US Political Discussion: Biden/Harris Edition (Rules in OP)

[SenorDingDong]

So we're in agreement that it's just a term to refer to the two separate ideas of white privilege and toxic masculinity but simultaneously.

Seems needless to me. Like asking for "red french fry ketchup" at a drive-thru. And I think it is a disservice to toxic masculinity issues that exist among non-whites, which as I've suggested earlier has even deeper roots--probably because of white privilege.

White privilege, in theory, will fight against toxic masculinity (for white people), by showing them better opportunity to get a proper education and more non-toxicly-masculine role models.

Growing up in a community with a relatively high Hispanic population, it always seemed like the toxic masculinity pushed on those kids was way worse than what was pushed on me. I've seen Latino kids scolded by their fathers for crying, even hit. While my white dad just gave me a hug and said it's OK to cry. IDK...

I live about 30 minutes from Detroit. I see far more toxic masculinity perpetuated by the overwhelmingly low income black community that comes from Detroit than any other community/collective/culture I have ever seen, having lived many places from NYC, Montreal, CT, GA, etc. We aren't talking the generic, white guy who pushes his kid to play football, calls him a pussy if he wants to quit and berates and belittles him and emasculates him--we're talking, a culture built around men needing to prove themselves and their manhood in every interaction, from appearance (fighting over sneaker dirtying is something I've seen more times than I can count, physical altercations over perceived insults to style, etc), money (fighting over single digit amounts, shootings, etc), and so many more examples.

In fact, in my industry, we have a lot of ground-level positions filled with lower income men from Detroit and we have to get training specifically to learn how to deal with their culture/behaviour/aggressiveness. We don't need those classes about women from Detroit, they genuinely focus ONLY on men. Security has to escort management to their vehicles for a 2-week period following terminations of certain employees, as there have been too many assaults following firings. Our entire training is based around the high level of toxicity and dangerous nature of the male culture in Detroit, and the potential danger of even giving off the perception of a slight to male employees from said city.

Again, with the women, we have little to no issue, save for attendance.

The thing is, while their may be a modicum of truth in the idea behind toxic white masculinity, as all races have a sliding scale of toxicity in the way their men are raised, the most dangerous cities in our country are an overwhelming product of non-white toxic male culture. I watch grown men in their 30s try to prove themselves daily by getting in heated verbal and often physical altercations over their manhood and their need for 'respect.' Less than 10% of those cases (I work in HR) are from white men. Overwhelmingly, they are black men from inner-city Detroit working on the lines. There is also an over-whelming pack mentality in which those who do not fit into the 'typical' or 'appropriately deemed' 'black guy from Detroit' mentality are mercilessly bullied and belittled and racially insulted by their black peers.

The amount of assaults perpetrated by said class is astonishingly disproportionate when compared to their non-African-American peers.

Is there male toxicity? Yes. Do I believe that the most overwhelming case in our country is white men? I'll drop you off on W Chicago St and let you find out for yourself. Then, whatever is left of you I'll drop off in some snobby, shit-nosed suburb with 'white male toxicity' prevelancy, such as Livonia. You can tell me which was most in need of being addressed and spotlighted.

 

[Explorer]

My reference to "toxic white masculinity" came from my readings on how the new APA guidelines came about, and what was noted in the original reasons for studying masculinity in the first place: males were treated as the default baseline from which all others are a deviation.

The researchers didn't say anything about toxic white masculinity, but I made the leap due to the hilariously obvious racism from groups like the now-failed Oathbreakers (did i get that right?) who had people leave them after one member asked the national organization to support an open-carry march for citizens of one city. The national organization didn't want support this one city though... because the citizens in question were black.

That treatment of non-whites as "other" positions *white* males as the baseline. It's a standard made obvious even when riots by whites are considered as playful, while minorities are portrayed as thugs. It's also obvious when one considers the right-wing hate groups like the Klan and the neo-Nazis who have a long history here in the US with no equivalent in terms of amount of accomplished violence on the left or among minorities. Even with the Trump administration doing what it can to prevent resources for dealing with homegrown extremism, the fact is that more people were killed in mass killings by predominately white homegrown sources than by foreign terrorists.

Still, consider my comment as withdrawn. Instead, which other national priority do *you* think will make Republicans gnash their teeth when a Democratic president declares said situation a national emergency?

 

[Explorer]

Oh, my. Apparently Trump engaged in a longer discussion with Putin than he claimed at the G20 meeting, had no translator or note-taker with him (only Melania), and used Putin's translator.

https://www.ft.com/content/61842ec4-23a0-11e9-8ce6-5db4543da632

Why does Trump keep lying about Russia matters? Is there any explanation beyond there being a Trump-Russia conspiracy to explain why *all* the ongoing issues being investigated have Trump and his campaign, administration and family members lying, and all the lies being centered on concealing contact with Russians?

 

[Drew]

It's a pretty interesting question to consider, whether even incontrovertible evidence of Trump willingly and knowingly breaking the law would lead to Republican senators voting for impeachment.

At this point, Republicans have been happy to engage in obvious public hypocrisy regarding how they will investigate possible law-breaking, depending on the party of whom they are investigating. That's one of the things which drove the blue wave last election. Will Republicans go even further on the same path in the run-up to 2020?

I think it's pretty straightforward. Given that the Congressional GOP delegation are at the end of the day self-interested rational decision makers, Republican senators will be likely to vote for impeachment when it's in their best interest to vote for impeachment, and they won't when they think it isn't.

