I admire Steve for the attempt at equanimity, but I'm not so sure about the wisdom. Because so many people are electively stupid or so set in their ways that to maintain composure with them, to attempt fairness, is at heart to deny reality, to engage in futility. I'm actually encourage to see Steve call the guy an idiot in this exchange,…
I admire Steve for the attempt at equanimity, but I'm not so sure about the wisdom. Because so many people are electively stupid or so set in their ways that to maintain composure with them, to attempt fairness, is at heart to deny reality, to engage in futility. I'm actually encourage to see Steve call the guy an idiot in this exchange, that shows a strengthening bond with the truth.
I lost one of my oldest friends out of the very few I have left this week. I lost him to his nihilism, his worsening temper, and his pigheadedness about "trans"; though he's smart enough to know better, he swallows the bullshit all the way to the reel. He says it costs him nothing to use the magic pronouns, he believes that "trans" is the successor to the gay rights movement, and he is incapable of seeing my disgust with "trans" as anything but bigotry. And he kept equating me with MAGA; his wife left him for sexual adventurism and she went completely Trump, andis moving to some red state to escape the "Dimocrat Part." He has to bite his lips with her but he's free to yell at me. He refuses to read my essay (https://bit.ly/3OhEKoF) that would give my real reasons.
His accommodation to his idiot wife and his son, whose wife won't allow them to meet, by taking an "I don't give a damn" attitude, which has been wearing me out because I am struggling to remain engaged with life. When Trump's first indictment came I thought our next phone call was going to be exuberant, but instead he just sighed and articulated toxic soul-crushing pessimism. That was the beginning.
I had agreed not to talk about "trans" anymore but it came up on our last call and he blew up and hung up. After some back and forth he finally told me we are not going to be in contact anymore. I sent an email saying what I had been inhibited from saying because of his worsening temper.
What does this have to do with this column? His intransigence. I've known this guy twenty years and he knows full well that I am not a MAGA bigot but that's the only explanation he's willing to examine, just as bigots are almost universally (repeat: almost, I am not forgetting Daryl Davis) incapable of examining their prejudices. In the case of my friend it's individually absurd; in the case of bigots, it tends to go back generations. Sen. Cotton is a seventh-generation hater.
Chris, the same thing happened to me with a friend last Christmas. I think it's more of a mutual dropping of the friendship, but on my end his growing anger and emotional volatility has worn quite thin. He lost two arguments with me last time around because he couldn't back up his dumbass conspiracy theories with facts. When he screamed my question was offensive at one of them I was like, okay, we're done here. My question wasn't offensive, it was logical and truth-finding and he had zero evidence (in fact later he bitched about 'what evidence do I need'? Well, something other than a conspiracy theory you pulled out of your ass....
And, I confess, I reconnected with a friend at my birthday party a few weeks ago, and then when we were talking at the end I floated a trial balloon to test her wokeness...and she got *really* upset when I said Lia Thomas had no business being on a swim team.
Since then I keep thinking I should reach out to her, but I don't. I've lost *so* much respect for her since then...
I can't deal with the guy's temper or his "I don't give a damn" approach to everything.
The call after Trump's indictment really pissed me off. The guy is playing a game with himself, and the name of the game is "I lose."
It's too bad, but we might have gone on a few weeks longer were it not his fingers-in-ears reaction to the "trans" thing. I'm really worried that a lot of Democratic parents are going to vote GOP to protect their kids from the surgeons, and he wouldn't even let me talk about that.
When noon Sunday came and went with no call, I actually felt relieved.
People often, perhaps most of the time, instinctively chant a tribal shibboleth to express the view that displays their membership in the tribe that they are identified with. In this case, membership in "woke".
A useful question for them is, "Do you actually believe that or are you saying what is expected of you by your tribe? Do you have the guts to go against one of your tribe's check box items if you know in your heart of hearts that it is something that you don't really buy into?" Depending upon the tribe, "Are you just [?]'s bitch?" - 𝘍𝘪𝘭𝘭 [?] 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘗𝘦𝘭𝘰𝘴𝘪 𝘰𝘳 𝘛𝘳𝘶𝘮𝘱
I wonder about this a lot. Do people actually believe that a man who mutters "I identify as a woman" actually is one? Really? That goes way past quibbling over definitions of words.
