General US Politics

[Crysta]

As for the links:

Anti-propaganda laws are dumb. If it actually trickles down to the States and we start arresting people for saying dumb shit, then I'll worry. But since we have the Westboro Church still protesting funerals, I somehow doubt that'll actually happen. I have no idea what's wrong with Canada.

The study is contradicted by other studies so it's left up to the reader to determine which sounds more factually accurate, ultimately. My personal experience tells me it's wrong, in lieu of the other studies, so eh.

[--------------------]

They're Pakistani gangs for the most part. We are talking about Rotheram, right?

Yes. Just as an example why PC culture isn't implausible.

[Moblin Major General]

You're allowed to BE criticized, too.

It's too one-sided. I and other people like have to repent for millennia of shitting on anyone who isn't the same gender, color, faith, or sexuality as we are.

Make it racist if you want, and I'm not saying it's bad in most cases, but being "the root of all evil" gets old sometimes.

[Life]

The study is contradicted by other studies so it's left up to the reader to determine which sounds more factually accurate, ultimately. My personal experience tells me it's wrong, in lieu of the other studies, so eh.

Did you look at the PDF study itself or just the article about it?

[Tryhard]

Why must it constantly be 'culture' that is labelled, both that western culture is either inherently racist, sexist or a rape culture, or that it is incredibly politically correct, both stated as mostly to push peoples ideas?

It grows tiresome.

Edited August 24, 2016 by Tryhard

[solrocknroll]

It's too one-sided. I and other people like have to repent for millennia of shitting on anyone who isn't the same gender, color, faith, or sexuality as we are.

Make it racist if you want, and I'm not saying it's bad in most cases, but being "the root of all evil" gets old sometimes.

Yes, and most Christians still haven't repented enough for what has been done to communities like the LGBT community. You can be a good person, but I know many people in my local area that aren't so magnanimous.

[Crysta]

Complaints to social workers and the police were ignored because they were "petrified of being called racist", former Labour MP for Keighley Ann Cryer said.

This is pretty much the only thing that links fright at being accused a racist to allowing the situation to occur, and I have to wonder if it's an excuse because I can't see how the alternative (being accused of fucking allowing rape and sex trafficking to go on) is any better.

The first article actually attributes it to this:

One of the ways the grooming gangs were able to get away with their crimes for so long was due to a coordinated campaign of witness intimidation, which made the girls and their families too scared to speak out.

But they say they feel powerless to act because of police indifference and the vice-like grip the criminal grooming gangs have achieved.

“Some police forces are good at dealing with missing persons and some not so good. Some forces aren’t good at teaming up missing persons reports with this kind of suspicious grooming activity.”

Which to me sounds a lot more believable.

I didn't read the PDF. I might later but I'm sort of multi-tasking atm.

EDIT: omg this forum has the most counter-intuitive quoting system I have ever had to use

Edited August 24, 2016 by Crysta

[Time the Crestfallen]

My major beefs with affirmative action in education are a) that fields in which men are underrepresented are glossed over. In Australia at the University of South Australia, men make up only 4% of students studying early education and 17% studying early education. They also mention that they've been trying to increase that number for four years, so obviously something isn't working

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-02-22/number-of-male-teachers-dwindling-isolating-experience-for-men/7178766

My other problem is that it seems to me like affirmative action at the college level in America is starting extremely too late. Here's a thing on graduation rates:

http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/data-mine/2016/03/23/study-college-graduation-gap-between-blacks-whites-still-growing

And here's a thing on schools with lots of minorities being underfunded:
http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/09/public-school-funding-and-the-role-of-race/408085/

I don't know if anything's being done right now, but it seems to me like putting more effort into improving public schools with high minority percentages would achieve a lot more results than affirmative action at a workplace or college level.

[Life]

Why must it constantly be 'culture' that is labelled, both that western culture is either inherently racist, sexist or a rape culture, or that it is incredibly politically correct, both stated as mostly to push peoples ideas?

It grows tiresome.

There is no rape culture?

I mean, women don't get sexually assaulted in numbers like they do in Eritrea or Congo? Where rape is a tool of war, mind you.

