Accusations alone prove Nothing

Peter Kropotkin: the simple reason I didn’t respond the points gloomy made was
they aren’t relevant to his post… his post was simply bashing liberals
and the method he used was about the very serious problem of the rape culture
in America… I don’t need to respond to a post that’s only value is to attack
liberals and liberalism…

Gloom:
You’re a sexist piece of shit, and you couldn’t philosophize your way out of a tiny cardboard box or paper bag.
You’re not here for honest, open and thoughtful dialogue, not even in the slightest, you’re here for diatribe.
I refuse to set an example of feeding trolls like you, and other jerk offs.
Now get the fuck off my thread.

K: and we have the anger issue… look, I am sorry you have anger issues and you
should probably see a professional for that… but I maintain that this thread was
created for the sole purpose of attacking liberals and liberalism…
and the continuing personal attacks seem to suggest that I am right…
I would suggest the failure here is yours and yours alone…
but not the reasons you may think…you have failed in the basic principle of
examining your basic principles for their truth…you have the courage of your convictions
but not the courage of an attack upon your convictions… you have failed the basic
point of being a philosopher which is to examine what you believe and see if it is true…
my point about having changed political viewpoints is to show that it is possible to
not only understand but to change one’s political viewpoint…as I have done, multiple times…
as an adult…I am willing to challenged my beliefs, attack my convictions as it were,
can you?

Kropotkin

Gloom, you are a common sense rational classical liberal, not a leftist.

You must discover the absolute difference between these two things. The false conflation of the one with the other is a major source of many problems right now.

I think he means giving people their due process, habaeus corpus.

And you’re right, fascism is a school of right thought, and it’s totalitarian, but I think in Ur’s mind, rightism means just capitalism, libertarianism and such, where as both fascism and socialism are somehow on the left.

I find it much more useful and applicable to assess “left” and “right” according to both social and economic stances, much like the “political compass” does.

Only simpletons like UrGod think absolutely and without nuance - as though there is 1 single homogenous left. The usual slightly more sophisticated understanding places people and parties along a relative scale, but you need to take into account that some people who support capitalism also support restraint in social behaviours (Conservatives), and some support freer trade as well as free living in general (Libertarians). Likewise some who support more economic controls also want to enforce what you can do and say in social respects (like this new wave of feminists), and some who support more economic planning also support a lack of control over individual choices outside of the workplace (like me).

It’s ham-fisted to ignore the broader spectrum of political beliefs, and so easily turned into an “us versus them” false dichotomy that completely misrepresents the vast majority of actual people. You should never listen to people who speak in black and white terms about politics (or anything).

You don’t want to talk about men’s rights because you hate men, pure and simple.

You will use any excuse to wiggle and worm your way out of one.

While I wouldn’t say all liberals are like that, and what liberalism means exactly is sort of nebulous (I have used liberalism in both a broad, abstract sense to refer to many ideological currents throughout the ages, and in a narrow, concrete sense to mean Canadian liberals/American democrats, in this thread), I agree many, if not most mainstream liberals have unfortunately become like that, they feel as tho their party is The way, The only way for all peoples, places and times, ahistoric, and that anyone who disagrees with them is the enemy, and while conservatives/republicans have definitely been guilty of this level of fanaticism in the past, as have many ideological currents, liberalism is perhaps the worst today, and that’s why I think we’re seeing this opposition to it that’s been simmering for ages in the underground, finally beginning to erupt into the mainstream.

@UrGod

I don’t think you can fit my views into that tiny of a box, but you can try.

Having two dimensions helps make things a little more sophisticated than one.
You can split politics into an economic and social sphere or domain.
You can make things even a little more complex by divvying them up like this:

There is socialist economics (left), where corporations are ran in the interest of workers and consumers, there is corporatist economics (right), where corporations are ran in the interest of capitalists, and there is capitalist economics (center), where it’s a free for all, economic competition.

And there is progressive ‘socionomics’ (left), if you will (don’t know what else to call it), which would be, what?
Promoting the rights of women and minorities, and in my view, often at the expense of men and the majority, multiculturalism/racialism, minimization of difference, feminization of men and boys/masculinization of women and girls, gun control, cameras everywhere, environmentalism, one or two child policy, planned parenthood, enforced vegetarianism/veganism, psychiatric fascism and so on.

And there is conservative socionomics (right), which are more well known and understood than progressive socionomics, because we had them for centuries:
Rigid roles for men and women and adherence to racial, religious, sexual and social norms, criminalization of drugs and prostitution, sanctity of marriage, life and so on.

And then you have liberal or libertarian (two words that as you’ve argued ought to mean the same thing: free) socionomics (center), where we’re free to conduct our personal, private affairs as we see fit independently of state intervention.

I think it’s important to make a distinction between liberalism on the one hand, and what could be called progressivism on the other.
Progressivism is one of the two major kinds of authoritarianism in our culture, the other is of course conservatism.
All too often liberalism is lumped in with progressiveism.

