The Politics Thread

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redwhiteandermblue said:
Everything needs to be judged on a case by case basis. For example, relating to an earlier point, a study found that teachers in US public schools were sexist, routinely recognizing and praising boys more than girls--but that this sexism was gender-blind: women teachers did it just as much as men. That's a case where I think teachers should attend a brief something or other looking at that study.
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I saw a similar study. There were two other interesting points. The first was that they asked the students whether the teachers were biased in favour of gender and neither the boys or the girls thought they were. The second was after the feedback the teachers tried to do better and when they remeasured their behaviour they had got to approx 50:50. But now the students thought they were biased in favour of the girls!
 
If you are black or a female, or old or young, have red hair or short stature, a big nose, large ears, are bald, have spots, stutter, are fat, speak loudly, speak softly, are blind, have bad breath, are French, are religious, not religious, are hand skilled or academically skilled, left wing, right wing, muscular, focused, use pot, drink beer, are English and on and on. You think of it someone else hates it or you because of it.
Two of the biggest are surely racism aimed at black people and discrimination aimed at females. Females are roughly half the world population and black people represent roughly 20% of the world population so it represents an enormous factor in human behavior.

Sadly making judgments based on superficial factors is a basic survival instinct. In a dangerous world there is not time to assess the opinions, attitudes or anything else of an approaching human. Hence the advantage of living in a civilised society where intelligent humans treat other humans with respect. All over the world we have such civilised humans, this forum is a testament to that fact, but too many of our rulers are not in this group. Infiltrated in to our civilised societys are the less developed humans who have less control over their instincts. Too often our leaders are leaders because they are more aggressive and more opinionated, too often they are psychopaths.

Progress towards a civilised world is very slow and you could argue that humans have not made progress in this area at all. Might is still right, our politicians have just voted to spend billions on weapons designed to kill millions of people. They still think it's a solution to change peoples minds by killing their friends and families.

Decent humans need to take more interest in the world around them and the one positive factor in all this world of **** is the internet which is revealing to the world population what their leaders have tried to hide from time immemorial. That many of the nastiest bastards on the planet look just like me.
 
lennypops said:
I understand people's criticisms and reservations with PC. Really I do. I think that people are stupid and shallow and judgemental through that particular lens too. I see and hear it all the time where people are so used to only ever allowing themselves to say the seemingly "right" thing that they forget to try to speak sense and to try to see the world clearly.

However I feel there's a real danger of throwing the baby out with the bath water just cos some nitwit blogger thinks it's sexist to say that women are shorter than men (or something). The previous decades' social pressures to basically *be less ****ing horrible to one another* was a very good thing. The world is less horrible because of it. Less people feel less alienated from society. It's good that my dad had to feel bad about being racist and homophobic in public. You know what? As a result he actually *is* a more accepting and open-minded person. And gay people, women, racial minorities all have a better life because of it too.
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Agree with that (and think it's very well put again), but we have moved away from the original issue being discussed imo.
 
PowerSpurs said:
I saw a similar study. There were two other interesting points. The first was that they asked the students whether the teachers were biased in favour of gender and neither the boys or the girls thought they were. The second was after the feedback the teachers tried to do better and when they remeasured their behaviour they had got to approx 50:50. But now the students thought they were biased in favour of the girls!
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Without seeing this, I'd be very scheptical about the objectivity of the analysts, in terms of how hey selected thheir sample, and how they analysed it.
 
I've said this before, by for me a lot of prejudice, and the discrimination that follows, stems from ignorance. In a way it's a fear of the unknown, because its different to what is perceived to be the norm.

As someone who lives in a country other than the one of my origin, I have found that there is some of the same preconception and prejudice here. However, some of the remedy is in your own hands. Get out there and mix with the local people. Show them that you're willing to integrate, that there's nothing too much different about you, that you're just another human being living their life. No different to them.

If you isolate yourself you merely feed their preconceptions and prejudices. If you try to integrate, you will find that the vast majority will accept you.
 
RobSpur said:
I'd actually argue the opposite. It's precisely BECAUSE we are all taught to walk on eggshells, that we all take offence so easily.

To me, it is the "learn your rights, learn how to take offence and when you should feel offended" culture, that causes the most problems.
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I agree it is very important that we can interact with others without taking offence at the slightest thing, but I think you are underestimating the amount that people feel bullied in the world we live in. And I would say that the best way of dealing with bullying is to have the courage to make it public.
The example of the woman barrister you quoted several pages ago is rather illustrative of the difference between us. You clearly see this as someone over-reacting to an innocuous comment so your reaction is to side with the man whose behaviour was publicised. I see it as older man bullying a woman by making comments about her appearance and her reacting in a proper way by making the exchange public to protect other victims. And by the way, her Linked-in photo was just a head and shoulders shot, and she didn't go to the press she put the exchange on Twitter. In interviews the barrister claimed that she had several times been sexually harassed while doing her job (including being asked for a bikini photo in a job interview and experiencing unwanted touching) and she just thought the man's behaviour was unacceptable. I agree with her but can see why others might think that was an over-reaction. Since her specialism is to represent women who have been subject to female genital mutilation the male solicitor might have expected her to be somewhat sensitive to such things. Since she made the exchange public she has had death threats on twitter and linked-in. That's what I call a hysterical over-reaction and bullying.
 
