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For a lot of people in the US, politics has become very personal. I believe that some policy decisions have become a direct threat to my health and I can try t

For a lot of people in the US, politics has become very personal. I believe that some policy decisions have become a direct threat to my health and I can try to discuss those policies calmly but I'm not good at covering my aggravation. I'd say that everyone has gotten increasingly disdainful of the 'other side'. I know I have - I'm not proud of it but I'm also not a good actor. I was in a message group recently and someone said something that (in my opinion) was so stupid and ill-informed that it was all I could do to sit on my fingers. If we'd been speaking in person, I'm not sure what I would have done but I certainly wouldn't have managed a polite response.

lotsofpulp 2y ago
[flagged]
- nineplay 2y ago
  That's the problem though right? I think that there are people who are so completely and utterly wrong that I don't know what to do with them. They also think that I am so completely and utterly wrong that they don't know what to do with me. So we don't talk about it.
  - shiroiushi 2y ago
    Exactly. To one side, the other side includes (or defends) people who were "trying to dismantle democracy [over] unsubstantiated claims of fraud". To the other side, these rioters were "peaceful protesters" (I guess they never watched the videos) who did nothing wrong. In a nutshell, the two sides simply can't even agree on basic reality. If you can't agree on the basic facts of something, it is not possible to have a fruitful discussion about it. I'm sorry, but I just don't see any kind of workable solution to this issue.
    - lotsofpulp 2y ago
      > To the other side, these rioters were "peaceful protesters" (I guess they never watched the videos) who did nothing wrong. I assume anyone claiming this is lying.
      - shiroiushi 2y ago
        A few people claiming something contrary to readily-available evidence could be explained by lying, but when a significant part of the population does so, it has to be something else.
        lotsofpulp 2y ago
        I am less hopeful. As I see it, there are a startling amount of people willing to trash the democratic process and dismantle trust in our institutions to accomplish their goals.
        shiroiushi 2y ago
        Sure, but if you look at the stuff they say on that side, they too think that "democracy is in danger" and that only their savior can protect it. It just seems like a case of mass delusion to me, but I'm guessing that in their echo chambers they've come up with some kind of weird logic to explain this. Maybe one of them here could explain it; after all, there are a fair number of these people lurking about on HN.
        freejazz 2y ago
        So the emperor is wearing clothes?
  - bbor 2y ago
    I'm just a rando but here's my unprompted solution: treat your fellow citizens as fallible epistemic machines instead of unified, rational members acting freely within a social contract. The solution to flat earthers (to pick a slightly less divisive topic) is not to engage them in logical debate, but rather help fix the systemic and personal issues that have lead them to develop such an obviously false belief. This obviously calls for some long-term sociopolitical changes to education and journalism (a deadly paradox of chickens and eggs...), but in the context of this specific conversation, I think it would call for finding common ground with your adversaries and working up from there via the Socratic method. You'll never convince someone who's not completely tuned-out to change their stance on an upcoming presidential election in a single conversation, but I think there's more room for agreement than is assumed. We all want to be healthy, wealthy, and wise, and we all intuitively agree that evidence is the basis of belief -- even something as cartoonishly evil as belief in racial supremacy is based in benign intentions corrupted by unclear/dishonestly-presented evidence, if you dig down deep enough. Practically, besides the Socratic method (framing the conversation as collaborative investigation rather than adversarial interpretation), this might mean asking some different questions than the burning ones we'd like to phrase. Beating around the bush, if you will. It's an incredibly frustrating task to be sure, but anyone who's worked with children knows that it's sometimes necessary. Perhaps; "Why do you think the election was stolen?" --> "I love Democracy, too, I just haven't seen any evidence of fraud that I've found convincing, yet; can we talk about specific pieces of evidence convinced you, and find where our disagreements begin? Maybe even quantify our levels of relative uncertainty on each?" "Why do you think immigrants are dangerous?" --> "I'm sure we're both proud of the Statue of Liberty and the freedom of action and belief it represents, and we would have never been large enough of an economy to meaningfully effect WWII with just the 13 colonies and their descendants. What are some policies you think could bring us back to that ideal? Are there any non-Americans in the world that you would welcome as compatriots today, and if not, what specifically do you think has changed?" Etc. This is admittedly just smuggling philosophy back into our discourse, so a lot of acquaintances or strangers will react with a gruff "shut up!" or "nuh uh, that's confusing", but I've found success employing it on family members. Again, people are trained to assume