End of USA republic imminent?

[_EAllusion]

You asked if a person, such as yourself, who has a lawn jockey is racist and I replied with probably and that displaying a lawn jockey itself is a racist act (unless it is contextualized as a display about racism or the underground railroad).

You then argued that anyone critical of overly racist iconography must be opposed to depicting images of black people in general like Islamic extremists who use threats of violence against those who depict Muhammed. It's quite hard to work around how infantile your understanding is here or not notice that it's right next to your defense of displaying lawn jockeys or outrage over a company discontinuing a corporate mascot decades after when people knew the racial stereotypes it is based on are offensive. You got awfully offended when I responded to your own questioning with the obvious answer that yeah, man, it's racist. You started implying I'm censorious based on nothing other than false culture-war stereotypes that exist in your imagination.

If you think doing this illustrates any point you have to make about respect for speech or the imminent fall of the Republic, that strongly suggests you don't have a non-crazy point to make.

I suspect part of the issue here is that no one likes to be called racist, even the most hardcore racists. Ajax, while he was posting as a Nazi sympathizer on Stormfront who called, among other things, for a white ethnostate and the genocide of specific racial groups, got offended bordering on outraged that he would be considered a racist. There is seemingly no level of racism that a racist think fits the bill. Why? Well, the term "racism" has built into it condemnation. It by definition involves obstinate prejudice or bigotry that is morally shameful and racists don't think what they're doing is wrong, intellectually or morally. After all, if it was wrong they wouldn't be doing it. And so you get offended at the suggestion something your doing is racist, even if it's comically racist, because you're not bad and only bad people do racist things.

Every now and then I'm reminded that this a Mormon related board and Mormon culture was extremely entwined with profound racism for a long time. There's whiffs of the culture pervading into the present among some of the ex-Mormons who post here and it surprises me from time to time even though I don't think it should.

[_subgenius]

If facing written criticism of ...

If written criticism were available in this context, you would be correct. But you are providing written condemnations and grievances - and while those are certainly "free speech" it demeans your point when you try to post-mortem dress them up as criticism.

[_EAllusion]

So here's a good example of what happens when discussion that involves listening takes a backseat to social media #winning.

In that sense I agree with Rock. EAllusion, you don't seem to have any other mode than attack and put down. And that's akin to McCarthy. Instead of talking through it with Rock which could have been productive, you chose to miss the opportunity.

Why? My running assumption is you are an anarchist. More than a libertarian. That's based in what you do more so than what you say. But maybe it's something else?

Lol. I'm saving this one.

[_subgenius]

...displaying a lawn jockey itself is a racist act

simply because you say it is so?!?!? based on what? movie iconography? your white-ness?
Or is it because any image of a black person is currently deemed racist because the Democratic party is getting desperate with every passing moment of decline in Biden's' viability as an actual functioning candidate?

[_EAllusion]

Mormondiscussions - Litigating whether lawn jockeys are racist.

[_Doctor CamNC4Me]

[quote=EAllusion post_id=1229500 time=1592849454 user_id=1078]
[quote=honorentheos post_id=1229497 time=1592848966 user_id=7137]
So here's a good example of what happens when discussion that involves listening takes a backseat to social media #winning.

In that sense I agree with Rock. EAllusion, you don't seem to have any other mode than attack and put down. And that's akin to McCarthy. Instead of talking through it with Rock which could have been productive, you chose to miss the opportunity.

Why? My running assumption is you are an anarchist. More than a libertarian. That's based in what you do more so than what you say. But maybe it's something else?[/quote]

Lol. I'm saving this one.
[/quote]

You should. And then you should realize your posting style is generally contrarian, very friendly to Leftist policies, and beholden to strawman argumentation. It works for people who can ally with that posting style, but for others your overall political signaling is smokey and fairly confusing, hence why it’s easy to come to the conclusion you’re an anarcho-libertarian sometimes, an ancap others, and a Leftist masquerading as a Libertarian simply to confuse the reader regarding your socialist-friendly posting history. Heck, sometimes you come across as a centrist, in the true sense of the word, not the Overton Window shifted so far to the Left that Scandanavian capitalism with strong socialist programs is the Center now.

