Why politics isn't the problem

#1 Politics isn't the problem. People being radical isn't the problem, that's a side-effect: the cause is lack of education. You have people either arguing that the systemic racism camp is gonna be the next Hitler and going to usher in some Communist Autocracy, and on the other side you have people rambling about systemic racism. Here's a new idea that you probably haven't heard before: both of those groups are wrong. And here's one of the main issues: everyone is treating this like it's a conflict between two 'ideologies' that have to be balanced and that when ideology becomes too prominent at the expense of another, it becomes authoritarian. This sounds very interesting and deep, but actually it's wrong, and personally I think this notion is meaningless. The issue as I see it is mainly the first one - that Conservatives are terrified and afraid that this is going to be doom of America and lions and goats and shit will be flying everywhere as in the aftermath of a nuclear fuck attack. The second issue, I'm pretty sure this is something you've never heard from anyone else before, this whole 'political spectrum' idea is an extremely simplistic one. I think it's actually kind of dumb and certainly cliché, and the reason it's so popular is that its so simple that you don't need to spend more than 3 seconds thinking about it. Even if you add 2 other dimensions like I've heard it being proposed, it's still extremely simple.

#2 One other thing I find hilarious is how everyone on the Internet is yapping about tolerance/freedom of speech and all that mumbo jumbo. Really makes you wonder where all the bad intolerant people are. Here's my take on things: they don't exist, everyone is taking everything else way too seriously, and people assume other people are automatically trying to screw you over just because they disagree with what you're saying; here's the kicker. It's not you they have a problem with. It's all the white noise thundering in their head that won't let them think.

#3 One other thing, and this is actually a major issue (I think). Everyone is just using waaaaaaay too much moralisation as a substitute for reasoning, and immediately assume that if it's a dictator they're 100% guaranteed to do like horrible things; do these people think dictators can rule without a base of support? If you shit on people, you're gonna lose that base of support, LOL. Whatever the fuck happened to pragmatism and putting yourself in someone else's shoes? Also, one other thing that is a huge problem, is that people don't think about issues deeply so they get attached to things that take like 3 seconds to think about and often these things are absolutes like 'YOU SHOULD NEVER DO X'. Here's an example from one of the latest games I've played: Wasteland 3. There's this guy called the Patriarch who's founded a "nation" in post-apocalyptic Colorado, and he's not exactly a nice guy because he's a dictator. However, the quality of life in his nation is extremely high, and there's little to no repression (ppl aren't getting gunned down on the streets, and there's actually a semblance of order and a civilised life going on). I saw a post on Reddit that said you should not side with him (long story short, you're part of a 'militia' from Arizona that supplies protection to people and tried to do something similar to what the Patriarch did, but failed), because 'you should not support a dictator as that's against what the Rangers stand for.' Are these people fucking serious? He's not killing people. He's not throwing the opposition in jail. The worst thing he did was make a deal with nomadic slavers and paid them off to fuck off and attack someone else.

Edit: The first few sentences in the paragraph #3 about dictators are just examples

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Originally Posted by Oberon

bump

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why can't i give negative rep??

considering all u've done was piss ppl off for the last year with ur politics, i rly hoped ur first posts wouldn't be political.

there's a way to talk politics without pissing ppl off, but rn if i were u, i'd keep my mouth shut on all political discussions

i think a dead site is better than a drama-filled and toxic site.

anyways blocked lol

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Originally Posted by theoneceko

why can't i give negative rep??

considering all u've done was piss ppl off for the last year with ur politics, i rly hoped ur first posts wouldn't be political.

there's a way to talk politics without pissing ppl off, but rn if i were u, i'd keep my mouth shut on all political discussions

i think a dead site is better than a drama-filled and toxic site.

anyways blocked lol

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there isn't a false sentence in this quoted post. up rep ceko!

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Originally Posted by theoneceko

why can't i give negative rep??

considering all u've done was piss ppl off for the last year with ur politics, i rly hoped ur first posts wouldn't be political.

there's a way to talk politics without pissing ppl off, but rn if i were u, i'd keep my mouth shut on all political discussions

i think a dead site is better than a drama-filled and toxic site.

anyways blocked lol

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There's nothing political about what I said.

