Official BBO Hijacked Thread Thread

[Zelandakh]

Sorry but I reject your association of authoritarianism and right wing.

I already posted about this earlier in the thread. Authoritarianism is linked to extremist views, which can be on the left as well as the right. However, in an American context the choice, in international norms, is between centre-right to extreme right and centre-left to right, so it is natural within that context to associate authoritarianism with the right, particularly as the centre-left part is relatively modern and if you go back a generation the parties were essentially right and more-right. For this reason, political graphs in US terms sometimes use a different set of axes from international norms (ie y:authoritarian-liberal; x:conservative-radical) and how Americans view left vs right is also different from the rest of the world.

 

So you are certainly right in the above statement in the general case but may be wrong in the context of a specific regional discussion. I may be wrong but I assume Winston was writing, or at least thinking, in terms of a specifically American viewpoint and not internationally. Most Democrats do not have warm and fuzzy feelings towards, for example, Russia just now so I am fairly sure that few would regard authoritarian regimes as specifically connected to right-winged governments.

[Cyberyeti]

I already posted about this earlier in the thread. Authoritarianism is linked to extremist views, which can be on the left as well as the right. However, in an American context the choice, in international norms, is between centre-right to extreme right and centre-left to right, so it is natural within that context to associate authoritarianism with the right, particularly as the centre-left part is relatively modern and if you go back a generation the parties were essentially right and more-right. For this reason, political graphs in US terms sometimes use a different set of axes from international norms (ie y:authoritarian-liberal; x:conservative-radical) and how Americans view left vs right is also different from the rest of the world.

 

So you are certainly right in the above statement in the general case but may be wrong in the context of a specific regional discussion. I may be wrong but I assume Winston was writing, or at least thinking, in terms of a specifically American viewpoint and not internationally. Most Democrats do not have warm and fuzzy feelings towards, for example, Russia just now so I am fairly sure that few would regard authoritarian regimes as specifically connected to right-winged governments.

 

I clashed with Winston on this upthread because I'm used to things like https://www.politicalcompass.org/ which are as you describe.

[Zelandakh]

I clashed with Winston on this upthread because I'm used to things like https://www.politicalcompass.org/ which are as you describe.

That graph illustrates the point very well. Biden, who some Americans view as a moderate Democrat, comes out as hard right by international standards. Trump meanwhile is in Fascist territory. And this is what Americans think of as Left versus Right. It is hardly surprising that such a high proportion of the electorate is so messed up.

[Zelandakh]

I looked through the site a little more and while they appear to use the traditional axes, it should be noted that the definitions are heavily influenced by American politics. Fully 1/6 of the test questions are directly devoted to religion and there are further questions that are indirectly religious such as abortion rights. Meanwhile there is not a single question about the role of different layers of government nor of public ownership of infrastructure businesses and utilities. It is what it is - an American remodelling of reasonably sound theory. For me, the Americanisms mostly cancel out and I am fairly close to my normal position. Many others though are likely to find the site misrepresents their politics in non-American terms.

[Cyberyeti]

I looked through the site a little more and while they appear to use the traditional axes, it should be noted that the definitions are heavily influenced by American politics. Fully 1/6 of the test questions are directly devoted to religion and there are further questions that are indirectly religious such as abortion rights. Meanwhile there is not a single question about the role of different layers of government nor of public ownership of infrastructure businesses and utilities. It is what it is - an American remodelling of reasonably sound theory. For me, the Americanisms mostly cancel out and I am fairly close to my normal position. Many others though are likely to find the site misrepresents their politics in non-American terms.

 

I don't know if you watched their vid explaining what they do, but the presenter there was (I think from the accent) Australian. I can find no info on where they're actually based but I had assumed from the questions that they were in the US.

[Winstonm]

Sorry but I reject your association of authoritarianism and right wing.

 

Is not the dream of everyone being free from any other person/authority's control a beautiful (albeit unrealistic) ideal at least (or to be more accurate every individual to be free to choose the level of control under which they live individually!)

