Politics... World events

[BruceVC]

8 minutes ago, Zoraptor said:

Companies can censor whatever they like. What they can't then turn around and do- without looking like massive hypocrites at very least- is claim that other entities censoring them is an awful crime against freeze peach and liberty. What's good for the goose is good for the gander. That's why Twitter got laughed at when complaining about getting banned in Uganda a few days ago as a crime against 'basic human rights'; (1) if you want to apply Jack Dorsey's standards don't be surprised if Twitter applies Museveni's standard's right back and (2) bans become matters of basic human rights, when you're the one getting the ban.

It's ultimately completely self defeating to selectively apply free speech criteria based on an approved political slant as a social media outlet; if you have free speech applied impartially you can rightly complain about others censoring you, if on the other hand you're partial and selective in applying those measures you can hardly complain when someone does the same back- and be absolutely sure that it will be thrown back in your face by those you disagree with politically and who have the power to retaliate.

Yes but we should be more than capable of understanding the different political realties in different countries and how autocratic governments decide to ban or shutdown SM and how we respond 

Uganda is an example of an appallingly  run African country which has demonstrated in numerous examples how the president, now in power for over 30 years, doesnt believe or support very basic human rights or freedom of speech. For example criminalizing the rights of LGBT community

This is not the same as Trump and right wing groups being banned from SM. There is a distinction and the  statement " What's good for the goose is good for the gander " clearly doesnt apply here

Its about separating these decisions and what country they applied in. That does matter 

Edited January 20, 2021 by BruceVC

[Darkpriest]

@BruceVC Now, this will be very controversial what I will say and is in no way something mandatory to answer or have a stance on as it touches a very sensitive topic.

If freedom of religious beliefs, collides with opinion and beliefs of secular position of LGBT+ movement, where would you draw a line and put who is right in their demands and rights of expression? 

Also, if most people would vote for criminalizing some of these beliefs, would you agree with such a democratic voice? 

Where is the line what should be done and decided by vote of the masses in the democracy? 

 

 

Edited January 20, 2021 by Darkpriest

[BruceVC]

2 minutes ago, Darkpriest said:

@BruceVC Now, this will be very controversial what I will say and is in no way something mandatory to answer or have a stance on as it touches a very sensitive topic.

If freedom of religious beliefs, collides with opinion and beliefs of secular position of LGBT+ movement, where would you draw a line and put who is right in their demands and rights of expression? 

 

 

Its a valid debate if we want to understand the difference. You are perfectly entitled to not support the rights of LBGT on a  personal level

But most of us live in countries where these rights are enshrined in our Constitutions and you dont have any right to discriminate against LGBT to the point where countries like Uganda made it illegal to be LGBT and members of these communities were murdered and arrested on the streets in Uganda because of their sexual orientation 

Thats wrong and should never be acceptable but I am not going to try to force you to accept the rights of LGBT because I cannot force you. But the laws of most of our countries prevent you from being killed  or legally discriminated against if you LGBT 

I hope this makes sense ?

[Pidesco]

10 minutes ago, Darkpriest said:

@BruceVC Now, this will be very controversial what I will say and is in no way something mandatory to answer or have a stance on as it touches a very sensitive topic.

If freedom of religious beliefs, collides with opinion and beliefs of secular position of LGBT+ movement, where would you draw a line and put who is right in their demands and rights of expression? 

Also, if most people would vote for criminalizing some of these beliefs, would you agree with such a democratic voice? 

Where is the line what should be done and decided by vote of the masses in the democracy? 

 

 

Care to specify which specific beliefs and opinions you might be referring to, religious or secular?

[Zoraptor]

Does he really need to? If you apply Leviticus or some of Saul's reactionary rubbish then homosexuality is an abomination and gays are going to hell. You could certainly label that as hate speech and ban the Bible, but then you're suppressing people's Religious beliefs instead and a large number of Christians effectively think Saul was a reactionary homophobic knobhead so you'd be lumping them all in together.

And talking of what's good for the goose is good for the gander: "You dont have any right to discriminate against LGBT to the point where countries like Saudi Arabia made it illegal to be LGBT and members of these communities were murdered and arrested on the streets in Riyadh because of their sexual orientation", eh Bruce.

[could also consider that if applied evenly and consistently if you banned the Bible for being anti LGBT you'd also be banning the Torah and Koran too, and thus be both an islamophobe and anti semite, so you'd have to then ban yourself for hate speech]

 

Edited January 20, 2021 by Zoraptor

[Elerond]

24 minutes ago, Darkpriest said:

@BruceVC Now, this will be very controversial what I will say and is in no way something mandatory to answer or have a stance on as it touches a very sensitive topic.

