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2016 Election

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Cenedril_Gildinaur
Post subject: Re: Election
Posted: Thu 24 Nov , 2016 4:47 pm
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Frelga wrote:
Also this came up

[ img ]
It's like voting at all and in general, not just Trump. If you do vote it shows you consent to and agree with the process and outcome, but if you don't vote it shows you consent to and agree with the process and outcome.

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It is a myth that coercion is necessary in order to force people to get along together, but it is a persistent myth because it feeds a desire many people have. That desire is to be able to justify hurting people who have done nothing other than offend them in some way.

Last edited by Cenedril_Gildinaur on Tue Feb 30, 2026 13:61 am; edited 426 times in total


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Cenedril_Gildinaur
Post subject: Re: Election
Posted: Sat 26 Nov , 2016 1:08 am
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LalaithUrwen wrote:
Much better, thanks! :D

As for responding to that, the Democrats definitely have a lot of work to do. I'm still a registered Republican, but I'm pretty disgusted with that party right now. I'm only marginally feeling more favorable about the Democrats at this point. What I found is that most people I know personally who voted for Trump are either not racist (not exactly anyway, though they did put other issues above the racism they perceived in Trump, and I have a major problem with that) or they are blind to their biases (as we all tend to be until they get pointed out to us) and didn't recognize any serious problems with Trump and were more concerned with other issues. I don't think I know anyone personally who supported Trump openly because of their own racism.
Regarding racism. An interesting perspective I found on Cracked.
Quote:
But what I can say, from personal experience, is that the racism of my youth was always one step removed. I never saw a family member, friend, or classmate be mean to the actual black people we had in town. We worked with them, played video games with them, waved to them when they passed. What I did hear was several million comments about how if you ever ventured into the city, winding up in the "wrong neighborhood" meant you'd get dragged from your car, raped, and burned alive. Looking back, I think the idea was that the local minorities were fine ... as long as they acted exactly like us.

If you'd asked me at the time, I'd have said the fear and hatred wasn't of people with brown skin, but of that specific tribe they have in Chicago -- you know, the guys with the weird slang, music and clothes, the dope fiends who murder everyone they see. It was all part of the bizarro nature of the cities, as perceived from afar -- a combination of hyper-aggressive savages and frivolous white elites. Their ways are strange. And it wasn't like pop culture was trying to talk me out of it:

It's not just perception, either -- the stats back up the fact that these are parallel universes. People living in the countryside are twice as likely to own a gun and will probably get married younger. People in the urban "blue" areas talk faster and walk faster. They are more likely to be drug abusers but less likely to be alcoholics. The blues are less likely to own land and, most importantly, they're less likely to be Evangelical Christians.

In the small towns, this often gets expressed as "They don't share our values!" and my progressive friends love to scoff at that. "What, like illiteracy and homophobia?!?!"

Nope. Everything.
The "racism" isn't about skin color, but about the difference between city and country. People of various skin colors in the country get along fine, even though that is where all the racism is supposed to be. It's the city folk they fear.

"When you go visit the big city, stay out of the bad neighborhoods."
"That's racist."

_________________

It is a myth that coercion is necessary in order to force people to get along together, but it is a persistent myth because it feeds a desire many people have. That desire is to be able to justify hurting people who have done nothing other than offend them in some way.

Last edited by Cenedril_Gildinaur on Tue Feb 30, 2026 13:61 am; edited 426 times in total


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yovargas
Post subject: Re: Election
Posted: Sat 26 Nov , 2016 1:36 am
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I do think it is accurate to say that a lot (not all, by a long shot, but a lot) of what gets called "racism" is more about cultural differences than actual "racial" differences. And I do think it would help a lot if the language we use in this kinds of discussions more precisely reflected that. That would go some way in helping the various "sides" communicate with each other, instead of past each other.

That said, whatever you wanna call it, it's still a lot of shitty "they're different than us so they scare me" bigotry so fuck that bullshit.


