woosh

thank you, I’ll edit my comment.

Important note, this was unrelated to the current stir up. Actually something that is real. Gamers nexus did a video on it.

Figured it out, gamers nexus has two videos on it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FGW3TPytTjc (initial investigation) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X3byz3txpso (response to linus forum post)

Makes me sad, man. They were the channel that got me into tech. I learned how to build a PC with their videos. :(

what happened?

I had some thoughts about being vegan. Why does everyone have to be so uptight about it? I’ve had multiple people give me the straw man “it destroyed my health” line. Or people get nervous around the subject. or they think it is their job to educate me?

I get eating meat, used to be the scumbag. I see how there is some complexity to the matter. Like “deer populations can’t get too out of control” is a valid statement. But why does that make me a weirdo or some self righteous POS just because I don’t want my meals to come from animals?

“Above nature”? Jesus, do you honestly think I go home and say to myself “I am above the laws of nature. Screw you God!”? It’s not complicated: I think eating meat is unethical because I am harming another living being.

yikes. I just don’t feel great about eating meat man… No need to get all political man…

Based

Can we not do the “I bet so and so, thinks so and so?”. It just seems kinda shallow.

best I can do is $400

I believe the phrase “Why then is extremist, explicitly Nazi rhetoric so pervasive within the Republican ranks?” is a far more complex phrase than you leave it to be. For one, we lack any objective way to gauge the overall opinions. All methods of gauging this (to my current knowledge) at all, have inherent issues.

The methods I know of are: Personal Experience, Media Coverage, Questionnaire studies, and the opinions of the leaders. Personal experience has to many unrelated variables at play. Were do you live? Who do you talk to? What are the people you talk with willing to talk to you about?

Media coverage can be extremely biased as it is often times more profitable to focus on the number of eyes that you get, versus the accuracy of your information. Media coverage is also not focused on representing society. It makes more sense to report on a single important incident, than it is to report 100 quiet days were nothing happened.

Questionnaires would normally be a good method and it normally would be. However, there are a lot of variables at play. How was the data gathered, is it peer reviewed, what measures were taken to prevent the inherent biases (either from the researchers, or by the nature of the current method studying), what is the sample size? This would be the best way to categorize the party as a whole, should the correct measures be taken. I have a had a lot of trouble finding solid studies that strayed away from this, as the current landscape of political questionnaires and studies are full of studies containing these flaws. Note: If you have found a good study that takes the necessary precautions, I would be grateful if you shared it. I should also note, that I’m not exactly a professional fact checker and I do not know all the best ways to find these studies.

The opinions of the leaders of a given party can also be a great way to gauge. However this necessitates that all members of the party agree with their current leader. Not all republicans want to vote for trump, or may not be paying enough attention to be knowledgeable about him (As much as we argue and it does in fact matter who you vote for. America seems to have grown a sub culture of people who are mostly dis-interested in politics. My belief is that it is most likely either people who do not care about politics, or people that trust their overall government and fellow man enough to make the decisions for him in such matters).

Another thing is that there are many “sub-parties”, if you will, under republicans. I have seen traditionalist republicans argue with libertarian republicans. I have seen republicans who refuse to budge an inch on guns, debate republicans who believe gun control is necessary. I have seen republicans who hate the war on drugs, debate republicans who think alcohol should be banned. I believe the reason that we see a more unified message among-st the republican party is due to the general state of politics in america.

I believe the biggest reason for this unification in message; is because the transition of politicians to more of a focus on careers, rather than directly fighting for what you believe in. A great example is how most republican candidates have tried to get endorsements from trump, because they new he was popular and it would help there image. Lobbying is a huge industry at the moment, encouraging both republicans and democrats to vote differently.

I believe the second biggest reason is need for traction to get started. To win an election you need votes, to get votes you need money, to get money you need a source to get money from. If you’re rich, great! You’ll be among the few who get a chance to risk throwing money away for the hope of maybe making this country better. If you’re not a wealthy person (who as a population, appear to be less concerned with politics and more concerned with business.), than you can try to start small and try to talk to everyone to get them to spread your name. This can be a very slow process and also carries with it the risk of failure, as you may be a liability to future employers and you might be seen as evil by some. The final option is to pander. Try to get other political candidates to endorse you, and build connections. The downside is that you have to not only worry about what is best for the country/state/city, you now have to worry about how it will look to everyone else if you openly fight against the very people who built your political career.

