Defining the Left and Right

[CityHermit!]

8 hours ago, Lost in Translation said:

 

GLP = Grand Ole Party, i.e. Republicans

 

Yes, I am, and I am happy to discuss, among many subjects, the differences between the left and the right. One primary difference between the left and right is the use of language. Since the left owns the media, entertainment, educational institutions, and most large city governments, it feels quite comfortable managing the narrative. One way it does that is by demonizing its opponents. Case in point: you chose to say "You a glper?" - the not so subtle implication being that a "glper" is something to avoid, hence derogatory. You have shown your hand. You have exposed your bias. I take no issue with you having a bias, we all do - but since us "glper's" are forced to constantly defend our positions we understand our own bias as well as yours. I suspect you cannot say the same.

 

 

No, glp is an acronym to a website and they call themselves glpers. There's even a thread somewhere around here that mentions it. I believe the full title is godlikeproductions. As with joeblast, you can interpret things how you will but it's not my problem either way.

 

I will state also I am apolitical. I don't care about left or right because I don't even believe in the state. I'm not sure how that is a bias. You know how little kids run around and do physical activity when they are playing imaginary games even though the premise is in their own minds? I see politics as the same thing, child minded people running around doing things in real life based on ideas in their head.

[CityHermit!]

7 hours ago, Marblehead said:

The left is the first foot that moves forward when instructed to "Forward March".  If you have moved the right foot forward first then the right is wrong.

 

 

I did not know that, thank you for sharing. It's nice to learn new things.

[CityHermit!]

Feel free to comment on anything else I've said already, as it has a lot more important implications.

[CityHermit!]

7 hours ago, silent thunder said:

and always remember... three lefts... make a right.

aha!

[silent thunder]

in my universe

 

GOP=Grand Ole Party

 

GLP= some other shit, or a typo

[CityHermit!]

2 minutes ago, silent thunder said:

in my universe

 

GOP=Grand Ole Party

 

GLP= some other shit, or a typo

Right, it's some other shit. Obviously I know what GOP is and would simply say Republican if anything if that's what I was asking.

[silent thunder]

[joeblast]

15 hours ago, CityHermit! said:

I don't watch tv, I'm outdoors a lot and in general out and about all the time. If I'm home I usually training or studying or have guests rather than laze about. It's too bad you had to interpret what I say in a manner to be offended by it, it's not my problem either way.

 

In any case it is a site with right leaning views, so you would feel at home there. However, it also has a legacy as a conspiracy theory site and their disclaimer is to not be believe a word on the site or something to that effect, so you would have to watch out for many dishonest people. I've studied the general conspiracy theory realm going on a couple of decades, I know what's in it and can say with accuracy it's full of dishonesty.

so you dont really consume much information, yet have the tv programming that conspiracy "theorists" are all dishonest and arent merely assembling publicly available pieces of information to try and figure out what really happened when we are presented with an obviously fake story with multiple plot holes in it.  *shrugs*  ok. 

 

that didnt offend me, it just showed me where you are, which basically equates to a waste of time on this particular subject.  I feel at home in my own skin, so I dont really feel the need to seek out potential like minds in order to feel satiated and comforted.

 

 

Edited May 19, 2018 by joeblast

[joeblast]

its not necessary for the save button to depress and act like its been clicked, lol

Edited May 19, 2018 by joeblast

[joeblast]

.

Edited May 19, 2018 by joeblast

[CityHermit!]

16 hours ago, joeblast said:

so you dont really consume much information, yet have the tv programming that conspiracy "theorists" are all dishonest and arent merely assembling publicly available pieces of information to try and figure out what really happened when we are presented with an obviously fake story with multiple plot holes in it.  *shrugs*  ok. 

 

that didnt offend me, it just showed me where you are, which basically equates to a waste of time on this particular subject.  I feel at home in my own skin, so I dont really feel the need to seek out potential like minds in order to feel satiated and comforted.

 

 

I read, a lot. I said I have close to two decades of experience with the whole conspiracy theory scene/community/what have you. I asked on page 444 of the Trump thread who have been to conspiracy theory forums and no one responded. I specifically said be honest then, and left at  it that. I shouldn't have assumed there would be anyone to take issue with that comment. If anything, your terminology and writing style is as a glper which is a kind of unique flavor and not inherently derogatory and I think they would see humor in what I just wrote too. If it was an honest mistake then you would fool them all the same, so don't take it the wrong way. Beyond that it doesn't make a difference to me what you believe, I don't care. Go ahead and argue with more political people, I'll laugh at the rest of you. The election was a joke, Trump is the punchline. Have fun.

[Marblehead]

I read just this morning that it is being suggested that octopuses were planted on Earth by aliens.

 

 

[silent thunder]

8 hours ago, Marblehead said:

I read just this morning that it is being suggested that octopuses were planted on Earth by aliens.

 

 

I read that as well.  33 scientists backed it up. 

 

I can see where the genetic oddities are a bit boggling... but to jump to the theory they offered in support of how that genetic oddity appeared here with us... was rather staggering to me. 

