Current Affairs Free Speech

[dholliday]

That's an interesting one - Kaepernick taking the knee.

Here was my take on that back in 2018.



It was a powerful gesture when he did it, purely for anti-racist reasons. And I did and continue to support what he did. Any backlash to what he was doing was obviously purely based on race and extreme nationalism; there was no other reason to protest against what he was doing.

However, that gesture then became something else much bigger than one man. It became a gesture of support for Black Lives Matter - not the sentiment, the movement itself, the organisation.

After that, it's simply disingenuous to claim the gesture has nothing to do with BLM, especially when the players started taking the knee explicitly for BLM with the organisations logo on their shirts in the first instance.

So if I supported Kaepernick but don't support the players taking the knee now, how does that square with the crowd saying the reasons for booing taking the knee are 'disingenuous'?

aye, hence my comment about BLM (the organisation) being a controversial outfit is certainly a major factor of the booing. But also i expect many who boo are just tired of the constant focus on skin colour. It's so tedious, and is clearly creating more conflict than it is solving.

Plus the USA angle is so different to UK. Another thing i disagree with conservatives on concerns police brutality against black folk. Sure UK haven't been entirely innocent but in the US it's a proper epidemic. Not just George Floyd (who was clearly murdered in the coldest way feasible) but plenty others. It's truly horrifying what goes on there. And I accept it's complex, due to lax gun laws many alleged-perps may be armed (and many are)...but still, the police there tend to put oil on the fire rather than attempt to calm things down.

In Kaepernick's case, the american conservative movement had a golden opportunity to meet the Left and offer support & sympathy. They did not. Now it's barely feasible for any compromise between the two sides to occur.

People on the Left & Right seem to have a set way of thinking, so any time a new culture-war case breaks out, you can predict who will have certain views. Even on GOT.

Those in the centre who swing both ways seem to be in a minority. Whereas i'm sure that was more the norm not so long ago.

 

[Tubey]

aye, hence my comment about BLM (the organisation) being a controversial outfit is certainly a major factor of the booing. But also i expect many who boo are just tired of the constant focus on skin colour. It's so tedious, and is clearly creating more conflict than it is solving.

Plus the USA angle is so different to UK. Another thing i disagree with conservatives on concerns police brutality against black folk. Sure UK haven't been entirely innocent but in the US it's a proper epidemic. Not just George Floyd (who was clearly murdered in the coldest way feasible) but plenty others. It's truly horrifying what goes on there. And I accept it's complex, due to lax gun laws many alleged-perps may be armed (and many are)...but still, the police there tend to put oil on the fire rather than attempt to calm things down.

In Kaepernick's case, the american conservative movement had a golden opportunity to meet the Left and offer support & sympathy. They did not. Now it's barely feasible for any compromise between the two sides to occur.

People on the Left & Right seem to have a set way of thinking, so any time a new culture-war case breaks out, you can predict who will have certain views. Even on GOT.

Those in the centre who swing both ways seem to be in a minority. Whereas i'm sure that was more the norm not so long ago.

On GOT and social media, sure they are.

In real life, they're really not.

It's easy to equate the online echo chambers with reality, but they aren't reflective of it, in any way, shape or form. If they were, Corbyn would currently hold a 200 seat majority as PM.

 

[dead_soft]

No, I think the idea that removing a picture of the Queen is somehow creating a 'welcoming space' is downright stupid. As the vast majority of people would.

Surely not as stupid as getting worked up by a few folks removing a picture of a woman they didn’t like but whatever helps you stay up at night is your choice.

 

[dead_soft]

On GOT and social media, sure they are.

In real life, they're really not.

It's easy to equate the online echo chambers with reality, but they aren't reflective of it, in any way, shape or form. If they were, Corbyn would currently hold a 200 seat majority as PM.

If they’ve not got much of a power base why do you keep getting upset about them?

And lol at this hyperbole when Corbyn doesn’t even carry that massive a support on here

 

[dholliday]

On GOT and social media, sure they are.

In real life, they're really not.

It's easy to equate the online echo chambers with reality, but they aren't reflective of it, in any way, shape or form. If they were, Corbyn would currently hold a 200 seat majority as PM.

aye, echoes another previous comment i made that my political opinions tend to get a better reception in real-life than they do on here! folk will still disagree, but our discussions are without conflict, and we change each others' minds more often.

something about the nature of online: with its dopamine-inducing likes/alerts etc deffo is pushing human thinking into set systems.

there's been studies on this, actual indications that such use is changing our brains:

The “online brain”: how the Internet may be changing our cognition - PMC

The impact of the Internet across multiple aspects of modern society is clear. However, the influence that it may have on our brain structure and functioning remains a central topic of investigation. Here we draw on recent psychological, psychiatric ...

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

question to you @Tubey - do you install social media apps on your phone, and do you regularly maintain an individual social media profile (facebook etc)?