that they're continuous, unified, rational beings[1] so they'll resist any sudden shifts, but a path exists, even if it's a somewhat treacherous one. Sorry for the rant, this has been a central belief of mine ever since I was exposed to it by an incredible undergrad philosophy professor -- definitely check her work out if you found any of this intriguing: https://digitalcommons.lib.uconn.edu/dissertations/1875/ https://digitalcommons.lib.uconn.edu/dissertations/1875/ All of this is sadly moot for people who have been convinced that evidence isn't required because they have a personal infallible connection to a divine force that secretly controls the world. I, too, have no idea what to with those people! [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critique_of_Pure_Reason#The_paralogisms_of_pure_reason https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critique_of_Pure_Reason#The_pa...
orionsbelt 2y ago
Want some practice? What policies?
- nineplay 2y ago
  Pregnant women are dying because they are not getting appropriate medical care. Doctors are unwilling to give pregnant women appropriate care because they may face criminal charges. This is happening directly because of legislation that has been pushed forward exclusively by one political party in this country. So I find it hard to understand how someone can care about women's health and support these policies. I'm flabbergasted that I know parents of daughters who support these policies.
  - wil421 2y ago
    Do you have a source for your claims? I’d like to use them in future, in person, conversations.
    - nineplay 2y ago
      "source for your claims" sounds pretty hand-wavey. So far as I can tell, neither side disputes this. Will a supreme court opinion do? https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/23pdf/23-726_6jgm.pdf https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/23pdf/23-726_6jgm.pdf
  - orionsbelt 2y ago
    I’d be curious (although you don’t have to answer and we can leave it rhetorical if you prefer) - how much is your health really directly at risk here? Are you a woman in a red state planning to have children soon? Or are you in a blue state, and perhaps have already had children? Even if you were in a red state - would you have the means, and would, travel to a blue state if you had an issue? And if not, really, what’s the magnitude of the likelihood this would ever impact you personally? My point here is that I find one of the reasons political disagreement is so bad in the US is the amplification of the media with respect to policies that don’t directly impact you to the degree that some people make it seem like, based on their emotional response. One tends to get more emotional when their safety is directly at risk, as you yourself stated it could harm your safety. But the people I have personally seen express this viewpoint in my life are almost exclusively blue state residing liberal women, many of whom are not going to have more children. Of course, one can feel bad for those that might end up directly affected by these policies and generally decide to support pro abortion candidates, but I think it would perhaps be easier for people to discuss and disagree on the merits of policies if people did not always believe it was a truly personal material policy to them — for example, would you feel the same emotional response debating a Polish person about Polish abortion policies? I also find that many people disagree poorly because they don’t acknowledge that there are pros and cons to almost all policies. You state good reasons to support liberal positions on abortion policies, and I agree with you on those and would prefer the same policies that you do. However, I can understand the following can lead someone to a different view: 1. If you truly believe life begins at conception, then one must weigh the harms to the fetus. Many liberals don’t, and that’s fine, but it’s intellectually dishonest to act like a conservative doesn’t care about pregnant woman and their safety just because they weight the fetus’ life more than you do. 2. The overturn of Roe v Wade was primarily about letting the states decide. Why is that a bad thing? Where do you live? If you have liberal views on this, live in a liberal state. The ones at risk would generally be in the red states, and activists can focus on shifting public opinion in the red states so that local legislatures change their local laws. Enforcing policies across the entire US is also an aspect leading to political division, as people don’t want to do the hard work of changing people’s views and local laws. If you want to argue that Roe v Wade was the right way to advance abortion rights in the US — how would you feel if a Republican court in 4 years made abortion illegal country wide?
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
renewiltord 2y ago
[flagged]
- zeroonetwothree 2y ago
  Didn’t take too long for Godwin’s law
- krapp 2y ago
  >Who’s the intolerant one? It's still the white supremacist fascist who wants to kill all the Jews and gay people.
  - renewiltord 2y ago
    Yeah, but perhaps one might find common ground with them on which football team one supports, or on the subject of the weather. Once the interaction is done, one can write B2B SaaS while the other goes to kill all the Jews and gay people (and perhaps the Communists and Trade Unionists as well if Niemoller is to be believed), both doubtlessly performing acts of equal moral value. In this way, America might be healed and people with different political opinions might get along.

