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http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/08/opinion/sunday/a-confession-of-liberal-intolerance.html?_r=0
WE progressives believe in diversity, and we want women, blacks, Latinos, gays and Muslims at the table — er, so long as they aren't conservatives. Universities are the bedrock of progressive values, but the one kind of diversity that universities disregard is ideological and religious. We're fine with people who don't look like us, as long as they think like us.
O.K., that's a little harsh. But consider George Yancey, a sociologist who is black and evangelical. "Outside of academia I faced more problems as a black," he told me. "But inside academia I face more problems as a Christian, and it is not even close."
I've been thinking about this because on Facebook recently I wondered aloud whether universities stigmatize conservatives and undermine intellectual diversity. The scornful reaction from my fellow liberals proved the point.
"Much of the 'conservative' worldview consists of ideas that are known empirically to be false," said Carmi. "The truth has a liberal slant," wrote Michelle. "Why stop there?" asked Steven. "How about we make faculties more diverse by hiring idiots?"
To me, the conversation illuminated primarily liberal arrogance — the implication that conservatives don't have anything significant to add to the discussion. My Facebook followers have incredible compassion for war victims in South Sudan, for kids who have been trafficked, even for abused chickens, but no obvious empathy for conservative scholars facing discrimination.
The stakes involve not just fairness to conservatives or evangelical Christians, not just whether progressives will be true to their own values, not just the benefits that come from diversity (and diversity of thought is arguably among the most important kinds), but also the quality of education itself. When perspectives are unrepresented in discussions, when some kinds of thinkers aren't at the table, classrooms become echo chambers rather than sounding boards — and we all lose.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Mykl on Monday August 29 2016, @04:30AM
You're making the assumption here (as are most people in the comments) that Conservative == Christian. That's not always the case and, although the article focuses on someone in academia who was criticised for his Christian beliefs, I think it equally likely that non-religious conservatives can be discriminated against for their beliefs.
What about people who hold conservative beliefs about economic issues, immigration, foreign policy etc yet are also athiests? I'll readily concede that issues such as gay marriage, abortion etc are religion-based, but you don't need to be religious to hold a conservative view on tax and welfare. Here in Australia, there are examples of non-religious conservatives being marginalised because of their non-religious beliefs in certain areas, most lately around the issue of 'illegal' refugees arriving by boat.
My interpretation of the article wasn't strictly a religious vs non-religious debate. It was about the intolerance of the left to alternative viewpoints and their willingness to ignore all views from an individual once they disagree with one view of theirs (e.g. "Your views on welfare are idiotic, so I'll ignore your views on immigration before even hearing them."). Of course, the right is equally guilty of this but, as the article states, nobody really benefits from this polarisation.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 29 2016, @05:05AM
I'll readily concede that issues such as gay marriage, abortion etc are religion-based.
Actually no.
"Gay marriage" is a bit of a misnomer, as the issue isn't whether gays can marry, but restrictions on partner selection, which can be arbitrary, but is by no means specific to gays (interestingly western society has grown more restrictive towards age in the same time).
So the question becomes if sexual orientation is sufficient cause to negate restriction, why should any of the others be encumbered as well (incest, pedophilia, zoophilia, etc.)?
Abortion is simply valuing human life so that there should be an overriding concern in ending it which "my body, my choice" doesn't even come close to.
The left is fond of painting conservatives with a broad brush of religious doctrine, but the arguments are generally more nuanced than God said so, and frequently don't originate from religion at all.
(Score: 4, Informative) by Azuma Hazuki on Monday August 29 2016, @08:05AM
Regarding your idiocy conflating gays getting married with pedophilia: the question here is one of harm. This isn't a hard concept, and you're deliberately repeating propaganda you ought to be too smart for.
My girlfriend and I getting married harms no one. Why is this? Because we are two adults, in our late 20s, with less than 2 years' difference between us, both of sound mind and body. We are doing financial planning, both employed, and neither of us are criminals nor drains on society.
