Author Topic: where is sol?  (Read 27370 times)

ericrugiero

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #50 on: July 12, 2019, 11:04:53 AM »
I hope to see Sol back one day because he provided funny, thought provoking and well thought out posts (usually).

That said, I disagree with many of his beliefs and he was way out of line in that last thread.  It seemed like it was a sensitive topic for him and he misread the intent behind a post and overreacted. 

Here is hoping he cools off and is able/willing to come back to the community. 

dougules

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #51 on: July 12, 2019, 12:02:39 PM »
How many people here would get a thread dedicated to their absence?  I guess that says something about sol. 

saguaro

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #52 on: July 12, 2019, 12:11:30 PM »
I miss Sol. He wrote many thoughtful posts that I enjoyed reading. Hope you come back Sol!

I am sorry to see him go.  I enjoyed his posts as well. 

HPstache

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #53 on: July 12, 2019, 12:19:53 PM »
How many people here would get a thread dedicated to their absence?  I guess that says something about sol.

https://forum.mrmoneymustache.com/off-topic/r-i-p-boarder42/

HBFIRE

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #54 on: July 12, 2019, 12:21:30 PM »
I like Sol -- intelligent, funny, articulate, insightful, and original --  I tend to disagree with him on politics, economics, and social issues but so what, he challenges my positions in an intelligent and thought provoking way and that's all that really matters.  I guess he's digital pouting right now because no one agreed with him or lent any support on the thread in question.  I think he was off the mark in that thread (huge understatement), but I can relate as I'm a stepfather myself.  Emotions got in the way of communication, it happens.
« Last Edit: July 12, 2019, 12:28:19 PM by HBFIRE »

Fish Sweet

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #55 on: July 12, 2019, 01:13:16 PM »
I think political conversations are a good test of emotional intelligence.  If you find yourself getting triggered then you need to evaluate your emotional and mental health.  I read a book on emotional intelligence and it talked about how it can be more effective than IQ in predicting future success.  I LOVE have political discussions with people, especially in real life but I've come to avoid it because too many people let their emotions cloud their judgement.

Hmm, I can't really agree with that.  It's easy to say "just stay above it all and don't be triggered" when you or your loved ones aren't being hugely personally impacted by politics.  Some political topics are very personal to some, and not so much to others.  Whether they are personal or "triggering" as you put it, rarely has anything to do with emotional intelligence so much as they have to do with personal experience. 

You (and I'm using the general you here) may enjoy a bracing political debate, but what's a fun exercise of your mental faculties can easily be a highly sensitized topic that will tremendously change someone else's quality of life or even be a matter of life and death.  Here are a few (personal!) examples:

- Arguing points of immigration with someone who has loved ones or family members how are undocumented-- and fears that their 17 year old nephew might have his parents deported, or be thrown out of the country he's lived in since the age of 2.
- Gender politics with someone wondering if their daughter will be kicked out of the military for being trangender, even though she has deployed and faithfully served her country for almost a decade.  After being discharged from the military (honorably? dishonorably?? who knows?), will she be able to find a civilian job? 
- Arguing marriage equality with someone who's facing the question of whether they can marry their same-sex loved one and not get fired for outing themselves as non-straight.  This one is particularly near and dear to my heart.
- Even an example earlier in this thread, someone saying, "I don't see why I have to pay for unhealthy idiots who get sick because I keep myself healthy!" versus "my daughter had childhood cancer."  Highly politicized topics such as the ACA may also spell literally, life or death for a lot of people with preexisting illnesses or conditions.

These responses aren't aren't a reflection of low emotional maturity or intelligence, just that someone has a far different set of experiences.

Now, that doesn't mean that people impacted by politics have carte blanche to flip out at other folks.  Sure, in some areas of the internet, it's a big old free-for-all, but I definitely value the well written and reasoned responses by the excellent MMM community, even the folks I disagree with.  But the impulse to fall into impassioned yelling, to be "triggered" by politics?  IMO, that's more a reflection of the current state of our world and of politics than anything else.

FIREstache

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #56 on: July 12, 2019, 01:17:13 PM »
How many people here would get a thread dedicated to their absence?  I guess that says something about sol.

It says one thing - that one person took the time to start the thread.   Once that happens, it's not uncommon for people to throw in their 2 cents, regardless of their opinion of sol.

afox

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #57 on: July 12, 2019, 02:21:12 PM »
actually, my bookmark to this form is a link to sol's posts:
https://forum.mrmoneymustache.com/profile/?u=393;area=showposts;start=0

I started doing this as time saver since I dont have time to browse all of the forums to find topics that are interesting to me and it seemed like sol was posting in the interesting threads so this link is sort of a curated list of "threads worth my time to read" on the forum MINUS the OT stuff, I dont engage in that stuff.

Now, I need a new suggestion of who to follow here? Who posts reliably good finance stuff and knows their shit when it comes to taxes, investments, etc?




FIREstache

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #58 on: July 12, 2019, 03:31:01 PM »
Now, I need a new suggestion of who to follow here? Who posts reliably good finance stuff and knows their shit when it comes to taxes, investments, etc?

Quite a few people.  Checking out the investment and tax sections of the forum should give you a pretty good idea.

Buffaloski Boris

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #59 on: July 12, 2019, 04:59:28 PM »
It seems to me that the only people who don't seem interested in talking about politics are the ones who either set it or would feel threatened by it changing. I agree I'm not sure how much good talking about it on a site like this does but it's pretty much inevitable when the subject matter is money and jobs and the like.

We are naturally political creatures bound by the limited resources around us and it seems silly to bury your head in the sand and pretend otherwise. It doesn't always end pretty but I think for the most part it's better to try to have a good discussion than not.

Interesting perspective, but I can’t relate to it. I don’t agree that we are inherently “political” creatures. Social ones, yes. But “political”is greatly stretching credulity. There is no reason why any of us need to discuss politics at all, let alone on a website that is primarily about personal finance.

Remaining staunchly apolitical in a society that is obsessively political takes some discipline. But no more so than say saving 50% of your income and investing it as many on this website do.

As for “hiding one’s head in the sand”, I find that sort of comment naive. As if any of us with our one voice have any impact whatsoever on national political policy.  Commenting on topics over which we have essentially zero control is pointless and the acrimony it generates destroys the sense of community that people would otherwise share. Further, it drives people away from actually formulating Solutions and solving problems on their own.

No one is apolitical. And this isn't a community of family and friends. It's a public forum. Civil conversation is possible and should be allowed. "Solutions" are dictated by policy.

Being perfectly apolitical is difficult to attain. That said, a plurality of the American public doesn’t vote, doesn’t participate in politics in any meaningful way, and doesn’t give a rats rear one way or the other regarding “current affairs”. I think it’s accurate to call those people apolitical.

Speaking for myself I’m not apolitical (yet), I’m more of an ANTI-politics bent. I’m against politics, do not see any good coming of it, and urge others to avoid politics. That said, the siren-song of indifference and being apolitical is very attractive to me and who knows, in a few years I might achieve that sort of zen state.

As for this being a public forum, its not. It’s a private website. If the mods or owner(s) decide to ban participants  for any or no reason, that is their right. They also retain the right to set any rules they wish for participation.

Buffaloski Boris

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #60 on: July 12, 2019, 05:21:45 PM »
Maybe he just realized that his time is too valuable to waste on conversations like these.  Taking a break from the forums & the internet is never a bad idea. 


Hope sol is enjoying the break.  (thumbs up)

I personally liked him and hope he’s doing well. There’s also the Pareto principle to consider. He might have hit his personal 80%. I know I’m getting close to mine.

To infinity and beyond! 😁

robartsd

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #61 on: July 12, 2019, 05:30:00 PM »
Being perfectly apolitical is difficult to attain. That said, a plurality of the American public doesn’t vote, doesn’t participate in politics in any meaningful way, and doesn’t give a rats rear one way or the other regarding “current affairs”. I think it’s accurate to call those people apolitical.

Speaking for myself I’m not apolitical (yet), I’m more of an ANTI-politics bent. I’m against politics, do not see any good coming of it, and urge others to avoid politics. That said, the siren-song of indifference and being apolitical is very attractive to me and who knows, in a few years I might achieve that sort of zen state.

As for this being a public forum, its not. It’s a private website. If the mods or owner(s) decide to ban participants  for any or no reason, that is their right. They also retain the right to set any rules they wish for participation.

It is a public forum, but only because the owner wants it to be (and has committed financial resources expressly to protect it as such).
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But if we are within our legal rights, then I will absolutely fight with every resource available to preserve those rights and keep publishing the opinions of both forum users and myself.