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aninkling
Post subject: Re: Election
Posted: Mon 28 Nov , 2016 5:37 pm
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A surprising choice for UN ambassador:
http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Politics/2 ... nt-message
Quote:
Gov. Nikki Haley is everything Donald Trump’s critics say he is not: a unifier, a moderating voice, a darling of the Republican mainstream. As governor of South Carolina, she’s been an outspoken opponent of white supremacists, a proponent of immigration, including properly vetted Muslim refugees.
Quote:
While the appointment of a woman with no foreign policy or national security experience has mystified foreign diplomats, she is more palatable than what many were bracing for, according to Poilitico.

“Diplomats were expecting Trump to send an angry white man to the UN,” said Richard Gowan, a senior fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations. “The mere fact that Haley is not an angry white man is good in terms of political optics.”

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Society can and does execute its own mandates, and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with it ought not to meddle, it practices a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself. ― John Stuart Mill


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aninkling
Post subject: Re: Election
Posted: Wed 30 Nov , 2016 4:42 pm
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One last article I thought was pretty balanced and insightful:
http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Politics/2 ... ears-video
Quote:
A sense of mounting dread among some Americans about the looming Trump presidency has been met with retorts that this was how many conservatives felt during the eight years of Obama – when legal marijuana took root, same-sex weddings were given equal legal status as heterosexual marriages, and the Affordable Care Act, with its individual mandate, became the law of the land.

Mix in a sense of uncertainty – about the man, his agenda, and how much what he said on the campaign trail means – and these weeks of transition have become explosive.

“For the four previous presidential elections, there’s been a pretty good sense of what the winning candidate was going to do as far as a broad policy agenda, but it’s hard to get a good read on President-elect Trump,” says Christopher Larimer, a University of Northern Iowa professor in Cedar Falls, who studies political behavior. “Yes, he’s criticized immigration policies, but on the domestic front it’s been a little more uncertain.”

“Add to that rhetoric that was more extreme than other recent presidential elections, and it’s making it harder for voters to figure out and understand what, exactly, [government is going to do] for the next four years,” he adds.
It goes on to talk about how more Democrats now fear Republicans than in the past, and vice versa, and how fear of Trump seems to be driving various behaviors, from increased sign ups on the healthcare exchanges, to stockpiling of IUDs to calls for vote recounts in some states. Apparently, similar fears led Republicans to buy more guns during the Obama presidency, while gun manufacturers' stock prices are now down.

_________________

Society can and does execute its own mandates, and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with it ought not to meddle, it practices a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself. ― John Stuart Mill


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Frelga
Post subject: Re: Election
Posted: Wed 30 Nov , 2016 5:00 pm
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The glaring difference here is that the people then were afraid of things that other people were doing, like smoking dope and having sex. The people now are afraid of violence directed at them and of being prevented from doing things they want or even need. Like marrying the person they love, wearing clothes appropriate to their beliefs, or getting medical care. That's not balance.

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aninkling
Post subject: Re: Election
Posted: Wed 30 Nov , 2016 5:10 pm
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I wasn't talking about the fears being equally balanced, but the reporting - which points out that not all sides of the political debate have the same fears and worries, or think that exactly the same solutions should be applied to problems like healthcare. And just as Obama didn't "take away" people's guns, this administration and legislature may not do everything that people are currently afraid of. Frankly, I don't see some things, like protection for homosexual marriages, disappearing - there is just too much support in the mainstream now. Sounds like some advocates for reproductive rights think that feeding the Trump panic is also not an appropriate response right now.
Quote:
Likewise, advocates for women’s issues are seeking to calm women who are going out and stocking up on birth control, fearing the worst.

“It was really interesting how that took hold in the atmosphere, this kind of panic,” says Heather Boonstra of the Guttmacher Institute, an advocacy group for women’s reproductive rights. “But I don’t think there’s a reason to panic quite yet.”

_________________

Society can and does execute its own mandates, and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with it ought not to meddle, it practices a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself. ― John Stuart Mill


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