Now compare this to the pedophile. A child, and indeed a teenager, is not ready for and cannot understand sex or relationships. Minds and bodies both are undeveloped. This is a clear-cut case of harm: children and teenagers CANNOT MEANINGFULLY CONSENT. Worse, if the body is also undeveloped, sex is outright injurious, especially to girls.
Incest: usually involves a massive power differential and/or blackmail, and prevents people from maturing properly and looking for mates outside the family. See above re: pedophilia. Personally, while it squicks me out, rationally-speaking I am not sure how I could morally condemn, for example, a pair of incestuous sisters or cousins. But even so, it may be better to prevent the entire category to stop the abusive cases, which is going to be nearly all of them anyway.
Bestiality: Again, animals cannot meaningfully consent. They are not humans, they do not (usually) have a theory of mind, and they can't understand how or why a human wants his/her way with them. This is animal abuse.
Do you get it now? Or were you just trolling?
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2, Flamebait) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday August 29 2016, @11:16AM
Wow, that's some quality Wrong to go with your normal morning bowl of Nasty. Teenagers are fully capable of making decisions every bit as good as those of adults, they simply need someone else's pool of experience to draw upon rather than their own limited pools. This is where teaching your kids about life instead of expecting a school to do it for you comes in. It helps if you are a good example but a bad one can do just as well, lucky for you.
This idea that teenagers are still metaphorically in diapers and need coddling is both extremely new and extremely foolhardy. No, their brains are not completely developed. They will make mistakes. They will also learn from them. Yours is fully developed (though in an abnormal and badly in need of servicing sort of way) and you likely have a worse decision-making record than the average teen but we treat you like an adult just the same.
The fact of the matter is, human beings were designed (by either nature or their creator, take your pick) to become sexually active at around twelve. Are you really brilliant enough to think that you can single-handedly outsmart whichever method of deciding that you picked? I'm pretty sure I can't outsmart a genetic algorithm that's been running for as long as it has, operating on billions of seats but then I don't have the kind of hubris it takes to be called a liberal today.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 29 2016, @01:46PM
It's much more pleasant wading through the -1 sewer when some exposition goes on to uncover the flaws in dangerous viewpoints rather than simple retorts using name-calling.
Thanks to both you and the author of the more detailed AC post below [soylentnews.org] for putting in the extra time.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday August 29 2016, @02:00PM
*Hat Tip*
Personally, I'm only in this one because I enjoy pointing out when AH is being a moron. I prefer my women over thirty and have since I was a teenager myself. I'd rather opt for celibacy than fuck a teenager, though they are nice to look at. It's just more fun to kick AH's ass with facts and logic if I have the time.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 29 2016, @02:58PM
Puberty always happens, without fail, at or before twelve? Thats news to me, I didn't go through puberty until 15 or 16.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday August 29 2016, @11:12PM
You fail to grok the meaning of the word "around"?
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 29 2016, @12:22PM
Regarding your idiocy conflating gays getting married with pedophilia
No, that was your idiocy. To repeat, there was not a single statue written that stated specifically that gays could not marry. There were ones that specified partner selection, and as far back as the dark ages of the 1980s, a 12 year old could marry with parental consent. Now it's around 16, well within the general consensus for pedophilia.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Age_of_marriage_in_the_United_States [wikipedia.org]
Perhaps you should actually learn the history of the laws before proceeding to lecture me?
Moving on...
the question here is one of harm.
Which is exactly why you couldn't be bothered to learn the age requirements for marriage, and have been tirelessly advocating for raising the minimum age?
Or maybe you are just self-serving, I'm-alright-Jack, while bringing up a point that was never broached in the first place?
A child, and indeed a teenager, is not ready for and cannot understand sex or relationships.
Which is why you are against sex education that starts in grade schools now, you closet conservative you, right? Or that even a brief survey of married men would make clear that sex and marriage is mutually exclusive, otherwise you'd be arguing for raising the age of consent across the board, not exclusive to marriage.
