site posted:

So I'm just getting around to reading about Umberto Eco's Ur-Fascism concept and I was wondering if anyone could give me a rundown (or at least provide a link to one) of why it's full of poo poo. I've seen it criticized here on the boards in passing before so I guess there's problems with it.

site posted:

So I'm just getting around to reading about Umberto Eco's Ur-Fascism concept and I was wondering if anyone could give me a rundown (or at least provide a link to one) of why it's full of poo poo. I've seen it criticized here on the boards in passing before so I guess there's problems with it.

site posted:

So I'm just getting around to reading about Umberto Eco's Ur-Fascism concept and I was wondering if anyone could give me a rundown (or at least provide a link to one) of why it's full of poo poo. I've seen it criticized here on the boards in passing before so I guess there's problems with it.

E-Tank posted:

I'm having issues convincing my mother that ISIS is not in fact, here in America and going to kill us all or things like that. Also that ISIS is in fact dying out, it's just a slow and drawn out death. Like she believes that ISIS is the biggest threat facing America at this moment.

Any suggestions on what I might use to convince her otherwise?

quote:

The U.S. charged six Minnesota men on Monday in connection with attempts to join Islamic State, exposing a network of young Somali-Americans who allegedly tried to help each other get to Syria.

The case involves one of the largest groups of would-be foreign fighters charged so far amid a stepped-up effort by authorities to stop Americans from traveling to join extremist groups in Iraq and Syria. It also underscores how Westerners who have succeeded in joining the fight act as a draw on the friends they left behind.

Some ISIL rear end in a top hat posted:

"I swear by God, their planes did not leave the air, day and night; they did airstrikes all day and night. They targeted everything. They even attacked motorcycles; they have not left a building standing. But by God willing we will return and we will have our revenge multiplied."

fade5 posted:

On the "here in America" front, the US just arrested six people who attempted to go join ISIL, so basically you can say that we're already successfully monitoring anything that could pop up:

Relatedly, point out that most of the time the story is that some idiot is trying leave the US (or whatever country) and go die in the desert fight with ISIL, rather than ISIL trying to come here to the US. On the "ISIL is dying" front, here's a new story about how ISIL has lost more than 25% of their territory that they once held:
http://edition.cnn.com/2015/04/15/middleeast/isis-loses-territory-iraq/index.html

The big answer to how that was achieved: airstrikes.
You can show her this hilariously long list of US airstrikes against ISIL, and ask her if she's heard of Kobani, and then point out/remind/explain to her that ISIL at full strength was successfully repelled from Kobani by YPG/YPJ Kurdish irregulars and US airstrikes (and FSA groups), with ISIL losing ~1200 of their fighters in a mini version of Stalingrad.

Not only has that return not happened, ISIL has been pushed even further back by literal daily US airstrikes; I did a summary on US airstrikes in Kobani (as of late February) here, and it really shows how US airpower has helped to beat back ISIL. (To be honest it's almost terrifying how effective airstrikes are.)

If you really want/need to bring the point home, show her a couple videos of US airstrikes on ISIL (maybe even the famous Tel Shaer one in my AV), to bring home the point that US air power makes ISIL a basically non-existent threat to us.

fade5 posted:

On the "here in America" front, the US just arrested six people who attempted to go join ISIL, so basically you can say that we're already successfully monitoring anything that could pop up:

Relatedly, point out that most of the time the story is that some idiot is trying leave the US (or whatever country) and go die in the desert fight with ISIL, rather than ISIL trying to come here to the US. On the "ISIL is dying" front, here's a new story about how ISIL has lost more than 25% of their territory that they once held:
http://edition.cnn.com/2015/04/15/middleeast/isis-loses-territory-iraq/index.html

The big answer to how that was achieved: airstrikes.
You can show her this hilariously long list of US airstrikes against ISIL, and ask her if she's heard of Kobani, and then point out/remind/explain to her that ISIL at full strength was successfully repelled from Kobani by YPG/YPJ Kurdish irregulars and US airstrikes (and FSA groups), with ISIL losing ~1200 of their fighters in a mini version of Stalingrad.

