ameancow @ ameancow @lemmy.world

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1 yr. ago

I'm not impressed by today's AI and I also fully understand that the tech is going to completely upend society and will eventually be a part of our picture of utopia, or our picture of actual hell on Earth.

The people who are screaming it's wild wonders and benefits are at least as closed-minded as the people who think we're going to be able to put the toothpaste back in the tube. The actual direction this tech moves is going to be far more like the discovery of radio, in that at the time of it's discovery and early implementation, the people then had no idea the implications down the road and we're at the same point. Except the big difference and why this is contentious is that radio was far less dangerous to society broadly.

Radio was a fundamental force that always existed around us, we learned to use it the way our ancestors used rivers and waters to move goods and people. AI is completely human-made and doesn't exist without human engineering, so it's not neutral, it's a tool shaped by man to do whatever a man wants with it.

I appreciate that. People aren't here in these sites for truth or being challenged, they're here to pound war-drums together and drive up dopamine fervor towards a fantasy war with fantasy enemies. Not humans.

I'm always saddened by how easily our species devolves from having moral high-ground on an issue to feeling like the superior humans for making their ideological opponent into a vile monster, both overpowering and oppressive but also too pathetic to consider as a human. We've seen what this leads to over and over.

A question I ask folks sometimes is "if you won tomorrow, if you got overwhelming success for your party, your team, your group, what would the next day look like?" and invariably with few exceptions, they get angry and offended. Making someone consider their ideological opponent's existence makes them feel like you're taking the opposing side. This is why and how we get some of humanity's worst acts.

A side rack with drainage into the sink is ideal for handwashing dishes, anything more or less complicated than that is going to be endless headaches. This thing looks unstable as fuck.

Imagine pumping soap from the dispenser while the top rack has several plates and pots and pans (and fruit??) on it.

So several things:

Quite the dedication to defending a terrorist

This is a juvenile and destructive bit of hyperbolic performatism and points to a clear lack of actual seriousness about the issue. If you don't care about outcomes you're on the wrong side.

Police, by your own admission, kill many family dogs. Police also heavily skew conservative

I will reference what I said elsewhere but you obviously didn't read, which is that conservatism as a mindset is not coherent, it's about how they feel now. They are gaining ground because we're addressing intellectual ideas with them and they only care about what's on their mind right now, this is what I'm saying we can exploit. But it involves something that will make reactionary turds on the left pretty uncomfortable, which is acknowledging that the vast majority of conservatives are normal people. Misguided but with the same emotions and wants for themselves.

The cops that shoot dogs? Probably have their own dogs that they cherish. The people who scream and cry about how we need to deport immigrants? They would fight tooth-and-nail to keep their groundskeeper from being deported because “he’s a good guy and has a family.” The ones who want to see women die from miscarriages? They’ll drive their daughter over state-lines and pay for HER abortion. You see this everywhere. They voted on grocery prices… ask them how they feel about the price of eggs and poultry right now and you’ll get a dumb stare and a shifting goalpost, because those feelings were then, these new feelings are now.

So my point is that we need to do better to appeal to the emotions they are using and figure out how to make it less about "including everyone" and more about "this is the pain you may feel next."

If this is too "kind to terrorists" for you, you obviously haven't been paying attention to how easily the underclass looking for equality can become the bad guys. Whatever happens in our country, we have to share it with them after, so I don't entertain these kinds of tones that the right is inhuman monsters. Maybe the people bankrolling the media personalities, but the people are just people and you're equally capable of losing cognitive thought and following your momentary feelings.

Well then you'll be surprised to know that I also condemn vigilantism broadly so we have less to argue about than it seemed, however I don't understand the need for provocation on this issue if you actually care about delivering your message. You should understand that in this space, if you're coming from the angle of saying that political violence is never an option, you're upholding the liberal mindset that existing power structures are adequate for creating systemic change and equality, and MOST leftists will tell you that no, it's not. That argument comes from the neo-liberal, pro-capitalist movement and it will do as well to shift hearts as coming at it from the right and claiming "no fair." It's a weak approach to denouncing violence.

Unless you're going for a full-pacifist angle, which least ethically clear and consistent, we need to understand that revolutions are violent. Were either of these people engaged in a revolution? No, but that's not because someone needs to "declare" a revolution, it just becomes one when enough people are doing the same thing. So it's expected that a "side" is going to cheer for someone who is furthering the goals of the group.

I think the better question you should be pondering though is at what point do you start agreeing with the violence? At what point do you see enough of the people standing up for what's right commit enough violence that you decide "oh, so this is now a revolution" and it's no longer vigilantism?

While you're there, ask what "law" means in this context. What are the rules around our society and what enforces them? It's always the threat of violence, so again we need to ask at what point do violent actions constitute overthrowing an old legal system and writing new laws? How do you do that anyway if you don't have other means?

