So today, Trump has announced that he will not, in fact, be going after Hillary Clinton in regards to a criminal case. Nevermind the fact that this was the entire basis of his campaign for the last month of the election and just more proof he is a pathological liar. The far more important thing to note here is that the President DOES NOT DECIDE who gets investiged and prosecuted in this country. Banana Republic much??
There is no case, republicans have been after Bill and Hillary for 30 years. Even when they're running the investigations and have control over the whole swamp of the government (executive, judicial and both legislative branches) they can't make a case.
I half wish he would go after her. if only to completely wake up the entire country to the right's shenanigans. The center and left have been playing nice for too long. Too much compromise, what has the right compromised on?
For 8 yrs of Obama, the right goes around scuttling their own legislation and doing nothing shutting down the government and failing to do their jobs. The cherry on top was stealing a supreme court justice. And then the right rallied behind a racist, xenophobic, misogynist agenda. Playing too nice with these guys.
Clinton has done a lot of good for the world. Her foundation is a world class one, she's brought AIDS drugs to countries and so forth. Is she perfect? No but is she a criminal? Ha. In the US, rich people don't go to jail, right Donald? So by all means, jail her, she can be a figure to rally around and proves that he's turned the country into a banana republic.
There is a line somewhere that DT can cross that people will be like - ok that's too far. Isn't there? You'd have thought it was the pussy grabbing comment but apparently not.
Amazing....I don't even know what to believe about Trump now. He is saying about climate change and human interaction that “I think there is some connectivity. Some, something. It depends on how much.”
And: He tells The New York Times on Tuesday that “clean air is vitally important” and he’s keeping an open mind about whether to pull the United States out of a multinational agreement on climate change.
@semiticgod That test is weird. Its forcing me to associate a skin color with bad by binding my response to them to one key. It goes so far as to tell me that I answer wrong on an association test. I'm not sure how this is supposed to work.
I'm not sure which test you're taking, but most of the tests don't measure IF you press the button; they measure how fast you press the button when you're not thinking about it. If you do the test quickly, without thinking about bias or the test, then your reaction time will slow down and speed up whenever you encounter something for which you have an unconscious bias.
So, in my test, they showed me various religious symbols, and I had to press a button to say if something was good or bad (is the smiley face good or bad? Stuff like that). I had a bias about certain symbols, which influenced my reaction time: I reacted to negative things faster when I saw Jewish or Islamic symbols than Hindu or Christian symbols.
Go through the test without thinking about biases. Don't slow down to think. The idea is to keep your conscious mind out of this.
@semiticgod That test is weird. Its forcing me to associate a skin color with bad by binding my response to them to one key. It goes so far as to tell me that I answer wrong on an association test. I'm not sure how this is supposed to work.
If you do the test quickly, without thinking about bias or the test, then your reaction time will slow down and speed up whenever you encounter something for which you have an unconscious bias.
@FinneousPJ: Take the test and see. If you don't have any biases, your reaction time should be consistent--the test does multiple iterations.
This is currently the only method for measuring unconscious bias on the individual level. You can't just ask people if they're biased; they would just say no--even if they were biased, consciously or not.
They measure reaction time because you can't consciously control how fast you react, down to the millisecond. Not unless you intentionally take the test extremely slowly.
For the record, this methodology came into existence long before anybody used it to measure racial biases. So no, they didn't invent this for the sole purpose of finding biases.
Online tests are crap. What if you just click an answer at random without even reading the question? How can it classify your answers with any degree of accuracy? What if you click the first response on every question? In other words, don't even waste your time taking online tests for anything, especially things such as "unconscious bias". I am consciously biased against such weak testing methodology.
Even for standard psychological tests I thumb my nose at the testing. You will see questions like "do you hear voices?" which I always find funny. I always answer "no" even though the true answer is "yes" unless you happen to be deaf. They are checking to see if you are trying to answer how you think they want you to answer--the average person interprets that question as "do you hear voices in your head?". I will also answer entire pages of questions as "strongly agree" or "strongly disagree" without even reading them. I have also made contradictory statements such as "when I talk to my parents on the phone or at holidays they are still upset that I am an orphan".