I don't like using personal anecdotes but I've actually been in a war. We weren't raping 1 in 4 women we saw in Gaza. I don't think that happens on American universities.

[-Cynthia-]

The thing is with welfare that I believe people on both sides agree on the ultimate goal- people should obtain the skills and resources to get off of welfare and become productive members of society. Commonly, the 'teach a man to fish' line is cited. The thing is...teaching someone to fish isn't free. Education costs money, tools to fish cost money, living expenses while the man is learning to fish costs money. Expecting to people to try and learn to fish while they have no money for these start up costs does not seem reasonable- easier to turn to another avenue of income like drugs. I can see the desire to reform welfare in many instances, but completely removing it to supposedly help people in poverty doesn't make sense.

[Life]

Yes, and most Christians still haven't repented enough for what has been done to communities like the LGBT community. You can be a good person, but I know many people in my local area that aren't so magnanimous.

Hold the fucking phone.

Are you advocating for discrimination against Christians? Did I just read that right?

"Hey Kettle!"

"What is it, Pot?"

"You're black!"

Isn't that exactly what you're supposed to be fighting against?

Edited August 24, 2016 by Right Wing Nut Job

[Lord Raven]

So let me get this straight.

Bush should also get blamed for any immediate drops in educational standards while Obama was in power because Congress or the Senate prevented Obama from doing anything?

That's not what I said.

Dude, seriously? The Democrats had a majority in both the Senate and Congress from 2009 to the end of 2010, not to mention a Democrat president.

I listed all the years where Congress was majority democrat.

Also, during the Clinton years which you are fond of shitting on, it was majority Republican for the majority of it.

So OK. Was NCLB a steamy pile of crap? Always thought "yes" but things were picking up near the end of Bush's presidency. Unless we're going to also attribute that to Clinton's presidency and so on and so forth (which is stupid).

But whatever the case, even if NCLB sucked, Obama and the Democratic party clearly didn't think so because they attempt to repeal it during the time when they had completely control.

And as I mentioned, trends were going upwards right through Bush's presidency while stagnating or decreasing during Clinton's. Are you actually implying that even trends that continue through Bush's 8th year are all thanks to Clinton? NCLB was signed in 2002 and trends were climbing.

This is where your point stops making sense. You say that NCLB was not crap, yet it was in effect until 2015. You also said the Democrats didn't change any of the legislation concerning education. Is this to blame on Obama? No! It means there's quite a few more factors in play. The only piece of legislation your post then mentioned was NCLB, which again does not make sense to your argument. Are you pro-NCLB or anti-NCLB? Or are you just singling out the president?

Correlation: NCLB signed at start of GWB presidency and noticable upwards trends (such as the decrease in attrition rate during elementary schooling and average test scores in mathematics and reading) begin at that time.

Conclusion: NCLB (the first education reform in 40 years) had something to do with rising education scores and falling attrition rates.

Draw your own conclusion. I'll look into it more myself but Obama and the Democrats had 2 full years where they could have done nearly anything they wanted and they didn't even address anything regarding education. Meanwhile, NCLB was drawn up and signed into law in a year.

I am not arguing about the effectiveness of NCLB. I am arguing about how sound your argument is. You are attributing NCLB to the Bush administration, but then blaming the Obama administration who kept it in place for 7 years before killing it off. My conclusion is that NCLB had little to do with this, and my other conclusion - from the facts that you stated in your post - is that Obama had little to do with this considering the lack of education reform. So where did you issue lie? You only stated the facts, not the core of the issue.

http://dailysignal.com/2011/07/09/president-obama-admits-welfare-encourages-dependency/

All this article is saying is that welfare is linked to marriage and more people should get married so welfare decreases. It doesn't really address your point, unless there's something I'm missing, cause it primarily talks about single parent homes.

That analogy is actually a very accurate one. Race is not this deep subject where we need to start delving into hypotheticals and theories. Occam's Razor; The simplest explaination is usually the best.

Yes it is, can you provide proof it's not that simple? What is your argument that it is not that simple? I guarantee you there is a post in this thread that sums it up, and I also guarantee you I've sent many messages concerning how this is not a simple matter and why.

