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The need to be "right" is the real sickness here (1 Viewer)

I’m sure they do too. You and about a dozen others have told them that they were responsible every time Trump did something stupid. 
 

Then you chirped once or twice a week about how high Biden’s approval rating was. 
 

And when his rating started dropping, you disappeared 

And as far as “you can’t stand the growing hostility “…..the PSF was really nothing but hostility when Trump was in the WH…it didn’t seem to bother you at all then

imo
It is your opinion and you’re welcome to it. But I don’t think it’s mostly  true (it’s a little bit true) and I’m sorry you feel that way. 

 
At some point, don't we just have to acknowledge that it is a near universal human nature to group ourselves into "us" and "them"? And too then be hostile towards "the other"? I am not sure how we beat that part of our nature, but our natural instincts are a problem.  
Ezra Klein covers this in his book Why We're Polarized.  Behavioral studies show that we'll take a tribal posture very quickly even for innocuous situations like how we score on silly tests.  

 
timschochet said:
I don’t agree with you about this. My personal experience is that many folks on both sides think the other side are bad people and that this has gotten worse in recent years. 
But even more than that, I think that more and more people on either side believes the other side hates them, irrationally so. And motives are often ascribed which often have no relationship to reality. 


I would agree. I removed myself from the political sphere a while ago, but people I would've considered moderate 10-15 years ago think the other side is literally trying to destroy America as we know it.   It's not a small inconsequential number of people and it's not people I would have expected would be radicalized if you asked back then.   I think when you have this extreme perspective, it's difficult to find anything redeeming in the other side as it really shatters your worldview. 

dhockster said:
If you haven't watched "The Social Dilema" it talks about this specifically. Social media companies, because they want you to stay online using their platforms, finds out what you like and then cater their newsfeed to you to make it things you like. So a person who spends a lot of time on right wing websites will get fed news that feeds to the right wing point of view, so that person will stay online looking at the news stories they get. Because they are now getting news with a right wing slant, it reinforces their right wing beliefs, and further emboldens them to speak out against the other side because they have evidence (with a right wing bias) to support it. It works the same way with someone who leans left.

Fascinating and totally scary.


I think the Social Dilemma is pretty spot on about this (and, at some point there was this "filter bubble" concept which was essentially the same thing) and explains why people have been driven to the the extremes. 

 
In  a sense—in regards to the United States—arguably this dynamic could be rooted in the dynamic of our Imperialism.  Our history books don’t teach us to second guess any decision that this country has made.  We’re taught to believe that Vietnam and other wars were necessary and that we won all of them..etc.      We’re basically trained to believe that one is either Pro-America and pro-American policy or they are anti-American.     I’m fully aware that I am over-generalizing here and I concede there are probably many exceptions to this hypothesis.  It just seems like a form of imperialism has manifested in our society on an individual level.  Instead of using military force to extend power—individuals are using the power of likes, social media, and other propaganda to spread their influence and validation towards people that share their same views (regardless of what the facts might be). 

 
In  a sense—in regards to the United States—arguably this dynamic could be rooted in the dynamic of our Imperialism.  Our history books don’t teach us to second guess any decision that this country has made.  We’re taught to believe that Vietnam and other wars were necessary and that we won all of them..etc.      We’re basically trained to believe that one is either Pro-America and pro-American policy or they are anti-American.     I’m fully aware that I am over-generalizing here and I concede there are probably many exceptions to this hypothesis.  It just seems like a form of imperialism has manifested in our society on an individual level.  Instead of using military force to extend power—individuals are using the power of likes, social media, and other propaganda to spread their influence and validation towards people that share their same views (regardless of what the facts might be). 
I’m not sure I know anyone who thinks we won the Vietnam War. I don’t believe my kids were taught that in history class either (not that they paid attention one way or the other.) 

 
It is your opinion and you’re welcome to it. But I don’t think it’s mostly  true (it’s a little bit true) and I’m sorry you feel that way. 
That place was a hornet's nest when Trump was president. Tanner literally told somebody that they were a bad person if they opposed government-run health care. It was a bizarre place when he was President, just like most places were.

The media was outright hostile to the presidency, and it showed everywhere, especially in the PSF. I don't blame the media for the PSF, but the mood of the nation and the information and entertainment was hostile and terrible.

Hermain Cain came back as a dead fly on SNL or something like that after having had died from COVID. It was ridiculous while it went on.

 
That place was a hornet's nest when Trump was president. Tanner literally told somebody that they were a bad person if they opposed government-run health care. It was a bizarre place when he was President, just like most places were.

The media was outright hostile to the presidency, and it showed everywhere, especially in the PSF. I don't blame the media for the PSF, but the mood of the nation and the information and entertainment was hostile and terrible.

Hermain Cain came back as a dead fly on SNL or something like that after having had died from COVID. It was ridiculous while it went on.
It’s still a Hornets nest. Only yesterday somebody wrote “General Milley is trash and anyone who defends him is trash.”
 

