Broadly speaking, you probably agree with the large majority of the views commonly attributed to whichever group you identify with - what are the exceptions? Something that if you mention without a caveat immediately makes people jump to conclusions or even attack you?
I’m a Democrat who values the 2nd amendment and doesn’t think we should just ban guns in the U.S. Stronger regulations and safety measures? Sure, absolutely. But I do think people should have the right to own and use firearms for recreation, hunting, personal protection, etc.
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I agree up to the point where the amendment is pointed at as disallowing reasonable regulation. If that’s the case, end 2A. But my goal is regulation, not abolishment. If 2A folks (mainly the Supreme Court here) can accept regulation existing in parallel with 2A, then I’m happy.
I’m mainly thinking about preventing school shootings and domestic violence and murder, so restrictions of some sort on mental health / violent history.
I think you’ll find that most people by a wide margin agree that prohibition of anything generally doesn’t work, and what they are looking for is regulations and enforcement.
I know plenty of people on the Left who want to ban guns, European-style. They think anyone who owns one is partially psychopathic and have a fetish about killing things. You’re right, they’re probably in the minority, but I question by just how much. I don’t think they’re as fringe as some people would like to believe.
Personal firearms ownership is legal in Europe.
My understanding was that it’s only legal under highly restricted conditions. If you’re just Joe Schmoe, you’re not going to be able to get a firearm just because you have no criminal history and no evidence of mental illness.
There are a lot of vocal anti gun nuts out there though.
Where I live, mentioning you own, or would like to own a gun, gets you labeled as a fascist Nazi/proto murderer. That’s regardless of all your other beliefs or political positions.
And there’s a fair amount of 2a absolutists out there too.
I had someone straight-faced say that Jeff Bezos should be able to buy a nuke (you can imagine the trajectory of the conversation that led to this, it wasn’t a non-sequitor).
I believe privately owned cars and on-street parking should be banned in cities, except for very few regulated exceptions, and replaced with municipal car sharing.
I’m a Christian who doesn’t celebrate Christmas. You can imagine how that goes over with the family. But it’s definitely a super pagan celebration. 🤷
In America its still not ok to be an atheist. Truly weird that it is ok to be part of several different mutually exclusive cults who all believe things that if they were not connected to a proper religion would get you laughed at but if you don’t have a cult its not ok.
on the coasts nobody cares. you must be talking about the south. the majority of the population in cities in athetist or non-practicing.
This honestly just isn’t true 70% of the pop is still Christian.
One of the things people constantly disagree with me about is children. Specifically how hard it really is to raise one, and that everyone isn’t meant to have them.
Many people don’t understand that where children begin, you end. There isn’t going to be time for things you used to do on your own time, at your own leisure. There are no natural born parents, people that can function on little sleep and overwhelming circumstances. You give up peace, money, autonomy and you don’t stop parenting until you’re gone. There are a large number of people who feel like one day, they’ll become a parent and that will be their identity. Some people start their journey in parenthood wholeheartedly believing their child is an extension of themselves; not a developing, unique person that may or may not be completely different- like no one else in the family.
Having children is the most important job that you will ever have. You don’t get to quit when you realize that maybe you aren’t cut out for it. That’s why it’s important to know yourself, and work on your trauma and shortcomings before they bleed into your children. If you aren’t prepared to make sure they have the absolute best you can provide them in all aspects of life; why are you having them? If you aren’t ready to let your priorities fall to the wayside while you guide a tiny human into themselves, you aren’t prepared.
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Bigotry and prejudice is always bad, even if it’s not against a “protected class”. Hating on white people, straight people, cis people, men, or anyone else for the way they were born, what their ancestors did makes the world a worse place. Heck, “white” itself is a nebulous concept that changes over time and is different depending on which racist you’re talking to. Just because someone resembles your oppressor does not make them your enemy.
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Kind of related, but I don’t broadly judge categories of things. I was at a party recently and someone asked me if I liked anime, and I responded that I like some anime. Most of it I don’t like, but that’s not specific to anime. In my experience, roughly 80-90% of all media is somewhere between “garbage” and “mediocre”, and it’s the 10-20% at the top that I look for. A lot of my favorite bands happen to be metal, but I’m not going to like every band that uses distorted guitars.