AA sets a lower standard for black students to get into college. Black students then fail out of college due to not being sufficiently prepared. Hmm, I wonder why.

http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2012/10/the-painful-truth-about-affirmative-action/263122/

One of the books they cite say this:

Their argument goes something like this: the pool of black and hispanic applicants to college is substantially smaller than the representation of those groups in the population, and since they are more likely to come from inadequate high schools, they come into college, on average, with lower test scores and preparation than the average white college applicant. Racial preferences are used to pull the representation towards (but not up to) the population share of these two groups.

Which means that while said applicant may have achieved more in their high school relative to their contemporaries at the time, because they are coming from a background that cannot provide them with some of the fundamentals, they don't do too hot. This should ideally be solved by placement tests showing their level of reading/writing/mathematics knowledge, so they're not completely overwhelmed in their introductory classes/semester. But then again, studies only show the bulk statistics, and it's hard to put them in a case-by-case basis. Is the university providing them classes that could work for them? Also, do any of those studies state what metric it uses to gauge whether or not the beneficiary of affirmative action is well achieving?

I've seen this pretty often and not just limited to affirmative action cases; people end up taking classes based on some AP class they took in high school, but it doesn't work out for them because the standardized testing from an AP course isn't a good gauge of how much they've actually learned in said class, which leads to them lacking the fundamental knowledge to do the next course in the college sequence. Something like that seems to have been glossed over in some of these arguments, relying on statistics that sort of don't have the extra level of detail or context in them.

EDIT: Phillius said it way better than I could have, because the lack of black representation in public schools leads to this issue.

The issue isn't the left. We can handle you fuckers because facts trump feelings (get the joke?). It's the alt-right that bothers us. We don't just have to fight against our usual enemies but we've also been backstabbed.

I don't see that on the left. Anyone who couldn't stand Hillary in the primaries has now just thrown in the towel and begun to defend her whole-heartedly with regards to her corruptiom. That doesn't happen with us. We call our candidates out if we don't like their stances (not Fox News or Breitbart but smaller sources).

I always thought the right was better than that. And it hurts that we've sunk to your level.

Why are you so confrontational about left vs right? Furthermore, you're saying facts trump feelings, but you do nothing but get angry at people in this thread, and the few times you offer facts you really misunderstand what people are questioning you about. This whole rant is more "feelings" based than anything the liberals in this thread have said.

Quick thing to add: Any criticism of Islam, women, LGBT, any race (aside from whites) or any other minority is considered bigotry in the eyes of PC culture. What's not are:

- Males

- Whites

- Christians

- Jews (because somehow, Israel is evil in the eyes of the left)

If you're any of those four, you're fair game.

Define "criticism", because criticism is definitely not drowned out of any of those movements, it just so happens that a lot of LGBT criticism and racism against minorities/Muslims has a tendency to come from a more bigoted point of view, whereas talking down on white people and etc (save Jewish people, who are a minority that only gets grouped with white people due to skin color - since racism in America is basically based on skin color) - are speaking from the point of view of the scholarly definition of racism which implies a systemic oppression. The system in general, even with Affirmative Action, has not actually hindered white people in the slightest (and in fact, Asian minorities are more likely to be rejected from things based on Affirmative Action, not white people), which is why things like what you mentioned are not as heavily looked down upon.

Really? So why am I a racist when I criticise Affirmative Action? How am I Islamophobic when I say that "hey, people are yelling Allahu Akbar before shooting up nightclubs and that's an issue"?

Why am I not allowed to criticize these issues?

It depends entirely on how you frame it.

There is no rape culture?

I mean, women don't get sexually assaulted in numbers like they do in Eritrea or Congo? Where rape is a tool of war, mind you.

I don't like using personal anecdotes but I've actually been in a war. We weren't raping 1 in 4 women we saw in Gaza. I don't think that happens on American universities.

Does rape have to be happening at a high rate for rape culture to be a thing? I don't understand the argument of "well it could be a lot worse." Edited August 24, 2016 by Lord Raven

[--------------------]

This is pretty much the only think that links fright at being accused a racist to allowing the situation to occur, and I have to wonder if it's an excuse because I can't see how the alternative (being accused of fucking allowing rape and sex trafficking to go on) is any better.

