Compromise

[Strike For The South]

"The london that in 15 years a white person will be a minority. [...] Am I racist? No. Do I have anything against people of other races? No. Would I prevent them from coming into my home? No. So what then is my gripe? [...] My gripe is that we were never asked. My gripe is we were told, not asked."

This is white nationalism? I though white nationalism was supposed to be the removal or extermination of non whites, Nazis! Ubermenchen! Rivers of Blood!

If this blood and soil ode to alienation is supposed to be white nationalism then the term has become rather diluted. Makes the posturing rather pathetic really, "Bone curdeling" "gross", how conditioned must you be that this rather sappy monologue to music engenders such revulsion.

What social connotation does "white" have in the UK beyond "not brown"? This is a primer video. It's like CSA state rights, Europe for the Europeans, or any other of those platitudes. It's meant for you to dip your toe before you take the big plunge.

[Husar]

What social connotation does "white" have in the UK beyond "not brown"? This is a primer video. It's like CSA state rights, Europe for the Europeans, or any other of those platitudes. It's meant for you to dip your toe before you take the big plunge.

Additionally I found it a bit weird that the voice whines about how it's all become unrecognizable and then claims he would let everyone in anyway, he just wants to be asked about it first. It seems incoherent/weird in several ways:

1. Why complain about not being asked if you claim you had done exactly the same thing anyway?

2. Why complain about becoming a minority if you had done the same thing anyway?

3. Should representative democracy only be suspended for immigration or for everything? If so, why especially for that topic?

Leads me to the conclusion that "I would let immigrants in anyway because I'm not racist" and "I'm only angry because I was never asked" are just lies to make it more palatable as a primer as you say.

[Montmorency]

What social connotation does "white" have in the UK beyond "not brown"? This is a primer video. It's like CSA state rights, Europe for the Europeans, or any other of those platitudes. It's meant for you to dip your toe before you take the big plunge.

Additionally I found it a bit weird that the voice whines about how it's all become unrecognizable and then claims he would let everyone in anyway, he just wants to be asked about it first. It seems incoherent/weird in several ways:

1. Why complain about not being asked if you claim you had done exactly the same thing anyway?

2. Why complain about becoming a minority if you had done the same thing anyway?

3. Should representative democracy only be suspended for immigration or for everything? If so, why especially for that topic?

Leads me to the conclusion that "I would let immigrants in anyway because I'm not racist" and "I'm only angry because I was never asked" are just lies to make it more palatable as a primer as you say.

The speech is from a 2001 episode of NCS: Manhunt, a BBC crime procedural. It is delivered by a far-right terrorist, I guess just before the good guys beat him?



Obviously if taken unironically it's exploitable as white nationalist propaganda.

[Montmorency]

Heard from a Trump supporter minutes ago: "Ha ha, he's so wonderfully screwing them!"

Sums it up nicely.

(Could be X-post with the Trump thread, but it works either way.)

[Pannonian]

The speech is from a 2001 episode of NCS: Manhunt, a BBC crime procedural. It is delivered by a far-right terrorist, I guess just before the good guys beat him?



Obviously if taken unironically it's exploitable as white nationalist propaganda.

People who believe in the immutability of Englishness probably believe there is nothing so quintessentially English as drinking tea with milk and sugar in china cups.

[a completely inoffensive name]

Heard from a Trump supporter minutes ago: "Ha ha, he's so wonderfully screwing them!"

Sums it up nicely.

(Could be X-post with the Trump thread, but it works either way.)

Better than reaching out to the other side over some ideal of "compromise" though right?
They got the right idea, destroy the other side at all costs, even if it destroys yourself.

[Montmorency]

Better than reaching out to the other side over some ideal of "compromise" though right?
They got the right idea, destroy the other side at all costs, even if it destroys yourself.

Think carefully: what are you trying to say here?

[Pannonian]

I would like to give you a friendly warning. As you attack the White population of Britain in your aims to gain Black Supremacy in this country, remember what happened to Jo Cox.

