Jay said:
I do the same when the right is intellectually dishonest.I’ve yet to see this happen.
Must never have happened then.
I know it didn’t happen. You refused to call out the intellectual dishonesty of Jordan Peterson, for example. When he says that lack of religion causes immorality, he’s factually incorrect to the point of potentially being an outright liar because it’s documented that the less religious a society, the lower its crime rate. That’s just one example of right wing dishonesty that’s come up in this thread that you’ve been silent on. I wouldn’t mind if you didn’t act as though you’re a neutral voice on this. You obviously, at the very least, lean right. Every person reading this thread can tell. That’s fine, I just don’t get why you want there to be a pretense of you being a centrist.
Most of the bullshit I see in this thread is left-leaning bullshit because most of the posters are left-leaning. Naturally, I sound right-leaning compared to most of you. To the far left, anything not bleeding-heart liberalism is “to the right”.
Not true. Rightwing bullshit is brought up all the time in this thread. Granted, mostly by left-leaning people that are complaining about it, but it’s still being brought up. The “far left” by the way is barely even represented in our government. To the right, everything even just in the center is socialism. The biggest lie that the right in this country has perpetuated is that Obama and the Democratic Party, which is corporate to the bone and totally bought and paid for, is leftist and socialist. It isn’t.
If you’d like to hear about my left-leaning tendencies, we can discuss healthcare and other social programs, for example.
I don’t really think those tendencies mean much, honestly, because you constantly defend an administration and the side that is diametrically opposed to those things. Saying that you are in favor of left-leaning programs while actively conflating the most embarrassing elements of the left with the left as a whole and ignoring the dangerous elements of the mainstream right doesn’t make you left-leaning. It’s like what that interviewer Dave Rubin does (or did? He may just admit to being on the right by now). He’ll claim to be liberal, then dedicate all of his commentary to condemning the left as a whole over the actions of a select few, and then defend the most egregiously extreme elements of the right in order to make them seem more legitimate and sympathetic than they are. He’ll then ask with incredulity why everyone thinks he’s on the right when he repeatedly says that he’s on the left.
I’m agnostic, so of course I don’t agree with Peterson on religion being the foundation for morality. I don’t see that as a reason to ignore his arguments that are based on social science and his experience as a clinician. However, you seem to conflate theocracy with religious society. Western society is very religious and yet has relatively low crime. It’s theocracies that tend toward violent oppression.
It has nothing to do with disagreement. Peterson is wrong and his statements are contradicted by reality. And no, I don’t conflate theocracy with religious society. Evangelical Republicans by and large want the government to teach creationism in schools, teacher-led prayer, the ten commandments in courthouses, bans on gay marriage (which is purely based on religious thinking), and many other things. Western society, with the exception of East Asia and formerly communist states (I’m not sure if Eastern Europe counts as Western society), is the most secular society in the world. Even the United States is incredibly secular in certain areas, and, the more secular a US state, the less crime-ridden it is. That may not on its own discount his other commentary, but his dishonesty on this subject makes me doubt him on others. As for him as a social scientist, I’ve never heard anything impressive from him. Enforced monogamy and his “sort yourself out” nonsense is just that, nonsense. The idea that marriage and culturally enforced monogamy would stop insane murderous virgins is ridiculous and some of the most simple-minded “analysis” of the issue I’ve ever heard that honestly is even dumber than “toxic masculinity,” which I previously thought was the dumbest assessment of mass killings I’d ever encountered. As for him being a clinician, I’d say his association with Stefan Molyneux who is a cult-leader that encourages people to abandon their families if they disagree with them politically, and whose wife was reprimanded for clinical malpractice for doing the same thing, makes Peterson very questionable in regards to being a good clinician. I certainly wouldn’t trust him with any patients. But anyway, Peterson’s religious commentary is an example of right-wing dishonesty that is clear-cut.