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RE: It’s hotter than   You are logged in as Guest
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Ricardo

Posts: 14797
Joined: Dec. 14 2004
From: Washington DC

RE: It’s hotter than (in reply to kitarist

quote:

Wait, are you saying that potholer54 claims he traced the falsifications and manipulations of the temperature record to falsely claim scientists were wrong about global warming to a single individual making a mistake at one point?


No. I was searching for how Koch was involved in fake science manipulation. The way the data was manipulated was explained at the time stamp, by an individual at CATO, once a scientist later acting for political reasons (no doubt the science background allowed him to see how he could fudge the error margins in order to show a misleading inference of failed prediction), who also admits to 40% funding by oil industry (Koch etc). A second individual at CATO was a public spokesperson that trusted the colleague was informed to look closer at the actual prediction scenarios and realized his colleague had knowingly been misleading, and thusly changed his public position, that being the climate prediction was dead on. But it took a personal effort on his part to understand the problem. Most people are not making that effort.

Now as to the reason for knowingly cherry picking and fudging data, it is easy to see how that natural tendency goes with a belief system, not necessarily for malicious intent. There is a general insinuation that it all goes back to evil oil industry….as shown they would be knowingly hurting themselves financially by deliberately doing this. It makes more sense that simple ignorance to the problem coupled with a belief system perpetuates these problems. I have not yet seen the peer reviewed scientists on the take getting published other than in the fake journals possibly. Even there, I have found fake science coming from individuals that have a belief system they publicize openly.

I am simply saying the number of evil individuals working in this regard seems to be minimal regarding climate misinformation, vast majority based on ignorance of the subject.

_____________________________

CD's and transcriptions available here:
www.ricardomarlow.com
  REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |  Date Aug. 26 2021 21:14:50
 
Ricardo

Posts: 14797
Joined: Dec. 14 2004
From: Washington DC

RE: It’s hotter than (in reply to estebanana

quote:

So I come back to the Foro and say to this august member that I read the paper and laid out very quickly why the site that used it is wrong and manipulative. Then pointed out that the website excerpted the paper out of context and that I knew the one of the principal investigators, adding I can invite him to clarify any if this on the Foro. The guitar maker who challenged me then said he doesn’t want to talk about climate politics online and immediately left the conversation, never to return to the Off Topic section.


Ok, so he is now completely educated on the subject and ignoring the debate because he wants to align with the evil oil industry? Or perhaps he realizes he doesn’t understand and needs to look deeper? And why did the site creator have the wrong conclusion? Are they evil, confused, believe the conclusion but want everyone to not understand it, or did they cherry pick for their own belief system?

Anyway what you did is exactly what potholer54 has been exposing….people getting info from wrong sources not checking the original. For guys like you potholer54 and Kitarist that might be fun and easy, but for most people it is tedious. Ok I’ll vote for you too

_____________________________

CD's and transcriptions available here:
www.ricardomarlow.com
  REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |  Date Aug. 26 2021 21:25:40
 
estebanana

Posts: 9351
Joined: Oct. 16 2009
 

RE: It’s hotter than (in reply to Ricardo

He showed the wrong information because he didn’t take the time to make sure the information was vetted. I said the information was being used out of context and he collapsed, he gave up. Because he was proved wrong his old man ego couldn’t take being shown he was incorrect so he said I don’t discuss politics. Before he was shown his information was incorrect he was pleased with himself for complaining about ‘troublesome liberal thinking’.

I was within my rights to nail him. Elsewhere on other social media, the same guy started complaining that us young guys didn’t understand the honest work of being a coal miner. ( pretty sure he was never a coal miner himself) My great grandfather from Sweden was a coal miner in Iowa, he’d previously been a train conductor in Sweden. He chased my great grandmother here and the job he could get in was mining coal.

My great grandfather told my grandfather, don’t become a coal miner. He said it was a horrible job.

