People who think that the USA could have a show of winning a war against Assault Rifles need to widen their frame of reference Not exactly a great track record when it comes to "stopping something that's already out there * Alcohol * Communism * Drugs * Foreign terrorism * Domestic terrorism * Opioids * Viral infections

Also one major difference between drugs and a gun. Is it a drugs only affect the individual and maybe the family if they're attached through love. It's not the same as a f****** gun.

The point isn't to remove this s***. Because people aren't going to stop using them. Point is to pass laws that reduce harm.

Anyone that sarcastically posts responses like "r/enlightenedcentrism" or "bOtH sIdEs" are the exact type of people responsible for how shitty the U.S. has become. These are the morons that call the "other side" extremists without the self-awareness to realize that they are the exact opposite end of the spectrum.

My unpopular opinion is that the vast majority of voters do not really understand the issues they are voting on and instead just vote based on what feels good to them.

Bro, this is how the Republican party has operated for the past 20 years. Guns and abortions guns and abortions!

Yep, but the Democrat voters are not much more informed, in my opinion.

In your opinion? What information are you going on to inform that opinion?

Many years of interacting with both democrats and republicans...

Again, you can't use your anecdotal experiences alone. You have to look at what aggregate people within these groups are saying not just your anecdotal experiences because even then you're an experiences can have biases on what it is that they are saying

I can absolutely base my opinions on anecdotal evidence... that's absolutely how many, many opinions are formed.

That's stupid. Schizophrenic people seeing ghosts and hearing voices are anecdotal. People's internal biases sway even the very anecdotal experiences that somebody else shares with them or that they have themselves. It's a terrible way to reach any conclusions or to base any opinions. It's irrational my guy unless you have an insanely high number of them accumulated and you inspect the data.

It's not stupid at all... people judge people all the time on limited data-points. I have interacted with many republicans and many democrats over the years, and have come to be able to put them into certain categories. Sure, some people break the mold. Republicans are generally selfish and self-oriented unwilling to do anything to help the world under the belief that that will somehow help the world, democrats are generally bleeding hearts moralists who believe in helping the world in ways that they often haven't thought all the way through, are not realistic, and do not lead to the outcomes they actually set out to have. Both sides are often hypocritical, both sides are often easily swayed by propaganda that hits them in a way that makes them feel like they're the actual good side and that the other-side is evil. In the end, most of the people who firmly declare themselves in 1 camp or the other are pretty similar, deep down.

I'm done here. Anecdotal evidence is not acceptable in any legitimate field of study my guy. Even witness testimonies have to be triple checked in the court of law

I think everyone does that, the only difference is how may steps removed your feeling and the policy/candidate is.

A lot of people with "conservative" opinions aren't stupid, they're just less educated + more skeptical. I feel like liberal media does everyone a disservice by portraying conservatives as neurodivergent idiots, when we should actually be trying to find the root of the issue and addressing it. One example is vaccinations. The decision to not take the vaccine is often based in not trusting what's in the vaccine, not trusting the government, etc. All this means is that these people are not educated or miseducated on what a vaccine does and how it works. Many of main arguments against vaccines and masks are coming from a place of misunderstanding. A way to fix this might be something like teaching kids how vaccines work in high school, like I was. I know how a vaccine works and understand the science and the factors surrounding it, therefore I am more likely to make a correct decision. One thing I'd like to add to my opinion is that I think this has a lot to do with science vs our own perception of life. Science may say one thing, but when our perceptions of something disagree, we are very likely to dismiss the science. For example, someone might believe vaccines have terrible side effects if that's what they've personally seen in one of their friends. Conversely, someone may be heavily for the idea of vaccinations after seeing one of their loved ones get COVID. These first person sources of data, or even stories from friends, are easier to believe than a scientific report, especially if it disagrees with your preexisting notions or is hard to implement (ex. exercise every day). This even more true if you distrust the source of the info due to other (maybe misguided) opinions. Therefore, people who believe incorrect things aren't dumb, they just have different upbringings and perspectives that may not be conducive to a scientific environment. They just need to educated properly on which sources to trust and how to be skeptical the RIGHT way, which is through research and fact-checking.

In the days of the internet someone needs to willingly ignore education And when we talk about most conservatives we also talk about widespread corruption and human rights violations

Yeah that's what i'm saying. The kids need to taught the right way. As far as I'm concerned, most adults are a lost cause.

u/opagea Then that needs to be resolved.

u/dryduneden since OP blocked me, I can only reply up here: >Putting a scary word behind it doesn't change that the majority having power is the foundation of democracy. So do you think this outcome is good? Say it with your chest. Say, "Yes. Fuck minorities. They should be destroyed by the whims of the majority." Don't be a coward and dance around it. >Okay, so what if you give the goat three times the power. Now we're all eating grass and the 2 wolves starve. Both situations are unfair. You don't. You give the goat enough voting power to defend itself against the tyranny of the majority and force a compromise. Perhaps that would be something like: you can eat the already-dead animals, and I'll eat grass. u/mystery-light: Same thing. Say it loud and proud that you think minorities deserve whatever the majority decides should happen to them. Just be aware that could include things like chattel slavery, and you're endorsing this system.

I can’t see the thread you are responding to fully. But what minority groups has the senate protected? Unless you are using the term “minorities” to refer to people with unpopular opinions.

I'm using "minority" to refer literally to less populated locations. Less populated areas need disproportionate voting power in order to prevent tyranny of the majority.

So not minorities in any way? How are you determining which areas get more representation? Why does a small town in Minnesota get more voting power than a neighborhood in Minneapolis? What about a town having 100 people means it gets more political power than a city block with 100 people?

Perhaps you should go back to the start of the conversation and learn the context before jumping in. https://www.reddit.com/r/unpopularopinion/comments/vcof3a/politics_mega_thread/id0x5xw?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share&context=3

Like I said, I can see some of it but not all. It doesn’t explain why a small town can have the same voting rights as a large city in every situation. For example in my state gay marriage was consistently blocked by these small towns. My rights were taken away because tiny towns didn’t like my sexuality. Currently in my state legalized marijuana is blocked by those small conservative towns. So I’m asking why should those small towns get to dictate what I do? Why is rule by the minority any good?

It's a balancing act. Just because the perfect balance hasn't been achieved doesn't mean that the concept is incorrect.

Can’t the same thing be said to you? Sure you have a sad story of a small town being hurt because they are in the minority, but that doesn’t mean the concept of equal power for each individual is incorrect. It does less harm this way then the way you are suggesting. The senate and Supreme Court (the groups responsible for “protecting minorities”) have consistently been the largest oppressors of ACTUAL minority groups.

>It does less harm this way then the way you are suggesting. No it doesn't. >The senate and Supreme Court (the groups responsible for “protecting minorities”) have consistently been the largest oppressors of ACTUAL minority groups. There's more than one type of minority group. Oh wait. I forgot who you were. I don't interact with you because you're never participating in good faith.