BudgetSlasher

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #62 on: July 12, 2019, 05:36:38 PM »
Wow, that thread!  Am I the only one who thinks this site probably doesn't need an Off-Topic section?  What a disaster and wasteland that section seems to be.

I'm of two minds about this.

First, that thread (and really anything in the MMM off-topic sub-forum) is very tame by comparison of what you get on the rest of the internet.

But (and second), I have been on too many message boards over the past 20 years where the original purpose of the site was overrun by the offtopic section. In some cases in killed the community; people would join up just for the booming off topic sub-forum and thing spiraled from there, in other cases the off topic subforum was deleted (sometimes too late). And sometimes the off topic forums were spun off into their own thing (the one that comes to mind today is offtopic.com which is can be directly traced back to the honda-acura.net forums).

Buffaloski Boris

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #63 on: July 12, 2019, 06:15:04 PM »
Wow, that thread!  Am I the only one who thinks this site probably doesn't need an Off-Topic section?  What a disaster and wasteland that section seems to be.

I'm of two minds about this.

First, that thread (and really anything in the MMM off-topic sub-forum) is very tame by comparison of what you get on the rest of the internet.

But (and second), I have been on too many message boards over the past 20 years where the original purpose of the site was overrun by the offtopic section. In some cases in killed the community; people would join up just for the booming off topic sub-forum and thing spiraled from there, in other cases the off topic subforum was deleted (sometimes too late). And sometimes the off topic forums were spun off into their own thing (the one that comes to mind today is offtopic.com which is can be directly traced back to the honda-acura.net forums).

 I’ve been on lots of websites over the years that have seen their core creative users/ posters leave. A recurring theme is acrimonious discussions that result in people saying “screw it” and leaving.

I no longer plan on staying on a website for very long. I reference the Pareto principle, but perhaps declining returns is more accurate. You learn the bulk of what you’re going to learn in a few months and then you’re just overstaying your welcome. The more established posters see you as a threat, and interaction becomes more of a chore and less a learning experience.

Know when to hold ‘em and when to fold ‘em!

BTDretire

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #64 on: July 12, 2019, 07:02:32 PM »
I miss Sol. He had nice ears.

 It would probably be against Forum Rules to say I disagree with both of your sentences.
 I think it would be an interesting psychological study to dig into why sol responded so personally and deeply to such a easily ignored sentence.

  In my background I have a story where I was accused of stealing electricity by a tenant to my landlord and it was spread to other tenants. (some details unexplained on purpose, I was much more involved as I worked in the area) This was not brought to the police although I often wish it had been. This accuser told many people we all knew, the landlord brought in 4 electricians to look at the situation, all they could say was there is no physical evidence he (I) stole electricity. I was under suspicion for a long time.
 As for the person that accused me, I can't say he made up a lie, because I think he believed what he said, and a series of coincidences made it look plausible to him.
 All that is to get to this point, I'm a bit on edge if someone even gets close to thinking I would steal something and could I come unglued.
 I think there was something in sol's background that was tickled and sol responded more to the background than what was in the actual post.
 

Kyle Schuant

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #65 on: July 12, 2019, 07:24:01 PM »
Hmm, I can't really agree with that.  It's easy to say "just stay above it all and don't be triggered" when you or your loved ones aren't being hugely personally impacted by politics.  Some political topics are very personal to some, and not so much to others.  Whether they are personal or "triggering" as you put it, rarely has anything to do with emotional intelligence so much as they have to do with personal experience. 
This is true. But it's also true that given a person is posting anonymously on a public forum - deliberately removing a large part of what makes them individual to others - they can't really complain that others aren't respecting them as an individual. Part of being close to another human being is that they know exactly what to say to hurt you deeply. It may be that in an anonymous public discussion someone else just happens to say that particular thing. In being offended as in criminal law we should consider intent. When someone who knows us says this thing, they intended offence; a stranger posting to your anonymous online handle obviously does not intend offence, or at least not to the same extent.

It is decent to try not to offend people, thus PC. But it is also decent to try not to be offended.

I grew up in an abusive household, was in the military, have been homeless and unemployed and at that time had mental health issues, and I'm Jewish, and nowadays I'm self-employed and also a stay-at-home dad. I'm not special in this regard, I'm simply old enough to have had a variety of experiences in my life. Like many others with their own individual experiences, I could dip into any thread on this forum or a thousand others and find something to be offended at in people discussing people like me. But I don't, because I recognise it's not personal.

You can't help what offends you, but you can help what you say and do about it. Every time someone says, "triggered", my firearms experience makes me think of firearms. Firearms are insensate machines. Humans should try not to be insensate machines, but make use of their rationality and willpower.


Put another way, we should try not to be offensive, but we should also try not to be offended.
« Last Edit: July 13, 2019, 08:18:40 PM by Kyle Schuant »

terran

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #66 on: July 12, 2019, 09:21:39 PM »
actually, my bookmark to this form is a link to sol's posts:
https://forum.mrmoneymustache.com/profile/?u=393;area=showposts;start=0

I started doing this as time saver since I dont have time to browse all of the forums to find topics that are interesting to me and it seemed like sol was posting in the interesting threads so this link is sort of a curated list of "threads worth my time to read" on the forum MINUS the OT stuff, I dont engage in that stuff.

Now, I need a new suggestion of who to follow here? Who posts reliably good finance stuff and knows their shit when it comes to taxes, investments, etc?

Neat trick! @MDM would get my vote.

lost_in_the_endless_aisle

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #67 on: July 12, 2019, 09:42:29 PM »
Sol better come back. He was one of my favorite off topic posters here early on, though I think once he FIRED he became increasingly Howard Hughes-ish and increasingly overtly intolerant of disagreement. I thought he was an interesting case-study to watch in that regard, especially after he probably blocked seeing my posts over some-such disagreement (40% confidence; 60% he just manually ignored me).

soccerluvof4

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #68 on: July 13, 2019, 05:24:07 AM »
Sol is /was by far one of my favorite members here but as many sometimes you just need to know when to move on. I think if hes allowed and comes back it would show true character but perhaps we wont know if hes given the opportunity or not. He did cross a line and the moderators did what there suppose to. I have been "yelled at" for alot less but while I agree the Open topic thread is good to have there are many threads on there that go beyond civil conversation. Its not for me but I do agree for those that can stomach it and like that kind of stuff more power to you. But I would like to see Sol come back. I dont agree with alot of what he says/writes as well but he is one of those that makes me challenge and think about things which I enjoy.

Metalcat

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #69 on: July 13, 2019, 06:38:38 AM »
Wow, that thread!  Am I the only one who thinks this site probably doesn't need an Off-Topic section?  What a disaster and wasteland that section seems to be.

I'm of two minds about this.

First, that thread (and really anything in the MMM off-topic sub-forum) is very tame by comparison of what you get on the rest of the internet.

But (and second), I have been on too many message boards over the past 20 years where the original purpose of the site was overrun by the offtopic section. In some cases in killed the community; people would join up just for the booming off topic sub-forum and thing spiraled from there, in other cases the off topic subforum was deleted (sometimes too late). And sometimes the off topic forums were spun off into their own thing (the one that comes to mind today is offtopic.com which is can be directly traced back to the honda-acura.net forums).

 I’ve been on lots of websites over the years that have seen their core creative users/ posters leave. A recurring theme is acrimonious discussions that result in people saying “screw it” and leaving.

I no longer plan on staying on a website for very long. I reference the Pareto principle, but perhaps declining returns is more accurate. You learn the bulk of what you’re going to learn in a few months and then you’re just overstaying your welcome. The more established posters see you as a threat, and interaction becomes more of a chore and less a learning experience.

Know when to hold ‘em and when to fold ‘em!

Sounds like you've had a lot of shitty political conversations.

However, everything is politics.
It's impossible to avoid discussing politics the same way it's impossible to avoid discussing money. Even if you aren't directly talking about it, you are always talking about it. It just takes some fancy conversational footwork to pretend like you aren't.

The moment you discuss the arts, you are inherently discussing the funding of the arts, which is a huge political topic.

If you discuss science, you are absolutely discussing the politics around research funding, publication, access to information, etc.

If you discuss housing...oops, there's a TON of policy inherent in the subject of housing.

You literally cannot talk about anything without some underlying relevant policy, and therefore politics being a fundamental part of the discourse, whether overtly acknowledged or not.

If what you mean to say is, overtly discussing broad strokes, hot button political issues as they directly relate to current campaigns/politicians, that's a very narrow band of political discussion, and yes, I too tend to avoid it since I find minimal utility in it as few people have much actually valuable insight.

