4 ms·

It's an interesting piece. Makes one think about all those folks that have a lot of pride and vanity for a place that they had no control over being born in. Th

It's an interesting piece. Makes one think about all those folks that have a lot of pride and vanity for a place that they had no control over being born in. The luck of the draw. And very likely had very little to do with the current state of the place. Pride at age 21? Meaningless vanity, like being proud of being born with a silver spoon. Pride at age 80? Sure, if it was a life well-lived.

gopperl 6mo ago
[flagged]
- ninjagoo 6mo ago
  > There's no luck involved in the fact that you were born to your parents, as they were to theirs. Are you claiming to have controlled where and to whom you were born? You did not choose your parents, country, ancestry, class, era, genes, language, or inherited institutions. You may be inseparable from those facts, but you did not earn them. > There's no luck involved in the fact that you were born to your parents > we were so fortunate to inherit from them. These two statements appear to be contradictory. > It is right to be proud of the achievements of your ancestors And what was your contribution to those achievements to justify this pride? You have to be careful to not fall into the trap of borrowed glory: treating an ancestor’s achievement as your own personal merit, or using ancestry to rank yourself above others. > toiled and strived to deliver the place that we were so fortunate to inherit > our responsibility to defend and improve that place for the coming generations of our people. Are you implying that the place belongs more fully to descendants of earlier inhabitants than to newer members of the community? So then Native Americans have a stronger claim than European descendants? Or is that a standard to only be applied moving forward? That's also like the caste system in India: only children of brahmins can be brahmins, children of shudras can only be shudras. One is superior to another by inheritance, not merit. That's ugly and abhorrent. > It is right to be proud of the achievements of your ancestors Are you then also ashamed of their crimes?
  - gopperl 6mo ago
    [flagged]
    - ninjagoo 6mo ago
      >> Are you claiming to have controlled where and to whom you were born? > My parents did. Their parents did. My children will. But not you >> you did not earn them > My parents did. Their parents did. My children will. But not you > Everything I have today has been hard-earned by my ancestors. But not by you > Everything my children have will be hard-earned by my ancestors and I. *We* earned them. LoL
    - kelnos 6mo ago
      > I can feel 'fortunate' that my parents got me the bike I really wanted for Christmas, but there's no randomness in my parents working overtime and budgeting responsibly that made it possible. Correct. But there is randomness, or luck, or whatever you want to call it, that you were born to parents who worked overtime and budgeted responsibly so that you could have nice things. You could just have easily been born to parents who were lazy and irresponsible, and couldn't give you nice things. > I am a part of the same collective, the long and continued story of my people. Sure, but you did not contribute to the achievements of your ancestors. You will (and/or have) presumably achieve things on your own, built on top of your ancestors' achievements, and pass that legacy to your children. But that's something different. Be (non-arrogantly) proud of your own achievements, because you had a hand in them. > You have to be careful not to fall into the trap of nihilistic individualism. You are part of something much bigger than yourself. I don't think anyone is disagreeing with that. But being a part of something doesn't mean that you've personally done something. I didn't do the things