Political Randomness

[LawBeefaroni]

Corruption went unchecked for for so long that it's now not only rampant but a fundamental force in the operation of all branches.

[Daehawk]

Alabama and Mississippi mark Confederate Memorial Day

"On one side, you have white conservative men defining what divisive is and what it means. ... At the same time, you are honoring the Confederacy, which in itself is a divisive concept. It’s really hypocritical, quite tone deaf,” Bennett said.

An Alabama Senate committee last week rejected a proposal to separate the joint state holiday celebrating Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee and slain civil rights leader the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. on the same day.

“We’re trying to separate the holidays of two men whose ideologies were totally separate, from one end of the totem pole to the other. One believed in justice and fairness for all, and another believed in slavery,” state Sen. Vivian Davis Figures said.

Figures’ bill would have kept Lee’s holiday but moved it to Columbus Day in October. “Whoever wants to honor either man will have their own day,” she said.

The vote split along racial lines, Figures said at the end of the meeting, with white Republicans voting against it and Black Democrats voting for it.

[Holman]

Figures’ bill would have kept Lee’s holiday but moved it to Columbus Day in October. “Whoever wants to honor either man will have their own day,” she said.

Wow. So it's just straight up Slavery Day.

[waitingtoconnect]

Alabama and Mississippi mark Confederate Memorial Day

"On one side, you have white conservative men defining what divisive is and what it means. ... At the same time, you are honoring the Confederacy, which in itself is a divisive concept. It’s really hypocritical, quite tone deaf,” Bennett said.

An Alabama Senate committee last week rejected a proposal to separate the joint state holiday celebrating Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee and slain civil rights leader the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. on the same day.

“We’re trying to separate the holidays of two men whose ideologies were totally separate, from one end of the totem pole to the other. One believed in justice and fairness for all, and another believed in slavery,” state Sen. Vivian Davis Figures said.

Figures’ bill would have kept Lee’s holiday but moved it to Columbus Day in October. “Whoever wants to honor either man will have their own day,” she said.

The vote split along racial lines, Figures said at the end of the meeting, with white Republicans voting against it and Black Democrats voting for it.

Somewhere an onion editor is screaming… “cmon leave some satire for us!”

[Kraken]

Figures’ bill would have kept Lee’s holiday but moved it to Columbus Day in October. “Whoever wants to honor either man will have their own day,” she said.

Wow. So it's just straight up Slavery Day.

I can tell you that Boston's large ethnic Italian population was not pleased when Columbus Day became Indigenous Peoples Day.

[Smoove_B]

from one end of the totem pole to the other.

Nice that he could work in a shot at the Native Americans during the exchange on racist holidays.

[Smoove_B]

Big week for...infamous media personalities:

The second round of Disney layoffs hit ABC News on Tuesday, with Nate Silver’s data-driven politics and journalism brand FiveThirtyEight among those being impacted.

Silver told FiveThirtyEight employees in a Slack message that he expects to leave Disney when his contract is up, which he added would be “soon,” The Hollywood Reporter has learned.

ABC News is expected to keep the FiveThirtyEight brand name, with plans to streamline the site and make it more efficient.

“ABC News remains dedicated to data journalism with a core focus on politics, the economy and enterprise reporting — this streamlined structure will allow us to be more closely aligned with our priorities for the 2024 election and beyond,” an ABC News spokesperson said in a statement. “We are grateful for the invaluable contributions of the team members who will be departing the organization and know they will continue to make an important impact on the future of journalism.”

He can at least pivot to being a communicable disease expert again. Good luck, sir.

[waitingtoconnect]

What I find fascinating is with FiveThirtyEight is that people expect a polling site to make money. You use it to drive audience to yourself by having in house experts on elections people want to tune in to watch.

On Slavery Day are we seriously talking about bringing that back now. Is the child worker thing a prelude to reopening slavery? As Lee himself said:

I think it however a greater evil to the white man than to the black race, & while my feelings are strongly enlisted in behalf of the latter, my sympathies are more strong for the former. The blacks are immeasurably better off here than in Africa, morally, socially & physically. The painful discipline they are undergoing, is necessary for their instruction as a race, & I hope will prepare & lead them to better things. How long their subjugation may be necessary is known & ordered by a wise Merciful Providence. Their emancipation will sooner result from the mild & melting influence of Christianity, than the storms & tempests of fiery Controversy.

He sounds scarily like some of today's Republicans.

