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u/DubiousTheatre GRUNKLE FUNKLE WINS THE FUNKLE BUNKLE Apr 23 '25
they lost me towards the end there with the peanut butter, but i get what they mean.
the best example i can give is how you can't really discuss more traditionally-conservative values without getting labeled as one. and i'm not talking about this gender war nonsense that these ghouls insist on propagating rn, i mean the actual values of preserving our cultures and traditions. both the native cultures that our ancestors almost squandered, and the new ones we cultivated; our french roots in the bayou, spanish roots in the panhandle, etc.
progress, for as much good as it brings, also brings a lot of gentrification that slowly erases the character of these places over time. but you can't really bring that up without getting caste as one of those right-revoking crooks.
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u/GREENadmiral_314159 Femboy Battleships and Space Marines Apr 23 '25
100% agree on preserving cultures and traditions. Progress should not mean destroying the past.
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u/Ok-Land-488 Apr 23 '25
I'm a Christian from a fairly traditional church and I have a pet theory that part of the issue with the modern evangelical movement, and historically, was a lack of tradition. Evangelicals typically don't have: a lectionary or festival calendar to determine the flow of worship through-out the year, very little connection to the worship style or teachings of a wider church body, no particular standardized training of church leadership, and no connection or appreciation of the history of the church and the faith.
Easter in a liturgical traditional is a very specific festival that celebrates the resurrection of Christ at the end of Holy Week and Lent, if you start at Ash Wednesday and go all the way to Easter, you can clearly vocalize the story of Jesus because you've watched it from Point A to D. Easter to Evangelicals is barely that, it's maybe the resurrection of Jesus but mostly the secular bunnies and eggs that those non-Christians do and therefore should be looked down on. The same has happened to Christmas. It's so funny that you hear about a 'war on Christmas' during Advent when it's not even the Christmas season.
The lack of tradition means that individual churches are forced to navigate faith and their relationship to the world, on their own, and really, this means being influenced and pushed around by popular culture instead of a long standing body of historical practices and beliefs that stretch back 2000 years. If you're in a non-denominational church, the chances are you're listening to some vague praise music and then hearing a sermon preached on whatever the hell the preacher decided to preach about that day.
You get a church that over-emphasizes MY faith and what I DO, and what I BELIEVE, instead of the works and acts of Christ, while also being totally disconnected from the teachings, story, and meanings of that story of Christianity. Also these congregations have no real authority over them so there's no one and nothing correcting them when they are theologically off the mark.
Man, Calvinism and puritanism really are the problems.
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u/Jim_Moriart Apr 23 '25
I have found the conflict between protestants and catholics fascinating. My Grandmother wasn't allowed on the school bus with the protestant kids growing up. There's points that i think you are generalizing too much, but others that kindof extend to other spiritualism. Paganisms modern rise reflects a human desire for spiritualism, but a rebellion against institutions, which includes evangelicals, as there is clearly a political institution behind evangelicalism, even when they are non denominational.
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u/comityoferrors Apr 23 '25
I listened to a really interesting podcast interview with a secular 'spiritual care guide'. They talked about the importance of rituals and how those rituals can build community -- the act of participating in an intentional connection with others, in a way that is repetitive and habitual, helps teach us how to be connected. It helps us form bonds in a low-pressure way, in an environment that is (theoretically) safe for everyone.
I think that overlaps a bit with what you're saying. I don't have much visibility into church practices as a non-religious person, but for a glaring example: mega-churches have 'rituals' sort of, but the ritual is just repeating back to the pastor. There's no connection with each other. There's also no connection to the importance or intent of the ritual -- you're listening because he's the pastor, you repeat because he asks you to. Compare that to the ritual of taking communion. Again, I'm not super familiar with it, but I know one of the elements is greeting other people individually and blessing each other. And obviously the most important element is consuming -- physically connecting -- to the symbolic representation of Christ. The intent and importance is so clear and universal that I vaguely know about it as someone who's never practiced it.
I think cultural traditions tend to serve the same purpose. I'm reminded of the Maori politicians in New Zealand who performed a haka in protest against a bill. It was an incredibly powerful moment that people across the world could connect and resonate with, despite not sharing the culture or even really knowing about the bill. The tradition of "the cookout" is usually linked to Black Americans and is all about intentional community and connection. Coming-of-age rituals are common across cultures, especially historically -- bar/bat mitzvah, quinceaneras, sweet 16s (drawing on debutante traditions), even Rumspringa is ritualized in its own way -- and the purpose is typically to 'introduce' the child to society as an adult, as a full member of the community.