Anyway...where was I....Trump isn't a politician and so whether you like him or not his Administration has the possibility of shaking things up and we are in desperate need of a little cage-rattling or some overturning of the apple cart. For the most part people handle stress in two ways: one group is like Mauna Loa, getting a little upset over things all the time but never too much because they don't let the stress build up, and the other group is like Krakatoa, and when they explode they leave an area of complete devastation in their wake. Countries may be thought of in this way, as well. The United States, with all its petty bickering between blues and reds, is in the Krakatoa group--the pressure has been building for quite a while now and when it finally explodes things are going to become truly ugly.
We have ourselves to blame for this. Too many of us have spent far too long trying to separate ourselves into equivalence classes of this-American or that-American, rich/middle class/poor, rural/urban, white/black/Hispanic/Latino/Asian/Native, straight/gay/bi/poly, and so on and so forth, identifying more with "our" group than with any other group, distrusting any group which isn't our own, sticking our nose into other people's business, and not letting go of the past in order to focus on the now and the future that we have forgotten that we are supposed to live our own life rather than telling other people how to live theirs. Even if someone is engaging in behavior which is irrational such as discriminating based on skin color or religion or income then let them--they have the right to be jerks and organize their life based on false perceptions if they so desire, it isn't any of your business. Of course, those people don't have the right to tell anyone else how to live, either--that sword cuts both ways.
We were never supposed to be one group of people all of whom think alike, like a painting that is entirely one shade. No, we are a mosaic--if you look at it from a close distance some of the color are garish, clash with the other color squares around them, and you can't make any sense of it but once you step back you can see the larger picture and things look just fine.
In any event, I look forward to Krakatoa should people fail to heed my advice--advice which, according to my own statements, people are free to ignore, of course. That being said, I am never above telling other people "I told you so".
@semiticgod I can see the reasoning behind that. My problem is I never interpret questions the way people seem to think I should. The test told me that a lot of my responses were wrong and I needed to redo the question. A lot times I also get bogged down trying to figure out how I am expected to answer certain questions.
@Mathsorcerer: What IS the methodology of this test? Have you taken it?
I have no idea and, no, I haven't taken it. I am instantly and derisively dismissive of any online test which purports to tell you what kind of person you are.
You were not impolite. I have seen "not polite" and your questions do not qualify as that. I concur--there are plenty of things which should be taken seriously, just not online tests. Even the ones which try to be serious are no better than those "which superhero are you?" tests which people splat all over their social media home pages.
@Mathsorcerer: To be fair, this test is designed by a university and is there for research purposes. It's not one of those silly quizzes that's just for entertainment; they posted it online to help them collect data. A lot of studies are conducted online.
I actually took a similar test as part of a psychology class. According to THAT test, if I was a police officer in a violent neighborhood, I'd be equally willing to gun down both black and white civilians because I thought their cell phone was a gun.
But I reacted so slowly that I'd probably get gunned down on the first day because I thought that violent criminal's gun was actually a cell phone.
The results of these tests are actually value-neutral--they don't try to say anything about you as a person--but I think it's funnier to describe myself as a slow-witted but racially colorblind anti-Semite who gets shot by a gangster with a cell phone-shaped Glock.
@Mathsorcerer You sound like a libertarian... like me!
I agree that the cage needs a little rattling. What I am worried about is that Trump is such a constant and rather hypocritical liar, will he actually do what he says and make good on his pledge "drain the swamp". He has all the tools he needs to: a majority in congress, he's surrounded himself with yes men, and he has the opportuinty to appoint in the judiciary system. Or will he abuse that power...? Or do nothing but play golf and hang out at the Trump tower...?
Or, even worse, will he misrepresent and misinterpret corruption and wreck our government in the name of draining the swamp? This is my biggest fear in regards to him being in the Oval Office. Only time will tell.
Trump reversed himself on a number of issues today concerning "lock her up", immigration and more. I would not be surprised to see him on Fox tomorrow re-reversing himself.
"Computer scientists believe they have found evidence that vote totals in the three states could have been manipulated or hacked and presented their findings to top Clinton aides on a call last Thursday.
The scientists, among them J. Alex Halderman, the director of the University of Michigan Center for Computer Security and Society, told the Clinton campaign they believe there is a questionable trend of Clinton performing worse in counties that relied on electronic voting machines compared to paper ballots and optical scanners, according to the source."