I'm not trying to be offensive. I'm presenting a different opinion that most people haven't heard, and it's completely outside of the predictable clichés that you hear nowadays.

"the cause of the world's issues is lack of education" - someone who self-admittedly does not read sources he disagrees with

Given the overwhelming positivity of this thread, I'll just reply to one simple thing....

Dictators need a base of support, it's true. That base of support is never the people for a long time; it usually is the military and the police.

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Originally Posted by Marshmallow Marshall

Given the overwhelming positivity of this thread, I'll just reply to one simple thing....

Dictators need a base of support, it's true. That base of support is never the people for a long time; it usually is the military and the police.

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Yeah, but if you antagonise your populace too much you're not gonna rule too long.

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Originally Posted by Oberon

Yeah, but if you antagonise your populace too much you're not gonna rule too long.

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Correct; that's why you have to end up... becoming democratic.

Also, I'm not sure Wasteland 3 is a good example for real life politics :D

Dictatorship is the best government, but only as long as the dictator is a top tier level human.

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Originally Posted by aamirus

Dictatorship is the best government, but only as long as the dictator is a top tier level human.

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Heresy! Why not a top tier level AI?
This is artificialintelligencephoby!

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Originally Posted by aamirus

Dictatorship is the best government, but only as long as the dictator is a top tier level human.

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That is only temporary, though. It's very rare to see two good dictators in a row.

You're both right. The point I made wasn't to glorify dictators, it was to show how simplistically people evaluate if something is good or not.

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Originally Posted by Marshmallow Marshall

Correct; that's why you have to end up... becoming democratic.

Also, I'm not sure Wasteland 3 is a good example for real life politics :D

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It isn't, but that's not the point. In the world of WL3 that dictatorship is more of a force of good than evil, but people get tangled up in simplistic ideals like 'freedom/democracy' and then apply it to worlds like that and don't understand why it doesn't work. The issue isn't that they're interpreting one society in terms of another, it's the simplicity and lack of nuance that led them to doing that, and which would cause them to oversimplify in the real world as well.

I do agree with your insinuation that American politics is a false dichotomy. But I do feel that real racists and hateful people exist.

I don't think people see the situation as a fight between 2 ideology's. There is blatantly a group of those who have and a different group of 'have nots' that is perpetuated by systemic factors. Its not fair to the 'have nots' for them to be where they are but its also not fair to say those who 'have' should just give away what they have. Its a very complex issue and I feel like discussion on it is an overall step in the right direction simply because the first step to any problem is to identify the problem. I am not in favor of forcing overt wealth redistribution (simply because you can look at lottery winners and see how ineffective that is) but I do feel a substantial amount of processes were created in our society that were overtly hateful and racial and some of those factors can be corrected.

Lets draw back to your original point of education. One of the most clear cut points I have seen on systemic racism is how citys zoning was done racially separating poor minorities into districts and funding their education with housing taxes. The rich would get a well funded school and therefore a better education which is itself the process our society uses to mold people to have better opportunity. This was blatant racial discrimination that exists in our society today and could easily be fixed. Rezoning districts would break the wealth disparity allowing for a level of equal opportunity. But you can't fault a group for having a poor education after placing them in a system that denies them a good one. And these sorts of process' keep poor people poor making a barrier between the 'haves' and 'have nots' that is in itself, very much systemic racism; and was overtly created by 'bad intolerant people.' Maybe we do not live in a society where those 'bad intolerant people' hold power and oppress but we do live in a system that was created by them.

Something I have been thinking a lot about the past few months is 'white privilege.' I disliked hearing someone say it because I felt it somewhat invalidated my accomplishments in life. But what I just described is a good example of how I was privileged. It does not change the fact I have worked my ass off doing some of the most dangerous work in my society to get where I am but understanding how I was given some opportunity's others were not, and how that was structured in my society by racial hate is the problem people are talking about when they ramble about systemic racism.

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Originally Posted by aamirus

Dictatorship is the best government, but only as long as the dictator is a top tier level human.

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I am a dictator uwu heewwo ;W;