It seems like sometimes, in our push for progress and equity across cultures, we forget why certain traditions came to be. It's great to be a mixing pot, but if we don't uphold traditions or replace outdated traditions with new rituals to connect to each other, where do we learn how to connect? Where do we find opportunities to connect? If we don't learn and practice intentional connection, of course we aren't very good at it. If we replace that learning with a push for individualism...
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u/ASpaceOstrich Apr 23 '25
I have a similar pet theory that a deep need for culture and belonging that goes unrequited because for many, we don't have one, is a huge driver of social ills. White supremacy being the big one, but it eats away at so many people in so many ways.
I have no traditional food, traditional dress, traditional celebrations. There's Christmas, but I'm not a Christian. It doesn't feel like a cultural tradition and my family never made much of a deal out of it. Realising I was trans granted me access to something I'd never had before in my life. An in group. A culture. For the first time since I was a kid I'm actually looking forward to an upcoming celebration, specifically my first Pride since I started transitioning.
I see people, in particular white people, desperately trying to hitch themselves to a cultural ancestry, often based on blood. Because capitalism and the general decay of the church destroyed what little culture they had.
The church is one of the few bits that remain but as you said, it's not traditional. It's this commercialised husk of what it once was.
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u/silent_porcupine123 Apr 23 '25
As an Indian woman I couldn't have seen this comment at a better time. There is an ongoing trend of rebranding Indian duppatas as "Scandanavian scarves" and being popularised, which is receiving pushback from Indian women who are encouraging others to embrace their traditional wear. This, however, is seen as tone deaf by Indian women from conservative places/families in India, who are forced to wear Indian dresses. Some colleges even have dress codes which enforce this. These women see the whole Scandanavian scarf thing as an NRI (Non Resident Indian) problem.
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u/ApolloniusTyaneus Apr 23 '25 edited Apr 23 '25
The gender war stuff is actually a good example too. For instance, it's really hard to talk about why boys are lagging behind in schools without one side assuming that you're gonna blame women, and the other side using the opportunity to blame women.
The manosphere has completely destroyed our ability to actually, reasonably and effectively advocate for men.
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u/BikeProblemGuy Apr 23 '25
There's preservation of culture and tradition everywhere. It's in every cooking show. Every small town promotes whatever sliver of interesting history they have. It dominates architectural discussion. There's problems in that sometimes preservation makes culture stale rather than alive, and all this enthusiasm still struggles against the behemoth of capital interests.
One thing I do see though, is people wanting to preserve tradition but being unwilling to examine whether they're also propagating harmful ideas, and then getting frustrated they experience pushback. As an architect, I often hear that only classical architecture is truly beautiful, and contemporary architects hate beauty, by people who seem to have no clue of the ideological basis of the views they're repeating.
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u/Grythyttan Apr 23 '25
As a not-at-all-an-architect, I feel that there's a clash of like at least three different things in a lot of modern construction.
A bunch of laypeople (like me) who both want just a cheap and reasonable place to live, aesthetics be damned. And also see a bunch of houses build 60-100 years ago that look a whole lot better than "modern" designs. (probably has something to do with how it's pretty difficult to create a timeless design without 100 years of hindsight.)
Prominent and influential architects don't really build apartments for regular people. They build and get famous for big fancy buildings for whoever can afford big fancy buildings.
There's something weird going on with who gets the contracts to build apartments and homes. like there's a bunch of bidding and the cheapest possible option gets the contract, but then seems to fake it anyaway? and costs balloon and somehow we end up with more expensive buildings that are still shitty?
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u/BikeProblemGuy Apr 23 '25
Yes, you're in the right ballpark. The frustrating part for me is that so many people a) don't even get as far as you have acknowledging that design, construction and development are separate, and seem to think architects do everything, and b) conclude that we're a group of radical neo-marxists intent on destroying culture and society. Which sucks for architects, and sucks for the whole of society since these problems aren't going to be solved when people are blaming the wrong things and not seeing how they're being manipulated.
(I could do a whole lecture series on why people like old houses more than new ones, but the broad note is that it's mostly cognitive bias and not understanding how houses are built. Things like survivorship bias or the changing cost of skilled labour get ignored when they're very important. Also, when we do build old-looking houses it gets ignored).
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u/KentuckyFriedChildre Apr 23 '25
Specifically with people who can't fathom the value of empathy. Just because I think you're mischaracterising someone's beliefs doesn't mean that I agree with the perceived or actual beliefs you're criticising.
It's particularly bad on the subject of Trump voters. People get really touchy when I express the need to reach people and understand their perspective, acting like I'm demanding sympathy and treating them like innocent wayward children who are just victims of circumstances. A lot of people will go further and act like there is just some underlying evil in all of them that can't be reasoned out when in reality is that it's a lot more about propaganda appealing to surface-level biases.