Would not be shocked. All voting fraud uncovered so far seems to be for Trump as well as voter suppression efforts trying to favor him. And of course he's losing the popular vote by about 2M votes. Additionally Russian agents seemed to be really interested in Trump winning and he even asked for their help at one point hacking his opponent.
I doubt there will be violence against white, hetero, cisgender males.
No, but the time will come when they will be called out again on treating everyone who is different from them with disrespect.
And in my experience that is an offender's worst nightmare. Being called out on their offenses.
I have been here on the forum a long time and that's something I have seen over and over again.
People getting consumed with rage and hatred because they cannot openly show their contempt for minorities without being called out on it.
I think the part I'm worried about is those who do not partake being branded with the same mark. Trust me, as a libertarian/conservative who refused to vote for Trump, its already happened to me. People were too quick to claim racism and homophobia before, but after having a president who is everything that the same people fear it will only get worse. People who think Trump will bring an end to over-political correctness are in for a very rude awakening.
The far more important thing to note here is that the President DOES NOT DECIDE who gets investiged and prosecuted in this country. Banana Republic much??
Small correction: The Attorney General does decide who gets prosecuted, and is nominated by the president. The Attorney General serves at the president's pleasure, and can be fired at any time without a hearing from the Senate. So in many ways the president does decide who gets prosecuted.
I doubt there will be violence against white, hetero, cisgender males.
No, but the time will come when they will be called out again on treating everyone who is different from them with disrespect.
And in my experience that is an offender's worst nightmare. Being called out on their offenses.
I have been here on the forum a long time and that's something I have seen over and over again.
People getting consumed with rage and hatred because they cannot openly show their contempt for minorities without being called out on it.
I think the part I'm worried about is those who do not partake being branded with the same mark. Trust me, as a libertarian/conservative who refused to vote for Trump, its already happened to me. People were too quick to claim racism and homophobia before, but after having a president who is everything that the same people fear it will only get worse. People who think Trump will bring an end to over-political correctness are in for a very rude awakening.
Bringing an end to "over-political correctness" isn't something that can happen because it's something that doesn't exist in the first place. Again, I continue to ask: What and who is being prevented from saying ANYTHING?? As for this feared "backlash" if minorities ever became majorities, it's total projection. Apparently many white American's base fear (and I'm not referring to you personally) is that if that ever happened, they would be treated the same way by the minority groups as (historically) white Americans have treated them. In the recesses of their mind, they know what has been done is wrong, and are terrified the roles could be reversed.
I doubt there will be violence against white, hetero, cisgender males.
No, but the time will come when they will be called out again on treating everyone who is different from them with disrespect.
And in my experience that is an offender's worst nightmare. Being called out on their offenses.
I have been here on the forum a long time and that's something I have seen over and over again.
People getting consumed with rage and hatred because they cannot openly show their contempt for minorities without being called out on it.
I think the part I'm worried about is those who do not partake being branded with the same mark. Trust me, as a libertarian/conservative who refused to vote for Trump, its already happened to me. People were too quick to claim racism and homophobia before, but after having a president who is everything that the same people fear it will only get worse. People who think Trump will bring an end to over-political correctness are in for a very rude awakening.
Bringing an end to "over-political correctness" isn't something that can happen because it's something that doesn't exist in the first place. Again, I continue to ask: What and who is being prevented from saying ANYTHING?? As for this feared "backlash" if minorities ever became majorities, it's total projection. Apparently many white American's base fear (and I'm not referring to you personally) is that if that ever happened, they would be treated the same way by the minority groups as (historically) white Americans have treated them. In the recesses of their mind, they know what has been done is wrong, and are terrified the roles could be reversed.
Just this week professors at U.Va. sent a letter to a colleague saying he should not be quoting Thomas Jefferson... at the school Jefferson founded. Another speaker was banned from talking about Ataturk at a California school because Armenian students were upset at the subject matter. As a Greek and a believer in the Armenian genocide, I don't like Ataturk either, but you can't ban people from discussing a massive historical figure. Other speakers as diverse as Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Ben Shapiro have been unable to speak at universities.
You can so "oh, that's just college. People aren't in college forever" but time spent at a university is incredibly formative, and we have yet to see how much of that close-mindedness remains after this generation graduates. Universities in the US are THE center of learning, and more importantly where almost all of the research in the social sciences are conducted . Stifling speech in the place where it is most important should never be taken lightly.