PowerSpurs said:
I agree it is very important that we can interact with others without taking offence at the slightest thing, but I think you are underestimating the amount that people feel bullied in the world we live in. And I would say that the best way of dealing with bullying is to have the courage to make it public.
The example of the woman barrister you quoted several pages ago is rather illustrative of the difference between us. You clearly see this as someone over-reacting to an innocuous comment so your reaction is to side with the man whose behaviour was publicised. I see it as older man bullying a woman by making comments about her appearance and her reacting in a proper way by making the exchange public to protect other victims. And by the way, her Linked-in photo was just a head and shoulders shot, and she didn't go to the press she put the exchange on Twitter. In interviews the barrister claimed that she had several times been sexually harassed while doing her job (including being asked for a bikini photo in a job interview and experiencing unwanted touching) and she just thought the man's behaviour was unacceptable. I agree with her but can see why others might think that was an over-reaction. Since her specialism is to represent women who have been subject to female genital mutilation the male solicitor might have expected her to be somewhat sensitive to such things. Since she made the exchange public she has had death threats on twitter and linked-in. That's what I call a hysterical over-reaction and bullying.
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Anyone who does not regard her behaviour as an over reaction and bullying, is not looking at matters objectively, in my opinion.

This is an individual who has deliberately and aggresively sought to bring hatred , vilification and destrucfion upon another. Her actions were utterly repulsive, and I struggle to believe that any reasonable person can fail to recognise that.

She is a vile individual, empowered by a vile and immoral movement.
 
RobSpur said:
Anyone who does not regard her behaviour as an over reaction and bullying, is not looking at matters objectively, in my opinion.

This is an individual who has deliberately and aggresively sought to bring hatred , vilification and destrucfion upon another. Her actions were utterly repulsive, and I struggle to believe that any reasonable person can fail to recognise that.
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We are not going to agree on this. I can't see how publishing unedited a message sent in a public forum is in any way aggressive and can't see how it brings hatred, vilification and destruction on anyone. It simply allows other people to judge who is in the right. Two reasonable people (you and I ) have come to the opposite conclusion. I'd be happy to have the barrister work for me and wouldn't touch the solicitor with a bargepole. You are in the opposite camp. But none of it would have happened if he hadn't made the comment in the first place. He is Diego Costa and she is Dembele....
 
PowerSpurs said:
We are not going to agree on this. I can't see how publishing unedited a message sent in a public forum is in any way aggressive and can't see how it brings hatred, vilification and destruction on anyone. It simply allows other people to judge who is in the right. Two reasonable people (you and I ) have come to the opposite conclusion. I'd be happy to have the barrister work for me and wouldn't touch the solicitor with a bargepole. You are in the opposite camp. But none of it would have happened if he hadn't made the comment in the first place. He is Diego Costa and she is Dembele....
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Sorry, but I don't consider you to be a reasonable person on this issue. As you say, we are not likely to agree, and there are other aspects of this discussion that I would prefer to focus on than the scumbag woman we are discussing here.
 
I have a response to make to Lenny, which I hope I can articulate satisfactorily. Going to read back through the rest of the discussion first though, starting at the bottom of page 43 where I left off a couple of nights ago.
 
RobSpur said:
I'm half way through Lenny's first comment and already struggling to keep a lid on my anger <laugh>
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Lol. Chill out. Look around you. See the feminazis climbing through the windows trying to ruin your life? See the PC brigade actively looking to hold you down and cut you up? Take all your stuff?

Nah. You're fine. It's okay. You are not being oppressed.
 
lennypops said:
Lol. Chill out. Look around you. See the feminazis climbing through the windows trying to ruin your life? See the PC brigade actively looking to hold you down and cut you up? Take all your stuff?

Nah. You're fine. It's okay. You are not being oppressed.
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:)

I haven't had them trying to ruin my life (yet), but ive seen them ruin the lives of others, and that alone makes me angry and want to take action.

And whether I am being opressed as an individual or not, I have been put into a box by equality activists, and they have called the box "middle aged, middle class white men". And they are opressing my box.


As for where I am in this discussion, I'm currently fighting wih myself over whether to take part, seeing as my current estimate for responding to the first paragraph - on the tampon tax - of your first comment, includes around half a day of research.
 
lennypops said:
Lol. Chill out. Look around you. See the feminazis climbing through the windows trying to ruin your life? See the PC brigade actively looking to hold you down and cut you up? Take all your stuff?

Nah. You're fine. It's okay. You are not being oppressed.
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Agreed
Don't see this as a zero sum game. People who feel that they are disadvantaged act differently and change the world for the worse. Even if they are wrong. Acting in a way that takes better account of other's perceptions and weaknesses makes the whole world a happier place through positive feedback.

For me it is not political correctness that is the issue - it is politeness. If i always act in the way that I'd be happy for people to act towards me then that is likely to work well. Too often in the past there have been classes of people in the world where the people in powerful positions (usually white, older men) have ignored this simple rule and we are now all feeling the backlash.
 
lennypops said:
The link between what and what though?
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Neanderthal man and another neanderthal man, I think.
PowerSpurs said:
I agree it is very important that we can interact with others without taking offence at the slightest thing, but I think you are underestimating the amount that people feel bullied in the world we live in.
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This is a massive part of the problem, though.
I don't care if somebody feels bullied. I do care if they actually have been bullied. That's not the same thing.
 
RobSpur said:
:)

I haven't had them trying to ruin my life (yet), but ive seen them ruin the lives of others, and that alone makes me angry and want to take action.

And whether I am being opressed as an individual or not, I have been put into a box by equality activists, and they have called the box "middle aged, middle class white men". And they are opressing my box.


As for where I am in this discussion, I'm currently fighting wih myself over whether to take part, seeing as my current estimate for responding to the first paragraph - on the tampon tax - of your first comment, includes around half a day of research.
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Wrote my previous post before seeing this!
The box you are being put in is the group that has historically wielded power in the world and has often wielded it to the major disadvantage of some groups. It is just an example of negative feedback.
 
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