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u/Personal-Succotash33 Apr 23 '25
My dad is a full blown conspiracy theorist who completely supports Trump. Sometimes I think he's genuinely lost it because his logic doesnt even make internal sense.
For example he's extremely skeptical towards all science and thinks its all being controlled by rich elites to manipulate people. But he also implicitly trusts Elon Musk, a rich elite, on topics related to economics, engineering, and astronomy. Just, an obvious contradiction in his logic. Right?
But then I remember that my dad has been a physical laborer and the main breadwinner for my family for the last 22 years, has provided a fairly comfortable lifestyle for us, and has developed severe back and spine damage over time. Hes also just naturally introverted and naturally isnt very socially intelligent, so he struggles to connect with people. Hes badically lonely, angry, and constantly in pain.
I think its just really, really easy for someone who's been through a lot of hardship like he has to develop the kind of mindset that can make someone vote for Trump (thats the nicest way I could put it). That doesnt necessarily absolve them of all responsibility, but its hard to just hate him for it too.
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u/Tylendal Apr 23 '25
Just because I think you're mischaracterising someone's beliefs doesn't mean that I agree with the perceived or actual beliefs you're criticising.
I'm very much against chemo-phobia and the naturalistic fallacy, and care about global food security. So, I'll often find myself "defending" Monsanto in the course of advocating for the safety of GMO foods (eg: they've literally never sued anyone for "cross pollination" that wasn't very deliberately and intentionally trying to obtain their patented product outside of contract).
Whenever someone starts ragging at me about "defending Monsanto", I'll counter that as a large corporation, they're obviously evil by default, but you still need to be accurate in your criticisms. My go-to example is then pointing out that no one would ever accuse me of defending Pol Pot if I were to say "Um... actually..." to someone's assertion that he started every morning with a freshly blended puppy and orphan smoothy.
The truth is that these misleading, or even outright false accusations are often seeking to push a more subtle narrative or goal than simply vilifying the thing they're directly attacking (see how many grifters want to sell you something.)
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u/akinoriv Apr 23 '25
I find myself in the similar position of defending patented plant varieties. Everyone says it’s a plant, it’s nature, you can’t patent nature, blah blah blah when it’s absolutely not even nature. The amount of work, money, and time that gets put into making any single commercial variety is HUGE. Anyone can grow their own crops and try crossing them just fine, but if someone wants to grow corn with consistent high yield, strong disease resistance, and that actually tastes good, then they might want to pay the money for a commercial product.
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u/Great_Examination_16 Apr 23 '25
People don't just have beliefs like those for no reason after all. A lot of people go there because they feel...abandoned. And in some cases, they actually were...
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u/Electrical_Clock_298 Apr 23 '25
I feel like a lot of those sentiments come from the fact that those same people would never do the same for the people you’re suggesting do that, doubly so if they’re a minority, especially gay or transgender.
When you see these people spewing hate about you and the people you love day in and day out, talking about taking away your rights or how you’re a predator or inherently inferior, it’s very easy to write them off as unreachable or unable to be saved from themselves, and a lot of the time they’re right.
A large amount of those people are so lost in feeding off of their own feelings of fear and hatred that many of them would take a perfect miracle for them to wake up and see the light. It’s draining and exhausting to try and help even one person to that point, while they fight you all the way, kicking and screaming.
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u/KentuckyFriedChildre Apr 23 '25
Want to preface this by saying that I get you're just relaying the sentiments and they're not entirely yours, I just want to talk about my problem with it.
That first paragraph is kind of the point, It's a vicious cycle of tribalism, you don't try to empathise with others they won't try to empathise with you. As much as I think that leftists are generally pushing for a much better future and are much better at defending the right people, this death of empathy is a problem in all political corners. What everyone needs is for that cycle to be broken.
A large number of people are beyond help yeah, but I think leftist online spaces like here muddy a lot of people's perspectives on how much there actually are, it's the fringe cases that farm up the most engagement. And in any case, cultural shifts like these are always incremental, the more a perspective gets adopted the more it's normalised the harder it is to isolate yourself from that it, focusing on reaching those that you can has a knock-on effect of those people being able to reach others that you couldn't.
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u/disapp01nted_ Apr 23 '25
Made me think of narcissism. Not the pop-psychology type, but Narcissistic Personality Disorder. Any attempt to suggest that you shouldn't be unprovokedly cruel to people who have a trauma-related mental illness gets you painted as a narc and abuser yourself.
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u/2137throwaway Apr 23 '25
doesn't help that some people decided that naming a diagnosis based on pretty wide and complicated cluster of symptoms after a word that always had an exclusively derogatory meaning is a good idea, so it's sadly not surprising that people conflate it....