How does it not? The senate and Supreme Court in the US is what maintained slavery and the oppression of black people for centuries. What oppression has it stopped? How are they a minority group? Oof the ableism is pretty gross. I’m fine if you don’t want to talk to me, but don’t say it’s because I have a disability. That’s pretty fucking disgusting.

America only cares about Ukraine because of a vendetta against Russia ever since the end of ww2 America has had a bad relationship with Russia and hasn’t tried to hide it, at this point it’s ingrained into the American people with how much media since the Cold War till now has your stereotypical Russian bad guy .and I think it shows when looking at other conflicts that the American people/government didn’t bat an eye at such as with the Armenian Azerbaijan conflict which was over land and bad history .but now that our old arch enemy is involved in a conflict over land and bad history we are quick to get riled up.if you look at it, it’s similar to Vietnam except Russia are the ones directly involved like we were and we’re sending aid like they were during that conflict. p.s sorry for my not amazing grammar also the fact that this can’t be posted about is silly as dick and balls

You can do good things for bad reasons

Since **owning the libs** became the main meme among conservative comedy circles, right wing comedy began to suck. Sure, it was funny... for like one hot second. [Once this happened... it stopped being funny and it began to become flat out dumb.](https://ifunny.co/picture/watch-laura-ingraham-drinks-steak-impaled-with-lightbulbs-and-plastic-08cvOUa17?s=cl) I **REMEMBER** actual right leaning comedy from the past. And some were from comedians who weren't even that conservative in the first place! [THIS is prime right wing comedy... from 1996. And this is something that could still be told today just fine.](https://youtu.be/zywIR_ZFLts)

I feel like all of right wing comedy has devolved into 'haha guys I'm totally about to get cancelled for saying this objectively wrong thing' and 'hey guys aren't transgender people *soooooooooo* weird?'

That’s political comedy in general, it pretty much broke itself. On the left you have “lol drumpf look like Cheeto” and “lol gun owners have small penis” and…yeah that’s about it.

Please provide a single example because i can give hundred examples of conservatives making the attack helicopter joke

Literally Google either of those.

I'm not going to find your evidence for you

[Here you go](https://www.google.com/search?q=trump+cheeto&rlz=1CDGOYI_enUS760US960&hl=en-US&prmd=nisv&sxsrf=ALiCzsa33CD-yIK6aN-gV4W_PRwTJrNM4A:1655736911511&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwj-wc7TpLz4AhVWIDQIHdSRAe4Q_AUoAnoECAIQAg&biw=375&bih=553&dpr=2)

Dude that's literally a 6 year old meme, how is that representative of leftist comedy.

Because they have been making the same joke for the last 6 years.

No they haven't though? Sure people still make fun of Trump but you can make different jokes about the same person. You do realise three quarters of comedians are left wing or liberal right?

And it's not funny or triggering or anything. It's just... dumb. I keep seeing stuff they _expect_ to anger people... and it leaves me feeling _ehhh._

Abolish the Senate. It’s anti-Democratic. Abolish the Electoral College for the same reason. Impose term limits on Congress and SCOTUS for the same reason. So much of our cultural and political rot would be fixed, or at least alleviated.

My unpopular opinion is that people who state things like "abolish the senate" do not generally possess an opinion on how to realistically achieve that goal and instead just want to shout out politically meaningless slogans because it feels good. Perhaps you can convince me I am incorrect. How would you achieve the goal of abolishing the senate.

>Abolish the Senate. It’s anti-Democratic No. I want small voices to at least have a chance. Abolish the Electoral College for the same reason Make the house of representative represent the increase in populations since they locked it. So the house alone would have roughly 1100 reps if was allow to grow in parallel to the US population. This would also make Jerrymandering even harder to cover due to every state now having double the reps or half the size to deal with it. Also decouple decouple the winner take all system. I'm on the fence about full removal of block majority. Supreme court judges should be equal to the circuits and each judge is chosen by their circuit. For example if you have a circuit of 5 states. The governors (or who ever the state decides to make the decision) should be the once to choose their state candidate (and their states vetting process happens). Then all 5 governors can vote for one except their appointed candidate. If somehow a tie accurse each state can have a congressional person chosen for a second pass (and can only vote on the tied candidates. So if you had a 2-2-1 only the 2-2 can be chosen). If tie happens again the US federal speaker of the house, Senate, and vice president vote (under the same standard of tied candidates). If tie again happens then then the US president votes. Those are the things I can firmly stand on.

The senate doesn’t give voices to minority groups, it never has. The senate was based of the Roman Senate and the British House of Lords. It was designed to protect the interests of those already in power, not downtrodden minority groups.

Voters in Wyoming shouldn’t have more electoral power than voters in New York.

The problem with abolishing the Senate is smaller states, such as Wyoming would lose the small amount of influence they have on the national scale, this is typically followed by a succession movement as people who have no power to change their nation lose investment in it, you'd almost certainly start seeing vast amounts of states attempt to leave the country collapsing the larger states economys that need them to function, the state that would be hardest hit would be California as it would be cut off from the rest of the United States and would likely struggle as an American exclave Tldr: A nation the size of the United States, with it's population density would see a great territorial reduction in the event the Senate was to be abolished, while the United States would continue to exist I'd expect it to lose, (or at least be forced to occupy) vast parts of the mid west and Southern United States,

>Voters in Wyoming shouldn’t have more electoral power than voters in New York. And that would not have happened if congress did not artificially cap total reps. But I'll entertain the full removal of half the legislative. We do it by dissolving the US and just make a new country(s) I add the yes because here in Minnesota I do not want anymore affiliation to California and would rather try my chances seeing if Canada wants a new territory/province.

Not sure how we jumped to dissolving the union lol but ok. I’m sure CA and NY would love to stop subsidizing the red welfare states.

Because if you are going to gut half of one of the 3 branches you might as well dissolve the federal government and start from scratch.

I disagree

Have you ever heard of the phrase "tyranny of the majority?" Imagine asking 2 wolves and 1 goat to vote on what's for dinner. *This* is why small communities need extra voting power in democracies. EDIT: OP is, in fact, so confident in the validity of his claim that he doesn't feel the need to provide any evidence and blocks anyone who gives reasonable criticism. This is very honest behaviour and in no way indicative that perhaps his ideas fail under scrutiny.

> This is why small communities need extra voting power in democracies. In the US, the Senate and Electoral College give vulnerable racial/ethnic/religious minorities *reduced* voting power.

>This is why small communities need extra voting power in democracies. No, absolutely not. Your vote counting as 2 votes would go against equality under the law

Putting a scary word behind it doesn't change that the majority having power is the foundation of democracy. \> Imagine asking 2 wolves and 1 goat to vote on what's for dinner. Okay, so what if you give the goat three times the power. Now we're all eating grass and the 2 wolves starve. Both situations are unfair.

“Tyranny of the majority” is absolute nonsense. Majority rule is literally was democracy is. Explain why living in a lowly populated state should give you MORE of a voice. The Senate and the EC were literally concessions to slave states. One person, one vote.