Today the coal industry is obsolete and being kept on life support by a few powerful lobbies in a very limited region who have influence over politicians. Coal is over with. Yet our fellow argued with a few younger guitarists who assured him coal mining isn’t a viable or lovely job. He retreated back into a defensive stance on it. This is a bit tricky because I viewed his behavior over different social media sites and came to a conclusion about what he thinks and how much his ego was engaged. Those seeing it from one online vantage point wouldn’t see my overarching view. He was as they say ‘cruisin’ for a bruisin’

You don’t have to placate old duffers who are rigid that refuse to do the intellectual work. Anyone who can read is responsible for themselves and responsible to suss out the facts. If they can’t, they can’t. But I’m not interested in coddling them. I learned this from Kant, it’s an argument related to the Catagorical Imperative ~

On the topic of changing opinions and hearts one person at a time, that’s also not me. Others can do that and it’s viable and probably works, but I’m more adept at looking to bigger systemic problems. I’m interested in universals, structurally looking at cultural issues and sometimes creating polemic discussions about them. That’s what works for me. I’m certainly not opposed to the person to person type of heart changing, but I live in the f-Ing moon as far as the English speaking world is available to me. Now in my situation teaching in the Japanese school system I have great sway with colleagues and even administrators who seek my opinions. I’m in a position to represent Americans in my city and I do it in a fair way. Online is different, I’m better at dropping items that some will disagree with, but I leave my opinions in a way they can be developed by another speaker or straight up refuted.


The reason I see structural racism is because it exists, and although not everyone who sees it wants to mention it, it’s a topic I find unavoidable.

On voting rights at the moment there are 30 states that are controlled by Republican state legislatures that have some form of the same bill they are trying to pass. The gist of the bill says that it will make it possible for the majority of a state legislature to override the system of votes reported an election. Each state sends electors votes to the federal government for certification, but the republicans bills seek to be override the electors chosen by voters and send the ones they select.

This is a systems problem that an earnest heart to heart talk with some nice guy you meet will not change the outcome of them passing these bills, which are by context, racist. These bills are strategized to negate minority voters and urban voters. The only ways to beat these unfair and institutionally racist tactics is to talk about them in a way that’s going to connect with lots of people.

Where I live I often get questioned to clarify something in US politics, because the media here us as clumsy as US media. But I dish it out with moderated language. When Mitch McConnell kicks the bucket am I going to celebrate? Oh yes because I despise that bastard. Will I tell those around me that I’m obsessed with his demise? No, it’s not important in the context of problems they ask my opinions on. They ask me a lot of questions about what I judge to be good ways to look at intercultural stuff. For example my boss, much to his credit, might ask me what a situation looks like through American eyes because they are trying to deal with a problem that a biracial kid is having in class. That’s where I have responsibilities to be honest and sensitive. The rest of the time dealing with English speakers I shoot my mouth off.

Another perspective is that I live in a place where there are maybe five or six Americans in a 50 mile radius, I only know one of them. I don’t socialize with any of them. I take a lot of annoying Sh¥t every day, not so much anymore, but still it continues. People ask me stupid questions like, “how to you survive? Can you eat Japanese food?” Or walking down the street one day a lady saw me coming and rolled up her car windows and slammed the electric door locks. Then looked at me like I was a criminal when I walked passed. I thought yeah, ok that’s how that black dude in Oakland felt when he walked through the parking lot in Montclair Whitey white neighborhood.

I don’t react, I just set nervous people at ease and carry on. I’m doing more than my share of global nice guy stuff.

_____________________________

https://www.stephenfaulkguitars.com
  REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |  Date Aug. 27 2021 1:48:07
 
Ricardo

Posts: 14797
Joined: Dec. 14 2004
From: Washington DC

RE: It’s hotter than (in reply to estebanana

quote:

Then looked at me like I was a criminal when I walked passed. I thought yeah, ok that’s how that black dude in Oakland felt when he walked through the parking lot in Montclair Whitey white neighborhood.


While that teaches you empathy for minorities in general, does it not also show that “WHITE privilege” is only good if you are in a WHITE majority area? I mean why didn’t your white privilege put those people in check or at ease? Did you suddenly lose it when you left the states? I was told by Turkish friends that when they are in a white neighborhood they don’t bother to lock the doors and feel at ease, at the same time had no desire hanging out with them or making friends. Then there was my mom’s Indian friend said if I lived with Turks I should sleep with a knife under my pillow! Ha ha! I was thinking THAT type of belief system is showing White Privilege (assumption that an average joe whitey is not dangerous but other ethnicities might be).

So I don’t get what the fear in Japan would be, unless there are “white gangs” or something going on there. Maybe it was just she was afraid of MEN and your skin color had nothing to do with it? In any case, majorities will pass bills no matter what color/creed/language they are, that make their own feel most comfortable.