 

You're entitled to your beliefs.

 

As to the dream, the answer is unequivocally no. Everyone want to be free from enslavement. Enslavement is not the same as having duties, responsibilities to others, the need to work together for the good of all. So, (most) people do not have to dream of being free from enslavement - here in the U.S. not since June 19, 1865, when African Americans in Texas learned of the Emancipation Proclamation having been signed into law.

 

Freedom is a libertarian red herring - no one is ever free from societal responsibilities while such responsibilities do no enslave but allow freedom.

[Zelandakh]

I don't know if you watched their vid explaining what they do, but the presenter there was (I think from the accent) Australian. I can find no info on where they're actually based but I had assumed from the questions that they were in the US.

If you go to the bottom you can see that "The Political Compass" is owned by Pace News Ltd, which is a company based in New Zealand. Things are however a little more complicated than that as by all accounts TPC itself is based in the UK. In addition, it was originally produced on the One World Action site and may retain links to that cause. In any case, if you are interested in this field I recommend looking up the work of Eysenck (in Europe) and Ferguson (in the USA) and taking it from there. Most subsequent models in political science can trace their ancestry back to one of those, and their different approaches to essentially the same issue is still reflected in the different thinking from either side of The Pond. My impression of TPC is that it attempts to draw the parts together very directly while missing out large areas that have (in their opinion) become less important in political thinking over time.

[Winstonm]

I already posted about this earlier in the thread. Authoritarianism is linked to extremist views, which can be on the left as well as the right. However, in an American context the choice, in international norms, is between centre-right to extreme right and centre-left to right, so it is natural within that context to associate authoritarianism with the right, particularly as the centre-left part is relatively modern and if you go back a generation the parties were essentially right and more-right. For this reason, political graphs in US terms sometimes use a different set of axes from international norms (ie y:authoritarian-liberal; x:conservative-radical) and how Americans view left vs right is also different from the rest of the world.

 

So you are certainly right in the above statement in the general case but may be wrong in the context of a specific regional discussion. I may be wrong but I assume Winston was writing, or at least thinking, in terms of a specifically American viewpoint and not internationally. Most Democrats do not have warm and fuzzy feelings towards, for example, Russia just now so I am fairly sure that few would regard authoritarian regimes as specifically connected to right-winged governments.

I admit to be almost totally ignorant of the political divisions outside the U.S. - not proud of that just that I am.

 

My understanding of the terms left/right in a political nature is that left indicates those who are not against centralized government actively engaged in helping solve societal issues while the right indicates those who favor limited interference from a central government. This is really no different than the debates from the initial constitutional convention of federal powers versus state powers.

 

From a totalitarian viewpoint, the form of government is irrelevant as long as the leader has the absolute final word.

 

Basically,I think it comes down to this: a liberal mind prefers a world that admits no one has all the answers while an un-liberal mind prefers answers, right or wrong.

[Zelandakh]

I admit to be almost totally ignorant of the political divisions outside the U.S. - not proud of that just that I am.

In that case I would very much suggest you read up on Eysenck (start with "Sense and Nonsense in Psychology" (1956)) and other political scientists. As an appetiser I will talk a little about his model as I think its development is rather interesting. Basically his left-right axis was something that he called "Radicalism", which essentially represents how conservative a person is. The interesting part is that this factor was initially not economically oriented so much as being base on social issues, with the 3 classic topics of the day (think 1950s) being issues around criminals, sex and the military. Later on, he recognised that this social factor was strongly correlated with economic values, which is the part that is more often used today. It does highlight the care that political scientists have to take in constructing questions though as it is very often the case that correlations fall down along that lines that are not immediately obvious.

