domain:thezvi.wordpress.com
IGI-111
God was a dream of good government.
40m ago
From Democracy in America:
The hatred that men bear to privilege increases in proportion as privileges become fewer and less considerable, so that democratic passions would seem to burn most fiercely just when they have least fuel. I have already given the reason for this phenomenon. When all conditions are unequal, no inequality is so great as to offend the eye, whereas the slightest dissimilarity is odious in the midst of general uniformity; the more complete this uniformity is, the more insupportable the sight of such a difference becomes. Hence it is natural that the love of equality should constantly increase together with equality itself, and that it should grow by what it feeds on.
See also: the psychoanalytical concept of the "narcissism of small differences".
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Also, & approx; → ≈
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ControlsFreak
50m ago
It's somewhat relevant to the discussions about the federal government workforce. The federal government employs a lot of people, and those people aren't being spewed out by a magic high-IQ-only people factory; they're just regular people, from the regular population. Some are really smart and capable; others, less so. Different agencies have different dynamics that draw from different subsets of the population.
There is a legend in the research community of a new director taking charge of one of the national labs and saying in his first appearance in front of the workforce some form of, "We know that 50% of you don't want to do anything. That's fine. We're not going to make you; we won't fire you. Just don't get in the way of the other 50%."
The reason for this legend is not overly linked with any dynamic particular to the federal government, but it has a slightly special form in such places. There is a long, complicated story about the inherent difficulty of evaluating research efforts. In every industry, you'll have people who frankly do not have the skills or ability to contribute to the actual mission/bottom line, but they obviously don't want to have that figured out. They might lose their job! So, they try to make it kind of look like they're doing something, even if it's dumb/not productive. In industries where it's harder to evaluate whether something is actually contributing, there's a lot more room for this to flourish. Also in industries that are so bloody rich that they can sort of afford to scattershot all over the place a little and not worry too much about economy. See also the tech industry in some recent times. The federal government has a bit of both floating around. Depending on the agency, their mission may be more/less well-defined. Some pockets clearly think that their mission is approximately everything. Some defense orgs definitely think this, as it's extremely easy to slide down the slope of thinking that you have to account for literally every possible situation, every possible contingency, every idea that could be used against you or by you to gain an advantage.
Couple these two things (a workforce so large really isn't drawn from just the best and brightest) and such a broad mix of groups being more-or-less mission-focused and more-or-less clear on what contributes to that mission, and you inevitably get allllllllll sorts of pretty random crap. Some is really really good; some is, well.
I'm riffing on all this in part to say that there will definitely be some obvious low-hanging fruit for Elon/Vivek, but there is also just such a massive diversity of agencies that have such different missions, different needs, different levels-of-evaluability, that it will likely be a lot more difficult than Elon just rolling in to Twitter and saying, "Everybody bring the code you've written in the last year directly to Elon." Sure, if they have the time and inclination to scratch and sniff down to small groups like this, they'd find some set of people who say, "I take the Latin from the internet and put it in the goddamn logo!" But a lot of times, they'll get some mountain of hazy documentation about 'work' that is supposedly in line with a mission that may be extremely sprawling, unclear, and questionable in the first place. But it might actually be good-ish! Hard to tell without a deep dive and lots of expertise... multiplied over and over again in thousands of different domains that require all different sorts of expertise. Godspeed, Elon... godspeed.
raakaa
55m ago
This discussion reminds me of another culture-war-adjacent meme referencing TF2 autobalancing (which I personally find a lot funnier)
That's not the same thing.
Yeah, that's why I said "not directly". Point remains if a parent makes a mistake they'll usually by wrecked with guilt, for the doctor it's tuesday.
But often they don't make the same decision their child would have if mature. Many parents attempt to override their child's decisions even after their child is mature.
If you mean something more than disagreeing with them and putting some social pressure, than I agree it crosses a line. Luckily the law is on the adult child's side in such cases.
No, I think that clears the higher bar.
Cool. So it just so happens that this blog post was talking about the exact same drug - down to the brand name - that gender clinics sell as "puberty blockers", the first line of medical intervention that they recommend, and claim is completely reversible. Funnily enough data from UK's Tavistok indicates that as many as 48% of kids referred to a gender clinic are autistic, so this is giving the exact same drug to a largely the same cohort. The only difference is the disorder they aim to cure, but both disorders are wishy-washy and not objectively verifiable (I guess autism might be, in the more extreme cases, but that's a point against gender affirming care).