Myself I’m mostly a socialist when it comes to the economy, and mostly a liberal or libertarian when it comes to our personal, private lives, like you, but with some progressive, and conservative elements thrown in.

We can add another dimension, a political one.
The tripartite division here would be democrat (left), monarchist (right) and anarchist (center).
And there are more dimensions you can add, and ways to split the aforementioned ones up.
You can go on adding and dividing, and I, like you, encourage people to become broader, more sophisticated and personalized in their thinking, if they can help it.

Back-pattin’. Congratulating the self.

Self/other relationship wherein self has already been established to be proudly humble, “other” (aka gloom) will now be analyzed to discover what obviously must be a problem from the point of view of the previously-established-all-perfect self.

More self-flattering wishful thinking. It’s impossible to love without hate because in order to love you must hate that which threatens what you love, so if you’re void of hate, as you claim, then you’re indifferent, ambivalent. In order to love all, you’d have to have sympathy for the devil and cheer equally on both sides of the fence. So you’re flattering yourself for possessing what is impossible to have while demonizing those who don’t from your altar of self-righteousness. You can’t see that?

Maybe you can see clearer to remove the splinter from your brother’s eye once you gotten the beam out of your own? :confusion-shrug:

“They’re probably guilty anyway” because they’re part of a class or category of people who do such things.

“Twisted logic liberals like to use” - “Liberals” are a class or category of people who do such things.

You’re essentially doing what you’re complaining about: the sweeping demonization of people for belonging to a class.

Generalizations are only generally good, but that’s ok since “men” are systemizers :wink: and it’s perfectly natural :slight_smile:

Nah, women should come first because they have the eggs while men are perfectly expendable. Gotta protect the eggs!

No, the woman is always innocent like the customer is always right. Eggs, man, eggs! We must protect the eggs!

Consider the poor muslim who has never seen a half-naked bleach-blonde unveiled from her burka. Poor guy, it must be like a starving child watching Trump eat a big mac. Screw that; hang the muslim to protect the eggs! Easter is almost here! :animals-bunnywhite:

@Serendipper

While the minority of men who rape women may be larger than the minority of women who rape men, it’s still only a minority of men who rape women, where as the majority of progressives arguably employ this form of twisted logic: they equate being accused of rape with being charged with rape, which’s not to say conservatives don’t have their own forms of twisted logic, they do.

I wouldn’t overgeneralize generalizations, they’re not always good or bad.
Charging and accusing are two very different things, charging requires a great deal of evidence, time and money, accusing requires none.
The majority of progressives employ this twisted form of logic, but if you point to one and say this is an example progressives who don’t, than I’ll happily recognize the difference between type B progressives, who don’t, and the more common type A progressives, who do.
Just because I employ generalizations, doesn’t mean I don’t recognize there are exceptions or meaningful differences between one class of thing and another.

And I mean the majority of people charged with theft and murder may be convicted, but does it follow that the majority of people who’re are accused of theft and murder are guilty, and that we should ruin their lives on the basis of accusation alone?
Of course it doesn’t, and neither should we ruin the lives of men or women who’ve merely been accused of rape or sexual harassment.

You can overgeneralize or undergeneralize.
For example, if I say all humans can talk, I’m overgeneralizing, if I say the vast majority of humans can talk, I’m accurately generalizing, if I say half of humans can talk, or if I say we can’t estimtate how many humans can talk, I’m undergeneralizing.
If I say most humans can talk, and you say what about humans wearing cowboy hats, and I say half of them will be able to talk, or we can’t estimate how many of them will be able to talk, I’m undergeneralizing, but if say most humans can talk, and you say what about the def who’re also dumb, and I say most of them will be able to talk too, than I’m overgeneralizing.
When things are practiclaly the same, generalizing will still apply, but when things are meaningfully different, generalizing will not still apply, or it will not apply to the same extent.
And this is true of accusations and charges, the two are meaningfully different, it’s highly unlikely accusations are just as good as charges, in all likelihood charges are a much stronger indication of guilt than accusations, just as a doctor saying you probably have x illness counts for more than some random dude saying you have x illness, which is not to say I always trust doctors, on the contrary, but their word generally carries more weight regarding many-most medical matters than some random dude.

I see your point and yeah it’s probably true that twisted logic is more proliferate than rape.

True. They have a certain amount of value.

I agree!

Is that an accusation or a charge that requires a great deal of evidence? Although I do agree with you, you have to recognize you’re treading on logical-thin-ice by relying on a generalization to make a claim and if I couldn’t see what you mean, you’d play hell trying to prove it.