If it were any other point in history of America I would be right alongside you decrying all forms of violent action, and I still do condemn taking lives without an organized movement, but we're well into the "grey" zone now where change comes at the end of a sword, because all other options are rapidly being closed in the faces of the people. In this kind of climate, it feels like saying "killing a corporate leader of the ruling class is wrong and you should feel bad for not feeling bad" just feels like more the leftist "scolding" that makes people broadly turn away from the movement, and enough of us should know this by now that engaging in this kind of rhetoric feels bad-faith. Polarities shift as the noose tightens and scolding people about their soft support for violence will have the opposite effect if you care about human life and are not just performatively clearing your conscience.

We attack what they're feeling. We shift their feelings. We appeal to their ever-shifting emotions and their selfish wants in the "now" and we make them hurt inside in a way that can't be shifted into anger at a target. Honestly the issue of showing how police kill pets is a HUGE one I think we're all leaving behind because I think for a lot of leftists, we're afraid that if we make it an issue we will get attacked by other leftists for ignoring all the other huge issues and the human lives that are also being harmed.

And that's the rub, we try so hard to craft arguments and make cases that encompass everyone and everything that we lose sight of how to deeply inject our feelings into the heart of that old white lady who commands the respect of her grown chud kids. People who do NOT care about how well crafted our socialist arguments are or how much data backs up our ideals. We gotta stupid-down and find a new grass-roots compass for change, because we're not winning.

Most of that I put on our ineffectual Democratic leadership who are supposed to represent the people. We had a mandate of millions and I don't remember a single, actual dramatic effort to reshape policy by our elected leaders.

At that time, many people still believed Democrats were actually the opposition group to conservative fascism, and not the checked-out wine-mom getting alimony checks every month from the right.

Because they were trying to topple the entire system, not voice disapproval or change policies.

There's no peaceful way to do that without a level of coordinated effort that we will NEVER get from groups of humans. To say nothing of the fact that even after the revolution, you have to share space with the people and sympathizers of those ousted, so sending a message of severe, popular consequence for regression is almost a necessity for lasting change.

Also, the "no violence" thing has a LOT to do with what the mobilizing group is trying to accomplish.

Changing policies and ousting leadership that isn't performing? Hell yeah, peaceful marches and protests all the way.

Want to remove a hostile and oppressive militarized regime? That shit is NEVER pretty, and turns even the best of people into monsters by necessity.

They may not have deep, intellectual compassion, but they have human feelings, and I can EASILY dig up thousands of facebook groups of right-wing dog lovers and their products, of people who have unparalleled love for guns, trump and dogs.

See, where you're having a disconnect is the normal, human response to seeing behavior that runs against their own feelings. You're encountering cognitive dissonance, and sorry to say once you start seeing it, you can't stop seeing it and learn it's fundamental to the human condition. Nobody is immune but some fall into it far more easily.

The cops that shoot dogs? Probably have their own dogs that they cherish. The people who scream and cry about how we need to deport immigrants? They would fight tooth-and-nail to keep their groundskeeper from being deported because "he's a good guy and has a family." The ones who want to see women die from miscarriages? They'll drive their daughter over state-lines and pay for HER abortion. You see this everywhere. They voted on grocery prices... ask them how they feel about the price of eggs and poultry right now and you'll get a dumb stare and a shifting goalpost, because those feelings were then, these new feelings are now.

And they do this all without a shred of self-awareness. I think we will fight the right a lot better when we understand that they're not people who think the same way as we do. They aren't aware of "punching down" or power structures, all they're aware of is "punching" and cannot, will not EVER be able to separate themselves from their limited scope of "this is how I feel right now." And this is also why this kind of mentality has been so successfully roped in by con-men who appeal to people's selfish feelings.

They actually love dogs a lot. They adore simple minds that give unconditional love. They're not mindless monsters with different axioms, they're just dumb as fuck. And we could absolutely use this to change narratives in this country if we understood it better.

Cops in the US murder around 10,000 dogs a year one study estimates, but the figure might be much higher, because it's not surprisingly hard to get data on something that police turn off their body cameras for or deny releasing to any outside agency.

Basically, if you own a dog, and you let a cop into your house, if they bark at the cop the cop will likely shoot the dog in front of you and carry on like nothing happened and you have no right to do anything, as the threat stands pretty strong in the air over the sounds of your dog's last breaths. If more people released videos of this happening, I think we could push police overhaul with far, far more success than we had with BLM.

And if you're reading between the lines and saying "wow he's saying that the right cares more about the lives of dogs than black kids" yeah that is what I'm saying. No, we can't change it. But I think if we worked with those primitive feelings at front and center, we could make a lot more progress in turning them little by little.

edit: as you predictably recoil at this and feel dismissive and offended at the idea that conservatives love dogs and we need to leverage that as another tool to change how they feel, try to ask yourself if you're reflexively angry here because you think they're incapable of love and human feelings. If they've been dehumanized for you, congratulations, you're sliding down the same path you've seen and condemned in others countless times before. Your enemy is human, they have human feelings. The difference is how they manage those feelings and the stories they tell themselves to explain those feelings. If you think understanding someone is the same as defending their actions and choices, you're flat out stupid and deserve whatever misery you're likely swimming in.

