The Witch Trials, anyone else?

[Varysblackfyre321]

Just now, Phylum of Alexandria said:

Can I answer a question with a question? What do you think the answer might be, given the rest of the comment I was making?

Honestly don’t know hence asking for specification.

[Ran]

1 minute ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

Honestly don’t know hence asking for specification.

Quote

But given that threat that the right wing poses, those wannabe-revolutionary looney types on the left do pose as a liability to our cause in effectively building a coalition that will resist right wing efforts to grab more and more power.

Read more, bad faith less.

[Varysblackfyre321]

Just now, Ran said:

Read more, bad faith less.

I don’t know what “our” cause is referring to.

 

[Phylum of Alexandria]

1 minute ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

Honestly don’t know hence asking for specification.

Why not wager a guess based on other information that's there? I'm not being cagey, I'm just completely done with bad faith interrogations by people who don't actually read what I write with any sort of effort.

[Ran]

Just now, Varysblackfyre321 said:

I don’t know what “our” cause is referring to.

 

Quote

 effectively building a coalition that will resist right wing efforts to grab more and more power.

 

[Larry of the Lawn]

3 minutes ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

I don’t know what “our” cause is referring to.

 

I'm guessing it means voting for Democrats.

[Phylum of Alexandria]

1 minute ago, Larry of the Lake said:

I'm guessing it means voting for Democrats.

At a minimum, yes.

[Kalbear]

It sounds a lot like making sure that we can throw trans people under the bus as long as it means the loony right doesn't have power. That's a pretty common discussion around these parts - which minority rights actually matter, which you can ignore, which you should not support too loudly or too well lest you alienate The Coalition. 

And yeah, it's a vaguely reasonable point if there were such a thing as independents who both were persuaded to vote dem BUT only if they can have a little bit of bigotry as a treat sometimes. 

[Ran]

3 minutes ago, Kalnestk Oblast said:

It sounds a lot like making sure that we can throw trans people under the bus as long as it means the loony right doesn't have power.

To me it sounds like the left winning elections does more to advance trans rights than the left losing elections, but what do I know?

[Larry of the Lawn]

What do any of us know?  Who wants to guess what I'm thinking?

[Kalbear]

1 minute ago, Ran said:

To me it sounds like the left winning elections does more to advance trans rights than the left losing elections, but what do I know?

Yep! That's the argument that we have all the time in US politics. We'll get into variations of that - are Democrats actually 'left', do they advance X policies when they're in power, if they're not in power are even worse policies put into place, does anything matter given the SCOTUS makeup, etc. 

It's a whole thing.

I'm not taking a side on it exactly, but I do think that you can advance policy preferences as activists while also accepting policy preferences for those in power and those things are different. Obama's view on same sex marriage is a famous one here. But I also think that you should be aware of those distinctions and not make choices about people's actual lives and safety based solely on political expediency. Furthermore, while trans rights are kind of a big-ish thing right now there's no real indication that they're going to be a massive litmus test on politicians the way, say, immigration or gun rights have been. 

[Phylum of Alexandria]

Those who gain political power and representation can do what they want with that power. The trick, though, is to get the power and the representation. And protect that ability to do so from those who would rig the system further in their favor.

This ain't easy, and unlike some I don't pretend to be certain about this shit. One thing I am certain about is that in order to build a coalition, you need coalitional politics. Will that result in compromises? Probably, though maybe it depends on one's persuasion and organizational skills. Other than that, the sky's the limit.

[Varysblackfyre321]

54 minutes ago, Phylum of Alexandria said:

Why not wager a guess based on other information that's there? I'm not being cagey, I'm just completely done with bad faith interrogations by people who don't actually read what I write with any sort of effort.

If I don’t understand something my interlocutor is saying I feel it’s best to ask for clarification first hazarding a guess which may be misconstrued as an accusation.

58 minutes ago, Ran said:

 

For what end must we resist “the right” to grab more power?

48 minutes ago, Ran said:

To me it sounds like the left winning elections does more to advance trans rights than the left losing elections, but what do I know?

Eh depends whose controlling or compromising  “the left” in question doesn’t it?

[Varysblackfyre321]

2 minutes ago, Phylum of Alexandria said:

Will that result in compromises

Is there any “compromise” that’s too big?