Right now, a major political issue in my city is that most of the residents find a certain architectural drawing to be ugly. That's it, a bunch of people find a drawing to be ugly. This is a massive political issue that is heading to court and is an ugly battle of different agencies desperately trying to attack each other with policy. It's costing a fortune and political careers will live and die with this issue.
...because a lot of people find a drawing ugly.
...I mean...it is REALLY ugly.

It's also impossible to pretend to avoid the subject of politics unless you live in a veritable monoculture of privilege. It's literally impossible to avoid political discourse in a community that doesn't have safe drinking water or has ongoing conflict with police.

Everything is politics. Everything.

Puppies, pandas, food, water, books, sex, roads, houses, cottages, clothes, weather, trees, rivers, music, churches, festivals, landscaping, tv/movie production, video games, education, socks, underwater basket weaving...it's all marinating in policy.

Politics=policy=EVERYTHING

I totally support avoiding non-productive conversations and agree that a lot of the off-topic conversations here are excessively reactive, but it's the internet, it's excessively reactive. It's not politics that's the problem, it's reactive conversations about sensitive issues with strangers on the internet that gets out of hand.

Bring up literally anything emotionally sensitive online and you're in for an epic cluster fuck of reactivity.
It is what it is.

wageslave23

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #70 on: July 13, 2019, 06:46:23 AM »
I think political conversations are a good test of emotional intelligence.  If you find yourself getting triggered then you need to evaluate your emotional and mental health.  I read a book on emotional intelligence and it talked about how it can be more effective than IQ in predicting future success.  I LOVE have political discussions with people, especially in real life but I've come to avoid it because too many people let their emotions cloud their judgement.

Hmm, I can't really agree with that.  It's easy to say "just stay above it all and don't be triggered" when you or your loved ones aren't being hugely personally impacted by politics.  Some political topics are very personal to some, and not so much to others.  Whether they are personal or "triggering" as you put it, rarely has anything to do with emotional intelligence so much as they have to do with personal experience. 

You (and I'm using the general you here) may enjoy a bracing political debate, but what's a fun exercise of your mental faculties can easily be a highly sensitized topic that will tremendously change someone else's quality of life or even be a matter of life and death.  Here are a few (personal!) examples:

- Arguing points of immigration with someone who has loved ones or family members how are undocumented-- and fears that their 17 year old nephew might have his parents deported, or be thrown out of the country he's lived in since the age of 2.
- Gender politics with someone wondering if their daughter will be kicked out of the military for being trangender, even though she has deployed and faithfully served her country for almost a decade.  After being discharged from the military (honorably? dishonorably?? who knows?), will she be able to find a civilian job? 
- Arguing marriage equality with someone who's facing the question of whether they can marry their same-sex loved one and not get fired for outing themselves as non-straight.  This one is particularly near and dear to my heart.
- Even an example earlier in this thread, someone saying, "I don't see why I have to pay for unhealthy idiots who get sick because I keep myself healthy!" versus "my daughter had childhood cancer."  Highly politicized topics such as the ACA may also spell literally, life or death for a lot of people with preexisting illnesses or conditions.

These responses aren't aren't a reflection of low emotional maturity or intelligence, just that someone has a far different set of experiences.

Now, that doesn't mean that people impacted by politics have carte blanche to flip out at other folks.  Sure, in some areas of the internet, it's a big old free-for-all, but I definitely value the well written and reasoned responses by the excellent MMM community, even the folks I disagree with.  But the impulse to fall into impassioned yelling, to be "triggered" by politics?  IMO, that's more a reflection of the current state of our world and of politics than anything else.

I stand by my assertion for two reasons.
1.  There have been plenty of issues that affect me greatly that I am able to argue emotionlessly for and even some that I argue against because of I believe it the fair or right policy even though it's detrimental to me personally.
2.  Most of the people who have been triggered in political arguments in my experience are triggered in all political arguments and often don't have a personal connection to the issue. 

As an aside, of course there are people who are emotionally intelligent who still get triggered by a topic but I would consider them even more emotionally intelligent if they didn't.

Part of this is maturity as I have gotten better at controlling my emotions with age.  And part of this is temperament as I've always been pretty adept at playing devil's advocate since grade school.
« Last Edit: July 13, 2019, 06:49:53 AM by wageslave23 »

Proletariat

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #71 on: July 13, 2019, 08:46:41 AM »
Being perfectly apolitical is difficult to attain. That said, a plurality of the American public doesn’t vote, doesn’t participate in politics in any meaningful way, and doesn’t give a rats rear one way or the other regarding “current affairs”. I think it’s accurate to call those people apolitical.

Speaking for myself I’m not apolitical (yet), I’m more of an ANTI-politics bent. I’m against politics, do not see any good coming of it, and urge others to avoid politics. That said, the siren-song of indifference and being apolitical is very attractive to me and who knows, in a few years I might achieve that sort of zen state.

As for this being a public forum, its not. It’s a private website. If the mods or owner(s) decide to ban participants  for any or no reason, that is their right. They also retain the right to set any rules they wish for participation.

I think for all intents and purposes, this is a public forum. Practically, there is very little interference here.

Everyone votes every day of their life. Whether or not you physically go to a poll and circle a few names once a year is irrelevant. Where you live/work/shop is a vote. This site is a form of proposed policy on how you should spend your money and live your life. If enacted personally, it's a form of self-governance, as no national government is likely to mandate anything here, but very much policy nonetheless. Everything involving the acquisition and then use of money is political in some way.

To say "nothing good comes out of politics" is wrong because everything comes from policy that allows it to exist or not and there are certainly some good things that we have.

The only thing I agree with you is that maybe the general public doesn't need to frequently get in heated debates amongst themselves over broad macroeconomic policy (or federal policy) that is extremely hard to change. But that also doesn't mean that those issues never need to be discussed. Pretending issues don't exist is silly, but recognizing that they exist and choosing not to talk about them also doesn't make you apolitical. If an issue affects you directly enough, you will most certainly get involved in some way. "No participation" is still a vote. Even if no participation is the result of one believing the system is broken, that's a vote.

Everything is politics. Everything.

Literally. Even the physics of atoms are governed by the laws of the universe. Everything we do falls under the umbrella of politics.

js82

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #72 on: July 13, 2019, 09:22:19 AM »
I stand by my assertion for two reasons.
1.  There have been plenty of issues that affect me greatly that I am able to argue emotionlessly for and even some that I argue against because of I believe it the fair or right policy even though it's detrimental to me personally.
2.  Most of the people who have been triggered in political arguments in my experience are triggered in all political arguments and often don't have a personal connection to the issue. 

As an aside, of course there are people who are emotionally intelligent who still get triggered by a topic but I would consider them even more emotionally intelligent if they didn't.

Part of this is maturity as I have gotten better at controlling my emotions with age.  And part of this is temperament as I've always been pretty adept at playing devil's advocate since grade school.

I don't think you're defining "emotional intelligence" correctly.  Emotional intelligence is not the ability to argue a controversial topic dispassionately - it's something closer to empathy or theory of mind - the ability to anticipate how others will think/feel or to read how they are feeling in the moment, and to use that knowledge to inform your own conduct(and granted, it can be used for good - to help people, or for evil - to manipulate them).

I don't think being emotionally "triggered" by something is inherently a sign of lower emotional intelligence(one's subsequent response may be, however).  In fact, I would argue that failure to anticipate that others will be "triggered" by one's own conduct is a pretty clear hallmark of low emotional intelligence.

I say this as someone who has occasionally been knocked for being *too* level-headed and logical during heated, emotional discussions.  That doesn't make me emotionally intelligent - it just makes me a highly rational/logical personality type.

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #73 on: July 13, 2019, 10:05:53 AM »


Sounds like you've had a lot of shitty political conversations.

However, everything is politics.
It's impossible to avoid discussing politics the same way it's impossible to avoid discussing money. Even if you aren't directly talking about it, you are always talking about it. It just takes some fancy conversational footwork to pretend like you aren't.

The moment you discuss the arts, you are inherently discussing the funding of the arts, which is a huge political topic.

If you discuss science, you are absolutely discussing the politics around research funding, publication, access to information, etc.

If you discuss housing...oops, there's a TON of policy inherent in the subject of housing.

You literally cannot talk about anything without some underlying relevant policy, and therefore politics being a fundamental part of the discourse, whether overtly acknowledged or not.

If what you mean to say is, overtly discussing broad strokes, hot button political issues as they directly relate to current campaigns/politicians, that's a very narrow band of political discussion, and yes, I too tend to avoid it since I find minimal utility in it as few people have much actually valuable insight.

Right now, a major political issue in my city is that most of the residents find a certain architectural drawing to be ugly. That's it, a bunch of people find a drawing to be ugly. This is a massive political issue that is heading to court and is an ugly battle of different agencies desperately trying to attack each other with policy. It's costing a fortune and political careers will live and die with this issue.
...because a lot of people find a drawing ugly.
...I mean...it is REALLY ugly.