If freedom of religious beliefs, collides with opinion and beliefs of secular position of LGBT+ movement, where would you draw a line and put who is right in their demands and rights of expression? 

Also, if most people would vote for criminalizing some of these beliefs, would you agree with such a democratic voice? 

Where is the line what should be done and decided by vote of the masses in the democracy? 

 

 

Article 30 of Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
 "Nothing in this Declaration may be interpreted as implying for any State, group or person any right to engage in any activity or to perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of the rights and freedoms set forth herein."

If country claims to follow human rights, they should make sure that democratic process can't take any of the human rights from any group for any reason. In case of conflicting rights neither party should be oppressed by other's rights.

Human rights are specifically designed to reign in tyranny of majority in democracies

 

[Darkpriest]

14 minutes ago, BruceVC said:

Its a valid debate if we want to understand the difference. You are perfectly entitled to not support the rights of LBGT on a  personal level

But most of us live in countries where these rights are enshrined in our Constitutions and you dont have any right to discriminate against LGBT to the point where countries like Uganda made it illegal to be LGBT and members of these communities were murdered and arrested on the streets in Uganda because of their sexual orientation 

Thats wrong and should never be acceptable but I am not going to try to force you to accept the rights of LGBT because I cannot force you. But the laws of most of our countries prevent you from being killed  or legally discriminated against if you LGBT 

I hope this makes sense ?

Yes it does, and my question is more aimed to show that things related to rights and beliefs are matter of perception. 

Laws can change, even what is deemed as human rights can change with time (and it did change) , so it seems there is nothing set in stone, aside of what 'opinion' is leading in a given timeframe. 

[BruceVC]

3 minutes ago, Zoraptor said:

 

And talking of what's good for the goose is good for the gander: "You dont have any right to discriminate against LGBT to the point where countries like Saudi Arabia made it illegal to be LGBT and members of these communities were murdered and arrested on the streets in Riyadh because of their sexual orientation", eh Bruce.

 

Yes you are correct and as I have mentioned before I have worked and travelled numerous times to the ME and as you may recall I support the new alliances and way forward with the Gulf States, Israel and USA on one side and Iran on the other 

And its also true most ME countries have laws where its the death penalty for LGBT but I have had to learn to separate different  countries laws but more importantly what is the countries overall role in the region and is the government  delivering services and economic prosperity to its citizens? But I have never supported the discrimination  you see in the ME against LGBT

But sometimes in life their is a big picture and you have to chose your battles because the reality of world  is  sometimes their is a  much more urgent precedent than just human rights and that precedent can have global or at least real regional ramifications. But later on you should address the human rights failures...just not now 

So going to back to the Uganda and ME comparison, Uganda's president hasn't delivered prosperity or quality of life for his citizens and the country is reliant on foreign aid. All of the Gulf states have working economies and the average citizen is happy  with their leadership because these countries face greater external threats to their way of life

So even through I dont support the Saudi's human rights record at all it is not the same as the  failed political reality of Uganda. 

I dont want to create the impression I am a hypocrite on this type of matter as these countries have different political realties and how we judge and interact with all countries does matter as they not the same

[Darkpriest]

5 minutes ago, Elerond said:

Article 30 of Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
 "Nothing in this Declaration may be interpreted as implying for any State, group or person any right to engage in any activity or to perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of the rights and freedoms set forth herein."

If country claims to follow human rights, they should make sure that democratic process can't take any of the human rights from any group for any reason. In case of conflicting rights neither party should be oppressed by other's rights.

Human rights are specifically designed to reign in tyranny of majority in democracies

 

What is deemed human rights can change and it did change in the past. 

Would you be in favor of some group defining them or majority of human population deciding what they are? 

[Gorth]

50 minutes ago, Darkpriest said:

@BruceVC Now, this will be very controversial what I will say and is in no way something mandatory to answer or have a stance on as it touches a very sensitive topic.

If freedom of religious beliefs, collides with opinion and beliefs of secular position of LGBT+ movement, where would you draw a line and put who is right in their demands and rights of expression? 

Also, if most people would vote for criminalizing some of these beliefs, would you agree with such a democratic voice? 

Where is the line what should be done and decided by vote of the masses in the democracy? 