Not only has that return not happened, ISIL has been pushed even further back by literal daily US airstrikes; I did a summary on US airstrikes in Kobani (as of late February) here, and it really shows how US airpower has helped to beat back ISIL. (To be honest it's almost terrifying how effective airstrikes are.)

If you really want/need to bring the point home, show her a couple videos of US airstrikes on ISIL (maybe even the famous Tel Shaer one in my AV), to bring home the point that US air power makes ISIL a basically non-existent threat to us.

quote:

But it is not enough for me to stand before you tonight and condemn riots. It would be morally irresponsible for me to do that without, at the same time, condemning the contingent, intolerable conditions that exist in our society. These conditions are the things that cause individuals to feel that they have no other alternative than to engage in violent rebellions to get attention. And I must say tonight that a riot is the language of the unheard. And what is it America has failed to hear? It has failed to hear that the plight of the negro poor has worsened over the last twelve or fifteen years. It has failed to hear that the promises of freedom and justice have not been met. And it has failed to hear that large segments of white society are more concerned about tranquility and the status quo than about justice and humanity.

quote:

The first thing I would like to mention is that there must be a recognition on the part of everybody in this nation that America is still a racist country. Now however unpleasant that sounds, it is the truth. And we will never solve the problem of racism until there is a recognition of the fact that racism still stands at the center of so much of our nation and we must see racism for what it is. It is the nymph of an inferior people. It is the notion that one group has all of the knowledge, all of the insights, all of the purity, all of the work, all of the dignity. And another group is worthless, on a lower level of humanity, inferior.

quote:

Secondly, we've got to get rid of two or three myths that still pervade our nation. One is the myth of time. I'm sure you've heard this notion. It is the notion that only time can solve the problem of racial injustice. And I've heard it from many sincere people. They've said to the negro and/to his allies in the white community you should slow up, you're pushing things too fast, only time can solve the problem. And if you'll just be nice and patient and continue to pray, in a hundred or two hundred years the problem will work itself out. There is an answer to that myth. It is the time is neutral. It can be used either constructively or destructively. And I'm sad to say to you tonight I'm absolutely convinced that the forces of ill will in our nation, the forces on the wrong side in our nation, the extreme righteous of our nation have often used time much more effectively than the forces of good will and it may well be that we may have to repent in this generation not merely for the vitriolic words of the bad people who will say bad things in a meeting like this or who will bomb a church in Birmingham, Alabama, but for the appalling silence and indifference of the good people who sit around and say wait on time. Somewhere we must come to see that human progress never rolls in on the wheels of inevitability, it comes through the tireless efforts and the persistent work of dedicated individuals who are willing to be co-workers with God and without this hard work time itself becomes an ally of the primitive forces of social stagnation. And so we must always help time and realize that the time is always right to do right.

quote:

Now there is another myth and that is the notion that legislation can't solve the problem that you've got to change the heart and naturally I believe in changing the heart. I happen to be a Baptist preacher and that puts me in the heart changing business and Sunday after Sunday I'm preaching about conversion and the need for the new birth and re-generation. I believe that there's something wrong with human nature. I believe in original sin not in terms of the historical event but as the mythological category to explain the universality of evil, so I'm honest enough to see the gone-wrongness of human nature so naturally I'm not against changing the heart and I do feel that that is the half truth involved here, that there is some truth in the whole question of changing the heart. We are not going to have the kind of society that we should have until the white person treats the negro right - not because the law says it but because it's natural because it's right and because the black man is the white man's brother. I'll be the first to say that we will never have a truly integrated society, a truly colorless society until men and women are obedient to the unenforceable. But after saying that, let me point out the other side. It may be true that morality cannot be legislated, but behavior can be regulated. It may be true that the law cannot change the heart but it can restrain the heartless. It may be true that the law can't make a man love me, but it can restrain him from lynching me, and I think that's pretty important also.

