Trying to have a rational conversation is difficult enough without people fixating on a single word in a sentence and then letting their lizard hind brain take control. A recent case in point was an article in the Washington Post about political scientists and sociologists concerned that the US is backsliding into autocracy. Link. One of the people commenting immediately started saying that this was sensationalist nonsense to sell papers - the President does not have autocratic power and the people around him are managing him very well so as to ensure that he never gets that power.

I was browsing some libertarian social media sites trying to understand the different variations of libertarians and I was struck by the similarity with religious converts. If you believe in the invisible market hand, then everything will be fine is the same as if you believe in my version of God, then everything will be fine. When asking about exploitation, I was pointed to this quote: “With the State - biggest, baddest exploiter of all time - out of the picture, exploitation, in terms of aggression, would all but vanish.

It is painful to watch the echo chambers missing what is happening right in front of their faces because they are so fixated on the enemy they have been brought up to hate. Is it that corruption is okay if its the guys behind our cheerleaders engaged in the corruption? I see people point to the problems in Venezuela as demonstrating the evils of socialism. No, the problems in Venezuela demonstrate the evils of corruption.

Terry Pratchett once said “Satire is meant to ridicule power. If you are laughing at people who are hurting, it’s not satire, it’s bullying.” I absolutely agree. At the same time, I want you to think about the phrase “people who are hurting”. Let’s assume that someone is hurting but it is not “justifiable” in your mind. Have you now decided that they aren’t really hurting? There seems to be a tendency by both parties to a disagreement to deny the reality of any hurt feelings by the other side and claim that they are the only side that has the right to feel hurt.

RIP Justice Ginsburg. From a pure power politics perspective I can understand why the Republicans said that they will bring the next nominee to a vote before the US election. I can’t make people care about other people. But don’t for a second believe that there are any morals or ethics left in the bloody carcass of a once respectable party. As usual, feel free to disagree using this contact link.

Apparently there is an old French proverb that says “When the disgusted have left, only the disgusting remain”. Painful, but true. There does become a point where leaving someplace because you cannot continue to work there and keep your integrity creates the danger that the place will get worse. However, if you have been sidelined and are no longer effective in trying to keep some integrity, morals, ethics there, then staying doesn’t help and maybe society is better placed for change from the outside.

Introduction (because this will be long) There is an old proverb that you should never meet your heroes or heroines. If you do, you will see their feet of clay. How you do react? If you have idolized and attached a sense of yourself to the hero or heroine, people often either hide the issues and double down on the hero/heroine worship or they are so upset they throw away the good with the bad.

I watched Ed Miliband’s speech in the UK Parliament and then watched all the social media posts from the “Remainders” congratulating each other. A typical title started “Boris Johnson’s humiliation by Ed Miliband…”. The same thing happens on the other side. It doesn’t matter whether it is in the UK, the US, India or elsewhere and it doesn’t matter what the subject is so long as there are at least two extremes on the position.

I will posit this as my opinion - it is easier to change opinions than it is to change beliefs. The line drawing between opinions and beliefs is probably fuzzy, however. I would also suggest that your own personality will affect whether seeing facts contrary to your own opinion will cause you to change that opinion. I think this opinion of mine gets some support in a recent paper (abstract published at Close Minded Cognition).

That paper determined that people scoring high in the desire for order, structure and preservation of social norms tend to be less successful at correcting erroneous beliefs when confronted by new information. For those people, a close-minded cognitive style negatively influences belief updating. (click on the title to see more)

There is a difference between politician: “one engaged in party
politics, especially as a trade; one who promotes the interests of a
political party, one concerned with public affairs for the sake of
profit or of a clique.” and statesman: “enlightened, disinterested,
and high-minded service to the state or the people of the state”.

We usually have too many politicians and not enough statesmen.

For my daughter when she was in junior high school. If you insisted on
a rule and justified it because the authority figure said so, you
guaranteed a fight. If you gave reasonable reasons for the rule, there
wouldn’t be any problem. I’ve seen reports that up to 30% of any human
population consists of authoritarians. Those in power want mindless
obedience. Even those not in positions of power want to be
thoughtlessly led and will insist on mindless obedience to authority
and punishment otherwise.

There is a place for warriors. There is a place for story
tellers. Sometimes both groups forget there is a need for the other.

Sometimes you wonder if the human race will ever stop the fighting.