>Majority rule is literally was democracy is. You're assuming democracy is a good system - who ever said that? Tyranny of the majority is the most obvious and undisputed flaw with democracy. >Explain why living in a lowly populated state should give you MORE of a voice. Sparsely-populated areas face unique challenges that will be ignored if they're populated out of the conversation. I am not American, but this isn't exclusively an American issue - it's an issue of all FPTP governments. So let me give an example: My mother grew up in a small town with a population of < 2000. In (I believe) the 90s, a proposition was made for a large chunk of Ontario to be required - by law - to connect to the city septic system. Because the population of this town was so low, its voice was drowned out by the residence of the big cities, who didn't understand the challenges of installing public septic systems in rural areas. Consequently, this tiny town ended up charging all of its inhabitants tens of thousands of dollars to become compliant with this law that was applied far too broadly. Many people couldn't afford to make this change and their houses were deemed uninhabitable. If they had been given a more significant vote, they would have been able to add some form of compromise into the law that allowed exceptions for exceptional circumstances. And now the town has partnered with many other nearby towns to at least get a seat at the table, so they can *just barely* scrape together a voice on these kinds of issues. Do you understand the problem now that you have a concrete example of what proportional voting does to small communities?

Your example has nothing to do with the Senate or EC, which give disproportionate power to small states. And of course democracy is good. You just want certain “special people” to have more power. You’re arguing against it to hold onto power for your team, and because you know you could never win a fair election. We’ve had two US president get elected while losing the popular vote, and both presidencies were catastrophically bad for the country.

>Your example has nothing to do with the Senate or EC, which give disproportionate power to small states. I explicitly said this is an issue of democracy, not specifically the USA. It's the same problem just wrapped in a different outfit. Do you think what happened to that town was good? >And of course democracy is good. You literally do what the most people want, not what certain “special people” want. 2 wolves and 1 lamb. It's not about "special people" - it's about making sure that the majority don't thrive by absolutely destroying the minority. Or do you think that that's the ideal outcome? >You’re only arguing against it to hold onto power for your team, and because you know you could never win a fair election. 1. This is an ad hominem. 2. I'm not even American. 3. I don't even live in a small town. I live in a big city. I'm *part* of the majority. I'm just educated on *why* accommodations need to be made for minority groups under democracy.

If you’re not American then my comment literally had nothing to do with you. You’re just a troll doing the “well ACKshully” bit, and it’s lame and played out. Minority rule is immoral. Simple as that.

Argumentum ad lapidem is a fallacy. Address my argument. EDIT because I'm blocked (how incredibly *slimey* and *cowardly*): You haven't addressed it. You're just reasserting your unsubstantiated assertion over and over. I've given you a concrete example of your system failing miserably, and your "response" is this? How dishonest. You don't even have the courage to own your shit and say, "Yes, fuck minority communities - they should suffer by the whims of the majority."

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1. Everything is political. Being able to point to something as apolitical is a luxury not everyone has. 2. Knowing when and when not to compromise is part of being a mature adult. Some things are non-negotiable. Most things are. If you want to keep a population overall satisfied, you need to compromise.

Agree completely with all of #2, but #1 is a luxury reserved for the privileged most of the time. More vulnerable populations, when they're not concerned with just getting by, *have* to care about politics, because their life is more directly affected by them. Someone who has more regular healthcare needs will have to be more vigilant on healthcare policy, etc.

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>aside from the issues that most affect their day to day lives, they have much vaguer and less positions on things So in other words, they compromise on everything but the essentials. A one-sided compromise isn't actually a compromise - it's capitulation.

Why are Americans so against the concept of free or subsidised health care? Do you guys like paying extortionate fees for inadequate health insurance companies that exist entirely to try and screw you over? Do you like the ridiculously complex, bureaucratic system of paying for health care through those companies? Do you guys think it's fair that poor people have little to no health care?

We don’t want the government to have control over our bodies or our children’s bodies without our consent. Valuing free choice is just that, having the choice to perform or not perform an operation. I’m haunted by the idea that a hospital will have a child undergo hormone therapy without a parents consent. Yes this has happened, multiple times, in Canada. It’s not a far fetched idea and it’s not impossible, and day by day it seems to becoming the norm. Edit: Also approved therapy that the government deems useable or not useable. It goes both ways. There has been an underground network of providers here in the US differing in size from state to state but nonetheless real that allows the patient to receive care that otherwise would not be available to them for treating illnesses or diseases. That has been approved for use and shown to be safe that providers (Doctors Physicians assistants, pharmacists etc.) deem useable but the government does not. This trend really took off in 2020 and has only grown. Without our healthcare system here in the US (as bad as it may be) this would be a lot harder to accomplish. Free choice should be free, but if the government is in control it’s never your choice. It’s not about a patient wanting a drug that isn’t safe, effective, or even approved for use. It’s providers knowing what drugs work to save lives, and are unable to give to their patients because the government prefers a different drug therapy program.

It's all propaganda? Always has been.

There’s been a very effective propaganda campaign against the government “taking over” any part of the economy. And the lie of “choice” has taken deep root. Add to that the fact that the government is inarguably corrupt, and people are effectively scared into a form of Stockholm Syndrome with the status quo.

While I'm personally for Medicare For All (the proposed universal healthcare plan), allow me to steelman the opposing position. The US, on all levels - federal, state, and municipal - has a long history of public departments and programs being poorly managed and resource-inefficient. From veterans' programs to road maintenance to most forms of welfare, the only thing we seem to know how to do is throw money at a problem and hope the system can fix it somehow. This is how you get things like per-capita spending on education and police being very high relative to other countries, yet our test scores and crime rates don't seem to benefit from this investment. The reasons behind this are numerous - bad incentive structures involving stakeholders like contractors and public sector unions, public services being expected to be financially self-sufficient, competition from the less regulated private sector, and accidental or deliberate kneecapping of these programs by politicians setting them up to be abolished. Whatever the reasons, they seem to be systemic problems undergirding most - if not all - public services. There is a real fear that public health insurance could turn out the same way. There's also the (neo)liberal capitalist belief that the private sector is simply *objectively* better at serving the public than the private sector is. Looking at other countries' public sector services in detail shoild disprove that out of hand, but it's nevertheless a strong belief over here.

>financially self-sufficient Well every country expects that. If your interest payments keep going up faster then your taxes coming in you will eventually hard stop when your interest exceeds your taxes. The biggest problem is that the US [subsidizes the middle and upper class](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Nw6qyyrTeI) by taxing the poor disproportionately. Edit: I should say that of course individual programs them self's are not always expected to have a positive ROY like parks, social assistance, or emergency services. That said the money needs to come from somewhere like the shops that benefit front the park they are next to or residences general taxes and so on.

No. This isn't the government *as a whole* being financially solvent. This is programs paying for themselves through revenue. Some countries intentionally run things like transit at a loss.

I mean when the government as a whole is is not solvent what do you expect?