Incest: usually involves a massive power differential and/or blackmail
That's a nice fairytale. Got any actual proof to justify your assertion?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laws_regarding_incest_in_the_United_States [wikipedia.org]
As you can see, marriage isn't prohibited in all jurisdictions either in cases of incest, so in your quest for harm reduction, you are 0 out of 2.
Boy, you've really got a handle on this marriage thing, don't you?
Bestiality: Again, animals cannot meaningfully consent.
Ah, so it is okay to kill and eat an animal, but damnit, they can't consent to marriage. That's just obscene.
And has been the running theme in this exchange-
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zoophilia_and_the_law_in_the_United_States [wikipedia.org]
So again, can you point me towards your exhaustive research on the subject before you reached your conclusions, because your very conservative approach to sex and marriage is clearly out-of-step with a large portion of the US.
See how easy it is to be very conservative about marriage, especially when it doesn't directly affect you?
And while this very selective, doesn't-stand-to-benefit-me-at-all notion of consent is amusing, you are also restricting mentally retarded people from sex and marriage.
Do I have to cue the information on this as well, or can we establish by this point you haven't the foggiest idea of what you are talking about?
Do you get it now?
Yes, you're basically a hypocrite who will make the most tenuous justifications excreted directly from your nether regions to make a claim.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Tuesday August 30 2016, @05:27AM
This is one long list of fallacies. I'm not even sure I should attempt to correct you, but there seems to be a masochistic streak here, so here goes...
First off, I'm actually all for sex education early on. I learned about the birds and the bees at four. 4. Quatro. Count 'em, four years old. The result of this? I stayed a virgin by choice until 21, despite having had the option to lose it earlier. Yes, some of what held me back was fear; I didn't feel right coming out to anyone but family before college. It also doesn't help that I haaaaaaated teenagers, especially other girls, while I was one. Seriously, high school is only some magical fantasy land on TV, and God teenage girls are awful.
As to the rest of your bullshit: your objection to the age of consent going up because "as late as the 80s it was 12 in some places" is a non-sequitur. So it was lower until a few decades ago. So fucking what? 400 years ago they would hang you or worse for blasphemy against the Holy Ghost; should we go back to THAT too?
Concerning nature's tendency to make us hit puberty early (don't fucking start; I was bleeding at 10 and my sister was barely past her 9th birthday), this is a naturalistic fallacy. The same mechanisms that make us hit puberty in early to mid teens also expected us to die at 30 of some horrible disease or starve to death or bleed out pushing kid #7 out. The entire POINT of being an intelligent species is so we can tell Mother Nature and her abusive pimp Malthus where they can go, what they can do when they get there, with whom, and for how long.
"Hurr hurr meat is fine but not fucking animals ur a hypocrite" is another non-sequitur. Also, how do you know I'm not a vegetarian? :) You assume rather a lot here.
I don't know what else to say concerning incest; you SHOULD, if you actually bothered to read my post, have noticed the part where I said I'm aware that "eww gross" does not a law make, and withhold judgement beyond "eww gross" in non-fertile cases like, for example, a pair of sisters.
You really, really suck at this :(
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by VLM on Monday August 29 2016, @02:15PM
Because we are two adults, in our late 20s, with less than 2 years' difference between us, both of sound mind and body. We are doing financial planning, both employed, and neither of us are criminals nor drains on society.
Planning to adopt? If not you should not get legally married. (note qualifier of "legally", its gonna be important to the discussion)
The purpose of the massive amount of government social engineering around the religious concept of marriage is to encourage reproduction and healthy stable long term family life for the kids. Family life as in "you gonna raise some kids". Not have pets, not buy a condo together, etc.
You seem reasonably intelligent, if occasionally outright incorrect on certain opinions, and at least claim to be a useful member of society of which I have no reason to doubt. That puts you ahead of quite a few actual parents, unfortunately. So I'd encourage you to have kids and get married, so as to generally improve the gene pool on average. And that would go for any other gay couples of a similar level of quality however many or few there are (honestly, no sarcasm intended nor any negative feels)
... Or if like most gay couples there is no intention of kids, that means no point in legal marriage. From the .gov point of view. From your point of view maybe you really enjoy filling out 1040A tax forms as a married couple, maybe you get the nice feels, but the .gov and society in general has no reason to encourage you or encourage that behavior. "Whats in it for us?" I'm not a social holiness spiral signalling type, like most people, so I get no dopamine rush by being righteous.
