The News Thread

[CiG]

Only if you take people in he media as being representative of everyone on the left. Talk to 'real' people and it's fucking easy.

I'm not especially gracious to people on either side. Those that identify as being on the right just seem to be, in general, less intelligent and/or informed. I hate that 'technocrat' has become a such a negative word.

I'd love to put this to the test because I honestly think you're wrong, I interact with a lot of nobody Leftists (because I'm also on the Left so there's crossover even though I disagree with them a lot) and in my experience, talking to nobodies, they're overwhelmingly in favour of the things I pin on somebodies on the Left.

It's overwhelmingly the Left that pushes things like gender wage gaps and 1 in 4 rape statistics, it's not the Right in my experience and I'm not at all saying the Right is perfect I'm just more critical of the Left because of the things they think they stand for, whereas the Right isn't really shitting on the values they claim to represent.

 

[CiG]

 

[Dak]

What Trump is doing is not promising enough gimmedats to the right populations. The left has never really been concerned with totalitarianism itself, and it isn't now.

 

[arg]

View attachment 3687

i'm okay with that.

 

[CiG]

I feel as if, though Trump is shit, this comparison is a massive stretch of the imagination.

 

[rms]

Of course it is. We aren't a debilitated nation using Jews as the scapegoat for all of our problems. Trump demonizes Mexicans in that he realizes they draw down wages for middle/lower class Americans. Mulsims for ISIS/"third world culture." Totally different things

 

[arg]

it's absolutely necessary to unite americans against illegals, terrorists, refugees and welfare abusers. they must be isolated and destroyed.

note that none of the above categories are race-specific. Trump is not racist. he does have arab, black and mexican supporters who are respectable

 

[rms]

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/01/bernie-sanders-reparations/424602/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...ates-on-bernie-sanders-reparations/?tid=sm_fb

Bernie sucks (for black people) because he doesn't agree with reparations.

What are your opinions? I would like to allow Omni state her view first, as us white men obviously are against reparations because it doesn't help us.

 

[viewerfromnihil]

I feel like Affirmative Action was intended to go into that direction, but failed because it was all inclusive and also because it didn't actually deal with issues within the black community. I'm unsure as to whether or not reparations would be effective. I don't think that most would just waste the money, but I'm concerned that the the lowest of the social strata may fall into doing so. Those who have overcome the adversity would likely be responsible with their money, but then the call for reparations isn't really intended to benefit those who are better off. I think tuition-free college, remedial courses, room and board costs for the descendants of slaves would be a better idea. Really, inner-city schools just need a total revamp. The solution to that problem is such a quagmire though, and unfortunately the problems often begin with the parents, which makes the problem exponentially more difficult. Finding a way to make honest, well-paying jobs seem a viable possibility to young, black youth would probably be the best option (edit: and this is why bernie disagrees with reparations. It's about creating a broad based, lasting, self-sufficient black middle class). How to go about that, I wouldn't know.

 

[Dak]

Who foots the bill? Who is deserving? How much? How would it fix anything? Any credit for everything already done? Why isn't there a statute of limitations? I've never seen good answers to any of those questions.

 

[CiG]

People that push the concept of reparations should take the first step, practice what they preach and give something up to the black people they feel the entire country owes so much to.

A tiny percentage of whites alive today have ancestors that owned slaves and there is no truly efficient way to find out which black people alive today are descendants of slaves, I wouldn't trust a government to fix a fucking sidewalk, let alone even attempt to enact this cluster fuck of a concept.

Not to mention it's the slaves long dead that would deserve the money, not some distant relative who has endured none of the hardship the slaves did.

"Black people will never get reparations and so our reparations is our language, we can say whatever the fuck we want and you just have to sit back and take it." ~ Patrice O'Neal

 

[viewerfromnihil]

Who foots the bill? Who is deserving? How much? How would it fix anything? Any credit for everything already done? Why isn't there a statute of limitations? I've never seen good answers to any of those questions.

It has to do with infrastructure. Who pays for it? Everybody, of course, and, of course, the rich should pay a higher percentage. How did we build our cities and highways in the first place? They need rebuilt. This won't solve the problem, but at least driving through the paved rural and inner city roads won't be worse than driving on a well leveled dirt road. We have to do it anyways.

 

[CiG]

So you're implying blacks should pay reparations?

 

[viewerfromnihil]

No, I support a graduated income tax system. We all have skin in the game. Nobody should go without paying at least some taxes if they enjoy the benefits of living within a governed society.

 

[CiG]

Yes but how does that relate to reparations?

 

[viewerfromnihil]

I didn't say I supported reparations. I said I was skeptical of whether or not they would be effective. Boys are standing on the corners because they have a lack of opportunity (yes, there are some great exceptions to this, but they're the exceptions, not the rule) and are taking up the most profitable opportunity they can get their hands on. There's plenty of work to be done in lower income communities in our cities, yet tax dollars never work their way there because they're always being poured into high-income attraction areas, like Baltimore's Inner Harbor. We can have both, but it requires the proper management of funds, in addition to additional funds.

 

[CiG]

Who foots the bill? Who is deserving? How much? How would it fix anything? Any credit for everything already done? Why isn't there a statute of limitations? I've never seen good answers to any of those questions.

It has to do with infrastructure. Who pays for it? Everybody, of course, and, of course, the rich should pay a higher percentage. How did we build our cities and highways in the first place? They need rebuilt. This won't solve the problem, but at least driving through the paved rural and inner city roads won't be worse than driving on a well leveled dirt road. We have to do it anyways.

But, you gave this answer to Dak's question about reparations.

If everybody foots the bill for reparations which is what you say here, you're implying that blacks and immigrants that had nothing to do with slavery in any context also pay. "The rich" is not synonymous with white either.

 

[viewerfromnihil]

Perhaps I was misinterpreting Dak's post, but I took it to be a response to my post. I was not referring to reparations in my response to him.

And what are you talking about? While depicting white as rich isn't accurate, depicting rich as usually white isn't that far from the actual case, certainly within the West.

 

[CiG]

Who foots the bill? Who is deserving? How much? How would it fix anything? Any credit for everything already done? Why isn't there a statute of limitations? I've never seen good answers to any of those questions.

I think you misunderstood, because this^ makes sense only in a context of talking about reparations.

Perhaps I was misinterpreting Dak's post, but I took it to be a response to my post. I was not referring to reparations in my response to him.

And what are you talking about? While depicting white as rich isn't accurate, depicting rich as usually white isn't that far from the actual case, certainly within the West.

Yes, but if you make blanket statements like "the rich should pay more" in relation to reparations, you're saying even the non-white rich should pay towards an end that makes no sense and that's without even considering that not all rich whites are descended from whites that were in America during slavery.

Of course all of this is moot if you weren't talking about reparations.

 

[viewerfromnihil]

I'm not talking about reparations. You're making the discussion moot by continuing to bring them up when I'm not talking about them. I apologize that I wasn't clear enough before, but, to make the point now, I'm not talking about reparations.