I am truly shocked at the extent to which institutions, government, workplaces ... have bough into this rubbish. Especially since even if you count the fake "trans" (0.6%) along with the GID sufferers (0.0065%), you have the tiniest minority there is.
And how anyone who's had to sit through an extended lecture on "my gender identity" or seen Dylan Mulvaney or any one of a number of YT videos like "It's MA'AM!" can possibly believe these people deserve respect.
Right now I'm reading Helen Joyce's 'Trans' and it spoke of trans as another 'psychic epidemic' - and these traditionally suck in doctors, academics, the press, popular opinion. I've bookmarked it to write about it in a future blog post.
I thought about buying it but I am nosing in on 70 and there is so much else I need to read. I'm afraid reading about "trans" would just piss me off (more).
It does piss me off but it also has some new insights I haven't found elsewhere. The truth is coming from Europe; gender-affirming care's days are numbered and when that house of cards falls, the rest will fall too.
These were my thoughts exactly as I was reading Chris's post. Everyone so desperately wants to belong to a tribe. I am wary of groups due to childhood bullying and this wariness has served me well during this hysterical era. I am not getting sucked in by either side and can maintain some rational thoughts outside of the peddled narratives.
Beyond this, why does everyone want someone else to do their thinking for them? Maybe it makes them feel safe if they hold what they believe to be the "right answer."
I'm beginning to wonder whether perhaps there's a cult out there to snag *all* of us. We think we're above that because we'd never join the Christians or NXVIM or QAnon, but then along comes something that speaks to our psychological weakness - on the loony left's side, the almost obsessive need for 'inclusivity' and the fear you might otherwise be 'oppressing' a 'marginalized group'.
The left strikes me as being a collection of cults, although not everyone on the left is part of one, or any. There's the antiracism cult; the trans cult; the feminism cult, the anti-colonialism cult; the queer cult (which is very amorphous). I don't pay as much attention to the right anymore but clearly Trump is a cult leader as is QAnon.
Someone else help me out: Are there right-wing cults besides these two you're seeing?
I admire Steve for the attempt at equanimity, but I'm not so sure about the wisdom. Because so many people are electively stupid or so set in their ways that to maintain composure with them, to attempt fairness, is at heart to deny reality, to engage in futility. I'm actually encourage to see Steve call the guy an idiot in this exchange, that shows a strengthening bond with the truth.
I lost one of my oldest friends out of the very few I have left this week. I lost him to his nihilism, his worsening temper, and his pigheadedness about "trans"; though he's smart enough to know better, he swallows the bullshit all the way to the reel. He says it costs him nothing to use the magic pronouns, he believes that "trans" is the successor to the gay rights movement, and he is incapable of seeing my disgust with "trans" as anything but bigotry. And he kept equating me with MAGA; his wife left him for sexual adventurism and she went completely Trump, andis moving to some red state to escape the "Dimocrat Part." He has to bite his lips with her but he's free to yell at me. He refuses to read my essay (https://bit.ly/3OhEKoF) that would give my real reasons.
His accommodation to his idiot wife and his son, whose wife won't allow them to meet, by taking an "I don't give a damn" attitude, which has been wearing me out because I am struggling to remain engaged with life. When Trump's first indictment came I thought our next phone call was going to be exuberant, but instead he just sighed and articulated toxic soul-crushing pessimism. That was the beginning.
I had agreed not to talk about "trans" anymore but it came up on our last call and he blew up and hung up. After some back and forth he finally told me we are not going to be in contact anymore. I sent an email saying what I had been inhibited from saying because of his worsening temper.
What does this have to do with this column? His intransigence. I've known this guy twenty years and he knows full well that I am not a MAGA bigot but that's the only explanation he's willing to examine, just as bigots are almost universally (repeat: almost, I am not forgetting Daryl Davis) incapable of examining their prejudices. In the case of my friend it's individually absurd; in the case of bigots, it tends to go back generations. Sen. Cotton is a seventh-generation hater.
Chris, the same thing happened to me with a friend last Christmas. I think it's more of a mutual dropping of the friendship, but on my end his growing anger and emotional volatility has worn quite thin. He lost two arguments with me last time around because he couldn't back up his dumbass conspiracy theories with facts. When he screamed my question was offensive at one of them I was like, okay, we're done here. My question wasn't offensive, it was logical and truth-finding and he had zero evidence (in fact later he bitched about 'what evidence do I need'? Well, something other than a conspiracy theory you pulled out of your ass....