If there's an argument for the government forbidding the doctor to administer it in one case but not the other, I'm not seeing it.
They said the same thing about kings once....
What can I say? If you want to live in platonic / marxist utopia where all children belong to the state, you're free to want it. I even wish that you get to live in the society you desire, as long as you don't go full Jihadi, and claim that this is the one true way for all of the world to live. This is why asked how are your ideas not based on your non-universal ideology.
We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all ... are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights
If you actually believed that this means parents have no authority over their children, you'd be quoting Rousseau, not the American founding fathers.
But they aren't deciding for themselves! They are deciding for another person! In the purest form of libertarianism, the child would decide everything for themselves.
I am not advocating for pure libertarianism, but that is what I mean by 'your children aren't your property.' The base state isn't parents having absolute power over their children, it's them having no authority whatsoever.
Yes, that's my point. If you were advocating pure libertarianism, I could consider your idea of removing all authority from parents, and ensuring the child's autonomy. But since you don't, the idea is completely absurd to me. If parents have no authority over their children, than an adult has even less authority over another unrelated adult.
WhateverHappenedToNorman
1hr ago
Funnily enough, both are the Casino-world tax haven of a bigger polity.
WhateverHappenedToNorman
1hr ago
They're good memes brent
WhateverHappenedToNorman
1hr ago
This is common enough that right wing twitter/substack has already "invented" a term for it. They call them hicklibs.
some
2hr ago
I've heard this phenomenon called "Tocqueville effect/paradox". @MaiqTheTrue
TowardsPanna
2hr ago
Same reason why (sane) people don't start expressing rage at someone pointing a gun at them. Anger is used as a tool when you think it'll work in favor of your interests rather than against them.
MaiqTheTrue
Renrijra Krin
2hr ago
I don’t think it’s a valley, I think it’s a sort of truism of political life. Complaints and protests tend to happen in places where said problem is least apparent. Environmental protests happen where the environment is well cared for, marital protests happen where women are safe, screams of authoritarian regimes happen where arbitrary arrests don’t.
2rafa
2hr ago
Bunch of UFO unsolved mysteries science fiction fans grew up and joined the DoD / MIC / Congress, and now they’re powerful enough to commission and staff these “investigations” where they get to sperg over found footage and can demand to be taken on tours of Area 51 outbuildings to forage for aliens in long unopened refrigerators.
There is nothing more to it.
Crowstep
2hr ago
My immediate reaction to this 'movement' is the same as when I see the 'we're not having kids because it's too expensive' or even 'we're not having kids because of global warming'. A rationalisation for what's going on, not a true reason. After all, Korea's birth rate been low for decades, and only now are the women supposedly swearing off men?
There are clearly a lot of things that contribute to Korea's low birth rate; the punishing work culture, the educational arms race, the pathological status obsession, hyper-urbanism, the lack of in-person socialising (and the comparative amount of spending time online), the sleep deprivation. I see the breakdown in gender relations as a symptom of all this, rather than the cause.
I can get behind some wall spaghetti testing
Double tilde: 30% vs. 90%
Triple tilde:30% vs.
High-spatial efficiency double tilde: ≈30% vs. ≈90%
EDIT: this is a known issue, see https://github.com/themotte/rDrama/issues/736
SubstantialFrivolity
I'm not even supposed to be here today
2hr ago
Oh yeah, I should've mentioned that. But you are correct. Lots of multiplayer games (TF2 but also others) have balancing mechanisms to even out the number of players on each team if they get too lopsided. So all of a sudden you can find yourself playing on the other team. The reference isn't meant to be taken literally, because obviously there isn't an algorithm switching allegiances around IRL. It's really just a jokey way to say "America has switched sides".
magic9mushroom
If you're going to downvote me, and nobody's already voiced your objection, please reply and tell me
2hr ago
· Edited 2hr ago
As I said to @TokenTransGirl, this isn't really my cause area and I don't have sufficient trustworthy information to be able to opine on the big Ought questions of proper treatment. There certainly exists a population that will desist if not "supported", and there almost certainly exists a population that won't; trustworthy data on how big these two populations are and whether it's possible to distinguish between them is the key determinant of the correct answer, but it would seem extremely difficult to acquire and I certainly don't have it. Some of the experiments you'd want to run don't even seem like the experimental protocol could successfully be followed (e.g. the obvious and central "what percentage of people who want transition in current Western society will resolve positively if transition is denied long-term"; in current Western society, how are you going to stop them?), and the studies that can be (and are) done frequently have huge bias issues (in both directions, depending on the allegiance of the researchers).
