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> This is a strawman. No, someone who says "you probably think" is not thereby strawmanning. This is an attempt to guess what someone else's position is (grant

> This is a strawman. No, someone who says "you probably think" is not thereby strawmanning. This is an attempt to guess what someone else's position is (granted, guesses like this are often not very charitable, but that in turn often results from a genuine inability to understand the other side). A strawman is when someone goes on to argue against that position without waiting for confirmation. GP's argument goes on to justify the quote. The justification does not depend on whether the guess about GGP's position was correct. > The statement is otherwise implying that a pot smoker should be denigrated, and a WNBA player should be denigrated, and a black person should be denigrated, and a lesbian should be denigrated No, it is not. It is lamenting that a WNBA player may be (in Kirk's view) praised more than a USM despite (in his view) a lesser achievement, and in spite of smoking pot, because of a system that (in his view) treats black people and lesbians preferentially. I give thanks here to GP for the context, which makes it entirely clear why Kirk would hold this view and give this specific object example. It also makes it obvious why my view of the statement is correct, but I already knew it would be something like this anyway before seeing the context. In fact, I wrote the above before reading GP. (In fact, I also realized this going in; qv https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45233308 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45233308 .) It's very easy to understand things like this by understanding the fundamentals of the arguments being made and policies being proposed (here, something like an objection to "DEI") and considering the speaker's statement within the speaker's own evidenced framework of morals and values, rather than your own. You appear to think, fundamentally, in terms of whether groups are being "hated" or described as superior or inferior. Someone like Kirk thought, from what I could tell, fundamentally, in terms of whether rules are being applied consistently and fairly to groups, and about whether the rules are acceptable in the abstract.

lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 1y ago
> No, it is not. It's a dog whistle. You're falling for the plausible deniability. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dog_whistle_(politics) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dog_whistle_(politics)
- zahlman 1y ago
  > It's a dog whistle. What is asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence. My evidence is that my interpretation is consistent with many other things I have learned about viewpoints like Kirk's, from observing him and others over a period of many years. It is not a matter of "plausible deniability"; my interpretation is plainly and straightforwardly the one that makes the most sense to me, by far. As noted upthread, the example also clearly maps to a specific object example. Your reading, meanwhile, requires transforming a rhetorical question about whether someone should be "treated better" than someone whom Kirk clearly sees as highly virtuous, into a claim that every single aspect described of that person is a basis for denigration. That is supremely uncharitable and frankly implausible.
  - lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 1y ago
    > Your reading, meanwhile, requires transforming a rhetorical question about whether someone should be "treated better" than someone whom Kirk clearly sees as highly virtuous, into a claim that every single aspect described of that person is a basis for denigration. That is supremely uncharitable and frankly implausible. That's kinda wild. You've not seen much of the anti- black, female, gay, and/or drug-using rhetoric that people use. It is an obvious dog whistle.
    - zahlman 1y ago
      > You've not seen much Yes, I have. People have been shoving it in my face for probably close to 20 years. Overwhelmingly, it simply is not what it is represented as being. And where people have expressed that kind of bigotry, it very clearly works very differently.
      - lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 1y ago
        > Yes, I have. People have been shoving it in my face for probably close to 20 years. > Overwhelmingly, it simply is not what it is represented as being. I find these statements so juxtaposed to be rather interesting. I can see that you are not representing this as it is.

lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 1y ago

> No, it is not. It's a dog whistle. You're falling for the plausible deniability. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dog_whistle_(politics) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dog_whistle_(politics)

zahlman 1y ago
> It's a dog whistle. What is asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence. My evidence is that my interpretation is consistent with many other things I have learned about viewpoints like Kirk's, from observing him and others over a period of many years. It is not a matter of "plausible deniability"; my interpretation is plainly and straightforwardly the one that makes the most sense to me, by far. As noted upthread, the example also clearly maps to a specific object example. Your reading, meanwhile, requires transforming a rhetorical question about whether someone should be "treated better" than someone whom Kirk clearly sees as highly virtuous, into a claim that every single aspect described of that person is a basis for denigration. That is supremely uncharitable and frankly implausible.
- lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 1y ago
  > Your reading, meanwhile, requires transforming a rhetorical question about whether someone should be "treated better" than someone whom Kirk clearly sees as highly virtuous, into a claim that every single aspect described of that person is a basis for denigration. That is supremely uncharitable and frankly implausible. That's kinda wild. You've not seen much of the anti- black, female, gay, and/or drug-using rhetoric that people use. It is an obvious dog whistle.
  - zahlman 1y ago
    > You've not seen much Yes, I have. People have been shoving it in my face for probably close to 20 years. Overwhelmingly, it simply is not what it is represented as being. And where people have expressed that kind of bigotry, it very clearly works very differently.
    - lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 1y ago
      > Yes, I have. People have been shoving it in my face for probably close to 20 years. > Overwhelmingly, it simply is not what it is represented as being. I find these statements so juxtaposed to be rather interesting. I can see that you are not representing this as it is.