Tribalism and TypoC

[rav3n]

Hopefully this won't get into politics. My hope was to do an impartial parsing of the politics data to help us suss out some of our issues. And [MENTION=4050]ceecee[/MENTION], I like your point. Any sort of "tribalism" or whatever that presents itself on this forum is likely spillover from the rest of our lives. We all like to think we're kind, rational, reasonable people who come to the defense of those in need, and who fight against bad behavior or "bad people" regardless of identity or whatever. But, sometimes there are implicit biases in our behavior that are only borne out through long-term patterns. Maybe we tend to defend those we agree with more often than those we don't, even when the former might be acting poorly and the latter is justified. And, maybe those people sense those things, and implicit hostilities develop.

People can agree on certain issues but not be part of any tribe. Most of my posts in the poli-forum are articles from acceptable media sources. The intent is for members to come to their own conclusions premised on the evidence at hand. I also rarely debate in the poli subforum since this site is a bit sensitive about my debate style.

 

[Doctor Cringelord]

Jonny, a census taker once tried to test me. I ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice Chianti

 

[Doctor Cringelord]

Thread split off by agreement of the OP.


Also, ChocolateMoose123 used to be MDP2525.

oh that's where she went?


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[MENTION=9251]Jonny[/MENTION] is there any particular reasoning behind the order in which posters and likers were listed?


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Also not to disparage your hard work, but one can get a pretty good sense of the 'factions' here just by spending enough time browsing those threads. Although I'm hesitant to think of the forum members (more specifically those who post or browse regularly in the politics sub) in terms of factions or tribes, it's pretty clear there are certain trends and beliefs in common among various groups of members, although there is a lot of overlap. I would say there's roughly 3 or 4 camps/factions. Obviously there is not much hard allegiance and some people occasionally break ranks to agree with members of other factions, as the data collected would suggest. I am curious if you came to any conclusions on which 'factions' exist here, how you would label/identify each faction, and which members you think belong to which factions. Do you plan to share any insights?


Here is my tentative list of typoC political 'factions':

1. hard right
2. hard left
these two are both fairly small groups but tend to be more vocal.

3. centrists

this one probably consists of a majority or at least large plurality of members who regularly post in politics sub and can be divided into
3a. soft left and
3b. soft right,
but the members in either sub-group tend to spread their likes more evenly across the spectrum of ideas/members, and tend to agree with both hard lefters and hard righters, depending on the given issue (I consider myself part of this group [very soft left]). Also something to consider which the data may not do a good job of conveying is that some people simply change their minds over time on various issues. So I would be cautious about who I would assign to any of the groups/factions, particularly if you're looking at threads and posts that are spaced out over a long time (more than a year)

I wouldn't assign anyone to any of the aforementioned groups without first setting up some basic criteria. Perhaps if members are interested in how they stack up against or align with other members, they'd be interested in doing some political spectrum tests and sharing their results (ISideWith is decent, although it emphasizes US issues and policies and might not be as useful for non-American members) in a new thread. Then someone could analyze all of the results, plus the data you presented, to come up with some broad, generalized groupings of members.

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as you get to the bottom half or so of the table, the likes start to be spread out a bit more, although at the very bottom, not so much. Are the circled likers the moderates of the forum (as they seem to have liked a broader range of ideas and posts)?

 

[Magic Poriferan]

Wait a minute, who the hell is S16M4? Whoever it was they're permabanned.

He was a toxic white supremacist and misogynist. Not that those qualities get you banned around here. Luckily for us, he just happened to be bad at keeping himself from being rude, too, so he got the axe.

I tend to think of him as the other Kullervo.

 

[Doctor Cringelord]

He was a toxic white supremacist and misogynist. Not that those qualities get you banned around here. Luckily for us, he just happened to be bad at keeping himself from being rude, too, so he got the axe.

yeah, only he wasn't white.

 

[Magic Poriferan]

yeah, only he wasn't white.

Doesn't change the content of what he said. He was a racist, no matter how confused he was.

Also, apparently you're just letting misogyny slide then.

 

[Doctor Cringelord]

Doesn't change the content of what he said. He was a racist, no matter how confused he was.

Also, apparently you're just letting misogyny slide then.

I didn't dispute that.

 

[ceecee]

He was a toxic white supremacist and misogynist. Not that those qualities get you banned around here. Luckily for us, he just happened to be bad at keeping himself from being rude, too, so he got the axe.

I tend to think of him as the other Kullervo.

Yeah he was Asian but he certainly held much of the same beliefs as white supremacists.

Oh and he was one of a couple that really embraced the r/K selection theory - he sent me this link and told me to read and get my head right lol.

r/K Selection Theory |

The other was serenesam.

