Yeah I have a similar mindset. I honestly have a lot of people tagged on here from some pretty rough debates at times. But weeks, months, years later I still up vote some of their stuff.

Do confirm that you actually believe this is unsubstantiated:

Either way, it doesn’t change the fact that right-wing extremism makes up the majority of violence.

Now in fairness I’ll clarify that I am focusing on politically motivated violence.

Additionally, did you miss the past tense of the first point?

Very well said, and I think that’s a reasonable take. A balance between protecting yourself but also not necessarily promoting a self-validating echo-chamber. Temporary blocks are genius.

It’s funny you mention the AI thing. I’m no pro or anything but I am a software engineer and was recently blocked by someone for just noting that AI has its uses in the fight against extremist hate and online discourse and that we shouldn’t necessarily limit our tool box in the fight against fascism — especially when it’s being used against us. That’s actually what spurred my thinking about these knee-jerk blocks.

Honestly, turning inwardly to my family has been great. Especially given the political climate and my general disappointment. Finding “your people” is quite pleasant. Tribalism is sort of ingrained into us at a primate level, I suppose.

Still, I guess I try to strike a balance when all possible because I know the traps of building one’s own silo and the consequences that can have.

There’s such a massive disconnect there, though, isn’t there? I agree the slow deliberative process is key; but there is clearly a missing piece of the puzzle to bridge that gap between experts and laypeople that unfilled leads to well… All this.

Follow-up to this question after seeing many responses (and thank you): What is your default mode for self-doubt when engaging in discussions?

That is, no matter how confident you may be in something, do you maintain an open door, or are your beliefs you block over completely set in stone?

For me, little terrifies me more than becoming the thing I hate; to be clouded by my own cognitive bias; to inadvertently throw myself into an echo-chamber of self-validation. As such I try my best to always maintain at least the slightest bit of doubt in even my strongest beliefs, and to that end to at least let dialogue challenging that come through.

Only way around this is editing your previous comment, though I’ve been told that can sometimes lead to a ban? Never happened to me though.

What really annoys me about that is that it prevents you from replying to anyone ELSE who replies to you in that thread, which is completely absurd.

People are trying to ‘win the argument’ for personal satisfaction. They’re not trying to self-correct or seek the truth.

How do we promote more people to cooperate instead of compete in the mutual pursuit of truth while maintaining humility and introspection that their own views could be incorrect?

I’m referring more to the immediate aftermath of the event. I wasn’t very clear when I said writings but rather writings on the casings and the immediate reaction of Fuentes.

I think there are many people out there who could.

To me, the problem isn’t being a benevolent dictator; it’s getting a benevolent person there in a benevolent way.

If that was his thinking, then he’s terrible at foreseeing the coming chess moves from the other side.

It was quite obvious the Trump administration was doing everything in their power to provoke something like this so they could then utilize it as their Reichstag Fire / October 7th incident to further strip civil liberties and consolidate power.

Best thing he could’ve done was just do a public protest about Epstein and rally people to vote for midterms. I fail to see how this made vulnerable group safer in any way in all reality.

That’s the sad part, it already isn’t. Many assholes on the right truly think they’re fighting a righteous war. Nay, a biblical crusade against evil. And they’re harming far more good people, both directly and indirectly.

All guardrails and checks & balances have since been broken to prevent this very thing from playing out but now it all just boils down to who can push a louder message to the masses and distort their perception of reality.

I’m pretty lost for answers on how to crawl our way out of this. My only hope is the economy tanks so hard that it hits the working class in their wallets. That’s pretty much the only thing they care about.

When a bunch of files got leaked from UK intelligence agencies some years back, one of the programs mentioned was one that could essentially frame targets with CP material.

I’m not sure this administration is competent enough to do that, but I’d bet money they got embarrassed and are using some bathtime pic one if his kids sent him of his grandkids.

Then came the forced confession.

Big emphasis on Network in this case. An entire dominant ecosystem promoted by right-wing billionaires and foreign nations like Russia and Israel.

My initial impression of his writings hit me as either Groyper posing as a leftist, or just an accelerationist psychopath.

Either way, it doesn’t change the fact that right-wing extremism makes up the majority of violence.

Pssst… You’re the only extremist here unwilling to recognize facts easily looked up in any encyclopedia. Please, grasp firmly and try — perhaps with a bit of lubricant — to pull head out of one’s ass. If not, then maybe you need to find some deeper right-wing radicalized echo-chamber of misinformation to make yourself feel more at home?

Our Republic is a Type-Of Democracy; a subset thereof. This is well known. Why do people quote conservative bullshit tropes like this?

Economy is going to contract especially come spring. These snowbirds most of the time were more kind than locals. People have no idea how much money they pump into local economies.

Hopefully this is advantageous to midterms but who knows.

But Harris was equally bad amirite.

Sooo… We’re not supposed to find this deeply disturbing that they don’t want to distance from it but in fact normalize the label?

And since when are conservatives ever remotely good at sarcasm or satire?

I’m pretty sure any fence-sitter would find this pretty weird to say the least, especially following Jan 6th, so I say keep showing it!