I will be surprised if they address it in anything but the most hands-off, distant references. "We heard something about the story, really tragic, we hate to see it."

Even acknowledging it at all is a political minefield. The good news (for them) is they don't have to! The vast majority of conservatives in this country, even the "tame" ones who are just scared of different people but have no political passion, they're getting a deeply cultivated perspective of the world, one that mentions this murder as a strange side-incident that nobody is really talking about, a feed that shows them hundreds of thousands of people cheering at Trump's parade, of sparse turnouts and cringe leftists at the "no kings" rallies that a few antifa agents organized, of the entire city of LA burning and the tariff's crushing the economic stability of every other country but the USA, and waves of migrant "criminals" crying in anguish as they are being deported by Daddy Trump every day.

We don't see how solid and happy the right is because we also have our own algorithmic bubbles that feed us false hope and dopamine hits of manufactured successes in the face of digital tyranny.

This is all very bad.

Okay this went a totally different direction than how you made it sound at outset, which you presented like an "our guy versus your guy" argument and why you're reaping downvotes and people willing to challenge you.

what I’m pointing out is the inconsistency in how people react to vigilante violence itself

So then is this what your actual problem is, that there is any celebration of vigilantism at all?

I don't have an argument, I a response to whatever your argument is, so that's where i will get clarity. Warning though, this takes actual reading so if you bemoan reading more than a paragraph this won't be fun for either of us. I say that ahead of time because the vast majority of internet discussions about contentious topics are ending with "I ain't reading all that" or "just put it in the bag" and other short-attention span, brain rot from every side of every political spectrum, which is why people don't talk anymore and why divisions are widening.

So to make sure I have your stance right: You see a lot of people "cheering" for Luigi Mangione, and no sympathy towards his victim, and you now see another killer getting mass condemnation and sympathy for his victims, and you see inconsistency in how people are treating these incidents because of which side of the political spectrum the individuals seem to represent, is that correct?

This kind of comment is a hallmark of a 2-dimensional mind, a linear thinking system that doesn't look at outcomes, people, lives or anything other than what group you belong to and how accepted you are in that group.

I can rip your logic to shreds if you want to dance. If you really, truly, actually think you have a point and moral, ethical framework to make some kind of argument, I can dismantle it and make you very frustrated. Just say the word and I'll make you painfully aware that you're not just ill-informed, but a victim of media you choose to consume and as a result are incapable of juggling more than one idea in your head at a time and this is why you're miserable.

Every last one of these insane fucks thinks themselves some kind of chosen, picked-by-god leader of the apocalypse main-character in the stupidest fairy-tale they never grew out of. They aren't just narcissistic, that implies some level of brain-power. This is a whole other level of self-absorption that turns off conscious thought.

I'm not even being hyperbolic, fundamentalist Christian doctrine is meant to strip of you thinking, of rationalization. You can be a very smart person and not have conscious thought about critical aspects of life or the world around you. Thinking isn't the same as being able to drive cars, go to work, plan murders, etc. You can do all that stuff without having a mental dialogue or monolog that lets you reason out ideas in your head. You only get that inner-dialogue if you've grown up in an environment that allows for it, by training you to question and figure things out on your own.

Religion doesn't let you figure things out on your own. You exist as this shape moving through life just waiting to die so Jesus can wrap you up in his arms and rock you to sleep like a lil' baby or something. It's a death cult. There is no value towards life of anyone. I was raised in that environment but never quite got the same incentive for heaven because it never made sense and seemed like eternal bliss would be a boring nightmare you could never wake up from.

And democrat leaders are like "Don't worry everyone, the rule-book CLEARLY states that a dog can't play basketball, if he even tries it will be a violation of our sacred institution" As the dog is dunking in the background and scoring points.

There is some level of divine irony in the fact that the vice president went from "JD who?" to now "Oh same as that killer guy" in common parlance. That smoke-eyed, infant-faced, nazi sofa-molester can't catch a break and I'm here for it.

I'll deliver this reply in Choose Your Own Adventure Format:

If you want to make a reference to Donald Trump being at his birthday parade and thus exposed, vulnerable and in the open and presently not looking up, turn to page 89.

If you rather make a reference to how we should leave the Devil be because the Devil himself is more respectable and honorable than any of these monstrous despots who murder out of spite and wrap themselves in scripture, turn to page 322.

There are more and more promising trials of life-extension drugs, procedures and genetic tricks, It seems like we might be only a couple decades away from extending human lifespans* by around 30% from conservative averages.

I wonder how many of us are going to slide under that lowering Indiana-Jones door. And how many people are going to live on after seeing people they care for dying to a disease that we still think of as natural. and will look back at one day the way we look at how we lived before germ theory or antibiotics existed.

in this case, "human" will probably mean wealthy white men, but it will be a start.