quote:

And so while legislation may not change the hearts of men, it does change the habits of men when it's vigorously enforced and when you change the habits of people pretty soon attitudes begin to be changed and people begin to see that they can do things that fears caused them to feel that they could never do. And I say that there's a need still for strong civil rights legislation in various areas. There's legislation in Congress right now dealing with the whole question of housing and equal administration of justice and these things are very important for I submit to you tonight that there is no more dangerous development in our nation than the constant building up of predominantly negro central cities ringed by white suburbs. This will do nothing but invite social disaster. And this problem has to be dealt with - some through legislation, some through education, but it has to be dealt with in a very concrete and meaningful manner.

quote:

You may well ask: "Why direct action? Why sit ins, marches and so forth? Isn't negotiation a better path?" You are quite right in calling for negotiation. Indeed, this is the very purpose of direct action. Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community which has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue. It seeks so to dramatize the issue that it can no longer be ignored. My citing the creation of tension as part of the work of the nonviolent resister may sound rather shocking. But I must confess that I am not afraid of the word "tension." I have earnestly opposed violent tension, but there is a type of constructive, nonviolent tension which is necessary for growth. Just as Socrates felt that it was necessary to create a tension in the mind so that individuals could rise from the bondage of myths and half truths to the unfettered realm of creative analysis and objective appraisal, so must we see the need for nonviolent gadflies to create the kind of tension in society that will help men rise from the dark depths of prejudice and racism to the majestic heights of understanding and brotherhood. The purpose of our direct action program is to create a situation so crisis packed that it will inevitably open the door to negotiation. I therefore concur with you in your call for negotiation. Too long has our beloved Southland been bogged down in a tragic effort to live in monologue rather than dialogue.

quote:

We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed. Frankly, I have yet to engage in a direct action campaign that was "well timed" in the view of those who have not suffered unduly from the disease of segregation. For years now I have heard the word "Wait!" It rings in the ear of every Negro with piercing familiarity. This "Wait" has almost always meant "Never." We must come to see, with one of our distinguished jurists, that "justice too long delayed is justice denied."

quote:

I must make two honest confessions to you, my Christian and Jewish brothers. First, I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen's Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to "order" than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: "I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action"; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man's freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a "more convenient season."

Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.

quote:

In your statement you assert that our actions, even though peaceful, must be condemned because they precipitate violence. But is this a logical assertion? Isn't this like condemning a robbed man because his possession of money precipitated the evil act of robbery? Isn't this like condemning Socrates because his unswerving commitment to truth and his philosophical inquiries precipitated the act by the misguided populace in which they made him drink hemlock? Isn't this like condemning Jesus because his unique God consciousness and never ceasing devotion to God's will precipitated the evil act of crucifixion? We must come to see that, as the federal courts have consistently affirmed, it is wrong to urge an individual to cease his efforts to gain his basic constitutional rights because the quest may precipitate violence. Society must protect the robbed and punish the robber.

quote:

Oppressed people cannot remain oppressed forever. The yearning for freedom eventually manifests itself, and that is what has happened to the American Negro. Something within has reminded him of his birthright of freedom, and something without has reminded him that it can be gained. Consciously or unconsciously, he has been caught up by the Zeitgeist, and with his black brothers of Africa and his brown and yellow brothers of Asia, South America and the Caribbean, the United States Negro is moving with a sense of great urgency toward the promised land of racial justice. If one recognizes this vital urge that has engulfed the Negro community, one should readily understand why public demonstrations are taking place. The Negro has many pent up resentments and latent frustrations, and he must release them. So let him march; let him make prayer pilgrimages to the city hall; let him go on freedom rides -and try to understand why he must do so. If his repressed emotions are not released in nonviolent ways, they will seek expression through violence; this is not a threat but a fact of history.

quote:

