The USA is a democracy, which means that the desires of voters are relevant to the behavior of the government. When people give up their vote, I believe that they also give up a rhetorical position which allows them to make cogent critiques of the government, because I see it as hypocritical. That’s all.
For example, I think that folks in Oregon should be allowed to marry regardless of gender or sex, and Cheong doesn’t. However, I’m an Oregon voter, so I actually hold a (tiny) modicum of power over the question, and Cheong’s opinion should be disregarded because he doesn’t live here and won’t be subject to our policies. He doesn’t get a heckler’s veto against the actual voting rights of citizens.
@corbin I can’t believe I’m defending this odious guy, but this kind of “don’t interfere in our internal affairs, foreigners” stuff is exactly the same playbook that countries like Russia and China and Iran roll out when they get criticised for, you know, declaring LGBTQA+ folk to be terrorists or sending people to labour camps because they’re inconvenient. The guy has the right to express whatever shitty opinions he wants about the US, but that doesn’t mean anyone has to listen, and the real problem here is that people in the US right are so willing to use this guy as a useful idiot in exchange for a bit of attention and the occasional wad of cash. This is exactly what you see from the above mentioned countries - “look, these foreigners agree with us, stop being mean about us!”.
Hell, Russia and Iran both have entire TV networks (RT and Press TV) dedicated to this kind of useful idiocy but in their cases they’re intended for foreign consumption. The US equivalent is Fox News - but that’s aimed at the US market, which is kind of an interesting difference.
Sure, I see your point. I think that we can be more precise. Let me prepare three utterances on, say, the topic of Pastafarianism in Russia. First:
“The Russian government oppresses Pastafarians.”
This one’s factual. No arguments here. Second:
“The Russian government should be sanctioned and shamed internationally for oppressing Pastafarians.”
This one is about how we should treat the Russian government diplomatically. Third:
“The Russian government ought to reform its policies to not privilege Christians over Pastafarians.”
This last statement is what I am objecting to saying. In addition to violating a Rather, it is a sort of interference in foreign affairs, and it helps Russia’s government justify its interference in return.
I think that your point is good. For example, in this article on the topic, note that all three sorts of statements are being made simultaneously: Russia did this, Russia should be shamed for doing this, and Russia ought to not do it. I’m advocating for dropping the final bit while still pointing out the underlying moral failure.
There’s nothing ipso facto wrong with thinking that a country to which you don’t belong should adopt a particular policy, whether it regards rights for pastafarians, the promotion of secular society, or more aptly rights for gay people. Gay people are the obvious point: I would hope that you think on some important level that Russian law should not discriminate against gay people. To be authentically in favour of democracy is to be in favour of democracy’s good, not to reify democratic process as an end in itself - and indeed one should want Russia to be democratic, which is not the case as things currently stand, but only on grounds of democratic good, not of process as an end in itself.
One reason to limit one’s criticisms of a country’s internal democratic politics is lack of understanding, and that seems to be the closest thing to what you’re shooting for here that isn’t what I would bluntly call an inauthentic pro-democracy stance. That’s a reason for being cautious, and it’s closely related to good arguments against particular interventions by outsiders in the internal affairs of a polity: a bunch of Westerners get up in arms that Indonesia, for example, introduces a law which negatively affects or appears to negatively affect gay people, but their failure to understand Indonesia’s highly complex politics means that their outraged arguments don’t even touch on what the effects of the new law actually are. Their hearts were, so to speak, “in the right place”, but in the worst way, and they only ended up making things worse.
In a sense these situations do touch on a right that members of a polity have which outsiders don’t, which is the right to “have a say” in the management of their affairs. If outsiders begin to “have a say” and the polity begins to lose some of its democratic character as a consequence, then there is a genuine concern that self-determination is at risk, not to mention the intelligent management of things by people who actually understand how things work locally. But this is not absolute, and indeed cannot be absolute, otherwise we would be left with a political world in which the only rights we gave people were those they got from the polity of which they happen to be a member, and Russia would be off the hook - there is clearly another order beyond the locally political by which people deserve morally good treatment, and outsiders to a polity cannot be denied a say in the nature of that order.
Exactly, you should always be cautious of imperialism hiding behind a humanistic veneer, but that doesn’t mean you should oppose any kind of international pressure. For instance I don’t believe anyone here feels it was wrong to pressure South Africa into dropping apartheid (even though presumably there must have been some capitalist self-interest involved somewhere?).
Well you make zero distinction between any of those things, most of which (BDS?!) aren’t even under discussion here, and your target is Ian Miles Cheong’s opinion-having about the US, particularly with respect to Oregon
What do you want me to do here?
Edit: let me rephrase that, what the hell do you want me to do here? Are you serious?
Dude, chill. This is a NSFW thread. It’s not for dunking on others, but for reflecting on our positions and argumentation. I’m not trying to win, just to explain my reasoning. I’d like it if y’all experienced what I experienced from this thread: interesting food for thought and a reminder that we don’t have to be 100% unified in our opinions.