I AM NOT ONE OF THEM but there are those out there who would like to see you suffer the same fate. Be careful!!

NB. Jo Cox was assassinated.

[a completely inoffensive name]

Think carefully: what are you trying to say here?

I am poking fun at the original question you posed. We are living at a time when compromise is a nonstarter for one party's constituents. This mentality is clearly damaging our discourse and our institutions. Why again should we not praise compromise as a good in an of itself?

[Strike For The South]

The speech is from a 2001 episode of NCS: Manhunt, a BBC crime procedural. It is delivered by a far-right terrorist, I guess just before the good guys beat him?



Obviously if taken unironically it's exploitable as white nationalist propaganda.

Do you take it ironically though? It has all the signs.

I don't hate "them", there is nothing wrong with "them", but "they" will be the ruin of us. Classic propaganda.

[Montmorency]

I am poking fun at the original question you posed. We are living at a time when compromise is a nonstarter for one party's constituents. This mentality is clearly damaging our discourse and our institutions. Why again should we not praise compromise as a good in an of itself?

So you're saying the problem with Trump supporters is that they aren't willing to compromise? Why would they compromise when they are in power, and believe that the opposition refuses to compromise, even as this attitude has itself been encouraged by the Democratic impulse to please Republican voters by drafting and voting for Republican policies?

The Trump movement shows exactly the failure of compromise as an ideal.

The problem is not a lack of compromise, I reiterate, but that bad and harmful policies are advanced in the first place. Compromising over bad policies still gets you bad policy. Compromise is the last resort to get good policy out of excellent policy.

Like this joke:

A man walks into a bar holding a pile of shit. "Look what I almost stepped in..."

[Montmorency]

Do you take it ironically though? It has all the signs.

I don't hate "them", there is nothing wrong with "them", but "they" will be the ruin of us. Classic propaganda.

That's what I mean; the far-right doesn't take it ironically, but deadly-serious. Why did so many left-leaning people like to safari in 4Chan, Stormfront, and explicitly racist, theocratic, etc. sites before 2015? It's certainly not as fun as it used to be.

[Strike For The South]

That's what I mean; the far-right doesn't take it ironically, but deadly-serious. Why did so many left-leaning people like to safari in 4Chan, Stormfront, and explicitly racist, theocratic, etc. sites before 2015? It's certainly not as fun as it used to be.

I think the past couple of years have shook the "just having a laugh" cohort. Sort of like how the GOP didn't think anti govt tea people could control their party circa 2010.

People who are convinced in their purpose can be tenacious.

[Montmorency]

I think the past couple of years have shook the "just having a laugh" cohort. Sort of like how the GOP didn't think anti govt tea people could control their party circa 2010.

People who are convinced in their purpose can be tenacious.

In high school, one Halloween a boy in my Global History class (1st period) showed up wearing some type of Nazi uniform, SA I believe. (I don't recall that he was wearing the swastika armband however.)

I boggled at the spectacle, so he did a little goosestepping for me and recited "Ein Reich! Ein Volk! Ein Fuhrer!" as we waited for the teacher to arrive.

Our regular teacher was an elderly lefty Jewish woman. Miraculously, we had a substitute that day.

The boy was himself, going by his name, descended from Soviet Jews. Them were the days for the edgelord.

[Furunculus]

In high school, one Halloween a boy in my Global History class (1st period) showed up wearing some type of Nazi uniform, SA I believe. (I don't recall that he was wearing the swastika armband however.)

I boggled at the spectacle, so he did a little goosestepping for me and recited "Ein Reich! Ein Volk! Ein Fuhrer!" as we waited for the teacher to arrive.

Our regular teacher was an elderly lefty Jewish woman. Miraculously, we had a substitute that day.

The boy was himself, going by his name, descended from Soviet Jews. Them were the days for the edgelord.

i only recently found out what an edgelord was. i had to ask.