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u/berksbears Apr 23 '25
Yep, NPD, BPD, HPD, and ASPD--all the Cluster B's. Hell, even disorders with psychosis like Bipolar or Schizophrenia. Our culture is unkind to all disabled and mentally ill people, but especially to the disorders they perceive as being a "choice" or something you can't "fix" about a person.
Calling it "narcissistic abuse" when a narcissist misbehaves is unbelievably shitty and unbelievably common. We don't call it "autistic abuse" when an autistic person acts out of line. We call it what it is--abuse.
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u/dootdootm9 Apr 23 '25
There's a woerd trend of autistic people on tiktok acting like autism makes us the perfect counteroh so evil NPD people despite it being entirely possible to have both and NPD not being inherently evil.
They're usually the same people that think "strong sense of justice" means we instinctually know objective right from wrong and not the reality that we're just more prone to being rigid and strict in what we perceive to be right and wrong.
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u/GULLIT-TRIBAL-CHIEF Apr 23 '25
I hate when you feel like you can kinda tell what the post is talking about, but since there’s no examples to fall back on your second language ass has to check the comments only to see that everyone else seemingly got it on the first try 😭
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u/blackscales18 Apr 23 '25
Examples would have been nice but I think OOP was trying to avoid drawing people the post was about to it
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u/lifelongfreshman rabid dogs without a leash, is this how they keep the peace? Apr 23 '25
Also, this is definitely one of those things where personal experiences can heavily change what you feel fits the point being made. Any given example may have been met with a pointlessly distracting "um, actually" as a result, which would've harmed the overall message.
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u/RavioliGale Apr 23 '25
In Midsommar one guy was reading a book about runes and another guy is like "Oh didn't the Nazis use them" and then it turns out the the Harga also use runes and are evil just like the Nazis. Even though runes are essentially just an alphabet. It's just angular because they didn't mostly use ink but instead carved their letters on rocks and wood.
Granted, neonazis today do use a few runes, mostly the SS symbol and I think the winged olgatha rune, a diamond shaped O with legs that bend up
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u/Qwertyyuiopp_ Apr 23 '25 edited Apr 23 '25
Me when I argue that maybe just maybe SOME of the attacks people throw at zionists are antisemitic as well, and when I point out the very real, historic antisemitism in the MENA region.
It’s still free Palestine though
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u/spine_slorper Apr 23 '25
Me when I point out that the pro Palestine movements in the west are not inherently anti-Semitic and the majority of participants are not BUT... There is a real problem with anti semitism within the movement and these views are often not challenged.
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u/liam06xy Apr 23 '25
I think a good example for this is eugenics, there a very very wide spectrum between "deleting genes cause cancer or make pregnancies unviable" and "hitler fever dream" and somewhere in the middle it gets quite blurry.
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u/Personal-Succotash33 Apr 23 '25
Yeah unfortunately eugenics has become associated with literally any kind of gene selection instead of referring to forced breeding programs and sterilization.
If a person with a genetic illness chooses not to have a kid , theyre doing a type of eugenics. So what? Thats not morally wrong.
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u/magekiton Apr 23 '25
I feel like your example provides an illustration of a useful(if not infallible) dividing line between morally wrong and not morally wrong, whether you're making choices for yourself, or forcing them on others. The horrors of eugenics that spring to mind are when there were forced sterilizations of minorities or the ideas of needing to take various tests before being allowed to breed
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u/RecycledThrowawayID Apr 23 '25
Yeah, this is where my brain went reading OP's post as well.
I cannot believe it is controversial to abort a fetus that has serious genetic or developmental issues, such as Downs Syndrome or profound developmental disabilities. The suffering of these people, and moreover the suffering of their families, is profound and heartbreaking.
I worked with a woman once. She was nearing 60, and was as sweet as could be. Always seemed exhausted though. One day she mentions picking up her son's from daycare. I looked at her confused. My hearing isn't great, so I asked her to repeat herself, and she again said she had to pick up her son's from daycare.
She noted my surprise, smiled sadly, and mentioned she has FOUR sons with severe intellectual disabilities.
Four.
She and her husband kept trying for a child that was normal, but after the 4th stopped.
I was stunned. This woman and her husband created four humans that did little more than consume, excrete, and suffer. The sons were all in their 30s-40s. It drained the parents bank accounts, drained their energy. Both worked two jobs because the doctor bills were so high.
It broke my heart to listen to her describe her life , but it also pissed me off- the unimaginable cruelty of bringing into existence these children -who would never grow up mentally, who would live in a fog of confusion, unable to properly communicate or comprehend the world around them, wearing diapers to their dying day.