It's also impossible to pretend to avoid the subject of politics unless you live in a veritable monoculture of privilege. It's literally impossible to avoid political discourse in a community that doesn't have safe drinking water or has ongoing conflict with police.

Everything is politics. Everything.

Puppies, pandas, food, water, books, sex, roads, houses, cottages, clothes, weather, trees, rivers, music, churches, festivals, landscaping, tv/movie production, video games, education, socks, underwater basket weaving...it's all marinating in policy.

Politics=policy=EVERYTHING

I totally support avoiding non-productive conversations and agree that a lot of the off-topic conversations here are excessively reactive, but it's the internet, it's excessively reactive. It's not politics that's the problem, it's reactive conversations about sensitive issues with strangers on the internet that gets out of hand.

Bring up literally anything emotionally sensitive online and you're in for an epic cluster fuck of reactivity.
It is what it is.
[/quote]



"Money is the mother's milk of politics." Jesse Unruh

Unruh's verity encapsulates  the inescapable entanglement of money and politics.

Their inseparability means that politics cannot be avoided  here since this website is largely about money.

« Last Edit: July 13, 2019, 10:13:18 AM by John Galt incarnate! »

firehelp

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #74 on: July 13, 2019, 11:09:21 AM »
Wait, masturbation accomplishes nothing?

May be in the very distant future, people will have figured out having sex only mentally and accomplishing satisfaction. Until then, mental masturbation without the physical accomplishes little. :-)

ender

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #75 on: July 13, 2019, 12:45:43 PM »
It's also impossible to pretend to avoid the subject of politics unless you live in a veritable monoculture of privilege. It's literally impossible to avoid political discourse in a community that doesn't have safe drinking water or has ongoing conflict with police.


This is why most folks can "get away" with saying they dislike politics and want to avoid it. If political discussions are just a conversational inconvenience, it means that the topics - almost all of which are deeply impactful to someone - just don't affect you.

But they can and do deeply affect other people, who don't have the luxury of just stopping the conversation.

Buffaloski Boris

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #76 on: July 13, 2019, 05:07:45 PM »

Sounds like you've had a lot of shitty political conversations.

However, everything is politics.
It's impossible to avoid discussing politics the same way it's impossible to avoid discussing money. Even if you aren't directly talking about it, you are always talking about it. It just takes some fancy conversational footwork to pretend like you aren't.

The moment you discuss the arts, you are inherently discussing the funding of the arts, which is a huge political topic.

If you discuss science, you are absolutely discussing the politics around research funding, publication, access to information, etc.

If you discuss housing...oops, there's a TON of policy inherent in the subject of housing.

You literally cannot talk about anything without some underlying relevant policy, and therefore politics being a fundamental part of the discourse, whether overtly acknowledged or not.

If what you mean to say is, overtly discussing broad strokes, hot button political issues as they directly relate to current campaigns/politicians, that's a very narrow band of political discussion, and yes, I too tend to avoid it since I find minimal utility in it as few people have much actually valuable insight.

Right now, a major political issue in my city is that most of the residents find a certain architectural drawing to be ugly. That's it, a bunch of people find a drawing to be ugly. This is a massive political issue that is heading to court and is an ugly battle of different agencies desperately trying to attack each other with policy. It's costing a fortune and political careers will live and die with this issue.
...because a lot of people find a drawing ugly.
...I mean...it is REALLY ugly.

It's also impossible to pretend to avoid the subject of politics unless you live in a veritable monoculture of privilege. It's literally impossible to avoid political discourse in a community that doesn't have safe drinking water or has ongoing conflict with police.

Everything is politics. Everything.

Puppies, pandas, food, water, books, sex, roads, houses, cottages, clothes, weather, trees, rivers, music, churches, festivals, landscaping, tv/movie production, video games, education, socks, underwater basket weaving...it's all marinating in policy.

Politics=policy=EVERYTHING

I totally support avoiding non-productive conversations and agree that a lot of the off-topic conversations here are excessively reactive, but it's the internet, it's excessively reactive. It's not politics that's the problem, it's reactive conversations about sensitive issues with strangers on the internet that gets out of hand.

Bring up literally anything emotionally sensitive online and you're in for an epic cluster fuck of reactivity.
It is what it is.

We’ll just have to agree to disagree. We’re probably proceeding from completely different definitions of politics. I tend to define it fairly narrowly as to encompass electoral decisions and governmental policy. Your definition seems to be much more inclusive of other social behaviors.

I do want to address this issue of “privilege” as it does seem to be all the rage these days. Saying “privilege” seems to be the 21st century equivalent of accusing someone of being “bourgeois.” And of course the “privileged” or “bourgeoisie” can’t hope to understand the issues of the downtrodden proletariat. Or some such. The irony of talking about “privilege” on a website that caters to those who are millionaires or striving to be millionaires isn’t lost on me. I do happen to find find it very funny. I will confirm that I do feel rather “privileged” to spend very little of my personal time on politics. Reclaiming the hours I used to spend formulating and voicing political opinions that in the end didn’t matter one bit makes me a happier person than I would otherwise be.

We all want to feel that we matter. And we do. We matter to God, our families, and our friends. We don’t matter to the politicians. Our views are irrelevant to them and in the end they will do as they please. We can choose to get ourselves all worked up over that and try 100% harder, 200% harder to get politicians to act according to our wishes. And we’ll still end up in more or less the same place. I choose to optimize my life by not spending precious time on something that I don’t enjoy that offers minimal payback. I encourage others to do the same.




Metalcat

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #77 on: July 13, 2019, 06:30:11 PM »

Sounds like you've had a lot of shitty political conversations.

However, everything is politics.
It's impossible to avoid discussing politics the same way it's impossible to avoid discussing money. Even if you aren't directly talking about it, you are always talking about it. It just takes some fancy conversational footwork to pretend like you aren't.

The moment you discuss the arts, you are inherently discussing the funding of the arts, which is a huge political topic.

If you discuss science, you are absolutely discussing the politics around research funding, publication, access to information, etc.

If you discuss housing...oops, there's a TON of policy inherent in the subject of housing.

You literally cannot talk about anything without some underlying relevant policy, and therefore politics being a fundamental part of the discourse, whether overtly acknowledged or not.

If what you mean to say is, overtly discussing broad strokes, hot button political issues as they directly relate to current campaigns/politicians, that's a very narrow band of political discussion, and yes, I too tend to avoid it since I find minimal utility in it as few people have much actually valuable insight.

Right now, a major political issue in my city is that most of the residents find a certain architectural drawing to be ugly. That's it, a bunch of people find a drawing to be ugly. This is a massive political issue that is heading to court and is an ugly battle of different agencies desperately trying to attack each other with policy. It's costing a fortune and political careers will live and die with this issue.
...because a lot of people find a drawing ugly.
...I mean...it is REALLY ugly.

It's also impossible to pretend to avoid the subject of politics unless you live in a veritable monoculture of privilege. It's literally impossible to avoid political discourse in a community that doesn't have safe drinking water or has ongoing conflict with police.

Everything is politics. Everything.

Puppies, pandas, food, water, books, sex, roads, houses, cottages, clothes, weather, trees, rivers, music, churches, festivals, landscaping, tv/movie production, video games, education, socks, underwater basket weaving...it's all marinating in policy.

Politics=policy=EVERYTHING

I totally support avoiding non-productive conversations and agree that a lot of the off-topic conversations here are excessively reactive, but it's the internet, it's excessively reactive. It's not politics that's the problem, it's reactive conversations about sensitive issues with strangers on the internet that gets out of hand.

Bring up literally anything emotionally sensitive online and you're in for an epic cluster fuck of reactivity.
It is what it is.

We’ll just have to agree to disagree. We’re probably proceeding from completely different definitions of politics. I tend to define it fairly narrowly as to encompass electoral decisions and governmental policy. Your definition seems to be much more inclusive of other social behaviors.

I do want to address this issue of “privilege” as it does seem to be all the rage these days. Saying “privilege” seems to be the 21st century equivalent of accusing someone of being “bourgeois.” And of course the “privileged” or “bourgeoisie” can’t hope to understand the issues of the downtrodden proletariat. Or some such. The irony of talking about “privilege” on a website that caters to those who are millionaires or striving to be millionaires isn’t lost on me. I do happen to find find it very funny. I will confirm that I do feel rather “privileged” to spend very little of my personal time on politics. Reclaiming the hours I used to spend formulating and voicing political opinions that in the end didn’t matter one bit makes me a happier person than I would otherwise be.

