Online vs. Offline

Originally posted by FMF
Because your political backwardness is the topic.

I've been debating with myself over whether or not I should explain what is so gosh darn funny about that statement.

The part of me that wants to tell you has won that debate...

Whenever someone makes it a point to portray themselves as being socially enlightened, they will usually try to hide the fact that their social awareness is actually politically motivated. In other words, they are like human weathervanes who will always turn to blow in the same direction the wind is blowing.

They forget (or don't know) that the wind never blows in the same direction all the time. The wind is always changing direction, so the politically enlightened social engineer wanna-be ends up not really pointing in any clear direction, but is turning this a way and that a way and any a way the wind blows.

Originally posted by lemon lime
I've been debating with myself over whether or not I should explain what is so gosh darn funny about that statement.

The part of me that wants to tell you has won that debate...

Whenever someone makes it a point to portray themselves as being socially enlightened, they will usually try to hide the fact that their social [i]awareness[/i ...[text shortened]... g in any clear direction, but is turning this a way and that a way and any a way the wind blows.

Words of wisdom from the sexist playbook.

Originally posted by HandyAndy
Words of wisdom from the sexist playbook.

Yeah... you go girl!

Oops, sorry about that. For a moment there I thought you were a feminist.

Originally posted by lemon lime

Whenever someone makes it a point to portray themselves as being socially enlightened, they will usually try to hide the fact that their social awareness is actually politically motivated. In other words, they are like human weathervanes who will always turn to blow in the same direction the wind is blowing.

They forget (or don't know) that the wind never blows in the same direction all the time. The wind is always changing direction, so the politically enlightened social engineer wanna-be ends up not really pointing in any clear direction, but is turning this a way and that a way and any a way the wind blows.

This screed of yours is little more than waffle. Of course support for the advance of women's rights is politically motivated just as resistence to it is politically motivated. When discussing an inherently political issue, charging someone with having a politial view on the issue is a swing and a miss.

I am more familiar with Indonesian, Japanese, UK and Australian politics ~ more so than US politics ~ but when you ramble on about... "weathervanes who will always turn to blow in the same direction the wind is blowing"... and "that the wind never blows in the same direction all the time"... and "The wind is always changing direction" and "turning this a way and that a way and any a way the wind blows" [this is your bumbling repetition, not mine], you sound like a politician who's been caught on the hop and who is trying to keep talking while also trying to say nothing substantial so they can't be be pinned down on their extemporization. [See UK TV sitcoms "Yes Minister" and "Yes Prime Minister".] Maybe your rambling flannel is US style rhetoric?

Unless you have evidence of supporters of women's rights who have later become opponents of advancing women's rights, then your metaphor about "wind direction" and "weathervanes" is nothing but waffle and you have said nothing.

Originally posted by FMF
[b]Whenever someone makes it a point to portray themselves as being socially enlightened, they will usually try to hide the fact that their social awareness is actually politically motivated. In other words, they are like human weathervanes who will always turn to blow in the same direction the wind is blowing.

They forget (or don't know) that t ...[text shortened]... aphor about "wind direction" and "weathervanes" is nothing but waffle and you have said nothing.

Sorry, but I can't take the womens movement (or feminism or whatever you want to call it) seriously. Feminists in our country attacked the reputations and credibility of women who were victimized by a well known sexual predator during the 80s and 90s, and actually worked to protect him and his reputation. If this isn't hyprocrisy in its most raw and ugly form, then I don't know what hyprocrisy is.

Since you obviously enjoy explaining things to politically backward guys like myself, why don't you go to your dictionary and look up the word hyprocrisy. And then explain to me what it means.

Originally posted by lemon lime
Sorry, but I can't take the womens movement (or feminism or whatever you want to call it) seriously. Feminists in our country attacked the reputations and credibility of women who were victimized by a well known sexual predator during the 80s and 90s, and actually worked to protect him and his reputation. If this isn't hyprocrisy in its most raw an ...[text shortened]... to your dictionary and look up the word hyprocrisy. And then explain to me what it means.

I know what hypocrisy means. If you are talking about the hypocrisy of some women who were involved in a story about some guy that made the news in the US in the 90s, why would this make you accuse "the womens movement" of "hypocrisy in its most raw and ugly form"?

Originally posted by lemon lime
Sorry, but I can't take the womens movement (or feminism or whatever you want to call it) seriously. Feminists in our country attacked the reputations and credibility of women who were victimized by a well known sexual predator during the 80s and 90s, and actually worked to protect him and his reputation. If this isn't hyprocrisy in its most raw an ...[text shortened]... to your dictionary and look up the word hyprocrisy. And then explain to me what it means.

Just one question. Who's the sexual predator you're talking about?

Originally posted by FMF
I know what hypocrisy means. If you are talking about the hypocrisy of some women who were involved in a story about some guy that made the news in the US in the 90s, why would this make you accuse "the womens movement" of "hypocrisy in its most raw and ugly form"?

