ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
No bio...
User ID: 2935
My intuition is that free speech, like many things, is something that works well in a culturally homogeneous society, and begins to break apart otherwise*. When the majority are basically on the same page about most things of real importance, you can tolerate a small group of weirdos ranting about blacks/gays/Jews/or whatever. When you have multiple cultures, some with very strong group-consciousness, free speech easily becomes abusable as a tool to direct aggression towards other communities in a zero-state competition for state benefits and favours. The UK is the obvious example of this: Muslims routinely use freedom of speech to organise thousands of young aggressive men to march around cities intimidating anyone they don't like into hiding away. OTOH, counter-protestors having the freedom of speech to express their dislike of this situation will cause outbreaks of violence with the aforementioned groups that will quickly escalate beyond what the state can handle, hence why they just simply deny this right to the less-favoured group.
*The obvious counter-example is the US, which is certainly more diverse than almost anywhere else by most metrics. I think they get away with it as the sheer scale of the country means that even if two groups of people want to kill each other, while they're living thousands of miles apart there's little chance of large-scale violence occurring.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
2mo ago
I honestly thought RFK was the libertarian party candidate.
My deep political offline conversation with the average committed right-winger is kind of like "Hey man, we don't agree but whatever, it's fun talking about this stuff". My deep political offline conversation with the average committed left-winger consists of me trying to get them to question their ideas while gingerly ballet-leaping my way over the various minefields that, if I stepped on, would cause them to classify me as Adolf Hitler. Don't get me wrong, I also often just straightforwardly speak my mind with leftists in the mode of just "chatting about politics for fun", and this has not brought me any harm. Most leftists I know in person are not about to go report me to the thought police, they are not totalitarian. What I mean is that in those occasional really deep political conversations that one engages in, the ones where both people actually care about talking about the politics in a meaningful way rather than doing it just for fun or to vent, I have found that right-wingers are generally more easily accepting of disagreement, whereas with left-wingers you have to slowly seduce them into letting go of their instinct to assume that your disagreements with them mean that you are Hitler.
I've also noticed this - I don't know how much is really down to right wingers being inherently more accepting of differing POVS as opposed to the fact that in young, educated circles leftism is the default and being willing to share right-views necessarily means having to be able to tolerate aggressive pushback.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
2mo ago
So did the Japanese. Before the invasion of China and WWII, the Japanese were known for being exemplary in their treatment of civilians and POWs. Things can change a lot in a decade or two.
Is there a simple explanation of why the Japanese changed so much in this regard over such a short time period?
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
2mo ago
AFAIK nuclear powers tend to want to avoid proliferation, even among their allies.
think the underlying problem might be not so much that women find stable reliable guys unattractive, it's that largely because of economic changes, it's become harder to become a stable reliable guy than it used to be. It is hard to be stable and reliable if you are struggling just to get a decent job and pay the rent. These days you can't just go to the factory and shake the foreman's hand, now you kind of have to either become a white collar guy or really succeed in the trades. In my experience of observing incel forums, it seems to me that being an incel is highly correlated with also having economic problems. The two share some common underlying causes, like mental illness and shyness. Hence the stereotype of the incel who lives in his parents' basement. Of course, physically attractive people also find it easier to get good jobs, which does not help the truly physically unattractive subset of the incel population.
I'm skeptical there's much of a correlation between economic stability and sexual success (at least at the levels of wealth that account for more than 99% of us i.e. not a millionaire). There's a reason the stereotype of the broke, loser man who cheats on his wife/has children with multiple women he owes child support to exists and it suggests that for all their problems, getting laid isn't the main problem for this kind of figure.
The reality is that most guys, reliable or not, are getting laid (at least during some periods of their lives). Genuine incels are a small group and people talk about them as if they have much more impact than they do (case in point, the suggested UK policies that this whole thread is discussing).
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
3mo ago
If that group of males is dropping out of the social system, then the only males you have remaining are either the Andrew Tate types or the totally progressive bought-in types.
Most guys do get laid and have relationships, without being Tate-types/Chads or simps. There are lot of normal dudes with normal romantic lives out there.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
3mo ago
I’m having a hard time finding what is currently done about “political Islam.”
My understanding is that authorities tend to try and build relationships with relatively moderate figures in Muslim communities, to try and encourage/help them redirect younger members away from particularly radical (i.e. ISIS-level) influences.
What should be illegal is incitement to crimes. I am sure that this is already illegal in the UK. "Blow up Parliament for Allah", "Rape some bitches to protest against wokism", "Kill a cop to bring forth the dictatorship of the proletariat" are not protected speech, if anyone posts them on their facebook they would quickly be removed and the poster charged.
While this may be legally true (IANAL), in reality this is very dependent on the person making the incitement. Muslims and other minorities effectively have legal privileges that include making exactly the sorts of statements you give with no repercussions.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
3mo ago
Very interesting stuff.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
3mo ago
My admiration for the guy keeps increasing.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
3mo ago
The London Met Chief Commissioner had an interview last week, where he said:
We will throw the full force of the law at people. And whether you’re in this country committing crimes on the streets or committing crimes from further afield online, we will come after you.
I'm not sure I understand this last bit. How exactly is the London Met going to "come after" Elon Musk? Or is this some weak-sauce "we'll charge him with a crime if he ever comes here"?
And once the coffins sent back home start being Western Europeeans and Americans, there is no telling where this ends.
IMO that would mostly result in greater political pressure not to send Western European and American troops to war.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
3mo ago
I actually think that German boots on the ground in Ukraine would be a fairly likely response in that event (and American ones if the assassination happened in the US)
It would be incredibly unlikely. NATO members absolutely do not want to get into an actual shooting match with russians.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
3mo ago
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
3mo ago
ELI5 for those less historically well-read of us?
I'd be inclined to believe Kamala's numbers simply because it seems so plausible that substantially more people prefer her than they did Biden.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
3mo ago
Not sure how much this counts as insightful in the way you meant it, but FWIW my take on all of this is that human courtship really isn't as complicated as people make out. Because most people are keenly interested in anything that improves their romantic prospects there's an incentive to come up with complicated analysis that can be sold as useful advice (much like stock-picking) but very little of it adds much explanatory power (again, like stock picking).
Like, an alien species discovering humanity for the first time would not find it difficult to come up with a model of human courtship that explains ~90% of observable dating behaviour.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
3mo ago
Goes for at least the parts of Stockholm I'm familiar with as well (which isn't too much admittedly). And migrants definitely do come here.
My best guess is that this is more of an American problem due to drugs coming through their southern border.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
3mo ago
That's a good explanation, though I suspect that the identity/oppression framework is still more fundamental than this. Many of the same people who claim that white Americans still deserve to be called colonialists would probably fiercely defend the Americanness of recent non-white illegal immigrants.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
3mo ago
Turks genocided Armenians because of the Crusades,
I hadn't heard that one before.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
3mo ago
Women are typically pretty good at giving negative advice (i.e. what not to do). Even on that tweet, there are far more women saying "no, don't do this" than there are saying "yeah I'd definitely find this attractive!"
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
3mo ago
This is like the "hello, human resources??" comic, except she's reporting the guy in both panels.
Lol
What's your basis for saying this? My only real sense of Harris' positions is that she's much likelier than Biden to indulge the left of the party, and that wing doesn't really care about Russia beyond any supposed connections the country's leadership has with Trump.
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