On the smaller questions, I oppose pro-trans censorship (both in the academic publishing system and more generally in social spaces) and I oppose people who try to portray the anti-trans movement as being inherently senseless and hateful. No surprises there. My personal stance on pronouns is "I won't use a pronoun someone doesn't like in front of that person, but I won't intentionally use neopronouns or singular "they" under any circumstances and I occasionally won't use a he/she/it pronoun if I think it's inappropriate (e.g. if the person is clearly insane in other ways and I suspect it's just a phase/delusion); I am prepared to spam names if necessary to thread that needle" (as noted above, my position on other people using pronouns is "free speech lol"), and my stance on deadname-erasure (on e.g. Wikipedia) is "fuck off with this Orwellian shit" although I'm willing to use the new one going forward.
If you want something else, ask.
MathWizard
Good things are good
3hr ago
I don't think I agree. If I saw a similar-looking meme from the right when Biden had taken office I would have cringed. There's a joke there, it's a tiny bit funnier than one of those braindead and overly-labeled political comics you'd see in a newspaper, but barely. It's a step in the right direction, but it's lacking....heart? authenticity?
Truth. It's lacking the "it's-funny-because-it's-true" bit. And I suppose 50% of that is simply me not agreeing with the substance, but 50% of that is just pure made up. Like, even for a left-winger who does believe Trump is authoritarian and is sympathetic to the other dictators, I don't think any of them genuinely believe he is going to join them and have the U.S. declare war on Ukraine. And also South Korea, and Taiwan for some reason. Who thinks Trump is pro-China???
Again, if the right had made a meme about the U.S. bombing Taiwan in 2020 because of the Biden-China connections, I would have cringed. This is not a good meme.
SubstantialFrivolity
I'm not even supposed to be here today
3hr ago
Thanks man. I appreciate the support. It was indeed a frustrating conversation, but on the other hand it's been out of my mind since then so I guess it couldn't have been that bad lol
I do agree with your broader point, that the people who kind of push people away from the faith the most are the super traditional ones. IDK why, exactly, I am sure it's not their intent. All I know is just about every time I go on /r/catholocism I come away from it going "man those people are crazy and if I didn't know lots of very nice Catholics IRL I would run screaming".
TwiceHuman
3hr ago
This is all getting silly. Women vote differently from men because they're more emotional, social and subjective. So they're camp "It's fine if everything gets worse, as long as we're not mean" while men tend towards "It's fine if we're mean, as long as our society improves".
There's like half a standard deviation of difference in the distribution of personality traits, which causes these differences in voting outcomes. There's no need to fabricate any wars, and act like natural tendencies are a way of punishing eachother and securing ones power. "Why are men keeping women out of engineering?" They just like engineering at a higher frequency.
Trying to pressure other people into having the same values as yourself is, and always was, bad taste. And both genders are biologically hardwired to enjoy sex. None of this is necessary, I know because I still hang out in communities with zero politics, and in which men and women enjoy eachother and in which people would be confused if you talked about power dynamics or even a gender divide.
Now, I don't disagree with your takes on the issue, I reject the issue itself and suggest that you do the same. I ended up replying to you because your comment is short and approachable
If a majority of people want to end democracy, I cannot think of an argument against it. If you're pro-democracy because you think the majorty is right, then you wouldn't be justified in stopping the majority from ending democracy. If you value democracy because it's correct, then you're also saying that you're wrong when the majority disagrees with you, which it would in this example. I can still save it, though. Suppose democracy was not about correctness, but rather about freedom. Then it would pain you to see people having the freedom to choose that they wouldn't want to be free anymore. But this choice imposes on the freedoms of those who still wants to be free. But if people say "I like democracy" when what they mean is "I like freedom", then people become confused and we reach the wrong conclusions, so it's important not to confuse ends and means. Democracy is not your highest value, it's something else which is unstated and which correlates with democracy.