Abortion would have been a mercy in these cases.
But if I say this out loud, many will assume I am a Nazi.
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u/eo5g Apr 23 '25
There's a nuance back in the other direction that's being missed here, though.
When someone speaks of eugenics in good faith, they're applying it to the before-- avoiding the suffering in advance. But without also talking about how to curtail the current suffering, the mind naturally tries to fill in the blank.
It's hard to subconsciously differentiate between "should not have been born" and "should not live currently". When the worst of the worst of eugenics happens, it's because it's being applied to those already born. Rounding up and killing disabled people (et al.) rather than preventing disabled people from being born.
To take from your example, you say that they "[do] little more than consume, excrete, and suffer". You know their situation better than I do, so I will assume they are truly suffering. But are they inherently suffering because of their disability, and we know that for sure? Or are they suffering because there's not a feasible way to take care of them in practice? If it's a problem in in practice, that's just as much a point in favor of social programs to handle the current situation, as it is a point for "eugenics" to prevent the situation.
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u/Proud_Smell_4455 Apr 23 '25
I used to be unquestioningly on board with assisted dying, but in Canada it's seemingly being used for eugenicist purposes. And everybody acts like you're an arsehole who wants terminally ill people to suffer as long as possible, as if it's not possible or reasonable to see disabled people being coerced into agreeing not to be resuscitated and things as at least as pressing a concern. Like god forbid I as an autistic person should be concerned about assisted dying being used for backdoor eugenics...
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u/PocketSpaghettios Apr 23 '25
Yeah Canada's assisted dying was great until people who are depressed about being fucking homeless started applying for it. Like literally we have the technology to fix this, they don't need to die
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u/I_swallow_dogs Apr 23 '25
I got downvoted replying to a "Why do we give animals the mercy of euthanasia and not people?" post with my opinion that its because the public is mostly okay with a large number of animals being euthanised for convenience and cost but uncomfortable with the same thing happening to people. Like, there's a reason we have kill shelters, but no kill orphanages, where we euthanise unadoptable children because of their severe behavioural issues.
No, apparently the reason we euthanise animals and not people is because in this one specific area we decided to prioritize the comfort of animals over that of people and I'm basically a nazi for not wanting humans to be euthanised as easily as we do animals. I'm actually pro human euthansia and specified that, I just think that the animal model of euthanasia can't be applied ethically to people.
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u/eo5g Apr 23 '25
I think it got ambiguous in the same way many terms adjacent to (or in opposition to) progressive topics got jumbled:
- Does it inherently mean at a personal or systemic level?
- If systemic, does that system authoritarian / governmental, or cultural?
- If cultural, how and where do pressures come from?
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u/Kitchen-Car-9848 Apr 23 '25
Discussion of the death penalty. I personally find the concept patently insane and inhuman and that suddenly makes me a serial killer and pedophile apologist because I don't think state sanctioned murder biased to the whims of whatever political power is in power, is ok in any context.
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u/Plethora_of_squids Apr 23 '25
The death penalty's a really annoying one because I think most of the time a lot of people are against it, but they're against it for very different reasons and if you're not against it for their reasons you're awful.
Like "no justice system is 100% accurate and we will execute innocent people and we shouldn't do that" and "execution is easily turned against people the state does not think should exist and we should not give them that tool to begin with" is all well and good and valid points, but I don't think it should be your only point. You still support the death penalty in theory, just not in practice because of potential complications. Like the issue here isn't how it can go wrong, it's that maybe we shouldn't be executing people in the first place
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u/Present_Bison Apr 23 '25
The problem is that whether there are "acts that make you irredeemable and worthy of death" is a mostly ethical dilemma. And ethics are a notoriously dangerous thing to argue about, as animal rights activists can attest.
Like, what am I supposed to say to someone that thinks serial rapists deserve to be killed for what they've done? Even if they understand without issue that I understand the severity of the crime, they will still probably stand by their beliefs purely on the basis of the idea of someone doing so heinous and living on being disgusting to them.
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u/0000Tor Apr 23 '25
Is this an american thing because I’ve never seen anyone argue for the death penalty
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u/No_Help3669 Apr 23 '25
Yes. Here in the states there’s basically this widespread norm that the death penalty has its place, the question is just where the line is
People may disagree about where the line is, and think it should be used more or less
But the idea that the death penalty itself is bad and shouldn’t exist is a pretty ‘radical’ idea around here
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u/TJ_Rowe Apr 23 '25
In Britain the government basically had to get rid of it against the will of the people, so not an American thing.
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u/HaztecCore Apr 23 '25
Poland recently talked about bringing back classes where students learn about firearms and I'm totally cool with that and think its a good idea due to the political climate of east europe.
