this post was submitted on 07 Nov 2024
671 points (85.8% liked)
Political Memes
5401 readers
3482 users here now
Welcome to politcal memes!
These are our rules:
Be civil
Jokes are okay, but don’t intentionally harass or disturb any member of our community. Sexism, racism and bigotry are not allowed. Good faith argumentation only. No posts discouraging people to vote or shaming people for voting.
No misinformation
Don’t post any intentional misinformation. When asked by mods, provide sources for any claims you make.
Posts should be memes
Random pictures do not qualify as memes. Relevance to politics is required.
No bots, spam or self-promotion
Follow instance rules, ask for your bot to be allowed on this community.
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
I'm not strawmanning anything, the M&M argument itself is a justification for bigotry. It's not shutting down the conversation, that is the conversation being had. The M&M argument isn't about helping people, it's a justification for prejudice and is to be rejected out of hand regardless of what demographic it's targeting or what justification it tenders, because human beings aren't fungible commodities. Read the articles I linked. Crime stats do not need context, because they do not matter at all.
How do you respond to M&Ming Japanese-American internment? After all, not all of them are traitors, but one poison M&M... And in response, do you say "well, if you look at the data, the average Japanese-American was actually..."? No, you reject the argument out of hand, because people are innocent until proven guilty. How do you respond to M&Ming vagrancy? Do you dig up data on shelters and talk about mental health? No, you reject the premise, because freedom shouldn't be contingent on property ownership. How about migrants? Do you waste time proving that actually they're all nice people who are worthy of help? No, you reject the argument, because people in need should be helped.
Incidentally, inherentness is also irrelevant. The M&M argument doesn't claim poison is inherent to M&Ms. You can just as easily make the argument that you know full well that ...m e n... aren't inherently violent, it's just that the crime stats very clearly show that they, as a demographic, have certain tendencies, and while you sympathize with them, and would like nothing more to help them overcome the circumstances, probably cultural, that are surely to blame for them being that way, the data is what it is, and you just don't feel comfortable working/socializing/sharing an elevator/being in the same bar/seeing them in the neighborhood, and, I mean, for all they complain, the back of the bus is still on the same bus so I don't get...
I realize nobody thinks of themselves as a bigot, and I know reexamining one's own biases is not pleasant, but it is a necessary step for growth.
And now you have strawmanned my argument... I get that you have heard an argument using M&Ms to justify widespread harm to targeted groups, and see Pyre's use of it as a sort of dog whistle. And who knows, I do believe you are attaching a whole truckload of intent that they nor I ever suggested, but maybe it is a secret play to take away the rights of men. But seeing as you had to jump to hyperbolic attacks on people's rights to find a way to imply I'm a bigot, I'm thinking it's also possible that you are just a big fan of strawmanning people.
All of my suggestions were looking at statistics and seeing how we could improve the lives of all involved.
What do you do about internment camps? Shut that shit down, there is no place for collective punishment in a humane society.
What do you do about vagrancy? Provide safe spaces to sleep in, offer free food, and free health care (preferably a "right to housing as well").
What do you do about the statistical discrepancy that men commit crimes at a higher rate? Invest in schools, provide positive role models, investigate the societal norms that may be affecting men's "sense of self" negatively and try to counter balance it. (The list goes on, but you should at least get my point)
But you don't just ignore statistics, after all data isn't bigoted, people are. So you do your best to use stats and data to point to underlying causes and try to improve the situation for everyone to the greatest extent possible.
And, to bring this back to its original point, you also use data and stats to make educated decisions about your safety. If you go to an area with high crime rates, it's not bigoted to carry and show less valuables. If you go to a city where cars get broken into a lot, it's not bigoted to not keep valuables on the car. And if you are a woman who has a 14.8% chance of being a victim of rape in their lifetime, it's not bigoted to not feel safe alone with men.
But you did make one very good point.
And I think you should take your own advice here. Because your biases have you so up in arms about this conversation, that you found a way to get from "maybe we examine why men commit a higher rate of crimes and see if we can help them so they don't have or want to anymore" to "men belong at the back of the bus!". And that's... not a healthy mindset.
The M&M argument, THE M&M argument, that the article describes, and that ...let's say Pyre, made, and admitted to making, is, in fact, a justification of prejudice. It's the argument of exclusion of an entire demographic based on "well, some of them are bad, and I'm not taking the chance." And if we're gonna shove buzzwords down each other's throat, I'm not strawmanning you, you're gaslighting me. Well, trying to, anyway.
If you wanna make a separate, different M&M argument, one that isn't the one above, go ahead - I am curious about how you're gonna talk your way into un-poisoning the M&Ms. But that new, different argument that you have not yet made is not what this conversation is about.