Perhaps another way of phrasing it is that I usually find that the parameters which define genre are often separate from the parameters that determine my personal enjoyment.
My theory is that most people are more concerned with the social groups around media than the media itself.
what did they say after you said you liked anime?
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I get why the whole “colorblind” thing ended, but what we replaced it with is even worse.
My anarchism.
Anarchism in general makes me the other when dealing with most people, but the specifics of my views on it also generally make me the other when dealing with most “anarchists.” (I oppose any and all attempts to institute anarchism - I believe it will arise organically or not at all - and I similarly reject any and all stipulations regarding what sort of standards, norms or systems may, may not, must or must not be a part of an anarchistic society),
What do you think about Cheran in Mexico?
Without first hand knowledge, I couldn’t say in any detail, but I expect that ambitious, greedy, power-hungry psychopaths are already angling for Council positions, from which they’ll exercise tacit authority until such time as their positions and their authority can be institutionalized, at which point they’ll become the new generation of corrupt officials.
That’s not to say or imply I oppose the effort - if nothing else, they’ve gotten some breathing room. And hopefully the next time they throw off their tyrants, they’ll remember how they got their start and reject authority in and of itself and entirely, rather than deluding themselves that it can be constrained.
Hey friend. This is basically what I came to write. I consider myself a “dictionary anarchist” which to me just means a complete lack of hierarchy whether natural or imposed.
I don’t think of it as a political philosophy but more just as a description of how I believe the world actually is when stripped of the systems we’ve laid on top of everything.
I also have no interest in figuring out or enforcing this belief on other people or groups.
I’m amazed and pleased. I almost never encounter anyone who shares my views, even among self-described 'anarchists."
Most of them carry around lists (figuratively at least) of all of the things that will be required and all of the things that will be prohibited in their “anarchism,” antagonistically immune to the fact that by doing so, they’ve already stipulated institutionalized, hierarchical authority and thus proactively eliminated anarchism.
I don’t think of it as a political philosophy but more just as a description of how I believe the world actually is when stripped of the systems we’ve laid on top of everything.
Very much yes.
My anarchism is rooted in my view that authority is a contrivance, and an ultimately unjustifiable one.
Tom lives alone on a desert island. That means that Tom, within the constraints necessarily imposed by simple reality (he can’t, for instance, flap his arms and fly) enjoys complete freedom of choice.
The only way that that freedom can be constrained is if another person is introduced and that other person acts to constrain Tom’s freedom.
So as you note, the state of affairs in which Tom’s freedom is constrained beyond anything determined by simple reality is some additional element that’s laid on top of the base state.
And as such, it’s the thing that must be justified. Tom doesn’t have to justify being free from constraint imposed by another - he already was so free, and would have remained so were it not for the fact that the other has chosen to try to introduce constraint.
Therefore, the introduction of constraint is the thing that must be justified
And there’s no possible justification for it that doesn’t ultimately establish a hierarchy by which the other person is seen to effectively be a superior being, such that their determination of what Tom may, may not, must or must not do is superior even to Tom’s
If the tacit presumption of innate superiority isn’t made, then any and all noninal justifications for authority over Tom’s decisions fail, since any argument by which any other party might justify imposing their will on Tom is also an argument by which Tom might justify imposing his will on them, and any argument by which they might claim to be rightly free of the imposition of Tom’s will is also an argument by which Tom might claim to be rightfully free of the imposition of their will upon him.
This is where and why institutionalized authority inevitably goes wrong, which in turn is why I’m an anarchist.
Do you like Waiting for Godot?
In my personal case, especially among the people I hang with here, my positive attitude toward generative AI seems like one of the major ones. Many people really don’t seem to like it when someone mentions enjoying using these tools.
I bet you even use Windows when you use AI.
I hope you didn’t bet much. Just goes to show how one shouldn’t make assumptions based on tiny bits of unrelated information.
Hey, props for separating your question and response, though.
I don’t hate AI. It’s fine. I don’t love it either, but it’s neat and often useful.