my ancestors did to get me to where I am today. I'm grateful, as I would probably not be happy doing many of the things they had to do. And I hope any children I may have will be grateful to me for the same reasons (but that also would depend on me actually being a good parent to them; I don't just get it for free). Re: that penultimate paragraph... oof, I'm struggling with what to say here. While yes, the vast majority of the modern USA was built by the colonizers and not the natives who came before, we need to temper our enthusiasm for our achievements with an acknowledgement of the barbaric actions of our ancestors who came to the New World and deceived, sickened, and slaughtered those who already lived there. > Isn't it funny how we are supposed to recoil in shame and horror with the constant reminders of the worst parts of our people's history, yet we are condemned for also proudly owning our best? I don't think that condemnation is as strong as you think it is, and your aversion to it is worrying. As I said, our best is tempered with acknowledgement of our worst. Be proud, if you must, of what you, personally, have accomplished. Look on the accomplishments of others (both contemporary and long-dead) with awe and respect, as appropriate. Acknowledge that many of those accomplishments involved slave labor, murder, and other atrocities. Vow to work toward your own future accomplishments in only moral and ethical ways. You correctly state that we are part of something much bigger than ourselves. Some of that "something" is good, and some of that "something" is bad. And everything in between. We have to live with all parts, and learn from both the good and the bad.
- kelnos 6mo ago
  I think that kind of pride is pointless and unproductive. I think it is right to be grateful to your ancestors for their achievements in ultimately giving you the life that you have. But proud? Hubris lies down that path. Re: luck, yes, it is absolutely luck that you were born to the parents you were born to, located in the place you were born in. I think you have the sense of the luck direction flipped from what GP meant. If you look at it from the perspective of your ancestors, then sure, your birth wasn't luck: it was a choice (or an accident, I suppose). But from the perspective of you, it's luck: you didn't get to choose the circumstances surrounding your birth. You got lucky in that sense; you could have instead had bad luck and been born on the streets in a third-world country to a drug-addicted single parent with no money and no prospects.
  - gopperl 6mo ago
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    - haritha-j 6mo ago
      And of course, your viewpoint, when zoomed out, can be weaponised as a justification for getting rid of orphanages. Those kids aren't unlucky, they should be ashamed of being parentless, as an extension of those parents that decided to give them up. How dare my tax money be used to feed them, that I and my ancestors worked hard for?
arduanika 6mo ago
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- ninjagoo 6mo ago
  > This is a core tenet of the Rawlsian religion, of which you are a (probably unwitting) fanatic. Ouch. How warped does one's thinking have to be to call "A theory of justice" (1971) for pluralistic, democratic societies, a "religion"? It seems to me that right-wingers love hyperbole and rhetoric, without addressing the meat of the matter. Your post is no different, being entirely free of reason. A good day to you, Sir.
  - arduanika 6mo ago
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- kelnos 6mo ago
  Such anger and contempt, for no good reason. If we're going to be calling names, I think the "twelve-year-old" moniker fits your attitude better.
  - arduanika 6mo ago
    It's only "for no good reason" if you think art doesn't matter.
- pjc50 6mo ago
  .. what?

