Reveal Your Uncool Conservative Beliefs Here

the gas stove post is completely idiotic

Is this another American thing where gas means petrol

it means farts

no "natural gas" -- America had a brief post trump stress disorder flashback seizure where some govt agency made a probably misguided suggestion to ban gas stoves, conservatives seized on it as they're coming for arr freedom, and then liberals had to reflexively take the polar opposite position and started throwing their stoves out the window. In reality, there are probably some decent environmental arguments for phasing out gas stoves (assuming we can actually make our electric grid cleaner, which it isn't yet), and induction stoves are very energy efficient and, though expensive, starting to come down in price. However, one of the main "facts" that has been cited against gas stoves is that they are "responsible for" some large % of child asthma cases, and that is just not true, it's based entirely on bad use of statistics.

America had a brief post trump stress disorder flashback seizure where some govt agency made a probably misguided suggestion to ban gas stoves

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-01-09/us-safety-agency-to-consider-ban-on-gas-stoves-amid-health-fears

in reality, one official (trumka jr) raised banning it in an interview, and in the same interview also suggested that other options, including setting standards on emissions from the appliances.

(assuming we can actually make our electric grid cleaner, which it isn't yet)

by the wording of this, i assume you mean "clean", and it'll never be 100% clean, so that's not a very good goal. if you mean "cleaner", as in, "improving",

https://i.imgur.com/AlfxKTK.png
https://electrifynow.net/fact-the-electric-grid-is-getting-cleaner-every-day

that was before the pandemic. but clean energy is now much, much cheaper per MWh than coal, and recently the costs have even dipped below natural gas. and many states have passed laws mandating 100% clean energy by 2035, 2040, 2050, etc. the winning argument, as always, is to be very cynical and say that those states will never get there. but they are doing better and making progress toward it, especially the states that aren't run by conservatives.

Claims about 'capitalism' producing a bad life condition (like, say, 'being a slave to the clock of the working day') are often implicitly predicated on a better alternative which once existed, whereas, unfortunately, in actual history (eg absolutism, feudalism, and arguably Stalinism also), it didn't.

This isn't truly a 'conservative' argument because it is, I hope, consonant with the Marxian view that capitalism represented progress and needs to be developed further / built on for something better, not reversed.

Pre-covid I remember having an argument with a fellow anarchist friend about this ... and he was kinda in denial about feudalism, and kept referring to some version of land stewardship by peasants minus kings/lords that seemed to be the exception to the rule

ecologically, tho, capitalism could well yet prove fatal to humanity

Like we agreed on the goals for the future, but were arguing about his premise that Capitalism was some "exile from Eden" thing whereas I was saying, "life was shit prior to Capitalism, there was no pre-Capitalist Eden"

xp - I'd argue that humanity could well prove fatal to humanity

it's the Lou Reed fallacy ... romanticizing being born 1000 years ago and sailing on a great big clipper ship ... dude would have gotten scurvy and been miserable tbrrwu

we're talking Lou Reed here lol

Also clipper ships didn’t exist 1,000 years ago

well Lou Reed is dead now so

Have to agree strongly with Sarahell. Life was bad back then - unfortunately.

Tend to agree with N Vague also. Capitalist infliction of ecological damage very dangerous for humans, as well as others.

So, agree that ecological case vs capital is a strong one, though from purely human POV, return to sustainable serfdom not a good plan.

She said hey babe

Take a sail on a clipper ship

And the colored girls go

ahoy ahoy ahoy hoy hoy hoy hoy ahoy avast avast ahoy hoy

apparently life was pretty swell in precolonial Hawaii

I don't understand UK politics

at some base level we're just talking about stronger people exploiting weaker people, with "strength" and "weakness" determined largely by economic status. And that's a tendency that far, far predates the industrial world that birthed Marxism, right?

otm

I don't understand UK politics

Don't see how that's conservative but I'm willing to hear the case.

As in, America is way more conservative than the UK

Ah. Just about, I guess, but the UK is catching up quickly and is insanely conservative compared to most of Europe. UKILX posters v much not representative, lol.

At least the US has legal weed and depending on which state you're in you might not be burned at the stake for being trans.

some of the US has better weather ...

I like how Mr. Bean gets presented as this aloof little dumb guy when in reality he's a massive dick to everyone he comes across. maybe I just don't get the UK mentality

is Mr. Bean related to Bosom Manor?

Mr Bean easily the most successful British cultural export within my lifetime, beloved around the globe, everyone loves a massive dick. lest we forget this recent international incident:

http://news.sky.com/story/next-time-send-the-real-mr-bean-the-bizarre-feud-between-zimbabwe-and-pakistan-surrounding-t20-world-cup-12732125

I prefer the older, less problematic British entertainment like Benny Hill

Mr Bean easily the most successful British cultural export ... everyone loves a massive dick

TIL

I don't understand UK politics

That's OK, I don't understand US politics.

i don't think those of us that live here do either

after listening to some deranged republican congresswoman railing against Tik Tok earlier I'd say US politics can be the politics of envy sometimes

Envy, fear, anger and resentment.

New board description?

90s Napalm Death album

An unpopular view that I increasingly hold is:

"I can't be anti-X, some of my best friends are X" is a statement that is automatically ridiculed, at best. But actually this statement is a natural and intuitive thing for anyone to say, if the second half of it is true.

I think the formulation's extremely bad reputation must come from it being so often used when it is not true. If Donald Trump is accused of racism and says "They say that about me, but some of my best friends are black", thinking of the time he had one black advisor - then this response is false.

But if someone is accused of homophobia and immediately thinks: "Wait a minute, my two closest confidants are gay, I'm giving a speech at a lesbian wedding next month, I work with an almost all gay team in my job at the LGBT bookshop, and my wife volunteers at the local gay LGBT archive" -- then that person may, in fact, have quite good reason to be puzzled by the accusation.

i rather think the issue is more likely to be the first half of the statement tbf

Bigotry does not confine itself to open hatred, it is perfectly possible to have amiable relations with members of a group while still holding prejudiced views against that group. Hell, it's possible to be in a group and hold those views about it!

Every decent person agrees that using slurs is racist. It's evil, let us say, and directed at a person.

Most decent people will not see how housing and immigration policy are racist. They're abstractions, not directed at a neighbor, a child, or, worse, a friend.

xpost yeah, that's where the "you're one of the GOOD ones" trope comes from

it does seem true that every person who is adamant that undocumented immigrants should be deported and forced to "do it the right way" cannot name a single person they think should be deported

Grand National protesters should be shot

Would make a change from the horses being shot.

I dunno if this is "conservative," but I still believe that most, if not all, people are capable of redemption.

Yet to meet a conservative who believes that tbh

conservatism seems to be very into the idea of a hard division between the worthy and the worthless

Re: capitalism and etc, what many radicals are bemoaning is quite obviously the enclosure of the commons and the basic structures of primitive accumulation, which I dunno, I think most reasonable people are not into?

Marx didn’t think pre-capitalist life was better than capitalism. He thought capitalism was a stage of development on the way to communism.

Not every radical is a marxist! That being said, a quick google reveals Marx wrote directly about the enclosure of the commons and his take wasn't "this is a positive step towards communism".

at some base level we're just talking about stronger people exploiting weaker people, with "strength" and "weakness" determined largely by economic status. And that's a tendency that far, far predates the industrial world that birthed Marxism, right?

otm

― sarahell, Thursday, 23 March 2023 bookmarkflaglink

That isn't really the case. You can be a Marxist without having read much Marx or theory, but capitalism driving the world to it's end in ecological catastrophe can't be explained merely by weak Vs strong.