lotsofpulp 2y ago

[flagged]

nineplay 2y ago
That's the problem though right? I think that there are people who are so completely and utterly wrong that I don't know what to do with them. They also think that I am so completely and utterly wrong that they don't know what to do with me. So we don't talk about it.
- shiroiushi 2y ago
  Exactly. To one side, the other side includes (or defends) people who were "trying to dismantle democracy [over] unsubstantiated claims of fraud". To the other side, these rioters were "peaceful protesters" (I guess they never watched the videos) who did nothing wrong. In a nutshell, the two sides simply can't even agree on basic reality. If you can't agree on the basic facts of something, it is not possible to have a fruitful discussion about it. I'm sorry, but I just don't see any kind of workable solution to this issue.
  - lotsofpulp 2y ago
    > To the other side, these rioters were "peaceful protesters" (I guess they never watched the videos) who did nothing wrong. I assume anyone claiming this is lying.
    - shiroiushi 2y ago
      A few people claiming something contrary to readily-available evidence could be explained by lying, but when a significant part of the population does so, it has to be something else.
      - lotsofpulp 2y ago
        I am less hopeful. As I see it, there are a startling amount of people willing to trash the democratic process and dismantle trust in our institutions to accomplish their goals.
        shiroiushi 2y ago
        Sure, but if you look at the stuff they say on that side, they too think that "democracy is in danger" and that only their savior can protect it. It just seems like a case of mass delusion to me, but I'm guessing that in their echo chambers they've come up with some kind of weird logic to explain this. Maybe one of them here could explain it; after all, there are a fair number of these people lurking about on HN.
      - freejazz 2y ago
        So the emperor is wearing clothes?
- bbor 2y ago
  I'm just a rando but here's my unprompted solution: treat your fellow citizens as fallible epistemic machines instead of unified, rational members acting freely within a social contract. The solution to flat earthers (to pick a slightly less divisive topic) is not to engage them in logical debate, but rather help fix the systemic and personal issues that have lead them to develop such an obviously false belief. This obviously calls for some long-term sociopolitical changes to education and journalism (a deadly paradox of chickens and eggs...), but in the context of this specific conversation, I think it would call for finding common ground with your adversaries and working up from there via the Socratic method. You'll never convince someone who's not completely tuned-out to change their stance on an upcoming presidential election in a single conversation, but I think there's more room for agreement than is assumed. We all want to be healthy, wealthy, and wise, and we all intuitively agree that evidence is the basis of belief -- even something as cartoonishly evil as belief in racial supremacy is based in benign intentions corrupted by unclear/dishonestly-presented evidence, if you dig down deep enough. Practically, besides the Socratic method (framing the conversation as collaborative investigation rather than adversarial interpretation), this might mean asking some different questions than the burning ones we'd like to phrase. Beating around the bush, if you will. It's an incredibly frustrating task to be sure, but anyone who's worked with children knows that it's sometimes necessary. Perhaps; "Why do you think the election was stolen?" --> "I love Democracy, too, I just haven't seen any evidence of fraud that I've found convincing, yet; can we talk about specific pieces of evidence convinced you, and find where our disagreements begin? Maybe even quantify our levels of relative uncertainty on each?" "Why do you think immigrants are dangerous?" --> "I'm sure we're both proud of the Statue of Liberty and the freedom of action and belief it represents, and we would have never been large enough of an economy to meaningfully effect WWII with just the 13 colonies and their descendants. What are some policies you think could bring us back to that ideal? Are there any non-Americans in the world that you would welcome as compatriots today, and if not, what specifically do you think has changed?" Etc. This is admittedly just smuggling philosophy back into our discourse, so a lot of acquaintances or strangers will react with a gruff "shut up!" or "nuh uh, that's confusing", but I've found success employing it on family members. Again, people are trained to assume that they're continuous, unified, rational beings[1] so they'll resist any sudden shifts, but a path exists, even if it's a somewhat treacherous one. Sorry for the rant, this has been a central belief of mine ever since I was exposed to it by an incredible undergrad philosophy professor -- definitely check her work out if you found any of this intriguing: https://digitalcommons.lib.uconn.edu/dissertations/1875/ https://digitalcommons.lib.uconn.edu/dissertations/1875/ All of this is sadly moot for people who have been convinced that evidence isn't required because they have a personal infallible connection to a divine force that secretly controls the world. I, too, have no idea what to with those people! [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critique_of_Pure_Reason#The_paralogisms_of_pure_reason https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critique_of_Pure_Reason#The_pa...