[Larry of the Lawn]

I just listened to episodes 5 and 6 of the podcast.  I guess my biggest question to those who listened to it, but didn't find Rowling's comments and writings on the topic to be transphobic, what to make of Natalie Wynn?  I thought she stated her position very clearly, despite being a victim of a couple of online pile-ons.  In my opinion she dismantles any argument JKR made about the [alleged] danger presented to women by trans people.

I'm going to listen to the first 4 episodes at some point but so far I haven't heard anything compelling from JKR to change my opinion on what she's said and written.  The Death Eaters quote from her 2020 explanation of her tweets in particular sticks out as an example of grossly exaggerating the "danger" of the "trans movement".  If anything Rowling and the gender critical camp seem the ones obsessed with language, victim hood, centering themselves in the narrative, and having a manichean view of the politics around transgenderism.  

 

 

 

Edited April 18 by Larry of the Lake

[DMC]

2 hours ago, Kalnestk Oblast said:

Obama's view on same sex marriage is a famous one here.

Yeah I was thinking about this comparison after the earlier talk about "bigotry."  If we associate this with the gay marriage debate, then about 80 percent of the US political establishment were "bigots" in the nineties.  Obviously, almost all of them weren't, and many of them knew better than their public position-taking, but that's how it was with DOMA and it took SCOTUS to change things only ten years ago beginning with Windsor.  Might have been a different SC than the current one, but not that much different. 

So..in the interest of lowering the temperature on things, feel like this should be emphasized.  As I said, I am very confident the future will determine certain figures like Rowling are on the wrong side of history in twenty or so years.  But by the same token, Clinton, and even Obama, as well as most of the Democratic Congress were on the wrong side of history in a very recent and relevant comparison.  Which is why I think the vitriol leveled on the internet is, most of the time, very unhelpful.

[GZ Bloodraven]

1 hour ago, Larry of the Lake said:

I just listened to episodes 5 and 6 of the podcast.  I guess my biggest question to those who listened to it, but didn't find Rowling's comments and writings on the topic to be transphobic, what to make of Natalie Wynn?  I thought she stated her position very clearly, despite being a victim of a couple of online pile-ons.  In my opinion she dismantles any argument JKR made about the [alleged] danger presented to women by trans people.

 

Watch Natalie's newest video "The Witch Trials of JK Rowling" it elaborates her position even more clearly.

39 minutes ago, DMC said:

So..in the interest of lowering the temperature on things, feel like this should be emphasized.  As I said, I am very confident the future will determine certain figures like Rowling are on the wrong side of history in twenty or so years.  But by the same token, Clinton, and even Obama, as well as most of the Democratic Congress were on the wrong side of history in a very recent and relevant comparison.  Which is why I think the vitriol leveled on the internet is, most of the time, very unhelpful.

The vitriol may be unhelpful, but it is decently understandable: a lot of these people are using a very real fear to justify an inflammatory anger. 

[DMC]

6 minutes ago, GZ Bloodraven said:

The vitriol may be unhelpful, but it is decently understandable: a lot of these people are using a very real fear to justify an inflammatory anger. 

Yeah, no argument there.

[Larry of the Lawn]

For anyone that listened to the podcast, I though this piece has some good criticisms.  I'll quote some relevant passages later but definitely worth a look:

https://sheseeksnonfiction.blog/2023/04/14/witchtrials/

@Phylum of Alexandria

@TrackerNeil

Would be very interested to hear your thoughts on this review of the podcast.  

Edited April 19 by Larry of the Lake

[The Anti-Targ]

39 minutes ago, GZ Bloodraven said:

Watch Natalie's newest video "The Witch Trials of JK Rowling" it elaborates her position even more clearly.

 

I watched Natalie's video. I don't have any intention of listening to the podcast so I won't comment on it. But I think it does somewhat behove people who have listened to the whole podcast to dedicate just a couple more hours of their time (or less than that if you are able to follow at 1.5, 1.75 or 2x speed) to hear out those contra points.

Interesting that in the few posts I've read in this thread the Motte and Bailey form of argumentation Natalie talks about seems to be being deployed a fair bit.

Link here for ease of access for those willing to hear her perspective.

Similar to @DMC I'm very confident the views of Rowling and those with similar attitudes will be on the wrong side of history.

Edited April 19 by The Anti-Targ