Most things are debatable by honest parties. The world is complicated and yes, there have been occasional times when the term “neoliberal” has been used by different groups. And I’d be happy to have a discussion about that.
Lemmy is NOT the forum for that discussion. The majority of posters here are NOT debating in good faith. They weaponize nuance to try and shift goalposts.
This applies to almost any topic.
Bringing up a brief, limited, temporary usage of the term from 40 years ago is just ammunition that they’ll use to push their “Democrats bad” agenda. And undecided Lemmy readers in general cannot psychologically handle nuance.
So for things which are generally true, or mostly true, you have to discuss them in absolute terms. It’s like teaching a 5 year old that the world is round, and then teaching a 12 year old that it’s actually a bit squished. Lemmy users are 5 years old, and there are people out there trying to convince them that the world is flat. They’ll use terms like “there is some debate” or “the science is not settled” to introduce doubt.
If we were in a venue where I could trust participants to have a rational and reasoned discussion, sure, we could talk about different permutations of the term and different ideologies attached to it. For our purposes, here, the answer must be “No. Democrats are not neoliberal.”
I see no evidence to suggest that the majority of posters here are not debating in good faith, most posters here seem to me just normal humans who have biases and emotions - but I’d hardly call that bad faith. If you think this low of lemmy and its users I don’t really understand why you are spending time here.
Even if your assumptions of lemmy users where true I don’t see how that affords you the opportunity to discuss without nuance. Discussing in absolutes and without nuance would categorize you in the “weaponize nuance to try and shift goalposts” crowd I’d say.
Ok, let me step back a bit.
Most things are debatable by honest parties. The world is complicated and yes, there have been occasional times when the term “neoliberal” has been used by different groups. And I’d be happy to have a discussion about that.
Lemmy is NOT the forum for that discussion. The majority of posters here are NOT debating in good faith. They weaponize nuance to try and shift goalposts.
This applies to almost any topic.
Bringing up a brief, limited, temporary usage of the term from 40 years ago is just ammunition that they’ll use to push their “Democrats bad” agenda. And undecided Lemmy readers in general cannot psychologically handle nuance.
So for things which are generally true, or mostly true, you have to discuss them in absolute terms. It’s like teaching a 5 year old that the world is round, and then teaching a 12 year old that it’s actually a bit squished. Lemmy users are 5 years old, and there are people out there trying to convince them that the world is flat. They’ll use terms like “there is some debate” or “the science is not settled” to introduce doubt.
If we were in a venue where I could trust participants to have a rational and reasoned discussion, sure, we could talk about different permutations of the term and different ideologies attached to it. For our purposes, here, the answer must be “No. Democrats are not neoliberal.”
I see no evidence to suggest that the majority of posters here are not debating in good faith, most posters here seem to me just normal humans who have biases and emotions - but I’d hardly call that bad faith. If you think this low of lemmy and its users I don’t really understand why you are spending time here.
Even if your assumptions of lemmy users where true I don’t see how that affords you the opportunity to discuss without nuance. Discussing in absolutes and without nuance would categorize you in the “weaponize nuance to try and shift goalposts” crowd I’d say.
But you do you
Lemmy users are terrible. Reddit the company is worse. And there really aren’t any alternatives left on the Internet.