Why do people who disagree with their party just vote for another party like the green party. The most common message that I hear is this: Voting for someone does nothing if they will never be elected. Most other parties are almost completely ignored. Thus my best option is to vote for the politicians closest to my beliefs, from the bigger republican party.

The current state of republican politics also makes it difficult to describe them through a study. Because of the sub-factions that exist, who may disagree heavily republican voting as a whole. Such people who would only vote for someone they believe is making the party a better party. This means that even if there is an over 50% population of republicans who are Nazis: there may still be “sub-parties” who act almost in-dependently from the republican party, excluding only the title of republican.

This is why I, and many republicans that I know, will agree with you that there is a dangerous group of Nazis within the republican party. There will be a dis-agreement as to how bad the situation is, but this the threat of Nazis is a commonly known fact. I think the use of this fact as a counterpoint to all republicans beliefs, has made many republicans afraid to say or admit how bad the situation is (out of fear that you will completely ignore any points they have to make. especially if they are one of these sub-parites). I also know republicans who refuse to vote for Donald Trump because of his handling of the Charlottesville incident, among other things.

I merely believe it to be more constructive to encourage republicans to look for the evils in there own party, just as democrats should within their own as well. While also trying to break down the adversarial nature of modern politics, as many people on both sides have a bad habit of shutting down when confronted, and encouraging collaborative political discussion.

P.S.

1. there are some errors in gammar and spelling I have to hop off now and I plan to fix them tomorrow.

2. Some of the language I used did not meet the standard that I am asking for from the final paragraph. As much as I hate to admit it, most of my other comments here were made while I was triggered. One of the few things that I hate this much about modern politics, has to be the over generalization and dismal of political beliefs made with arguments that do not actually question the policies or specific politicians. This is not an excuse for the way I went about commenting, and I want to condemn the way I spoke earlier. I only leave those comments up because I believe others have a right to see how the conversation got to this point, and how I have handled myself in the past.

I apologize about the mis-understanding.

We both agree on the fact that there are Nazis within the republican party, and I believe we both agree on the dangers associated with that. The mere goal of my argument was such: “Not all republicans are Nazis, therefore we should be careful with how we address them. We should avoid dismissing them on the mere basis that some may be bad actors and instead engage in a different line of reasoning.”

The portion you quoted, “Calling such people Nazis is counter productive and only inflames the current issues at hand.”, had some very important context. “Such people” in this case, was referring only to the portion of republicans who were not bad actors and were voting in good faith.

The following is my more fleshed out thoughts on the manner.

To better explain my ideas on the matter, I think it is best if I explain my trajectory from generic conservative to were I am now. So please bare with me. I know I’m giving you my whole life’s story, but I think it is important to show what I mean.

My first political ideology that I ever adopted was freedom of speech and the value of free thought. This was before I new what republicans, democrats, socialists, capitalists, etc. My reasoning was that we, as humans, are fundamentally imperfect. My general assumption is that I most likely hold at least one incorrect belief, and my constant goal is to find this belief and correct myself. This means I want to talk with others I disagree with and I want to understand why they believe what they believe. I want to challange my own beliefs. And even if I believe others are wrong, understanding their beliefs helps me to better understand my own beliefs; as I will better understand the pitfalls and weak points in my own beliefs.

The first introduction I had with politics was when my parents recommended to me Ben Shapiro. At first I agreed with a lot of his beliefs and I had found him generally reasonable. There was one section of politics that I disagreed with him however. Particularly his approach to transgender politics. I didn’t agree or disagree with him on many of his policies, as I know very little about the physiology at play and I pushed that in my “to be researched” set of opinions. However what I was able to pick a bone with, was his general attitude towards transgender people. He didn’t just say that many topics relating to transgender people where nuanced and needed to be taken with care, he seemed to assume that any pro transgender law was an attack on cis people (this is not what he outright says, but I think it is a serviceable description for the purposes of this discussion). It only got worse when he actually conversed with transgender people in debate. His outright refusal to even refer to them by their pronouns, and sometimes emphasis on not calling by their pronouns, was confusing to me. I noticed that he never really explained this outside of that It would be implicitly agreeing with them.

It was that lack of an honest discussion that really bugged me. This allowed me to notice that this was a pattern with Ben Shapiro. He would rant about what he dislikes, and only ever provide surface level discussion. Becoming my first experience with modern republican culture.

However, I still often agreed with his points and I still held my same beliefs. Never the less, I did eventually find people who would go further into detail on their beliefs.