From a religious point of view, marriage being a sacrament, go ahead. Two adults having fun in church that hurts no one is not an issue for any sane person. Insane people, of course, are going to flip their shit, but I enjoy watching that show as much as anyone else, so absolutely no problem there. They're always flipping out about something or another anyway.
Just trying to open your mind a bit, that I agree completely with your assessment in your examples that gay marriage seems a victim-less crime. I agree with you completely in your analysis and find no fault in it. Its just that you did the wrong analysis topic, and your opponents did a totally different analysis topic. That is the fundamental failure of your argument, which was otherwise well written, reasoned, and persuasive.
The actual problem, is similar to tax fraud, like trying to claim my 1960s suburban tract house is a Victorian for those sweet prop tax historical marker reductions. In that way, all of your examples are LARPy, if in the specific example you assume no adopting kids.
Pretending to be married is bad for everyone actually doing it, eventually the .gov is going to take away our kids education credit, or some damn thing, once the percentage of couples faking it exceeds Z%, where Z might be any arbitrary low number during a budget crisis. Consider it an insult directed against the government and their love of social engineering programs. Its not you per se, its that enough of you are going to get our tax credits taken away unless all those gay couples adopt at a rate matching other couples having kids plus adopting. Gay couples you got your marriage, now you better be smashing down the doors at the state adoption agencies to keep up with us straights...
Personally I would feel a lot happier if as per separation of church and state, the government had about as much control over and interaction with the religious rite of marriage as they do over baptism. Then you can do whatever you want at church, as you should, and it won't impact my relationship with "big brother" even theoretically. I think the whole world would be better off if Big Brother's giant nose were about as interested in the rite and ceremony of marriage as it is WRT the rite and ceremony of first communion, aka "none"
Another useful opinion to float is I clearly have a strong probably unbreakable analysis and argument against it, but its a useless debate to have, as the whole thing is only coming up as a "divide and conquer" propaganda anyway. Is it wrong in a binary yes no sense? Yeah, clearly. Is it worth fighting over? Hell No. Its about as "wrong" as jaywalking. Actually that's a pretty good analogy in many ways. If one couple jaywalks it doesn't matter much. If everyone jaywalked we'd be totally F'ed in so many ways. But not many people are going to regardless if its legal or not. That also doesn't mean the cops should never write a jaywalking ticket, or that people who jaywalk are right or morally superior, it doesn't mean anything other than some couples are now very lucky we're not enforcing some plain sense traffic laws today. Of all the wrongs in the world to right, it's pretty low priority in the list.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Tuesday August 30 2016, @05:17AM
Yes, actually, we DO plan to adopt, if we're allowed to. My girlfriend is Chinese by way of Malaysia; she has stories, SO many stories, to tell about girl babies thrown away for the sin of not having a Y chromosome. We are going to adopt at least one if money (and law) permits.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 3, Interesting) by TheRaven on Monday August 29 2016, @09:37AM
"Gay marriage" is a bit of a misnomer, as the issue isn't whether gays can marry, but restrictions on partner selection
The issue is precisely about marriage, as few few of the people who object to it would make gay couples illegal entirely. The issue is that we conflate a religious notion of marriage with a legal definition encompassing inheritance rights, power of attorney in case of incapacitation, visiting rights in hospital, income tax breaks, and so on. Gay people are objecting that there are a bunch of legal rights that they are only available to heterosexual couples. The solution to this should be:
If a church wants to refuse to marry gay couple's, that's fine, as long as they're not able to do so while also benefiting from tax exemption for services that they offer.
sudo mod me up
(Score: 3, Interesting) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday August 29 2016, @11:27AM
Your numbers are off. The people with firmly held religious beliefs against gay marriage do not precisely coincide with those objecting to gay marriage. There are plenty who simply hate you and everything you stand for as a default position. There are also people who disapprove of homosexuality simply because it is a deviant* lifestyle and thus at odds with their own. There are also plenty of people who disapprove simply because it was culturally unacceptable when they were growing up to be gay at all. Yeah, lots of reasons that don't involve a bible at all.