[Max Peck]

It's starting to sound like if we didn't know the name "Jack Teixeira" as the guy who got sloppy with his illegally shared classified documents, we might still have known him as yet another mass shooter.

Guardsman in leak case wanted to kill a ‘ton of people’: US

The Massachusetts Air National guardsman accused of leaking highly classified military documents kept an arsenal of guns and said on social media that he would like to kill a “ton of people,” prosecutors said in arguing Thursday that 21-year-old Jack Teixeira should remain in jail for his trial.

But the judge at Teixeira’s detention hearing put off an immediate decision on whether he should be kept in custody until his trial or released to home confinement or under other conditions. Teixeira was led away from the court in handcuffs, black rosary beads around his neck, pending that ruling.

The court filings raise new questions about why Teixeira had such a high security clearance and access to some of the nation’s most classified secrets. They said he may still have material that hasn’t been released, which could be of “tremendous value to hostile nation states that could offer him safe harbor and attempt to facilitate his escape from the United States.”

[Daehawk]

A Picture Book About Betty White Was Just Banned By A Florida School—And Fans Are Furious

The organization noted that the individual who proposed the ban—Florida teacher Vicki Baggett—took issue with two pages in the book "where a character references his two dads."

Baggett claimed the book has an "agenda" that constitutes a "violation of parental rights, introduction of alternate lifestyles and characters."

Earlier this year, her calls to ban nearly 150 books on the grounds it is her "responsibility to protect minors" received pushback from former students who say she has a history of making openly bigoted comments and exhibiting equally problematic behavior.

Former students also said Baggett regularly expressed homophobic beliefs in class and that at one point she told a student whose sister had a girlfriend that she was "faking being a lesbian for attention."

Baggett made homophobia one of the cornerstones of her crusade to ban books with LGBTQ+ themes, notably And Tango Makes Three, which tells the story of two male penguins, Roy and Silo, who create a family together.

Baggett believes the book uses penguins to "promote the LGBTQ agenda" and said she opposes including And Tango Makes Three in school libraries because second graders might read the book and determine "these are two people of the same sex that love each other."

Who is responsible for watching the asylum doors these days???

[YellowKing]

I don't understand why book bans can just go into effect because one person complains. I mean we've had plays canceled and books banned because one parent got butthurt. Tell them to piss off and take their kid to another school if they don't like it. If one parent complains that math is offensive, should schools just stop teaching it?

[Unagi]

I don't understand why book bans can just go into effect because one person complains. I mean we've had plays canceled and books banned because one parent got butthurt. Tell them to piss off and take their kid to another school if they don't like it. If one parent complains that math is offensive, should schools just stop teaching it?

I heard that 7 8 9.

They are teaching our children cannibalism!

[Pyperkub]

Big week for...infamous media personalities:

The second round of Disney layoffs hit ABC News on Tuesday, with Nate Silver’s data-driven politics and journalism brand FiveThirtyEight among those being impacted.

Silver told FiveThirtyEight employees in a Slack message that he expects to leave Disney when his contract is up, which he added would be “soon,” The Hollywood Reporter has learned.

ABC News is expected to keep the FiveThirtyEight brand name, with plans to streamline the site and make it more efficient.

“ABC News remains dedicated to data journalism with a core focus on politics, the economy and enterprise reporting — this streamlined structure will allow us to be more closely aligned with our priorities for the 2024 election and beyond,” an ABC News spokesperson said in a statement. “We are grateful for the invaluable contributions of the team members who will be departing the organization and know they will continue to make an important impact on the future of journalism.”

He can at least pivot to being a communicable disease expert again. Good luck, sir.

538 was always more of a statistical analysis site than a polling site, and they've branched out to sports, which dovetails nicely with online gamblers and the espn side of the house.

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[Skinypupy]

PornHub and all its affiliates banned Utah IP’s today in response to our stupid online ID law.

And boy, did searches for VPN’s spike.

[LawBeefaroni]

[LordMortis]

He wasn't alone. The mentioned a bunch of them on CNBC this morning.

[malchior]

A lot of folks sold off their regional bank stocks as SVB happened. I don't see anything ominous unless we get some indicator he had inside information.

[LawBeefaroni]

A lot of folks sold off their regional bank stocks as SVB happened. I don't see anything ominous unless we get some indicator he had inside information.

He sold right before it happened (March 6), not as it happened (March 10).


Sure, he may have just been lucky. A lot, like really lucky. But appearances matter.

[malchior]

A lot of folks sold off their regional bank stocks as SVB happened. I don't see anything ominous unless we get some indicator he had inside information.