[Gilrandir]

i only recently found out what an edgelord was. i had to ask.

I still don't know.

[Beskar]

I still don't know.

edgelord (plural edgelords)
(informal, pejorative, Internet slang) Someone who attempts to seem edgy by doing or saying risque or offensive things.

It would be like Monty's example where someone comes across a jew, replying with "卐 卐 卐 Hitler was Right 卐 卐 卐" to be edgy. Though only success this individual would have is gaining entry onto the banned list. The individual might not actually believe that statement, but they say it because they think it makes them "cool".

[Strike For The South]

In high school, one Halloween a boy in my Global History class (1st period) showed up wearing some type of Nazi uniform, SA I believe. (I don't recall that he was wearing the swastika armband however.)

I boggled at the spectacle, so he did a little goosestepping for me and recited "Ein Reich! Ein Volk! Ein Fuhrer!" as we waited for the teacher to arrive.

Our regular teacher was an elderly lefty Jewish woman. Miraculously, we had a substitute that day.

The boy was himself, going by his name, descended from Soviet Jews. Them were the days for the edgelord.

He probably now has an immaculate room thanks to one Canadian professor LOLOLOL.

[Montmorency]

For anyone who was confused, here is a convenient exemplar of the bi-partisan "middle ground" ethos from Mike Bloomberg:

I’ve never much liked political parties. I’ve always believed that we should put country before party. Too many politicians practice the reverse, with terrible consequences for the American people.

But although I don’t believe in partisanship, I very much believe in the importance of politics and elections. That’s how we make change and progress in a democracy.

Over the years, I have supported candidates in both parties who were willing to break with partisanship and the special interests and seek common ground around solutions to make America better.

In the last election, for example, I spent nearly ten million dollars to help a Republican, Pat Toomey, get re-elected in Pennsylvania. [...] At the same time, I spent roughly the same amount to help successfully elect a Democrat in New Hampshire — Maggie Hassan — who was running to defeat a Republican incumbent who had voted against Toomey’s bill.

my belief that democracy and government work best when people from both parties work together.

I’ve never thought that the public is well-served when one party is entirely out of power, and I think the past year and half has been evidence of that.

Republicans, who control both houses of Congress, have done little to reach across the aisle to craft bipartisan solutions

When the content of policy is treated as an afterthought, you realize it's a billionaire conceit this way, a game and a paresis of the status-quo. Whatever Mike, you had 12 years.

And in case one has forgotten, there is no dilemma between hyperpartisan stonewalling and the prioritization of deliberative context and process over substance.

[Strike For The South]

I mean Bloomberg is pro hyper capitalism. He knows he can get that from either party.

[Montmorency]

I mean Bloomberg is pro hyper capitalism. He knows he can get that from either party.

Hence why many leftists argue that no billionaire is really an ally, they're just buying favorable political results and a balance of powers. Heck, even conservatives will admit this when they want to criticize Warren Buffett or whomever.


Shifting in the subject of compromise, this essay points out that the Sanders/Corbyn movements have assimilated the far-left to the center more so than the other way around, creating a sort of 'big-tent' socialism in public discourse that is closer to mid-century progressivism than to Marxism - and yet that this is also what has made "socialism" so much more accessible for people today.


Or in a memage:



Great use of meme tho

[Strike For The South]

Shifting in the subject of compromise, this essay points out that the Sanders/Corbyn movements have assimilated the far-left to the center more so than the other way around, creating a sort of 'big-tent' socialism in public discourse that is closer to mid-century progressivism than to Marxism - and yet that this is also what has made "socialism" so much more accessible for people today.


Or in a memage:



Great use of meme tho

This is what makes Ocasio-Cortez so fascinating. Her interviews on NPR and her Kaisch like pro small business tweets are reminiscent of old school democrats. Yet the DSA claims her? I suppose it's the truth. By her own admission the DSA were the ones on the ground organizing things and that is what attracted her to them. Fair play.