 

I also need to pull you up on the term liberal from your post as I suspect it does not mean what you think it means. One of the most famous political modellers following on from Ferguson and Eysenck was Nolan. On his diagram, the opposite of conservative was liberal. This is a popular misconception in America where the term Liberal has come to mean Social Liberal. But liberal is far broader than that. In the UK, the original (classical) Liberals have a place that is roughly directly opposite that of Communism. Here in Germany, the local Liberal party are, in economic terms, somewhere to the right of the local Conservative party. As I am British, liberal to me means slightly right of centre and extremely anti-authoritarian - this is more or less my own position when I do such tests (though sometimes I come out left of centre). In America though, I know the term is tied to the left and most do not seem to understand that this is not typical. Indeed, some axis labelling uses liberal in the same way as TPC uses libertarian, as the label for the opposite of Authoritarian, neither left nor right.

 

So to answer your point about what a liberal mind prefers I would first need to understand what you mean by the term liberal. In general though, classically liberal thinking is based around the rights of the individual over those of the State, most specifically around freedom, democracy, equality and consent. Liberals also traditionally believe in small central government and strong regional bodies to allow the government to be tailored as close to the individuals involved as possible for the issue at hand. I do not see it as fundamentally about having or not having answers so much as that the answers are different when you stress the values above rather than tradition, authority, social stability and hierarchy, which might be more important to a person with conservative values. I cannot even say that one is right, although obviously I believe quite strongly in one approach over the other, because it is a matter for society as a whole to decide and each state is going to develop differently. It is, I think, quite useful to understand those differences though and not to live in any sort of bubble. That is as true for liberals as any other group.

[kenberg]

Eysenck! I recall that I once bought a book by him and, seeing that Sense and Nonsense in Psychology was published in 56, I bet that was the one. I might have bought it a bit later, but not much. This was long ago so I am not prepared to defend my views of the time but I can remember citing it to friends as an extraordinarily bad book!.

 

Our possible disagreement about Eysenck aside, I found your discussion of political terms and views very interesting. I was aware that "liberal" means very different things in different counties, and I believe it has meant different things at different times here as well. Sort of like agreeing to play, say, unusual over unusual. It's best to check the details on what it is you have just agreed to.

 

I think of my own views as "1950s mainstream", meaning that the government has a role to play in providing opportunity and that people are ultimately responsible for their own choices. In concrete terms that means that I think Trump is an idiot but I don't support massive forgiveness of student debt. I realize the world has changed since the 50s and I like to think I have adapted, possibly even matured, at least some but...

 

I might get back to Eysenck but probably not. I recall having a pretty strong reaction even if I cannot recall the details

[Winstonm]

In that case I would very much suggest you read up on Eysenck (start with "Sense and Nonsense in Psychology" (1956)) and other political scientists. As an appetiser I will talk a little about his model as I think its development is rather interesting. Basically his left-right axis was something that he called "Radicalism", which essentially represents how conservative a person is. The interesting part is that this factor was initially not economically oriented so much as being base on social issues, with the 3 classic topics of the day (think 1950s) being issues around criminals, sex and the military. Later on, he recognised that this social factor was strongly correlated with economic values, which is the part that is more often used today. It does highlight the care that political scientists have to take in constructing questions though as it is very often the case that correlations fall down along that lines that are not immediately obvious.

 

I also need to pull you up on the term liberal from your post as I suspect it does not mean what you think it means. One of the most famous political modellers following on from Ferguson and Eysenck was Nolan. On his diagram, the opposite of conservative was liberal. This is a popular misconception in America where the term Liberal has come to mean Social Liberal. But liberal is far broader than that. In the UK, the original (classical) Liberals have a place that is roughly directly opposite that of Communism. Here in Germany, the local Liberal party are, in economic terms, somewhere to the right of the local Conservative party. As I am British, liberal to me means slightly right of centre and extremely anti-authoritarian - this is more or less my own position when I do such tests (though sometimes I come out left of centre). In America though, I know the term is tied to the left and most do not seem to understand that this is not typical. Indeed, some axis labelling uses liberal in the same way as TPC uses libertarian, as the label for the opposite of Authoritarian, neither left nor right.