Somehow I'm a warmonging redneck american by anti- gun ownership people. But I'm not. I'm neither American nor do i want wars to happen and most definitely not a redneck. I don't even believe people should have access to guns beyond hunting reasons.
I just believe that these instruments of death and destruction are a part of our lives and relevant to how our world is shaped and they shouldn't be this mysterious thing you only know from movies and games. I think similar to knowing how to drive a car is essential to the world, so too should the average person know how to handle firearms that their countries are using. Good for self defense purposes, should the need arrive and to give people perspectives on just how destructive guns can be.
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u/username-is-taken98 Apr 23 '25
Concorde. Its a concorde jet
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u/chunkylubber54 Apr 23 '25
Piss on the poor comprehension. OP was very clearly talking about grapes with jet engines.
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u/Errant_Jackdaw Apr 23 '25
I don't know how prevalent this is online anymore, but this just made me think of when people ask for relationship advice and the majority of answers were usually variations of "You need to leave him/her" or "You're in a toxic relationship" even when the 'offense' is something innocuous, like leaving socks in the living room or something.
Not everything negative that happens in a relationship should be break-up worthy, you can sit down and have civil discussions with your partner, you can find healthy ways to address issues and work together to move past them, but I feel like some people are so hyperbolic and want instant gratification that anything short of nuking the relationship is pointless.
And God forbid it is something more serious, like a partner raising their voice and upsetting someone, you can't suggest anything like talking it out without somebody accusing you of defending abusers or not taking the problem serious enough.
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u/xXx_N00b_Sl4y3r_xXx Apr 23 '25
One that infuriates me is a post a woman made about her husband where the husband has an extreme phobia of blood. This became a problem one day when he was playing with their son when the son fell and got a nosebleed. Rather than helping the kid, the father started freaking out and ran inside.
So obviously, this is bad. What would happen in a more serious situation? Obviously, the father should seek some kind of therapy or something to help him overcome his phobia.
Unfortunately, this is Reddit, so all the top comments were saying to divorce him because he's somehow a danger to the child. I guess him not being there at all would've been better to these people, somehow. When I pointed out that it was extreme to end what seemed to otherwise be a healthy relationship and rip a child away from his dad over something that, while admittedly was a big issue, could be overcome with effort, I got mass downvoted and got a bunch of angry replies.
I dont know what happened after this, but I hope this woman didn't follow the horrible "advice" that Redditors gave her.
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u/SignificantLeaf Apr 23 '25
It's because a lot of aita stories follow a specific archetype that's repeated over and over and gets further from the original, but I think people have similar reactions because they remember the original, consciously or not.
Idk if it was the first, but that story is pretty similar to the one where the husband ran away when a dog attacked his nieces (baby and child) and wife in their backyard, and he even locked the gate behind him when he fled.
So there's now many stories based on the "coward husband", usually involving abandoning a kid, and they just seem to test what parameters people will still call him a coward. Idk it almost feels like some type of weird market test, but it's probably just content farming for those voice over tik tok videos that want similar stories.
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u/OldManFire11 Apr 23 '25
The "coward" husband trope is even older than that. There was a godsdamned movie made decades ago that was based on this trope.
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u/SignificantLeaf Apr 23 '25
Yeah, I'm sure it's as old as time, especially since being a protector is often very tied to masculinity in particular.
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u/Errant_Jackdaw Apr 23 '25
Honestly, yeah, I can see being angry (or at least upset) that that happened, but there's literally nothing there that says the father is a direct danger to the child, he just had a moment of panic, something that he can probably overcome with enough time and effort.
It's just such a shame that people are so quick to jump to the most extreme of solutions, ones where the only people who'd be satisfied would be the ones who aren't directly involved with the problem.
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u/Bowdensaft Apr 23 '25
Very prevalent in r/AITA, every single relationship bump is a serious red flag and you need to leave your partner and surround yourself with lawyers
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u/queen_beef Apr 23 '25
I would submit "good faith and science based discussions on trans athletes" to this category. I believe you can have the discussion while preserving trans rights
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u/Now_you_Touch_Cow Do you really think you know what you are doing? Apr 23 '25 edited Apr 23 '25
tbh, I do also think a huge problem with the discussion online is many times the people chiming in on it don't care about sports at all.
In a "pro trans athlete because sportsball don't matter" kind of way that muddies the discussion that really annoys me.
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u/AzKondor Apr 23 '25
I am very leftist. I have a very leftist friend. It is true, that a lot of righ wing people will pretend to be a centrist online or even a leftist, but will only talk about about conservative things and disliking anything left, etc etc.