- Doc

[_RockSlider]

Maybe he really does care about Aunt Jemima or Uncle Bens and he can explain the association he has with them that is being lost with the change. Or maybe he really has a lawn jockey.

I don't care about Aunt Jemima or Uncle Ben and I have never owned a lawn Jockey. I was unable to express my concerns here clearly. I responded with two posts to you honorenteos trying to explain my position of concern for institutions buckling under to leaderless irrational crowds. I presented a bad example. When those institutions are involving not only commercial interests but academy and the sciences, as suggested by Weinstein I'm concerned. That was the whole purpose of the OP. Should we be concerned? Is the American institutional structure possibly in jeopardy of a critical theory, Mao like revolution?

I very much agree that the underlying problem here is the inequality of the distribution of opportunity/wealth of "all people matter". The current King of the Mountain is what is keeping the Indians, Blacks, Mexicans, White trailer trash, name your group oppressed. The explosive atmosphere with a total lack of any Republican or Democratic desire to change the game does not see to forecast anything other than disaster on the horizon.

[_Chap]

... you should realize your posting style is generally contrarian, very friendly to Leftist policies, and beholden to strawman argumentation. It works for people who can ally with that posting style, but for others your overall political signaling is smokey and fairly confusing, hence why it’s easy to come to the conclusion you’re an anarcho-libertarian sometimes, an ancap others, and a Leftist masquerading as a Libertarian simply to confuse the reader regarding your socialist-friendly posting history. Heck, sometimes you come across as a centrist, in the true sense of the word, not the Overton Window shifted so far to the Left that Scandanavian capitalism with strong socialist programs is the Center now.

Maybe I have dined too well.

But reading the above post and what preceded it, I am reminded of what Nell Gwyn said when, having gone to a tavern with Charles II and other courtiers incognito, she found that she had to pay the bill, since none of them had any cash (they were just too noble to bother with such vulgarities):

"Lord! What company am I gotten into?"

[_EAllusion]

My views are fairly stereotypical of a certain kind of libertarian. I've suggested reading either Julian Sanchez or Radley Balko as examples to get a sense of my views as expressed by someone similar. Balko is a particularly good read at the moment as his expertise is specifically in American policing. That still holds true.

That it's confusing to you, Doc, means you are unfamiliar those views. That doesn't make them incoherent or even necessarily hard to parse. I can come across as centrist because my views aren't driven by some grand philosophical key ideology and my relative positioning on the political spectrum shifts as contemporary politics does. For instance, I don't want less regulation per se. I want enough specific regulations repealed such that my position can be described as generally wanting "less regulation" but if I get what I want, then I don't want "less regulation." If regulations i think make sense are repleted, then I want "more regulation." For people's whose understanding of how to label someone politically is the simple "less or more" frame, someone like me looks confusing as my relative stance shifts as policy does. I think these labels are supposed to enlighten rather than obscure, so I don't try to sweat it. My views on zoning laws used to be thought of as the domain of economic conservatives, but liberals and conservatives seem to be flip-flopping on it and soon there's a chance it will be thought of as the liberal position. Liberals in general have virtually wholesale adopted common libertarian views on police powers without seeming to even realize it, and I'm not even sure what to do with that. I just have positions on things with underlying rationales.

You seem to struggle to understand the labels you are using, which is strange because they are esoteric enough that the people who use them normally do so with precision, and I think this is contributing to confusion. I don't think anyone reading me would ordinarily think, "Gee. This sounds like a Chomsky anarcho-syndicalist", but you do for some reason. I think you struggle to get a read on someone with generally socially liberal views who holds generally economic conservative ones if those labels don't match the specific disputes in the political now.

I find Honor's post so quintessentially honor that it's worth saving and referencing.

[_EAllusion]

Should we be concerned? Is the American institutional structure possibly in jeopardy of a critical theory, Mao like revolution?

No, no it's not.