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Joined 5 months ago
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Cake day: August 12th, 2025

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  • I think this is a more nuanced take on the situation. I would agree that folks who are directly impacted by an issue are more likely to be impacted by it. Original comment seemed too absolutist too me.

    I think there are 22yo who can be impacted by the issue of taxes while being poor (Though they may end up on the other side of the argument). For example, issues of food stamps and medicare-for-all affect all ages. A 22yo might have a strong opinion in favor of taxation for these purposes. A conservative making an ad hominem argument on the basis of age in this case (e.g., that they are simply being manipulated by the radical left) would be clearly incorrect.

    I also think, as more of a moral argument, you shouldn’t need to be directly impacted by something in order to support/oppose it. I am not on food stamps but I absolutely think we should have them (or perhaps “upgrade” it to UBI to avoid nonsense on what poor people are allowed to buy).

    In any case, dismissing someone as simply being manipulated is not a good approach in general. It could be a good approach when we are specifically talking about the person overselling on confirmation bias from ChatGPT, but it is a poor way to change minds as a general tactic.

    Is there any particular language I should adjust to avoid being “aggro”? I did say that I hated their argument. And I did call them hostile after their last sarcastic response to me trying to extend an olive branch.

    Is that going too far? “Touch grass” is about the same level, I would think, but I’ve been wrong before and I’ll be wrong again.



  • I suppose I did simplify your argument.

    I’ll restate, then: it’s erroneous to say that any young person/22yo with a strong opinion on taxes is being manipulated. Although life experience may prevent naivete in some cases, I think it’s incorrect to make a bold assertion like that because older folks are capable of being manipulated and younger folks are capable of being discerning and having the critical thinking skills to avoid manipulation.

    I would also take issue with your follow up on whether owning property impacts whether or not someone’s opinions on economic issues are well defined. I don’t think people need to be personally invested in an issue to have a nuanced opinion on it, though it can certainly help (and you definitely want to consider interested parties when it comes to property tax- i.e., before a city raises property taxes, they should take into consideration property owners with fixed incomes, who do tend to be 60+)

    I get that you were just making a short comment and didn’t intend to go deep into the weeds on it, but I find these kinds of assumptions dangerous.



  • I kinda hate the premise that young age automatically makes you stupid or your opinions a result of manipulation. Someone in their 60s can be just as stupid as a 22yo, and a 22yo is also capable of having nuanced thoughts about politics and taxation. “Young=naive” is a bad trap to fall into when evaluating political opinions and feeds into the old adage about people becoming conservative as they get older.

    I think this person is just stupid on their own, regardless of their age.


  • According to Chenoweth, the number refers to peak, not cumulative participation. She also says 3.5% is not absolute – even non-violent campaigns can succeed with less participation, according to her 2020 update to the rule.

    That’s the opposite of what her update said (well, it’s rather misleading). Her update noted cases where nonviolence failed even when they beat 3.5% - including one case that achieved 6% participation. She did note that most successful attempts didn’t need to reach 3.5%, but also that reaching that is no longer a guarantee.

    Her original research only went to 2006, there’s been a few recent cases which broke the rule. Like she said in her update, history isn’t necessarily a predictor of future results. I think there are also some very recent cases like Nepal where 95% of the movement is nonviolent, but violence at the very end of the movement tips the scale. (IIRC something similar happened with the Iranian revolution, though the results of that were decidedly undemocratic in the long run). There’s some nuance with Nepal as well- the organizers did not choose to go for violence, it was largely an unplanned mob reaction.

    Based on the totality of her research (which is publicly accessible and based on publicly accessible data), I still think nonviolence is more likely to achieve success than violence, but it really annoys me when articles like this one overstate the effects. It makes it really easy to tear apart the argument.



  • I don’t see the point in boycotting something that’s free and doesn’t make money off of selling my data. I suppose you aren’t obligated to donate to it, but that was already true.

    I suppose OTOH, I’m not pro-tankie, but I at least prefer tankies to the fascists and authoritarian capitalists (or whatever you want to call them) that run mainstream media. Harm reduction is the name of the game IMO, not finding a platform with a perfect set of political values aligning with yours (at least for me, I haven’t run into many leftists who are also committed to nonviolence due to pragmatic reasons). The russia/ukraine stuff in that thread you link does look nasty, on the other other hand


  • The politics of preservation is definitely an interesting one. I suppose one argument in favor of preserving more popular music is that there are going to be fewer popular tracks than unpopular tracks - and they’re already at 300TB, which is nothing to sneeze at, especially since it’s a third the size of their existing library of ebooks.





  • This post in particular probably won’t cause a wide swing in support, but it will cause a few people to reconsider past beliefs. This might get those people thinking if it was really OK to make fun of the attack on Pelosis husband, and then that might get them to reconsider how they look at Jan 6.

    Rising grocery bills will flip more people than this, of course

    I’m not saying that the people who change their minds now are good people (I don’t think anyone thinks this) but we need everyone we can get (WITHOUT compromising our core values) when it comes to opposing trump. Every time he fucks up, we need to put the pressure on. Cult deprogramming is difficult, and can’t be done for everyone, but it is possible.

    There is only one person you are helping when you preach defeatism and give up early.