gopperl 6mo ago

[flagged]

ninjagoo 6mo ago
> There's no luck involved in the fact that you were born to your parents, as they were to theirs. Are you claiming to have controlled where and to whom you were born? You did not choose your parents, country, ancestry, class, era, genes, language, or inherited institutions. You may be inseparable from those facts, but you did not earn them. > There's no luck involved in the fact that you were born to your parents > we were so fortunate to inherit from them. These two statements appear to be contradictory. > It is right to be proud of the achievements of your ancestors And what was your contribution to those achievements to justify this pride? You have to be careful to not fall into the trap of borrowed glory: treating an ancestor’s achievement as your own personal merit, or using ancestry to rank yourself above others. > toiled and strived to deliver the place that we were so fortunate to inherit > our responsibility to defend and improve that place for the coming generations of our people. Are you implying that the place belongs more fully to descendants of earlier inhabitants than to newer members of the community? So then Native Americans have a stronger claim than European descendants? Or is that a standard to only be applied moving forward? That's also like the caste system in India: only children of brahmins can be brahmins, children of shudras can only be shudras. One is superior to another by inheritance, not merit. That's ugly and abhorrent. > It is right to be proud of the achievements of your ancestors Are you then also ashamed of their crimes?
- gopperl 6mo ago
  [flagged]
  - ninjagoo 6mo ago
    >> Are you claiming to have controlled where and to whom you were born? > My parents did. Their parents did. My children will. But not you >> you did not earn them > My parents did. Their parents did. My children will. But not you > Everything I have today has been hard-earned by my ancestors. But not by you > Everything my children have will be hard-earned by my ancestors and I. *We* earned them. LoL
  - kelnos 6mo ago
    > I can feel 'fortunate' that my parents got me the bike I really wanted for Christmas, but there's no randomness in my parents working overtime and budgeting responsibly that made it possible. Correct. But there is randomness, or luck, or whatever you want to call it, that you were born to parents who worked overtime and budgeted responsibly so that you could have nice things. You could just have easily been born to parents who were lazy and irresponsible, and couldn't give you nice things. > I am a part of the same collective, the long and continued story of my people. Sure, but you did not contribute to the achievements of your ancestors. You will (and/or have) presumably achieve things on your own, built on top of your ancestors' achievements, and pass that legacy to your children. But that's something different. Be (non-arrogantly) proud of your own achievements, because you had a hand in them. > You have to be careful not to fall into the trap of nihilistic individualism. You are part of something much bigger than yourself. I don't think anyone is disagreeing with that. But being a part of something doesn't mean that you've personally done something. I didn't do the things my ancestors did to get me to where I am today. I'm grateful, as I would probably not be happy doing many of the things they had to do. And I hope any children I may have will be grateful to me for the same reasons (but that also would depend on me actually being a good parent to them; I don't just get it for free). Re: that penultimate paragraph... oof, I'm struggling with what to say here. While yes, the vast majority of the modern USA was built by the colonizers and not the natives who came before, we need to temper our enthusiasm for our achievements with an acknowledgement of the barbaric actions of our ancestors who came to the New World and deceived, sickened, and slaughtered those who already lived there. > Isn't it funny how we are supposed to recoil in shame and horror with the constant reminders of the worst parts of our people's history, yet we are condemned for also proudly owning our best? I don't think that condemnation is as strong as you think it is, and your aversion to it is worrying. As I said, our best is tempered with acknowledgement of our worst. Be proud, if you must, of what you, personally, have accomplished. Look on the accomplishments of others (both contemporary and long-dead) with awe and respect, as appropriate. Acknowledge that many of those accomplishments involved slave labor, murder, and other atrocities. Vow to work toward your own future accomplishments in only moral and ethical ways. You correctly state that we are part of something much bigger than ourselves. Some of that "something" is good, and some of that "something" is bad. And everything in between. We have to live with all parts, and learn from both the good and the bad.
kelnos 6mo ago
I think that kind of pride is pointless and unproductive. I think it is right to be grateful to your ancestors for their achievements in ultimately giving you the life that you have. But proud? Hubris lies down that path. Re: luck, yes, it is absolutely luck that you were born to the parents you were born to, located in the place you were born in. I think you have the sense of the luck direction flipped from what GP meant. If you look at it from the perspective of your ancestors, then sure, your birth wasn't luck: it was a choice (or an accident, I suppose). But from the perspective of you, it's luck: you didn't get to choose the circumstances surrounding your birth. You got lucky in that sense; you could have instead had bad luck and been born on the streets in a third-world country to a drug-addicted single parent with no money and no prospects.
- gopperl 6mo ago
  [flagged]
  - haritha-j 6mo ago
    And of course, your viewpoint, when zoomed out, can be weaponised as a justification for getting rid of orphanages. Those kids aren't unlucky, they should be ashamed of being parentless, as an extension of those parents that decided to give them up. How dare my tax money be used to feed them, that I and my ancestors worked hard for?

arduanika 6mo ago

[flagged]

ninjagoo 6mo ago
> This is a core tenet of the Rawlsian religion, of which you are a (probably unwitting) fanatic. Ouch. How warped does one's thinking have to be to call "A theory of justice" (1971) for pluralistic, democratic societies, a "religion"? It seems to me that right-wingers love hyperbole and rhetoric, without addressing the meat of the matter. Your post is no different, being entirely free of reason. A good day to you, Sir.
- arduanika 6mo ago
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kelnos 6mo ago
Such anger and contempt, for no good reason. If we're going to be calling names, I think the "twelve-year-old" moniker fits your attitude better.
- arduanika 6mo ago
  It's only "for no good reason" if you think art doesn't matter.
pjc50 6mo ago
.. what?