[ExI] very informative
F. C. Moulton
moulton at moulton.com
Sun Dec 27 23:04:45 UTC 2020
Since I am trying to be more positive this month I will start off by
saying something positive about the video: I did not notice any spelling
errors.
I was very disappointed in the content of the video however not
surprised. I am not going to waste my time going through the video
point by point however I will offer one example from the beginning.
Near the beginning of the video is the assertion that the Liberal
Position concerning "The color of a person's skin" is "Insignificant"
about 44 seconds in the video. Of course as a blanket statement this
is misleading in large part because it does not provide context for that
assertion. Consider the context of finding a job or renting an
apartment, certainly many people apply for jobs or apartments and are
not selected however if (all other things being equal) persons with dark
skin are proportionately less likely to get the job or apartment then
skin color is significant; in fact skin color has an observational
significance which is necessary before one can even consider explanatory
significance.
Now I suspect that at this point there are fingers poised over keyboards
about to explain how this is obviously not what was meant. I am not
going to say that I know the inner thoughts of the the person in the
video nor will I say that the person is necessarily deliberately being
dishonest however I will urge great caution before signing on too
quickly to their rhetoric. For example I would not be surprised if some
are about ready to write something about the "Liberal Position" being
that skin color is insignificant as relates to the "Rule of Law" and
that "Rule of Law" is a "Good Thing" or something similar. So consider
the example of a fine for speeding with nothing in the law relating to
skin color in relation to the amount of the fine. At first glance one
might say skin color is not significant since it is not mentioned in the
law however consider how it plays out for very poor people who might not
have the money to pay the fine and might wind up with a suspended
driving license and then get caught driving to work on a suspended
license and are jailed and then lose their job whereas the relatively
financially well of pull out their American Express card and problem
goes away with much lower impact on their daily life. Now if poor
people are disproportionately of a particular skin color or ethnicity or
religion or whatever would that be significant? What about right
dominant hand versus left dominant hand? If some law does not mention
dominant hand however if persons with a left dominant hand are getting
fined more often in proportion to their level in the population would
not you say the dominant hand might maybe perhaps be significant and at
least worth considering.
One reason I am taking the time to write this is that I have seen well
meaning people fall into the trap of uncritically accepting "skin color
is not significant" or "color blind to race" when they mean that they do
their best not to prejudge someone based on skin color. However things
get sticky when these same well meaning people start to try to talk
about some phenomena where skin color might be an important
consideration and persons who do not want the conversation to take place
or who want to steer it in a different direction say "Wait why are you
bringing up skin color, did not we all agree that skin color was
insignificant. Only racists want to talk about race all of the time" and
the conversation either gets derailed or never gets started. So to
avoid this I strongly suggest we all developed nuanced and sophisticated
views on race, gender, etc. And as for the video I suggest those who
initially thought it a good video put on your Popperian hats and look at
every statement in the video and think of examples which contradict what
is said as well as what is implied. Seriously. This is an extropian
email list.
I wrote at the beginning of my remarks that I was disappointed in the
content of the video but not surprised. So to continue that thought I
will note that I have not seen very many prageru.com videos however each
that I have seen appears to be intellectually shallow. So I will end
these comments by noting that this video is consistent in that tradition.
Fred
On 12/27/2020 11:10 AM, spike jones via extropy-chat wrote:
>
> > *On Behalf Of *William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat
> *Subject:* [ExI] very informative
>
> https://www.prageru.com/video/left-or-liberal/
> <https://www.prageru.com/video/left-or-liberal/>
>
> >…I simply did not know. When liberals have been attacked I have
> defended them. But what I did not know was that it is not the
> ultraliberals who came up with the ideas I fought - it was the Leftists.
>
> >…Very clear differences. I am most definitely a liberal and not a
> Leftist. bill w
>
> Thanks for that billw. What Prager describes as liberal is something
> I have always thought of as libertarian. I agree with everything he
> said in that video. You and I are liberals.
>
> spike
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> extropy-chat mailing list
> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org
> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat
--
F. C. Moulton
moulton at moulton.com
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