The first article actually attributes it to this

Which to me sounds a lot more believable.

I didn't read the PDF. I might later but I'm sort of multi-tasking atm.

There was also

"Another girl, going under the pseudonym Lizzie, said: "I know a few girls who have come forward recently and been told they are being racist and I know a lot that won't come forward and to be fair I can't blame them."

Corrupt and cowardly I would have to agree. But I don't really see why they would specifically cover up crimes done by ethnic middle easterners specifically. e.g. Cologne and

"A recent follow-up report, published by Professor John Drew in March, concluded that the police are now “adequately” tackling child grooming and that historic failures had been “isolated”.

But testimony, pieced together from independent sources, paints a starkly different picture of the authorities’ response. "

From the article.

There was also my point about reporters calling the gangs "Asian" even though they would usually be much more specific if it were anything else. I recall many articles about murderers/rapists that were british being called "British" (even when they're immigrants), a far more specific term than say "European".

So I think it's beyond reasonable doubt there is /some/ PC culture going on here where people are afraid of criticising people of some designated marginalised group.

A good question to ask, imo, is why people can be brushed off as "racist" when they accuse a brown man of raping them. But it can't be when it's a white man.

Edited August 24, 2016 by Autumn

[Tryhard]

There is no rape culture?

I mean, women don't get sexually assaulted in numbers like they do in Eritrea or Congo? Where rape is a tool of war, mind you.

I don't like using personal anecdotes but I've actually been in a war. We weren't raping 1 in 4 women we saw in Gaza. I don't think that happens on American universities.

It's not whether I think there is or not, it's that I can just as easily state that there is no "PC culture", after pointing to example instances and just dismissing them as isolated and people will just argue over this shit.

[solrocknroll]

Hold the fucking phone.

Are you advocating for discrimination against Christians? Did I just read that right?

"Hey Kettle!"

"What is it, Pot?"

"You're black!"

Isn't that exactly what you're supposed to be fighting against?

As someone who's faced discrimination my entire life, I wouldn't want to wish that on anyone.

But I also don't think it's fair for modern churches to still teach about the horrors of the transgendereds or the homosexuals (always using the full terms and never the actual terms). Having once had to sit and listen someone literally publically trash me and people I love isn't okay.

I at least want an apology from those people. I don't exactly know what you thought I implied by "repent" other than apologies.

Edited August 24, 2016 by Enigmar

[Crysta]

I don't know how the fuck that was calling for discrimination.

At least not any moreso than going up to a Japanese person and insisting that their government needs to apologize to a subset of people they have treated poorly in the past (to say the least).

[Crysta]

It's not whether I think there is or not, it's that I can just as easily state that there is no "PC culture", after pointing to example instances and just dismissing them as isolated and people will just argue over this shit.

haters gonna hate

i think i'll put you in a culture later

[Moblin Major General]

Hold the fucking phone.

Are you advocating for discrimination against Christians?

So what if he is? Your culture spawned my religion, meaning neither can be liked by "decent" people. It's something I'm used to, to be honest.

[Lord Raven]

A good question to ask, imo, is why people can be brushed off as "racist" when they accuse a brown man of raping them. But it can't be when it's a white man.

I'm not justifying it because rape is a serious crime, but this should shed some light on it:

http://www.truth-out.org/speakout/item/25848-how-often-do-wrongful-convictions-involve-black-defendants

Basically, there are far more minorities that are wrongfully accused of a crime than white people.

[--------------------]

It's not whether I think there is or not, it's that I can just as easily state that there is no "PC culture", after pointing to example instances and just dismissing them as isolated and people will just argue over this shit.

The claim that "there is no PC culture" doesn't require any proof since it's a absolute statement. To prove it you would need to find every last person and investigate their "culture" to see if it's PC. And only then can you prove that there is no PC culture. Just like saying "there are no white crows" would would need to go find every last crow to prove it.

Which is basically impossible.

Which is why in a discussion the statement "there is no PC culture" needs to be falsified by someone if it is to be proven wrong. That is only one isolated example of PC culture is required to prove that the claim "There is no PC culture" is categorically wrong.