orionsbelt 2y ago

Want some practice? What policies?

nineplay 2y ago
Pregnant women are dying because they are not getting appropriate medical care. Doctors are unwilling to give pregnant women appropriate care because they may face criminal charges. This is happening directly because of legislation that has been pushed forward exclusively by one political party in this country. So I find it hard to understand how someone can care about women's health and support these policies. I'm flabbergasted that I know parents of daughters who support these policies.
- wil421 2y ago
  Do you have a source for your claims? I’d like to use them in future, in person, conversations.
  - nineplay 2y ago
    "source for your claims" sounds pretty hand-wavey. So far as I can tell, neither side disputes this. Will a supreme court opinion do? https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/23pdf/23-726_6jgm.pdf https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/23pdf/23-726_6jgm.pdf
- orionsbelt 2y ago
  I’d be curious (although you don’t have to answer and we can leave it rhetorical if you prefer) - how much is your health really directly at risk here? Are you a woman in a red state planning to have children soon? Or are you in a blue state, and perhaps have already had children? Even if you were in a red state - would you have the means, and would, travel to a blue state if you had an issue? And if not, really, what’s the magnitude of the likelihood this would ever impact you personally? My point here is that I find one of the reasons political disagreement is so bad in the US is the amplification of the media with respect to policies that don’t directly impact you to the degree that some people make it seem like, based on their emotional response. One tends to get more emotional when their safety is directly at risk, as you yourself stated it could harm your safety. But the people I have personally seen express this viewpoint in my life are almost exclusively blue state residing liberal women, many of whom are not going to have more children. Of course, one can feel bad for those that might end up directly affected by these policies and generally decide to support pro abortion candidates, but I think it would perhaps be easier for people to discuss and disagree on the merits of policies if people did not always believe it was a truly personal material policy to them — for example, would you feel the same emotional response debating a Polish person about Polish abortion policies? I also find that many people disagree poorly because they don’t acknowledge that there are pros and cons to almost all policies. You state good reasons to support liberal positions on abortion policies, and I agree with you on those and would prefer the same policies that you do. However, I can understand the following can lead someone to a different view: 1. If you truly believe life begins at conception, then one must weigh the harms to the fetus. Many liberals don’t, and that’s fine, but it’s intellectually dishonest to act like a conservative doesn’t care about pregnant woman and their safety just because they weight the fetus’ life more than you do. 2. The overturn of Roe v Wade was primarily about letting the states decide. Why is that a bad thing? Where do you live? If you have liberal views on this, live in a liberal state. The ones at risk would generally be in the red states, and activists can focus on shifting public opinion in the red states so that local legislatures change their local laws. Enforcing policies across the entire US is also an aspect leading to political division, as people don’t want to do the hard work of changing people’s views and local laws. If you want to argue that Roe v Wade was the right way to advance abortion rights in the US — how would you feel if a Republican court in 4 years made abortion illegal country wide?

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

renewiltord 2y ago

[flagged]

zeroonetwothree 2y ago
Didn’t take too long for Godwin’s law
krapp 2y ago
>Who’s the intolerant one? It's still the white supremacist fascist who wants to kill all the Jews and gay people.
- renewiltord 2y ago
  Yeah, but perhaps one might find common ground with them on which football team one supports, or on the subject of the weather. Once the interaction is done, one can write B2B SaaS while the other goes to kill all the Jews and gay people (and perhaps the Communists and Trade Unionists as well if Niemoller is to be believed), both doubtlessly performing acts of equal moral value. In this way, America might be healed and people with different political opinions might get along.