He sold right before it happened (March 6), not as it happened (March 10).


Sure, he may have just been lucky. A lot, like really lucky. But appearances matter.

Yeah from an appearances POV it definitely matters. I still think national leadership shouldn't trade at all individually.

[malchior]

30 minutes away...also where my BIL lives. Nuts.

[Defiant]

The one thing I will say against the book in the examples provided is that I think it's enough for the book to say that "voter fraud is rare". I don't think it's necessary or particularly enlightening to say "when it does occur, it's often perpetrated by Republicans", given that it is so very rare and not representative.

[malchior]

The point of including it isn't to discuss how representative it is versus regular voting. It is that Republicans claim/believe voter fraud is rampant. When it *is caught* it is usually Republicans. That hypocrisy/projection is at the root of a good chunk of Republican discussion which makes it relevant if the point is to spur discussion about modern civics.

[Pyperkub]

The point of including it isn't to discuss how representative it is versus regular voting. It is that Republicans claim/believe voter fraud is rampant. When it *is caught* it is usually Republicans. That hypocrisy/projection is at the root of a good chunk of Republican discussion which makes it relevant if the point is to spur discussion about modern civics.

The worst part is that when it's charged is increasingly ignoring Republican vote fraud ( see Florida's election police...)

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[Defiant]

The point of including it isn't to discuss how representative it is versus regular voting. It is that Republicans claim/believe voter fraud is rampant. When it *is caught* it is usually Republicans. That hypocrisy/projection is at the root of a good chunk of Republican discussion which makes it relevant if the point is to spur discussion about modern civics.

Except it's not hypocrisy or projection when ~99.9+% of Republicans don't commit voter fraud - it's disinformation designed to hurt faith in democracy. It'd only be hypocrisy/projection in those handful of unrepresentative cases of Republicans who both commit fraud and complain about fraud.

[Holman]

The insidious thing is this: Republicans convincing themselves that "Democrats always cheat" provides a solid justification for any policies that suppress voting in Democrat-leaning areas.

Rural/suburban GOP voters won't be bothered (let alone alarmed) when their state legislatures cripple urban voting because they'll see it as a necessary correction against "corruption."

[malchior]

The point of including it isn't to discuss how representative it is versus regular voting. It is that Republicans claim/believe voter fraud is rampant. When it *is caught* it is usually Republicans. That hypocrisy/projection is at the root of a good chunk of Republican discussion which makes it relevant if the point is to spur discussion about modern civics.

Except it's not hypocrisy or projection when ~99.9+% of Republicans don't commit voter fraud - it's disinformation.

I don't know how the sentence is composed but it seems to be saying as reported that the majority of voter fraud convictions are Republican registered voters. That is factually accurate, therefore it can't be disinformation.

It'd only be hypocrisy/projection in those handful of unrepresentative cases of Republicans who both commit fraud and complain about fraud.

Sorta. This misses the point. You're focusing on individuals who have been caught when the problem is with the behavior of them as group and what they say. But I'm beginning to think that you hinge this all on this representative sample issue which I think it is a massive red herring in light of all the crackdowns on minorities predicated in ginning up 'election fraud', polling around 'The Big Lie', and widespread belief in the illegitimacy of Democrat governance because they steal every election.

[Defiant]

The point of including it isn't to discuss how representative it is versus regular voting. It is that Republicans claim/believe voter fraud is rampant. When it *is caught* it is usually Republicans. That hypocrisy/projection is at the root of a good chunk of Republican discussion which makes it relevant if the point is to spur discussion about modern civics.

Except it's not hypocrisy or projection when ~99.9+% of Republicans don't commit voter fraud - it's disinformation.

I don't know how the sentence is composed but it seems to be saying as reported that the majority of voter fraud convictions are Republican registered voters. That is factually accurate, therefore it can't be disinformation.

OK, maybe I should have been clearer - Lots of Republicans claim/believe voter fraud is rampant, but almost all of those Republicans don't commit voter fraud, so their claims of rampant fraud are disinformation, not hypocrisy/projection.

It'd only be hypocrisy/projection in those handful of unrepresentative cases of Republicans who both commit fraud and complain about fraud.

Sorta. This misses the point. You're focusing on individuals who have been caught when the problem is with the behavior of them as group and what they say. But I'm beginning to think that you hinge this all on this representative sample issue which I think it is a massive red herring in light of all the crackdowns on minorities predicated in ginning up 'election fraud' and polling around 'The Big Lie'.