 

So to answer your point about what a liberal mind prefers I would first need to understand what you mean by the term liberal. In general though, classically liberal thinking is based around the rights of the individual over those of the State, most specifically around freedom, democracy, equality and consent. Liberals also traditionally believe in small central government and strong regional bodies to allow the government to be tailored as close to the individuals involved as possible for the issue at hand. I do not see it as fundamentally about having or not having answers so much as that the answers are different when you stress the values above rather than tradition, authority, social stability and hierarchy, which might be more important to a person with conservative values. I cannot even say that one is right, although obviously I believe quite strongly in one approach over the other, because it is a matter for society as a whole to decide and each state is going to develop differently. It is, I think, quite useful to understand those differences though and not to live in any sort of bubble. That is as true for liberals as any other group.

 

Thank you, Zel. Kind of you to take the time to help me understand. My own understanding of liberal is based on psychology - or my reading of psychology - that a liberal is flexible of mind while the conservative is less flexible. One is fine with disorganization; the other seeks order and rules.

[thepossum]

 

As to the dream, the answer is unequivocally no. Everyone want to be free from enslavement. Enslavement is not the same as having duties, responsibilities to others, the need to work together for the good of all. So, (most) people do not have to dream of being free from enslavement - here in the U.S. not since June 19, 1865, when African Americans in Texas learned of the Emancipation Proclamation having been signed into law.

 

Freedom is a libertarian red herring - no one is ever free from societal responsibilities while such responsibilities do no enslave but allow freedom.

 

Personally I believe that being responsble for the collective well-being and everyone's rights, and also implictly having responsibilities, is implicit within a truly libertarian philsophy since by definition you cannot be imposing your views/beliefs/expectations on others (that would violate their rights). So to achieve that for everyone and for everyone (I mean everyone) to be free to live under whatever level of authority (none, indicivual, collective, religious, state) whatever without imposing that on others leads to a position of responsbility and duty to others and the planet in fact etc Sorry not thinking clearly late at night. It would seem quite possible to be that under a libertarian world a large number of people would choose to live under some form of authority. But if you acted as an individual/group in a socially irresponsbile way surely that would be contrary to libertarian philosophy.

 

But as I said, for me its just a guiding principle or ideal, and almost certainly impossiblye, but I think it is a superior position/principle that taking the principle of having the right to impose any system/beliefs on anyone else etc

[Winstonm]

Personally I believe that being responsble for the collective well-being and everyone's rights, and also implictly having responsibilities, is implicit within a truly libertarian philsophy since by definition you cannot be imposing your views/beliefs/expectations on others (that would violate their rights). So to achieve that for everyone and for everyone (I mean everyone) to be free to live under whatever level of authority (none, indicivual, collective, religious, state) whatever without imposing that on others leads to a position of responsbility and duty to others and the planet in fact etc Sorry not thinking clearly late at night. It would seem quite possible to be that under a libertarian world a large number of people would choose to live under some form of authority. But if you acted as an individual/group in a socially irresponsbile way surely that would be contrary to libertarian philosophy.

 

But as I said, for me its just a guiding principle or ideal, and almost certainly impossiblye, but I think it is a superior position/principle that taking the principle of having the right to impose any system/beliefs on anyone else etc

 

IMO, this twisted apology for libertarian philosophy is itself enough to refute it.

[Winstonm]

Thank you, Zel. Kind of you to take the time to help me understand. My own understanding of liberal is based on psychology - or my reading of psychology - that a liberal is flexible of mind while the conservative is less flexible. One is fine with disorganization; the other seeks order and rules.

 

I should add that the political views are a byproduct of the underlying psychology - hence, totalitarianism for me is not politically based but psychologically based. The form of government is irrelevant, as long as it can be co-opted to the authoritarian's use.

[shyams]

I found it interesting that Christian Pulisic -- a US soccer star playing in the Premier League -- pronounces his own surname as Puli(sick) whereas all British commentators and fans correctly pronounce it as Puli(sitch).

 

Random thought for the day!

[johnu]

Texas Politician Alienates Twitter Users By Suggesting E.T.s Need Religion

 

I don't think I need to clarify that this was a Republican politician B-)

IF aliens are real, salvation through Jesus Christ is the only way they enter Heaven.

