I posted [link]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AYP8-oxq8ig&t=1s) to 1960 presidential debate on Digg with the title: “1960 presidential debate. No interruptions, no insulting, no screaming, just two gentelmen having civilized discussion.”. It got some likes but some comments are wild.
It almost looks like there are certain keywords that when their ears and brains detect, there is some trigger which causes brain areas responsible for logic and rationality to shut down.
And another thought I just had that i find interesting , is that it looks like there is plenty of white Americans, that shit on their own country because of slavery, but there is very small number of Germans that do the same because of WW2. Leftist Germans don’t hate their own country because of war attrocities, they focus their energy on stuff like LGBT, immigrant rights etc. I’m guessing it has to do with the fact that in war mainly white people were killed. Concetnration camps killed 3 million Jews and 3 million Poles. As bad as it sounds that leads to conclusion that nowadays white person has less “value” for these people, and what’s craziest it looks like that agenda is pushed by whites themselves as well.
In such moments I’m glad I was born in Poland and that Poland had nothing to do with slavery and was on the good side in world wars. We don’t have any internal guilt feelings sitting on shoulders that I’m sure is the case for some Americans or western Europeans.
You must log in or register to comment.
You’re missing the point. In the 1800s, political discourse was massively shaped by the people who were allowed to participate. You didn’t have people using racial slurs or misogynistic language against each other because everyone was white and male.
Don’t look to the past for how things could be better. We can’t go back there, and we shouldn’t anyway because it was filled with injustice. The future is where we’ll find our greatness, we should work on that.
In the 1800s people were having 10 kids because half of them wouldn’t live past puberty. Then if you did, you’d probably get drafted and die in the civil war, or die from an easily treatable disease, or die during child birth.
I wish we could send conservatives back to the 1800’s, it’s what they deserve
The thing is 1800 is not just slavery and America was not the only place in the world that existed in that time. Believe it or not US is just about 6% of total land mass and 5% of global population. There were no black slaves in Poland, does that mean I can’t talk about how political discourse was conducted here? Similarly in other countries. You want to make conducting a political discourse a taboo because of slavery in America?
You called out white Americans specifically and now you want to make it about everywhere else? Okay then, smartarse, find me a place in the world in the 1800s that was a bastion of equal representation. I contend any “civility” in politics anywhere in the world at that time was highly partisan and relied entirely on the brutal suppression of dissenting voices. Good luck arguing against that.
I called out white Americans in a different context if you read the post again. This was second part of post when I talk about something else that I thought about, comparing white Americans and Germans shitting on their own caountry. It wasn’t the context of conducting the political debate. In this context in my original post there are only Nixon, Kennedy and word “gentlemen” in general brought up. It’s you who expanded context by not specifying society or country when you mentioned 1800s in later comment, I responded adequately.
It’s worth mentioning that there is no such thing as bastion of equal representation. Inequalities are everywhere, it’s just a matter of size.
I agree that 1800s bad for many people, but 200s were bad in a different way for other people in a different place, although maybe the scale was smaller. Should we make make philosphers like Socrates or Aristiotle a taboo topic because rich Greeks had African slaves? Same thing with Ancient Rome. You can taboo everything by having that way of thinking. 1800s are not special in this regard.
Also, from the beginning I only wanted to discuss the WAY those two people speak with each other, the WAY the debate, despite thir skin color or nationality. I wouldn’t care if they were black, yellow or whatever. It’s just a good example of the WAY they speak and I specifically mentioned that in the title. But for some reason you and users from the photo that were commenting keep drifting to other things and opening up completely new topics.
but there is very small number of Germans that do the same because of WW2
This is not true from the (admittedly) two IRL Germans I’ve spoken too. Nazi anxiety is part of their culture.
I’m sure they look at Nazi Germany that way, but the thing is do they look at their country today like that as well? Not historically. Cause I get a feeling that a lot of white leftist Americans actually hate their country today because of the past. Do Germans hate their country in it’s current shape and form beacuse of the past or just it’s historical version?
Cause I get a feeling that a lot of white leftist Americans actually hate their country today because of the past.
I think most hate it because of the present. The past is just that: history that lead us to where we are right now. What folks see is kind of a caricature thanks to social media, but there’s some bad shit in the present too, including threads of slavery still running today.
I mean, if you want a personal anecdote from the deep US South, one of my parents overheard their relative threaten to shoot my parent’s black friend for stepping foot on their property. With a shotgun. Not to their face of course; my (white) parent was young back then, so was their (black) friend, and a hallmark of the culture is public politeness. These folks were perfectly civil at face; doesn’t mean the raging racism isn’t there, and I knows its still there with some today.
There are worse examples I’d rather not type out for other’s privacy/fear of doxxing, but let’s say that’s kind of a theme.
Do Germans hate their country in it’s current shape and form beacuse of the past or just it’s historical version?
I dunno. But my impression is there’s paranoia over Germany falling back to what it was. It’s fear more than ‘hate’ I’d say.
PS: The random deletions are because Lemmy won’t let me edit posts now for some reason.
deleted by creator
deleted by creator
deleted by creator
In such moments I’m glad I was born in Poland and that Poland had nothing to do with slavery and was on the good side in world wars.
Also the only country in europe that didn’t use forced labour by prisoners of war for rebuilding after world war 2.
“Slavs not slaves” should be the Polish motto :p
if I’m being honest if I had prisoners of war of a country that attacked my country killing many people and destroying many things, I think it would be kind of fair to have them to rebuild my country.
I guess one could argue “it depends” though.
I’m not sure but USSR probably took many German prisoners of war and had them work in gulags? Wouldn’t be surprised. To be fair Germany attacked USSR, and killed many people there. I guess we could look at the numbers and take many factors into consideration if we wanted to estimate “fairness” of that.
I would imagine it feels good, a kind of revenge.
But history has shown that the revenge just perpetuates the violence.
Hence why examples such as the Polish reconstruction, or the marshal plan benefiting italy and germany as well, are so impressive to me.
Ok it feels like revenge were real people are actually suffering. Folks in gulags are probably suffering indeed, but there there are other ways of making up for doing wrong.
I agree, sending real human labor may sound not ok, even if it’s not in gulag. But what about reparations? Could be in different form, but something that has real value in dollars.
I believe that things should be fair. That’s why we have justice system and courts with judges. Fairness and justice should be and is at the core of every society. Vast majority of societies have written laws, there are consitutions etc which help to achieve that. Obviously not always these laws are respected, but in general they help to keep society organized, developing and healthy.
And something similar should be for the international cases, but that is much harder to achieve in practice because of differences in culture, history etc.
I believe that things should be fair
I get what you mean. It’s the feeling that after all is said and done, you’ve won, justice is restored. For day-to-day grievances the courts, especially one that also does rehabilitation, work fine.
Then there’s pain which no reparations will ever heal. Where both you and your “opponent” have lost.
To me it’s impressive when people in that situation realise that the best you can do is try your best to prevent that same pain from re-occuring in the future and to others.
And empirically, dialogue and cooperation, not (solely) punishment, has shown to be good at that.