Just gonna vent a little, don’t mind me. I don’t hate AI. I hate how it’s being used. In a vacuum, AI is fine. But we don’t live in a vacuum, we live in a capitalist hellscape where everyone saw how AI was going to be abused even before corporations started jumping on every chance they got to do so. Now we’re stuck in the timeline where the public consensus is that using AI for any reason at all is seen as fundamentally unethical. People are zealously anti-AI and the nail is only getting pounded in further with new reasons to hate it appearing every other day. And it didn’t have to be this way. Photography didn’t try to pass itself off as painting, it had time to develop into its own art form. But AI didn’t. Out the gate, it was being used deceptively, and continuously became worse. People want to abolish AI as a whole, but it isn’t the problem. The problems run way deeper. Our world is a sinking boat and AI is showing us where all the leaks are. Lack of education, lack of access to mental health professionals, those in power using every chance they get to screw over the working class by cutting every corner. Any new technology in any form that can be used to exploit people, WILL be used to exploit people. The hate on AI may be justified but it’s too generalized and unfocused to bring about any meaningful change. There needs to be regulation, but I fear that any laws that are passed will only benefit the rich and horrible.
You’re fine with companies stealing other people’s work?
As far as I know, the jury is still out on whether that is infringing (not stealing). Based on my understanding, AI is transformative and would fall under fair use. That being said, claiming fair use and then selling the output is problematic to me.
Every single model should be open weights and uncensored. I wouldn’t have any issue with companies adding value or supplying the compute to run the model.
As far as I know, the jury is still out on whether that is infringing (not stealing).
They don’t even have to sell it, company valuation increases alone are evidence of piracy
Religion and spirituality, broadly considered, are not inherently evil. That organized religion can justify great evils is a function of human weakness, nothing more.
Then again, this is coupled with a ‘there is no god but that we create ourselves/god has no material existence, but is no less powerful for that’’ POV, which is admittedly a weird one that I’ve been pulling at for a bit. Nothing to do with the nature of our reality or first causes, everything to do with our relationship to reality.
Came here to comment on the religion part. Humans are biologically programmed to be in a tribe and we need an “other” and we need a bad guy. On its own religion could be a neutral or a good thing, but it fits that need for tribalism and a common enemy and feeling superior. It’s the same mindset as nationalism or racism or when fans of sports teams riot and beat the shit out of each other for no reason. If religion never existed humanity would have just discovered some other way to segregate ourselves, feel superior, order each other around with arbitrary rules even the in group can’t agree on, and isolate and kill those who don’t comply. Add in manipulative people who are all too eager to hop into leadership roles and use them for their own power and selfish gain and you have pure evil, but it’s the system, not the religion, that’s a distraction.
I largely agree, but I don’t think people actually need to have an “other” to hate. I suspect it’s an easily activated community-level defense mechanism, if that makes sense. One that’s easily a used by manipulative people.
I’m just trying to figure it if there’s an evolutionarily-selected use for having manipulative power-seeking types in our populations, or if they truly are more analogous to a parasitic mutation of a more conventional personality type.
I can’t say that I disagree with anything here. What bugs me about it is that at an idea at the core of many religions is that all us humans are of one kind, some particular expression of the universe (however that’s conceptualized), and can/should act in that fashion, towards each other and the world around us.
But it’s almost always turned into a footnote among a bunch of other bullshit that perpetuates tribalism, subjugation and violence. Going to use words that are easily poked apart, but I hope the idea comes across: we all contain something of the divine. It’s a miracle we exist at all, and maybe it’s possible we can all act like it and set aside meaningless divisions. One ‘tribe’, the world over, created by mutual recognition and respect rather than force and othering.
Literally all the bones are there, you just have to cast out the outdated divisive bullshit. But doing so also involves actively rejecting some ugly facts about humans as a group, which is, well, hard - to put it mildly.
Idk - this is all why I don’t talk about my beliefs (such as they are) too much, and just try my best to act with the good stuff above in mind as much as possible.