I have tried to say that this normal and healthy discontent can be channeled into the creative outlet of nonviolent direct action. And now this approach is being termed extremist. But though I was initially disappointed at being categorized as an extremist, as I continued to think about the matter I gradually gained a measure of satisfaction from the label. Was not Jesus an extremist for love: "Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you." Was not Amos an extremist for justice: "Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever flowing stream." Was not Paul an extremist for the Christian gospel: "I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus." Was not Martin Luther an extremist: "Here I stand; I cannot do otherwise, so help me God." And John Bunyan: "I will stay in jail to the end of my days before I make a butchery of my conscience." And Abraham Lincoln: "This nation cannot survive half slave and half free." And Thomas Jefferson: "We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal . . ." So the question is not whether we will be extremists, but what kind of extremists we will be. Will we be extremists for hate or for love? Will we be extremists for the preservation of injustice or for the extension of justice? In that dramatic scene on Calvary's hill three men were crucified. We must never forget that all three were crucified for the same crime--the crime of extremism. Two were extremists for immorality, and thus fell below their environment. The other, Jesus Christ, was an extremist for love, truth and goodness, and thereby rose above his environment. Perhaps the South, the nation and the world are in dire need of creative extremists.

quote:

Urban riots must now be recognized as durable social phenomena. They may be deplored, but they are there and should be understood. Urban riots are a special form of violence. They are not insurrections. The rioters are not seeking to seize territory or to attain control of institutions. They are mainly intended to shock the white community. They are a distorted form of social protest. The looting which is their principal feature serves many functions. It enables the most enraged and deprived Negro to take hold of consumer goods with the ease the white man does by using his purse. Often the Negro does not even want what he takes; he wants the experience of taking. But most of all, alienated from society and knowing that this society cherishes property above people, he is shocking it by abusing property rights. There are thus elements of emotional catharsis in the violent act. This may explain why most cities in which riots have occurred have not had a repetition, even though the causative conditions remain. It is also noteworthy that the amount of physical harm done to white people other than police is infinitesimal and in Detroit whites and Negroes looted in unity.

quote:

A profound judgment of today's riots was expressed by Victor Hugo a century ago. He said, 'If a soul is left in the darkness, sins will be committed. The guilty one is not he who commits the sin, but he who causes the darkness.'

The policymakers of the white society have caused the darkness; they create discrimination; they structured slums; and they perpetuate unemployment, ignorance and poverty. It is incontestable and deplorable that Negroes have committed crimes; but they are derivative crimes. They are born of the greater crimes of the white society. When we ask Negroes to abide by the law, let us also demand that the white man abide by law in the ghettos. Day-in and day-out he violates welfare laws to deprive the poor of their meager allotments; he flagrantly violates building codes and regulations; his police make a mockery of law; and he violates laws on equal employment and education and the provisions for civic services. The slums are the handiwork of a vicious system of the white society; Negroes live in them but do not make them any more than a prisoner makes a prison. Let us say boldly that if the violations of law by the white man in the slums over the years were calculated and compared with the law-breaking of a few days of riots, the hardened criminal would be the white man. These are often difficult things to say but I have come to see more and more that it is necessary to utter the truth in order to deal with the great problems that we face in our society.

quote:

There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, “When will you be satisfied?” We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality.

icantfindaname posted:

If you watch TV and radio interviews with MLK from the 1960s it's amazing how much the attitudes of the interviewers towards the Civil Rights movement mirror the attitudes of people towards the protestors today. It's pretty much 100% bitching that the blacks aren't satisfied with the tiny concessions they've already been given and why won't you just shut up, go away and leave us poor white middle class folks alone ??????

icantfindaname posted:

If you watch TV and radio interviews with MLK from the 1960s it's amazing how much the attitudes of the interviewers towards the Civil Rights movement mirror the attitudes of people towards the protestors today. It's pretty much 100% bitching that the blacks aren't satisfied with the tiny concessions they've already been given and why won't you just shut up, go away and leave us poor white middle class folks alone ??????