_____________________________

CD's and transcriptions available here:
www.ricardomarlow.com
  REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |  Date Aug. 28 2021 18:41:06
 
BarkellWH

Posts: 3458
Joined: Jul. 12 2009
From: Washington, DC

RE: It’s hotter than (in reply to estebanana

quote:

Then looked at me like I was a criminal when I walked passed. I thought yeah, ok that’s how that black dude in Oakland felt when he walked through the parking lot in Montclair Whitey white neighborhood.


Actually, many blacks feel safer in a white neighborhood than they do in their own crime-infested neighborhoods. Remember Jesse Jackson's observation when he was running for president in the 1984 campaign, quoted below.

“There is nothing more painful to me at this stage in my life than to walk down the street and hear footsteps... then turn around and see somebody white and feel relieved.”

I have no idea whether or not that white walking behind Jesse Jackson was exercising his "white privilege," but I imagine Jackson's relief was much more pronounced than it would have been if he had heard those footsteps behind him in your "black dude's" Oakland.

And by the way, something the media are extremely reluctant to discuss is that many of the recent assaults on Asians in the United States, particularly in Oakland, New York, Brooklyn, Detroit, and other cities, are perpetrated by blacks. And whenever there is an inner city riot, whether in Baltimore, Los Angeles, Brooklyn, or elsewhere, the first thing the rioters trash and loot, after trashing and looting the nearest CVS, are Korean grocery stores.

Which brings up another recent phenomenon, that of applying the term "people of color" to, as is repeated ad nauseum, "black" and "brown" people. No one today applies the term to Asians, I think because Asians as a group have cultural characteristics that lead to family honor, hard work, and academic achievement that are not often found in the so-called "black" and "brown" communities of "color."

Yet, many successful Asians come from very moderate, even poor, circumstances. The difference is largely one of culture and attitude. It is not racism to recognize that certain social pathologies exist among many black communities that inhibit taking advantage of education and opportunities that in many cases could lead to reasonable success. That is not the whole story by any means, but it is a significant element if one wants to understand the differences in achievement among minorities.

Bill

_____________________________

And the end of the fight is a tombstone white,
With the name of the late deceased,
And the epitaph drear, "A fool lies here,
Who tried to hustle the East."

--Rudyard Kipling
  REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |  Date Aug. 28 2021 20:09:58
 
estebanana

Posts: 9351
Joined: Oct. 16 2009
 

RE: It’s hotter than (in reply to Ricardo

quote:

While that teaches you empathy for minorities in general, does it not also show that “WHITE privilege” is only good if you are in a WHITE majority area? I mean why didn’t your white privilege put those people in check or at ease? Did you suddenly lose it when you left the states?


The reference to the white neighborhood shopping district parking lot needs a bit more context- in Oakland I lived in several different areas, I lived in a neighborhood around 30th and San Pablo which is a rough patch of West Oakland ( now I hear there is a TV show about the gentrification of West O) I lived there 2010 2012 - my neighborhood was mostly black. Credence a guy in my building was talking about the difference between police time responses in Montclair vs San Pablo and 3oth.

There was an abandoned car, stolen, left in an intersection. Kids were trying to play in it, third grader age. I called the police to get a tow because we feared kids would be injured if another car hit the stolen car by accident. The dispatcher told me that there was a murder investigation going on a few blocks away that was taking up all the resources and man power. We’d have to wait. So we pushed the car out of the intersection and watched it to shoo kids away from being curious. It took until 4pm for the cops to get out and tow it.

Credence says by contrast if a white lady gets her purse stolen in Montclair the
Cops are there in under three minutes looking for any non white guy on the scene. And this is true.

Why the woman locked her door ? It’s because I’m tall and foreign and it shocked her she didn’t know what to expect.

The reason I told the story was to illustrate how in America white guys don’t often have an experience that turns the situation around on them to be the object of fear. It’s not common for a white person to be perceived as a menacing figure. And I know it was about my otherness that frightened her because it’s an area that where the cafe I go to doesn’t lock the door at night. It’s a homogeneous population and she was shocked to see a non japanese person, let alone a tall long haired white guy. I looked like every drug addled hippie the conservatives in government warned her about.

Another reason I related that story is to contrast it with my school district’s administration and teachers who have sensitivity to mixed race kids and neuro divergent kids. In the West, Japan often gets talked a like it’s a cultural monolith, platitudes like ‘the nail that sticks up gets hammered down’ abound. But it’s not the case. Even though it’s a homogeneous country, cultural attitudes are diverse and constantly changing on social issues. The old stigmas against admitting you have a neuro divergent child are breaking down and school systems are putting in programs to accommodate kids who fit in different ways of learning.