We all want to feel that we matter. And we do. We matter to God, our families, and our friends. We don’t matter to the politicians. Our views are irrelevant to them and in the end they will do as they please. We can choose to get ourselves all worked up over that and try 100% harder, 200% harder to get politicians to act according to our wishes. And we’ll still end up in more or less the same place. I choose to optimize my life by not spending precious time on something that I don’t enjoy that offers minimal payback. I encourage others to do the same.

No.

I specifically mean policy, as in...well...policy.

There is no matter of interpretation, there is simply a matter of level of bureaucracy and government, but policy is policy is policy is policy.

Feel free to ignore it, but it's there, in literally everything in your life.

Do you drive?
There's policy in your license, your roads, your speed limits, your seat belts, your car's emissions, it's air bags, the taxes you paid on it, the policies that supported it being made domestically, or the policies that governed it being imported, the police that administer the laws of the road, your insurance...fuck, even the goddamn ink used to print your insurance documents, all are touched in some way by policy, which is decided by politicians, whom are elected officials.

Politics reaches well beyond the very very limited view you want to include in your sweeping criticism, but it's not a matter of opinion, it's a matter of fact.

Policy underpins literally everything, which means that everything is politics.
There simply is no other interpretation. So no, I don't agree to disagree. I disagree.

As for privilege.
It may be "trendy" to talk about, but it absolutely exists.
You can write off what I said because you don't like my use of the word "privilege", but you deftly dodged my actual point.

As I said, it's hard to avoid talking politics with people who don't have access to potable water because of shitty fucking politics. I don't care how good you are at being a devil's advocate or how dispassionate you are, but the claim that all political discussion is somehow bad is pretty fucking rich if you are actually talking to people whose safety is being actively affected by politics.

That's what I mean by privilege.

If you are fortunate enough to not have to worry about the real life impacts of politics in your day to day life, then that is, in fact, by definition, a privilege. Period.

Me?
I'm in the middle of a political mess because my pain patients just had funding cut for their injections.
For me, politics is affecting my every workday. The people I care for are suffering. None of us have the privilege of being able to ignore what our ridiculous and shitty provincial government is doing.

Politics= real life impacts to many, many people.
« Last Edit: July 13, 2019, 06:39:19 PM by Malkynn »

BTDretire

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #78 on: July 14, 2019, 09:24:54 AM »
Malkynn, you have done a much better job, of stating my own position that politics is in almost everything. I had a previous discussion here saying the same thing and I seem to recall that my argument was only warmly received.

Quote
Politics=policy=EVERYTHING

+1

 You have probably seen this thread,
"Does anyone else think there should be a "No Politics" rule?"

https://forum.mrmoneymustache.com/forum-information-faqs/does-anyone-else-think-there-should-be-a-'no-politics'-rule-101977/

BicycleB

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #79 on: July 14, 2019, 11:24:44 AM »

As for “hiding one’s head in the sand”, I find that sort of comment naive. As if any of us with our one voice have any impact whatsoever on national political policy. Commenting on topics over which we have essentially zero control is pointless and the acrimony it generates destroys the sense of community that people would otherwise share. Further, it drives people away from actually formulating Solutions and solving problems on their own.

I have personal experience that one person's voice can have impact.

One person's voice can influence a group of others. A group can affect policy. I have repeatedly participated in successful efforts of this type. Affecting national policy is a high bar, so my % of wins is higher in local issues than national ones, but from time to time, groups I've been in have at least had visible effects on the national conversation.

Politics has a different response curve than personal activity. It takes more time and has less certainty of success. But your power extends far beyond yourself if you choose to exercise it. You're only guaranteed to be powerless if you believe you're powerless.

PS. I like Sol, and miss about 90% of his posts. Hope he comes back.
« Last Edit: July 14, 2019, 11:27:00 AM by BicycleB »

Zikoris

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #80 on: July 14, 2019, 11:42:59 AM »
Malkynn, you have done a much better job, of stating my own position that politics is in almost everything. I had a previous discussion here saying the same thing and I seem to recall that my argument was only warmly received.

Quote
Politics=policy=EVERYTHING

+1

 You have probably seen this thread,
"Does anyone else think there should be a "No Politics" rule?"

https://forum.mrmoneymustache.com/forum-information-faqs/does-anyone-else-think-there-should-be-a-'no-politics'-rule-101977/

And to re-iterate that thread, saying "Well, EVERYTHING is politics, so it's impossible to not discuss" is seriously a huge cop-out, because you know perfectly well that

1. TONS of discussion spaces ban politics without difficulty (including FIRE-oriented spaces, like r/financialindependence and many of the FIRE Facebook groups) and are still able to discuss stuff like how a new tax policy affects their investments

2. When people like me say "get this political crap out of here", we are obviously not saying "Look at those assholes calmly discussing tax strategy", we are obviously talking about the toxic political discourse that is all about emotional vomit, personal attacks, calling the other side names, and has nothing to do with FIRE or Mustachianism at all. THAT is what drives people away from spaces. THAT is what people want gone.

I seriously think political discussion here should be something that happens in journals only, or at the very least journals and off-topic only so people can reasonably avoid it while still being able to participate in the forums.
« Last Edit: July 14, 2019, 12:50:07 PM by Zikoris »

FIREstache

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #81 on: July 14, 2019, 12:29:03 PM »
Malkynn, you have done a much better job, of stating my own position that politics is in almost everything. I had a previous discussion here saying the same thing and I seem to recall that my argument was only warmly received.

Quote
Politics=policy=EVERYTHING

+1

 You have probably seen this thread,
"Does anyone else think there should be a "No Politics" rule?"

https://forum.mrmoneymustache.com/forum-information-faqs/does-anyone-else-think-there-should-be-a-'no-politics'-rule-101977/

And to re-iterate that thread, saying "Well, EVERYTHING is politics, so it's impossible to not discuss" is seriously a huge cop-out, because you know perfectly well that

1. TONS of discussion spaces ban politics without difficulty (including FIRE-oriented spaces, like r/financialindependence and many of the FIRE Facebook groups) and are still able to discuss stuff like how a new tax policy affects their investments

2. When people like me say "get this political crap out of here", we are obviously not saying "Look at those assholes calmly discussing tax strategy", we are obviously talking about the toxic political discourse that is all about emotional vomit, personal attacks, calling the other side names, and has nothing to do with FIRE or Mustachianism at all. THAT is what drives people away from spaces. THAT is what people want gone.

I seriously think political discussion here should be something that happens in journals only, or at the very least journals and off-topic only can reasonably avoid it while still being able to participate in the forums.

+1   I have to agree 100%.

Buffaloski Boris

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #82 on: July 14, 2019, 01:34:41 PM »

Sounds like you've had a lot of shitty political conversations.

However, everything is politics.
It's impossible to avoid discussing politics the same way it's impossible to avoid discussing money. Even if you aren't directly talking about it, you are always talking about it. It just takes some fancy conversational footwork to pretend like you aren't.

The moment you discuss the arts, you are inherently discussing the funding of the arts, which is a huge political topic.

If you discuss science, you are absolutely discussing the politics around research funding, publication, access to information, etc.

If you discuss housing...oops, there's a TON of policy inherent in the subject of housing.

You literally cannot talk about anything without some underlying relevant policy, and therefore politics being a fundamental part of the discourse, whether overtly acknowledged or not.

If what you mean to say is, overtly discussing broad strokes, hot button political issues as they directly relate to current campaigns/politicians, that's a very narrow band of political discussion, and yes, I too tend to avoid it since I find minimal utility in it as few people have much actually valuable insight.

Right now, a major political issue in my city is that most of the residents find a certain architectural drawing to be ugly. That's it, a bunch of people find a drawing to be ugly. This is a massive political issue that is heading to court and is an ugly battle of different agencies desperately trying to attack each other with policy. It's costing a fortune and political careers will live and die with this issue.
...because a lot of people find a drawing ugly.
...I mean...it is REALLY ugly.

It's also impossible to pretend to avoid the subject of politics unless you live in a veritable monoculture of privilege. It's literally impossible to avoid political discourse in a community that doesn't have safe drinking water or has ongoing conflict with police.

Everything is politics. Everything.

Puppies, pandas, food, water, books, sex, roads, houses, cottages, clothes, weather, trees, rivers, music, churches, festivals, landscaping, tv/movie production, video games, education, socks, underwater basket weaving...it's all marinating in policy.

Politics=policy=EVERYTHING

I totally support avoiding non-productive conversations and agree that a lot of the off-topic conversations here are excessively reactive, but it's the internet, it's excessively reactive. It's not politics that's the problem, it's reactive conversations about sensitive issues with strangers on the internet that gets out of hand.