The problem is absolutely what Republicans are saying, that voter fraud is "rampant" when it isn't, which hurts trust in democracy (and, as pointed out by Holman, serves to justify voter suppression).

The problem isn't that they're projecting because very few of them are.

[malchior]

The point of including it isn't to discuss how representative it is versus regular voting. It is that Republicans claim/believe voter fraud is rampant. When it *is caught* it is usually Republicans. That hypocrisy/projection is at the root of a good chunk of Republican discussion which makes it relevant if the point is to spur discussion about modern civics.

Except it's not hypocrisy or projection when ~99.9+% of Republicans don't commit voter fraud - it's disinformation.

I don't know how the sentence is composed but it seems to be saying as reported that the majority of voter fraud convictions are Republican registered voters. That is factually accurate, therefore it can't be disinformation.

OK, maybe I should have been clearer - Lots of Republicans claim/believe voter fraud is rampant, but almost all of those Republicans don't commit voter fraud, so their claims of rampant fraud are disinformation, not hypocrisy/projection.

Got it.

The problem isn't that they're projecting because very few of them are.

I'm not going to get into defending the definition of projection but IMO it seems you are hung up on this statistical angle when I am talking about the larger group psychology - which I think is at the heart of things. When polling suggests they all believe everyone else is cheating when they are the ones cheating (in various ways including election fraud) it seems misguided to me to worry about representative sampling about one category that is in essence just supporting evidence.

[Max Peck]

Today my phone decided to tell me about "OutKick", which is a sports(?) website founded by a radical moderate pro-Trump dude who gets upset about things like woke story-telling in Star Wars. Apparently.

If it's really that important to have OK as their logo (I see what you're doing there, Clay), something like "The OK Corral" would have been a lot better than a weirdly contrived name like "OutKick" but maybe that's just me.

[Kraken]

radical moderate pro-Trump dude

Does not compute.

[Max Peck]

radical moderate pro-Trump dude

Does not compute.

It's targeted marketing, not an attempt at a coherent world view.

[Sudy]

What realm of political philosophy deals with acknowledging and minimizing the effects of our primordial urges on society? ("All of them"?) I.e. what is the best way to pursue social reforms in a reality in which greed and competitiveness are inherent traits many of us don't even struggle to overcome? And when such individuals and groups are most likely to gain power, and wield it to suppress the rest, or just blow the whole thing up (socially or physically) if they don't get their way?

Do you try to actively suppress these traits? To bring them into balance with a more benevolent social system? Do you hope that social evolution will slowly weed them out? Is any of this really possible?

I know it may be reductionist, but the older I get the more I see our ape instincts as an insurmountable obstacle to societal advancement. I approve of fairly radical goals for society, but I feel like we're straining against the constraints of biology and it's not a battle that can feasibly be won. Not at our level of biological evolution, anyway. And at what point does biological evolution become about more than propagation, and why would it? I don't think this is a good reason to give up or give in. I believe we must do all we can to reduce suffering on both global and individual scales. The possibility of life holding no inherent meaning is all the more reason to try to manufacture a positive one. But the reality seems so alarmingly simple I feel as if the majority delude themselves into believing it isn't. Or, they're so absorbed in the social systems they were born into they don't even consider it. I mean, my own thinking is tainted with the presupposition that maintaining and forwarding benevolent order is good, desirable, and/or possible. The golden rule may benefit me, and it may benefit society. But it seems like such an aberration.

I know these ideas aren't original. I'm just stuck on them right now. The most humbling realization is that I probably couldn't actually do better than many of our leaders. I'm not about to give up and go caveman. But the temptation is there. It even seems rational sometimes.

[Kraken]

I feel like we're straining against the constraints of biology and it's not a battle that can feasibly be won. Not at our level of biological evolution, anyway. And at what point does biological evolution become about more than propagation, and why would it?

In social animals such as humans, social harmony contributes to reproductive success. We advance more by cooperating than by warring and enslaving. But I think that biology only sets the scene that society plays out on. Only individuals whose basic needs are met have the luxury of striving for higher goals. People who face hunger, housing insecurity, domestic violence, sexual abuse, exploitation, and myriad other threats to their daily well-being have to survive one day at a time, however they can. Idealism is a luxury of the educated and secure.

This is not to say that only the privileged are ethical. Quite the contrary; much of this forum is about the rich and powerful being absolute monsters. Meanwhile, many -- maybe even most -- of those on the lowest rungs strive to be good people. Dysfunctional social systems that reward ill behavior with wealth and influence are more to blame for our shortcomings than is our animal nature.