The USA is a democracy, which means that the desires of voters are relevant to the behavior of the government. When people give up their vote, I believe that they also give up a rhetorical position which allows them to make cogent critiques of the government, because I see it as hypocritical. That’s all.
For example, I think that folks in Oregon should be allowed to marry regardless of gender or sex, and Cheong doesn’t. However, I’m an Oregon voter, so I actually hold a (tiny) modicum of power over the question, and Cheong’s opinion should be disregarded because he doesn’t live here and won’t be subject to our policies. He doesn’t get a heckler’s veto against the actual voting rights of citizens.
@corbin I can’t believe I’m defending this odious guy, but this kind of “don’t interfere in our internal affairs, foreigners” stuff is exactly the same playbook that countries like Russia and China and Iran roll out when they get criticised for, you know, declaring LGBTQA+ folk to be terrorists or sending people to labour camps because they’re inconvenient. The guy has the right to express whatever shitty opinions he wants about the US, but that doesn’t mean anyone has to listen, and the real problem here is that people in the US right are so willing to use this guy as a useful idiot in exchange for a bit of attention and the occasional wad of cash. This is exactly what you see from the above mentioned countries - “look, these foreigners agree with us, stop being mean about us!”.
Hell, Russia and Iran both have entire TV networks (RT and Press TV) dedicated to this kind of useful idiocy but in their cases they’re intended for foreign consumption. The US equivalent is Fox News - but that’s aimed at the US market, which is kind of an interesting difference.
Sure, I see your point. I think that we can be more precise. Let me prepare three utterances on, say, the topic of Pastafarianism in Russia. First:
This one’s factual. No arguments here. Second:
This one is about how we should treat the Russian government diplomatically. Third:
This last statement is what I am objecting to saying. In addition to violating a Rather, it is a sort of interference in foreign affairs, and it helps Russia’s government justify its interference in return.
I think that your point is good. For example, in this article on the topic, note that all three sorts of statements are being made simultaneously: Russia did this, Russia should be shamed for doing this, and Russia ought to not do it. I’m advocating for dropping the final bit while still pointing out the underlying moral failure.
There’s nothing ipso facto wrong with thinking that a country to which you don’t belong should adopt a particular policy, whether it regards rights for pastafarians, the promotion of secular society, or more aptly rights for gay people. Gay people are the obvious point: I would hope that you think on some important level that Russian law should not discriminate against gay people. To be authentically in favour of democracy is to be in favour of democracy’s good, not to reify democratic process as an end in itself - and indeed one should want Russia to be democratic, which is not the case as things currently stand, but only on grounds of democratic good, not of process as an end in itself.
One reason to limit one’s criticisms of a country’s internal democratic politics is lack of understanding, and that seems to be the closest thing to what you’re shooting for here that isn’t what I would bluntly call an inauthentic pro-democracy stance. That’s a reason for being cautious, and it’s closely related to good arguments against particular interventions by outsiders in the internal affairs of a polity: a bunch of Westerners get up in arms that Indonesia, for example, introduces a law which negatively affects or appears to negatively affect gay people, but their failure to understand Indonesia’s highly complex politics means that their outraged arguments don’t even touch on what the effects of the new law actually are. Their hearts were, so to speak, “in the right place”, but in the worst way, and they only ended up making things worse.
In a sense these situations do touch on a right that members of a polity have which outsiders don’t, which is the right to “have a say” in the management of their affairs. If outsiders begin to “have a say” and the polity begins to lose some of its democratic character as a consequence, then there is a genuine concern that self-determination is at risk, not to mention the intelligent management of things by people who actually understand how things work locally. But this is not absolute, and indeed cannot be absolute, otherwise we would be left with a political world in which the only rights we gave people were those they got from the polity of which they happen to be a member, and Russia would be off the hook - there is clearly another order beyond the locally political by which people deserve morally good treatment, and outsiders to a polity cannot be denied a say in the nature of that order.
Exactly, you should always be cautious of imperialism hiding behind a humanistic veneer, but that doesn’t mean you should oppose any kind of international pressure. For instance I don’t believe anyone here feels it was wrong to pressure South Africa into dropping apartheid (even though presumably there must have been some capitalist self-interest involved somewhere?).
Be careful not to equivocate opinions, normative claims, BDS, electoral interference, and belligerence.
Well you make zero distinction between any of those things, most of which (BDS?!) aren’t even under discussion here, and your target is Ian Miles Cheong’s opinion-having about the US, particularly with respect to Oregon
What do you want me to do here?
Edit: let me rephrase that, what the hell do you want me to do here? Are you serious?
Dude, chill. This is a NSFW thread. It’s not for dunking on others, but for reflecting on our positions and argumentation. I’m not trying to win, just to explain my reasoning. I’d like it if y’all experienced what I experienced from this thread: interesting food for thought and a reminder that we don’t have to be 100% unified in our opinions.
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