Bring up literally anything emotionally sensitive online and you're in for an epic cluster fuck of reactivity.
It is what it is.

We’ll just have to agree to disagree. We’re probably proceeding from completely different definitions of politics. I tend to define it fairly narrowly as to encompass electoral decisions and governmental policy. Your definition seems to be much more inclusive of other social behaviors.

I do want to address this issue of “privilege” as it does seem to be all the rage these days. Saying “privilege” seems to be the 21st century equivalent of accusing someone of being “bourgeois.” And of course the “privileged” or “bourgeoisie” can’t hope to understand the issues of the downtrodden proletariat. Or some such. The irony of talking about “privilege” on a website that caters to those who are millionaires or striving to be millionaires isn’t lost on me. I do happen to find find it very funny. I will confirm that I do feel rather “privileged” to spend very little of my personal time on politics. Reclaiming the hours I used to spend formulating and voicing political opinions that in the end didn’t matter one bit makes me a happier person than I would otherwise be.

We all want to feel that we matter. And we do. We matter to God, our families, and our friends. We don’t matter to the politicians. Our views are irrelevant to them and in the end they will do as they please. We can choose to get ourselves all worked up over that and try 100% harder, 200% harder to get politicians to act according to our wishes. And we’ll still end up in more or less the same place. I choose to optimize my life by not spending precious time on something that I don’t enjoy that offers minimal payback. I encourage others to do the same.

No.

I specifically mean policy, as in...well...policy.

There is no matter of interpretation, there is simply a matter of level of bureaucracy and government, but policy is policy is policy is policy.

Feel free to ignore it, but it's there, in literally everything in your life.

Do you drive?
There's policy in your license, your roads, your speed limits, your seat belts, your car's emissions, it's air bags, the taxes you paid on it, the policies that supported it being made domestically, or the policies that governed it being imported, the police that administer the laws of the road, your insurance...fuck, even the goddamn ink used to print your insurance documents, all are touched in some way by policy, which is decided by politicians, whom are elected officials.

Politics reaches well beyond the very very limited view you want to include in your sweeping criticism, but it's not a matter of opinion, it's a matter of fact.

Policy underpins literally everything, which means that everything is politics.
There simply is no other interpretation. So no, I don't agree to disagree. I disagree.

As for privilege.
It may be "trendy" to talk about, but it absolutely exists.
You can write off what I said because you don't like my use of the word "privilege", but you deftly dodged my actual point.

As I said, it's hard to avoid talking politics with people who don't have access to potable water because of shitty fucking politics. I don't care how good you are at being a devil's advocate or how dispassionate you are, but the claim that all political discussion is somehow bad is pretty fucking rich if you are actually talking to people whose safety is being actively affected by politics.

That's what I mean by privilege.

If you are fortunate enough to not have to worry about the real life impacts of politics in your day to day life, then that is, in fact, by definition, a privilege. Period.

Me?
I'm in the middle of a political mess because my pain patients just had funding cut for their injections.
For me, politics is affecting my every workday. The people I care for are suffering. None of us have the privilege of being able to ignore what our ridiculous and shitty provincial government is doing.

Politics= real life impacts to many, many people.

Wow Malkyn. Seems I inadvertently pissed you off. Not good and my apologies.

Just wanted to address a couple of points.  You’re obviously passionate and see great utility in engaging in politics whereas I do not. You’re not going to convince me of the utility of politics, and I’m not going to convince you of the futility. Folks believe what they want to believe.

I’m saddened by your situation. And I have no specific solution other than to point out that it’s extremely cruel for anyone to withhold pain meds from someone who needs it. What sort of person does that? Well, other than a scum-sucking politician. Hope you find some peace.



RetiredAt63

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #83 on: July 14, 2019, 01:44:39 PM »

I’m saddened by your situation. And I have no specific solution other than to point out that it’s extremely cruel for anyone to withhold pain meds from someone who needs it. What sort of person does that? Well, other than a scum-sucking politician. Hope you find some peace.

I hope Malkynn is i the same province I am, because I would hate to think there are people in two provinces going through this. And yes, scum-sucking just about says it all.  Politicians do not have to be scum-sucking.  And we don't have to elect the ones that are.  But some are and we do.

Buffaloski Boris

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #84 on: July 14, 2019, 02:16:26 PM »

And to re-iterate that thread, saying "Well, EVERYTHING is politics, so it's impossible to not discuss" is seriously a huge cop-out, because you know perfectly well that

1. TONS of discussion spaces ban politics without difficulty (including FIRE-oriented spaces, like r/financialindependence and many of the FIRE Facebook groups) and are still able to discuss stuff like how a new tax policy affects their investments

2. When people like me say "get this political crap out of here", we are obviously not saying "Look at those assholes calmly discussing tax strategy", we are obviously talking about the toxic political discourse that is all about emotional vomit, personal attacks, calling the other side names, and has nothing to do with FIRE or Mustachianism at all. THAT is what drives people away from spaces. THAT is what people want gone.

I seriously think political discussion here should be something that happens in journals only, or at the very least journals and off-topic only so people can reasonably avoid it while still being able to participate in the forums.

I have mixed emotions about the toxic political discourse. I find it repulsive, but useful in a twisted and ironic way. As I noted upthread I don’t consider myself apolitical but rather ANTI-political. And all those toxic political conversations complete with wide-eyed participants foaming at the mouth and screaming at each other are undeniably useful to making my point.

All I have to do is point at the screaming lunatics and ask the rhetorical question: “do you like what you see? This is what the politicos have to offer you. Is this the type of culture and society that you find  desirable?”  And if not, maybe you should consider my alternative of rejecting political discourse and involvement in their entirety.

You don’t win arguments on logical grounds. You win them based on emotion. I just happen to prefer logic.  I guess at some point you have to choose whether you want to win or lose. ((Shrugs))


DaMa

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #85 on: July 14, 2019, 02:56:53 PM »
I like the political threads in Off Topic.  Although they do become heated, they are generally intelligent arguments, or at least the most intelligent arguments I get exposed to. Many posters also provide good resource links that have led me to look deeper into some issues.  I still disagree with the opposition, but at least I get some insight into their arguments.


Buffaloski Boris

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #86 on: July 14, 2019, 03:03:35 PM »

As for “hiding one’s head in the sand”, I find that sort of comment naive. As if any of us with our one voice have any impact whatsoever on national political policy. Commenting on topics over which we have essentially zero control is pointless and the acrimony it generates destroys the sense of community that people would otherwise share. Further, it drives people away from actually formulating Solutions and solving problems on their own.

I have personal experience that one person's voice can have impact.

One person's voice can influence a group of others. A group can affect policy. I have repeatedly participated in successful efforts of this type. Affecting national policy is a high bar, so my % of wins is higher in local issues than national ones, but from time to time, groups I've been in have at least had visible effects on the national conversation.

Politics has a different response curve than personal activity. It takes more time and has less certainty of success. But your power extends far beyond yourself if you choose to exercise it. You're only guaranteed to be powerless if you believe you're powerless.

PS. I like Sol, and miss about 90% of his posts. Hope he comes back.

Thank you for the excellent response. I want to hone in on one thing you had to say with regards to the response curve. I don’t argue that if you were to spend enough time and effort that you couldn’t move the political needle some small amount. Because given enough time and effort, you probably could. My argument is that the response curve or what you get out of that time and effort is so poor that it just isn’t worth your while.

We FI folks talk a lot about optimization. Optimization of our finances, optimization of our precious time, optimization of our spending. But for some reason we want to establish this sort of artificial boundary around politics and say “well you HAVE to be involved in politics because, well, you just gotta!” 

OK. Why? Why is politics any different from anything else? If we want to shine the harsh light of analysis on the utility of cars, houses, and actively managed mutual funds, why would we not shine that same harsh light on the utility of politics?

As regards SOL, I miss him too. I disagreed with him on politics of course but he has a keen analytical mind and I appreciate that. I’m also just a little jealous that he seems to have beaten me out the door😁.

former player

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #87 on: July 14, 2019, 03:32:06 PM »

As for “hiding one’s head in the sand”, I find that sort of comment naive. As if any of us with our one voice have any impact whatsoever on national political policy. Commenting on topics over which we have essentially zero control is pointless and the acrimony it generates destroys the sense of community that people would otherwise share. Further, it drives people away from actually formulating Solutions and solving problems on their own.

I have personal experience that one person's voice can have impact.

One person's voice can influence a group of others. A group can affect policy. I have repeatedly participated in successful efforts of this type. Affecting national policy is a high bar, so my % of wins is higher in local issues than national ones, but from time to time, groups I've been in have at least had visible effects on the national conversation.

