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Comments
Also, I'm not sure if I'm misunderstanding you, but evolutionary biology is a scientific framework for understanding biological systems/organisms/zoology/botany/etc., not a social sciences or civics thing about history/morality/philosophy/etc..
I mean if we're going to understand humans (which are just really fancy animals) you can't do that by splintering biology from the social sciences. The former has much more grounding in reality, and so should guide the latter. Otherwise you get rampant social constructivism.
> you can't do that by splintering biology from the social sciences
But given how much humanity does (and how much of humanity does that humanity can actually understand) that goes far beyond what other animals do (or at least human understanding of what animals do), and how much of that is not studied directly in the field of biology/zoology but is studied in fields of social sciences, the two have rather distinct foci, even though they are necessarily related. In a similar way, classical mechanics is still studied in physics because it has proven useful, even though it may not be an absolutely correct representation of the world at a more fundamental atomic level.
Anyhow for some reason I am wondering whether this is leaning toward being a proxy for the whole row earlier about transgender people.
Stuff like monogamy, I guess. Or the disapproval of people over 18 pursuing those under 18 sexually even if those people (15-17 I'd say) have gone through puberty. Very general stuff.
The "enforced" part is cultural. How did this become entrenched in X culture and how does that further the culture's survival and how thrives or fails to thrive.
I am not a greatest hits album man, this wasn't about trans people at all. In fact, [no matter what I say here it'll sound bad but acknowledge this space as a caveat], the trans stuff would still be linked to aspects of biology. It'd be insane if it wasn't.
This lack of humility about humans being animals really bothers me. We are not free of instincts no matter how much we understand them. Not from you specifically, but just in general.
As far as I can see; It's a complete waste of time to study sociology without a basis in biology, however the reverse doesn't hold true. This is a fundamental difference between you and I, so I don't think there's any point in dragging this part of the debate out any more.
OTOH my guess is that you and I disagree on the extent to which one can look to biology and expect to find accurately-applicable answers to sociological questions. I see the overapplication of this as something that leads to patently silly backward-justifications of beliefs (such as the suggestion that women like pink because they're evolutionarily predisposed to looking for berries in a hunter-gatherer society), and I caution strongly against using this approach without proof for more than just idle speculation (much less for choosing appropriate norms for humanity).
wow, fuck you
Oh, did you want to see buck-passing?
No?
Too bad.
Edit: before this balloons into another argument: the only excuse they had was "this program is being mismanaged by the University of West Florida". There are a few more words on it in this article: https://www.wfla.com/news/florida/desantis-quietly-ends-virtual-learning-program-amid-coronavirus-surge/
The appropriate response to that is to fix the program so that it's got better oversight, not to kill it and leave everyone who uses it hanging.
meanwhile lol @ Florida
we're smashing records!! :-DDDDD
As for a topic that's not COVID-19:
Some thoughts on historical figures and how they're honored:
I'd bet that if some of those people who were slaveowners or otherwise had let's say regressive views on civil rights were alive today, they would be more supportive of civil rights. At the very least, those who were political pragmatists would likely have a different tone. One can complain that they're cowards for not crusading harder, but I'd be hesitant about making hasty blanket judgements and would rather research the particular figures before deciding my opinion on them.
Overall, I'm of the opinion that we should be asking ourselves some hard questions before we decide to rule on condemning previously-glorified historical figures simply for, say, having been slaveowners. But more broadly, perhaps the mistake was idolizing them in the first place -- as humans, they inevitably did some things right and some things wrong, and we should understand this, that they were human, and not simply symbolic icons of philosophical ideas. (In a way, perhaps there's some prudence in the condemnation of idolatry in the Abrahamic religions...)
Meanwhile, though, specifically for historical figures from the Confederacy, material about them is stuff that should belong in museums. We definitely need to keep careful and comprehensive records about the past, so as to understand what happened, including the good, the bad, and the ugly. The world is not neatly organized according to moral values.
But, glorifying Confederate leaders -- especially glorifying them to further this "Lost Cause" ideology and basically keep this flamewar going for over a century and a half -- is precisely the behavior that Gen. Robert E. Lee himself warned against, but whose words were, as we know, ironically unheeded by those who glorified him. We don't even need to get into civil rights issues to conclude that such glorification is a bad idea.
Even more ironic is U.S. military installations named after those who are, pretty indisputably, traitors to the country. While one can maybe argue about the moral motives of said betrayal, it's still particularly self-contradictory to name a military institution after a traitor, when there are, at the very least, far more names to choose from, including names of people who were far more loyal.
Historical items belong in museums (and research libraries) and ought to be valued. But working names of things (e.g. names of military bases, schools, roads, etc.), as well as statues specifically meant to honor certain subjects, are another matter. (At most, they are historical markers of a different era, one that is reacting to a specific past event.)