is a valid critique of democracy
Yes, but then it's not democracy which is optimized for, but rather "good opinions", which democracy once did better. But now we have a problem, for while I can agree with your take, there's no objective way to measure if we're correct or if we're mislead. For democracy used to be how we measured, and now we have made something out to be more important than democracy, which we have no way to measure.
the people putting in place mandates should really have considered the second order effects
Vaccine skepticism can be blamed on those who promoted the vaccines. They repeatedly acted like people who were out to mislead you and put you in danger, while stating the opposite. For instance, they said "These vaccines are completely safe", but also that neither these companies, nor the government, would be to blame if getting the vaccine went horribly wrong for you. "I promise you this is safe, but I take no responsibility for the consequences" is a statement which will make people distrust you. Now, this doesn't imply that the vaccine isn't safe, merely that it's reasonable and logical to doubt that it is. About 10 more things like this happened (documents being held back, people being told that herd immunity would occur, being being told that the vaccine prevented you from spreading or getting Covid, both claims which turned out to be false), etc etc etc.
So, again, even if the vaccine is perfectly safe, the only reasonable response to somebody repeatedly lying to you, and even trying to use political and legal pressure to force you to inject something in your body which hasn't even been properly tested, is resistance. It's not the counter-movements fault that people distrust vaccines, but the sheer incompetence of the main movement.
No, but "if you were able to drive sober airbags wouldn't be a top issue" still works as a non nonsensical retort.
If you remove the reckless drivers from the road the value of car safety features goes down substantially
TwiceHuman
4hr ago
I generally agree with everything you wrote, but I wouldn't limit myself to just trustworthiness. I think there's a sort of "brainrot" quality to modern news which is independent of truthfulness. A lot of articles are "watch this silly video" or "guy does whacky thing". That's news exploiting other psychological needs, which is a bad direction to go in, because you end up with people optimizing only for the thing which triggers rewards in the brain, without the substance. Instead of news which are also interesting, we're getting interesting things which aren't news. This is like selling lootboxes without the videogames, or sugar without the food, or fanservice without the story.
By the way, I seem to remember journalists being people who put their lives on the line in order to fight against corruption (that it was almost an admirable job to have). It seems like the news are now owned by those who are corrupt, though, causing a disconnect with the average viewer. One of the causes is that the scope (size/range) of news media is too big. Decentralized news for every local area is superior to everyone reading the exact same set of global news. And to large companies, we're just numbers on a spreadsheet, so the human element is lost. This is a another kind of disconnect, and honest news alone cannot make up for it (objectivity and empathy are different after all) Anyway, a small sphere of concern is essential to psychological health, most of the mental health problems lately can be attributed to people who worry about far-away things while neglecting what's near to them (like themselves and their family, factors which are actually within their ability to influence or control).
solowingpixy
the resident car guy
4hr ago
Yep. I live in an SEC college town and we had to import our Trump supporting female bartender from California. There are few species of liberal more obnoxious than the first-gen college educated late Xer/Millennial liberal with high-school educated Trump supporting late boomer/Gen X parents, especially if they come from a place where the Moral Majority actually mattered. The middle-aged Yankee liberal English professor might be easy to offend, but was more tolerant in the long run. It's a shame I never got to meet her daughter, who is reportedly very high on the "hot, but crazy" scale (The professor is also this, according to the boomer regular who dated her.). My Gen X mom from George Wallace Democratic stock has been waging a Clintonian holy war on Facebook for far longer than my Gen X father's acquired Trumptardism and addiction to the dumb parts of right-wing Twitter.
Interestingly, the Southern liberals I know from more upper-class backgrounds have been vastly more relaxed about it. One of favorite drinking buddies (He is a hilariously obnoxious womanizer with a country lawyer's drawl and Yellow Fever when drunk.) is a lawyer's son turned Democratic campaign operative. Another is a 40-something professor who never got a steady gig, a hilarious, hopeless dandy who even his liberal female counterparts write off as gay (This does, in fact, cripple his dating life.).
My favorites to drunkenly talk history/politics with are female law students, by a mile. They're well informed and while tough in an argument, they won't take disagreement personally.
Southkraut
A tale Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing.
4hr ago
Sorry for being unavailable, by the way. My excuses are kid's joining Kindergarten and I started at a new time-consuming job.
How did she find out? Did you tell her outright? I'm sorry either way.
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