And from that point the discussion is one of how prevalent this PC culture is.

I was having trouble understanding your point. So I'm sorry if I misunderstood.

[Life]

As someone who's faced discrimination my entire life, I wouldn't want to wish that on anyone.

But I also don't think it's fair for modern churches to still teach about the horrors of the transgendereds or the homosexuals (always using the full terms and never the actual terms). Having once had to sit and listen someone literally publically trash me and people I love isn't okay.

I at least want an apology from those people. I don't exactly know what you thought I implied by "repent" other than apologies.

Are people not entitled to freedom of religion? If Christian doctrines teach that homosexuality is immoral, why are your feelings valued more than their freedoms on which the USA was based? They're not trying to have you burned at the stake. They just think that it's wrong for two dudes to sleep with each other because it goes against their teachings.

You like to mentiom transexuals a lot so I have a question for you. Why should the country change all of its policies to cater to 0.4% of its population?

And furthermore, the way you said it was implying that you want Christian communities to be treated with utter disrespect at the very least. If you want an apology, pretty sure the Pope already apologized on behalf of Christians everywhere. If you don't accept it, then I don't think you just wanted an apology.

Raven, I'll hit your stuff later. Bed time.

[--------------------]

I'm not justifying it because rape is a serious crime, but this should shed some light on it:

http://www.truth-out.org/speakout/item/25848-how-often-do-wrongful-convictions-involve-black-defendants

Basically, there are far more minorities that are wrongfully accused of a crime than white people.

That may be so, yeah. I've heard a lot about that.

But still I don't think the way to deal with this is for the police department to discourage reporting of black people on the basis that /some/ people are racist pricks. Rather there should be heavier consequences for malicious false rape accusations etc cetera to deter these "racist pricks". But that's a whole other discussion.

[Tryhard]

Are people not entitled to freedom of religion? If Christian doctrines teach that homosexuality is immoral, why are your feelings valued more than their freedoms on which the USA was based? They're not trying to have you burned at the stake. They just think that it's wrong for two dudes to sleep with each other because it goes against their teachings.

they have the freedom to be a homophobic dumbass, but their freedom of religion is not for them to put into effect discriminatory anti-gay laws.

The claim that "there is no PC culture" doesn't require any proof since it's a absolute statement. To prove it you would need to find every last person and investigate their "culture" to see if it's PC. And only then can you prove that there is no PC culture. Just like saying "there are no white crows" would would need to go find every last crow to prove it.

Which is basically impossible.

Which is why in a discussion the statement "there is no PC culture" needs to be falsified by someone if it is to be proven wrong. That is only one isolated example of PC culture is required to prove that the claim "There is no PC culture" is categorically wrong.

And from that point the discussion is one of how prevalent this PC culture is.

I was having trouble understanding your point. So I'm sorry if I misunderstood.

I'm having trouble understanding how people can both claim that there is or is not a PC culture - and what does 'culture' mean in this context, anyway? It's been used so often as a buzzword that it has lost its meaning. Edited August 24, 2016 by Tryhard

[solrocknroll]

I admittedly forgot about Pope Francis, who is absolutely amazing.

Edit: In fact, he might be the most genuinely saintly person alive. He gets a check mark from me tbh

Edited August 24, 2016 by Enigmar

[--------------------]

Are people not entitled to freedom of religion? If Christian doctrines teach that homosexuality is immoral, why are your feelings valued more than their freedoms on which the USA was based? They're not trying to have you burned at the stake. They just think that it's wrong for two dudes to sleep with each other because it goes against their teachings.

Freedom of religion only goes as far as people's lives are not adverse impacted because of it.

So following this logic, people are free to not want to, themselves sleep with members of the same sex. But they should not infringe on the right to choose to do so, of other people, because that can adversely impact their life.

If you grew up in a gay religion, and you were forced to marry someone of the same sex because in that (imaginary) religion's eyes heterosexuality is a sin... Then you wouldn't lead as happy a life as if you could be with someone you actually loved in that way. And I do not think religion should be free to take away the happinesses of people via indoctrination.