It is important to note that when I refer to "over-political correctness" I am referencing instances like I stated above, and not something as innocuous as adding homosexual characters to a television program to send a political message. Some people might find that annoying, but it is not damaging. Especially not in the way that shutting down academic and political discourse is.
Frankly, I've experienced this over-political correctness this past week, where at a Friendsgiving someone I know said that the judge my friend clerks for "isn't allowed to have an opinion since he's a white male".
I doubt there will be violence against white, hetero, cisgender males.
No, but the time will come when they will be called out again on treating everyone who is different from them with disrespect.
And in my experience that is an offender's worst nightmare. Being called out on their offenses.
I have been here on the forum a long time and that's something I have seen over and over again.
People getting consumed with rage and hatred because they cannot openly show their contempt for minorities without being called out on it.
I think the part I'm worried about is those who do not partake being branded with the same mark. Trust me, as a libertarian/conservative who refused to vote for Trump, its already happened to me. People were too quick to claim racism and homophobia before, but after having a president who is everything that the same people fear it will only get worse. People who think Trump will bring an end to over-political correctness are in for a very rude awakening.
Bringing an end to "over-political correctness" isn't something that can happen because it's something that doesn't exist in the first place. Again, I continue to ask: What and who is being prevented from saying ANYTHING?? As for this feared "backlash" if minorities ever became majorities, it's total projection. Apparently many white American's base fear (and I'm not referring to you personally) is that if that ever happened, they would be treated the same way by the minority groups as (historically) white Americans have treated them. In the recesses of their mind, they know what has been done is wrong, and are terrified the roles could be reversed.
Just this week professors at U.Va. sent a letter to a colleague saying he should not be quoting Thomas Jefferson... at the school Jefferson founded. Another speaker was banned from talking about Ataturk at a California school because Armenian students were upset at the subject matter. As a Greek and a believer in the Armenian genocide, I don't like Ataturk either, but you can't ban people from discussing a massive historical figure. Other speakers as diverse as Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Ben Shapiro have been unable to speak at universities.
You can so "oh, that's just college. People aren't in college forever" but time spent at a university is incredibly formative, and we have yet to see how much of that close-mindedness remains after this generation graduates. Universities in the US are THE center of learning, and more importantly where almost all of the research in the social sciences are conducted . Stifling speech in the place where it is most important should never be taken lightly.
It is important to note that when I refer to "over-political correctness" I am referencing instances like I stated above, and not something as innocuous as adding homosexual characters to a television program to send a political message. Some people might find that annoying, but it is not damaging. Especially not in the way that shutting down academic and political discourse is.
I doubt there will be violence against white, hetero, cisgender males.
No, but the time will come when they will be called out again on treating everyone who is different from them with disrespect.
And in my experience that is an offender's worst nightmare. Being called out on their offenses.
I have been here on the forum a long time and that's something I have seen over and over again.
People getting consumed with rage and hatred because they cannot openly show their contempt for minorities without being called out on it.
I think the part I'm worried about is those who do not partake being branded with the same mark. Trust me, as a libertarian/conservative who refused to vote for Trump, its already happened to me. People were too quick to claim racism and homophobia before, but after having a president who is everything that the same people fear it will only get worse. People who think Trump will bring an end to over-political correctness are in for a very rude awakening.
Bringing an end to "over-political correctness" isn't something that can happen because it's something that doesn't exist in the first place. Again, I continue to ask: What and who is being prevented from saying ANYTHING?? As for this feared "backlash" if minorities ever became majorities, it's total projection. Apparently many white American's base fear (and I'm not referring to you personally) is that if that ever happened, they would be treated the same way by the minority groups as (historically) white Americans have treated them. In the recesses of their mind, they know what has been done is wrong, and are terrified the roles could be reversed.
Just this week professors at U.Va. sent a letter to a colleague saying he should not be quoting Thomas Jefferson... at the school Jefferson founded. Another speaker was banned from talking about Ataturk at a California school because Armenian students were upset at the subject matter. As a Greek and a believer in the Armenian genocide, I don't like Ataturk either, but you can't ban people from discussing a massive historical figure. Other speakers as diverse as Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Ben Shapiro have been unable to speak at universities.