My contrast of experiencing the perception of being feared with seeing how the school system is working to be aware that older ways of teaching or organization of schools needs to be updated shows that Japan isn’t a hive mentality as much as Western platitudes enforce. I hear it from both sides, I hear cultural stereo typecasting in both directions constantly.


It requires I observe as a still point and take a modicum of flak from both sides. But my white privilege remains, only modified and occasionally subjected to challenge that one wouldn’t get in America. I’m
Not making any equivalence argument between the things I experience and a reduction in white privilege, but I’m reporting what I observe from the place of being in the minority and there is some value there.

_____________________________

https://www.stephenfaulkguitars.com
  REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |  Date Aug. 29 2021 1:46:23
 
estebanana

Posts: 9351
Joined: Oct. 16 2009
 

RE: It’s hotter than (in reply to BarkellWH

quote:

Yet, many successful Asians come from very moderate, even poor, circumstances. The difference is largely one of culture and attitude. It is not racism to recognize that certain social pathologies exist among many black communities that inhibit taking advantage of education and opportunities that in many cases could lead to reasonable success. That is not the whole story by any means, but it is a significant element if one wants to understand the differences in achievement among minorities.


The paths out of all black or mostly black areas of cities are not as simple as big self determination wins the prizes. There are outside stigma problems against black neighborhoods that cause them to often times receive less school funding. And the difference between black cultural self determination and Asian historically has been one of making black progress invisible at the same time Asian progress is made visible. There’s also a long history in the US of making progress exponentially more difficult for black business owners and property buyers.

I’ll just let that sit because it’s a thing that lots of information is available on.

_____________________________

https://www.stephenfaulkguitars.com
  REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |  Date Aug. 29 2021 3:13:57
 
estebanana

Posts: 9351
Joined: Oct. 16 2009
 

RE: It’s hotter than (in reply to Ricardo

I’ve been stopped in two airports by the security. Once in Guatemala City because the metronome in my suitcase on the cargo loader was clicking. They came and got me in the passenger area with machine guns and took me back to open the suitcase and remove the battery. It was a ‘stupid gringo’ object lesson.
The other was in Japan because the security guys are trained to be suspicious of Yankees with long hair because that indicates they take drugs or are drug smugglers. They are fixated on drug trafficking. But once you’re out in the middle of the country long hair means, you’re not US military ( maybe CIA though) and you’re an arty farty type. Because if you got through the airport, you’re not a drug smuggler. But there are little old ladies who hear or read the conservative news outlets and clutch their pearls that gaijin are counter culture thugs on dope.

The there are the Japanese Nationalist extremists who travel in convoys of all black vehicles usually an RV and six to ten SUVs all with tinted windows so you can’t see them. They blast nationalist propaganda from speakers. Everybody hates them but constitutionally the organization can exist. The government knows very little about them that they will inform the public about. I’m told that if I see them on the road to walk behind a building until they pass because of course they are anti immigrant and anti American. It’s also rumored to be a false flag operation run by Korean Nationalists to make Japan look bad. Nobody really knows much about them. I usually just watch them go by, they drive through town every six months. Everyone hates them and feels embarrassed.

Then there are the lost generation kids. They live about in rural areas and are like easygoing back to the land hippies who run farms and make artisan jellies and stuff like that. Sort of the opposite of a ‘salaryman’ what we’d call an office worker.

Japan is a homogeneous cultural juggernaut, but within it there are all kinds of political and social attitudes. Sometimes when I hear people talk about Japan I feel like the idea or western perception of what Japan is hasn’t advanced since Pearl Harbor, seriously. But in the other hand, I hear the platitudes and wild assumptions that people here make about westerners. It’s funny to be in the middle, and I think it’s a odd situation that if I try to explain it, it’s not understood what it means. People on the western side usually try to take it away from me, arguing there is no such thing as a middle. Japanese people sometimes get it, the ones who leave left the country when young and then return understand that there’s is a middle. You don’t quite fit in either place. It’s interesting.

_____________________________

https://www.stephenfaulkguitars.com
  REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |  Date Aug. 29 2021 3:40:26
 
BarkellWH

Posts: 3458
Joined: Jul. 12 2009
From: Washington, DC

RE: It’s hotter than (in reply to estebanana

quote:

The paths out of all black or mostly black areas of cities are not as simple as big self determination wins the prizes.