Idk, it’s just been bugging me lately and that seemingly everyone is pigeonholing, categorizing, stigmatizing, and demonizing as a convenient way of making or dismissing arguments and I suppose I’m slightly hyper-sensitive to labels. Maybe it’s a guy-thing because it almost seems they all do it, which is what I’m doing now by defining a guy-thing :confused:

Anyway, to classify progressives is to complain that they have too much power as a group and that’s the very same complaint progressives have about white men as a group which is how they justify having some incidental casualties while dispensing justice. As Saddam Hussein said, “A dead friend is better than a live enemy.” It’s better to take out a few innocent in order to guarantee the elimination of evil, which is pretty much evil.

There is a lot of talk on this board about “leftists”, which is a stigmatized word and anyone who uses it risks being perceived as appealing to popularity or some emotion. If I were reading peer-reviewed literature, I’m not sure which high-brow words they would choose, but I’m confident it wouldn’t be “leftist”. Even uttering the word in seriousness could tarnish a reputation of an objective thinker.

Generalizations have value, but they can’t be used to demonize people as you pointed out with rape accusations: just because rapes are typically committed by men and because white men are typically “evil” anyway, then we may as well side with the woman. But by generalizing people who generalize, you’re doing the same demonizing thing, though to no effect.

If you’re merely pointing out there are people who use twisted logic and people who don’t, then why name them liberal? Clearly you’re seeking to demonize liberals by associating “liberal” with “twisted logic”.

K: I think you are hanging your hat on hate because it is all you know…
anyone who knows me will tell you that I have often and very publicly
stated to people including to my wife and mother, that I am extremely glad
to be a man… I quite often say, well that is reason number 456 that I am
glad I am a man…and I am… I would be a terrible woman…however you think
that I won’t talk about a “man’s right” because I hate men, no, I am interested in
the right of people, not just men, but all people…to focus on just men’s rights is
to focus far too narrowly…it is not just about “men” or “women” but about people…
for you to have your “rights”, everyone else must have their “rights”…as a liberal,
I seek justice and the path to justice is equality, an equal society is an just society…
equality: the act of treating everyone equal… is the same action as justice…
Justice: the act of treating everyone equal…and we do not have a society that
is equal… not too long ago, a boy from Stanford university raped a girl who was
unconscience, from drinking too much, and he was caught mid act… the boy who
was an athlete, swimmer I believe, was given 6 months probation, for his act,
let me repeat that, 6 months probation for raping an unconscience girl…
the judge said, you know, boys will be boys and we don’t want to ruin the
boy’s life with prison… that judge is facing a recall this next election
and he can’t go out in public anymore because he is truly hated around here…
unless we treat crimes equally regardless of who they are, that is justice,
we can’t be free, we can’t have justice, men’s rights are not separate from
women’s rights,

men’s rights are women’s rights and women’s rights are men’s rights…

you cannot separate and divide them… an equal society is a just society…

and as long as we say and act upon the phrase, oh, boys will be boys,
we don’t have an equal and just society… simple as that…

Kropotkin

*Refuses to talk about the injustice committed by society against men in the OP.
Instead brings up an injustice committed by an individual against women.
Look I’m done wasting my time and energy on you.
You and your posts aren’t welcome in this thread.

@Serendipper

Perhaps most progressives don’t support ruining peoples lives over allegations.
Maybe I’m stretching it a bit, maybe not.
But I don’t think I’m stretching it by saying the progressive MSM and politicians are in many cases encouraging the destruction of these men’s lives, and in many cases standing idly by, as other progressives encourage it, and few, if any progressives are opposed to it.
The progressive MSM, Hollywood and the entertainment industry, and progressive politicians on the whole seem fine with ruining men’s lives solely on the basis of allegation.
I don’t think anyone, including progressives themselves are going to seriously challenge me on that, and if there are any out there, they’re free to express that challenge here.

And while it may not be a crime to destroy these men’s lives, I think it should be, it is definitely immoral, unless of course they publically confessed to a crime as serious as rape.

Labels don’t hurt people, they’re just a tool, it’s people who misuse and abuse them we have to worry about.

Ultimately all words/thoughts are labels.
even your name, serendipper is a label.
Having the name serendipper implies some consistency and constancy about you, but of course there is none, at least not absolutely, perhaps roughly there’s some.

I’m neither against, nor for progressives as a whole.
I am against them on the issue raised in the OP, and some other issues, but not all issues.

I try not to get too hung up on words because of their connotations or stigma.
Todays derogatory word is worn as a badge of honor tomorrow.

Again, I’m not demonizing people who generalize, or generalization itself, you have to contextualize what I’m saying.
I’m critiquing very specific generalizations.

I don’t think I ever said, nor implied ‘liberals’ (or as I prefer to call them now: progressives, since liberal etymologically means and historically meant free, like free from authority, and still means free in some contexts, and arguably ought to mean free in all contexts, to avoid confusion) are the only ones who twist logic, just they seem to be exclusively employing this form of twisted logic, which’s what the OP is about.
If you want to start a thread about the kinds of twisted logic conservatives and other ideologies and parties employ, than by all means, I’m not going to try and stop you, but this thread is primarily for addressing a specific sort of progressive illogic.