That’s not the sort of discussion or debate that I care to engage in. Reasonable people can disagree about what Milley did or may have done and that’s fine, but we can’t have that discussion when these sorts of statements are made. For all of my flaws (and sure, I have plenty) I never made this sort of “argument”. 
 

So that’s why I stopped posting there. Not because, as claimed here, that “my side” is losing now (whatever that means), but because it’s gotten so damn ugly. And I got sick of it. 

 
So that’s why I stopped posting there. Not because, as claimed here, that “my side” is losing now (whatever that means), but because it’s gotten so damn ugly. And I got sick of it. 
Eh. You might have just noticed it, but posting like that was going on about Trump and his supporters on the reg. In fact, you once said that Trump and his supporters were or had to be racist, given what people knew about Trump.

That was pretty incendiary. I think calling Milley "trash" isn't even akin to that. Yours was a deliberate thought process yielding a deliberate epithet. Calling somebody "trash" could just be emotive.

You then stuck to that position and reiterated it.

 
Eh. You might have just noticed it, but posting like that was going on about Trump and his supporters on the reg. In fact, you once said that Trump and his supporters were or had to be racist, given what people knew about Trump.

That was pretty incendiary. I think calling Milley "trash" isn't even akin to that. Yours was a deliberate thought process yielding a deliberate epithet. Calling somebody "trash" could just be emotive.

You then stuck to that position and reiterated it.
I don’t want to belabor this  but you are not correct here. What I wrote, several years ago, was that Trump was making racist comments and that if you were aware of these and still supported him you either agreed with him or you didn’t find these statements important enough to stop supporting him. I acknowledged at the time I wrote it that a good chunk of Trump supporters were unaware of the statements and therefore blameless. 
What I did NOT acknowledge was a fourth option- that many Trump supporters were aware of the comments but didn’t find them to be racist. That was wrong of me, I realized it later and stated it and I’ve never made similar comments since. 
So no I don’t think it’s anywhere close to akin or worse. 

 
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But one of my biggest flaws in the political forum was that I made far too many absolutist statements in general. That annoyed many people and if any of them are reading this, sorry. If and when I return I will try to refrain from doing so. It’s very insulting to others. But I don’t think I ever engaged in the ugliness that pervades the place now. 

 
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I don’t want to belabor this  but you are not correct here. What I wrote, several years ago, was that Trump was making racist comments and that if you were aware of these and still supported him you either agreed with him or you didn’t find these statements important enough to stop supporting him. I acknowledged at the time I wrote it that a hood chunk of Trump supporters were unaware of the statements and therefore blameless. 
What I did NOT acknowledge was a fourth option- that many Trump supporters were aware of the comments but didn’t find them to be racist. That was wrong of me, I realized it later and stated it and I’ve never made similar comments since. 
So no I don’t think it’s anywhere close to akin or worse. 
Huh. I'm a nuanced line-drawer. I guess I can see that. What you're really saying is that you weren't not right, then.

 
But one of biggest flaws in the political forum was that I made far too many absolutist statements in general. That annoyed many people and if any of them are reading this, sorry. If and when I return I will try to refrain from doing so. It’s very insulting to others. But I don’t think I ever engaged in the ugliness that pervades the place now. 
I see.

I don't know what to say to that.

Good luck?

I'm not sure you were ever that absolutist. In fact, I quoted the one time I thought you were, and it turns out that it's more nuanced than I thought. You might have painted with a pretty broad brush, but it always seemed at least somewhat tethered to reality and you were rather impersonal, and when personal, a pretty stand-up, nice guy. I saw some ugliness hurled your way that I did not like at all.

 
Lol no I’m really saying exactly what I just wrote. 
Everything you wrote has a truth table in symbolic logic. I'm just trying to translate. Most likely I'm doing it completely and utterly wrong. That's my burden, not yours.

 
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The original premise has been proven. Thanks for coming everyone.

Now, go away....put down your phone...have a cold beer and go talk to a tree.

 
The original premise has been proven. Thanks for coming everyone.

Now, go away....put down your phone...have a cold beer and go talk to a tree.
I did, however, just admit to being very likely wrong. Twice. I also had my mind changed online about a deeply personal political issue that usually just brings hollering. It was a comment from somebody that caused me to think very deeply about a very personal issue.

People can be wrong. People can change. And admitting it is not weakness, it's growth.

 
But that last part was the OP's point. That we should grow and be willing to admit wrongfulness. I just see this growth in subtle ways from lots of people. They never do mea culpas like I do -- and I'm not complimenting myself, it's part of my whole persona -- but they change subtly, in ways we cannot necessarily pin down. See it all the time, actually.

 
Eh. You might have just noticed it, but posting like that was going on about Trump and his supporters on the reg. In fact, you once said that Trump and his supporters were or had to be racist, given what people knew about Trump.