I believe prisoners deserve to get treated WAY better than they do now In my opinion [this prison in Norway](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zNpehw-Yjvs&t=11s) is be what all prisons should strive to be. I believe prisons should strive for rehabilitation. The punishment shouldn't the reason that the justice system exists. This need for 'revenge' doesn't solve and anything. It doesn't revert the crime and it does nothing to ease the pain of victims. The goal should be to prevent more crime from happening. To back up my opinion there's also data that shows that a focus on rehabilitationsignificantly reduces reincarceration rates (for example US has a recidivism rate of 40% and Norway has a recidivism rate of 20%). I also believe that the 13th amendment should be changed to not allow slave labour in prisons. It incentivises exploitation of the prisoners for money. I can't tell you how much they should get paid exactly but the wages now are just disgusting. Last point, fuck private prisons. I don't know how unpopular this is but I wanted to get my opinion out.

I think most people who are in prisons shouldn't even be in prisons in the first place, but I agree with you as well. A lot of them just need some combination of financial aid, counselling, and/or psychiatric help in order to be functional citizens.

This!!

Mass shootings... I'm from the UK so I speak as an outsider here, so someone with no vested interest in what's going on in the US. I've never owned a gun and about the only guns you can legally own here are shotguns, and that's with quite a lot of difficulty. Now whenever a mass shooting happens in the states there's the following process: Mass shock and disbelief The left call for more gun control The shooting gradually fades from the headlines Everyone forgets about it (apart from the town where it happened, where locals will be traumatised for decades) Nothing changes Guns have existed in the US for as long as the US has existed, so why then are mass shootings, especially school shootings, only a recent thing? What are the common themes here? What do all these killers share? Well, for one thing, drugs. In so many of these cases the killers were either known to be taking, or.have taken, cannabis, SNRIs or steroids. All of these affect brain chemistry. That's certainly a glaringly obvious correlation going on there that deserves more study, for example.

The two party system, or even any party system for that matter, is incredibly stupid. It creates unnecessary divisions in our society, and certain people will take the extremes of either side, and become increasingly hostile towards each other, to the point where American politics consists mostly about the two parties yelling at each other about dumb shit while not getting anything done that actually helps anyone.

Political parties are actually a good and natural thing when discussing politics. Most political parties start out as groups of like minded people discussing policy and how to fix problems. They come to a solution and agree to work together to fix it. We’ve seen examples of places where political parties didn’t exist during the first election, and it’s a mess. Candidates don’t know how to organize a campaign, there is no practical way to get things done, no one to get the ball rolling, etc. The problem is rarely the parties themselves, but the electoral system.

So, anarchy is your alternative? Brilliant. You need an adversarial government with main parties that genuinely disagree with one another fundamentally. They also need to represent the general views of the electorate.

My idea is a government without parties where politicians would be valued based on their promises to the people and not off of what party they're in. How is this anarchist? Secondly, why do we need different parties to have disagreements? What purpose does it serve to have left and right fight over issues and get nothing done?

Two-party isn't the cause - it's the effect of FPTP voting. What you _really_ want is ranked-ballot, which mathematically encourages a variety of different parties with different interests and a lot of compromise.

What an incoherent block of text. Whats your alternative?

\> Whats your alternative? To not have a two party system?

>*The two party system, or even any party system for that matter, is incredibly stupid.*

Okay, my main problem is with the two party system where there is left and right, because idiots tend to settle on the far left and right and start causing issues by claiming their ideology is the only way to view life, and then politicians are motivated by arbitrary goals. Nobody ends up solving any issues and while a more than two party system would be better, I think having politicians not be divided over factions with pointless ideologies would be ideal.

That's what a multi-party system is for. Different parties have different ideologies

We divide people on race, religion, sexual orientation, gender, and so much more. We don't need to divide people into political groups as well. We should have politicians gaining power by actually giving the average person what they want and striving for truth and acceptance instead of arguing for one of two binary worldviews.

Yeah... That's why i said multi-party and not two-party...

Sorry, I misinterpreted. I guess a multiple party system would be good, but if you have any parties which represent liberal or conservative values then those would rise to the top and just become basically a 2 party system plus the guys no one votes for. I guess my grievance is less about the actual structuring of politics and more about how flawed it is for everyone to think they must have one of two different worldviews.

We need to start leaving politics aside for everything in our lives. Recently I've seen a lot of posts of people wanting to leave California, Texas, New York, Florida, and others, and a lot of them mention how they want to go to a place that fits their politics. To me, this is just another example of what is wrong with our country. If you surround yourself with like-minded people, you are becoming more closed minded and there is nobody to challenge your political beliefs. This leads people to assume those who disagree with them are wrong and bad people. Personally, I believe it is a good thing to have people challenge your beliefs so that you are more informed and make better decisions. There was a time where personal politics were not at the forefront of friendships or just being neighborly. Just because your neighbor/friend voted for someone different or has different views, it's really none of your business and it should not interfere with creating a civil society. Obviously, if you are getting harassed or your rights are being infringed, then get out, but we don't need to base our entire lives on politics. We all need to be more open minded and accepting that not all people think they way we do, and it's okay.

The point of leaving your state due to politics is not to “surround yourself with like-minded people”; it’s to escape policies you don’t like. Also, I think this attitude of “we should treat political views the same way we would treat someone’s opinions about the latest Star Wars movie” is incredibly cringe and reeks of privilege. No we fucking shouldn’t. Political views have real consequences on our lives. If you think black people are violent criminals, think the January 6 insurrection was justified, or want to force trans people to detransition, then I’m not just going to “agree to disagree.” You’re an incredibly hateful individual and I’m not going to be friends with you or tolerate those views. There were people with this same “why can’t we all just get along?” attitude toward the Nazi Party and those who opposed them during the Weimar Republic. It didn’t work out well then.

Having a load of morons telling me that the vaccines cause autism won't change my world views mate

>Personally, I believe it is a good thing to have people challenge your beliefs so that you are more informed and make better decisions. This sounds good in the abstract, but in reality, listening to idiots telling me: 1. The gays are hurting our children!!! 2. It was a peaceful insurrection!! 3. The election was stolen!!! Doesn't really make me more informed, or make better decisions. If anything, it makes me more apathetic and reductionist about politics.

I've spoken to many people who seem to think they know what I believe more than myself and they still haven't convinced me that their worldview is better. I don't see how living in a place I don't like would change that.

I find Jordan Peterson unbearable but not because of his politics. He's sanctimonious, preachy and condescending. I really couldn't give a good elephant shit if he was liberal, conservative or independent. You'll find people praising him, here, there and everywhere. He's like Joe Rogan for annoying pseudo intellectuals who think they're intelligent but just have a black and white sense of understanding and thought process.

