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Post 12 Jan 2011, 9:09 am

Fairness X? Is that the core failing, a "belief" that society isn't fair and it should be more fair?
Is that corrosive and dangerous? Can it be rationally discussed and debated?
The FAR rights big thing is paranoia. Government as a threat. Plots and conspiracies.
Its the tolerance of that fringe by mainstream conservatives that I don't get... It poisons the rationale conservative arguement.
From Myerson today...link below which if you take the time to read illustrates many fine paranoid rants.

A fabricated specter of impending governmental totalitarianism haunts the right's dreams. One month after Barack Obama was inaugurated as president, Beck hosted a show that gamed out how militias in Southern and Western states might rise up against an oppressive government. The number of self-proclaimed right-wing militias tripled - from 42 to 127, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center - in 2009 (and that doesn't count those that are entirely underground).

As much of the right sees it, the government is planning to incarcerate its enemies (see Beck and Erickson, above), socialize the economy and take away everyone's guns. At the fringe, we have figures like Larry Pratt, executive director of the Gun Owners of America, who told a rally in Washington last April that, "We're in a war. The other side knows they are at war, because they started it. They are coming for our freedom, for our money, for our kids, for our property. They are coming for everything because they are a bunch of socialists."

But the imputation of lurking totalitarianism, alien ideologies, and subversion of liberties to liberals and moderates has become the default rhetoric of the right. Never mind that Obama is a Marxist, a Kenyan and an advocate of sharia law. Consider the plight of poor Fred Upton, the Republican congressman just installed as chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, over considerable right-wing opposition. According to Beck, Upton is "all socialist," while Rush Limbaugh calls him the personification of "nannyism" and "statism." Upton's crime is that he supports more energy-efficient light bulbs. How that puts him in a league with Marx, Engels and Nanny McPhee, I will leave to subtler minds.

source:http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/01/11/AR2011011105685.html?hpid=opinionsbox1
Last edited by rickyp on 12 Jan 2011, 9:12 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Post 12 Jan 2011, 9:10 am

pretty true!
Lefties are overly optimistic, Righties overly pessimistic. Lefties think things should be fair and will force others (unfairly) to be fair, Righties insist there is no such thing as fair and ruin those things that really are fair already.
the answer is of course somewhere in the middle but neither side can see that middle ground very clearly.
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Post 12 Jan 2011, 9:12 am

hahaha, see Ricky posted before me,
The lefty can't see the middle ground, he refuses to accept anything he considers unfair and he must make it right, the other side can never be correct!
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Post 12 Jan 2011, 9:56 am

Is it dangerous to be too concerned with fairness?
Yes, most certainly!
You have your share of whack jobs who will do anything for the cause, you have those who could care less about anything else but their cause, screw any who happen to stand in the way of their "fairness", of COURSE it can be a bad thing. To suggest too much of anything is good is, well, bad!
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Post 13 Jan 2011, 1:57 am

Minister X wrote:Also (talking about brain differences), lefties are always much more concerned about fairness. That's #1 on their priority list at all times. Conservatives are inured to the idea that the world is and will always be unfair.
:smoke:


Just because the world is and will always be unfair is not a reason to ignore unfairness. The danger with becoming inured to things is that your inaction is a self-fulfilling prophesy. Why bother fighting slavery, there's always been slavery? Why bother giving women and poor people the vote, they've never had the vote?

I find it odd that right wingers are assumed to not worry about fairness and are 'inured' to it. We are commenting in a thread where right wingers have expressed the idea that it's grossly unfair to only criticise one set of media for their bias.

Don't sound too 'inured' to me. Just seems that people have different ideas about what is 'unfair' - usually defined by 'stuff I don't like'.
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Post 13 Jan 2011, 7:00 am

Wow, you made zero sense in your attempt to pull different pet peeves of yours into yet another discussion. Conservatives have no problem with your criticizing FOX, go ahead. What we have a problem with is your refusal to acknowledge MSNBC and the less biased but leftward leaning main stream media and then your disbelief when someone points it out AFTER (notice once again the liberals bring it up first!) being calle don it.

What does this have to do with the topic in the least?
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Post 13 Jan 2011, 11:13 am

Wow, you made zero sense
There are three possibilities. It could that I made no sense. It could be that there are translation issues. Or it could that you are unable to understand. Which of these could it be, I wonder?

Let me try again, a little more simply. You say you do not object to criticism of Fox. What you object to is that we do not raise the same criticisms of MSNBC, or whoever. Which means that you are saying that the two are not being treated the same way. Another way to put this is that we are not acting as if they are equals - we are being unfair in our choice of target.

Does this make sense to you? Do you think we are being 'fair' to FOX when we commit a sin of omission regarding MSNBC's bias?

Now, if you are inured to something, it means that it is something you find objectionable, but with which you are able to put up with, having become accustomed to it. So, if you are inured to the unfairness of the liberal treatment of various media, it means that while you do not like it, you are used to it and accept it as unfortunate yet inevitable.

So, if you are so inured that that unfairness, why do you keep mentioning it? Why do you appear to be angry about it? It seems to me to be no different to a liberal who complains angrily on a forum thread about income inequality.

Now, perhaps the problem is translation, and perhaps the words fairness and inured mean something completely different to you than they do to me. Or perhaps I really am writing something totally nonsensical. Maybe a third party may wish to comment on whether my point is at least comprehensible and based in reason, even if they disagree with me?

If we eliminate those two options, what are we left with?

Or am I being, perhaps, unfair?
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Post 13 Jan 2011, 9:01 pm

I told you I don't like these smilies. I included one after my "fairness" comment and nobody has paid it the least attention.
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Post 13 Jan 2011, 9:11 pm

ok, I seem to get it now. You spelled it out so much clearer.
It's simply a matter of translation because it still makes no sense in the least.
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Post 16 Jan 2011, 11:47 am

GMTom wrote:ok, I seem to get it now ... it still makes no sense in the least.
Surely those two are mutually exclusive. Either you get what I was trying to say, or you understand none of it.

Unless, of course, you are a master of doublethink.

Min X - I spotted it. Still, even in jest, I wonder how much it is believed. Such as by the guy who posted three times in a row to say how true it was, how much ricky is wrong and how awful fairness can be.

I have a theory about the 'fundamental' differences between political groups. They are not as important as we seem to think.

Some say they want to miminise the power of government. But at the same time will also say they want the government to control immigration, fight crime and to provide strong national defence. Even some will attempt to justify torture.

Seems to me that it's not about less government as a fundamental tenet of Tea-Party-style conservatism, but really about the government doing less of the stuff they don't like, and more of the stuff they do like.

'Freedom' is the rallying cry of pretty much all political movements. Liberals, socialists, conservatives, all have used it. Communists, fascists and leaders of military coups tend not to, but even then it isn't exclusive. The thing is that they each have different ideas of what 'Freedom' is the most desirable. And which 'freedom' is less important. Which is a more important freedom of these two:

1) The freedom to decide who can and cannot come into your store
2) The freedom to be able to walk into any store and buy stuff