I, for example, used to have a purely pedantic beef with it back in my 20s. I don't like definitions of words being changed to suit a political agenda. I decided that was a stupid reason to tell people what they could do and changed my position but you angrily telling me it was a stupid reason would have been about as counterproductive as it was possible to be.
* Yes, it by definition is. Look up the word "deviant" in the dictionary.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 29 2016, @11:09AM
why should any of the others be encumbered as well (incest, pedophilia, zoophilia, etc.)
Are you really so stupid you can't figure this out on your own?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 29 2016, @01:51PM
Gee, if it's so obvious as to why it's stupid, how about rattling off the simple reason(s) as to why it's so stupid rather than using absolutely nothing other than ad hominem?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 29 2016, @03:14PM
If you can't tell the difference between an animal and a person of legal age to consent, there's no helping you.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 29 2016, @04:35PM
The latter I sweet-talk/buy into having sex with me; the former I kill for food or sport.
Are you saying death is better than consensual penis-in-vagina sex?
(Score: 4, Interesting) by VLM on Monday August 29 2016, @01:19PM
Conservative == Christian
Because they're uneducated and/or kids. Old people remember that before the civil rights era and the end of Jim Crow laws and "the southern strategy", your average white religious-nut evangelical in Mississippi was a Democrat. Politics makes strange bedfellows so from the civil war until 1960 or so, the creationist wing of American Christianity was pretty much 100% Democrat. There's vestiges of it today, the Catholics still poll somewhat leftie and there are black baptist churches in the deep south that have been D party supporters since the civil war reconstruction era.
The next problem is confusion of liberal vs conservative. If you define it as traditional party membership and all R are conservative and all D are liberal you're in for a huge impact with reality, as the 60s hippies ARE the conservatives in 2016. The lefties from 1960 ARE "the man" in 2016. The crazy liberals who want to think about new ideas and try new things are all on the right wing, reactionaries, alt right etc. Hillary for example is the establishment candidate this year and she's channeling Johnson from the 60s and she's never seen a country full of brown people that she doesn't want to bomb, whereas Trump is the only seriously anti-war candidate we've had in decades (well, serious as in made it to nomination, srry Bern-victims). The hippies have made a disaster of things for 50 years, so by conservative do you mean going back to 1970 or 1950? The progressives have been in charge for a long time and they've really Fed everything up and its time to replace them. Prog ideas are simply obsolete, old ways of thinking that no longer model the real world successfully. What in the 60s were brave new ideas are in the 10s obsolete, failed, discredited, and low energy, although they're the very popular establishment ... today ... for a little while longer, but not much longer.
Try a scientific analogy. There's nothing wrong with trying on the theory of epicycles on and walking around and seeing how it feels for a couple decades. Now the longer you use it, the worse it seems to fit reality. You can punish people for measuring the position of the planets and getting results that don't fit the epicyclical theory all you want, but that doesn't make the world go away. And Copernicus has crazy new ideas about elliptical orbits that are Very non-establishment ... but ... they aren't the failed system, and they seem to work when rubbed up against both present AND past data. Huh. Now its not a moral or ethical failing to have tried epicyclical theory for awhile. The people that tried it were not necessarily evil. They happened to be wrong and its an obsolete worldview in 2016. Ditto progressivism. The Cathedral has failed. Oh well. Time to move on. We have better ideas that model reality more closely to use now. In 2016 its a moral and ethical failing not to use Copernicus to predict planetary orbits, or to not use post-progressive politics to understand how the world works. Sorry, Woodstock is over. It mostly failed. Well thats OK, we have better new plans and better time tested plans.