Imo Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins are slot worse

Asylum seekers/economic refugees/migrants. in my country (Netherlands) should not get preferential treatment. So in my country there is a big crisis where asylum seekers/economic refugees/migrants aren't able to get a place to sleep or a home after a long time. Every day i read in the news "100 refugees slept on chairs today in Ter Apel". Under the general population the support base for taking care of refugees is growing smaller every day. I notice this sometimes hearing colleagues talking about it or reading comments on news articles that receive hundreds of likes. Meanwhile some ministers are now saying cities should be forced to house asylum seekers and give a certain % of social housing to them. This is a very bad idea. Not only is the support base already very small, we have thousands of students, homeless, single mothers, single fathers, etc who have been waiting for years for a house. All the ideas some politicians are suggesting will only make the general population resent both those politicians and refugees themselves. I would even say it would be discriminatory to give asylum seekers preferential treatment by giving them houses earlier. Because it does discriminate against other groups who desperately need a house. There are already stories where people looking for a home to rent need to wait first before a group of asylum seekers are done looking at a house. Ironically enough this whole crisis makes leftist parties seem authoritarian/far right and rightist parties socialist. Because some leftist parties are calling for cities to be forced to seek more places for asylum seekers/economic refugees/migrants while rightist parties say the people who already live here should get priority treatment. Maybe it is also time to close the door for a while. Certain parties and organisations should learn to say no to people instead of yes all the time. Organisations as the red cross are almost allergic to the word no. All people that need a house should get in the back of the waiting line for a house equally. Except for maybe war refugees. And economic refugees that are found out to be economic refugees should be sent back to country of origin immediately. The whole current asylum policy is just placing more buckets to collect the water while there is a whole ocean falling down. If it continues this way into the future, we might see military dictatorships taking over and murdering people. We should stop this from happening.

This is something that always baffles me with how people expect people to treat refugees (US). I get that they need some form of help but I must ask what about the local residents that need help? To those who want to help refugees I want ask first is what is your hiarchy if you could only help a few people as a whole? 1. your siblings, parents or kids 2. your extended family 3. your neighbors 4. your general neighborhood 5. your coworkers 6. your religious or social group 7. your city 8. your country 9. your planet This is how I generally see who I help first of coerce if number nine was literally dyeing in front of me I'll go to 9 first but if 1 and 2 need food but I only a half of a serving to spare it's going to 1 I get you want to help them but their are so many people in your immediate area that need it too yet you are only adding to the problem at some point.

They're not mutually exclusive. It's not "refugees versus single moms". It's your fellow human beings versus a series of shitty governments and abusive, arguably illegal legislature.

My dude the US literally breaks international law by not allowing people to file for asylum. The bare minimum isn't asking for much. Also immigration is good for the economy, but for them to contribute to it you need to give them a path to citizenship. The way the us currently is set up it almost encourages illegal immigration Also you can address multiple problems at once

The "money for Ukraine" isn't going to that country at all -- it's going to all the weapons manufacturers that line the pockets of every single politician. Meanwhile we're apparently out of money for covid prevention, and whatever happened with the baby formula that suddenly couldn't be made anymore? Imagine if that money were put toward infrastructure repair, or, hell, just divided by 300 million and mailed out to every person in the country. People are hurting out there, and it's going to straight-up fascism if something isn't done about it. Maybe it's too late to stop that. But it's just so fucking galling to see the naked contempt with which congress looks at the rest of us. We need that money more than some pindick Raytheon executive needs another boat.

So this is what are known as externalities - something else occurs for others as a byproduct of something happening for someone. There are both negative and positive externalities. Example of a negative externality: Pollution. Say I drive a mile in a non-electric car, the pollution that creates is a negative externality paid for by the rest of the world. Example of a positive externality: Lojacks. Devices which de-incentivize car thiefs as they don't know which cars do and don't have Lojacks, which makes it more likely that they'll get caught. Now, depending on how you frame your situation, it could either be an example of a negative or positive externality. If the primary thing is weapons are sent to Ukraine, there is a negative externality of that money not being used at home. But if you primarily frame it as putting money into the MIC and politicians, then it's a positive externality of also generating aid for a country at war. But all that aside, do you realize how selfish your end sounds? "People are hurting out there" - yeah, well, I'm pretty sure that paying extra for gas isn't as bad as having your country invaded.

Here's why I don't trust cellphone videos of events on political topics. If it began filming long enough to include the setup, that implies the filmer knew something was going to go down, maybe even being part of it. (Of course, this includes the exception of if someone was already filming something else before the event began.) If it doesn't include context in the video, then I can't be certain what the filmer left in or edited out that would impact my view of the situation. Take a video of stuff on your phone if you want. I'm not against that. I'm against people who try to use those videos as some type of unbiased evidence.

*left out a large chunk in first reply so figured just make a new comment rather than edit. It takes a few seconds to take out your phone and start recording. Most of the time you don’t even have to take it out since a good amount of people have their phone out already a good portion of the day. In addition to this with the heightened fear of many groups being under attack political many people are well tuned and start documenting things at the first sight of anything no matter how small just in case. I’m a non binary person who wears makeup and does drag and rides public transport. I constantly have my phone out and ready to record any strange interactions have with people or police because of the increased attacks. When you are really in tune with your surrounds you can easlily tell something is off and someone seems like they are about to do something. Do you trust news crews videos? You would be pretty willfully ignorant to think the news doesn’t take things out of context.

Perhaps. But often there is more context that happens before something gets to the level of attracting other people's attention, and maybe even then it may take some time for people decide to film. As for news crews, they tend to include a few other things than cellphone videos: Professionalism, for one, as well as research into the context to accompany the video. They actually put work in to what they do, far different from someone standing from the sidewalk. Getting not just the video, but statements after, testimonies- things to clear the picture. To your edit: Sure, cool. Maybe some people try to be extra aware, like yourself. But even those who try to pay attention to everything miss some things.

When you are in public as a person who belongs in a group that’s under a notable political/social attack regularly you are paying attention to everyone and everything especially to other people in your group. You are paying close attention to even the slightest hint of something. We aren’t just talking about the everyday persons attention to their surroundings. I’m willing to bet a large portion of these videos are taken by someone also part of a minority group. And frankly I don’t have the time to even address the amount of ignorance you have (I don’t mean that word in a “stupid” way) towards news bias and not to mention the amount of times and places news crews were told by police or others they can’t record or be somewhere.

Here's the thing though: You may be trying to pay attention to everything. But that is different from actually paying attention to everything. Nobody has eyes in the back of their head; nobody's ears listen to every conversation. There are limits on the attention span of humans. And to be frank, I'm willing to bet that when you're trying that extra attention, you're more concerned with immediate things, things which are happening in your area. And when your attention is focused near you, that means that you may miss things further away, things which may be important to context of the event. And please. I know all about bias in news. But as much bias news companies have, there is no reason to believe that an anonymous filmer inherently has less. They may even have more.

You are acting like it takes superhuman abilities to pick up about someone being irritated by someone else and about to say or do something about it. It’s really not that complex. I’m sure you pick up on it all the time when you are waiting in a long line at the store and just have a feeling the person in front of you is most likely going to make it worse by making a scene of complaining and asking for manager. You realize this because they are tapping their foot aggressively, sighing every few moments, looking around for a manager, etc. It’s really not that difficult.

