Captain Crimson wrote: ↑Sat May 09, 2020 11:55 pm
Draco Dracul wrote: ↑Sat May 09, 2020 10:33 pm
It's not going to benefit me directly so I'm not going to lift a figure to make anything better or even to stop things from getting worse is exactly the kind of moral cowardice I'm talking about. You say you do it for your principlce while standing for nothing but your own benefit. You're DJ from The Last Jedi.
That's you putting words into my mouth, and I do NOT appreciate that. Political entrenchment is not something which can be fought overnight, and frankly the hypocrisy from the left turns me off if they are the ones to guide us into this apparent bright future they see on the horizon. It seems more you're collective shaming, which is a tried-and-true tactic to the left. Blame people for not getting involved, when it's so hard to get any kind of meaningful change done, when the rich get richer, the powerful seize more power, and the cruel become nastier, that it's all too easy to wonder what contribution you will make.
It's hard to get meaningful change done because people like you are willing to sit on the side lines as things get worse and worse. I mean you're complaining about the things that the left wants to stop. Especially when you want to not fight the face of the rights push toward wanton cruelty is up for reelection.
Well, I know what contribution I'll be making. You can be active in community in other ways past electoral voting on candidates I find to be wanting. Even if I couldn't help out all the time, I gave to charities to help out in relief efforts for Hurricane Sandy, the Flint, Michigan water crisis, and a few more. I volunteer at soup kitchens, when I am able to. Plus as I have noted before, when others were disregarding warnings and COVID-19 hit the beaches, I did not. I stayed at home, however tempting it might have been to do the same thing. I would do more if not for the fact the economy is taking a hit and I want to ride it out until we get to the other end. Gotta look after my family now.
You can, but it's like renovating a home without fixing the cracked foundation first. You might make something's better, but you're work will be for naught because you are letting the problem get worse and worse.
Draco Dracul wrote: ↑Sat May 09, 2020 10:33 pm
Four more years of Trump means no progressive legislation for an entire generation because it will mean a 6-3 court. It will mean more disasters like the one we are living through now. It will mean more and more of the state apparatus warped to sole attack the enemies of Trump and by extension the Republican party. You're justifying your apathy by making a standard so high for action that all of histories greatest monsters combined would not reach it.
Mr. 45 is not going to end the world in four years. He is merely doubling down on the way American culture has been moving for decades.
Only if you define the right wing as the only american culture, and the american right wing has spent 50 years moving hard to the right to the point where doubling down on it means actively engaging in fascistic rhetoric, which trump is currently engaged in.
Besides, Mr. 45 is the most heavily criticized president on cable news channels like CNN and MSNBC, so I really don't get what your point. I am not apathetic, as I have proven above. I just don't define an ability to forge change with the highest levels of power.
Criticism in the media only matters if it leads leadership to bend to popular opinion or if it creates a groundswell of opposition. Trump has shown that he will only listen to media that sings his praises and assholes like you won't lift a finger to stop anything short of the end of the world.
I'd prefer to do that where people matter, not abstractions that I personally cannot influence because I'm just a single cog in the machine. I also do NOT defend history's greatest monsters, the likes of Hitler, Stalin, Attila the Hun, Mussolini, Genghis Khan, and others you could name past them. For however awful he is, Mr. 45 has nowhere near the body count those tyrants had. If you want to claim that's only because he is not able to do so, then that's a diversionary tactic, because the system puts limits on all leaders we have had, even the most highly regarded of the modern era with the benefit of hindsight.
You fundamentally are defending histories monsters because none of them ended the world either and that's the standard you have set for action to be worth taking. Additional Trump has spent his first term actively undermining the checks and balances of the system, filling the justice department with cronies, and every time he's been given any slack he proceeds to push the boundaries even further.
Draco Dracul wrote: ↑Sat May 09, 2020 10:33 pm
The system is only self correcting on a geological time scale. The changes we've made in 2 centuries will linger for millions of years. The major negative effects are already being felt, climate change is responsible for the drought that was a major sparking point for the Syrian civil war.
Disasters like Chernobyl, yes, on that, I agree. But I also take severe umbrage by attempting to rally votes with terror tactics fundamentally no different than the GOP. Earth is such a complex system of counterbalanced forces, it would still take centuries to pull off irreparable damage, and by that time I feel as if all the social issues of today could possibly be worked out, with changing technology and a time to grow accustomed to them. Yeah, it's a bit of a Roddenberryist view of the future, but there it is.
I'm starting to feel at this point as if further conversation is pointless, as it was with SSJGodGoku.
You have it backwards, disasters like Chernobyl are quick for nature to counterbalance and fix. The Chernobyl exclusion zone is largely safe to enter right now. Climate change on the other hand is a constant stress that creates positive feed back loops, for instance as sea ice melts the earth absorbs more heat, which causes more sea ice to melt. We've actually hit a point where if all man made emmisions stopped tomorrow the Temperature would keep rising.