Really it is more illustrative of how frighteningly rightward this country has drifted since Nixon. A lot of what She is saying are the same things LBJ talked about when he envisioned the great society 50 years ago. And that was LBJ, you know, Hey hey how many kids did you bomb today. decidedly not a DSA member lol.

[a completely inoffensive name]

The next generation of leftism in America is starting to learn that it cannot trade economics for culture or vice versa. We need both a left that both checks corporate greed and fights for legal gay marriage. Without both they are vulnerable to losing it all, which is really what we are looking at now.

50+ years of political correctness that made America a more tolerant nation could be wiped out in 5-10 if Trumpism wins out.

[Beskar]

Saw this and thought of this topic.

[Montmorency]

Brevity.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

[rory_20_uk]

John Oliver's analagy was: sometimes compromise doesn't make any sense - such as with vaccines, or eating a bar of soap. Just because one side wants to do it, the compromise position of eating half a bar is still stupid.

The fact these days we have to view everyone and everything (yes, there are exceptions but they seem to be decreasing) as equally valid is the problem since there is the "logic" that the alternative is that all freedoms will be removed. Female Genital Mutilation is wrong. I don't care about what your horrible culture says about this - this is more evidence that it is a lesser culture.

[a completely inoffensive name]

I am still not exactly convinced that compromise or at least an attitude of compromise and conciliation is not the best approach because some issues are black and white. Yes, vaccines are good and we should have them. Yes, civil rights are good and racism is bad. But are we being willfully blind to the realities of the typical voter?

Average joe who is not affiliated with a party will pop up two months before an election to watch debates and CNN talking heads and is not going to evoke strong passions towards a given topic. In fact, they actively detest the passionate, and believe them to be the problem with politics.

To what degree did civil rights win in the 1960s not because it was the right choice but because it was framed as the middle ground between the fervent segregationists standing in front of schools on one side and the Malcom X type militants on the other (at least up until his change of heart after visiting Mecca)?

Maybe it's two parts co-dependent. We need both the compromises and the militants. Without the former we get public alienation of the core ideas, and without the latter we get a slow drift of the public discourse to the other side.

I take it back, you guys must be correct. If the last 30 years in the US have shown anything it is a drift rightward. We are lacking the conviction of stubborn leftists to hold the Democratic party to its promises towards the working class.

[rory_20_uk]

Perhaps I was less than clear - generally compromise is good and that is with mutual tolerance and so forth. But the position should be assessed and not just placed between the two. Perhaps with human nature it does indeed require both extremes just to add utility to finding compromise is.

I wish the whole left / right misnomer was scrapped and something at least slightly more complex but far more meaningful was used. I realise one can add as many dimensions as one wants but surely a compromise ends up with a number greater than one...

[Montmorency]

To what degree did civil rights win in the 1960s not because it was the right choice but because it was framed as the middle ground between the fervent segregationists standing in front of schools on one side and the Malcom X type militants on the other (at least up until his change of heart after visiting Mecca)?

Maybe it's two parts co-dependent. We need both the compromises and the militants. Without the former we get public alienation of the core ideas, and without the latter we get a slow drift of the public discourse to the other side.

A more important point than you may realize. Think also of how socialist militancy propelled social democrats to victory in Europe and America in the first half of the 20th century...

What's the point? That you need a credible fight, or you are irrelevant. Build your own power as you won't be awarded any for "game balance".


On messaging and the "Left":

What, after all, is the fundamental principle of the political left? The most obvious candidate is a preference for equality over inequality. But the left is about more than equality. After all, to ensure perfect equality, you could just make everyone equally miserable. If the left is about nothing more than “equality,” the quickest way to achieve its goals is by taking everything everyone has away and leaving them destitute.