 

 

You rights and your freedom *usually* ends where it impinges on somebody else's rights and freedoms. Lets say Bob is a religious nutcase (insert your most disliked religion here). Bob doesn't like gingers. Nobody should prevent Bob from disliking gingers and he can rage and rant privately all he wants against the blasphemous hair dye gingers are wearing openly, without covering with a hat. Bobs private rants are nobody else's business really. When Bob wants to force all gingers to cover their hair with a hat so *he* doesn't feel his vision is polluted by watching ginger haired people, then Bob is a problem. Not the gingers.

Yes, a grossly simplified example and I'm sure someone out there on the internet will go to great length to come up with 17 exceptions why it's perfectly reasonable to force gingers to wear hats.

 

[BruceVC]

8 minutes ago, Elerond said:

 

If country claims to follow human rights, they should make sure that democratic process can't take any of the human rights from any group for any reason. In case of conflicting rights neither party should be oppressed by other's rights.

Human rights are specifically designed to reign in tyranny of majority in democracies

 

 

3 minutes ago, Darkpriest said:

Yes it does, and my question is more aimed to show that things related to rights and beliefs are matter of perception. 

Laws can change, even what is deemed as human rights can change with time (and it did change) , so it seems there is nothing set in stone, aside of what 'opinion' is leading in a given timeframe. 

Dark, Eleronds post I quoted is probably the best way to make the point around why human rights, like LGBT rights, matter in a Democracy 

[BruceVC]

27 minutes ago, Zoraptor said:

 

And talking of what's good for the goose is good for the gander: "You dont have any right to discriminate against LGBT to the point where countries like Saudi Arabia made it illegal to be LGBT and members of these communities were murdered and arrested on the streets in Riyadh because of their sexual orientation", eh Bruce.

 

Oh and another important distinction between countries like Uganda and the ME

Most countries in the ME have never claimed to be Democracies or have Constitutions that support human rights. Uganda claims it is a Democracy with a Constitution that includes human rights. Also Uganda is part of the African Union which does have a charter where human rights are suppose to be protected and are suppose to be mandatory

This is based on the historical reality of Colonialism where black people were discriminated against through  racism ...but for some African countries racism is bad but homophobia against your own black citizens is okay

So you can see the inconsistency ?

[Darkpriest]

4 minutes ago, Gorth said:

You rights and your freedom *usually* ends where it impinges on somebody else's rights and freedoms. Lets say Bob is a religious nutcase (insert your most disliked religion here). Bob doesn't like gingers. Nobody should prevent Bob from disliking gingers and he can rage and rant all he wants against the blasphemous hair dye gingers are wearing openly, without covering with a hat. Bobs private rants are nobody else's business really. When Bob wants to force all gingers to cover their hair with a hat so *he* doesn't feel his vision is polluted by watching ginger haired people, then Bob is a problem. Not the gingers.

Yes, a grossly simplified example and I'm sure someone out there on the internet will go to great length to come up with 17 exceptions why it's perfectly reasonable to force gingers to wear hats.

 

So, if a company says, identify with this symbol and wear it or you will be fired, is that a breach in human rights? 

I guess, perhaps this is not the best topic to derail to various philisophical questions and lets just go back to bashing one anothers political viewes or what's presented in various media spaces. 

[Gorth]

1 minute ago, Darkpriest said:

So, if a company says, identify with this symbol and wear it or you will be fired, is that a breach in human rights? 

I guess, perhaps this is not the best topic to derail to various philisophical questions and lets just go back to bashing one anothers political viewes or what's presented in various media spaces. 

By all means, create a philosophy thread

 

Your example is a philosophical question of sorts. When is the dress code of a private company discriminating and when isn't it. In most civilized countries, you are no longer allowed as a company to discriminate based on gender, sexual orientation and ethnicity. You can still demand they wear a KFC logo if they work for KFC etc. But things like requiring women to wear skirts and high heels as part of their dress code is luckily on the way out. Even in countries that used to quite conservative, the 21st century seems to catch up with them (albeit slowly in some cases).

[Darkpriest]

47 minutes ago, Pidesco said:

Care to specify which specific beliefs and opinions you might be referring to, religious or secular?

Both, technically, secular is a type of a religious belief (you believe there is no form of higher being, but cannot prove it or disprove it) 

Edited January 20, 2021 by Darkpriest

[Elerond]

14 minutes ago, Darkpriest said:

What is deemed human rights can change and it did change in the past. 

Would you be in favor of some group defining them or majority of human population deciding what they are? 

