5 ms·
When did virtue signaling become a bad thing? If the goal of the act is to protect people's access to sunshine, why not say as much -- at least the act has a hu
by anikan_vader 5y ago
When did virtue signaling become a bad thing? If the goal of the act is to protect people's access to sunshine, why not say as much -- at least the act has a human readable name.
- spacemanmatt 5y agoIt's not a bad thing, but in the eyes of people who genuinely believe they do not do it.
- DocTomoe 5y agoVirtue signalling usually is juxtaposed with being virtuous for its own sake: Those who have to tell everyone how good/enlightened/progressive they are usually aren't.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- bumby 5y ago"Being powerful is like being a lady. If you have to tell people you are, you aren't." -M. Thatcher Just substitute the word "virtuous" in
- Rayhem 5y ago> When did virtue signaling become a bad thing? I'll offer no commentary on whether "Sunshine Protection Act" is virtue signaling, but I think virtue signaling is less "talking about having done virtuous things" and more "talking about doing virtuous things with the intent to gain social capital". It's the facade, the ulterior motive that most people balk at. In that sense it has always been a "bad" thing.
- guelo 5y agoTherefore, using virtue signaling as an epithet is a bad faith claim to be able to peek into people's minds and determine bad intent in order to discourage people from publicly supporting a cause.
- s1artibartfast 5y agoOr it can be used as a condemnation after comparing their professed values against their actual behavior.
- BitwiseFool 5y agoWhile it is indeed impossible to read people's minds, people can reasonably sense a mix of insincerity and attention seeking behavior.
- gxs 5y agoIt's a bad thing when they are passing laws that violate your privacy but call the act "the protect the children act" - I think this is the habit OP was referring to
- s1artibartfast 5y agoVirtue signaling is a problem when it injects a moral aspect into areas that are disputed or subjective. In this case, it frames the issue as the enlightened who want to"protect people's access to sunshine" against the evil forces of darkness. In reality, there is no moral highground, good guys, or bad guys. Some people simply like sunshine at different times. It would be nice if we could act like adults and start from this premise. We can try to come up with a solution for how to set our clocks without claiming the preference of the other side is illegitimate or morally bankrupt.
- sdflhasjd 5y agoWhen you end up with bills called things like the "Patriot" that whitewash the dangerous capabilities of the laws and at the same time create a name thats immune to criticism. Obviously ending DST isn't like that, but you have SOPA, EARN IT, etc, etc. I believe this kind of branding should have no place in legislature.
- throwaway0a5e 5y agoVirtue signaling the act or virtue signaling the term? Hollow signaling has always been crap as far as I'm concerned. The term became a dirty word in left leaning circles and a slight pejorative in right leaning ones in the last ~10yr or so which IMO is a shame because it describes a wide variety of modern behavior and there is no good replacement.
- s1artibartfast 5y agoThere's probably a rhetorical term for it. Claiming that someone or something is good, but not demonstrating or justifying why it is good