Overtime I noticed though, how they would complain about being labeled bigots and nazis (without ever being given a justification. Or only ever seeing the clips of people who don’t know what those words mean). The problem was that they were doing the same thing back, using words like woke or liberals. Leading me to become someone who agreed politically with them, but I hated the way they went about things. My main focus of discussion with them was to encourage them to talk in a more productive manner and to avoid just using woke and liberal as a way to write someone off.

The turning point for me had to be one trip I had with my Dad. We went to a “prepper” camp, ie we played with ham radios, did some metal working, and camped out in the woods (it was a lot of fun). Towards the end, there was going to be a republican speaker who I had heard good things about and was already considering voting for. Most of his speech was one that I could agree with at the time. Even if our beliefs didn’t line up 1:1 and it was going well. Than he said one line “I want more of our children to be praying in school”. I took some offense to this as I am a strong believer in the separation of church and state but I assumed it was likely just a slip of the tongue in an otherwise solid speech. He was accepting questions after the speech, so I thought I would ask him to clarify.

What followed was one of the most eerie situations I have ever experienced. I asked him something along the lines of “I remember you noted, that you wanted more children to be praying in school. I just wanted to clarify as to whether you meant that you don’t want christian children feeling shame about praying in school.”. I forget his exact words but it was something along the lines of “I think you’re a misguided liberal and I hope you see the error of your way”, which is a bit of a shell shock for someone who very much a republican supporter. Before I could say anything else, or had a chance to explain to him that this was a small detail and that we were mostly aligned politically, I was assured away with two women (I assume were part of his campaign team) who interrogated me. Eventually they realized that I was someone that agreed with them and they backed off.

Past this point, I became acutely aware that most republicans were not interested in thoughtful discussion. They wanted their dopamine and then take off.

As to why many of my opinions have changed, I credit this both to my attempt to be open minded and the fact that all of this happened more when I was still just getting my ideological footing (so to speak).

The reason I disagree with you is because I have met similar people who voted democrat, and I have met republicans who hold themselves to a higher standard than this. I attribute labeling and finger pointing to both sides and the darker sides of general human nature. At this time, I recognize the danger that there are Nazis in republican ranks. However I don’t think it is as black and white as that.

Republicans see a similar danger among-st democrats. As a lot of the media they see and share involves BLM riots burning houses, or crazy laws that would destroy what they hold dear. And even if I dis-agree with many republican points and beliefs. I see why they think the way they do. And it would be hard to argue with them given the current state of media, were nothing can just be the facts. It has to be a pro republican or a pro democrat spin. It’s one of the main reasons I have trouble getting a solid foothold on my beliefs of socialism versus capitalism.

Ultimately I know people who earnestly hold these beliefs and have been one at one time. I know that the version of me who was disgusted with the current state of how republicans act, while agreeing with their policies. And I know how earlier me would be disgusted at the idea of Nazis and believe my best course of action was to hunt Nazis out of my own party. That’s why I want to be specific about how we address them. Because calling them Nazis, when they earnestly understand and hate the ideology, only paints you as someone who refuses to understand them. Rather than someone who wants to partner with them to make the world a better place.

P.S. I feel the last line may come across as somewhat judgmental, I only word it that way because I feel it best describes my feeling. I still am open to being corrected, and would be glad if you have more to add.

Thank you for the reply.

As for my grammar: Sometimes I have trouble putting my thoughts on paper. I half blame it on being “noschooled” where I was given a lot less writing assignments (I will note that it wasn’t all bad, as I channeled all that time into programming and computers. Thus making me better in my field than my peers. I think it has pros and cons, I plan to better explain my thoughts in a later comment). I also heavily use autocomplete. However I’m normally a better writer if I give myself time to review my work (I have gone through and made multiple edits on my comments). The other half I blame on me rushing to explain my ideas. I’m not used to the forum format and I was rushing myself before the post became irrelevant. I plan to take more time in the future when commenting on forums regardless of whether my comment becomes irrelevant. As I now see that harm it causes, and how I appear to others.

As to Nazis using their ideology as a cover. It is fully plausible and I do not have any retorts to that statement.

I have a habit of avoiding good/bad words such as Nazi/Woke/Socalist/Etc unless I can prove your arguments line up. I find that most people will shutdown around these words. Most republicans I speak with will ignore everything you have to say, if they hear a phrase like “Republicans are Nazis”. It’s also why it is so hard to talk with them.