I’m not at all religious now, but I was raised Christian. There’s some awful, awful shit in the Bible, but Jesus was such a chill dude. If everyone acted like Jesus, the world would be an awesome place. He was just a hippie who drank wine and hung out with his bros and made friends with prostitutes and outcasts and condemned the church leaders who abused their positions. According to legend he was the legit son of God and yet when he was asked to judge sinners he was like yo dudes that’s not my place only my dad can do that I’m not worthy and neither are any of you, maybe instead of worrying about what other people are doing you should deal with your own issues, ok? Can you imagine if people actually lived like that? I’m not as familiar with other religions, but from what I know other major prophets were pretty chill, cool dudes too. If people actually followed the prophets of their religions instead of being assholes, religion would be great. Instead we have poor people being exploited, women and children being abused, and the entire system is fucked and corrupted because of human nature run amok.
100%. It’s why (when I take a look at things from my bottom-up god POV, which is a key stumbling point here re:implementation) I think a Christian movement that interprets the fucked system behind such outcomes as ‘Satanic’ corruptions to be cast aside would be interesting and possibly pretty cool. Or it’d just continue the cycle of fucked up shit with new window dressing, idk.
Satanic in quotes 'cause there’s lots you can unpack with that term/figure, but you know, popular broad strokes version - evil force trying to keep us from what we can be. It’s really just us getting in our own way IMO.
Truth of the matter is people who aren’t religious always have a proxy for religion in their lives, which they irrationally worship.
And they are often prepared to justify evil towards others in defense of that proxy and use it to justify their social and moral superiority to those that don’t hold to it the way they believe they do.
It’s just how human beings are. But a lot of them are in rampant denial of it if you confront them over it.
People have passions about other things than Jeebus. They are often irrational and they tend to become attached to their pre-existing notions. These basic facts about humanity doesn’t make their other passions a proxy for religion.
Typical cultist thinking. People’s politics and thought processes are a religion like bald is a hair color.
so MAGA isn’t a cult? the .ml users who are all rabid communists and think anyone who isn’t are facist nazis, aren’t a cult?
ok buddy
Religion and politics are oft intertwined that doesn’t make them the same thing. In fact you might note that insofar as MAGA membership in a christian cult is highly correlated with being in a political cult.
Some of us aren’t in any cult. Maybe that can be you one day.
sorry, what cult am I?
weird that you know so much about me.
I had figured you to be one of the hurr durr atheism is a type of religion hurr durr types which are almost always Christians or the flavor of agnostic that holds so many Christian beliefs that you might as well call them Christian in everything but name. Did I guess wrong?
sounds like you think there is such a thing as a ‘true’ atheist? and you are one and everyone else isn’t?
sounds pretty cultist to me…
I’m all for healthcare “rationing”, that is cost-effectiveness analysis for both public and insurance-funded healthcare and setting a cap that will exclude even some evidence-based interventions.
Why though?
Why I think so or why it gets me weird looks?
Healthcare is expensive. For public healthcare, it’s always a balancing act between how much to tax, and how to distribute taxed funds. I don’t want sky-high taxes (already live in Finland, not exactly a tax haven); and 100k€ spent on e.g. education is better than 100k€ on a treatment that will likely give someone a year more of life.
For insurance, same, I just don’t want to pay as much as “truly full coverage” would cost. I wouldn’t grudge more costly premium plans for other people though.
I voted to leave the EU. I work in agriculture and the CAP just funds wealthy landowners and has incentivised the destruction of the environment.
I think we can all agree destruction of the environment is bad. Has it or the incentives gotten any better since, or was it optimistic?
The EU has weakened their green farming rules. The UK has strengthened theirs with replacement policy
I lost my job thanks to people like you.
So how have things been since you left?
I’m bullish on open borders. Not lack of sovereignty, and all fully documented. But if people are emigrating/immigrating “illegally”, there’s only one real solution. Tightening borders only benefits the well-off and slavers. Poor people are well aware it is possible to be poor in an MEDC. And mostly colder.
I don’t think AI is the devil. Liberals/leftists are frightening lately over this topic, in a way that is increasingly difficult to construe as anything other than garden-variety technophobia and anti-intellectualism.
People jump to crazy conclusions when they learn why I never had children. They think I’m a eugenicist because I made a decision for myself even though I specifically don’t give a fuck what others do.
Liberals/leftists get strangely aggressive about wanting a cure for my genetic disorder. This apparently also makes me a eugenicist.