 

[Doctor Cringelord]

Well, I don't think any race is specifically more r or K in their general reproduction strategies. It would vary from family to family, and also a lot of other factors (scarcity, cultural attitudes toward sex, economic stagnation, et al) might determine which strategy would be more favored at any given time or place. I do think it's a theory some of the racial realists misunderstand and misuse, but I'm not sure it's a completely useless theory either. Looks like it's on the out with biologists and sociologists anyway, so I suppose it's irrelevant. On the issue of whether liberals and conservatives are one or the other, I think that's rubbish, at least I'd want to see plenty of studies with large sample sizes before jumping to any conclusions such as liberals=r and conservatives=K. So what, when a conservative becomes more liberal, they become more r, or vice versa? I don't know that would be the case. People are too fluid, enough at least that I don't think supposed r/K traits would be wired into us at the biological level. I think it's our adaptivity to varying situations and strategies that makes us remarkable.


Sorry to go off topic.

 

[ceecee]

Well, I don't think any race is specifically more r or K in their general reproduction strategies. It would vary from family to family, and also a lot of other factors (scarcity, cultural attitudes toward sex, economic stagnation, et al) might determine which strategy would be more favored at any given time or place. I do think it's a theory some of the racial realists misunderstand and misuse, but I'm not sure it's a completely useless theory either. Looks like it's on the out with biologists and sociologists anyway, so I suppose it's irrelevant. On the issue of whether liberals and conservatives are one or the other, I think that's rubbish, at least I'd want to see plenty of studies with large sample sizes before jumping to any conclusions such as liberals=r and conservatives=K. So what, when a conservative becomes more liberal, they become more r, or vice versa? I don't know that would be the case.


Sorry to go off topic.

I don't know, man. Until I encountered conservatives talking about it, I only knew the r/K selection theory to be a debunked theory about cuttlefish and sea turtles and such.

 

[Magic Poriferan]

I didn't dispute that.

What exactly were you disputing and what was the point?

Well, I don't think any race is specifically more r or K in their general reproduction strategies. It would vary from family to family, and also a lot of other factors (scarcity, cultural attitudes toward sex, economic stagnation, et al) might determine which strategy would be more favored at any given time or place. I do think it's a theory some of the racial realists misunderstand and misuse, but I'm not sure it's a completely useless theory either. Looks like it's on the out with biologists and sociologists anyway, so I suppose it's irrelevant.

It started going out in biology decades ago, and it was never suited to describe behavior among different human beings in the first place. That wasn't really the point.

As a result, when anyone these days brings up r/K selection theory to talk about people, you can nearly guarantee they are a racist. It's just a smart bet. However, it's not like we'd have to depend on that heuristic to draw such a conclusion about S16M4.

On the issue of whether liberals and conservatives are one or the other, I think that's rubbish, at least I'd want to see plenty of studies with large sample sizes before jumping to any conclusions such as liberals=r and conservatives=K. So what, when a conservative becomes more liberal, they become more r, or vice versa? I don't know that would be the case. People are too fluid, enough at least that I don't think supposed r/K traits would be wired into us at the biological level. I think it's our adaptivity to varying situations and strategies that makes us remarkable.

Where did that idea come from?

This is the kind of thing that makes me wonder where do you go to read in your free time.

 

[Doctor Cringelord]

What exactly were you disputing and what was the point?

the claim that he was a white supremacist.

It started going out in biology decades ago, and it was never suited to describe behavior among different human beings in the first place. That wasn't really the point.

As a result, when anyone these days brings up r/K selection theory to talk about people, you can nearly guarantee they are a racist. It's just a smart bet. However, it's not like we'd have to depend on that heuristic to draw such a conclusion about S16M4.



Where did that idea come from?

This is the kind of thing that makes me wonder where do you go to read in your free time.

I was addressing the link ceecee shared, as it went to an article alleging r is liberal and K is conservative.

you realize I wasn't agreeing with or accepting the theory as an explanation of human reproductive behavior, right? Also, I've read up on the history of the theory and the debunking, no need for a magic history lesson.

 

[Magic Poriferan]

the claim that he was a white supremacist.

So he was someone who said all that would be said by a white supremacist and a misogynist, but you wanted to clarify that he was not himself white, therefore presumably he could not be a white supremacist (though I'm not actually sure that presumption follows), just everything else a white supremacist is minus that technical detail.

Thanks for clearing that up.

I was addressing the link ceecee shared, as it went to an article alleging r is liberal and K is conservative.