A lot of the reason why they see opposing viewpoints automatically in a negative light, I believe is due to them only ever hearing the “Republicans are Nazis” part. I have never heard the reasoning why, people thought this (outside of REPUBLICAN BAD!). I (and I assume many republicans, as I never hear them talking about this point. Family or on the internet) will ever hear anything like what you have explained to me on the matter.

I still think it is wise to not address republicans as Nazis, as this often rings as a generalization that causes the conversation to be unproductive. I still think it is best to address their beliefs on their own merit; as I believe the best way to expose an idiot, is to explain how they are an idiot in a calm manner. Only describing the nature of Nazism and how it effects their voter base, emphasizing that not all republicans are necessarily Nazis. However, I have both learned from your comment and realized how I was not following my own beliefs in fear of being ignored. Thank you for taking the time to talk with me.

Quick note: I’m tired right now (12:30am atm) and I just wanted to update the conversation as to not leave it at that. I will go over this post and fix any issues and expand on it tomorrow when I am properly rested.

Key word “well meaning conservatives” my argument is that we should not label said conservatives as Nazis or their group as Nazis because that’s not what their about. They may have Nazis in their party, and Nazis may be encouraging certain policies. However it is bad faith to call them Nazis. As with the 30 years of experience, that’s fair. I have a relatively short knowledge on modern politics. With how almost all media is biased one way or the other, my young age, and my lack of time due to college: many of my opinions I still consider a work in progress and I’m still researching them out. Most debates I have are about what I see in front of me at the moment. What I see in front of me is well meaning republicans who ignore me when I disagree with them, because I’m a woke liberal who is going to call them a Nazi (even when we agree). I just want people to stop labeling because it just leads to more hatred when we should be able to talk it out like adults.

I’m talking about it from a ideology point of view. The truth is that the hatred did most likely lead them into their opinions and may be the real reason they adopted these viewpoints. However, from the standpoint of “Why are Nazi’s wrong?” it is this biggest issue with their ideology. As to “Conservative values are based on using power in any way to achieve their goal; If you think that their contradictory, scapegoating, culture wars make no sense, its because you aren’t looking at it simply enough. they lie and get what they want each step of the way.”. Again we are talking about them from an ideology standpoint, the reason they claim to do what they do. To argue them on a different basis, I believe, is a bad faith argument. The only thing I believe I can do is, debate them at what they say and hold them to what they say. Because there may be republicans that hold there beliefs honestly and it would be unjust for me to label them as Nazis. As to “conservative lies” about communism and socialism, I do not know what you are specifically talking about (The only conservative speaker I have listened to was Ben Shapiro. I didn’t listen to much of him as it seems he is only interested in parroting the opinions of his constituents in a way that sounds smart rather than thinking for himself). I know that both capitalism and socialism have both failed under certain circumstances (biggest examples are modern america and the USSR), and both had pros and cons. I see from an ethics viewpoint that socialism has a better grounding. I believe in unions and workers standing up for themselves. However government involvement has had a history of failures and a socialist system is something that would need to be implemented very careful or may be impossible. I will note that I have not been able to find many sources that honestly cover the topic in good faith (IE anything other than CAPITALISM SUCKS or SOCIALISM SUCKS!) that I have a very weak ground to stand on when talking about the topic. Because of this, I still see my opinions as developing in this area.

Which republican candidate? And I don’t wanna be the “SoUrCe!” guy. But anyone can make up some BS, I even almost fell into that hole myself. I ask as I don’t recall any major republican openly saying this or pushing for a bill that would effectively do this. And even if there is a republican politician that is open about this, I would wonder what there traction was with the rest of the party. Because anyone can call themselves a republican, we would need to prove that such an individual has had enough backing as to be able to represent the rest of the party before we could make a generalization.

Who cares. How are they voting now. Are they bad now or good now. Both parties have changed drastically from the inception.

Again, both sides have egg on their face. Democrats will throw up a bunch of nothing burger laws that either do nothing to solve issues (like gun laws that anyone with any knowledge of firearms knows will be circumvented with ease, assuming that throwing money at the welfare system will solve issues with how it is often handled corruptly or can have unforeseen consequences), or they will commit crimes (see Joe Biden). The current state of politics is everyone is evil, people have just decided to vote for who the think is the lesser of two evils. Also I think this may be a difference in experience, as most of the republicans I have met are very much against Nazism. Such is the difficulty with generalizations, who’s right? WHO KNOWS! All we know is that we hate the other guy.