Zeitgueist posted:

Yeh I've commented this several times, but surprise bigoted white nerds dont' know or care to know the history of civil rights before using them as a bludgeon to silence minority voices in the same way their grandparents did

i had a dude tell me that there were no riots during civil rights protests in the 60's the other day in response to a literal quote from MLK on rioting

FISHMANPET posted:

I mean, short of full communism I'm just not sure there's anything you can actually do to keep the rich from getting what they want.

FISHMANPET posted:

I think trying to put hard limits in place via laws often just ends up shifting things around. The free market is smarter and more nimble than laws are. Look at CAFE standards and how it changed the cars that were built. The letter of the law was followed but the spirit was not. The free market decided that working around the rules was more profitable than just complying with the spirit of the law. If instead of complex CAFE standards, gas was just taxed more heavily, there may have been a different shift in vehicle production towards more fuel efficient vehicles, rather than just inventing vehicles to fit into a category that had less stringent standards.

quote:

Bullshit. First, the "free market" doesn't think and second, the free market isn't omnipotent and isn't God. The worship of the "free market" is what got us into the mess we're in.

FISHMANPET posted:

Realizing that people respond to incentives doesn't mean worship of the free market, it's just a realistic evaluation of how people interact with rules and regulations around them.

There's no omnipotent singular "free market" yet somehow almost every car maker is selling minivans and SUVs and almost nobody is making station wagons.

quote:

The "free market" is not "smarter" than laws because neither one thinks!

Honestly, this idea of the invisible hand is very dangerous. The "free market" is not a benevolent being out to do us good. It has in many, many, many ways done exactly the opposite.

Your outlook is not unlike those who think evolution has a "goal."

And that's somehow good for us? I'd rather have the station wagons.

The ultimate goal is to do things that are good for us, right? Making money is a side-effect. The fact that we have this backward in our society is a large part of what ills us.

FISHMANPET posted:

I agree that I'd rather have the station wagons. But because CAFE standards are they way they are, car makers build minivans instead of station wagons. That's the outcome of the laws setting hard limits. Maybe we'd have different outcomes if we just applied gas taxes instead.

And saying that laws and the free market don't think is just being pointlessly pedantic. The actors that comprise the "free market" are more crafty (maybe smarter wasn't the best word) and more nimble than the people and process that comprise the "law." I'm sure the writers of CAFE standards didn't intend to destroy the station wagon and bring about the minivan and the suv, but it happened. It was an unexpected outcome. I'm sure the intention was for cars and trucks to become more fuel efficient but to hold them to different standards because they're different, but the outcome was that instead we got more "trucks" and fewer "cars."

So laws can be created with the best of intentions, but the "free market" (in the car case, auto makers, in the NYC case, the global elite) follows the letter of the law, not the spirit of the law. So is it possible to wrote a law that let's some people do a thing but not let other people do a thing, and somehow have all the desired people able to do the thing and the rest not able to do the thing? I'm not so sure it is, at least not in our country's current economic system. At the very least, to do it would be so burdensome on enforcers and good actors that the "loss" from enforcing the law would outweigh the benefits it's desired to create.

Just tax the drat things, it's way easier.

FISHMANPET posted:

Buried alive posted:

I..can't make heads or tails of what you two are actually arguing about. I mean, your stance seems to be something like "Regulation is ineffective because the market can work around it," with 'the market' being used as a loose substitute for private actors with lots of resources. Since regulation is ineffective, tax the hell out of things instead.

His stance seems to be something like, "You are mischaracterizing what a market is and markets aren't all that great anyway," but you aren't coming out as 'let the free market reign supreme!' so you both seem to be talking past each other. I mean..I'd ask him what he thinks you think of markets as a starting point.

Also your stance needs some nuance or it's just self-defeating. If markets are good at getting around regulation, we can't just tax stuff because taxes are also regulations. You'll have to say what's so great about taxing stuff that it's likely it will work when other forms of regulation won't. Unless you've already done that and just didn't bring it up here in which case, well, there you go.