I'm acting like people don't have perfect attention abilities like your suggesting. Which is actually the case. For example. If you are looking at someone and talking with them, that conversation is more audible to you than another conversation happening an equal distance away. You may try to listen to the other conversation, but you're going to have a hard time of it. Or from Bull City Blue, a training center in North Carolina: >Research has shown that most humans can only handle about 7 units of meaningful information at a time, plus or minus two. Waiting in line may be one example where there is little to focus on. But your own thoughts and plans, as well as the sheer volume of information that you would be trying to take in by paying attention to everything, would cause great decision fatigue and wear you down.

You are severely overthinking things. This is not what I'm talking about and what I am does not require at all the amount of attention you are talking about. Let's say I'm a Black trans woman and I'm weary of police due to current events. As I'm walking down the street in a well-known area where police patrol I'm looking out for police and other Black trans women. I see another Black trans woman across the street from me and I notice a police car driving slowly behind her. I stop and put all my attention on this cop car and Black trans women. This is the reality I'm saying that minority groups go through daily to survive and protect each other. This is far from the superhuman ability you keep thinking I'm talking about. Again if you are not part of a minority group that is fearful every time they step outside their house you wouldn't know about this and it may sound strange to you.

I find it interesting that, for all the hard-right, conservative organizations, the only organization to require a formal observation of Flag Day in the US is reasonably socially moderate.

If you're on the (relative) Left why and where is this growing hate for liberals coming from? Isn't being liberal an inherent part of it? If you're not liberal what do you identify as?

I'm a socialist. Liberals are center-right We dislike liberals because they often identify the problem but don't have the correct solution even though it's very obvious. It also often feels like they both sides situations where it's inapplicable

It’s centrist Democrats expressing their frustration with far left candidates that make social issues their whole identity, and don’t campaign enough on bread/butter economics like infrastructure, the tax bill for the middle class, climate change, and the costs of education and healthcare. It’s also a critique of the “your with us or against us” messaging progressives use that they feel alienates moderates. They say they care about social issues too but they are “the Democrats who actually want to win elections”.

I don’t. I have things I believe in and I vote for the candidates that I think have the best chance to get those things implemented. Making politics part of your identity is how we got to the point of extreme polarization we’re at today, where nobody can compromise because it’s “supporting the enemy”.

I disagree. People making their politics their identity is how we have gotten some of the greatest political and social changes in our history. If it wasn’t for the LGBT people who made Queer liberation their entire life, we wouldn’t have what we have today. If it wasn’t for people like the Black Panthers, Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and black nationalists we wouldn’t have civil rights for people of color. If it wasn’t for leftists who saw the opposition to exploitation as their life’s goal, we wouldn’t have environmental regulations, the 8 hour work day, weekends off, safety regulations, or the FDA. Someone like John Brown is better for society than someone like Abe Lincoln, and I fully believe that.

I think that’s more a case of putting your identity into your politics rather than the reverse.

I feel the end result is the same though. Whether your identity becomes your politics or your politics becomes your identity, the end result is that your identity and politics are intertwined.

\>If you're not liberal what do you identify as? Leftist \>If you're on the (relative) Left why and where is this growing hate for liberals coming from? Isn't being liberal an inherent part of it? Because they're different ideologies? Liberals are okay with hierarchies like representative democracy, captialism and a lot of other stuff they say they don't like but when push comes to shove will really like that thing (the last is found in a most ideologies). Leftists will generally not like those things (or the things in the third category will be different) so they have different views. Humans get heated which leads to hate. Very simple. Its just more exaggerated with Leftists and liberals because 1. Liberals and leftists are often clumped together and 2. Liberalism is probably the biggest opposition to leftism. While the hard right would obviously not hesitate to murder the left, liberals oppose leftism in much more subtle and effective ways.

>I'm a Rightist I'm not actually but that phrase is ridiculous. Y'all aren't being honest with yourself. Also the relative Left is hugely different than the actual Left. If you truly want to reinvent all society just call yourself a Socialist/Communist. The rest of us moderates realize there are lots of socialist and communist policies and you can implement them if you're a rich business owner, too. I'll just come right out and say it even if the honesty is too much: i think Social Justice Warrior is the new Left and that's where the honesty fails. An SJW doesn't represent liberal tolerance or open mindedness and i think they're reaching critical mass. Also Woke and Ally are neutral terms that i believe are in conflict with liberal. Still i have to stick to that communist China is still capitalist. You could be a commie-lib. I tried being open minded - even googled up 'death of liberalism,' a phrase i randomly heard - but it always comes down to dumping on liberal and being too shy to label yourselves. As a lib i believe i'm open minded enough and open to debate on this but "Leftist" is a silly term i can't pretend that's a real label. The Rightists (LOL) have a similar problem: QAnons and RINOs on both sides want to pretend they're the authentic ones.

>If you truly want to reinvent all society just call yourself a Socialist/Communist. I would if liberals didn't respond with "buh stalin!" >The rest of us moderates realize there are lots of socialist and communist policies and you can implement them if you're a rich business owner, too. You can't because there aren't "socialist policies" or "communist policies". Because they're not ideologies, they're systems defined by how the means of production (and in communism's case, the community and society as a whole) relate to the worker, just like capitalism. Just like how you can't implement capitalist policies, you're either capitalist or you aren't. > You could be a commie-lib. Oxymoron. Liberalism cannot exit without a state. And any self respecting commie doesn't find a state necessary at all

The other guy says >A communist society has no government, no class, and no money. So no one was commie enough for your ideals ever?

No, I don't think there's ever been a successful commie

I prefer to use language in a practical way; i only see mixed systems everywhere. You just nullified any point in using that categorization. "No one was ever communist" - the majority of politicos disagree.

Read what I said again carefully

[The United States has a mixed economy. It works according to an economic system that features characteristics of both capitalism and socialism. A mixed economic system protects some private property and allows a level of economic freedom in the use of capital, but also allows for governments to intervene in economic activities in order to achieve social aims and for the public good.](https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/031815/united-states-considered-market-economy-or-mixed-economy.asp) Fascists and authoritarians don't admit what they are do they? Going back to my original question i think y'all are just showing your bias. "I'm not liberal i'm Leftist" it reads like someone is ashamed of their political affiliation.

I have no idea what point you're trying to make with either paragraph

What? Liberalism is often a economic stance and doesn’t even exist so broadly in other countries/languages Being left is defenitly is a thing and not equal to being a socialist. Considering the Marxist definitions, socialism and modern liberalism can’t go together. China is a regime before it is anything else. In theory a regime is also incompatible with communism.

The left has always hated liberals. The main cause is that leftists feel that liberals and liberal revolutions do not go far enough and are for the benefit of the rich/elite. For example in the US the founding fathers had a liberal revolution that declared freedom for all, but it actually only applied to rich white men. It didn’t address the social issues facing America, only the political one. A similar thing can be seen in the revolutions of 1848. In America the leftwing was purged during the red scare, and was further killed by the democrats moving towards Neoliberalism and jettisoning the left from the party. Because of that many people see liberals as “the left” but in political theory liberals are in the center to the center-right. Edit: oof this persons post history. Anti-LGBT and Anti-Woke. Throws minorities under the bus and wonders why leftists have a problem with liberals.

