The Glade 4.0

Fairly certain Midgen thinks your actual view is that this thread and those videos are a venue for disingenuously bashing Republicans or "conservatives" or "Tea Partiers" or "whoever else isn't sucking Democrat wang" ...

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RD, have you considered, with your abortion counter-example, that nobody here has leapt to the boards and posted a thread, "This is what's wrong with the Democratic base" that smugly declares "They're cheering baby-killing!!!"?

I may find the cheering more distasteful, in that example, because I believe they're in the wrong. However, I don't find it to be a moral failing of the cheerers. I just feel they aren't applying sound judgement to the root argument to come up with what I, admittedly, feel is a pretty clear moral answer.

In other words, I (and, I presume, a host of other conservatives who have ALSO not posted on the internet in the way that you have with this thread) am more than willing to consider that they're good people who have come to bad conclusions through unsound logic, or emotional biases, or what have you, while trying to support a "right" thing. You, with this thread, have soundly denounced the cheerers (and some vaguely defined, but no doubt massive, group of their peers) as morally depraved and blood-lusty blights on humanity.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

Isn't that what your thread title implies?

Yes, that's pretty much what I think you think...

Kaffis has a pretty solid point, I think.

Yes, conservatives on the internet generally and on this board in particular positively ooze respect and open-mindedness toward liberals, Dems, Obama-supporters, etc., whereas I, as is my wont according to Khross and Nitefox, have yet again launched into a tirade of liberal hatred toward all those who disagree with me.

To quote Jon Stewart: "That is, if I may say, some of the most free-range, organically grown, disingenuous, ideologically-marinated unself-awareness I've ever seen in the wild!"

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/wed-july-27-2011/gop---special-victims-unit

Snark aside, I actually think you're a fair-minded guy, Kaffis, but my thread is literally the only one in at least the last month taking a shot at the right instead of the left. Was the thread title blunt? Sure, but my critique was targetted ("Republican base" not conservatives or the Right generally, not all Republicans or anyone who supports Republicans) and rationally expressed (not calling people "knob-slobberers," "idiots," "douchebags," or "**** dirtbags"); I addressed the substance of counterarguments instead of just dismissing them as bias, condescension and hand-waving; I acknowledged the applicability of the criticism to people on my own end of the ideological spectrum instead of leaping to their defense; and so on. I'm sorry, but claiming that this thread is somehow beyond the pale by comparison to the commentary from folks on the conservative end of the spectrum is really ludicrous.

I disagree. I think the parade of antipathy toward Dems, the Left, Obama, Obama-supporters, etc. here has just become so constant and so one-sided that it's perceived as background noise now. Also, conservatives/Republicans/etc. these days are among the most thin-skinned folks out there. Seriously, the only two groups I reliably offend on the internet are hardcore feminists and hardcore conservatives, and in both cases all that's really required is to criticize them (or anyone they identify with) from an out-group perspective.

I think the idea that conservatives or Republicans are thin skinned in relation to the left is absolutely hilarious. As for one-sided, it may be one-sided here on this board, but there ar plenty of boards where its far more one sided in either direction, and its hardly one-sided in society at large.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

Well, that certainly didn't help your argument...

For **** sake ...

CLICK HERE AND READ THE GOD DAMNED ESSAY

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Khross,

You've linked to this many times. It is very hard to read because the author writes with a non-standard style. He also uses many obscure terms and references and it would require research just to understand what he's saying, like reading a document from the 1800s.

GOOMH!

"I cheer the idea that the government should allow X to occur" is a distinctly different position than "I want X to occur" or "I believe that X is good".

(fair warning - long post is loooooong)

RD:

What Kaffis brings up is exactly why I asked the question. There are, I'm sure, at least some people who really do support the pro-choice position because they think that abortion is, in general, a great idea and morally good. I don't, however, believe that the vast majority of people who are pro-choice think that way. Probably that base is pretty evenly divided on whether or not abortion is even morally neutral, and it's fair to say that a good number of them believe that it's a bad thing and yet feel that the government should nevertheless allow it, at least in the presently allowable circumstances.

"You're pro-choice? ZOMG you support baby-killing!" is a hasty generalization and thus an unfair criticism of (IMHO) a significant portion of that group. The pro-choice position may, in and of itself, still be morally wrong, but for entirely different reasons than the one claimed.

By parallel, your criticism regarding the health care issue is largely misplaced. No doubt there are some people in that camp who really do engage in "smug schadenfreude", but it's quite thoroughly unfair to project that onto the entire group.

I suppose you are at least apparently consistent about how you apply this reasoning, though. Nevertheless, I think you're wrong in both cases. The more I think on it, I believe the fundamental difference of opinion here is actually one of the cornerstones of libertarian thought -- maybe even the very "core" itself. Ultimately what we're really talking about is as simple as:

"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it."

There is, at the core, a separation between "what should be allowed" and "what I think is (morally or pragmatically) good". The more (hypothetical) examples of this that I rattle off, the more familiar this all starts to look:

"I think that the failure of big corporations is a bad thing, but I believe that the government should permit it." (i.e. not bail them out)

"I think that homosexuality is wrong, but I strongly believe that gay marriage should be legal."