 

[Tubey]

aye, echoes another previous comment i made that my political opinions tend to get a better reception in real-life than they do on here! folk will still disagree, but our discussions are without conflict, and we change each others' minds more often.

something about the nature of online: with its dopamine-inducing likes/alerts etc deffo is pushing human thinking into set systems.

there's been studies on this, actual indications that such use is changing our brains:

The “online brain”: how the Internet may be changing our cognition - PMC

The impact of the Internet across multiple aspects of modern society is clear. However, the influence that it may have on our brain structure and functioning remains a central topic of investigation. Here we draw on recent psychological, psychiatric ...

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

question to you @Tubey - do you install social media apps on your phone, and do you regularly maintain an individual social media profile (facebook etc)?

No, don't have Facebook, never have, have a Twitter account I went years without using, used it briefly a few months back, no others at all.

 

[dholliday]

No, don't have Facebook, never have, have a Twitter account I went years without using, used it briefly a few months back, no others at all.

i have one but haven't updated since 2013-ish. no other social media. always preferred discussion-forums.

i'd be interested in a study of those with very ideologically-set political views and those who feel free to swing in all directions: i.e. if there is a correlation with regular social-media use.

@dead_soft @Bishop Thumpety-Thump @JimmyJeffers feel free to contribute to this study.

 

[dholliday]

The people reject Woke. The Establishment embrace it.

The booing of bending the knee at England matches should be a further clue.

And .... on 'ignore' you go.

You gonna ignore John Barnes too, ste?

 

[dholliday]

 

[Bishop Thumpety-Thump]

That's literally what happened by their own admission, but no, not on its' own, but as I've said a few times it's death by a thousand stupid cuts - they all add up, they all become associated with a persistent ideology, and the Labour party get the blame and the Tories benefit. Hell, the picture has absolutely nothing to do with the Labour party in theory, but because of their strategy they are implicated by political position anyway due to the lurch to the extreme left under Corbyn.

Here's an unnamed Tory MP:

'The Labour Party is losing the plot. They can carry on banging on about all this stuff. The reality is most of the public are not with them on it. We are just agreeing with the public saying this is ridiculous.'

He's right. They are benefitting every time. If I was a Tory, rather than get annoyed I'd just do what they do - shake my head disapprovingly and express manufactured outrage while privately laughing about how the left eats itself. But I get annoyed, because the opposition should be credible, and Labour aren't.

Lol. Yep it's Corbyn's fault lads. 'Lurch to the left', what are you on about? Last time I looked the UK had a right wing Tory government. For 11 years no less.

You really do get outraged over nothing mate. Calm down and have a nice cup of tea.

 

[Bishop Thumpety-Thump]

I really couldn't give a toss if anyone kneels or not. It's a free choice or at least it should be.
Just because you are a Christian you don't need to go to church everyday to prove it. Or do you?
Racism is abhorrent and evil. But people shouldn't have to adhere to certain signals or behaviours just to
prove they are not racist. If so, George Orwell didn't know half of it.

Do you read a lot of Orwell mate? If so, which of his works are you referring to here?

 

[Bishop Thumpety-Thump]

No, I think the idea that removing a picture of the Queen is somehow creating a 'welcoming space' is downright stupid. As the vast majority of people would.

Yet you said to make a safe space. Which they didn't say.

Do you know the scene in Scissored Isle where Alan Partridge goes off on a rant to the freegan? That's you that is. When you go off on your seemingly daily outrages about nothing, I read your posts in Partridge's voice.

Freegan: "It's like they say: give a man a fish, he'll eat for a day. Give him a fishing rod-..."

Alan: "Yeah, he'll come back the next day saying 'you know that fishing rod you gave me?', 'go on...', 'can I have another?' *sigh* 'what happened to the one I gave you?', 'oh I sold it', 'let me guess, to buy some skag?', 'no to buy some fish, I was hungry,' 'did it not occur to you to use the fishing rod to catch some fish?' 'oh, I haven't got a permit and I don't know how to get one', 'Google it!'".

Freegan: "When did this happen?"

Alan: "Oh, it didn't. It's just a generic, annoying man who lives inside my mind. A head squatter - I don't mean a dominatrix."

 

[dholliday]

Do you read a lot of Orwell mate? If so, which of his works are you referring to here?

any reading of 1984 today will only see parallels with the woke agenda, reactions to the pandemic and Trump as Emmanuel Goldstein.

 

[tsubaki]

any reading of 1984 today will only see parallels with the woke agenda, reactions to the pandemic and Trump as Emmanuel Goldstein.

That is some take, given how the majority of the media here actively supports the government and actively encourages people to hate “the woke agenda”.

It’s almost as if you are unable to see a tree from the wood you are stood in.

 

[dead_soft]

any reading of 1984 today will only see parallels with the woke agenda, reactions to the pandemic and Trump as Emmanuel Goldstein.

I would give so, so, so, much for people to stop invoking 1984. It's an okay book written over 60 years ago, and your reading of it is quite wild.