volkris @volkris@qoto.org
I think the most pressing and fundamental problem of the day is that people lack a practically effective means of sorting out questions of fact in the larger world. We can hardly begin to discuss ways of addressing reality if we can't agree what reality even is, after all.
The institutions that have served this role in the past have dropped the ball, so the next best solution is talking to each other, particularly to those who disagree, to sort out conflicting claims.
Unfortunately, far too many actively oppose this, leaving all opposing claims untested. It's very regressive.
So that's my hobby, striving to understanding the arguments of all sides at least because it's interesting to see how mythologies are formed but also because maybe through that process we can all have our beliefs tested.
But if nothing else, social media platforms like this are chances to vent frustrations that on so many issues both sides are obviously wrong ;)
Joined Dec 2022
@Wen the story of Bitcoin burning vast amounts of power is false, though, based on a misrepresentation of how Bitcoin works.
We really need to stop promoting that narrative.
Yes, it gets clicks for websites, but it's not actually true.
Bitcoin can operate on a car battery and solar power. THAT's what Bitcoin burns.
Other people trade extra power for Bitcoin because it's proven so valuable to them, but that's not Bitcoin's fault.
It's like blaming art for the amount someone might pay for a Picasso.
Bingo.
And it's important to keep this firmly in mind so we can learn the lesson and avoid repeating it in the future.
I mean, #twitter was fairly awful. It had a terrible interface, it was constrained, it promoted slogans and echo chambers over conversation... I think a lot of people remember it with sentimentality.
But to the point here, Twitter was never the public square, and folks who misunderstood ended up caught off guard when the private service provider acted like a private service provider.
Recognizing that reality helps avoid repeating the cycle.
If one wants a public square, then they need to push for a service that's actually public.
And better than Twitter, while we're at it.
volkris
boosted
@annaleen I can understand the meaning of losing Twitter for many people, who made their living by connecting there.
However, Twitter was as public as X is today, meaning it wasn't. It never was yours nor "ours". If it was actually public, it could not have been sold to Musk in the first place. The means of its past owners just aligned more with yours, by incident.
@quixoticgeek it's not blindness to the harm of cars but recognition of their benefits.
We balance the risk vs reward with such systems, and that includes the tremendous value that cars bring us.
@Free_Press it's not that he's removing non-loyalists but that the party has been faltering, losing support, and based on election results, Trump seems to have the strategy to regain public appeal.
It's not ideological but prudent.
A new management team being hired when the old one failed.
@Aethelstan I mean, democracy brought us Trump.
He's acting only under the framework of democracy.
The RNC lost the support of the people, so democracy chose this new direction to regain it.
@fisunov would that be retweeting/retooting?
@freemo well, I end up thinking that if Trump wasn't that way then Republicans would be in a better position to call Biden out on it.
That's the problem with this situation of having two incompetent frontrunners: they can't hold each other in check, and both parties are worse off without that struggle making them better.
@HistoPol I'm actually in agreement: he has a clear focus of the things HE wants to accomplish.
Not the country, not what the democratic process might accomplish, not what he might be able to grow consensus around, not even what the law might allow.
His speech was a long list of the things HE says he wants to accomplish.
That's exactly the criticism I'm leveling at him.
I don't think it's inspiring. It's authoritarian, of anything, but mainly it's just out of touch.
He wants to do all sorts of things. That's nice. However, he's still only president and subject to both that reality, and the realities of, well reality as well.
And that's exactly why this missed the mark as a SOTU speech.
It'd be fine as a campaign speech to his people, though, where he can make promises that he won't keep.
@freemo Yeah, one thing I was struck by was the constant talk of himself and what he (supposedly) did, instead of what we did, or what the government did, etc. Humility would be nice, but at least he should realize that it wasn't a moment to talk about himself.
@SteveThompson I think it's more that claims about a dramatic shift to the right, instead of sober, serious descriptions of rulings, have convinced many in the public to lose trust.
Which is funny because then you get pieces like this echoing that rhetoric that is itself the problem.
Self-fulfilling circle.
Oof, I just realized i forgot to hashtag USPolitics, which I always try to do to help people filter that out of their own timelines.
My apologies to anyone who sees my post but was trying to avoid politics on their feeds! I completely understand that position!
The big problem with the #Biden State of the Union speech was that instead of speaking to the whole country about the whole country, it focused on speaking to his own choir about himself and his reelection.
That's why people are criticizing it as a campaign speech.
If you're a Biden supporter, realize that the speech did not invite non-supporters, including independents, to join in his efforts. It appealed only to those already on board, which is not productive in terms of actually getting those efforts done.
In other words, if you're in favor of what Biden was calling for, you too should be critical that this #SOTU won't help get those things done.
The speech seemed focused on helping nobody... except Joe Biden's personal reelection.
@manton exactly.
We live in an era when swaths of the US can't agree on facts even when they watch the same media.
It's so important to recognize that fundamental issue, and the role it plays in shaping our times.
If we can't agree on the color of the sky that we're both looking at, is it any surprise that folks can't agree on the actually complicated questions?
@mbkriegh each politician should be held accountable in their own right, not compared to anyone else. That's how we encourage each one to be better, and how we encourage parties as a whole to be better, so we can hopefully have better choices in the future.
Heck, Biden dipped into promoting some of Trump's campaign rhetoric. Had many speakers on the left not been doing that for years we might not be facing the possibility of Trump at this point.
We need to be calling these people out, not giving them a pass because they're better than alternatives in matchups that they themselves help make.
@JeremyMallin well, I'd say in the states it just means many different things to many different people, same as how liberal and conservative have also come to mean such different things.
It's just generally best to avoid that kind of terminology when talking about #USPolitics unless one is sure that their audience is all on the same page with a single definition.
I find it better to talk about positions instead of labels at this point.
Just for one example, consider the huge numbers of libertarians who are completely opposed to the Libertarian Party. Those terms have simply changed meaning over time.
@eurobubba not at all.
This is consistent with the VRA in that both highlighted the lack of legal process. In both cases the Court pointed out that punishment was being doled out without a legal finding of guilt.
Gerrymandering is a little more complicated, but even that's similar: without a legal process for ruling, there's no legal process for blocking it.
@x_minus_t@mstdn.social funny that you jumped to "make me a sammich"
That's some projection there.
@manton it's one of those cases where different people end up walking away with opposite perceptions.
No, he said so many things in the speech that seemed political rather than magisterial, flat out false, out of touch, and the delivery itself came across as uninspired.
He blamed others for his own failures to enact policy, just highlighting that he seems incapable of living up to his promises.
His priorities seemed out of touch with the mainstream, leaving us to wonder, what was this? Just a campaign speech?
That's not what a president is supposed to be doing with a State of the Union presentation.
But most importantly, whether out of ignorance or lack of talent, he seemed unqualified for the office of president.
@manton wow, that is a bizarre take
I think the most pressing and fundamental problem of the day is that people lack a practically effective means of sorting out questions of fact in the larger world. We can hardly begin to discuss ways of addressing reality if we can't agree what reality even is, after all.
The institutions that have served this role in the past have dropped the ball, so the next best solution is talking to each other, particularly to those who disagree, to sort out conflicting claims.
Unfortunately, far too many actively oppose this, leaving all opposing claims untested. It's very regressive.
So that's my hobby, striving to understanding the arguments of all sides at least because it's interesting to see how mythologies are formed but also because maybe through that process we can all have our beliefs tested.
But if nothing else, social media platforms like this are chances to vent frustrations that on so many issues both sides are obviously wrong ;)
Joined Dec 2022
volkris's choices:
