Escaping the Echo Chamber
- Túrin Turambar
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- Location: Melbourne, Victoria
Re: Escaping the Echo Chamber
Here’s something which I do think is an overraction -
There have been calls for Virginia’s Governor to resign after a 1984 yearbook photo of him emerged wearing a racist costume (the photo shows a man in blackface next to a man in Klan robes – he hasn’t says which one is him).
This was obviously a pretty silly thing to do, but I’m reluctant to judge someone’s behaviour from thirty-five years ago by modern standards, and equally reluctant to argue that someone’s career in public life should end after it emerged it took part in an offensive joke as a teenager. I’m actually concerned that, with social media, we’re eventually going to struggle to find people willing to go into public life because of something highly embarrassing in their past. The Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez dancing video is a harmless example which she was able to laugh off, but it’s a sign of things to come.
There have been calls for Virginia’s Governor to resign after a 1984 yearbook photo of him emerged wearing a racist costume (the photo shows a man in blackface next to a man in Klan robes – he hasn’t says which one is him).
This was obviously a pretty silly thing to do, but I’m reluctant to judge someone’s behaviour from thirty-five years ago by modern standards, and equally reluctant to argue that someone’s career in public life should end after it emerged it took part in an offensive joke as a teenager. I’m actually concerned that, with social media, we’re eventually going to struggle to find people willing to go into public life because of something highly embarrassing in their past. The Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez dancing video is a harmless example which she was able to laugh off, but it’s a sign of things to come.
Re: Escaping the Echo Chamber
I felt, and still mostly do feel, that way about the Kavanaugh controversy. I don't really understand the position that one negative act decades ago should have some relevance to what we think of them today.
I wanna love somebody but I don't know how
I wanna throw my body in the river and drown
-The Decemberists
I wanna throw my body in the river and drown
-The Decemberists
Re: Escaping the Echo Chamber
Well, he was actually in medical school when this happened. I'm not sure what to make of it. There've been some glancing reports it may have been part of a variety show. I'm surprised it never came out earlier.
So far a pattern of racist behavior is not emerging. In fact, he's got a history of not racist behavior. So I'm inclined to sit out the hysteria and chalk it up as a case of really bad judgment 35 years ago. Or maybe he was racist and has been working very hard through his adult life to get better.
He could try going full Kavanaugh and screaming "I LIKE BEER!" at the top of his lungs. That sort of behavior seems to be very effective...for men.
So far a pattern of racist behavior is not emerging. In fact, he's got a history of not racist behavior. So I'm inclined to sit out the hysteria and chalk it up as a case of really bad judgment 35 years ago. Or maybe he was racist and has been working very hard through his adult life to get better.
He could try going full Kavanaugh and screaming "I LIKE BEER!" at the top of his lungs. That sort of behavior seems to be very effective...for men.
When you can do nothing what can you do?
- Voronwë the Faithful
- At the intersection of here and now
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Re: Escaping the Echo Chamber
He is now saying that he is not in the picture. He claims that the reason he first admitted that he was one of the two in the picture was that he was actually thinking of another occasion when he darkened his skin for a Michael Jackson dance contest.
As far as I am concerned, he should resign.
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As far as I am concerned, he should resign.
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"Spirits in the shape of hawks and eagles flew ever to and from his halls; and their eyes could see to the depths of the seas, and pierce the hidden caverns beneath the world."
Re: Escaping the Echo Chamber
Yeah I was more sympathetic until that happened. Not sure what's better, resignation or some real, sincere public flagellation.
When you can do nothing what can you do?
- Túrin Turambar
- Posts: 6161
- Joined: Sat Dec 03, 2005 9:37 am
- Location: Melbourne, Victoria
Re: Escaping the Echo Chamber
And if he isn't in the photo, why is it in his yearbook page? The entire thing has gone from the embarrassing to the bizarre.
Re: Escaping the Echo Chamber
His communications team is doing a lousy job, that's for sure. Either that or he's ignoring them.
When you can do nothing what can you do?
Re: Escaping the Echo Chamber
And did he really offer to use facial recognition to prove he wasn't the one in his KKK hood? (per Nate Silver)
I do think it's a shock that any Republican who demands his resignation but says nothing about Trump is not being smote by a lightning bolt on the spot.
I do think it's a shock that any Republican who demands his resignation but says nothing about Trump is not being smote by a lightning bolt on the spot.
If there was anything that depressed him more than his own cynicism, it was that quite often it still wasn't as cynical as real life.
Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
- Dave_LF
- Wrong within normal parameters
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Re: Escaping the Echo Chamber
Eh. If lightning bolts worked that way, none of 'em would still be around.
Re: Escaping the Echo Chamber
Case in point
https://twitter.com/KFILE/status/1091840716848943104I had forgotten the VA GOP, who called on Northam to resign, previously accused him of betraying his heritage for supporting Confederate monument removal. https://t.co/0tshfwFMlh
If there was anything that depressed him more than his own cynicism, it was that quite often it still wasn't as cynical as real life.
Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
Re: Escaping the Echo Chamber
No one's walking away clean from this one...
When you can do nothing what can you do?
Re: Escaping the Echo Chamber
It's what happens when a systemic, institutionalized problem is treated like each individual case is a shocking exception.
If there was anything that depressed him more than his own cynicism, it was that quite often it still wasn't as cynical as real life.
Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
- Voronwë the Faithful
- At the intersection of here and now
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Re: Escaping the Echo Chamber
Well said. Frelga.
"Spirits in the shape of hawks and eagles flew ever to and from his halls; and their eyes could see to the depths of the seas, and pierce the hidden caverns beneath the world."
- Primula Baggins
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Re: Escaping the Echo Chamber
An excellent and insightful summation of the swamp we’re all up to our necks in.
“There, peeping among the cloud-wrack above a dark tor high up in the mountains, Sam saw a white star twinkle for a while. The beauty of it smote his heart, as he looked up out of the forsaken land, and hope returned to him. For like a shaft, clear and cold, the thought pierced him that in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Return of the King
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Return of the King
Re: Escaping the Echo Chamber
While I find it profoundly uninsightful. That kind of language is part of a bad tendency of the left/liberals to use vaguely defined but emotionally loaded words as part of their lingo. Any attempt to argue against such language is usually met by accusations of bigotry, which immediately shuts down any conversation. Which I don't find very helpful.
In this case, the vaguely defined but emotionally loaded words being "systemic" and "institutionalized", words that seem to imply some sort of formal, official, organized power groups attempting to do....something. Something vast and nefarious. Which is basically the definition of a conspiracy theory, couched in intellectual sounding terms. Like most conspiracy theories you'll be able to cherry pick examples to prove your narrative. But also like most conspiracy theories, well, it's pretty silly.
In this case, the vaguely defined but emotionally loaded words being "systemic" and "institutionalized", words that seem to imply some sort of formal, official, organized power groups attempting to do....something. Something vast and nefarious. Which is basically the definition of a conspiracy theory, couched in intellectual sounding terms. Like most conspiracy theories you'll be able to cherry pick examples to prove your narrative. But also like most conspiracy theories, well, it's pretty silly.
I wanna love somebody but I don't know how
I wanna throw my body in the river and drown
-The Decemberists
I wanna throw my body in the river and drown
-The Decemberists
Re: Escaping the Echo Chamber
Yov, if you are unaware of the systemic and institutionalized history and reality of racism in the United States, then may I recommend that you so some reading?
For example.
The troubling history behind Ralph Northam’s blackface Klan photo
For example.
The troubling history behind Ralph Northam’s blackface Klan photo
If there was anything that depressed him more than his own cynicism, it was that quite often it still wasn't as cynical as real life.
Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
Re: Escaping the Echo Chamber
Yes, I am aware that there were many laws and rules in our nation enforcing segregation and discrimination several decades ago. I assumed you were talking about 2019 though.
I wanna love somebody but I don't know how
I wanna throw my body in the river and drown
-The Decemberists
I wanna throw my body in the river and drown
-The Decemberists
Re: Escaping the Echo Chamber
Why, what happened in 2019? Did we get a new president since yesterday?
If there was anything that depressed him more than his own cynicism, it was that quite often it still wasn't as cynical as real life.
Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
Re: Escaping the Echo Chamber
echo chamberDictionary result for echo chamber
noun
1.
an enclosed space where sound reverberates.
"purpose-built echo chambers allow the addition of natural-sounding reverberation to the recordings"
2.
an environment in which a person encounters only beliefs or opinions that coincide with their own, so that their existing views are reinforced and alternative ideas are not considered.
"people are living in partisan and ideological echo chambers"
The Vinyamars on Stage! This time at Bag End
- Voronwë the Faithful
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Re: Escaping the Echo Chamber
If you believe that institutionalized racism in the U.S. ended decades ago, you simply aren't paying attention. That's not being in a partisan echo chamber; that's reality. Ask Tim Scott, the conservative GOP Senator from South Carolina (and the only Republican African-American senator and one of only two GOP African-American members of Congress) and I guarantee you, he would agree. That's not being partisan, it is facing the facts.
"Spirits in the shape of hawks and eagles flew ever to and from his halls; and their eyes could see to the depths of the seas, and pierce the hidden caverns beneath the world."