Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?
This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.
Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.
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Notes -
You didn’t even make an argument to critique, though! You just said that any discussion of Ukrainian corruption is ipso facto Russian propaganda. There’s no attempt to justify this with evidence. (Was nobody discussing Ukrainian corruption before Russia said we should? What if there’s counter-evidence of neutral parties acknowledging corruption within the Ukrainian government, regardless of anything that Russia has to say?) There’s no attempt to grapple with why somebody who is not Russia-aligned might independently arrive at the conclusion, based on observable evidence, that Ukraine’s government is corrupt relative to Western standards. It’s just “These conversation topics give me the ick.” That’s not a valuable contribution to this forum.
So, if someone makes an argument that you personally think is not valuable, it’s okay to insult them? Can I start calling you unserious for claiming to want to debate and discuss while undermining the entire ethos of the site and driving away the very people you want to argue with with low-effort pot shots? No. Because that’s against the rules, and I would be rightly moderated.
Yes, of course you can call me unserious! I wouldn’t be offended if you did! (Particularly because I know it’s not an accurate characterization of me, and also because I don’t respect the source!) I don’t interpret the rules of this site as prohibiting any commentary on the quality of a user’s output, provided that said commentary is not egregiously acrimonious or ad hominem.
I’m not saying you’re a bad person, or even that you’re dumb. In the last extended exchange I had with you, while I strongly disagreed with your arguments and I don’t believe you’re conversant with all of the available data, I think it’s fair to say that you engaged in a serious and effortful way. That’s the opposite of what you’re doing now, which is just saying that any discussion of a particular topic you don’t like is tiresome and illegitimate, and threatening to pick up your toys and leave because some people here have the temerity not to share your same visceral aversion to the discussion of those topics. That is corrosive to the purpose and ethos of this forum; me calling you unserious in response is small potatoes in comparison.
For what it's worth, I think the misstep here was saying "you're a deeply unserious person", rather than "this is an unserious position". The latter is, as you said, a comment on the quality of a person's output. The former is (at least imo) a personal insult.
But if a specific user’s output is consistently unserious, I don’t see an issue with offering commentary on that user as a whole, rather than simply on individual positions they might take. Personally I’m in favor of a bit more of a rough-and-tumble exchange that acknowledges users as having consistent personae over time, rather than just taking shots at individual claims each time.
But even then, it seems to me like you would need to qualify that. If you say "your positions are consistently unserious" that's one thing, but "you're an unserious person" strikes me as a general attack on someone's character. That's how I read the original sentence, at least.
Yeah that’s fair, I probably did express myself too harshly initially. Probably a better way to frame it would have been, “You have consistently failed to engage effortfully and in good faith with the reasons why people here disagree with you. You haven’t demonstrated a serious approach to discussion.” And in fairness to @justawoman, I did acknowledge that I have had at least one back-and-forth with her which, though I don’t consider it to have been especially fruitful in changing either my mind or hers, at least demonstrated her capability to seriously engage. I think it’s very lamentable that she has elected not to apply that ability to discussions about Ukraine.
I wish you would have begun with your last sentence, because it was touching and moved me. I think you are right that I haven’t been fair about the Ukraine topic; the Bucha massacre moves me deeply, apparently enough to push me out of my wise mind.
I actually had never heard of the Bucha massacre until it got brought up here, and still don't know the details.
I have heard of a lot of massacres over the years, and have expended some effort to not let them move me deeply any more, because I've had the repeated experience of being "moved deeply" by atrocities to support something that turned out to be a disaster. This is not a claim that your reaction is less valid than mine; only an attempt to illuminate a difference in perspective. I would guess that you see being moved by atrocity as a good thing, because it means that the sword of justice will be drawn against the wicked. I see it as a bad thing, because I've seen the sword of justice be drawn against the wicked, only to be swung blindly and stupidly to terrible ends.
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No, I can’t. Calling you unserious is an insult to your character, which is against the site rules. Arguing about what I’m insulting, or how insulting it is, is also against the rules. Consistent rulemaking protects all of us; otherwise it starts slipping from “no insults” to “no acrimonious insults” to “well I think your argument was unserious even though I didn’t say “your argument is unserious” I said “you’re unserious” and you should have known what I meant” to “fuck it, open fire free-for-all”. Which is also why the rules are “speak plainly”. You think it’s small potatoes, I think it’s a further indication that the moderation on this site is not for me.
Alright, then let me offer a clarification: I think that refusing to engage with the substance of people’s arguments, and instead accusing them of being unwitting stooges of a hostile foreign power, is the mark of someone who is not willing/able to be a serious interlocutor.
I think that probably a lot of your opinions are rooted, ultimately, in your exposure to top-down messaging which I would characterize as, if not overt propaganda, then certainly propaganda-adjacent. I’m sure you think the same of me! However, this does not give me license to simply dismiss those opinions as “regurgitating propaganda” and making a big show of being scandalized by the fact that someone here would dare to express them. If I did so, I think it would be extremely fair to accuse me of not taking the spirit of open debate seriously. And if I did it repeatedly, I think it would be fair to accuse me of not being a serious person generally. Perhaps that would be an insult, but I personally believe it’d be permissible within the rules of this forum because it is directly related to the question of whether you ought to continue to participate. (Not, to be clear, whether or not you ought to be allowed to participate; I’m certainly not calling for you to be banned or censured.)
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Come now, that's uncalled for / against the rules. An insult expressed in a civil manner is still an insult.
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