 

Though with a creature as incredibly magical and unlikely as the octopus, Heisenberg's disembodied voice rings in my ears.  'Reality isn't stranger than you think it is, Creighton.  It's stranger than you can think it is.' 

 

My son has been fascinated by them since he was a toddler.  We've spent many hours researching them and as of now... however they came to be, I find my opinion of them something like "Given the octopi's remarkable mental acuity, problem solving abilities and advanced, anticipatory predation techniques, combined with their innate ability to completely alter their physical shape and color.  Nature limits them to a 2 year life span, simply to allow the rest of the Earth's species, a fightin' chance."

[ralis]

9 hours ago, Marblehead said:

I read just this morning that it is being suggested that octopuses were planted on Earth by aliens.

 

 

 

Have you been reading Lovecraft and hanging out in those Southern swamps? 

 

[OldDog]

This is my first venture into the off grid world. I chose this tread with some trepidation but have been pleasantly surprised by the lack of vitriolic exchange. So, kudos to all for keeping it civil.

 

I see the left/right political polarity as the most crucial issue of our time and have struggled greatly to try and understand it and how we might possibly break out of this pattern. 

 

Since this thread has to do with defining the left/right phenomenon, I wonder if any of you have explored the work of social psychologists, specifically the work of Jonathan Haidt.

 

 

Doesn't this kind of discussion contribute significantly tounderstanding left vs right?  Thoughts? 

 

[Marblehead]

Interesting that Conservative was the same level for all six considerations.  Consistency?  While Liberal is erratic?  Or maybe just more forgiving?

 

Yes, pretty much any more Liberal = Democrat and Conservative = Republican.

 

And most time the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing.

 

 

 

[joeblast]

Meh, any analysis that doesnt include the ever pervasive cattle herding efforts of the international criminal cartels is lacking a key component.  Progressivism was created by those criminals, and these days some folks embrace the peripheral feel-good aspects of the....*pukes a bit*...philosophy....or trojan horse, as it were, take your pick....but any objective study of the roots of progressivism show it to be an initiative of the international criminal cartels taking their newly conquered United States with its shiny new pseudo Constitution, and leading the populace away from its roots, into "new ways" that made "progress," but they mainly left out that the progress was 95% for the few percent that owned the scam and by nature away from said roots, and most all else is hot air and lip service that's actually corrosive to liberty.

 

"Progressive" as a term disappeared from the landscape after 30 or 40 years and it became practically a pejorative, wherein they began to call themselves something rather opposite of what the classical term meant - liberal.  (This was as much of an affront to classical liberalism as it was to the anti federalists winding up seeing Jackson on a Federal Reserve Note!)  A glance throughout Progressivism's history shows that the trojan horse...sorry, "philosophy"...has sought to discard established foundations, discard established language and pervert it so that language contains too many meanings, hindering the free flow of ideas - all while couched in the sheep's clothing of compassion for the public.  Distractions from the primary theft, mainly - that's the entire point of the feel goodyness aspects of the pseudo-philosophy.

 

I dont separate Progressivism from its black, rotten, fraudulent, scheming roots.  It was Hillary after all who was the front person for the criminals' assertion that - "OK, 'Liberal' has finally jumped the shark after 80 years - let's go back to 'Progressive' now that people have by and large forgotten the term."  Progressivism imbues Stockholm Syndrome upon its victims.  Progressivism brought the sovereignty undermining UN, the sovereignty undermining EU. 

 

For purposes of this thread its also important to note that there have been plenty of Republican Progressives (a misnomer, I know, we're moving past that whole "Republic" thing and on straight to Democracy, where the living breathing law can be amended to 'our' will, i.e. the criminal cartels' will - but that's in the portion they dont tell you, of course.  Your will, not so much.  We went from taxation without representation, to bought off representation amending law to a fraudulent pseudo Constitution.) (Which, incidentally, is how we'll know if the 'Q' team is actually fully legit and DT was fully honest on inauguration day when he said that the USA was being returned to its citizens.  You'll know by what they do with the pseudo Constitution, and whether or not we'll see the return of the lawful original, The Constitution For These United States of America.)

 

 

 

"It behooves one to ask questions in such a manner so as to receive the responses he likes."  (or does it? lol)

 

 

 

I wind up putting it into a framework of "what makes a person accept or reject the programming they have been provided."

 

 

Some people eat what's provided in one big gulp without examining

Some people examine and then eat in one big gulp

Some people pick out all the onions before consuming

Some take the dish provided, scrape off a few items, and head back to the buffet to reassess just what sort of food there is available at this joint here, anyway (but usually keeping a few items from the original dish)

 

 

 

 

Some people cling bitterly to whatever their textbooks and teachers told them while they were young and impressionable,

 

Some temper big handed assistance with freedom, liberty, and personal responsibility

 

Some stay away from substance that undercuts their arguments,

 

Some learn from the gaps in their training.