[thepossum]

IMO, this twisted apology for libertarian philosophy is itself enough to refute it.

 

I wasnt making an apology for anyone's philosophy. Just discussing aspects of my own. Sorry it seemed so twisted

 

But in a nutshell, nobody has a right to tell me what to do unless what I am doing infringes someone elses rights :)

[Winstonm]

I wasnt making an apology for anyone's philosophy. Just discussing aspects of my own. Sorry it seemed so twisted

 

But in a nutshell, nobody has a right to tell me what to do unless what I am doing infringes someone elses rights :)

 

Consider your position - you can't make me - isn't that the same cry of the adolescent trying to exercise independence? One would hope that after adolescence full maturity would teach the lesson no decision is truly made in a vacuum, that each of us has an affect on everyone else, either directly or indirectly.

 

That lesson then teaches that no one is telling you what to do - you allow yourself to be governed. That is maturity.

[thepossum]

Consider your position - you can't make me - isn't that the same cry of the adolescent trying to exercise independence? One would hope that after adolescence full maturity would teach the lesson no decision is truly made in a vacuum, that each of us has an affect on everyone else, either directly or indirectly.

 

That lesson then teaches that no one is telling you what to do - you allow yourself to be governed. That is maturity.

 

Grow up Winston. How old are you? I will stop graffiting my neighbours fence ok

 

But seriously Winston if you saw my definition of my ideal philosophy I wouldnt actually be able to do very much at all. In fact if anything I take too much notice and consideration of other people's rights. It tends to hold you back in life sadly

[jjbrr]

 

Artemis and Celeste

[y66]

Lebanon Is Exhausted by Lina Mounzer at NYT

 

Exhausted is the word. How much more can people take?

[Winstonm]

The goal of the Republican party has been fulfilled - to crush Labor:

 

Adam Smith said, "The man whose whole life is spent in performing a few simple operations*…always the same, has no occasion to exert his understanding, or to exercise his invention….loses, therefore, the habit of such exertion, and…becomes as stupid and ignorant as it is possible for a human creature to become…."

* AKA known as Labor.

[y66]

Desperate to Leave Beirut, Young Lebanese Are Also the Ones Fixing It

 

BEIRUT, Lebanon — The scooter engines snorted out, and Sara el-Sayed swung herself down to the pavement outside the third damaged building she had visited that afternoon, two carpenters in tow.

 

Upstairs, a woman’s blown-apart doors needed fixing. Cigarettes and cellphone in one hand, pen and paper in the other, Ms. el-Sayed jotted down dimensions as the carpenters measured empty door frames and shattered windows.

 

She has taken this up as her job now: volunteering to hammer together as much of the splintered city as she can before leaving it — hopefully for good.

 

Six days after the explosion that crushed much of Beirut, a Spanish master’s degree program in interior design notified Ms. el-Sayed that she had been accepted, a long-held dream come true.

 

When she leaves, she will be done with all of this, she hopes: a government whose incompetence appears to have led to the blast; a corrupt political system young Lebanese blame for aborting their futures; a country where the middle class is sinking into poverty as the politicians slow-walk economic reforms, and where the only way to survive seems to be a second passport, a job or a graduate program somewhere else.

 

Many Lebanese were already looking for such escape hatches before the Aug. 4 explosion. An exodus now seems inevitable.

[Winstonm]

Protests Erupt After Los Angeles County Sheriff's Deputies Fatally Shoot Black Man During Bicycle Stop

 

 

Ever asked yourself why these headlines never seem to read Bike Riding White Man Fatally Shot? Come think of it, when was the last time you even heard of a white man or white woman stopped by police for bike-riding violations?

[Zelandakh]

 

 

Ever asked yourself why these headlines never seem to read Bike Riding White Man Fatally Shot? Come think of it, when was the last time you even heard of a white man or white woman stopped by police for bike-riding violations?

Well there was

...