No one is saying it is as simple as "big self determination wins prizes." What I am saying is that it is largely a matter of cultural characteristics and values that determine both academic and professional achievement, and those are rooted, not in the schools or playgrounds, but in the home. There have been many studies that have confirmed this fact, beginning with Daniel Patrick Moynihan's 1965 study on the the demise of two-parent families among blacks (which has gotten much worse since his study) as a major reason for lack of achievement.

The late economist Walter Williams, the economist and social commentator Thomas Sowell, and the academic Linguistics specialist and social critic John McWhorter are among the black academics who have noted the primacy of culture and values in the home in determining the likelihood of achievement, academic and otherwise. Likewise, the international development specialist Lawrence Harrison and the academic Samuel Huntington note the same thing in their book entitled "Culture Matters." They specialize largely in the cultural characteristics and values that lead to international development, but they have a section in which they apply their critique to the differences in achievement among minority communities in the United States.

Among the characteristics and values all suggest are conveyed to children in the home and are more likely to lead to achievement are two-parent families; not dishonoring the family; valuing education; delaying instant gratification today in order to have more tomorrow; and hard work. Asians, by and large, hold to these values and cultural characteristics. You don't see Asian communities with a 72 percent out-of-wedlock birthrate having children they can neither afford nor in whom they can instill proper values. Nor do you see Asians kids with a high truancy rate. Nor do you see Asian kids mocking academic achievement as "acting white." All of this matters if one wants to drill down to the core of what ails the black community.

As you point out, there are other elements that impede black achievement and progress as well, just as historically there have been impediments to Asian achievement and progress in the U.S. But the dilemma of black under-achievement will never be solved unless there is a change in cultural characteristics and values in the home. Instead of being among those assaulting Asians, blacks would do well to emulate them, at least in the realm of culture and values that are likely to result in achievement.

Bill

_____________________________

And the end of the fight is a tombstone white,
With the name of the late deceased,
And the epitaph drear, "A fool lies here,
Who tried to hustle the East."

--Rudyard Kipling
  REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |  Date Aug. 29 2021 12:44:25
 
estebanana

Posts: 9351
Joined: Oct. 16 2009
 

RE: It’s hotter than (in reply to BarkellWH

Bill,

Have you been dipping into your wife’s sociological library? 😂

As much as I appreciate Moynihan….
The two parent family is a difficult one for me. It’s a patriarchal construction that’s embraced across the board from ultra right Christian to super left populists like the Bernie Bros. Marx wrote about the opposition to capitalism and the uplifting of the worker from the position that the nuclear two parent family is normal. But if you go back to Mary Wollstonecraft and then forward to Simone de Beauvoir they unravel that particularly male idea that that a two parent family with the man as the head is the way it really works in all cultural settings. It’s more likely that for more agrarian cultures that it’s a larger family collective that lends support the success of families.

And in America, for specific example, the successful Koreans have a chain business system in which ten, twenty or more people get together and pool a certain amount of money together and give it under contract to one of the members with a business plan. This guy takes the $200,000 or whatever amount, starts a business and then in a few years pays forward $5000 bucks every year so the chain keeps going to set up the next guy.

Well in America after the civil war freed slaves became citizens and did the same thing, before Koreans arrived. But their self enterprise was often met with disapproval by white city councils, banks you name it, and black business districts were either attacked and burned ( happened more often than the media or school history talks about) I understand the 1960’s and social ideas about success, but I’m not so sure it’s a fair match to say one culture should adopt the success model of another. It’s also discounting the successful black kids who were guided by women, mothers and grandparents. Assigning the success model if Korean men to Black American men is a tricky proposition, as the Koreans came much later and didn’t have to evade the physical and psychological trials, plus the pressures that cities put on black businesses. I think our history as a nation has put a heavy thumb on the scale against black families and it’s not as easy as requesting one culture to model itself on another culture. If there are problems that the Black culture identifies as things they need to change in order to become more successful, I trust that they can make those shifts themselves.

I’m retiring for the night.

_____________________________

https://www.stephenfaulkguitars.com
  REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |  Date Aug. 29 2021 13:37:34
 
BarkellWH

Posts: 3458
Joined: Jul. 12 2009
From: Washington, DC

RE: It’s hotter than (in reply to estebanana

quote:

Have you been dipping into your wife’s sociological library? As much as I appreciate Moynihan….