[Carpet_pissr]

What realm of political philosophy deals with acknowledging and minimizing the effects of our primordial urges on society? ("All of them"?) I.e. what is the best way to pursue social reforms in a reality in which greed and competitiveness are inherent traits many of us don't even struggle to overcome? And when such individuals and groups are most likely to gain power, and wield it to suppress the rest, or just blow the whole thing up (socially or physically) if they don't get their way?

Do you try to actively suppress these traits? To bring them into balance with a more benevolent social system? Do you hope that social evolution will slowly weed them out? Is any of this really possible?

I know it may be reductionist, but the older I get the more I see our ape instincts as an insurmountable obstacle to societal advancement. I approve of fairly radical goals for society, but I feel like we're straining against the constraints of biology and it's not a battle that can feasibly be won. Not at our level of biological evolution, anyway. And at what point does biological evolution become about more than propagation, and why would it? I don't think this is a good reason to give up or give in. I believe we must do all we can to reduce suffering on both global and individual scales. The possibility of life holding no inherent meaning is all the more reason to try to manufacture a positive one. But the reality seems so alarmingly simple I feel as if the majority delude themselves into believing it isn't. Or, they're so absorbed in the social systems they were born into they don't even consider it. I mean, my own thinking is tainted with the presupposition that maintaining and forwarding benevolent order is good, desirable, and/or possible. The golden rule may benefit me, and it may benefit society. But it seems like such an aberration.

I know these ideas aren't original. I'm just stuck on them right now. The most humbling realization is that I probably couldn't actually do better than many of our leaders. I'm not about to give up and go caveman. But the temptation is there. It even seems rational sometimes.

Has someone just read ‘Sapiens’?

(FWIW I’m obsessed with it and it’s ideas).

[Sudy]

Lol no, but I think I've had it recommended to me before. (Possibly by you.) These are just thoughts that have been rattling around in my brain these past couple of years as I've grappled with my mental health, religious beliefs, and general place in society. Nihilism. I don't embrace it as a philosophy, but I'm constantly questioning whether anything really matters and deciding how to move forward from that.

And Kraken, those are some interesting points. About what behaviours society rewards, and how social structures contribute to reproductive success. If everyone had their basic needs provided for it would be a different world, so that's still something to strive for. I just think we'd be so much better off without the biological pressure to reproduce. But, you know, that's life. And some of us need to. At least until science takes over.

[Unagi]

I was just given 'Sapiens' by my sister, I've not yet cracked it though. Mostly because gift-books always come with a little negative enthusiasm to get over before I will want to read it, if ever.

[Pyperkub]

What realm of political philosophy deals with acknowledging and minimizing the effects of our primordial urges on society? ("All of them"?) I.e. what is the best way to pursue social reforms in a reality in which greed and competitiveness are inherent traits many of us don't even struggle to overcome? And when such individuals and groups are most likely to gain power, and wield it to suppress the rest, or just blow the whole thing up (socially or physically) if they don't get their way?

Do you try to actively suppress these traits? To bring them into balance with a more benevolent social system? Do you hope that social evolution will slowly weed them out? Is any of this really possible?

I know it may be reductionist, but the older I get the more I see our ape instincts as an insurmountable obstacle to societal advancement. I approve of fairly radical goals for society, but I feel like we're straining against the constraints of biology and it's not a battle that can feasibly be won. Not at our level of biological evolution, anyway. And at what point does biological evolution become about more than propagation, and why would it? I don't think this is a good reason to give up or give in. I believe we must do all we can to reduce suffering on both global and individual scales. The possibility of life holding no inherent meaning is all the more reason to try to manufacture a positive one. But the reality seems so alarmingly simple I feel as if the majority delude themselves into believing it isn't. Or, they're so absorbed in the social systems they were born into they don't even consider it. I mean, my own thinking is tainted with the presupposition that maintaining and forwarding benevolent order is good, desirable, and/or possible. The golden rule may benefit me, and it may benefit society. But it seems like such an aberration.

I know these ideas aren't original. I'm just stuck on them right now. The most humbling realization is that I probably couldn't actually do better than many of our leaders. I'm not about to give up and go caveman. But the temptation is there. It even seems rational sometimes.

Civil-ization

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[Holman]

One thing to remember is that when disaster strikes and order does break, people are just as likely--and maybe even more likely--to cooperate in mutual aid than to leap into a war of all against all. Rebecca Solnit's A Paradise Built in Hell is a good study of this.