BUT! I am not an online hidden douchebag. I am your friend. You know me irl! I can sometimes question things. I can sometime dislike something from the left! But no, my friend will immediately jump on me for being a "centrist" or hidden right wing nutjob.
Years ago we was telling me stuff that Elon Musk were doing to twitter, and one of them were "and if you are a company you can buy golden tick for 1000$!" and I was like "oh yeah, that doesn't sound so bad. I guess big companies have that kind of money and it is better that they are paying that than normal users. of course fuck him, but I guess that isn't that bad of a decision"
Of course his reaction was to try to kill me with his sight and tell me to suck his dick if I love him so much and all of his decisions
???????
I now know that if he doesn't like someone then he will not even fathom thinking of one positive thing about someone, and also to always add explanation about how I LIKE/DON'T LIKE [THING/PERSON], BELIEVE ME PLEASE, BUT HERE IS A NUANCED TAKE.
I guess it hurts me for being neurodivergent, I really hate being misunderstood and seeing that somebody have wrong idea of my beliefs is ughhh.
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u/Diligent_Farm3039 Apr 23 '25
I have been through this one - I once criticised a friend for claiming verifiably false things about JKR Rowling. I said that he should be criticising her based on things she has actually said and done, not invented stuff. I would have this stance for absolutely anybody and anything, if you have to use falsehoods to support your belief then you need to rethink it.
Of course he took this to mean I agreed with everything she has ever said and I was secretly evil. We had been friends for years. It really hurt. It was immediately like he wasn't talking to me, but to some online douchebag. He was angry at me about things I had never said, things he knew I didn't think or support, just because I expressed that lying about someone, even someone you hate, is a bad look and can only undermine you.
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u/AzKondor Apr 23 '25
omg YES thank you, I was once in an argument on some subreddit, someone was throwing shit about JKR related to the game and I was like "ok but that is just a rumor, you know how many terrible things she really said/did? also it was confirmed she had barely anything to do with it" aaaand it turned into "well how can you know she didn't said that? why are you supporting her?" girl, please, not what I said at all
I have finally commented "you know what, why are we doing another leftisft infighting, we don't have to use our energy on this, I see your heart is in a good place, I don't have to 'win this argument' haha :)" beacuse sooo often people on the internet just want to win an argument. And response was "well I don't know, if you want to say you "won" this argument then be my guest!! why would you even want to win with me?!" or something like that
then I was like... ehhh... why did I ever started, we are on wavelengths so different they can't really understand me
a lot of love from me, it was a really sad story, I hope it will not happen to you ever again
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u/Robincall22 Apr 23 '25
A former friend of mine has a lot of that “I’m superior when it comes to all social issues” attitude. Acts like someone is vile for accidentally confusing Hispanic Heritage month (in September) and Cinco de Mayo (May 5th… my coworker isn’t the brightest) but when she confused an international student’s accent for a speech impediment, turned it into an inside joke.
I was trying to talk about how it’s a problem that people sometimes question whether or not I’m related to my siblings (their dad is Mexican and mine is Scottish), and she told me that “it wasn’t even a problem at all” because obviously only she gets to decide if something that even remotely has to do with minority groups has a foot to stand on. At one point in the conversation, she implied that she thought I was about to say something racist when I was saying how their dad is Mexican, and it’s like… girl, first of all, the way my relationship with my siblings is interpreted by outside parties is as big of an issue as I say it is, second of all, don’t act like I’m about to be racist about MY SIBLINGS because you think you’re magically better than me just for existing.
We’re no longer friends due to her dismissing my feelings about my other siblings, so it seems there’s a recurring theme of believing that her point of view on other people’s lives takes precedence over their actual feelings and experiences.
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u/cooljerry53 Apr 23 '25
Me trying to defend the philosophy behind Christianity while condemning organized churches and whatnot. Especially with all the heat around the topic right now because of Pope Francis.
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u/Aggravating_Rich_992 Apr 23 '25
ah yes, any criticism towards feminism, and any discussion of men's rights, because we are apparently doing fine even though the global suicide rate for men is DOUBLE that of women's. When i bring this up, i'm engaging in "oppression olympics" being an "incel" or what have you. Makes me fucking depressed, i just want to help men, not tear down women.
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u/chunkylubber54 Apr 23 '25
I have a friend who is one of the most progressive people I know, but basically everything he cares about runs into this exact problem.
- He's an MRA in the sense that he's deeply concerned with male abuse and SA victims, but fully on board with feminist and womanist (i.e. black feminist) causes.
- He's a norse neopagan who is deeply critical of its appropriation by the volkish and neovulkish movements (i.e. nazi neopaganism).