Two points to clarify. Marta is an anthropologist, not a sociologist; and I didn't need to dip into her extensive library (I have one of my own) because when Moynihan's work came out in 1965 I was a sentient being and read it when it was published.

Let's just agree to (agreeably!) disagree on the issue of cultural characteristics and values instilled in the home and their relationship to achievement or lack thereof.

Get a good night's sleep.

Bill

_____________________________

And the end of the fight is a tombstone white,
With the name of the late deceased,
And the epitaph drear, "A fool lies here,
Who tried to hustle the East."

--Rudyard Kipling
  REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |  Date Aug. 29 2021 14:20:20
 
estebanana

Posts: 9351
Joined: Oct. 16 2009
 

RE: It’s hotter than (in reply to Ricardo

Well I’m hitting the hay, but all I can say is in 1500 years the Koreans never produced a Charlie Parker, Louis Armstrong, Aretha Franklin or Miles. Those artists, they changed the world and their culture also did your laundry.

_____________________________

https://www.stephenfaulkguitars.com
  REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |  Date Aug. 29 2021 15:58:46
 
Piwin

Posts: 3559
Joined: Feb. 9 2016
 

RE: It’s hotter than (in reply to BarkellWH

quote:

the primacy of culture


IIRC, Sowell has also argued that culture is contingent on material and environmental circumstances. Meaning that in theory one could then just argue that the cultural state of affairs in certain minority communities is the result of their material circumstances, which brings us back to "structural racism". I don't know what the answer is, but to me the whole thing looks like a snake eating its own tail, and it is not clear to me at all what the causal relations might be, if any.

Connecting this to another thread, I feel the same way about what you were saying about Afghanistan and Islam. Is Afghanistan poor because it has a strong Islamic fundamentalist component to its culture? Or does it have a strong Islamic fundamentalist component to its culture because it is poor? Both make sense to me, but I'm satisfied with neither. The fact that the Islamic world was once a major hub of culture, innovation and research should at least make us question whether that causal relation is really that strong.

I'm also not sure what reading to have of European history. It is often just accepted that the Middle-Ages were "dark ages" with little to no development due largely to the stranglehold of the Church on society. The causality there is not clear to me, so all I can say is "maybe". And of course anyone could reply with any number of examples of someone being oppressed by the Church. But that still wouldn't address the underlying question: was the Church the cause or the consequence? A question made nearly impossible to parse by the fact that Enlightenment writers had a very clear bias that led them to shun their immediate history and glorify the Ancient Greeks and Romans.

It's basically Marx vs Hegel all over again. My personal inclination is to favor Marx over Hegel on that question. But I don't have any strong feeling of certainty either way.

_____________________________

"Anything you do can be fixed. What you cannot fix is the perfection of a blank page. What you cannot fix is that pristine, unsullied whiteness of a screen or a page with nothing on it—because there’s nothing there to fix."
  REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |  Date Aug. 29 2021 20:38:49
 
estebanana

Posts: 9351
Joined: Oct. 16 2009
 

RE: It’s hotter than (in reply to Piwin

quote:



IIRC, Sowell has also argued that culture is contingent on material and environmental circumstances. Meaning that in theory one could then just argue that the cultural state of affairs in certain minority communities is the result of their material circumstances, which brings us back to "structural racism". I don't know what the answer is, but to me the whole thing looks like a snake eating its own tail, and it is not clear to me at all what the causal relations might be, if any.



Limiting this to the US there is conclusive evidence that the root cause of a culture of black citizens being oppressed is a direct and indisputable cause of chattel slavery. And the studies on environment and home are valid insofar as this is a platform for self development. The outside factors, literally the environment out of the home is also a factor. The early studies in these areas were conducted by primarily white investigators and they missed important parts of the causes imposed by the ‘outside’ environment. Up to date studies indicate that the US has developed a kind of caste system reinforced by politics in which systemic racism is a key component of inequality.

In America it’s not a guessing game as to which came first, the slavery came first and it was not voluntary. Followed by the generational objectification and dehumanization of Black people. That didn’t stop after emancipation, a caste system was built called Jim Crow which relegated Black citizens to certain jobs, and regions within regions.

