Time to give Trump Presidency it's own Thread.Follow

Gbaji is not a complicated guy.

Well don't get me wrong liberal outrage does have it's amusing side, kind of like a kitten that gets all floofed up when in attack mode. This was more about reports coming out that he was going to be more open about testifying to the grand jury than to congress, and him being quasi-adversarial with the president as of late.

Gbaji, you ******* ******. Answer me this question: why are you so stupid?

And don't ******* ***** out by rejecting my premise or trying to turn things around on me. You ARE stupid, and you WILL explain why.

Or I'll yell really loud.

Well, I got it from Fox News.

You mean the Russian funded news outlet that made up about 85% of the report on Russian election meddling that was "released" by 17 intelligence agencies (but written by just three)? Those of us who actually read the report, rather than just repeating what others told us about it, know this. We also know that the report detailed year by year information about this outlet, how it operates, how it's funded, and how it influences election outcomes (and how its issues positions reads like the planks in the Democratic party platform).


But hey. All anyone talks about is how the Russians hacked the DNC and leaked to wikileaks to help Trump win the election. Cause that's what the report was all about, right? Lol! That bit is like one paragraph in the report dropped in absent any support or context, suspiciously similarly to how the whole "riot that grew out of outrage over a video" showed up in the Behghazi report. I'm sure there was no executive meddling in that one at all.

What? Someone had to at least mention Trump, right?

No one believes that you read anything and "repeating what others told them" is your usual operation.

So, you read that Haidt book yet? The one where you read someone else's book review and started pretending that you were an expert?

Ah, so ignore what I wrote about the report, don't bother to determine if it's accurate, and just toss rhetoric in my direction instead. That's pretty much par for the course. Yes Joph. I've read the report. I read it shortly after it came out. I've posted about it here on this forum. How about addressing what I'm saying instead of just denying that I read some source somewhere?



Yeah. Kinda the same thing. No, I haven't read the book. I told you this way back when. I've told you this every time you've raised the issue. I have also pointed out, multiple times, that the book is not the only source of information (much less the best source) about the subject I was talking about. The guy has a freaking website where he talks about his pillar theory, explains it in great detail, writes blogs about it, answers people's questions, provides data on the studies he's done related to it (which aren't in the book btw), and a host of things that are quite sufficient for someone to speak intelligently about the subject.

What's more telling is that you have not once even bothered to attempt to argue that my understanding of what he was talking about is actually wrong. You're just playing this silly game instead. If you think I'm wrong about something, say that, and then back it up. Bypassing the discussion entirely is counterproductive.

Seeing as the dictionary definition for liberal is "open-minded anf amenable to change" and that for conservative is "close-minded and resistant to change" I'm OK with gbaji using those terms, because it's funny.

Edited, Jan 19th 2018 11:56pm by Bijou

Because, in all sincerity and honesty, I don't believe you've read it.


You're adorable.

"You guys are listening to other sources about this report but I've actually read it! Well, I claim to have anyway..."
"Why on earth would I need to read a book when I can just have other people tell me what it said?"


I've read the website. It's not remotely in depth and nothing approaching the book. Know how I know this? Because I've read the book so I'm actually qualified to make that statement as opposed to someone who is just trying to make excuses for why he'd rather parrot what a book report told him than potentially have his comfortably cherry-picked lines challenged.

But tell us again all about how you don't let other people tell you what to think.

That is exactly how derogatives work.



It's not. I get that you used the wrong term and are attempting to double down on it, or something, but you are still wrong.



Most people would properly label your use of the term as irony. Because... wait for it... that's how you were using the term.



This is also an example of irony. Unintended irony, but irony nonetheless.

Edited, Jan 23rd 2018 7:29pm by gbaji

It's a great argument that you're talking about concepts of which you have very shallow and selective knowledge because you're basing them off a rather shallow overview from a website and the cherry-picking of some conservative books reviews all delighted that someone said some less than stellar things about liberals.

Look, whatever. I know you're never going to read the book. You're absolutely not the sort to challenge yourself and you'd rather make a thousand excuses for why you're just too damn special to need to read it than risk reading something that doesn't fit neatly into your beliefs. "Hey, this guy said liberals are like X! Haha, boy ain't that the truth! He said conservatives are what now? Well, I never read that and I don't ever intend to but ain't that something about the liberals? Haha!" It's cool, we've been at this for going on two decades now or something. Trust me, you're not exactly full of surprises.

Edited, Jan 24th 2018 9:40am by Jophiel

They are concepts that match with my own observations over the last couple decades Joph. Long before I'd heard of Haidt and his study, heck, long before he did his study, I have been observing the very same thing that he discovered. I've been posting on this forum for probably the last 15+ years about how liberals and conservative are not just flip sides of the same coin, but actually speak a different language and place priorities on different things.

I'm not starting with "some guy on the internet says this so it must be true!". I get that for you, appeal to authority is super important, but for me, it's not. I started with my own observations of this behavior difference between liberals and conservatives, and have commented on it many times. Then, one day, I run across some link or article somewhere discussing the same thing I've noticed (and I'm not along among conservatives for noticing this btw), and it points to this study that Haidt did, where he basically confirmed the very same thing I'd been observing for years.

For me, its not about what Haidt thinks about the data, or his philosophical approach, or whatever. It's that this study confirms what I'd been observing myself. I frankly don't care what he writes about in his book in addition to this. The key point for me is that his study very firmly confirms something I'd already suspected based on my own observations. So yeah, I'm more than comfortable repeating my own observations and opinions, and then pointing at Haidts work as additional support for same.

How many times over how many years have I said that liberals and conservatives speak a different language? How many times have I posted about how I'll make an argument for a position I hold, only to either have the liberal response appear to be a complete lack of understanding of what I'm talking about, or flat out disbelief that my stated argument is *really* why I hold the position I do, followed up with something like "You're just saying that because it sounds better, but you really believe... <insert strawman argument here>". This has been happening since long before I'd ever heard of Haidt.

This wasn't something I read about and then adopted Joph. I'm not taking Haidt's work and applying it. I'm starting with my own observations and only care about Haidt's work to the point that it provides one more data point in support of those observations. So yeah, reading the book is irrelevant to that.

Typically, you completely failed to understand this though. Which, I suppose, is just another data point in support of the observation. Liberals literally do no understand Conservative thinking. You insist on framing it within your own tightly bounded viewpoint. And when our positions don't match yours, you assume it's because we're "evil", or "stupid", or whatever, and it never occurs to you that we're looking at things in a completely different (and frankly broader) way.