You can so "oh, that's just college. People aren't in college forever" but time spent at a university is incredibly formative, and we have yet to see how much of that close-mindedness remains after this generation graduates. Universities in the US are THE center of learning, and more importantly where almost all of the research in the social sciences are conducted . Stifling speech in the place where it is most important should never be taken lightly.
It is important to note that when I refer to "over-political correctness" I am referencing instances like I stated above, and not something as innocuous as adding homosexual characters to a television program to send a political message. Some people might find that annoying, but it is not damaging. Especially not in the way that shutting down academic and political discourse is.
Well, yes, I will continue to say it's "just college", because 99% of us aren't spending our days on college campuses. I have no interest or stake in what is or isn't said on college campuses anymore because I'm no longer 19 or 20 years old. I don't care if there are "safe-space" there, and I don't care if there isn't. I know these so-called safe spaces don't exist in the real world outside of student unions, and the idea that this movement on college campuses has oozed it's way into society at large and is causing some massive negative breakdown in society, is, quite honestly, absurd.
Now, many on the center and right have long claimed that liberals are too quick to yell "racism" and "homophobia" to shut down arguments. If that is true, then all the anti-PC movement has become is the exact same thing on the right. Saying someone is "triggered" or is being PC is really nothing more than someone admitting they are pissed off that someone else vigorously disagrees with what they have just said.
Well, yes, I will continue to say it's "just college", because 99% of us aren't spending our days on college campuses. I have no interest or stake in what is or isn't said on college campuses anymore because I'm no longer 19 or 20 years old. I don't care if there are "safe-space" there, and I don't care if there isn't. I know these so-called safe spaces don't exist in the real world outside of student unions, and the idea that this movement on college campuses has oozed it's way into society at large and is causing some massive negative breakdown in society, is, quite honestly, absurd.
Now, many on the center and right have long claimed that liberals are too quick to yell "racism" and "homophobia" to shut down arguments. If that is true, then all the anti-PC movement has become is the exact same thing on the right. Saying someone is "triggered" or is being PC is really nothing more than someone admitting they are pissed off that someone else vigorously disagrees with what they have just said.
Translation: "It doesn't matter because it doesn't affect me, personally. Also I've grossly underestimated the number of college students in the world."
Frankly, I've experienced this over-political correctness this past week, where at a Friendsgiving someone I know said that the judge my friend clerks for "isn't allowed to have an opinion since he's a white male".
That isn't over-political correctness, that's just a stupid thing to say. I might think such things in my head at times about certain people, but I generally don't SAY THEM OUT LOUD, and that's rather the point. "Political correctness" is simply the unwritten rules we all follow when we're in public or group settings so people aren't screaming at each other and coming to blows all the time.
Well, yes, I will continue to say it's "just college", because 99% of us aren't spending our days on college campuses. I have no interest or stake in what is or isn't said on college campuses anymore because I'm no longer 19 or 20 years old. I don't care if there are "safe-space" there, and I don't care if there isn't. I know these so-called safe spaces don't exist in the real world outside of student unions, and the idea that this movement on college campuses has oozed it's way into society at large and is causing some massive negative breakdown in society, is, quite honestly, absurd.
Now, many on the center and right have long claimed that liberals are too quick to yell "racism" and "homophobia" to shut down arguments. If that is true, then all the anti-PC movement has become is the exact same thing on the right. Saying someone is "triggered" or is being PC is really nothing more than someone admitting they are pissed off that someone else vigorously disagrees with what they have just said.
Translation: "It doesn't matter because it doesn't affect me, personally. Also I've grossly underestimated the number of college students in the world."
If I cared about the ridiculous problems of college politics, I'd never get any sleep at night. I sure as hell hope nobody gave a shit what I thought in college. And there is a difference between feeling empathy for something that actually MATTERS, rather than spending my time worrying about whether someone is going to be able to speak at a college lecture and take home a 5-figure paycheck for a 45 minute speech. Or whether the College Republicans are feeling ostracized and outnumbered. And 6% of the world's population has a college degree. So even though 99% is clearly a phrase used for rhetorical effect to imply "barely anyone on a meta level", even in my hyperbole, I was off by a whopping 5%.