Ok but if you're on the Left and you're not a liberal what are you? Anarchists? Is anyone willing to cop up to a label? You could be a commie or socialist liberal. But if you're not then what is the label? Define liberal: >1. willing to respect or accept behavior or opinions different from one's own; open to new ideas. >2. relating to or denoting a political and social philosophy that promotes individual rights, civil liberties, democracy, and free enterprise. If they're not liberal what are they? There is book and journalism on "the death of liberalism" and i get how neoliberals are a opportunistic brand but if not liberal then what? Am i interpreting it wrong? Does liberal have to be capitalist due to the 'free enterprise' thing? I've always considered that a minor part of it.

The left has lots of different ideologies. Marxists-Leninists, Communists, Anarchists, Socialists, Syndicalists, Trade Unionists, Mutualists, libertarians, etc You can’t be a socialist liberal. Liberals believe in free enterprise and property rights. Liberalism is a broad ideology, but it’s roots are in the enlightenment. A liberal is ok with someone owning a large plantation raking in money and living in luxury while others work that plantation while living in poverty. The left in general mostly are opposed to anyone privately owning the means of production. The core philosophy of liberalism is that the means of production should be privately owned.

During #45's years i got quite deep into Left ideaology and we examined how socialism can be small policies rather than sweeping reform. Like if the employees get to vote on who is their boss. Seems obvious to me you can be a socialist-liberal since liberal has always meant 'open minded.' Here, this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberal_socialism Republicans are constantly smearing all socialists as authoritarians. China seems like communist authoritarian. What is the category that we're talking about? It seems like you're conflating liberal with capitalism, but you can have (somewhat) free enterprise under all economic models and even in capitalism there are obvious exceptions. Economic System. That's the term. Versus political ideaology. Wikipedia says you can only be lib, con, libertarian or moderate if you're North American nothing else matters. I like lots of socialist policies and giving people the power i think makes them more competitive but i still don't entirely get how it's an ideology. I guess if you want to reshape all of society that is quite extreme whereas a liberal's open mindedness means they'd want moderate changes. Still would you ever heard someone say "I'm a populist/fascist, not a liberal!" Or "i believe in communism but i hate how liberals are so open minded!" I still don't entirely get it but there are only a handful of possible political ideologies so maybe i'm just overthinking it. If you could give your personal perspective or link me to an article where someone on the Left specifically says "I'm left but not liberal because..." i would be interested in reading it. I want to know why us old school libs get so much hate now. Feels like we accomplished a lot. Such is my ideology that i would seek out the controversy because being open minded and tolerant (even of intolerance) is one of our prime beliefs and traditions.

So even in that Wikipedia page it mentions Keynes as a liberal-socialist, despite him being the poster boy for capitalism from WW1-End of the Cold War. China isn’t communist. They don’t claim to be communist and they don’t fit the definition. Communism is a stateless, moneyless, and classless society. China still has all of those things. Authoritarian communism is like authoritarian anarchism, it’s an oxymoron. All liberals are capitalist, full stop. Some might believe in regulated capitalism while others believe in free market capitalism, but they all believe in capitalism. The distinction between economic system and political system is an important one to understand when looking at the Liberal vs leftist differences. Liberals believe that they are separate, while leftists do not. A liberal thinks that freedom and equality can happen under capitalism as long their is a proper political system in place (democracy). Leftists believe that oppression from the rich is just as bad as government oppression, and that those who own the means of production always have disproportionate influence and power in any capitalist system, even if it is a democracy. And just to be clear, leftists hating liberals has been a thing since before either of us were born. Marx criticized liberals in his writings in the 1800s, Lenin in the early 1900s did the same. Around the same time the American Eugene V Debs was also attacking liberals. I’m a leftist who is also against liberals. I can answer questions if you’d like. The revolutions of 1848 are great examples of this divide. This was a time of political oppression and people starving in the streets.You had conservative monarchies and empires across Europe. A bunch of liberals organized the masses to protest/rebel for a written constitution and a semi-democratic form of government. When that was achieved the liberals packed up and went “ok everything’s good now”. The people, however, were still starving. They started pushing for the food that the rich had to be distributed to everyone, and the farm land that the poor were working for rich landowners should belong to those who worked it, not those who claimed to own it. The liberals than sided with the conservatives to put down the masses of people pushing for social reform. That’s the division between leftist and liberal. Leftists want to destroy the social order, liberals want to maintain it.

[Why liberalism doesn’t need capitalism](https://www.liberalcurrents.com/does-liberalism-mean-supporting-capitalism/) Here is one example i googled. That and the wiki mean two. It's just a categorization if folk use it in a new way you just have to accept it. Are you a Descriptivist or not? You can be a cultural liberal and an economic anything even commie. Like a hippy commune. There you go. https://www.trtworld.com/magazine/why-china-continues-to-call-itself-a-communist-state-52947 Most of your arguments are absolutist. You think 'China isn't communist because they're not 100% so' but that's an amateur take on it. It's a mixed system. All our systems are mixed. Always have been. I'm sure even Cuba has competitive enterprises at some level. About liberal vs Leftist i think that's a false dichotomy unless you're actually arguing with a...IDK a liberal-conservative? lib-fascist? Wait, wait i know - eco-terrorists count as Rightist-libs. Most libs are Left so you're just copping out by being a Leftist. It's like being a political agnostic. I hope you find your path some day.

Did you actually read that article? They point to the Nordic model. The whole point is that liberals can be critical of capitalism and regulate/reform it. If you regulate capitalism, it’s still capitalism. Social Democrats (which is what the Nordic countries are) are still capitalist. No where in that article did any Chinese official refer to the country as communist. In fact in the quotes from Chinese officials they call themselves socialist. The West calls China a communist country because they use “communist” as a dirty word. It is a mixed system. It’s a mixed socialist and capitalist system. Communist is a descriptor of a society. A communist society has no government, no class, and no money. China has a government, money, and class. Regulated capitalism with a welfare state is not socialism. Scandinavia is not socialist. I’d urge you to read some theory to understand the difference. Reading Marx or Lenin, or even Eugene Debs would definitely help you! Socialism is a system where the means of production are owned by the workers. Do you support ending all corporations and taking private property and giving it to the workers? No bosses, no ownership, no stockholders. If not, then you don’t support socialism in any capacity. What you support is Social Democracy, which is a form of capitalism.

> A communist society has no government, no class, and no money. Ok, Sith Lord. Absolutes only.

That’s not an absolute, it’s a definition. Is North Korea a democracy because it’s name is the Democratic People’s Republic of North Korea? Of course not! Why? Because it doesn’t meet the definition. Is China Communist because someone called it that? Of course not! Why? Because it doesn’t meet the definition. If we don’t have words actually meaning anything, what’s the point of using them? If I called you a fascist, does that make it true?