All this contributed to a wealth gap across black society, as a whole black citizens have made less money than white citizens since the freeing of slaves due to the imposition and superimposition of caste laws which determined who could advance and who could not. It’s definitely not a wishy washy notion of a snake eating it’s tail. In America it’s a big white snake eating everyone else.

As far as Marx vs. Hegel — really? How odd. It’s more like Wollstonecraft spiced up with a little Kant, because Marx has been a contributor to creating caste systems, and f%ck him.

_____________________________

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  REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |  Date Aug. 30 2021 1:11:54
 
estebanana

Posts: 9351
Joined: Oct. 16 2009
 

RE: It’s hotter than (in reply to Ricardo

The reason I don’t believe in Marxism is because it’s another patriarchal developed system that’s like the Taliban, to bring those lovelies back in. Marxism talks big talk about inclusivity, but when it comes down to it, Marxism is exactly like capitalism in that all the shots are called by an old boys network of cigar smoking hacks who rise up through the ranks by proving filial piety to a god at the top. Then it’s reinforced by a private security apparatus- its exactly the same thing as a southern plantation model or corporation.

These models are based on cultural exclusivity and are patriarchally authoritarian - see modern China.


What we need is a voting democracy where the fair voice is heard and not pushed down by an angry few. What I mean is, after slavery and the construction of a caste system that functions in proxy to slavery we need to look at that. Jim Crow was a form of white backlash because after centuries of being on top certain factions of whites couldn’t handle the idea that everyone would be equal. AND THAT IS STILL THE MAIN PROBLEM.

The division in the country is based on the change in demographic- whites will no longer be majority in two decades and the old guard white institutions are battling the inevitable over the hit it gives to their false pride.

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  REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |  Date Aug. 30 2021 1:27:23
 
Piwin

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RE: It’s hotter than (in reply to estebanana

quote:

As far as Marx vs. Hegel — really?


Yes. In the sense of idealism vs. materialism. If you can broadly map on "culture vs. material conditions" onto that, that's the comparison I'm making. A philosophical disagreement that crystallised over Prussia's monarchy, with the left-wing Hegelians arguing that the monarchy was just fine, and all you really needed to do was to clear up the philosophical ideas a bit so as to resolve the inner contradictions, opposed to the early Marxists arguing that the ideas were nothing more than an epiphenomenon of material conditions, and that therefore no matter how much clearing up of the ideas you did, nothing would really resolve until the material conditions changed. In very broad strokes of course. None of that is inviting any kind of big debate over Marxism per se.

I think that disagreement is similar in kind to what I'm observing in "Western" debates over how to relate with the so-called Islamic world. Those who believe that if only we could change their ideas, the way they think, then a change in material conditions would ensue vs those who believe that if only they could get out of poverty, then the way they think would change. I'm hearing echos of that also in your own domestic debates over ethnicity in the US.

I see it as a snake eating its own tail in the sense of a feedback loop where both foster the other and there is no clear starting point. Culture affects material conditions, and vice-versa. On specific issues you can decide to open the window of analysis at a specific moment in time. And it is necessary to do so when litigating or legislating. But if we're examining the question of how culture and material conditions interact in the broader sense, it no longer makes much sense to do that. Chattel slavery didn't appear in a vat. It was the result of something else, which itself was the result of something else, which itself was the result of something else, etc. etc. until everything is lost in the fogs of our evolutionary past.

Beyond those generalisations, I don't particularly care to comment on the situation in the US. Each situation is unique, and it's difficult to not colour our analysis of another part of the world by events more familiar to us. So I'll just have to take your word for it and leave it at that.

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  REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |  Date Aug. 30 2021 2:21:03
 
estebanana

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RE: It’s hotter than (in reply to Piwin

I’ve says the same thing vis a vis Afghanistan and the Islamic parts of the globe. It’s their world to change in their own, and likely real change will come with equal rights for women. We as a country, my country of origin should condemn Saudi Arabia for its assassination of Jamal Kashogi and for its human rights violations against women. Etc.

Marx should be relegated to the dust bin, it’s an outmoded way of thinking that’s a perpetrator of patriarchal control, just like Islam…. Or as William S. Burroughs called it, Islam Incorporated.

People need to bypass Marx and go back to who he stole his ideas from and changed them into a patriarchal system. Wollstonecraft is the greater mind.

Marx is dead. He’s caused too much misery in the world under the guise of the helping hand.

