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Bridging the gap between left and right. I came across this clip showing Glenn Beck and Samantha Bee, and thought that this SoylentNews story / comment thread should be stickied till the new year so we have an ongoing conversation. It's a short clip from her show where Glenn Beck is a willing guest; the key point is they are trying to find common ground. Beck points out that Bee is following some of his own patterns of crying "catastrophe" but they really don't provide much insight beyond the significance of their little coming together moment.
The divide is clear and present on this site as most everywhere else, I would like to see a meta discussion where we fact check each other and drill down through the rhetoric until we get some straightforward lists and proposals on how we can move forward together. What are the fundamental blockers? Which ideas do we consider to be too outrageous for credibility? Many here are guilty of attacking each other — can we try and Spock it out for about a week?
I'll start us off with my supposition:
Climate change is real and human activity has an important effect on it. We must agree on this point in order to move forward, and social/economic issues must be handled after needed environmental changes."
If you post as AC — try and behave as if you were logged in — reduce the flames for better quality discussion.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 24 2016, @12:23AM
I will stipulate that it is impossible to debate the topic because it is getting to the level of religion.
I don't think global warming is happening, so I'm biased and a hateful person. I look at the research and come to the conclusion that it is, but I doubt that it is man caused so now im still a biased and hateful person. I read up on it and think that it is possible we are having an effect but think we should consider solar cycles, and now I am still biased and hateful for coming to that conclusion.
I don't plan on not eating meat, I don't plan on walking to work everyday, I don't plan on taking a massive step back in standard of living from the setbacks the boomers already got us stuck with. Where I can I modify my life to lessen my impact where it makes sense. Driving less, buying products produced locally, paying attention to packaging options, not eating beef. But I suspect no matter what I do I will always be a biggot and ignorant because I won't go as far as I am directed to go.
I intend to wake up tomorrow and continue to smoke, drive, and eat meat.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 24 2016, @12:49AM
Here is what you should do. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascal's_Wager [wikipedia.org]
That is it. Even *IF* you think it is bunk treat it as if it is. Pollution bad. Simple.
We should strive to create things that lower our impact on the world. I say this as a dyed in the wool capitalist pig. Pollution is waste. Waste by definition has no value or negative value. It subtracts from the value of our world and others AND most importantly your bottom line. You should strive to minimize or reverse the negative effects. If your scheme involves creating taxes/incentives you are *going* to distort the market. That distortion will not be predictable. It probably will hurt you and the very people you were looking to help. Any economist selling you that they know what is going to happen is lying.
To properly reduce pollution. You need to make the polluting way more expensive. Most gov busy bodies reach for taxes to do that. It works short term. Long term you create a distortion you can not measure. It may be good or bad. For example the alternative way may raise its price to match the old way making them equal and fungible in purchase. You can not predict that. The proper way to do it is actually harder. You create things that are better and actually cheaper than the original thing. The US has managed to reduce its emissions. Not through any magic. It was the market. The price of one item to burn became cheaper than the other. It also has a lower carbon footprint. THAT is the market at work. When it does work it moved swiftly and efficiently. You introduce a tax you will get people playing games with arbitrage and lawsuits and law lock in. Count on it.
The divide is clear and present on this site as most everywhere else
Also this whole article is little more than flamebait. It started off OK. Then went straight for a third rail issue. This is one of the reasons we end up with debates that go nowhere. They picked an issue and then started with their position. Instead of stating both sides of the position. It was a thinly veiled attempt to basically create a giant yell fest that goes nowhere. https://media.giphy.com/media/srTYyZ1BjBtGU/giphy.gif [giphy.com]
(Score: 2) by Zz9zZ on Saturday December 24 2016, @12:52AM
That doesn't sound hateful to me, but I don't know who you're hanging around. I've never seen the walk/bike never eat meat crowd around here on SN, but then again its not a topic I pay much attention to.
Modifying your life where possible is already a huge step in the right direction, and I can only imagine you were called a hateful bigot because of whatever context the argument was in. Don't give in to
I suspect no matter what I do I will always be a biggot and ignorant
, call people out if they're unfairly characterizing you. What you just said wouldn't get praise from much of anyone, but I have a hard time imagining it would be met with scorn. Most people I know would say "at least you're doing something".
~Tilting at windmills~
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday December 24 2016, @01:16AM
You haven't been paying attention then. Serious progressives do not allow for the possibility of anything but guilt. Witness such in the phrase "white privilege".
Really? How exactly do you prove the negative that you're not a racist, for instance? Cause I guarantee you even if you come up with a thousand people testifying to your character, they'll simply change the definition of racism until you do fit it.
There's a really spot-on blog entry [blogspot.com] I read earlier today detailing exactly what people face from progressives every single day. Thankfully it also offers solutions on how to deal with said malevolent idiocy.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 24 2016, @01:39AM
That link has a strange obsession with"Milo", is that normal on political blogs these days?
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday December 24 2016, @02:01AM
Possibly. Not reading them for the most part, I wouldn't know. I think the author's just a fan. He is pretty entertaining.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 24 2016, @02:36AM
Did you ever read this piece on the "outgroup"? Describes the phenomenon perfectly. It's a couple years old but more prescient than ever today.
http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/09/30/i-can-tolerate-anything-except-the-outgroup/ [slatestarcodex.com]
(Score: 2) by Sulla on Saturday December 24 2016, @06:20PM
I enjoyed the supposition. Before we move forward it is important that you give in and agree with my entire premise, then I can move on to the social issues and call my opinion common sense logical and if you would just agree with everything I say then we can move on.
Plays into the opinion that they don't want debate they want capitulation.
Debating is pointless when the opposition is unwilling to give ground, and every suggestion you try to make as a concession is not enough.
Ceterum censeo Sinae esse delendam
(Score: 2) by Zz9zZ on Saturday December 24 2016, @07:21PM
You're too stuck in the us vs. them mentality. I was not looking for capitulation. I am looking for a discussion of the issues so we can find a way to solve our problems that is agreeable enough to everyone concerned. I opened with my own supposition in order to get the discussion rolling and I made a comment about how there seems to be consensus about reducing fossil fuels. Therefore I don't care if you don't believe in AGW as long as we can agree on reducing fossil fuels.
Don't be a fatalist and move to your imagined "end" of the debate without even trying.
~Tilting at windmills~
(Score: 2) by Zz9zZ on Saturday December 24 2016, @07:30PM
My response is to agree with your statement about some progressives being insane but that same complaint goes the other way. The only way to handle crazy insane shit is to not react and as calmly as possible focus on the actual issues. If someone calls you racist you just say "nope, try getting a real point if you want to have a real discussion" or something to that effect.
I did something similar recently, went to a bar with a girl who wore a camo jacket and some old conservative dude was friendly to her and straight up insulting to me. I hadn't said anything and was laughing at what seemed like over the top characterizations until he really got serious about his insults. He characterized me based on my appearance and treated the camo jacket wearing girl as a compatriot. I stayed calm, and after we moved away he still wanted to get my attention so we had a brief, useless, but decent little conversation about the "fake news" problem. My takeaway from that was to be really REALLY worried that a lot of people will support violating the 1st amendment if it lets Trump "clean house". However, by staying calm enough I was able to move it from "likely bar fight" to "almost civil conversation".
Sometimes you just gotta ignore the assholes trying to start shit because they're upset at something and taking it out on you. Left / Right we're all human and have quite similar reactions.
~Tilting at windmills~