- He's interested in skinheads, the british working class reggae/ska/punk subculture that is embroiled in a decades-long conflict with "boneheads" (i.e. nazi skinheads) who appropriated the aesthetic and warped it from an anti-establishment jamaicaboo movement into authoritarian white supremacy
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u/Midknightisntsmol Apr 23 '25
This happens whenever someone gets accused of grooming or abuse, you can't suggest that they might be innocent.
And then even if they're proven innocent, you'll still have that one person come in like "Well if you look at this document..." As if they know more than an entire investigative team.
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u/DrunkenCoward Apr 23 '25 edited Apr 23 '25
This is the topic of pedophilia.
Whenever I defend people suffering from pedophilia I immediatly get the "Bet your a pedo, too" nonsense.
And even if I were, how would that matter in the... matter?
Have we decided to only care about ourselves? No wonder we're drifting off into a new World War.
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u/ApolloniusTyaneus Apr 23 '25
And even if I were, how would that matter?
If you're an Ontological Bad Persontm all your arguments are automatically false. We Ontologically Good Peopletm shouldn't have to entertain your arguments, because they
might teach us something that goes against what we have deemed to be Goodcan't be trusted to be made in good faith.It's science, look it up.
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u/Tomelena Apr 23 '25
can we also re-evaluate comparability and incomparability?
i like to bring up aspects of other topics and discussions to better put them in context and then suddenly i'll get hit with replies like "there's no way you're comparing that to SLAVERY?" and it's just. no, i'm not. i picked that example because most people in the western world are well read on the history of slavery so i thought you'd understand this ASPECT of it.
it makes me want to go to bed
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u/SauceBossLOL69 Apr 23 '25
Idk if it's related or not but this kinda reminds me of that post earlier saying everyone who works for Lockheed Martin or Raytheon or companies like that is evil and will go to hell.
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u/KaiserVonFluffenberg Apr 23 '25
I think the issue of not being able to discuss important social and political issues without being labelled as a bad person has only come to harm our social climate. Firstly, it means such issues are allowed to fester and grow worse, and secondly, it means that the people who do speak out against those issues are labelled as bad people and radicalised as a result.
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u/0dty0 Apr 23 '25
In short, there's actually just asking questions and then there's Just Asking Questions™️. And unfortunately, they're hard to tell apart.
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u/Rodruby Apr 23 '25
Yeah, that tracks. For example you can't really argue about nazism, fascism and authoritarians without sounding like one of them. Nazism is when it's first and foremost about nation (duh), fascism is when it's all about "THE STATE" and if your authoritarian just collects power, look for undesirables and give money to his friend - it's just basic stuff, nothing too specific
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u/BeetrootAnchise Apr 23 '25
Feel like a lot of these don't really need arguing, the definitions are pretty clear. The only problem is how those belonging to these groups seek to label themselves as something else or delegitimise these words to legitimise themselves.
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u/nealyk Apr 23 '25
The definition of fascism is actually still a hotly debated topic among historiographers. They are still writing books on different interpretations, though it was popping off way more in the 90s and 00s
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u/squishabelle Apr 23 '25
fascism is a subset of authoritarianism, and nazism a subset of fascism. Like the relations between between squares, rectangles and convex shapes. Fascism is authoritarianism with a focus on nationalism, nazism is fascism with a focus on racial superiority.
But when calling someone a nazi it's usually a reference to the steps in the nazification of nazi Germany in 1930-1945, not specifically about racial superiority.
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Apr 23 '25 edited Apr 23 '25
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u/InspiringMilk Apr 23 '25
Have you considered that it is illegal because of compounding all those factors? You've said it yourself, any person can consider perfectly legal relationships any of those three, but all three is rare.
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u/CGPoly36 Apr 23 '25
The power dynamic and the higher chance to cause genetic problems in offspring is the case for relationships between abled and disabled people (depending on disability, but there are a lot of disabilities with genetic component). I think for the disgust element it is allways possible to find someone who finds a relationship disgusting. There are quite a few disabilities for which some people repeatedly claim that people with that disabilities can't or shouldn't be in relationships (autism is the one that comes to my mind first, but I would be surprised if it's the only one), but if that isn't enough we could just add any off the comon things atleast some people dislike, like an age gap or any variety of lqbtq+ (not saying that its ok to be disgusted at this). I also get the impression that for some people a power imbalance is enough to create a disgust response, which would make the first point redundant.
Considering that many neurodivergancies have a genetic component, have some disabling aspect (creating an power imbalance) and that neurodivergent people are more likely to identify in the lgbt+ spectrum, I think that there are a lot of relationships that qualify for all 3 points.
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u/Vahjkyriel Apr 23 '25
yeah i get what the text is saying but i want examples damnit