[RightWingRabble]

Ditto. The left made the personal political, not the right. They're the ones who say we're not allowed to have jobs if we think the wrong thoughts or have the wrong opinions.

Even the worst bible-thumping rednecks I know (many, many cousins of both sides of the family) will agree to disagree and behave in a civil manner in the presence of those with whom they disagree.

When I was living in San Francisco, I've been literally run out of coffee shops, restaurants and parties after the wrong person finds out I'm pro-gun.

[com2kid]

> When I was living in San Francisco, I've been literally run out of coffee shops, restaurants and parties after the wrong person finds out I'm pro-gun.

Come to Seattle, in my RPG group we had 2 people conceal carry and visits to the local range are a common activity for all political persuasions.

One night one of my players brought in a collection of knives he'd just purchased. The MtG players next to us did look a bit.... unsettled as we handed around all the various new sharp toys that'd been brought in.

> They're the ones who say we're not allowed to have jobs if we think the wrong thoughts or have the wrong opinions.

I've seen plenty of people on the right proclaim that "all atheists should be removed from the country" or that "if you aren't Christian you are a traitor to the nation."

The people you are complaining about and the people I am complaining about are all authoritarian, that is the problem, not the left/right spread. The people who cause problems are those who think someone should be in charge and be dictating the rules that everyone must follow.

The actual set of rules being dictated is fairly arbitrary.

[thieving_magpie]

I think you're color blind on this one.

>Even the worst bible-thumping rednecks I know (many, many cousins of both sides of the family) will agree to disagree and behave in a civil manner in the presence of those with whom they disagree.

You've got to be kidding me. You (and I) are from the land of Jim Crow. My high school's prom was segregated until the late 90's. I worry for the safety of anyone openly gay in my hometown.

Let's just be honest - every classification of people you can think of has their assholes. It's a fact of life, ignore them and move on.

[RightWingRabble]

When was the last time a gay in your home town was actually strung up? How about a black man? As a direct contrast, the number of minorities in my little hometown has increased at a startling rate the past 3 years. People mumble and grumble, but none of them would ever consider not hiring one of them because they were black/mexican/democrat.

Thank you for perfectly demonstrating my point.

[thieving_magpie]

I think you're delusional if you don't think there's incidents of discrimination against minorities or those with non-hetero sexual orientations.

But to give you a very specific example, you may remember this from the news this year:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Walter_Scott

If you're going to be that snarky, at least be right.

> the number of minorities in my little hometown has increased at a startling rate the past 3 years

Sorry we startled you.

[xsmasher]

> They're the ones who say we're not allowed to have jobs if we think the wrong thoughts or have the wrong opinions.

Yeah, like that crazy leftist Joe McCarthy, and his modern-day ilk that try to get teachers fired for being gay or atheist.

No party has a monopoly on nutbags; it just seems that way because of selection bias.

[vezzy-fnord]

This is clearly wrong unless you posthumously redefine all right-wing political violence as being leftist.

Though, really, "left" and "right" are useless terms without defining your usage of them beforehand. Rest assured, there are many right-wingers who are all too willing to make the personal political and to stifle dissent. In fact, that's more-or-less a signature distinction of the New Right that emerged around the era of Buckley and National Review.

[engi_nerd]

...Isn't one of the tropes of the left that you can't just reject the experiences of others offhand in such a manner? Maybe the parent has been run out of places when his views were known. Who are you to just reject that and say that's wrong?

[dragonwriter]

> ...Isn't one of the tropes of the left that you can't just reject the experiences of others offhand in such a manner?

The first paragraph, which appeared to be what was rejected, was a generalization, not a recounting of personal experience.

And, nothing in the post you responded to was any kind of rejection that violates any precept that is particularly common, AFAICT, on the left (it might, I suppose, violate a right-wing stereotype of the left, but, then, that's more a problem of the alignment of the stereotype with reality.)

[engi_nerd]

I am not sure how else to interpret a post wherein someone relates something personal and then the first sentence of the follow up tells them they're wrong.

[dragonwriter]

What was called wrong was the generalization about the left which started the post, not the personal experience offered after it. At least, the "unless..." which qualifies the statement about wrongness only makes any sense as a qualifier to a rejection of the generalization, not the specific personal experience story, so there is no other reasonable way to interpret the post.

[engi_nerd]

I have gone back and re-read that post again.

You are correct. I was wrong.

[vezzy-fnord]

I don't know, I'm not a leftist. Though what you seem to be describing are postmodernism and moral relativism, and I know plenty of left-wing people who reject both.

Again, the term "left" is useless without defining it first. I have no idea what the hell you actually mean when you say "left".

[RightWingRabble]

I'm not going to get bogged down in a "no true scotsman" fallacial argument. People define themselves by these terms and the terms are also widely used. If you can't figure them out, that's on you.

[vezzy-fnord]

It's not a No True Scotsman when there's inherent vagueness.

People define themselves by these terms and the terms are also widely used. If you can't figure them out, that's on you.

Is that so? Because I've heard definitions of "right" as variously economically liberal, economically protectionist, socially conservative, socially liberal (as in classical liberalism), non-interventionist in foreign policy, interventionist in foreign policy, anti-statist, statist and so forth.

In fact, all of these contradictory views have belonged or continue to belong to various movements categorized as "right-wing".

So I'm asking about what you mean. Or perhaps you don't mean anything and are simply looking for an ax to grind.