"I believe that not helping/not doing more to help the poor is morally repugnant, but I support your right not to do it."

"I believe that destroying your body with drugs is wrong, but I support their legalization."

"I think that guns are dangerous, violent instruments, but I defend your right to own/use them."

You either "grok" this philosophical pattern or you don't. Once it starts to click with you that [supporting liberty] and [supporting all of the things that other people are going to do with liberty] are not the same thing, your entire outlook necessarily changes. Once you accept that you aren't morally responsible for Bob's choices, you start to realize that there's no conflict of interest between you supporting Bob's right to make his own choices and your own personal moral/economic/social compass. It's hard to let go of that need for control at first, but it gets easier with time.

If you don't get it, then, well .... You choose your sacred cows from the (obviously incomplete) list above and your particular herd of cows will define you as either "left", "right", or "centrist". But if you do get it, any combination of the above is equally arbitrary and nonsensical. And this is why, in case you've never understood it, those of the libertarian mindset have a tendency to say that the political left and right (and for that matter the center) as they are presented in "main stream" American politics are really the same thing. We understand that substantively the Deomcratic platform and the Republican platform are comprised of a different set of control issues. But in either case, it's functionally the same thing -- forcing the rest of the world to conform to your particular vision of how they should live their lives rather than letting them chose for themselves.

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Sail forth! steer for the deep waters only!
Reckless, O soul, exploring, I with thee, and thou with me;
For we are bound where mariner has not yet dared to go,
And we will risk the ship, ourselves and all.

*chuckle* Ok, I will do so tonight. For now, I'll just lay down a marker and say that in my view, the current Republican base in in the process of morphing into a mixture of radical anti-government sentiment and white, southern (or southern diasposra) nationalism and cultural populism. Basically, remnants of the John Birch society and the old Dixiecrats two generations removed and mixed into a partisan, post-modernist stew.

Good freaking Lord...

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"It is true that democracy undermines freedom when voters believe they can live off of others' productivity, when they modify the commandment: 'Thou shalt not steal, except by majority vote.' The politics of plunder is no doubt destructive of both morality and the division of labor."

That hole you keep digging is getting deeper and deeper...

You might consider upgrading your shovel to a backhoe...

I agree that one-sidedness is far worse (in either direction) on other boards. I believe the thin-skinned thing is less crazy than you might think, though. The right has really embraced victim politics with both arms in recent years. Hell, even on this board, in this very thread, how often do people get defensive and complain about conservatives being unfairly maligned by liberals?

If so, it's because it was learned from the masters on the left.

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"It is true that democracy undermines freedom when voters believe they can live off of others' productivity, when they modify the commandment: 'Thou shalt not steal, except by majority vote.' The politics of plunder is no doubt destructive of both morality and the division of labor."

Still haven't said what you think/claim I said, though, Midgen. Do I have a generally low opinion of the Republican base? Yep. Do I think they give insufficient moral and emotional weight to uninsured people dying of preventable causes? Yep. Do I think they just like letting uninsured people die for shits and giggles because they're evil, bloodthirsty bastards? Nope. Do I think most/many people on this board are part of the Republican base? Nope. Do I think libertarians generally are part of the Republican base? Nope. Do I think most Republicans are equivalent to the party base? Nope.

So, basically, I'm just saying there's a particular minority (maybe 20%) of hardcore Republican voters who suck *** on this particular point.

But that's not what you said in the title of this thread...

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"It is true that democracy undermines freedom when voters believe they can live off of others' productivity, when they modify the commandment: 'Thou shalt not steal, except by majority vote.' The politics of plunder is no doubt destructive of both morality and the division of labor."

Now you're just makin' **** up...

Yes and no. The Left's use of the victim card in the 80s and 90s was pretty epic, and the Right jumped on the bandwagon, but the roots of victim-card politics on the Right go back at least to Nixon's "silent majority" schtick and the southern persecution complex it tapped into.

That's exactly what I said in the thread title: "This is what's wrong with the Republican base."

"This" is a particular point. "Republican base" is a particular minority of hardcore Republican voters.

The left's use of the victim card is still the top dog in the yard. Your a blind moron if you think otherwise.

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"It is true that democracy undermines freedom when voters believe they can live off of others' productivity, when they modify the commandment: 'Thou shalt not steal, except by majority vote.' The politics of plunder is no doubt destructive of both morality and the division of labor."

Ahh I see. Totally get it now. You just have no idea who the republican base is.

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"It is true that democracy undermines freedom when voters believe they can live off of others' productivity, when they modify the commandment: 'Thou shalt not steal, except by majority vote.' The politics of plunder is no doubt destructive of both morality and the division of labor."

Humans love to control others. It is very unlikely that once someone is in their 30's that their brains remain plastic enough to radically change their perception of their role in the world (which is usually "to get others to be more like me").

Liberty is so rare because humans tend to be lazy and petty.

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"...but there exists also in the human heart a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to attempt to lower the powerful to their own level and reduces men to prefer equality in slavery to inequality with freedom." - De Tocqueville

Is this yours? I like it.