Notes General and Particular
Glad you are getting your laughs.
Well, Bowser does make a certain point about supporting Trump:
I've been absorbed by politics today, so forgive me if this seems a little mixed in content. Watching the congressional hearing of AG Barr, I'm getting a feeling that the Democratic Party is getting desperate, especially now that the Mueller report has been released. They appear to be grasping at straws, and possibly they have lost control of their Party.
I've tried to avoid politics these past months, but for some reason I felt a need to tune back in on the topic. Based on your knowledge of current events, what do you believe the future holds for American politics?
Setting aside the point of the post reading like a farm script: After a bizarre first paragraph, Bowser notes his entire post is written in ignorance: "I've tried to avoid politics these past months, but for some reason I felt a need to tune back in on the topic."
Something that stands out to me is that one can pretty much straight-up tell us he is full of shit, and as long as it's something someone wants to hear or argue with for whatever reason, it seems there are plenty who are willing to grant that posture some measure of credibility.
(He's been at this for years; at what point, for instance, does the prospect of searching for information, failing to find a primary source among the myriad available, and only managing to find political discourse given to condemning what one purports to inquire about, start to stand out for its talented ignorance? No, really, he's been at this
for years↗.)
We might wonder, for instance, how the topic post would read if this thread fails to establish its unique purpose and then, per custom, is folded into the large, pre-existing thread on the same subject. But that's the whole point: Clueless, unsupported, generally insupportable bullshit intended to change the subject.
Also, in a broader framework, it is easy enough to notice how this goes; it's a difficult prospect, attempting to winnow the dispute to two narrative sides, but inasmuch as we might, a familiar pattern suggests itself all over again: One side requires as much error and omission as possible while appealing to emotion, and the other seeks some valid semblance of the truth while trying to manage in some orderly manner the implications thereof.
One way to look at it is per the assertion of
ceteris paribus, colloquially recited as
all things being equal. First, there is a question of what it means in any given circumstance; then there is also the question of what that actually does when applied. All things being equal, for instance, the politicking akin to pro wrestling is what it is, and there is an argument to be made for its merit according to market results. However,
ceteris paribus is not necessarily in effect; validating certain arguments requires ignoring history and praxis.
It's like we all watched the Attorney General walk into the office with the open intention of performing a grift, then watched him do it, and are now expected to pretend there is no grift afoot. All things being equal, sure, it is possible to attend only what one side of a dispute says and assert an opinion, but what, really, is that assertion of opinion worth, and, moreover, to what degree should anyone else be obliged to validate it? However, history demonstrates that not all things are equal. Were Barr's conduct not so extraordinary, sure, maybe pretending we don't see a grift falls within the range of everyday American political reality, but an Attorney General has observably jumped protocol in order to undertake certain extraneous actions, encountered protests from the people he misrepresented, and answered this subect inaccurately in an affecting manner while under oath. For all the controversy people complain of Attorneys General, this is extraordinary behavior and controversy controversy.
Naturally, someone who, "tried to avoid politics these past months, but for some reason … felt a need to tune back in", emerges perfectly on beat according to both his partisan message and method. The vapidity of it all, the degree to which he poses as desperately ignorant, like
#3↑ above, "It's my understanding that the full text is available in a secure location, yet only three members of congress have bothered to look at it. Is this incorrect?" He cannot tell us why that is his understanding, but he can certainly put it on other people to prove a negative. Again at
#9↑:
Politics is a dishonest business. That is the light shining down on our political system. What's worse, it has polarized the nation. We can blame Trump, or we can blame the Democrats, or we can blame ourselves. Who's to blame for not finding a compromise?
A truism, an empty sentence, a political assertion of observable reality, a
ceteris paribus equivocation, a vapid question without fundamental definition. Furthermore, as you already noted, at least he's getting some laughs.
It is acceptable, eventually, that people might take consistent behavior at face value: This whole thing is a troll job, part of a perpetual poseur ignorance intended to reiterate fallacy in lieu of informed political discourse. It is acceptable to observe, generally and particularly, who benefits from such obfuscation, distraction, and pretense. Over the long run, normalizing this behavior as many tend to is a problematic prospect. Like Iceaura's assessment in
#19↑—
The real "explanation" - why somebody like you can post as you do here without the shame of their behavior relegating them to a decent silence and efforts of atonement - is already in front of you: the Republican voting base is an organized and manipulated shitpile of bigots, fundies, and imbeciles.
—one can say what they will about his tone, but this has been going on long enough, both particularly and generally, that complaining, "Calling them names for disagreeing with your politics doesn't resolve any issues", as our topic poster did in
#20↑, overlooks the accuracy of the assessment itself. If one is distressed by an accurate assessment of particular behavior, perhaps the behavior is in some way problematic. The question is not whether Bowser, in his complaint, is aware that we are in a period during which a particular range of political argument not so much fails to give a damn if it offends with its sloth and wrongness, instead to be offensive and disruptive as such:
I never had many Trump-supporting friends on Facebook to begin with, but the few I did have spent the last year systemically antagonizing everyone they knew, almost challenging them to sever ties ....
.... How do you engage with someone who doesn't just not care if their aggressive political stances upset you, but wants you to get upset—someone for whom "this makes people upset" is actually the whole reason to have that stance in the first place?
(Nelson↱)
Rather, we can obsserve he is engaging in willfully antisocial behavior, like his post at
#12↑; the idea that Bowser, after all this time, is still so ignorant of how the U.S. Constitution works is absurd. He might have been trying to avoid politics for a time, but he most certainly tuned back in long enough to pick up the latest Republican talking points.
Per your point on getting his laughs, and Iceaura's assessment of particular political discourse, there comes a point at which we can accept our neighbor's posts aren't intended for sincere discourse.
That's been obvious for years.
Which, in turn, brings us 'round.
It does, in fact, say something about supporting Trump.
Look at what it takes.
___________________
Notes:
Nelson, K. T. "Trump Fans Are Owning Libs by Losing All Their Friends". Vice. 21 November 2017. Vice.com. 5 May 2019. http://bit.ly/2oXBZwM