Meanwhile, if I ever plan a city, I'm naming the roads after Fire Emblem characters.For those not in the know: post-American Civil War restructuring of the South under federal supervision, if I get it right.
* he did indeed embrace Reconstruction and support the Republican Party (n.b. back then the roles of the Republicans and Democrats were basically the opposite of what they are today, with regards to civil rights)
* he was during the war known to be a brilliant commander/tactician and basically served as Gen. Robert E. Lee's right-hand man or something like that
* he was later blamed for the defeat at Gettysburg, though such blame seems to be incorrect
* he did later lead a militia, which included some number of black men, against a white supremacist militia, in a battle in New Orleans in 1874 that was among the many repercussions of the disputed Louisiana gubernatorial election of 1872
* there are a few things commemorating him, but not many
here's stuff I skimmed through, for reference:
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Longstreet (particularly the section on Legacy)
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Liberty_Place
* https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/equestrian-statue/ (not really relevant but he just shows up here and it's the top and/or only Snopes page about him)
* https://www.cnn.com/2017/08/23/opinions/where-are-monuments-to-confederate-general-longstreet-opinion-holmes/index.html (this piece opines that the relative lack of monuments has to do with other people not liking him due to his position on civil rights and his de facto alignment against the "Lost Cause", and even compares him to Maj. Gen. George Pickett, whose famously unsuccessful "Pickett's charge" was apparently Lee's idea which Longstreet disagreed with but carried out anyway)
* https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-forgotten-confederate-general-who-would-make-a-better-subject-for-monuments/2016/01/27/f09bad42-c536-11e5-8965-0607e0e265ce_story.html (another opinion piece along similar lines)
* https://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/os-xpm-1998-06-28-9806270731-story.html (1998 news article about the belated erecting of a statue commemorating Longstreet at Gettysburg in that year)
* http://cwmemory.com/2016/01/30/does-james-longstreet-deserve-a-monument/ (this piece opines that Longstreet was not a saint in being pro-Reconstruction anyway, in a response to the Washington Post opinion piece saying that Longstreet ought to be memorialized more)
It seems that the actual situation is that there is probably some truth to the contention you mentioned, mixed in with maligning him over some unfavorable outcomes (particularly at Gettysburg) and also some things he once wrote about Lee. While some historical markers and monuments exist of him, Longstreet certainly was not celebrated anywhere near, say, Lt. Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest, who held the same rank. (N.B., Forrest later became the first Grand Wizard of the Klu Klux Klan, though Wikipedia says he later disavowed that organization.)
Yes, there was a period called "Reconstruction", which is basically sorta what you're talking about. In fact, part of the reason for the outcome of the 1876 U.S. presidential election is actually that politicians in a series of southern states basically struck a deal that ended Reconstruction in return for letting the states support a presidential candidate they didn't like.
You may be interested in this article, which discusses the topic of commemorations of the Confederacy in general, and includes a timeline showing when each of a variety of different commemorations (including statues but also other things named after Confederate historical figures) were established. (Longstreet is not mentioned there.)
The argument that many of these figures were commemorated for with more intent of an expression of political resentment, rather than historical accuracy, does certainly seem quite plausible.
* I learned something new today,
* there actually was a Good Guy Confederate and he's totally not what one would expect,
* he was vilified specifically because he was above the level of society he lived in,
* the possibility he really wasn't that good actually adds some depth to his person rather than simply make him more Machiavellian than the rest of them (in my opinion).
or did they just yell at thin air each?
The last public centrists are leaving U.S. media institutions, so it'll be fun to see what happens next.
Similarly, politics is now in every major commercial product. When I was a teenager, I thought this would be beautiful and great. It's hilarious how often children are wrong.
I agree with the argument that shutting down the economy for containment is not economically sustainable beyond a short time, but at this point we've figured out how to move past that, which is with mask wearing.
But for some people get really angry when told to wear masks, or even in some cases at the sight of other people wearing them or the sight of stores selling them.
Isn't this just how you guys roll? "Hey man, pay for your five'o'clock!" "FREEEEEEDUUUHM!"
lol jk
But yes, there are folks who politicize everything.
I don't! I understand the impulse very well and how it's working so far.
As for the rest of your points, I feel we'll have ample time to argue the important ones later and so we shouldn't start of the first day (or second day already for you?) of the Politics Is Back IV arc with a hypermajor discussion.
And in any event, I've already outlined quite a bit about the things you questioned in the images thread.
Glenn you didn't have to go that far in annihilating the ceasefire.
Anyhows, don't you mean something like "confrontational" or maybe "partisan" instead of "political"? I mean, mandatory* face masks are a political matter in the most straightforward sense of the word, whatever else you can say about those who oppose it, they didn't bring politics where it wasn't already there.
.* This is what we're talking about, right?