And, I confess, I reconnected with a friend at my birthday party a few weeks ago, and then when we were talking at the end I floated a trial balloon to test her wokeness...and she got *really* upset when I said Lia Thomas had no business being on a swim team.
Since then I keep thinking I should reach out to her, but I don't. I've lost *so* much respect for her since then...
I can't deal with the guy's temper or his "I don't give a damn" approach to everything.
The call after Trump's indictment really pissed me off. The guy is playing a game with himself, and the name of the game is "I lose."
It's too bad, but we might have gone on a few weeks longer were it not his fingers-in-ears reaction to the "trans" thing. I'm really worried that a lot of Democratic parents are going to vote GOP to protect their kids from the surgeons, and he wouldn't even let me talk about that.
When noon Sunday came and went with no call, I actually felt relieved.
People often, perhaps most of the time, instinctively chant a tribal shibboleth to express the view that displays their membership in the tribe that they are identified with. In this case, membership in "woke".
A useful question for them is, "Do you actually believe that or are you saying what is expected of you by your tribe? Do you have the guts to go against one of your tribe's check box items if you know in your heart of hearts that it is something that you don't really buy into?" Depending upon the tribe, "Are you just [?]'s bitch?" - 𝘍𝘪𝘭𝘭 [?] 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘗𝘦𝘭𝘰𝘴𝘪 𝘰𝘳 𝘛𝘳𝘶𝘮𝘱
I wonder about this a lot. Do people actually believe that a man who mutters "I identify as a woman" actually is one? Really? That goes way past quibbling over definitions of words.
I am truly shocked at the extent to which institutions, government, workplaces ... have bough into this rubbish. Especially since even if you count the fake "trans" (0.6%) along with the GID sufferers (0.0065%), you have the tiniest minority there is.
And how anyone who's had to sit through an extended lecture on "my gender identity" or seen Dylan Mulvaney or any one of a number of YT videos like "It's MA'AM!" can possibly believe these people deserve respect.
Right now I'm reading Helen Joyce's 'Trans' and it spoke of trans as another 'psychic epidemic' - and these traditionally suck in doctors, academics, the press, popular opinion. I've bookmarked it to write about it in a future blog post.
Ad hoc
Ad loc
And quid pro quo
So little time
So much to know
— The Nowhere Man, Yellow Submarine
I thought about buying it but I am nosing in on 70 and there is so much else I need to read. I'm afraid reading about "trans" would just piss me off (more).
It does piss me off but it also has some new insights I haven't found elsewhere. The truth is coming from Europe; gender-affirming care's days are numbered and when that house of cards falls, the rest will fall too.
I'm becoming more selective with my time as it runs out.
I'm currently reading "The Righteous Mind" by Johnathan Haidt. Strong recommend!
Pelosi is gone. How about 'AOC's bitch'? Pelosi is a very bright woman with her head straight on her shoulders. I've lost all respect for wokie AOC.
Generic voice that dictates tribal policy.
Better Pelosi's than AOC's. But that's just my opinion.
These were my thoughts exactly as I was reading Chris's post. Everyone so desperately wants to belong to a tribe. I am wary of groups due to childhood bullying and this wariness has served me well during this hysterical era. I am not getting sucked in by either side and can maintain some rational thoughts outside of the peddled narratives.
Beyond this, why does everyone want someone else to do their thinking for them? Maybe it makes them feel safe if they hold what they believe to be the "right answer."
For me my thought is often, why should that issue belong to a political party or its default current ideology?
I'm beginning to wonder whether perhaps there's a cult out there to snag *all* of us. We think we're above that because we'd never join the Christians or NXVIM or QAnon, but then along comes something that speaks to our psychological weakness - on the loony left's side, the almost obsessive need for 'inclusivity' and the fear you might otherwise be 'oppressing' a 'marginalized group'.
The left strikes me as being a collection of cults, although not everyone on the left is part of one, or any. There's the antiracism cult; the trans cult; the feminism cult, the anti-colonialism cult; the queer cult (which is very amorphous). I don't pay as much attention to the right anymore but clearly Trump is a cult leader as is QAnon.
Someone else help me out: Are there right-wing cults besides these two you're seeing?
Agreed.