and I resent it. IMHO such victories are rotten to the core. "Shall there be two cities of Minas Morgul, grinning at each other across a dead land filled with rottenness?" The only thing I can do about it is to interact civilly with like-minded people of totally different political persuasions and hope that others will be inspired not to enter the cesspool.
- 100011_100001 5y ago
  I live in the States but wasn't raised here. One of the things you might not know is that unless you live in a middle east or China, right of center is left in the States.
  - inglor_cz 5y ago
    Plenty of people say that, but I think this is too simple to be true. You have a lot less conservative Christians in Europe (perhaps with the exception of Poland), but a lot more blatant ethnocentrist nationalists - a legacy of former decades and centuries where everyone was threatened by everyone else. (Exceptions apply.)
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - cmrdporcupine 5y ago
    What has happened in western countries but most dramatically in North America is that "left" vs "right" has been transformed from a strong disagreement about management of the economy to a strong disagreement about how to manage the culture. This is because in the US especially the "left" in the traditional socialist sense -- and its allies in the union movement and among students and academia -- have lost the class war. Since Clinton and Blair, there is no political space left for serious redistributive politics and the parties claiming the mantle of "left" or "social democratic" in the west have mostly given up. I'd say anti-capitalism remains strong among their base, but for all intents and purposes there is no path towards actually enacting policy... Which is why "Medicare for All" can be insanely popular in the United States across the population and voters of parties but still never ever become successful legislation. And it's also why I find it so hilarious to see right wingers talk about the "MSM" and calling things like CNN "left wing"; all the bitching about "wokeness" and griping about culture wars and so on and complaining that somehow the "left" dominates society... It's amazing because in the context of what "left" meant for most of the 20th century... the left lost. It's gone. And I say this as a strong proponent of its classic positions.
    - inglor_cz 5y ago
      Content of expressions shifts over time, especially in politics. Contemporary Pope would probably be horrified if someone suggested to him to initiate a crusade against the unbelievers. The combination of Christianity and politics has shifted over time, there is much less hard force and much more sentimentality involved. But that does not mean that Crusaders weren't true Christians while Francis I. is, or vice versa. The traditional left is gone because its proponents died out, but before they died, they introduced the young wokesters into their parties. The shift from blue collar workers to academia took decades to complete and there is a clear continuity in the process. So I think the label still fits, only the relevant institutions changed their priorities.
      - cmrdporcupine 5y ago
        Nah, I think it's deeper than that. If the Catholic Church stopped believing in God and Jesus completely, would you still call them Christians/Catholics? At what point do we just throw our hands up in the air on a term? Likewise with socialist/social democratic parties -- if they abandon all the tenets of socialism: worker control of capital, anti-capitalism, etc. but still keep the name... is it just that the content of the expression has changed? That seems a stretch. However, I guess there's an argument to be made that "left wing" is so non-specific that it could do what you're saying. The phrase itself has its origins in the French Revolution with the Jacobins, etc. who were certainly not socialist. So I guess there's that. But here's the thing. Many of the politicians called "left" in the United States don't even call themselves that. The right wing in the US calls almost everything "left wing". I stare in amazement at people who call Clinton or Biden "left wing"; they don't describe themselves that way, and actual socialists and left wingers don't support them (except grudgingly with their noises plugged when they have to vote). But to the Tea Party and Trump types, they are "left wing." By which they just mean something pejorative
a_conservative 5y ago
Republicans do have similar echo chambers. My personal experience, as someone who has moved from left to right but still hangs out in a lot of left leaning circles, the right tends to be more tolerant of dissent. It's getting harder to remember life before the internet, but it was largely similar. Different pockets of people had different beliefs and tended to choose an echo chamber. As you said, the circles are bigger now. The other difference is that media is so less centralized now, the circles are further apart. The centralized main stream media applied a certain amount of social pressure itself that sort of kept the circles from straying to far into "forbidden thoughts". This has largely been destroyed by the internet.
- sharikous 5y ago
  > It's getting harder to remember life before the internet, but it was largely similar. Different pockets of people had different beliefs and tended to choose an echo chamber. Before the internet, in fact, it was difficult to seek out information from outside your echo chamber. Now it is a few clicks away, even if you might prefer not to do that. > The other difference is that media is so less centralized now, the circles are further apart. I think it is questionable to say that. The mainstream part of the internet today is very much centralized. > the right tends to be more tolerant of dissent. I agree with that. I remember when the "inclusiveness" buzzword started to gain traction and I naively thought that the meaning was being welcoming to all, regardless of political opinions. Boy, I was wrong.
- 100011_100001 5y ago
  > the right tends to be more tolerant of dissent. ...some restrictions may apply. Abortion, gay rights, immigrants, any non Christian religion; especially Muslims, policy brutality against people of color, healthcare to all, living wages the list goes on...oh and Biden actually winning the election. However, I am not trying to attack you. To give you credit, media is more extreme and biased, except for specific news outlets and sites. Of course based on your beliefs we might not agree on which ones those are.
  - a_conservative 5y ago
Melting_Harps 5y ago
> You make it sound like this only happens on the democratic side. Republicans have similar echo chambers. I'm not succumbing to the folly to believe that such a false paradigm (Left v Right) is anything but a dichotomy that people continue to think is separate; while wokeness may be often attributed to the Left, but I think it's clear that both sides seek the same goals which is to enforce self-censorship (University campus on Sex/Gender) or impose an archaic notion about self-ownership where the State determines what you can and cannot do to your own body (abortion). So, to be clear: I don't think their is a discernible difference between those two entities enough to make such an argument. I don't think conformity is a natural byproduct in a free and tolerant Society; what I do believe is natural and spontaneous in Nature is order, often by incentivized consensus.

inglor_cz 5y ago

I am a non-American who is right of centre, and I can see "my" people adapting cancel culture tactics as well, and I resent it. IMHO such victories are rotten to the core. "Shall there be two cities of Minas Morgul, grinning at each other across a dead land filled with rottenness?" The only thing I can do about it is to interact civilly with like-minded people of totally different political persuasions and hope that others will be inspired not to enter the cesspool.