@jjstraka34 I think the point was if we lose the function of the university as seekers of the truth of science and other disciplines because it might hurt someone's feelings, we are truly on the verge of the downfall of civilization.
@jjstraka34 I think the point was if we lose the function of the university as seekers of the truth of science and other disciplines because it might hurt someone's feelings, we are truly on the verge of the downfall of civilization.
I'd say it's more likely we're close to the downfall of civilization by electing an orange fascist who is going to run a kleptocracy out of the Oval Office, ostensibly because many people just "feel" that they can't say what they really want to anymore.
Just found out about this insightful quote that gives information concerning Nixon and his aide, John Ehrlichman. Pretty intense about our government.
'At the time, I was writing a book about the politics of drug prohibition. I started to ask Ehrlichman a series of earnest, wonky questions that he impatiently waved away. “You want to know what this was really all about?” he asked with the bluntness of a man who, after public disgrace and a stretch in federal prison, had little left to protect. “The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I’m saying? We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.”'
@Mathsorcerer You sound like a libertarian... like me!
Guilty as charged. I voted for Gary "What's an Aleppo?" Johnson (hur dur) and did so with a clean conscience. I refuse to officially join that party, though, because I am far too independent for that.
@smeagolheart I saw that news story, as well, and so far it amounts to nothing. No one has uncovered any direct, verifiable evidence of hacking any electronic voting machine even though such things are possible...only not from a distance. Those machines are not connected to the Internet so unless hackers have physical access to the machines (highly unlikely) or are stationing enough of them near voting places and trying to hack in wirelessly (again, highly unlikely) then no hacking took place. The Clinton team needs to face reality as it is, not as they would like it to be--they failed to reach key voters in those swing States, mostly because Clinton had too many credibility issues and her campaign dismissed those voters. The Democrats will learn from their mistakes and will pay closer attention to those Midwest voters in 2018 and 2020. In any event, it is a moot point--she already conceded. This isn't a children's game so she can't say "wait--I take it back".
As far as "safe spaces" and uninviting people to speak at universities....people should willingly engage in topics which make them uncomfortable on a daily basis. If you go to bed and you didn't get out of your comfort zone that day then you wasted your time. That doesn't mean that you have to get in anyone's face about it, of course, but engaging in a discussion on a sensitive topic is the best way to take the sting out of that topic so that everyone may address it more clearly and factually without all the emotional brouhaha.
My problem--and I don't mind admitting this--is that I sometimes have to fight the urge to purpose poke poke poke people about sensitive topics specifically to get a reaction out of them, to get them to drop their self-imposed masks, and to get them to face the topic openly and directly. I had all of my illusions carefully peeled away layer by layer when I was younger so in my arrogance I think everyone else should enjoy that experience, as well.
Now, on the topic of whether white people fear a backlash should minorities become the majority...I am certain some of them do feel that way. I don't, but then I don't think like other people think. I didn't engage in systemic racism (the Jim Crow laws, many of which were enacted by truly old-school Democrats over a century ago), I didn't discriminate against people, I don't judge people based on their physical appearance, and I don't spend my days saying racist things or engaging in racist behavior; therefore, I do not fear a backlash. The actions of people in the past do not reflect on me--I answer only for my own actions.
@mashedtaters Nixon should never have been President. Truthfully, I am surprised things didn't collapse more than they did because of his Presidency.
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I half wish he would go after her. if only to completely wake up the entire country to the right's shenanigans. The center and left have been playing nice for too long. Too much compromise, what has the right compromised on?
For 8 yrs of Obama, the right goes around scuttling their own legislation and doing nothing shutting down the government and failing to do their jobs. The cherry on top was stealing a supreme court justice. And then the right rallied behind a racist, xenophobic, misogynist agenda. Playing too nice with these guys.
Clinton has done a lot of good for the world. Her foundation is a world class one, she's brought AIDS drugs to countries and so forth. Is she perfect? No but is she a criminal? Ha. In the US, rich people don't go to jail, right Donald? So by all means, jail her, she can be a figure to rally around and proves that he's turned the country into a banana republic.
There is a line somewhere that DT can cross that people will be like - ok that's too far. Isn't there? You'd have thought it was the pussy grabbing comment but apparently not.
And: He tells The New York Times on Tuesday that “clean air is vitally important” and he’s keeping an open mind about whether to pull the United States out of a multinational agreement on climate change.