I guess you could say it's "political" in the sense of being an aspect of public policy, and if people have concerns over it like abnormal runs on masks, or accommodations for people who can't use masks for various reasons, or discussing how restaurants or other businesses where people might consume food might fare under a mask policy. It's not a perfect solution; rather, it's more like a way to get by while stuff like vaccine research is underway.
But it shouldn't be "political" in the sense of people using it as an excuse for grandstanding on "freedom". (There's a reason that bad meme of Americans that lrdgck mentioned exists.) I guess you're right in that "partisan" might be more accurate, though the typical usage here uses the word "political" to describe this -- similar to fourteenwings's post wherein he wrote "politics is now in every major commercial product".
I think the problem with this is pretty simple; you've decided these things (masks, waiting, vaccine) as if they are immutable facts, whereas in reality they are the one strategy that is being presented to us.
A lot of other people may have alternative strategies -policies- that they would like to go ahead with, and they believe those are the right way to go. I mean, who even knows if the vaccine will ever happen, or we'll ever need it? There's strong a chance that co-morbidities are the main drivers of death.
Is the disease as bad as we feared, or are there other infectious illnesses that share it's death rate that currently exist? What happened to natural herd immunity?
And in terms of the reaction, we've had really bad first runs of diseases in humanity, but the response was always more in line with stoicism. Have modern times softened the leading countries too much, therefore setting a bad pace for the rest of the world?
And for goodness sakes where do Cyril & Co get off banning alcohol, twice. I am a teetotaler, but I know the insanitiy restricting alcohol creates.
Deciding on the problem, solution, and process beforehand and then treating everybody who doesn't agree with you as misguided (or evil) is where a lot of modern troubles come from.
Well, if I were to be specific, one brand of partisan politics is now in every commercial product.
There was a time when a brand refraining from engaging in politics was seen as a valid position to hold, long before "silence=complicity and violence" was (very quickly) mainstreamed a few months ago. I remember very clearly when the first French* McDonalds commercial came out featuring a dad driving a son on his first gay date came out.
Hilariously enough that was about exactly ten years ago.
*French cause it was controversial in 2010 to be political.
And you're seeing them as "immutable facts" whereas I actually just see them as "these seem like reasonably prudent measures before we get something better". (The vaccine is not part of this, because it doesn't exist yet; it's just a guess based on what people are trying to develop, and it's also possible that the vaccine itself will need to keep being updated to keep up with a mutating virus, and so on.)
There are but we have ways of controlling those, such as known treatments or other procedures. And they're also not currently widespread in the US.
You have to have a large number of people immune, which either means that they get sick or vaccinated first. The off-chance that a large number of people are actually already immune to this as of now has been shown to likely a poor bet, given how much transmission and incidence we've already seen.
I don't think "modern times" have changed much from the general advice that people ought to sit tight and look at the big picture and the long term, but it's just that living through it -- especially with social media enabling people to constantly bounce their thoughts off of each other -- makes it harder to sit tight.
???
(Tangent: I also can't figure out whether "get off" here means to "let go of/stop trying to do" or "pleasure oneself on and thus by implication be incentivized to do".)
Personally I still hold the opinion that it's a valid position, but I also don't mind per se the idea of companies deciding to espouse various social views (whether I dislike or like it depends on the view itself). Either way, I tend to not fault someone for not having anything to say about a given topic, unless they are reasonably responsible for or associated with that topic.
I just meant "think they can get away with". I genuinely think that's how it's meant to be used?
It feels really weird because I genuinely thought people knew about this but I don't have any real reasoning for that.
I think that's the way things should be? As much as I personally get more wired and wired, I understand that this is a very nerdy thing to do.
It's like that thing I'm always talking about; I was raised on the notion that politics is really boring (it is) and only uptight people do more than vote (also very true).
That's a really charitable notion in regards to social media.
.* Ehh, maybe not everywhere but I've heard stuff from lots of places and of course, here too.
I was raised on the notion that politics is dirty and dangerous, yet I ended up touching it anyway. I've also been told that people in my ethnicity tend to not care who's running the show, but I was only explicitly told this after I grew up.
OTOH I do think that people ought to pay more attention to it as various pieces of it may be important in the sense of affecting one's life and livelihood.
It's ironic that you say that, since I was criticizing it with regards to its effect on society.
It is!
But in a really boring way.
I think, in the absence of major issues, voting covers that.
IJBM: the terms "Congressman" and "Congresswoman" (with or without capitalization).
The "Congress" actually contains both the Senate and the House of Representatives. Every senator is also a congressman or congresswoman. Thus, members of the House of Representatives should be titled "Representative".
Here's a summary of what's happened here so far.
Frankly, this is a current "controversy" because the presidential and gubernatorial administrations have insisted it isn't a problem (or otherwise made a variety of efforts to downplay it), causing people to argue over it.
I know vaporwave is a meme, but I did not expect it to be used in an actual campaign ad this year.