The enduring myth that a thin veneer of civilization is all that separates us from mutual viciousness is apparently not all that accurate. (In fact it has probably always served as a kind of self-congratulatory fable designed to celebrate civilization, however bluntly, and to make its inherent inequalities seem inevitable.)

I always remember the case of the real-life "Lord of the Flies" scenarios: in the mid-60s a group of boarding school boys were stranded alone on a desert island for more than a year. Rather than going tribal and degenerating into a parable of man's darkest impulses, they worked very hard at survival, shelter, and keeping up each other's spirits. They were especially attentive to those who fell sick or were wounded.

And almost all "desperate cannibalism" stories are the same way, from the Donner party to the Peruvian(?) soccer team stranded in snowy mountains. No one went savage. Eating human flesh was a last resort that was treated with great reluctance and humility. The hurt and sick were cared for until the very end, not bumped off for a taste of their juicy parts.

It's true that we have it in us to be cruel. But there's little evidence that cruelty is somehow our baseline. Very often, cruelty must be stoked and engineered through ideology, lies, and exploitation.

[Sudy]

I would like to believe that's true. I will look into that book, thank you for mentioning it.

I feel like during a sustained, regional or worldwide breakdown cooperation may not last though. Sure, most people will always look out for their tribe. But beyond that?

I mean look at COVID. There were many heartwarming stories. Many healthcare and other critical workers sacrificed immensely. But there was also an apparent prevailing "fuck you, got mine" attitude. Perhaps that's not wholly accurate or as widespread as I might think; commentators tend to focus on the negative. But this was potentially an "easy" disaster to manage (I mean, compared to nuclear war or whatever) and enough people wouldn't cooperate to avoid propagating major, needless problems. And there were times I was tempted to be selfish too. Sometimes I was. I wasn't coughing in people's faces or yanking packages of toilet paper out of granny's arms. But I took fewer precautions than I knew I should, because they made me physically uncomfortable or I didn't want to make the effort. And COVID isn't even over! But for the majority, individual comfort and "personal rights" dictate it may as well be.

In speaking with a friend recently, I asked "how far does our responsibility to better--if not save--others' lives extend?" Neither of us knew the answer, but she thought less far than I did. And obviously, there is a foggy endpoint. The average person won't let themselves starve to death to feed a stranger. But I don't think the average person is willing to do nearly enough even when confronted with irrefutable proof that modifying their behaviour in small ways could indirectly save lives, either.

I remember being stunned at a young colleague's declaration (years ago) that he would run out into traffic to save his dog (and he had!), but wouldn't consider risking himself in any way to save the life of a human he didn't know. But maybe I'm the aberration.

Anyway, I accept that my thinking may partially be the product of a not completely enlightened, recently troubled mind. And part of me has always been a huge optimist. But when I really examine the details, I question whether I'm deluding myself. The majority of humanity seems largely concerned with little more than staying comfortable and amused and getting laid. And getting laid is a HUGE, primary motivator for so much of our behaviour. We try downplay and disguise it. Which isn't to say I'm down on sex, or sex for the sake of pleasure. But I think our cultural obsession and exploitation of it is out of line with our societal ideals. But it's often not even willful. These needs are encoded biologically, and we've struggled to control them throughout the history of civilization.

I'm not suggesting everyone needs to take a vow of poverty and chastity to advance society. But I think far less than 50% of humanity make a positive impact on the world. (However that should be defined.) The privileged and the wealthy? Even fewer. Power corrupts. Wealth breeds a greater form of greed than poverty. If humanity really gave a shit there'd be many fewer orphans, hungry, and unsheltered.

Anyway, I'm enjoying this conversation and want to learn from everyone's wisdom. Believe me, I want to be proven wrong. But at this stage in my life I believe we're far less evolved and civilized than many of us think. Are we above lesser animals and cavemen? Sure. But I've witnessed the pull of the darkness and the selfishness and the indifference within me and accepted I'm far less "good" than I used to believe. It doesn't mean I don't constantly work to overcome it. It doesn't even mean I don't usually succeed. But with my back against the wall? I used to think I knew I'd do the right thing. I no longer do.

[Isgrimnur]

I remember being stunned at a young colleague's declaration (years ago) that he would run out into traffic to save his dog (and he had!), but wouldn't consider risking himself in any way to save the life of a human he didn't know. But maybe I'm the aberration.

Depends on the individual in danger. Race/gender/age are all going to play a factor in that split-second decision. And there's a game for that.