The view from the Center

[huckelberry]

Drumdude, I should add I listened to the link in your opening post and think Sam Harris has a significant points. Woke has made itself noxious not by the basic idea but by the strong arm insistence on silencing others and swallowing eagerly extremes.

Yellowstone opened a thread on the topic with a link to a person saying she changed from no Trump in the past to voting for him due to here fears of left wing culture extreme demands. I did not feel that was all fair but found myself thinking there is a political reality there.(thread center right and center left)

[drumdude]

Woke has made itself noxious not by the basic idea but by the strong arm insistence on silencing others and swallowing eagerly extremes.

I mostly agree. I think the basic idea of equality for all is worth fighting for, but the implementation of that is worth discussing. "Woke" tends to bypass the discussion and go straight to the solution, even if that solution is ill conceived and self-defeating. It's essentially become a parody of itself, which is why I see the left swinging back to center and coming back to the table with the right to discuss these ideas. This time without so much emotion and with a lot more thought.

[canpakes]

Drumdude, I should add I listened to the link in your opening post and think Sam Harris has a significant points. Woke has made itself noxious not by the basic idea but by the strong arm insistence on silencing others and swallowing eagerly extremes.

Somewhat ironically, the solution to this problem on the left is to accept and submit to the same problem as promoted by the right. Already, the phrase ‘climate change’ has been prohibited within legislation/gov’t documentation in conservative strongholds (Florida got that ball rolling in 2017), Project 2025 framework relies heavily on a Christian viewpoint for its structure, Trump has threatened to cut funding from schools that explore diversity (with further threats to use those funds to pay ‘restitution’ to anyone deemed harmed by such a grievous occurrence) and proposes to monitor and report the miscarriages of pregnant women to a federal agency, with an eye on determining a ‘cause’ subject to legal consequences (P2025, pg. 455).

Considering that a woman who competes athletically could conceivably (no pun) have charges brought against her for suffering a miscarriage under the premise that her involvement in sports endangered and ‘murdered’ the fetus, I still see the basic list above as much more dangerous than anything that the left was threatening to impose. I’m not even sure what that list from the left is given that its woke demands usually did little more than ask for certain easy considerations. As example, one person using pronouns and requesting that others would do the same isn’t much of an infringement on the other, much the same as having a transgender-available bathroom doesn’t impose on the rights of anyone not wanting to use it. Having one’s pregnancy monitored by a federal agency for possible criminal charges issued in the wake of a spontaneous miscarriage seems much more problematic.

Yellowstone opened a thread on the topic with a link to a person saying she changed from no Trump in the past to voting for him due to here fears of left wing culture extreme demands. I did not feel that was all fair but found myself thinking there is a political reality there.(thread center right and center left)

I suspect that folks with that mindset were already in the Trump camp. I’d also suspect that many folks voted for Trump for the reason that so many have stated in post-election interviews: that he will somehow be able to make grocery prices revert to 2019 levels and will somehow make all energy costs decline by 50%. Neither will happen, but there are enough people who are not versed in how markets work to believe in the lie being promoted there.

[Gadianton]

Sam says they're mostly on Twitter and in academia, two places I'm not constantly around like he is. The nice thing about those particular places is that the first is mostly anonymous, and accounts and posts are easily deleted. Academia is similarly out of view of most of the public, unless you happen to have the time to be on a university campus and listen in on liberal professors' classes.

Recently the left wing has pivoted to the center, with Kamala saying "don't come here" and Democrats saying they're pro-gun and anti-illegal immigration. It's a rapid 180, disingenuous, and transparent ploy to most everyone watching. It's a little gaslighty for them to forget what they were saying during the George Floyd protests. They literally wanted to get rid of policing because it was "too racist."

Yes on academia, and that's where my examples would come from. I have no knowledge of Twitter. I think Sam's point was correct that Biden halted on the border issue before he did anything substantial. There was clearly an identity war going on with liberal officials showing their goodness by embracing illegals sent to them on buses. And the defund the police thing was also problematic. I recall being informed that the changes weren't so drastic as the soundbite implied, but having a soundbite like that is a huge problem if you're trying NOT to be like THEM.

Are classic Democrats who were anti-gun switching to pro gun? The "Democrats" I know of who are "pro gun" have always been pro gun, and former Republicans, and are looking to join forces with anyone else trying to avoid living in Myanmar.

[yellowstone123]

Huckelberry wrote:

Yellowstone opened a thread on the topic with a link to a person saying she changed from no Trump in the past to voting for him due to here fears of left wing culture extreme demands. I did not feel that was all fair but found myself thinking there is a political reality there.(thread center right and center left)

To which canpakes wrote:

I suspect that folks with that mindset were already in the Trump camp. I’d also suspect that many folks voted for Trump for the reason that so many have stated in post-election interviews: that he will somehow be able to make grocery prices revert to 2019 levels and will somehow make all energy costs decline by 50%. Neither will happen, but there are enough people who are not versed in how markets work to believe in the lie being promoted there.

I can understand this response by canpakes but I have watched a lot of Bridget Phetasy, the comedian who speaks out on issues that concern her on her Dumpster Fire show.

I have learned some interesting things from the last few shows. In 2016 she voted for Hillary. It was during the Trump years that she started her shows. I saw her Walk-Ins Welcome shows at the beginning which she still records.

She wrote for the entertainment industry prior to her podcasts. In 2019 she wrote an open letter to the Democratic Party stating that far-left activist had hijacked her party and she didn’t know what to do.

She did not vote in 2020 because Trump and Biden were the ones who were on the ticket.

She is not MAGA and her vote for Trump was an anti-Kamala vote.

I thought Trump would give her new material, but not so fast as he did by submitting the name of Matt Gaetz for the role of Attorney General.

Her motto is that she makes burgers out of your sacred cows and I’m sure something about Matt Gaetz is being written or recorded right now.