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> People have different beliefs because they're being fed different information, and the media promotes different salience of those beliefs. Well that’s an unj
by avazhi 5d ago
> People have different beliefs because they're being fed different information, and the media promotes different salience of those beliefs.
Well that’s an unjustifiably negative view of the population’s capacity for agency and downplays local social dynamics, and also I’d suggest you are overstating how much influence the media has on personal beliefs.
> The question of whether it matters more that a few trans kids play sports (and it really is less than a dozen nationally!) than large areas of the world running out of petrol (_not_ the US, but former US ally Pakistan is really not doing OK).
Yes, to conservatives boys playing girls sports (whether it’s one or a thousand examples) is a bigger deal than Pakistan’s domestic situation because to them it is Exhibit A of America’s cultural decline and if you can’t at least understand how and why they think that (nobody said you have to agree with it) then you’ve just proven the point of the person you were replying to. Perceived cultural and societal decline is far more important to the citizen of any particular country compared to something happening on the actual opposite side of the world to a society that is nothing like, and has no connection to, their own. What happens in his own society to its values, customs, and beliefs will definitely directly affect a citizen of that society and his children. What’s happening to the Pakistanis won’t.
- pjc50 5d ago> Perceived cultural and societal decline Yes, but the key word here is percieved. Almost any form of change can be sold as decline under that rubric. People who objected to Loving v Virginia legalizing interracial marriage probably called it "societal decline". Certainly we got that with legalization of gay marriage. Both of those continued to become more popular after the legal change. People hate change. A lot of people hate those who are different from them. That does not mean we should respect those particular beliefs. Anyway, as gasoline prices continue to tick up we shall see what price people put on the culture war.
- avazhi 5d ago> That does not mean we should respect those particular beliefs. From an evolutionary perspective it makes a lot more sense to, at least prima facie, prefer an established and longstanding custom than to embrace the brand new. Not saying we should all become Luddites, but in any culture long-standing and deeply held beliefs have served some purpose, logically, that contributed to a society's continued stability. And sure, people will pay attention to gasoline price increases that directly affect them, as opposed to increases in gas prices on the other side of the globe, obviously.
- Zigurd 5d ago> From an evolutionary perspective it makes a lot more sense to, at least prima facie, prefer an established and longstanding custom than to embrace the brand new. Americans are particularly susceptible to taking comfort in this idea, simply because America is big enough that they can. But even Americans are ill served by ignoring large scale trends: urbanization, cosmopolitanism, the rise of women in elite positions and broadly as more educated in the population in general, etc. These trends are bigger and operate unopposed on a global scale. If you think in terms of red and blue teams sloshing back-and-forth, you're going to get blindsided.
- avazhi 5d ago> rise of women in elite positions and broadly as more educated in the population in general, etc. Actually this is isolated to Europe. Russia, Africa, Asia (particularly China), the Middle East, America, and South America don’t subscribe to this nonsense, particularly in the business (not necessarily political) arena. And last I checked Europeans can’t even fill their girl quotas because it turns out most girls have no interest in leading or sitting on the board of a company. So don’t pretend like whatever this is is inexorably taking over the world. As a pretty funny aside, in Australia the biggest corporate fuckups of the past 10 years have been overseen by women (Optus, Auspost). So inexorable. When impostor syndrome comes true, you might say.
- nostrademons 5d agoAs a side note, this thread is a prime example of the point I was making: that people are stuck on the object level of "what should a society's values be?", rather than being able to zoom out to the meta level of "there are different groups that all have different sincerely-held beliefs about what a society's values should be, and each of them believes their version of reality is righteous and inevitable."
- Zigurd 5d agoHalf of university graduates in India and China are women now. The percentage is higher in GCC nations.
- marsmaps 5d ago> What happens in his own society to its values, customs, and beliefs will definitely directly affect a citizen of that society and his children. What’s happening to the Pakistanis won’t. this is the kind of thing one has to be american to actually come up with and write down
- avazhi 5d agoNeither American nor (mercifully) european. But congrats on managing to pull out the ad hominem and being wrong to boot, that takes special skill.