100011_100001 5y ago
I live in the States but wasn't raised here. One of the things you might not know is that unless you live in a middle east or China, right of center is left in the States.
- inglor_cz 5y ago
  Plenty of people say that, but I think this is too simple to be true. You have a lot less conservative Christians in Europe (perhaps with the exception of Poland), but a lot more blatant ethnocentrist nationalists - a legacy of former decades and centuries where everyone was threatened by everyone else. (Exceptions apply.)
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- cmrdporcupine 5y ago
  What has happened in western countries but most dramatically in North America is that "left" vs "right" has been transformed from a strong disagreement about management of the economy to a strong disagreement about how to manage the culture. This is because in the US especially the "left" in the traditional socialist sense -- and its allies in the union movement and among students and academia -- have lost the class war. Since Clinton and Blair, there is no political space left for serious redistributive politics and the parties claiming the mantle of "left" or "social democratic" in the west have mostly given up. I'd say anti-capitalism remains strong among their base, but for all intents and purposes there is no path towards actually enacting policy... Which is why "Medicare for All" can be insanely popular in the United States across the population and voters of parties but still never ever become successful legislation. And it's also why I find it so hilarious to see right wingers talk about the "MSM" and calling things like CNN "left wing"; all the bitching about "wokeness" and griping about culture wars and so on and complaining that somehow the "left" dominates society... It's amazing because in the context of what "left" meant for most of the 20th century... the left lost. It's gone. And I say this as a strong proponent of its classic positions.
  - inglor_cz 5y ago
    Content of expressions shifts over time, especially in politics. Contemporary Pope would probably be horrified if someone suggested to him to initiate a crusade against the unbelievers. The combination of Christianity and politics has shifted over time, there is much less hard force and much more sentimentality involved. But that does not mean that Crusaders weren't true Christians while Francis I. is, or vice versa. The traditional left is gone because its proponents died out, but before they died, they introduced the young wokesters into their parties. The shift from blue collar workers to academia took decades to complete and there is a clear continuity in the process. So I think the label still fits, only the relevant institutions changed their priorities.
    - cmrdporcupine 5y ago
      Nah, I think it's deeper than that. If the Catholic Church stopped believing in God and Jesus completely, would you still call them Christians/Catholics? At what point do we just throw our hands up in the air on a term? Likewise with socialist/social democratic parties -- if they abandon all the tenets of socialism: worker control of capital, anti-capitalism, etc. but still keep the name... is it just that the content of the expression has changed? That seems a stretch. However, I guess there's an argument to be made that "left wing" is so non-specific that it could do what you're saying. The phrase itself has its origins in the French Revolution with the Jacobins, etc. who were certainly not socialist. So I guess there's that. But here's the thing. Many of the politicians called "left" in the United States don't even call themselves that. The right wing in the US calls almost everything "left wing". I stare in amazement at people who call Clinton or Biden "left wing"; they don't describe themselves that way, and actual socialists and left wingers don't support them (except grudgingly with their noises plugged when they have to vote). But to the Tea Party and Trump types, they are "left wing." By which they just mean something pejorative

a_conservative 5y ago

Republicans do have similar echo chambers. My personal experience, as someone who has moved from left to right but still hangs out in a lot of left leaning circles, the right tends to be more tolerant of dissent. It's getting harder to remember life before the internet, but it was largely similar. Different pockets of people had different beliefs and tended to choose an echo chamber. As you said, the circles are bigger now. The other difference is that media is so less centralized now, the circles are further apart. The centralized main stream media applied a certain amount of social pressure itself that sort of kept the circles from straying to far into "forbidden thoughts". This has largely been destroyed by the internet.

sharikous 5y ago
> It's getting harder to remember life before the internet, but it was largely similar. Different pockets of people had different beliefs and tended to choose an echo chamber. Before the internet, in fact, it was difficult to seek out information from outside your echo chamber. Now it is a few clicks away, even if you might prefer not to do that. > The other difference is that media is so less centralized now, the circles are further apart. I think it is questionable to say that. The mainstream part of the internet today is very much centralized. > the right tends to be more tolerant of dissent. I agree with that. I remember when the "inclusiveness" buzzword started to gain traction and I naively thought that the meaning was being welcoming to all, regardless of political opinions. Boy, I was wrong.
100011_100001 5y ago
> the right tends to be more tolerant of dissent. ...some restrictions may apply. Abortion, gay rights, immigrants, any non Christian religion; especially Muslims, policy brutality against people of color, healthcare to all, living wages the list goes on...oh and Biden actually winning the election. However, I am not trying to attack you. To give you credit, media is more extreme and biased, except for specific news outlets and sites. Of course based on your beliefs we might not agree on which ones those are.
- a_conservative 5y ago

Melting_Harps 5y ago

> You make it sound like this only happens on the democratic side. Republicans have similar echo chambers. I'm not succumbing to the folly to believe that such a false paradigm (Left v Right) is anything but a dichotomy that people continue to think is separate; while wokeness may be often attributed to the Left, but I think it's clear that both sides seek the same goals which is to enforce self-censorship (University campus on Sex/Gender) or impose an archaic notion about self-ownership where the State determines what you can and cannot do to your own body (abortion). So, to be clear: I don't think their is a discernible difference between those two entities enough to make such an argument. I don't think conformity is a natural byproduct in a free and tolerant Society; what I do believe is natural and spontaneous in Nature is order, often by incentivized consensus.