So, in my test, they showed me various religious symbols, and I had to press a button to say if something was good or bad (is the smiley face good or bad? Stuff like that). I had a bias about certain symbols, which influenced my reaction time: I reacted to negative things faster when I saw Jewish or Islamic symbols than Hindu or Christian symbols.
Go through the test without thinking about biases. Don't slow down to think. The idea is to keep your conscious mind out of this.
This is currently the only method for measuring unconscious bias on the individual level. You can't just ask people if they're biased; they would just say no--even if they were biased, consciously or not.
They measure reaction time because you can't consciously control how fast you react, down to the millisecond. Not unless you intentionally take the test extremely slowly.
Even for standard psychological tests I thumb my nose at the testing. You will see questions like "do you hear voices?" which I always find funny. I always answer "no" even though the true answer is "yes" unless you happen to be deaf. They are checking to see if you are trying to answer how you think they want you to answer--the average person interprets that question as "do you hear voices in your head?". I will also answer entire pages of questions as "strongly agree" or "strongly disagree" without even reading them. I have also made contradictory statements such as "when I talk to my parents on the phone or at holidays they are still upset that I am an orphan".
Anyway...where was I....Trump isn't a politician and so whether you like him or not his Administration has the possibility of shaking things up and we are in desperate need of a little cage-rattling or some overturning of the apple cart. For the most part people handle stress in two ways: one group is like Mauna Loa, getting a little upset over things all the time but never too much because they don't let the stress build up, and the other group is like Krakatoa, and when they explode they leave an area of complete devastation in their wake. Countries may be thought of in this way, as well. The United States, with all its petty bickering between blues and reds, is in the Krakatoa group--the pressure has been building for quite a while now and when it finally explodes things are going to become truly ugly.
We have ourselves to blame for this. Too many of us have spent far too long trying to separate ourselves into equivalence classes of this-American or that-American, rich/middle class/poor, rural/urban, white/black/Hispanic/Latino/Asian/Native, straight/gay/bi/poly, and so on and so forth, identifying more with "our" group than with any other group, distrusting any group which isn't our own, sticking our nose into other people's business, and not letting go of the past in order to focus on the now and the future that we have forgotten that we are supposed to live our own life rather than telling other people how to live theirs. Even if someone is engaging in behavior which is irrational such as discriminating based on skin color or religion or income then let them--they have the right to be jerks and organize their life based on false perceptions if they so desire, it isn't any of your business. Of course, those people don't have the right to tell anyone else how to live, either--that sword cuts both ways.
We were never supposed to be one group of people all of whom think alike, like a painting that is entirely one shade. No, we are a mosaic--if you look at it from a close distance some of the color are garish, clash with the other color squares around them, and you can't make any sense of it but once you step back you can see the larger picture and things look just fine.
In any event, I look forward to Krakatoa should people fail to heed my advice--advice which, according to my own statements, people are free to ignore, of course. That being said, I am never above telling other people "I told you so".
You were not impolite. I have seen "not polite" and your questions do not qualify as that. I concur--there are plenty of things which should be taken seriously, just not online tests. Even the ones which try to be serious are no better than those "which superhero are you?" tests which people splat all over their social media home pages.
I actually took a similar test as part of a psychology class. According to THAT test, if I was a police officer in a violent neighborhood, I'd be equally willing to gun down both black and white civilians because I thought their cell phone was a gun.
But I reacted so slowly that I'd probably get gunned down on the first day because I thought that violent criminal's gun was actually a cell phone.
The results of these tests are actually value-neutral--they don't try to say anything about you as a person--but I think it's funnier to describe myself as a slow-witted but racially colorblind anti-Semite who gets shot by a gangster with a cell phone-shaped Glock.
You sound like a libertarian... like me!
I agree that the cage needs a little rattling. What I am worried about is that Trump is such a constant and rather hypocritical liar, will he actually do what he says and make good on his pledge "drain the swamp". He has all the tools he needs to: a majority in congress, he's surrounded himself with yes men, and he has the opportuinty to appoint in the judiciary system. Or will he abuse that power...? Or do nothing but play golf and hang out at the Trump tower...?
Or, even worse, will he misrepresent and misinterpret corruption and wreck our government in the name of draining the swamp? This is my biggest fear in regards to him being in the Oval Office. Only time will tell.