Politics has a different response curve than personal activity. It takes more time and has less certainty of success. But your power extends far beyond yourself if you choose to exercise it. You're only guaranteed to be powerless if you believe you're powerless.

PS. I like Sol, and miss about 90% of his posts. Hope he comes back.

Thank you for the excellent response. I want to hone in on one thing you had to say with regards to the response curve. I don’t argue that if you were to spend enough time and effort that you couldn’t move the political needle some small amount. Because given enough time and effort, you probably could. My argument is that the response curve or what you get out of that time and effort is so poor that it just isn’t worth your while.

We FI folks talk a lot about optimization. Optimization of our finances, optimization of our precious time, optimization of our spending. But for some reason we want to establish this sort of artificial boundary around politics and say “well you HAVE to be involved in politics because, well, you just gotta!” 

OK. Why? Why is politics any different from anything else? If we want to shine the harsh light of analysis on the utility of cars, houses, and actively managed mutual funds, why would we not shine that same harsh light on the utility of politics?

As regards SOL, I miss him too. I disagreed with him on politics of course but he has a keen analytical mind and I appreciate that. I’m also just a little jealous that he seems to have beaten me out the door😁.

Part of the reason I'm involved in policy and politics is because I can: both my grandmothers were married with children and in their 30s before they got the right to vote.  My paternal grandparents were suffragists campaigning for the rights of women to vote and being attacked for it, rotten tomatoes and all.  It's all close enough that I can't take my rights for granted - I'm not going to rely on someone else somewhere else to do what I think is right without my telling them what that is, whether by voting or otherwise.

And as I'm FIREd, I have the leisure to be involved, even on a small level: I'm an elected councillor on my parish council and as a result I do get a say in my local environment: what development proposals are acceptable, how we manage facilities such as playgrounds, open spaces, public footpaths and highways, public toilets, the parish hall and our community sports club, and what if anything we can do to mitigate climate change through reducing carbon emissions and responding to coastal erosion.  It's all stuff that matters in making this small community a better place for everyone.  It has great utility.   Before I was FIREd I was a civil servant mainly working on policy issues: even there I could have an impact: words I drafted are in many pieces of national legislation and even European legislation.  And, Buffalo Chip, if you are in the USA then I have to tell you that the USA is signed up to at least one piece of international legislation that I helped negotiate and that includes a significant amount of my drafting.

There is a great tendency to think that politics is all about national elections and the talking heads on the media, because that's all most people see of it, and that personal involvement has no effect on them.  There's much more to running the sorts of countries that we want to live in than that, and if we don't put in the effort then we have only ourselves to blame when the countries we live in become less and less like places we want to live.

Buffaloski Boris

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #88 on: July 14, 2019, 05:05:41 PM »

As for “hiding one’s head in the sand”, I find that sort of comment naive. As if any of us with our one voice have any impact whatsoever on national political policy. Commenting on topics over which we have essentially zero control is pointless and the acrimony it generates destroys the sense of community that people would otherwise share. Further, it drives people away from actually formulating Solutions and solving problems on their own.

I have personal experience that one person's voice can have impact.

One person's voice can influence a group of others. A group can affect policy. I have repeatedly participated in successful efforts of this type. Affecting national policy is a high bar, so my % of wins is higher in local issues than national ones, but from time to time, groups I've been in have at least had visible effects on the national conversation.

Politics has a different response curve than personal activity. It takes more time and has less certainty of success. But your power extends far beyond yourself if you choose to exercise it. You're only guaranteed to be powerless if you believe you're powerless.

PS. I like Sol, and miss about 90% of his posts. Hope he comes back.

Thank you for the excellent response. I want to hone in on one thing you had to say with regards to the response curve. I don’t argue that if you were to spend enough time and effort that you couldn’t move the political needle some small amount. Because given enough time and effort, you probably could. My argument is that the response curve or what you get out of that time and effort is so poor that it just isn’t worth your while.

We FI folks talk a lot about optimization. Optimization of our finances, optimization of our precious time, optimization of our spending. But for some reason we want to establish this sort of artificial boundary around politics and say “well you HAVE to be involved in politics because, well, you just gotta!” 

OK. Why? Why is politics any different from anything else? If we want to shine the harsh light of analysis on the utility of cars, houses, and actively managed mutual funds, why would we not shine that same harsh light on the utility of politics?

As regards SOL, I miss him too. I disagreed with him on politics of course but he has a keen analytical mind and I appreciate that. I’m also just a little jealous that he seems to have beaten me out the door😁.

Part of the reason I'm involved in policy and politics is because I can: both my grandmothers were married with children and in their 30s before they got the right to vote.  My paternal grandparents were suffragists campaigning for the rights of women to vote and being attacked for it, rotten tomatoes and all.  It's all close enough that I can't take my rights for granted - I'm not going to rely on someone else somewhere else to do what I think is right without my telling them what that is, whether by voting or otherwise.

And as I'm FIREd, I have the leisure to be involved, even on a small level: I'm an elected councillor on my parish council and as a result I do get a say in my local environment: what development proposals are acceptable, how we manage facilities such as playgrounds, open spaces, public footpaths and highways, public toilets, the parish hall and our community sports club, and what if anything we can do to mitigate climate change through reducing carbon emissions and responding to coastal erosion.  It's all stuff that matters in making this small community a better place for everyone.  It has great utility.   Before I was FIREd I was a civil servant mainly working on policy issues: even there I could have an impact: words I drafted are in many pieces of national legislation and even European legislation.  And, Buffalo Chip, if you are in the USA then I have to tell you that the USA is signed up to at least one piece of international legislation that I helped negotiate and that includes a significant amount of my drafting.

There is a great tendency to think that politics is all about national elections and the talking heads on the media, because that's all most people see of it, and that personal involvement has no effect on them.  There's much more to running the sorts of countries that we want to live in than that, and if we don't put in the effort then we have only ourselves to blame when the countries we live in become less and less like places we want to live.

Thanks for the well thought out reply. And thank you for your service to your community.

We’re all a product of our experiences and I’m no different. I’ve spent many, many hours in political advocacy and done more in that realm than many. In the end, I was fortunate enough to have my own moment of clarity. I came to the difficult conclusion that what I was doing was ineffective and probably counterproductive. Even though you could argue that at the time my “side” was winning. I couldn’t and still can’t reconcile myself to the enormous amount of time and resources it took to move the needle. As I indicated in the post above I don’t question that the needle can be moved, I question the effort needed to do so especially as compared to other available alternatives.

One of the myriad problems I have with the framing of the debate is it does tend to be framed as a set of (false) binary choices. You are either Republican OR Democrat. You are either with us OR you’re with the evil “them.” You either are involved in politics OR you are letting your community fall into disarray. In my opinion that’s a false dichotomy: you can completely reject politics AND do great things for your community AND do it in a manner of greater effectiveness.

Rosy

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #89 on: July 14, 2019, 06:05:47 PM »
I do hope Sol returns. I loved his grit, his compassion and his often contrarian views that illuminated perspectives I hadn't even dreamed of. The thread about religion was particularly fun to follow.
He cut through the BS or inflamed the off-topic threads - entertaining and often informative.

Looks like the thread which caused him to leave, struck a nerve with him. He heard something in the arguments that deeply cut him - something only he could see and hear.
I miss him.

KBecks

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #90 on: July 14, 2019, 07:41:48 PM »
I hope Sol is feeling better. The conversation was unexpectedly rough for him. If he chooses to come back, that would be great. On the other hand, if he's out enjoying the beautiful summer, that's great too.

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #91 on: July 14, 2019, 08:08:38 PM »

I’ve spent many, many hours in political advocacy and done more in that realm than many.


Thank you for your service!


In the end, I was fortunate enough to have my own moment of clarity. I came to the difficult conclusion that what I was doing was ineffective and probably counterproductive.

That is a tough thing to realize. Much respect.

Curious - was it counterproductive regarding the original goals you were working for, or counterproductive regarding your personal life, or counterproductive simply in the sense that other activities would have more effect (aka, the opportunity cost wasn't worth it)?

I have made mistakes in my civic efforts. One of the most successful turned out to have bad effects. Also I over-volunteered for several years, then went into what I called "volunteering remission" before slowly reactivating. You have my sympathy in any of the cases!


Even though you could argue that at the time my “side” was winning. I couldn’t and still can’t reconcile myself to the enormous amount of time and resources it took to move the needle. As I indicated in the post above I don’t question that the needle can be moved, I question the effort needed to do so especially as compared to other available alternatives.


Thanks for clarifying this point. Upthread, you sounded as if you thought no one could make a difference.