We saw a pretty pronounced blue wave in 2018, and the Senate held up relatively well. But, it's important to remember that a lot of the seats up for election were in republican friendly districts that had been won in an earlier blue wave in 2012, and that the picture is a lot murkier when you start considering special election results, where Doug Jones took Session's old seat in AL and Kyrsten Sinema took Flake's old seat in AZ. Meanwhile, the house, last elected in a neutral/slightly Republican environment, the Republicans got blown out, and if anything Trump's approval numbers have gotten worse since then, possibly on a sustained basis since it seems fairly likely that Trump will continue to pick stupid fights with the Congressional Democrats (and possibly his own party).

I really do think it's as easy as estimating the electoral probability cost of impeaching a sitting president, vs the electoral cost of not impeaching an unpopular president for cause (while noting the culpability of Pence and the possibility of flipping the Executive branch adds some wrinkles here). If there's plausible cause and enough Senators think they're more likely to get elected by impeaching Trump than by having him remain an unpopular and divisive president come November 2020, then he'll get impeached. It's not rocket surgery.

 

[Spaced Out Ace]

"Blue wave"? That was a purple puddle at best.

 

[Explorer]

I guess you're right, if you ignore the huge amount of gerrymandering, voter suppression and even outright vote fraud engaged in by the Repubiclans. That's why the Democrats didn't gain more Senate seats, in spite of having over 12 million votes more than the Repubiclans.

It's also hilariously telling that Republicans have to rely on such tactics to retain seats, instead of just having better ideas.

 

[jaxadam]

 

[thraxil]

I guess you're right, if you ignore the huge amount of gerrymandering, voter suppression and even outright vote fraud engaged in by the Repubiclans. That's why the Democrats didn't gain more Senate seats, in spite of having over 12 million votes more than the Repubiclans.

It's also hilariously telling that Republicans have to rely on such tactics to retain seats, instead of just having better ideas.

Tellingly, the Democrats in the House just introduced HR 1 which would make election day a national holiday, prevent voter roll purges, require presidential candidates to disclose their tax returns, and PACs to disclose large dollar donors. McConnell called it a "power grab".

 

[spudmunkey]

Until I see compelling arguments against any of those, I think I'm for them all, as they all seem reasonable and "about time" on the surface.

 

[tedtan]

make election day a national holiday, prevent voter roll purges, require presidential candidates to disclose their tax returns, and PACs to disclose large dollar donors

All long overdue and just the first step in the thousand mile journey into right direction.

 

[Drew]

"Blue wave"? That was a purple puddle at best.

I'd be curious how you make this argument, considering that in the House the Dems picked up 41 seats, and in the Senate, despite having the worst map in at least the last 25 years with 26 seats to defend vs only 9 the GOP had to defend, they managed to hold losses to two, winning 24 seats to the GOP's 11.

I guess their showing in the Governors' races was only moderately good, though...? picking up a net gain of 7, out of the 39 states holding Gubernatorial elections...? A good showing no matter how you dice it, though they should have been able to flip a few more given the partisan environment so it was still a bit of a disappointment...

 

[PunkBillCarson]

So if it's a National Holiday, does that mean a day off work?

 

[MaxOfMetal]

So if it's a National Holiday, does that mean a day off work?

Depends on where you work, like most all holidays.

 

[spudmunkey]

The next step is to make it Sunday,Monday & Tuesday (or similar), and have more vote-by-mail options.

 

[MaxOfMetal]

Without reading through the whole bill, was there anything mentioning the removal or reduction of the lame duck session?

Signed,
Someone in Wisconsin

 

[Drew]

"Blue wave"? That was a purple puddle at best.

Still waiting, btw.

 

[Spaced Out Ace]

Still waiting, btw.

Did both get flipped, or just the one?

 

[jaxadam]

Boy this is inconvenient for Dems in Virginia.

https://www.cnn.com/2019/02/06/politics/herring-northam-fairfax-virginia-democrats/index.html

https://nypost.com/2019/02/06/yearbook-staffer-questions-northams-blackface-photo-claim/

https://www.washingtonpost.com/poli...tted-doing-same-thing/?utm_term=.f3e3b3041ff0

 

[Explorer]

@MaxOfMetal - I don't really view it as inconvenient. The party moves on, as those with no such baggage move up.

It's been interesting, with the Northam situation, to hear people I know wrestling with the question of, "What if someone does something like this, and then runs for higher office? Isn't that person entitled to be forgiven and not have it held against them?"

And that's the question, isn't it? Is such a person *entitled* to an office? Or in a contest with another person, someone who didn't ever think of mocking the grim history of murder by lynching, can the citizenry go with the person without such a taint?

I get that someone might change their viewpoint over time. Does that make such a person preferable to another who never dabbled with a negative viewpoint?

----

I was telling my partner this past weekend that there was absolutely *zero* chance of a picture surfacing of me in either blackface or a Klan robe. I did remember, when I was in elementary school, laughing with my friend Stevie about a Bugs Bunny cartoon with Yosemite Sam as a Confederate soldier, with Bugs trying to sneak into the south disguised as a slave. Yup, the whole "Don't beat me, massa! Don't beat this tired old body!" didn't strike us as odd, because we were *much* younger than Northam was as an adult in medical school, and our experience was set more than a decade before Northam's photo with blackface and klansman.

So, the other thing specifically about Northam which struck me as odd was that he thought initially that he was in the photo. I *know* I've never dressed that way. That's why Northam walking it back seems like deliberate dishonesty.

----

Honestly, the thing which seems most inconvenient about the whole situation is that Republicans keep seizing upon it to justify their own racists, while ignoring all those Democrats who are *not* justifying it. "We're alike!" "No, because you Republicans are arguing that you want to keep your racists."

 

[Explorer]

Hey, I just noticed that was Jaxadam! Any chance you'll be responding in a fact-based manner to my points? Or is this just another fly-by?