Computer scientists urge Clinton campaign to challenge election results
"Computer scientists believe they have found evidence that vote totals in the three states could have been manipulated or hacked and presented their findings to top Clinton aides on a call last Thursday.
The scientists, among them J. Alex Halderman, the director of the University of Michigan Center for Computer Security and Society, told the Clinton campaign they believe there is a questionable trend of Clinton performing worse in counties that relied on electronic voting machines compared to paper ballots and optical scanners, according to the source."
Would not be shocked. All voting fraud uncovered so far seems to be for Trump as well as voter suppression efforts trying to favor him. And of course he's losing the popular vote by about 2M votes. Additionally Russian agents seemed to be really interested in Trump winning and he even asked for their help at one point hacking his opponent.
You can so "oh, that's just college. People aren't in college forever" but time spent at a university is incredibly formative, and we have yet to see how much of that close-mindedness remains after this generation graduates. Universities in the US are THE center of learning, and more importantly where almost all of the research in the social sciences are conducted . Stifling speech in the place where it is most important should never be taken lightly.
It is important to note that when I refer to "over-political correctness" I am referencing instances like I stated above, and not something as innocuous as adding homosexual characters to a television program to send a political message. Some people might find that annoying, but it is not damaging. Especially not in the way that shutting down academic and political discourse is.
Now, many on the center and right have long claimed that liberals are too quick to yell "racism" and "homophobia" to shut down arguments. If that is true, then all the anti-PC movement has become is the exact same thing on the right. Saying someone is "triggered" or is being PC is really nothing more than someone admitting they are pissed off that someone else vigorously disagrees with what they have just said.
'At the time, I was writing a book about the politics of drug prohibition. I started to ask Ehrlichman a series of earnest, wonky questions that he impatiently waved away. “You want to know what this was really all about?” he asked with the bluntness of a man who, after public disgrace and a stretch in federal prison, had little left to protect. “The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I’m saying? We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.”'
http://harpers.org/archive/2016/04/legalize-it-all/
Warning: strong, offensive language:
I was laughing uncontrollably at this.
@smeagolheart I saw that news story, as well, and so far it amounts to nothing. No one has uncovered any direct, verifiable evidence of hacking any electronic voting machine even though such things are possible...only not from a distance. Those machines are not connected to the Internet so unless hackers have physical access to the machines (highly unlikely) or are stationing enough of them near voting places and trying to hack in wirelessly (again, highly unlikely) then no hacking took place. The Clinton team needs to face reality as it is, not as they would like it to be--they failed to reach key voters in those swing States, mostly because Clinton had too many credibility issues and her campaign dismissed those voters. The Democrats will learn from their mistakes and will pay closer attention to those Midwest voters in 2018 and 2020. In any event, it is a moot point--she already conceded. This isn't a children's game so she can't say "wait--I take it back".
As far as "safe spaces" and uninviting people to speak at universities....people should willingly engage in topics which make them uncomfortable on a daily basis. If you go to bed and you didn't get out of your comfort zone that day then you wasted your time. That doesn't mean that you have to get in anyone's face about it, of course, but engaging in a discussion on a sensitive topic is the best way to take the sting out of that topic so that everyone may address it more clearly and factually without all the emotional brouhaha.
My problem--and I don't mind admitting this--is that I sometimes have to fight the urge to purpose poke poke poke people about sensitive topics specifically to get a reaction out of them, to get them to drop their self-imposed masks, and to get them to face the topic openly and directly. I had all of my illusions carefully peeled away layer by layer when I was younger so in my arrogance I think everyone else should enjoy that experience, as well.
Now, on the topic of whether white people fear a backlash should minorities become the majority...I am certain some of them do feel that way. I don't, but then I don't think like other people think. I didn't engage in systemic racism (the Jim Crow laws, many of which were enacted by truly old-school Democrats over a century ago), I didn't discriminate against people, I don't judge people based on their physical appearance, and I don't spend my days saying racist things or engaging in racist behavior; therefore, I do not fear a backlash. The actions of people in the past do not reflect on me--I answer only for my own actions.
@mashedtaters Nixon should never have been President. Truthfully, I am surprised things didn't collapse more than they did because of his Presidency.