I do think each person gets to decide for themselves how much they do or give outside of themelves. Some have more choice than others, but you get to make choices in the large range available to you. No hard feelings from me, except if someone says "you can't" or "you shouldn't" and discourages people who can indeed make a difference.

I do think people skills and circumstances differ greatly... and that there are many ways of being a good person in the world. If yours are in activities that are not labeled politics, that's fine. Do the things where you can see and feel the impact you have.

I often find that when people had a discouraging experience, they overstate the barriers. My personal opinion is that that is discouraging to others. I hope I'm not offensive in belaboring the point. My goal isn't to urge you to do something different, it's to make sure others do something whenever they are ready.

Power, like beauty, is often in the eye of the beholder. (Ok, I'll get off my soapbox now!)   :)



One of the myriad problems I have with the framing of the debate is it does tend to be framed as a set of (false) binary choices. You are either Republican OR Democrat. You are either with us OR you’re with the evil “them.” You either are involved in politics OR you are letting your community fall into disarray. In my opinion that’s a false dichotomy: you can completely reject politics AND do great things for your community

Strongly argree. Great points.
« Last Edit: July 14, 2019, 08:11:16 PM by BicycleB »

Metalcat

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #92 on: July 15, 2019, 06:00:19 AM »

Wow Malkyn. Seems I inadvertently pissed you off. Not good and my apologies.

Just wanted to address a couple of points.  You’re obviously passionate and see great utility in engaging in politics whereas I do not. You’re not going to convince me of the utility of politics, and I’m not going to convince you of the futility. Folks believe what they want to believe.

I’m saddened by your situation. And I have no specific solution other than to point out that it’s extremely cruel for anyone to withhold pain meds from someone who needs it. What sort of person does that? Well, other than a scum-sucking politician. Hope you find some peace.

Lol, no, not pissed off, just fiesty.
I'm rarely rarely ever actually pissed off, and certainly not likely to be so because of something said on the internet.

As for politicians, well...most of the people I love are politicians or work in government at different levels, so I do not share your disdain for them as a species.

Yes, I have ample disdain for the literal drug dealer who is in power in my province right now, but there are fucking assholes in power all over.

However, in politics, the likelihood of an incompetent criminal being elected is *directly* proportional to how clueless the public is and how easily swayed they are by irresponsible, absurdist, extremist discourse. As evidenced across the world right now.

Politics isn't the problem, the public not understanding politics is the problem.

DadJokes

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #93 on: July 15, 2019, 07:09:30 AM »
I disagree with the idea that it is not possible to discuss financial matters without it turning to politics.

It is possible to discuss how best to tax plan under the current tax law without offering an opinion on the fairness of the law itself.

It is possible to discuss how to pay for healthcare or qualify for ACA subsidies without declaring your stance on the state of healthcare in America.

It is possible to discuss how to reduce your own personal pollution without stating what you think the government should do about climate change.

It is actually fairly easy to do these things. More importantly, the possibilities I listed fall within everyone's circle of control, whereas political discussion here does not improve anyone's lives.

SwitchActiveDWG

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #94 on: July 15, 2019, 07:17:22 AM »
Hmm, I can't really agree with that.  It's easy to say "just stay above it all and don't be triggered" when you or your loved ones aren't being hugely personally impacted by politics.  Some political topics are very personal to some, and not so much to others.  Whether they are personal or "triggering" as you put it, rarely has anything to do with emotional intelligence so much as they have to do with personal experience. 
This is true. But it's also true that given a person is posting anonymously on a public forum - deliberately removing a large part of what makes them individual to others - they can't really complain that others aren't respecting them as an individual. Part of being close to another human being is that they know exactly what to say to hurt you deeply. It may be that in an anonymous public discussion someone else just happens to say that particular thing. In being offended as in criminal law we should consider intent. When someone who knows us says this thing, they intended offence; a stranger posting to your anonymous online handle obviously does not intend offence, or at least not to the same extent.

It is decent to try not to offend people, thus PC. But it is also decent to try not to be offended.

I grew up in an abusive household, was in the military, have been homeless and unemployed and at that time had mental health issues, and I'm Jewish, and nowadays I'm self-employed and also a stay-at-home dad. I'm not special in this regard, I'm simply old enough to have had a variety of experiences in my life. Like many others with their own individual experiences, I could dip into any thread on this forum or a thousand others and find something to be offended at in people discussing people like me. But I don't, because I recognise it's not personal.

You can't help what offends you, but you can help what you say and do about it. Every time someone says, "triggered", my firearms experience makes me think of firearms. Firearms are insensate machines. Humans should try not to be insensate machines, but make use of their rationality and willpower.


Put another way, we should try not to be offensive, but we should also try not to be offended.

Words to live by.

Omy

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #95 on: July 15, 2019, 07:57:37 AM »
The political discussions in this forum are far more civil than anywhere else I "hang out" on the internet. In fact, some of these lively and intelligent discussions have inspired me to volunteer for a political group to try to help fix a problem that is important to me. I don't believe I would have been motivated to do this without exposure to this forum since I had previously been so turned off by the venom on Facebook and with the current administration's antics that I avoided discussing or being involved in politics at all costs.

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #96 on: July 15, 2019, 08:29:31 AM »
He was obviously an intelligent individual.Unfortunately for him, he couldn't help but bash on conservatives every opportunity he got by calling them sexist, bigots, misogynists, or racist immediately. It was tired, pedantic, and was not constructive conversation.

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #97 on: July 15, 2019, 09:27:29 AM »

However, in politics, the likelihood of an incompetent criminal being elected is *directly* proportional to how clueless the public is and how easily swayed they are by irresponsible, absurdist, extremist discourse. As evidenced across the world right now.

Politics isn't the problem, the public not understanding politics is the problem.

This.  I can't tell if those in this thread who are arguing against the utility of political discourse are saying 1) I find political conversations unpleasant and unproductive and try to avoid them or 2) politicians are all lying scum, so all engagement with politics -- from conversations to calling my representative to voting -- is pointless. 

If it's the first, fine.  Everyone can talk about or not talk about politics as they wish, and reasonable people can differ on whether internet forums generally and this forum in particular are a good place to do that.

But if it's the second, that is a big, deep problem.  Anyone who lives in a representative democracy has the obligation as a citizen to do their personal best to be sufficiently informed about policy to have an opinion about what good policy would look like and vote for candidates and issues in a way that reflects the opinions.  The whole enterprise of representative "small d" democracy is premised on those who can vote exercising that obligation responsibly.  Those who simply shrug off that obligation because it's tedious or confusing or annoying or upsetting--and, at least in the US where I live, there's an awful lot of that--are quite literally undermining good governance and the rule of law. They are contributing to the corruption they purport to despise by failing to hold their elected officials accountable.  That's precisely how bad politicians stay in office and bad policy stays in place.

This is not directed to anyone in particular.  But as Malkynn pointed out, voter complacency and the resulting poor governance is happening all over.  And regardless of what anyone's political views may be, and whether they're inclined to engage in conversations about them, I sincerely hope they continue to participate in politics.  The continued existence of political freedom depends on it.

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #98 on: July 15, 2019, 10:04:03 AM »
I always enjoyed his point of view. 

EngagedToFIRE

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Re: where is sol?
« Reply #99 on: July 15, 2019, 10:24:24 AM »
Malkynn, you have done a much better job, of stating my own position that politics is in almost everything. I had a previous discussion here saying the same thing and I seem to recall that my argument was only warmly received.

Quote
Politics=policy=EVERYTHING

+1

 You have probably seen this thread,
"Does anyone else think there should be a "No Politics" rule?"

https://forum.mrmoneymustache.com/forum-information-faqs/does-anyone-else-think-there-should-be-a-'no-politics'-rule-101977/

And to re-iterate that thread, saying "Well, EVERYTHING is politics, so it's impossible to not discuss" is seriously a huge cop-out, because you know perfectly well that

1. TONS of discussion spaces ban politics without difficulty (including FIRE-oriented spaces, like r/financialindependence and many of the FIRE Facebook groups) and are still able to discuss stuff like how a new tax policy affects their investments

2. When people like me say "get this political crap out of here", we are obviously not saying "Look at those assholes calmly discussing tax strategy", we are obviously talking about the toxic political discourse that is all about emotional vomit, personal attacks, calling the other side names, and has nothing to do with FIRE or Mustachianism at all. THAT is what drives people away from spaces. THAT is what people want gone.

I seriously think political discussion here should be something that happens in journals only, or at the very least journals and off-topic only so people can reasonably avoid it while still being able to participate in the forums.

Yup, THIS.  I don't see how fired up emotional outbursts over whether certain voters are racist or other voters are unstable whatever is in any way beneficial to this site.  It makes no sense to have it here and seems to only turn people against each other.