What we’re really about, then, is making life better for people, eliminating human suffering and creating better conditions for people to exist in. We’re about taking the bad features of society, the pain and the torment and the exploitation, and replacing them with good things.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

It is the job of the left to make life better, to care about improving people’s conditions in tangible ways. This means helping people achieve decent wages. Making sure they have good schools. Making sure they’re not tangled up in red tape as they try to get healthcare. Making sure that they’re not lonely, or depressed, that they have a sense of community and purpose. Our job is to bring everybody the good life, to make sure they are able to eat good food, have great healthcare, have fulfilling and rewarding work, and maximize their potential. We don’t want people stuck in dead-end tasks that they hate, we don’t want them having to worry about whether they’ll be able to pay for their children’s medical needs, we don’t want them blown to pieces in a needless war.

Yet consider how people on the left frequently talk: in abstractions, generalities, and theories, in ways that don’t put our principles in intelligible terms. Partly because so much left-wing thinking originates in the academy, the language of the left frequently doesn’t lend itself to mass appeal. Instead of talking about suffering, cruelty, and deprivation, the left now frequently talks about “marginalization” and “exclusion.”

we need terms that make clear to everybody what the problem is and what it would look like if the problem were solved. We should be careful about using language that is unclear or vague, because this makes our goals fuzzy.

It’s important to believe in things that are real. Left-wing principles are often stated in abstractions. For example, “fighting oppression” or “creating equality.”

The more one uses shorthand terms (like “systemic injustice”) rather than descriptors of the actual problems in people’s lives that this shorthand term refers to (like “women being fired for becoming pregnant” or “factories closing and leaving hundreds of dads unable to pay for their children to visit the doctor” or “black men on the way home from their jobs being thrown against police cars and frisked” or “transgender people being bullied and beaten up and then crying all night believing they are totally hated and alone in the world”), the less we help people who are not leftists understand what we are actually concerned with.

Utopian thinking is often seen as the height of uselessness, because it necessarily speculates on worlds that don’t exist rather than dealing pragmatically with the world that does exist. But this misses a crucial purpose of these dreams: They help us understand what the end goal is, what the underlying vision is toward which we want to keep moving. By envisioning the promised land, you can chart a path toward it. You may not get there. But you will at least be heading in the right direction. (This is one reason why Martin Luther King’s dream was such an effective image; it offered a vision of a seemingly impossible world and gave people something to look forward to and begin to build together.) [...]
But you still need an answer to the obvious follow-up question “Well, if you’re not Donald Trump, then what are you?” Progressives therefore need a meaningful vision. Why should people want a left-wing world? What does the left actually stand for? And what would it actually look like to have a world in which the things the left wants are implemented? If nobody gives people a clear answer to these questions, then we cannot expect people to sign on to our program.

Don’t Move To the Right, Move to the Good – When Democrats lose, they sometimes have a tendency to believe they should act more like Republicans in order to win. This is true in one sense, in that Republicans know how to accomplish their political agenda while Democrats do not. But it shouldn’t be taken to mean that Democrats should adopt more right-wing political positions in order to attract a broader base of support. If you try to be both progressive and conservative, you’ll end up being nothing at all. People are far more likely to respect sincere progressives who are truthful about their values than politicians who take the public’s temperature via focus group and adopt their political positions accordingly. Liberalism does not need to be more watery, it needs to be more principled and genuine. People dislike liberals not because their ideas are too radical, but because they are frequently hypocritical (say by flying around in private jets while preaching about inequality) and because they are perceived to be elitist (say by insisting that people who disagree with them are dumb and uneducated). We don’t need to get rid of our commitments, we need to be persuasive in presenting them.

Communication must be effective if it is to be of any use at all. That means you need plain language. Preserving the social safety net. Getting tough on the 1%. Saving the middle class. We do not like cruelty. What is cruelty? Intentionally causing a person feel to feel pain and being indifferent to or enjoying that pain. Why is Donald Trump cruel? Because deporting people inflicts terrible pain on families, and sexual assaulting people traumatizes them.

Many ideological differences are not mere “misunderstandings” and it will be impossible to find common ground. Sometimes values are simply in conflict. But where resolutions are possible, we should try to find them before dismissing a clash as intractable.