USA Goes to War Against Iran
Time for a dedicated thread to the war.
How long will it last and what will be the probable outcome?
I wasn't asking whether you personally had changed anyone's mind for the better. I was asking whether you could identify any poster whose beliefs you believe changed for the better as a result of participating in the forum. I guess you could argue that Inso0's views changed somewhat for the better insofar as I actually believed him when he said that he would not vote for Trum
I think this forum over the years has been a case study in how to entrench views. Even so if you read the archives I'm confident you will find some posters with views that suprise you. How much is down to the forum would be debatable. Personally I have shifted a lot on capitalism in general and the UBI in particular. Some of this I would argue reflects real change in the world but some (particularly the ubi) has been down to exposure to ideas. No doubt other things I've forgotten about or don't even realise.
Obviously I think these new views are 'better' but think 'better' is a tricky concept in this discussion. My case simply boils down to that if we think someone holds a bad position then acting in a way that further binds them to it is not good politics. It is fun.
My case simply boils down to that if we think someone holds a bad position then acting in a way that further binds them to it is not good politics. It is fun.
Everyone would agree that behaving in a way that binds people to bad positions is not good politics. But it is far from self evident that anything that anyone does on 2+2 loosens or strengthens attachments to positions. That's why I'm asking for examples.
I strongly suspect that what you describe as the evolution in your views would have occurred regardless of what anyone said or didn't say on 2+2.
Maybe nato should step in to open the strait.
This entire forum is a cesspool of **** posters and uneducated fools. Come to terms with reality.
There is basically 0 quality control on the posts and posters. I mean Victor has 80k posts lmao. You can’t make up a joke this bad.
lol, was this you buddy?
That’s life. The Palestinians have had a century to figure that out. It should be clear by now they the Israelis are looking for realistic solutions above all else. The time for your moral and ethical qualms has come and gone.
The Israelis have rightly determined that coexistence is not really possible. Sometimes the only option is to cut the cancer out before it spreads. We’ve allowed a century for the situation to resolve itself and instead we’ve just seen the cancer spread to Israel itself.
Did you actually think the civilized world was going to side with savages whose crowning achievement after billions of dollars of aid is building a network of underground tunnels and letting their families get blown up while they cower underground?
Maybe slow down on the whole "We have to exterminate the cancerous savage Arabs" Nazi shtick before complaining about quality control.
lol, was this you buddy
Maybe slow down on the whole "We have to exterminate the cancerous savage Arabs" Nazi shtick before complaining about quality control.
When you have been given enough time and grace to believe the absolutely heinous beliefs you have should be espoused, only then should we have debate so I can change your mind rather than ridicule your heinous and vile ideology and mock it into illegitimacy
-chezlaw probably
Everyone would agree that behaving in a way that binds people to bad positions is not good politics. But it is far from self evident that anything that anyone does on 2+2 loosens or strengthens attachments to positions. That's why I'm asking for examples. I strongly suspect that what you describe as the evolution in your views would have occurred regardless of what anyone sa
So we can at least gree that views do change.
It's a start.
When you have been given enough time and grace to believe the absolutely heinous beliefs you have should be espoused, only then should we have debate so I can change your mind rather than ridicule your heinous and vile ideology and mock it into illegitimacy
-chezlaw probably
Nothing like anything I've said or believe.
That may or may not bother you
When you have been given enough time and grace to believe the absolutely heinous beliefs you have should be espoused, only then should we have debate so I can change your mind rather than ridicule your heinous and vile ideology and mock it into illegitimacy
-chezlaw probably
Nothing like anything I've said or believe.
That may or may not bother you
Shut the fuck up, chez, the adults are talking.
Wait what? Where?
As exhaustingly pointless as this is I’m going to go ahead and address this1. I don’t believe for a second you have convinced anyone to think different. If I were a hardcore maga posting on the politics subforum of an online poker forum and had a come to Jesus moment reading anything you said, I mean, ****ing lol me2. The idea that mongo/luckbox/victor/blahblah/etc etc are owed
I hope we don't let this get in the way of our enjoying each other's company if/when we get together for our coffee date. Please don't forget to PM me a day ahead of your arrival in San Clemente. Thanks!
Everyone would agree that behaving in a way that binds people to bad positions is not good politics. But it is far from self evident that anything that anyone does on 2+2 loosens or strengthens attachments to positions. That's why I'm asking for examples. I strongly suspect that what you describe as the evolution in your views would have occurred regardless of what anyone sa
Mine have. It probably comes down to confirmation bias, though, which is why I don't find say SRM's Alinsky-style of political engagement effective at all in terms of affecting change.
Mine have. It probably comes down to confirmation bias, though, which is why I don't find say SRM's Alinsky-style of political engagement effective at all in terms of affecting change.
It's also more than sufficient for my case that no-one is influence positively by being on this forum.
While I think that's too strong, it is fact that the progressive left is losing and losing badly. So even losing less slowly would be better than the SRM approach. I think it's almost impossible to win much of an argument for progressive politics when 'our' political parties are so rubbish and social media is so toxic. We have to be offering something and then implementing well when we get the opportunity. Then the progressive ideas that people are exposed to have some fertile ground they could take hold in. There's no one problem or one answer. we are losing on multiple fronts and we have to tackle them all. It's very tough because we've been losing for a long time.
lol, was this you buddy
Maybe slow down on the whole "We have to exterminate the cancerous savage Arabs" Nazi shtick before complaining about quality control.
I don’t care about virtue signaling. If after 80 years of diplomacy you have no progress, you need to move onto other options. I never said they should exterminate them, although I did acknowledge that that would have happened long ago if the Palestinians were dealing with Arabs or Christians instead of Jews.
And apparently Iran doesn't know where all of their mines are and they don’t have the capability to demine the strait so it’s not clear if they actually have the ability to reopen the strait.
Literally me: I have no interest in the abhorrent other than belittling and mocking
John and chezlaw: we question SRM’s path at debate
While I think that's too strong, it is fact that the progressive left is losing and losing badly.
There's probably a reason for that, and it'll be the usual one -- promoting niche elitist beliefs over most people's actual concerns. The British Labour Party nearly got wiped out in the early Thirties when it proposed abolishing the armed forces just as Hitler took power, it got similarly trounced under Corbyn in 2019 when it followed activist rather than popular concerns, and it's now hogtied to Red Ed's net-zero fantasy when the alternative energy supplies simply aren't available ( and Ed's currently predicted to lose his seat to Reform). It's also badly damaged by adherence to discredited gender-identity woo and slavery to 'progressive' public-sector union leaders who are completely out of touch with the membership.
Meanwhile the US Democrats, who aren't meaningfully progressive anyway but represent an elitist class interest, are expecting gains, because of the regrettable White House incumbent's weirdness, but still don't recognise how they lost the plot last time.
There's probably a reason for that, and it'll be the usual one -- promoting niche elitist beliefs over most people's actual concerns. The British Labour Party nearly got wiped out in the early Thirties when it proposed abolishing the armed forces just as Hitler took power, it got similarly trounced under Corbyn in 2019 when it followed activist rather than popular concerns, and
It doesn't really matter how often the democrats or new/changed/whatever labour win elections when they don't win the argument for change and then they do **** all to change anything. They rerarrange deckchairs while entrenching the awful gains of the right. Then the right come back in.
There are Democrats arguing for real change, labour people arguing to reverse thatcherism. These embers need to be fanned but it's not easy.