Your own personal attitudes aside, please understand that Americans are affected by stories covered in the American media, even if other countries take little to no notice.

Originally posted by Suzianne
Your own personal attitudes aside, please understand that Americans are affected by stories covered in the American media, even if other countries take little to no notice.

Imagine this: U.S. liberal or progressive: "Sorry, but I can't take conservatives (or right wingers or whatever you want to call them) seriously. Some conservatives in our country did something hypocritical. Why don't you look up the word hypocrisy in the dictionary and tell me what it means?" What kind of 'argument' is this? Is it considered a valid argument in America?

Originally posted by Suzianne
Just one question. Who's the sexual predator you're talking about?

Presumably lemon lime voted for Bush Sr and Dole. Just a wild guess. 😉

Originally posted by Suzianne
Just one question. Who's the sexual predator you're talking about?

I was expecting FMF to ask that question since he's not from around here. [meaning the U.S] But since you are from around here (so to speak) I think I've given enough clues:

Well known
80s and 90s...

Maybe saying the 80s will throw some people off the scent, because he wasn't nationally known until the 90s. He was well known within his own circle and political party before the 90s, but a lot of people (including me) never heard of him until he stepped into the national spotlight... after that he continued stepping into something else.

Originally posted by lemon lime
I was expecting FMF to ask that question since he's not from around here. [meaning the U.S] But since you are from around here (so to speak) I think I've given enough clues:

Well known
80s and 90s...

Maybe saying the 80s will throw some people off the scent, because he wasn't nationally known until the 90s. He was well known within his own circle a ...[text shortened]... he stepped into the national spotlight... after that he continued stepping into something else.

Since you won't answer my question, I'm guessing you mean Bill Clinton.

I'd hardly call Bill Clinton a sexual predator. He maybe had an eye for the ladies and this led to poor choices, but this hardly makes him a sexual predator. Monica Lewinsky has made it clear on many occasions that their relationship was maybe misguided, but it was consensual.

Originally posted by FMF
Imagine this: U.S. liberal or progressive: "Sorry, but I can't take conservatives (or right wingers or whatever you want to call them) seriously. Some conservatives in our country did something hypocritical. Why don't you look up the word hypocrisy in the dictionary and tell me what it means?" What kind of 'argument' is this? Is it considered a valid argument in America?

Some Americans like to paint with a wide brush. We like to crowd everyone into small boxes with other people we find equally dislikeable for the same reasons. One person's actions don't define a group, but we like to pretend they do.

Originally posted by Suzianne
Since you won't answer my question, I'm guessing you mean Bill Clinton.

I'd hardly call Bill Clinton a sexual predator. He maybe had an eye for the ladies and this led to poor choices, but this hardly makes him a sexual predator. Monica Lewinsky has made it clear on many occasions that their relationship was maybe misguided, but it was consensual.

I wasn't talking about Lewinsky, because as you said it was consensual. But if you know anything about her you would know that the only reason she approached him in the first place is because she was aware of his reputation with the ladies... to put it mildly.

And I suppose you could call what he did to all the women before her consensual, unless you take into account how he pursued those women. Before he entered politics and was a still a young man there are unverifiable stories of how he forced himself on at least one young woman. That's easy enough to dismiss until you look at his track record later on, when as a mature man he had learned to be a bit more crafty when getting a woman to satisfy him. He used the power he had as governor to pressure many of them, and yes, they could have said no, but he was a force to be reckoned with if he didn't get his way.

The top brass in the Democratic party took him aside when he won the presidency (for his first term) and warned him to not try governing the country the way he had governed Arkansas... that's one of those little tidbits that seemed to leap off the page of a Time magazine article, but the article conveniently left out any clue as to what their concerns might have been.

I realise this will strike a nerve in people who think their s*** never stinks, but my main point is how the Feminist leadership in this country reacted to him when they learned about all of this. The feminist leadership had to say something, because people were to looking to them to see what they would say about it. There was less feminist literature published after that, and fewer news stories about feminist activities, so the movement sort of quietly moved underground for a while.

Originally posted by lemon lime
The wind is always changing direction, so the politically enlightened social engineer wanna-be ends up not really pointing in any clear direction, but is turning this a way and that a way and any a way the wind blows.

We are social creatures. Every single one of us ~ as individuals or in groups ~ attempts to "engineer" our human environments to some degree. Slavery was the result and practice of "social engineering", as was its abolition. Gated communities are "social engineering". Raising my kids is "social engineering". The U.S. Constitution was an example of "social engineering". Apartheid and the ending of Apartheid were "social engineering". Both your refusal to take the woman's movement seriously ~ or people actively resisting its agenda ~ and the efforts of the woman's movement to promote that agenda are "social engineering". The attempted 'barb of referring to aspirations, action and change as "social engineering" is another swing and a miss.