That was pretty incendiary. I think calling Milley "trash" isn't even akin to that. Yours was a deliberate thought process yielding a deliberate epithet. Calling somebody "trash" could just be emotive.

You then stuck to that position and reiterated it.


I don’t want to belabor this  but you are not correct here. What I wrote, several years ago, was that Trump was making racist comments and that if you were aware of these and still supported him you either agreed with him or you didn’t find these statements important enough to stop supporting him. I acknowledged at the time I wrote it that a good chunk of Trump supporters were unaware of the statements and therefore blameless. 
What I did NOT acknowledge was a fourth option- that many Trump supporters were aware of the comments but didn’t find them to be racist. That was wrong of me, I realized it later and stated it and I’ve never made similar comments since. 
So no I don’t think it’s anywhere close to akin or worse. 
Those of us who don't want to deal with the PSF REALLY don't want people rehashing old arguments from the PSF in the FFA. 

 
So that’s why I stopped posting there. Not because, as claimed here, that “my side” is losing now (whatever that means), but because it’s gotten so damn ugly. And I got sick of it. 
I stepped away from politics a few months ago and my life is a lot less stressful.  Why bother trying to argue with people who experience a different reality and aren't willing to accept that they might not be viewing things objectively due to their preexisting beliefs or choice of media they consume.  It's an issue on both sides, btw. 

 
It all reduces to the fact that we are a nation of sore losers, as in the sorest or sore losers.

Some people will flip the board when playing Risk or Monopoly, rather than lose with grace.  That's where we are at as a nation.

 
Agree that the need to be right is a major flaw right now…I will piggyback that by saying the ability to stop on a dime and dislike/hate someone who thinks differently about just one thing is something that is relatively new…there has always been division on a big picture level but right now one simple disagreement can change a relationship forever.

 
I feel I learn a lot more from being wrong than I do being right. But y'all seem to be talking about much larger levels of right and wrong than what I ha in mind entering this thread.

 
A man wakes up on the operating table, looks around, and says "I guess I'm dead. This must be the afterlife."

The surgeon tries to reassure him that he just had a successful operation and that he's going to be fine, but the patient becomes more and more insistent that he must be dead. So the surgeon attempts to reason with him. "Dead people can't bleed, right?"

The patient agrees that dead people don't bleed, so the surgeon pokes him on the finger and shows him the droplet of blood. The patient looks impressed and says, "Well, what do you know? I guess dead people CAN bleed."

 
It all reduces to the fact that we are a nation of sore losers, as in the sorest or sore losers.

Some people will flip the board when playing Risk or Monopoly, rather than lose with grace.  That's where we are at as a nation.
My brother did that when we were kids.  He taught me how to play chess and I beat him on the 2nd try.

 
My brother did that when we were kids.  He taught me how to play chess and I beat him on the 2nd try.
I flipped the board once while playing Risk with my sister.

I hated it when despite playing well and having a vastly superior army, I would lose due to the randomness of the dice and just lost it once...think I was like 12-13 yrs old.

She still won't let me forget it.  I'm 43 now.  :mellow:

 
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It all reduces to the fact that we are a nation of sore losers, as in the sorest or sore losers.

Some people will flip the board when playing Risk or Monopoly, rather than lose with grace.  That's where we are at as a nation.
This might correlate with our also being ingracious winners. In a distant time that some of my fellow oldsters may recall, crowing after a win was considered poor form. But that notion will just get you ridiculed in a lot of social media these days.

 
This might correlate with our also being ingracious winners. In a distant time that some of my fellow oldsters may recall, crowing after a win was considered poor form. But that notion will just get you ridiculed in a lot of social media these days.
Yep. It's bat flips and hesitation steps around the bases. But you'll actually get smeared with implications of racism or racialism or being an old, fuddy-duddy white dude if you feel that way.

There's probably an element of racism in some people's assessments of celebration. But really, I always just wanted winning to be done with grace and consideration for the loser. I don't see how that implicates race, but it does. 

Sorry to hijack your thought, but those that push back against the crowing after a win get smeared with "you just don't understand," and it has all the implications of calling somebody a racist.

 
Ran across this when doing some reading today. Thought it was relevant to this topic, so thought I'd share:

Wisdom Is Never Found in Certainty

As Jeff Bezos says, "the smartest people are constantly revising their understanding, reconsidering a problem they thought they'd already solved. They're open to new points of view, new information, new ideas, contradictions, and challenges to their own way of thinking." 

That's because wisdom isn't found in certainty. Wisdom is knowing that while you might know a lot, there's also a lot you don't know. Wisdom is trying to find out what is right rather than trying to be right. Wisdom is realizing when you're wrong, and backing down graciously.

Don't be afraid to be wrong. Don't be afraid to admit you don't have all the answers. Don't be afraid to say "I think" instead of "I know."

 

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