Another confusion is the neocon merger of crony capitalism and evangelical Christianity is dying in the republican party. Assuming you mean the R party when you say "conservative". So the radical alt right Trump etc no longer needs to be creationist. Furthermore you seem to have the bizarre idea that conservative views only come from holy books. Most conservative views are best defined by a dead dude named "Robert Conquest". Yeah I know it sounds like a pen name. But he's got some friggin awesome quotes:
“Everyone is conservative about what he knows best.”
He has some awesome Dilbertian or Menckenian commentary. Worth the time to at least read a list of his quotes.
The point I'm trying to make is I don't need Jesus to know murder is bad, nor do I need Jesus to know abortion is best avoided or minimized as much as possible. Government regulated marriage (including gay)? Probably as bad of an idea as government regulated baptism or government regulated last rites. Folks on the radical or far or alt right don't need a holy book to identify stupid ideas. To describe them charitably, the "highly religious" are getting laughed out of the R party and either are demographically dying out or are moving to the D party. The majority of people on the right today in 2016 with new and interesting ideas are either atheists or are atheist compatible (like America should be a Catholic nation but with extremely strong separation of church and state, culturally Catholic not governmentally Catholic, as a non believer myself, I kinda like that idea... Culturally I like the Catholic worldview, I just don't want them in charge of my taxes or kids education or the DoD)
The final section is its possible to build elaborate pipe dream mechanisms to explain the behavior of some lefties as progressive political with elaborate rationalizations of policy. However, a much simpler predictive model that matches observed reality much closer is to simply assume they're racists who are anti-white and sexists who are anti-male. Occams razor and all that. Its a simpler model with a higher correlation when compared to actual behavior. A similar analogy can be made around the Civil War WRT southerners trying to erect elaborate and ridiculous theoretical models of insane complexity to explain why their behavior which vaguely resembles anti-black racism is actually a mere figment of capitalist theory or a distortion of observation. Naw, you can build all this distracting rationalization but it boils down to racism. Ditto progs in 2016 and the Democratic Party and BLM and all that, they talk a big game and make elaborate rationalizations but it boils down to they're racists and sexists who hate white males. I'm not trying to argue if its justified or not. I'm just describing what is, and what helps predict their behavior more accurately than elaborate psuedotheory inspired by astrology and rationalization. Then you got to decide if you want to hang out with people who are 1) racists 2) anti-white racists. So I've got three reasons not to be a leftie D party progressive, they hate me for what I was born as, I somewhat dislike racists (depends a lot on your definition of the word and the actions of those identified), and I don't like anti-white people for obvious personal reasons.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Tuesday August 30 2016, @05:11AM
Someone pointed out that the regressive left, behaving as a religion, is just filling the void left by the decline of Christian culture -- that as humans we're gonna have SOME sort of "guiding principle" and if it's not one, it'll be another.
This remark made me rethink the value of Christianity to Western civilization, and I say that as a nonbeliever.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Tuesday August 30 2016, @11:55AM
is just filling the void left by the decline of Christian culture
There's been an ongoing discussion for some years, more so recently, on the "ascending the tower" podcast where a simplification and distillation of modern alt-right thought could be summarized to the American revolution was a continuation of the English civil war between the Puritans and, well, the sane people, and progressiveism, under any name, is a degenerate evolved form of that Puritanism. So its not really a decline in terms of influence or followers but more a degeneration (or evolution) of specifically Puritan beliefs.
Obviously that's a huge simplification, like trying to explain the French Revolution or WW1/2 in one line, you can get some insight but obviously there's a lot going on...
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Tuesday August 30 2016, @03:41PM
Yeah, that's a reasonable way to look at it. There will always be a subset of people who think if only they could dictate terms for everyone, the world would be perfect. Western civilization has been perhaps unique in generally keeping such types out of power.
I'm reminded that the reason America wound up with the Puritans is because they kept imposing their beliefs on their neighbors and as a result were kicked out of the most tolerant countries of their era.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.