As far as the US you don’t understand it enough to see it any other way than as a relativistic ouroboros. It’s good you hold your speech.

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  REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |  Date Aug. 30 2021 3:19:32
 
Piwin

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RE: It’s hotter than (in reply to estebanana

Plug in whatever name you like better and represents the "materialism" side of that debate. Like I said, I'm not inviting a debate on Marxism. You're on your own if you want to go off on that tangent.

quote:

As far as the US you don’t understand it enough to see it any other way than as a relativistic ouroboros. It’s good you hold your speech.


Troll.

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  REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |  Date Aug. 30 2021 3:57:43
 
estebanana

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RE: It’s hotter than (in reply to Piwin

What’s going on in the US is that major restrictions in voting rights are going to be implemented by republicans because they are so unpopular the only way they can get into office is to game the system and then gaslight everyone else. They know that some of the bigger electoral college states could and probably will turn from ‘red’ states to ‘blue’ states and the only way to hold it off is to create new laws that eco the Jim Crow era laws that made it more difficult for urban and minority voters.

They are cheating because they think they can get away with it and they don’t care. Any thinking person who’s not an arch extremist right winger can understand this.

They are trying to keep democrats from gaining power in the Bible Belt state legislatures because they know the attitudes in these regions are becoming more rational about religious fanatics running politics, lot of people are sick of it. If the state legislatures turn blue they will sign onto The Interstate Voter Compact and with seven more states signing on it will become ratified. The Interstate Voter Compact limits the power of the electoral college without changing the US Constitution which is extremely difficult to change.

What’s happening has zero to do with any form of Marxist analysis. The US is either going to become a minority ruled country by a small number of arrogant white farts like the governors of Texas and Florida, or it’s going to stay on a course of incremental changes towards a community based society. The frustration here is that very few if you perceive this or want to understand it.

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  REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |  Date Aug. 30 2021 10:40:54
 
Piwin

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RE: It’s hotter than (in reply to estebanana

None of that conflicts with anything I've said.

All I've said is that I'm not sure how culture and economic outcomes interact, and that if they do interact, it seems to be a two-way street. I apparently stepped on a landmine by mentioning a name that has triggered all sorts of unwarranted assumptions about what and how I think about these issues.

That's all from me. I'm not interested in yet another exercise of American navel-gazing on this forum.

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  REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |  Date Aug. 30 2021 13:43:33
 
estebanana

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RE: It’s hotter than (in reply to Piwin

Not only do my American friends not understand what’s at stake and I have no country allies in this, but a European dismisses the situation as navel gazing.
It’s really time for me to stop visiting here. I’m sure it work better that way for everyone. I don’t even know what you guys stand for anymore. You play music created by a non white culture, yet you go out if your way to be indifferent to social struggles and try to down play the existence of institutionalized racism. I clearly little in common with you and it just makes my angry to see musicians take such vanilla stances on politics and social problems. It makes me really unhappy to around you and yet it one of the few places my work is useful to help people. I really hate this place now. You people are miserable.

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  REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |  Date Aug. 30 2021 14:35:20
 
Piwin

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RE: It’s hotter than (in reply to estebanana

Feel free to make all the wild assumptions about me you want. My response was addressed to Bill, not to you. Not even sure why you felt the need to push back against it, since what I was saying supports your opinion more than Bill's, as I was saying that even if there were cultural issues in the home, you could still interpret those as being the consequence of external pressures.

Apologies but right now I don't have the time to hand-hold you through these kinds of discussions. I have enough on my plate as it is. And indeed, I'm growing weary of the American glorification of skin colour and other physical differences, and of having everything I say or do interpreted through that lens by people seemingly incapable of stepping out of their own cultural circle for 10 seconds.

In the meantime, there are other strategies you can use to make this forum more amenable to you. Avoiding off-topic threads and using the block function will go a long ways in doing that. I've done so in the past, to great effect. A flip of the finger really isn't going to get my heart rate up. And you'd know that if you had any idea who I was and what involvement I've had on some of these issues where I'm from. But you're right: I come off as having "vanilla" opinions for those who believe discourse is where these battles are fought.

That's all from me.

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  REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |  Date Aug. 30 2021 15:38:44
 
Escribano

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From: England, living in Italy

RE: It’s hotter than (in reply to estebanana

Enough said on this. The off-topic section is suspended for a while. back to flamenco please.

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  REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |  Date Aug. 30 2021 16:32:00
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