 

 

I dunno, maybe someone needs to invent those "They Live" glasses....

 

 

 

Edited June 8, 2018 by joeblast

[CityHermit!]

Why is a longtime Taoist forum suddenly so political anyway? How about commentary about politics in China/Asia? Would such discussion be a liability for Chinese users who potentially face repercussions by their government?

[Aetherous]

17 minutes ago, CityHermit! said:

Why is a longtime Taoist forum suddenly so political anyway?

 

Even the Daodejing was a highly political text. Not that Daoism = politics.

 

I think this forum attracts people that have many interests, who have been influenced by Daoism, and one of the subjects they're into is politics.

 

17 minutes ago, CityHermit! said:

How about commentary about politics in China/Asia?

That would be an entirely different field of thought. Most of us don't live there, so we don't care as much about it.

[CityHermit!]

5 hours ago, Aetherous said:

 

Even the Daodejing was a highly political text. Not that Daoism = politics.

 

I think this forum attracts people that have many interests, who have been influenced by Daoism, and one of the subjects they're into is politics.

 

That would be an entirely different field of thought. Most of us don't live there, so we don't care as much about it.

 

To start with, I just want to point out that I find it more than odd that a thread debating about Trump is on its way to 500 pages while other topics closer to the heart of Daoism don't have nearly as much content. I also notice that this may have been a more recent development, and by suddenly I mean within the last couple years. In the years before I only glanced at the site here and there, and didn't really see much political focus if any. Then again I did not have an account and did not have access to Off-Grid, so maybe I just wasn't seeing it where it would be.

 

I'm well aware of the political references in DDJ and other texts, and I'm familiar enough with Chinese history and the role Daoism has had with regards to it and related politics. I would expect that anyone else who is can also appreciate the struggle Daoists have had against the political climate of their times. If anything that applies all the more in contemporary times than dynastical ones given the Cultural Revolution and other events. It's because of the desperate circumstances following those events that Westerners can get the privilege of being exposed to Daoism in ways that even many Chinese could not throughout the course of history. I can expect Westerners not interested in Daoism to not care, but I have a hard time understanding why Western Daoists on a Daoist forum would not care. I also have a hard time understanding why those so interested in domestic politics would be so oblivious to the context of China in our foreign relations and how that in turns gets tied back to domestic politics as well.

 

Again, it's just very odd that posters could be so detached from anything regarding China yet debate over a single US election passionately enough as to virtually be at each others throats over it, long time members who seem to know each other fairly well nonetheless. It just does not add up to me. I did notice a Chinese language section and I assumed posters in there could be from China, so I guessed that a lack of discussion on Chinese politics could be for their own safety if anything.

 

If there were no qualms about it and no risk to anyone, I would have a lot to say more about China. Maybe I could start a "talk Xi Jinping" thread.

 

 

Edited June 11, 2018 by CityHermit!
typo

[windwalker]

7 hours ago, CityHermit! said:

Would such discussion be a liability for Chinese users who potentially face repercussions by their government

 

If you were Chinese or  live / lived there you would know. The answer would be obvious.

 

As to the Trump thread. 

 

An interesting thread that can be proven or disproven regarding the facts as presented by users with different ideologies,  worldview's.

 

One could look at it as a presentation of what is verses what is thought to be or wanted to be.

Edited June 11, 2018 by windwalker

[Marblehead]

Yeah, China is a country that is still evolving.  It is a very powerful economic power.  Politically, the evolving is a bit slow but it will speed up as the economy becomes stronger and the common people have more of a say as to how the government business should be conducted.

 

I have never visited China.  The closest I have been was Korea.  I am aware of the historical problems of Korea.  

 

The only thing I can say about today's Chinese government is that I don't like Communism.

 

 

[windwalker]

1 minute ago, Marblehead said:

I have never visited China.  The closest I have been was Korea.  I am aware of the historical problems of Korea.  

 

The only thing I can say about today's Chinese government is that I don't like Communism.

 

 

 

lived and worked in both places.  Regarding whats called Communism.

 

Try this sometimes...list what you think or feel it is, and compare with what is done in the US either publicly or as in the Trump thread behind the scenes.  If one is using modern China as a comparison I've found that really there's not that much difference. 

 

What some who are called progressives or the left, seem to be trying to do is Communism, not even in the modern sense of it....

Group speak and  thought  animal farm times,,,oops slipped some find the word animal offensive when used in comparisons with humans. 

[Marblehead]

Humans are animals.  We damn sure ain't plants or fungi.  Those are the only known life forms on Earth.

 

And yes, I understand what you are alluding to and that is why I have become more anti-liberal in the recent past.

 

[OldDog]

3 hours ago, windwalker said:

If one is using modern China as a comparison I've found that really there's not that much difference. 

 

The commonality seems to be that of a few seeking to manipulate events and narratives toward some end ... using communism, capitalism, democracy, plutocracy, whatever ... which typically distills down to aggrandizement of the oligarchs.

 

The problem individuals have is to figure out how to thrive in whatever form it takes.