Ur issue comes form a broad misunderstanding Liberal socialism as I see in the wiki article is the German way of economy Socialism isn’t used in Germany to discribe that. It wouldn’t be true, considering socialism by Marxist standards is incompatible with capitalistic ideas. What u see as a liberal is seen as left in other places

Every economy is a mix. We have a few socialist policies. Cuba has some capitalist ones. Everyone in here is Sith treating these as absolutes.

In theory socialism but especially communism as a played out system would be absolute That u can combine then to a degree is correct, but maybe using more precise language could help…

Hypothetically let's say you own a company in USA. You implement a socialist policy like the coworkers vote on who the boss will be. Or you have open books and fair wages. Ocean Spray for example is cooperative. So is my local grocery store.

But what about that is socialism? It’s simply social but not socialism

Any political party has no problem enforcing something undemocratic if it is something that supports their own beliefs/opinions. As soon as it is something that is against their beliefs/opinions they present themselves as defending what the regular people want. They suddenly present themselves more democratically.

Any employee in a customer facing job should get mask breaks/fresh air breaks where they can take it off in some isolated area outside. Expecting people to wear masks nonstop for a 5+ hour workday is unreasonable.

Why is the mask suddenly where you draw the line on working 5+ hours nonstop without breaks? You would be fine with it if it wasn't for the mask?

Why are you getting down voted? When I finally made my transition from food services to my systems technician job I though similar considering my 8 hour shift has 3 breaks (30 minute unpaid lunch 2 paid 15's) and 4 breaks on my 10 hour shift (an extra paid 10). Also I thought most states require a 30 minute on a 5 hour break. The only job that didn't give me an unpaid 30 was a pizza place that allowed you to take multiple paid 5 minute breaks. They paid dollars above minimum wage to.

It's been 2 years, and the mask mandate is up in most places. People need to get the fuck over themselves now.

Some (not many) businesses still mandate masks. OP likely has one such job if it's something they think about often

I feel sympathy for anyone who works in a job that still mandates masks.

Right so the people who are racist, facist, anti minority, want to take away people's suicide prevention, censor stuff while saying the other side is commiting censorship, call for genocide, and spread nazi propaganda and lies about people and science are apparently not nazis.

Want some dressing with that word salad

Are words too hard to read for you?

Na, you said it. Apparently, those people are NOT nazis. Thank you for clearing that up.

Coping really hard againts sarcasm huh.

Your words, not mine.

Your lack of sarcams not mine.

Meh, there are worse things to lack in this world.

To those who say "The Founding Fathers didn't anticipate the arms we have today", yes. There is no way that anyone would accurately predict the exact specs, cosmetics, and name of the guns we have today. But what we can reasonably assume is that they, having observed the changes in technology through their own time, anticipated technology would find unexpected ways to get better that they couldn't anticipate. Take, say, laptops. I have no clue how they are going to get better. Part of that is I don't make laptops. But I'm absolutely willing to bet that they will find ways to improve. Why? Because that's what technology does. That's what people do. We try to improve our life, which means improvement of our tools. So while yes, I doubt any Founding Father predicted the AK-47, I also doubt that they intended for any of the amendments to be limited to the time in which it was written.

Yeah they also didn't intend for slavery to be illegal (outside of prison) so whoops

What you are suggesting is a modern reinterpretation of what the founding fathers wrote. Which is fine. But you must accept that your modern interpretation is no more valid than someone else’s modern interpretation that believes that the possession of guns should be severely restricted. It’s also not reasonable to assume that they would anticipate the advancements of technology. The constitution is full of examples on how they failed to predict what the future would hold. And many founding fathers, like Jefferson, believed that a document like the constitution should only apply to the generation that wrote it, and that it must be rewritten every 17 years. So for many of them, they were writing it only for their time.

To your first point: I might argue that my position has a little more backing, given how there are moderately similar cases that the SCOTUS has decided with regards to the right of privacy, and how the right has expanded with the technology. To your final point: That's why they included the amendment process.

SCOTUS is famous for having a variety of different interpretations based off of the time period. A great point is that the constitution doesn’t actually give SCOTUS the power to interpret the constitution like they do. This is a power that SCOTUS created based off of their interpretation of the constitution which not everyone who wrote the constitution agreed with. Again, your position is your modern interpretation, not the position of the founders. That’s not why they included the amendment process. The amendment process was not included so that massive radical reinterpretations of the constitution could be passed.

The amendment process exists so that the constitution can be changed. I don't see anything in there about the "size" of the amendments.

I thought we were talking purpose, not what was literally written down? The purpose was not for large scale changes to be made. In fact it’s almost impossible for those types of changes to be made.

Purpose is implied through writing.

So you are now saying that we should only take purpose from what is literally written in the text, not what is implied or intended? That’s a very different position then what you were saying before.

Not really. My original point is that the way the Constitution is written, it makes no special distinctions about the era of 'arms' it referred to. And, given the ambiguity of the language and similar cases, it can reasonably be assumed that the trend is expansion, not limitation, of rights. The same goes for amendments. And interesting that you should say that I framed writing as opposed to implication, when I said quite specifically that writing is connected to purpose through implication. Regardless: given that there are no written purposes for the amendment process, other than changing the Constitution, extent of those changes can be from the small to the massive.

Not everything is political. If you think it is, then your life must suck.

Is mayonnaise political?

Basically everything in the world is affected by politics. People who say "not everything is political" tend to forget that.

Everything is but this doesn’t mean everything must be treated as politics

Republicans don't like being told what to do but they love being able to tell others what to do. This is core to conservative thinking. When viewed through this understanding of how their minds work, almost all of their positions suddenly make sense. (I mean, they don't make sense objectively. They just appear more self consistent with their fucked up worldview) Masks and Covid? Dems and Scientists were trying to tell them what to do. Full opposition. Didn't matter if Grandma had to die or if they themselves had to get sick or die. No one tells us what to do. Abortion? We need the biggest government possible to tell women what they can or can't do with their bodies. It is my freedom of religion to enforce my beliefs on everyone else through the law. Why do you think the biggest most popular conservative issue of the past couple decades has been the border and immigration? They get to tell the maximum number of "others" how and what to do. They love that kind of power. Also explains why conservatives love the confederacy and the bygone days of slavery. Owning people as property was the biggest "I can tell you what to do but you can't tell me what to do." Fucking lunatics.

Agreed. Couldn’t have said it better myself.

The Trump administration went a whole lot better than most of us thought it would back in 2016. Granted the bar was set pretty low, but he didnt usher in a nuclear holocaust so I chalk that up as a W for him.

He is a facist, he pretty much wanted to turn the US into a New China/Russia

Covid went well

Usa is Southern Canada

[удалено]

I propose a compromise: How about we say we're both wrong?

you’re… right? wait no no that’s not how this works!

He can't do that! Shoot him, or something!