Ah, that actually makes sense. And of course I would expect him to be a source of something like that. I left myself out of the loop there because I felt no compulsion to see whatever predictable garbage he would have linked, but that meant I didn't know you were referring to it.

you realize I wasn't agreeing with or accepting the theory as an explanation of human reproductive behavior, right? Also, I've read up on the history of the theory and the debunking, no need for a magic history lesson.

But you seemed to be giving a partial defense of its credibility or asking for some kind of openness toward it. Or what?

This happens a lot with you. I perceive you to write a a lot "I'm just sayin'" posts, and I often don't see the point, but I do know that no one is ever really just saying.

 

[Doctor Cringelord]

But you seemed to be giving a partial defense of its credibility or asking for some kind of openness toward it. Or what?

This happens a lot with you. I perceive you to write a a lot "I'm just sayin'" posts, and I often don't see the point, but I do know that no one is ever really just saying.

It wasn't a "just sayin" post, I mean I basically said I didn't agree with the theory as a good model for explaining human reproduction or political ideology. I said "I'm not sure it's a completely useless theory" which is far from a statement of strong support for the theory. I then said "People are too fluid, enough at least that I don't think supposed r/K traits would be wired into us at the biological level." Again, hardly a strong affirmation of support for that theory. I find it interesting, that doesn't mean I accept it. Similarly, I find certain religious allegories and ideas interesting but that doesn't necessarily mean I believe them.

and in regards to whatshisface, I dunno, I suppose we could call him an Asian Supremacist?

 

[ceecee]

So he was someone who said all that would be said by a white supremacist and a misogynist, but you wanted to clarify that he was not himself white, therefore presumably he could not be a white supremacist (though I'm not actually sure that presumption follows), just everything else a white supremacist is minus that technical detail.

Thanks for clearing that up.





Ah, that actually makes sense. And of course I would expect him to be a source of something like that. I left myself out of the loop there because I felt no compulsion to see whatever predictable garbage he would have linked, but that meant I didn't know you were referring to it.



But you seemed to be giving a partial defense of its credibility or asking for some kind of openness toward it. Or what?

This happens a lot with you. I perceive you to write a a lot "I'm just sayin'" posts, and I often don't see the point, but I do know that no one is ever really just saying.

I'm not really sure why I'm getting questioned either. I was only posting about a short incident regarding a banned member that I didn't bring up to begin with and the site that he PM'ed me, unsolicited and told me to read to get my head right called the Anonymous Conservative. But anytime anything unsavory/untrue is attached to "conservative " there seems to be a problem for some people no matter what it's actually about.

 

[Doctor Cringelord]

I'm not really sure why I'm getting questioned either. I was only posting about a short incident regarding a banned member that I didn't bring up to begin with and the site that he PM'ed me, unsolicited and told me to read to get my head right called the Anonymous Conservative. But anytime anything unsavory/untrue is attached to "conservative " there seems to be a problem for some people no matter what it's actually about.

Questioned by who?

All I did was share thoughts on a theory I've already stated I don't subscribe to. I actually give very few fucks about some fringy right wing website (I hadn't heard about until someone linked it in this thread) and their naive interpretations of evolutionary biology. I skimmed that page you linked and was not impressed. It read like a junior high student who just stumbled upon the theory and derived a lot of crazy conclusions. I was familiar with the theory, but not with its interpretation by conservatives and racial realists. My thoughts I shared were on their interpretation, but they were not a defense of that interpretation.

 

[Peter Deadpan]

I hate this place.

 

[ducks]

I have a personal dislike for these "like" systems because people like posts for many reasons that they never say (and I have intentionally not liked posts that I did like for certain reasons as well); so I'd much rather people just explicitly said what it was that they did or did not like, rather than concealing everything behind a social abstraction that further obfuscates and complicates communication. Not to mention that there is no "dislike" button either to compare the likes to, so what does it really mean anyway?

I mean from what I understand, its original purpose was to encourage more participation in social medias, such as Reddit or Facebook, which is fine, but then people tend to take sides and encourage polarized thinking, rather than alleviate it. And don't we have a bit of a problem with polarized politics nowadays? Despite all the numerous problems with Congress and US politics and the Corporate involvement in our News Media, I'd be very content if we ever get to a point where people could disagree with equanimity and respect. I really think it would help if we could get a third party as a legitimate alternative. Then even if the third party doesn't win, the Republicans and Democrats would have to consider making decisions that appeal to more than just their party or they could lose an election via a third party. I think this would help water down polarized politics.

 

[anticlimatic]

I love this thread so much. Bravo OP. The time you spent on this is appreciated.

Also, I don't know how other people use likes, but I just assumed it was a way to communicate that you read something without having to directly respond to it.

 

[highlander]

It was good when it started out anyway