I would not be favor of such decision making. 

Human rights have not really change in past, because Universal Declaration of Human Rights is actually first time in history when such rights are actually defined in sense that they are natural rights of all human being and even then they weren't approved by majority of humanity

[BruceVC]

1 minute ago, Gorth said:

. But things like requiring women to wear skirts and high heels as part of their dress code is luckily on the way out. 

Why would we be happy or lucky  with women not wearing skirts and high heels ....what if a women wants to wear a mini-skirt with boots or high heels to work? Personally I love seeing a liberated women confident with wearing a skirt ?

Gorthfuscious we mustnt dictate to women what we think is acceptable, remember part of gender equality is we must respect their choices 

[Guard Dog]

And so today it ends. 
 

for five long miserable years this country has spoken a little else other than Donald John Trump. We are sick unto death of the subject. I would not go so far as to suggest his name be stricken from history. But by God we need to turn our backs on him far quicker than is typical of an ex-president. He needs to fade into obscurity in record time. 
 

There are numerous people in this country who have suggested putting an every man in the White House. There are many others who flirted with the idea of a celebrity president. I seriously hope both factions have gotten that crap out of their system. Let’s not do this again huh?

Edited January 20, 2021 by Guard Dog

[BruceVC]

3 minutes ago, Guard Dog said:

And so today it ends. 
 

for five long miserable years this country has spoken a little else other than Donald John Trump. We are sick unto death of the subject. I would not go so far as to suggest his name be stricken from history. But by God we need to turn our backs on him far quicker than is typical of an ex-president. He needs to fade into obscurity in record time. 
 

There are numerous people in this country who have suggested putting an every man in the White House. There are many others who flirted with the idea of a celebrity president. I seriously hope both factions have gotten that crap out of their system. Let’s not do this again huh?

One thing I am definitely not going to  miss is the endless discussions on certain news channels like CNN about " what Trump said " and " can you believe what Trump said " 

I am utterly exhausted by these topics and look forward to the change going forward 

 

 

[Darkpriest]

5 minutes ago, BruceVC said:

One thing I am definitely not going to  miss is the endless discussions on certain news channels like CNN about " what Trump said " and " can you believe what Trump said " 

I am utterly exhausted by these topics and look forward to the change going forward 

 

 

They are scrambling and thinking, what to outrage about now to generate similar traffic. 

I'm sure they will still go Trump this and that. 

Meanwhile, keeping to SM censorship and its consequences. 

https://archive.is/GmCsG#selection-2953.0-2957.246

 

Edited January 20, 2021 by Darkpriest

[BruceVC]

5 minutes ago, Darkpriest said:

They are scrambling and thinking, what to outrage about now to generate similar traffic. 

I'm sure they will still go Trump this and that. 

Meanwhile, keeping to SM censorship and its consequences. 

https://archive.is/GmCsG#selection-2953.0-2957.246

 

Dont joke but for some journalists not talking about Trump anymore is going to be a weird new reality for them

[Pidesco]

47 minutes ago, Darkpriest said:

Both, technically, secular is a type of a religious belief (you believe there is no form of higher being, but cannot prove it or disprove it) 

Uh, that didn't answer my question and that's not what secular means.

[Pidesco]

35 minutes ago, Guard Dog said:

And so today it ends. 
 

for five long miserable years this country has spoken a little else other than Donald John Trump. We are sick unto death of the subject. I would not go so far as to suggest his name be stricken from history. But by God we need to turn our backs on him far quicker than is typical of an ex-president. He needs to fade into obscurity in record time. 
 

There are numerous people in this country who have suggested putting an every man in the White House. There are many others who flirted with the idea of a celebrity president. I seriously hope both factions have gotten that crap out of their system. Let’s not do this again huh?

Trump was anything but an every man.

[majestic]

22 minutes ago, Pidesco said:

Trump was anything but an every man.

He convinced a hell lot of people that he is though.

Being an Average Joe is also by no means a requirement to understand the plight of the working class. Our greatest chancellor way back in the 70ies was a wealthy person. Bespoke suits, shoes, living in a luxurious villa in the rich part of the capital.

Didn't matter though. He understood the problems of the regular people and acted accordingly (good old times indeed, in this case). Unlike Trump, who simply applied the Ferengi Rule of Acquisition #211 to politics: Voters are the rungs on the ladder of success. Don't hesitate to step on them.

[Hurlshort]

Hey, he ate McDonalds. Trump was a man of the people.