If the only choice were between, say, Elizabeth Warren and Gavin Newsom, or between Jim Jordan and Tucker Carlson, I would consider either of those to be a real "binary-choice prison" and would sit the election out.
The choice between Biden or Trump for President is binary, but it's no prison. Almost nine years after Trump came down that …
If the only choice were between, say, Elizabeth Warren and Gavin Newsom, or between Jim Jordan and Tucker Carlson, I would consider either of those to be a real "binary-choice prison" and would sit the election out.
The choice between Biden or Trump for President is binary, but it's no prison. Almost nine years after Trump came down that garish elevator, I think that a lot of what comes across as "patronizing" is actually tightly controlled frustration at people who prefer blaming the messenger to accepting that (our current) reality is real, that the difference between the two is one of kind and not degree, and that the election of only one will lead to a disaster that may be unrecoverable.
You seem to accept our current milieu as a force of nature for which no one can be held responsible - a constraint that we just have to accept and react to. I refuse to accept those rules of the game as a given. I know too much game theory to allow myself to get stuck in one model.
But this is also a matter of my personality. Whenever anyone tries to coerce or manipulate me, my top priority becomes making them regret it.
Not a force of nature, but one of a limited universe of available fact sets among which we can choose. We exercise our agency by choosing the fact set in which we're going to participate, but we have very little power as individuals to modify the conditions of the set itself, so the question of "who's responsible" is only a distraction, at least in the short term.
I exited this particular fact set in 2017 by becoming a permanent expat, so I enjoy these discussions as an intellectual and social exercise rather than as a real participant. While I certainly have family and some financial connections to the US, I don't in fact have a dog in the fight, so if I seem detached and perhaps a little blasé, that's probably why.
My personality is not dissimilar, except that whenever anyone tries to coerce or manipulate me, unless they do something malicious to actually harm me, my top priority is only to neutralize any power they may have over me. After that, their regrets are not my concern.
If the only choice were between, say, Elizabeth Warren and Gavin Newsom, or between Jim Jordan and Tucker Carlson, I would consider either of those to be a real "binary-choice prison" and would sit the election out.
The choice between Biden or Trump for President is binary, but it's no prison. Almost nine years after Trump came down that garish elevator, I think that a lot of what comes across as "patronizing" is actually tightly controlled frustration at people who prefer blaming the messenger to accepting that (our current) reality is real, that the difference between the two is one of kind and not degree, and that the election of only one will lead to a disaster that may be unrecoverable.
You seem to accept our current milieu as a force of nature for which no one can be held responsible - a constraint that we just have to accept and react to. I refuse to accept those rules of the game as a given. I know too much game theory to allow myself to get stuck in one model.
But this is also a matter of my personality. Whenever anyone tries to coerce or manipulate me, my top priority becomes making them regret it.
Not a force of nature, but one of a limited universe of available fact sets among which we can choose. We exercise our agency by choosing the fact set in which we're going to participate, but we have very little power as individuals to modify the conditions of the set itself, so the question of "who's responsible" is only a distraction, at least in the short term.
I exited this particular fact set in 2017 by becoming a permanent expat, so I enjoy these discussions as an intellectual and social exercise rather than as a real participant. While I certainly have family and some financial connections to the US, I don't in fact have a dog in the fight, so if I seem detached and perhaps a little blasé, that's probably why.
My personality is not dissimilar, except that whenever anyone tries to coerce or manipulate me, unless they do something malicious to actually harm me, my top priority is only to neutralize any power they may have over me. After that, their regrets are not my concern.