FISHMANPET posted:

Yeah, basically my stance was tax it to the point where either NYC is no longer a good place for the global elite to park their capital (the premise being that the global elite are buying expensive units and leaving them empty). That's not good for housing affordability because we should build units that people live in (and the poor aren't going to live these units but the global elite are displacing local 100 millionaires who now are buying slightly less nice apartments displacing regular millionaires etc etc). His stance was just make it illegal to buy an apartment and not live in it, which I said is reaaaaalllllly difficult to enforce. A tax would be easier to implement (kick up the property taxes to insane rates if the value is absolute $50 million or whatever) and it either makes these uber units no longer be profitable so they aren't built and bought by the global elite, or it still makes financial sense to build and buy them, but the city gets a huge pile of money for affordable housing. There was quite a bit I cut out of mine and also other people chiming in. And I made the analogy of CAFE standards having consequences that were unintended. The goal was to lower emissions but it ended up in many ways creating a market for larger vehicles that are less fuel efficient. I think a smarter move would have been higher fuel taxes, perhaps even setting a price floor on gas, and let the market react to that. But anyway I feel pretty sound on my argument there.

My problem is with him specifically. And that sounds rude, but there's a group of like 10ish of us that know each other in real life and some of us have actually met this guy but we've basically all came to the conclusion that he's... off somehow. Which I guess is what I was trying to express. Like I said, it's hard to convey without dumping the thousands of posts of him and other people engaging with him. But I always come back to my analogy about losing station wagons, and all I can think is "He read all that, and somehow he got out of it that I'm glad there aren't station wagons anymore?" He just aproaches everything with this incredible naievete, and has absolutely no ability to grasp nuance or subtlty or be able to read between the lines or anything. He takes everything you say at absolute face value. Most discussions involve people talking past each other because he can't really properly engage with anyone. He has a wife and kids, a good engineering job, is active in the community (and this can all be independently verified), etc etc. He is for all intents and purposes a fully functional adult. Yet he seems to have a very poor grasp on communication.

Mostly I'm here to vent, but also I'm hoping there's some small chance that there's some DSM listed condition called bad-internet-debater-itis, and/or some help engaging with him.

Jerry Manderbilt posted:

Added two more quotes by MLK on riots to my megapost.

Volkerball posted:

its because Y% of white people deserve to have crimes done on them, so more black people have to commit crimes because there are a lot more whites and not very many minoritys per capital to stab them

Volkerball posted:

the knowledge has been pooled

Volkerball posted:

white people control the media, even BET, and so they make up the stories people follow. they only do stories on guys who its easy to argue against. like all they talk all about are guys who were shot when someone can just say "oh well he stole a candy bar and then was going to fight that cop" or "he was beating that man up, of course he shot a gun at him," and so those are the stories that white and black people talk about. the news dont talk about the people who didn't do anything to get shot though. the truth is that 93% of black people who get shot or killed are kids on the honor role who had their hands up and at their sides, and who didn't do something to get shot at by the man who also called them niggers four times first.

Accretionist posted:

Any good articles on the origins of suicide bombings? I've got someone who I can probably get to read one article before he quits and who looks like he's simply internalized an Appeal to Ignorance of, "If not Islam, then what? Clearly still just Islam."

Accretionist posted:

Any good articles on the origins of suicide bombings? I've got someone who I can probably get to read one article before he quits and who looks like he's simply internalized an Appeal to Ignorance of, "If not Islam, then what? Clearly still just Islam."

Cingulate posted:

Do you have any convictions here?

quote:

And is the question about Islam being a necessary precondition for suicide bombings (which is obviously silly), or of it being a sufficient condition?

Dr. Arbitrary posted:

I think the Tamil Tigers were among the first to use suicide vests and belts.

Cingulate posted:

And you don't think that for any given islamist suicide bomber, their specific, individual religion is an important motive?